'Bah!' said his voice; and then in a minute he added, 'Let her go if

she will. But, where she goes, I will follow; so don't cry before

you're hurt.'

By this time, they had nearly stripped the body; and the conversation

turned on what they should do with it. I learnt that the dead man was

the Sieur de Poissy, a neighbouring gentleman, whom I had often heard

of as hunting with my husband. I had never seen him, but they spoke as

if he had come upon them while they were robbing some Cologne merchant,

torturing him after the cruel practice of the chauffeurs, by roasting

the feet of their victims in order to compel them to reveal any hidden

circumstances connected with their wealth, of which the chauffeurs

afterwards made use; and this Sieur de Poissy coming down upon them,

and recognising M. de la Tourelle, they had killed him, and brought him

thither after nightfall. I heard him whom I called my husband, laugh

his little light laugh as he spoke of the way in which the dead body

had been strapped before one of the riders, in such a way that it

appeared to any passer-by as if, in truth, the murderer were tenderly

supporting some sick person. He repeated some mocking reply of double

meaning, which he himself had given to some one who made inquiry. He

enjoyed the play upon words, softly applauding his own wit. And all the

time the poor helpless outstretched arms of the dead lay close to his

dainty boot! Then another stooped (my heart stopped beating), and

picked up a letter lying on the ground--a letter that had dropped out

of M. de Poissy's pocket--a letter from his wife, full of tender words

of endearment and pretty babblings of love. This was read aloud, with

coarse ribald comments on every sentence, each trying to outdo the

previous speaker. When they came to some pretty words about a sweet

Maurice, their little child away with its mother on some visit, they

laughed at M. de la Tourelle, and told him that he would be hearing

such woman's drivelling some day. Up to that moment, I think, I had

only feared him, but his unnatural, half-ferocious reply made me hate

even more than I dreaded him. But now they grew weary of their savage

merriment; the jewels and watch had been apprised, the money and papers

examined; and apparently there was some necessity for the body being

interred quietly and before daybreak. They had not dared to leave him

where he was slain for fear lest people should come and recognise him,

and raise the hue and cry upon them. For they all along spoke as if it

was their constant endeavour to keep the immediate neighbourhood of Les

Rochers in the most orderly and tranquil condition, so as never to give

cause for visits from the gendarmes. They disputed a little as to

whether they should make their way into the castle larder through the

gallery, and satisfy their hunger before the hasty interment, or

afterwards. I listened with eager feverish interest as soon as this

meaning of their speeches reached my hot and troubled brain, for at the

time the words they uttered seemed only to stamp themselves with

terrible force on my memory, so that I could hardly keep from repeating

them aloud like a dull, miserable, unconscious echo; but my brain was

numb to the sense of what they said, unless I myself were named, and

then, I suppose, some instinct of self-preservation stirred within me,

and quickened my sense. And how I strained my ears, and nerved my hands

and limbs, beginning to twitch with convulsive movements, which I

feared might betray me! I gathered every word they spoke, not knowing

which proposal to wish for, but feeling that whatever was finally

decided upon, my only chance of escape was drawing near. I once feared

lest my husband should go to his bedroom before I had had that one

chance, in which case he would most likely have perceived my absence.

He said that his hands were soiled (I shuddered, for it might be with

life-blood), and he would go and cleanse them; but some bitter jest

turned his purpose, and he left the room with the other two--left it by

the gallery door. Left me alone in the dark with the stiffening corpse!

Now, now was my time, if ever; and yet I could not move. It was not my

cramped and stiffened joints that crippled me, it was the sensation of

that dead man's close presence. I almost fancied--I almost fancy

still--I heard the arm nearest to me move; lift itself up, as if once

more imploring, and fall in dead despair. At that fancy--if fancy it

were--I screamed aloud in mad terror, and the sound of my own strange

voice broke the spell. I drew myself to the side of the table farthest

from the corpse, with as much slow caution as if I really could have

feared the clutch of that poor dead arm, powerless for evermore. I

softly raised myself up, and stood sick and trembling, holding by the

table, too dizzy to know what to do next. I nearly fainted, when a low

voice spoke--when Amante, from the outside of the door, whispered,

'Madame!' The faithful creature had been on the watch, had heard my

scream, and having seen the three ruffians troop along the gallery down

the stairs, and across the court to the offices in the other wing of

the castle, she had stolen to the door of the room in which I was. The

sound of her voice gave me strength; I walked straight towards it, as

one benighted on a dreary moor, suddenly perceiving the small steady

light which tells of human dwellings, takes heart, and steers straight

onward. Where I was, where that voice was, I knew not; but go to it I

must, or die. The door once opened--I know not by which of us--I fell

upon her neck, grasping her tight, till my hands ached with the tension

of their hold. Yet she never uttered a word. Only she took me up in her

vigorous arms, and bore me to my room, and laid me on my bed. I do not

know more; as soon as I was placed there I lost sense; I came to myself

with a horrible dread lest my husband was by me, with a belief that he

was in the room, in hiding, waiting to hear my first words, watching

for the least sign of the terrible knowledge I possessed to murder me.

I dared not breathe quicker, I measured and timed each heavy

inspiration; I did not speak, nor move, nor even open my eyes, for long

after I was in my full, my miserable senses. I heard some one treading

softly about the room, as if with a purpose, not as if for curiosity,

or merely to beguile the time; some one passed in and out of the salon;

and I still lay quiet, feeling as if death were inevitable, but wishing

that the agony of death were past. Again faintness stole over me; but

just as I was sinking into the horrible feeling of nothingness, I heard

Amante's voice close to me, saying:

'Drink this, madame, and let us begone. All is ready.'

I let her put her arm under my head and raise me, and pour something

down my throat. All the time she kept talking in a quiet, measured

voice, unlike her own, so dry and authoritative; she told me that a

suit of her clothes lay ready for me, that she herself was as much

disguised as the circumstances permitted her to be, that what

provisions I had left from my supper were stowed away in her pockets,

and so she went on, dwelling on little details of the most commonplace

description, but never alluding for an instant to the fearful cause why

flight was necessary. I made no inquiry as to how she knew, or what she

knew. I never asked her either then or afterwards, I could not bear

it--we kept our dreadful secret close. But I suppose she must have been

in the dressing-room adjoining, and heard all.

In fact, I dared not speak even to her, as if there were anything

beyond the most common event in life in our preparing thus to leave the

house of blood by stealth in the dead of night. She gave me

directions--short condensed directions, without reasons--just as you do

to a child; and like a child I obeyed her. She went often to the door

and listened; and often, too, she went to the window, and looked

anxiously out. For me, I saw nothing but her, and I dared not let my

eyes wander from her for a minute; and I heard nothing in the deep

midnight silence but her soft movements, and the heavy beating of my

own heart. At last she took my hand, and led me in the dark, through

the salon, once more into the terrible gallery, where across the black

darkness the windows admitted pale sheeted ghosts of light upon the

floor. Clinging to her I went; unquestioning--for she was human

sympathy to me after the isolation of my unspeakable terror. On we

went, turning to the left instead of to the right, past my suite of

sitting-rooms where the gilding was red with blood, into that unknown

wing of the castle that fronted the main road lying parallel far below.

She guided me along the basement passages to which we had now

descended, until we came to a little open door, through which the air

blew chill and cold, bringing for the first time a sensation of life to

me. The door led into a kind of cellar, through which we groped our way

to an opening like window, but which, instead of being glazed, was only

fenced with iron bars, two of which were loose, as Amante evidently

knew, for she took them out with the ease of one who had performed the

action often before, and then helped me to follow her out into the

free, open air.

We stole round the end of the building, and on turning the corner--she

first--I felt her hold on me tighten for an instant, and the next step

I, too, heard distant voices, and the blows of a spade upon the heavy

soil, for the night was very warm and still.

We had not spoken a word; we did not speak now. Touch was safer and as

expressive. She turned down towards the high road; I followed. I did

not know the path; we stumbled again and again, and I was much bruised;

so doubtless was she; but bodily pain did me good. At last, we were on

the plainer path of the high road.

I had such faith in her that I did not venture to speak, even when she

paused, as wondering to which hand she should turn. But now, for the

first time, she spoke:

'Which way did you come when he brought you here first?'

I pointed, I could not speak.

We turned in the opposite direction; still going along the high road.

In about an hour, we struck up to the mountainside, scrambling far up

before we even dared to rest; far up and away again before day had

fully dawned. Then we looked about for some place of rest and

concealment: and now we dared to speak in whispers. Amante told me that

she had locked the door of communication between his bedroom and mine,

and, as in a dream, I was aware that she had also locked and brought

away the key of the door between the latter and the salon.

'He will have been too busy this night to think much about you--he will

suppose you are asleep--I shall be the first to be missed; but they

will only just now be discovering our loss.'

I remember those last words of hers made me pray to go on; I felt as if

we were losing precious time in thinking either of rest or concealment;

but she hardly replied to me, so busy was she in seeking out some

hiding-place. At length, giving it up in despair, we proceeded onwards

a little way; the mountain-side sloped downwards rapidly, and in the

full morning light we saw ourselves in a narrow valley, made by a

stream which forced its way along it. About a mile lower down there

rose the pale blue smoke of a village, a mill-wheel was lashing up the

water close at hand, though out of sight. Keeping under the cover of

every sheltering tree or bush, we worked our way down past the mill,

down to a one-arched bridge, which doubtless formed part of the road

between the village and the mill.

'This will do,' said she; and we crept under the space, and climbing a

little way up the rough stonework, we seated ourselves on a projecting

ledge, and crouched in the deep damp shadow. Amante sat a little above

me, and made me lay my head on her lap. Then she fed me, and took some

food herself; and opening out her great dark cloak, she covered up

every light-coloured speck about us; and thus we sat, shivering and

shuddering, yet feeling a kind of rest through it all, simply from the

fact that motion was no longer imperative, and that during the daylight

our only chance of safety was to be still. But the damp shadow in which

we were sitting was blighting, from the circumstance of the sunlight

never penetrating there; and I dreaded lest, before night and the time

for exertion again came on, I should feel illness creeping all over me.

To add to our discomfort, it had rained the whole day long, and the

stream, fed by a thousand little mountain brooklets, began to swell

into a torrent, rushing over the stones with a perpetual and dizzying

noise.

Every now and then I was wakened from the painful doze into which I

continually fell, by a sound of horses' feet over our head: sometimes

lumbering heavily as if dragging a burden, sometimes rattling and

galloping; and with the sharper cry of men's voices coming cutting

through the roar of the waters. At length, day fell. We had to drop

into the stream, which came above our knees as we waded to the bank.

There we stood, stiff and shivering. Even Amante's courage seemed to

fail.

'We must pass this night in shelter, somehow,' said she. For indeed the

rain was coming down pitilessly. I said nothing. I thought that surely

the end must be death in some shape; and I only hoped that to death

might not be added the terror of the cruelty of men. In a minute or so

she had resolved on her course of action. We went up the stream to the

mill. The familiar sounds, the scent of the wheat, the flour whitening

the walls--all reminded me of home, and it seemed to me as if I must

struggle out of this nightmare and waken, and find myself once more a

happy girl by the Neckar side. They were long in unbarring the door at

which Amante had knocked: at length, an old feeble voice inquired who

was there, and what was sought? Amante answered shelter from the storm

for two women; but the old woman replied, with suspicious hesitation,

that she was sure it was a man who was asking for shelter, and that she

could not let us in. But at length she satisfied herself, and unbarred

the heavy door, and admitted us. She was not an unkindly woman; but her

thoughts all travelled in one circle, and that was, that her master,

the miller, had told her on no account to let any man into the place

during his absence, and that she did not know if he would not think two

women as bad; and yet that as we were not men, no one could say she had

disobeyed him, for it was a shame to let a dog be out such a night as

this. Amante, with ready wit, told her to let no one know that we had

taken shelter there that night, and that then her master could not

blame her; and while she was thus enjoining secrecy as the wisest

course, with a view to far other people than the miller, she was

hastily helping me to take off my wet clothes, and spreading them, as

well as the brown mantle that had covered us both, before the great

stove which warmed the room with the effectual heat that the old

woman's failing vitality required. All this time the poor creature was

discussing with herself as to whether she had disobeyed orders, in a

kind of garrulous way that made me fear much for her capability of

retaining anything secret if she was questioned. By-and-by, she

wandered away to an unnecessary revelation of her master's whereabouts:

gone to help in the search for his landlord, the Sieur de Poissy, who

lived at the chateau just above, and who had not returned from his

chase the day before; so the intendant imagined he might have met with

some accident, and had summoned the neighbours to beat the forest and

the hill-side. She told us much besides, giving us to understand that

she would fain meet with a place as housekeeper where there were more

servants and less to do, as her life here was very lonely and dull,

especially since her master's son had gone away--gone to the wars. She

then took her supper, which was evidently apportioned out to her with a

sparing hand, as, even if the idea had come into her head, she had not

enough to offer us any. Fortunately, warmth was all that we required,

and that, thanks to Amante's cares, was returning to our chilled

bodies. After supper, the old woman grew drowsy; but she seemed

uncomfortable at the idea of going to sleep and leaving us still in the

house. Indeed, she gave us pretty broad hints as to the propriety of

our going once more out into the bleak and stormy night; but we begged

to be allowed to stay under shelter of some kind; and, at last, a

bright idea came over her, and she bade us mount by a ladder to a kind

of loft, which went half over the lofty mill-kitchen in which we were

sitting. We obeyed her--what else could we do?--and found ourselves in

a spacious floor, without any safeguard or wall, boarding, or railing,

to keep us from falling over into the kitchen in case we went too near

the edge. It was, in fact, the store-room or garret for the household.

There was bedding piled up, boxes and chests, mill sacks, the winter

store of apples and nuts, bundles of old clothes, broken furniture, and

many other things. No sooner were we up there, than the old woman

dragged the ladder, by which we had ascended, away with a chuckle, as

if she was now secure that we could do no mischief, and sat herself

down again once more, to doze and await her master's return. We pulled

out some bedding, and gladly laid ourselves down in our dried clothes

and in some warmth, hoping to have the sleep we so much needed to

refresh us and prepare us for the next day. But I could not sleep, and

I was aware, from her breathing, that Amante was equally wakeful. We

could both see through the crevices between the boards that formed the

flooring into the kitchen below, very partially lighted by the common

lamp that hung against the wall near the stove on the opposite side to

that on which we were.

Portion 3

Far on in the night there were voices outside reached us in our

hiding-place; an angry knocking at the door, and we saw through the

chinks the old woman rouse herself up to go and open it for her master,

who came in, evidently half drunk. To my sick horror, he was followed

by Lefebvre, apparently as sober and wily as ever. They were talking

together as they came in, disputing about something; but the miller

stopped the conversation to swear at the old woman for having fallen

asleep, and, with tipsy anger, and even with blows, drove the poor old

creature out of the kitchen to bed. Then he and Lefebvre went on

talking--about the Sieur de Poissy's disappearance. It seemed that

Lefebvre had been out all day, along with other of my husband's men,

ostensibly assisting in the search; in all probability trying to blind

the Sieur de Poissy's followers by putting them on a wrong scent, and

also, I fancied, from one or two of Lefebvre's sly questions, combining

the hidden purpose of discovering us.

Although the miller was tenant and vassal to the Sieur de Poissy, he

seemed to me to be much more in league with the people of M. de la

Tourelle. He was evidently aware, in part, of the life which Lefebvre

and the others led; although, again, I do not suppose he knew or

imagined one-half of their crimes; and also, I think, he was seriously

interested in discovering the fate of his master, little suspecting

Lefebvre of murder or violence. He kept talking himself, and letting

out all sorts of thoughts and opinions; watched by the keen eyes of

Lefebvre gleaming out below his shaggy eyebrows. It was evidently not

the cue of the latter to let out that his master's wife had escaped

from that vile and terrible den; but though he never breathed a word

relating to us, not the less was I certain he was thirsting for our

blood, and lying in wait for us at every turn of events. Presently he

got up and took his leave; and the miller bolted him out, and stumbled

off to bed. Then we fell asleep, and slept sound and long.

The next morning, when I awoke, I saw Amante, half raised, resting on

one hand, and eagerly gazing, with straining eyes, into the kitchen

below. I looked too, and both heard and saw the miller and two of his

men eagerly and loudly talking about the old woman, who had not

appeared as usual to make the fire in the stove, and prepare her

master's breakfast, and who now, late on in the morning, had been found

dead in her bed; whether from the effect of her master's blows the

night before, or from natural causes, who can tell? The miller's

conscience upbraided him a little, I should say, for he was eagerly

declaring his value for his housekeeper, and repeating how often she

had spoken of the happy life she led with him. The men might have their

doubts, but they did not wish to offend the miller, and all agreed that

the necessary steps should be taken for a speedy funeral. And so they

went out, leaving us in our loft, but so much alone, that, for the

first time almost, we ventured to speak freely, though still in hushed

voice, pausing to listen continually. Amante took a more cheerful view

of the whole occurrence than I did. She said that, had the old woman

lived, we should have had to depart that morning, and that this quiet

departure would have been the best thing we could have had to hope for,

as, in all probability, the housekeeper would have told her master of

us and of our resting-place, and this fact would, sooner or later, have

been brought to the knowledge of those from whom we most desired to

keep it concealed; but that now we had time to rest, and a shelter to

rest in, during the first hot pursuit, which we knew to a fatal

certainty was being carried on. The remnants of our food, and the

stored-up fruit, would supply us with provision; the only thing to be

feared was, that something might be required from the loft, and the

miller or someone else mount up in search of it. But even then, with a

little arrangement of boxes and chests, one part might be so kept in

shadow that we might yet escape observation. All this comforted me a

little; but, I asked, how were we ever to escape? The ladder was taken

away, which was our only means of descent. But Amante replied that she

could make a sufficient ladder of the rope lying coiled among other

things, to drop us down the ten feet or so--with the advantage of its

being portable, so that we might carry it away, and thus avoid all

betrayal of the fact that any one had ever been hidden in the loft.

During the two days that intervened before we did escape, Amante made

good use of her time. She looked into every box and chest during the

man's absence at his mill; and finding in one box an old suit of man's

clothes, which had probably belonged to the miller's absent son, she

put them on to see if they would fit her; and, when she found that they

did, she cut her own hair to the shortness of a man's, made me clip her

black eyebrows as close as though they had been shaved, and by cutting

up old corks into pieces such as would go into her cheeks, she altered

both the shape of her face and her voice to a degree which I should not

have believed possible.

All this time I lay like one stunned; my body resting, and renewing its

strength, but I myself in an almost idiotic state--else surely I could

not have taken the stupid interest which I remember I did in all

Amante's energetic preparations for disguise. I absolutely recollect

once the feeling of a smile coming over my stiff face as some new

exercise of her cleverness proved a success.

But towards the second day, she required me, too, to exert myself; and

then all my heavy despair returned. I let her dye my fair hair and

complexion with the decaying shells of the stored-up walnuts, I let her

blacken my teeth, and even voluntarily broke a front tooth the better

to effect my disguise. But through it all I had no hope of evading my

terrible husband. The third night the funeral was over, the drinking

ended, the guests gone; the miller put to bed by his men, being too

drunk to help himself. They stopped a little while in the kitchen,

talking and laughing about the new housekeeper likely to come; and

they, too, went off, shutting, but not locking the door. Everything

favoured us. Amante had tried her ladder on one of the two previous

nights, and could, by a dexterous throw from beneath, unfasten it from

the hook to which it was fixed, when it had served its office; she made

up a bundle of worthless old clothes in order that we might the better

preserve our characters of a travelling pedlar and his wife; she

stuffed a hump on her back, she thickened my figure, she left her own

clothes deep down beneath a heap of others in the chest from which she

had taken the man's dress which she wore; and with a few francs in her

pocket--the sole money we had either of us had about us when we

escaped--we let ourselves down the ladder, unhooked it, and passed into

the cold darkness of night again.

We had discussed the route which it would be well for us to take while

we lay perdues in our loft. Amante had told me then that her reason for

inquiring, when we first left Les Rochers, by which way I had first

been brought to it, was to avoid the pursuit which she was sure would

first be made in the direction of Germany; but that now she thought we

might return to that district of country where my German fashion of

speaking French would excite least observation. I thought that Amante

herself had something peculiar in her accent, which I had heard M. de

la Tourelle sneer at as Norman patois; but I said not a word beyond

agreeing to her proposal that we should bend our steps towards Germany.

Once there, we should, I thought, be safe. Alas! I forgot the unruly

time that was overspreading all Europe, overturning all law, and all

the protection which law gives.

How we wandered--not daring to ask our way--how we lived, how we

struggled through many a danger and still more terrors of danger, I

shall not tell you now. I will only relate two of our adventures before

we reached Frankfort. The first, although fatal to an innocent lady,

was yet, I believe, the cause of my safety; the second I shall tell

you, that you may understand why I did not return to my former home, as

I had hoped to do when we lay in the miller's loft, and I first became

capable of groping after an idea of what my future life might be. I

cannot tell you how much in these doubtings and wanderings I became

attached to Amante. I have sometimes feared since, lest I cared for her

only because she was so necessary to my own safety; but, no! it was not

so; or not so only, or principally. She said once that she was flying

for her own life as well as for mine; but we dared not speak much on

our danger, or on the horrors that had gone before. We planned a little

what was to be our future course; but even for that we did not look

forward long; how could we, when every day we scarcely knew if we

should see the sun go down? For Amante knew or conjectured far more

than I did of the atrocity of the gang to which M. de la Tourelle

belonged; and every now and then, just as we seemed to be sinking into

the calm of security, we fell upon traces of a pursuit after us in all

directions. Once I remember--we must have been nearly three weeks

wearily walking through unfrequented ways, day after day, not daring to

make inquiry as to our whereabouts, nor yet to seem purposeless in our

wanderings--we came to a kind of lonely roadside farrier's and

blacksmith's. I was so tired, that Amante declared that, come what

might, we would stay there all night; and accordingly she entered the

house, and boldly announced herself as a travelling tailor, ready to do

any odd jobs of work that might be required, for a night's lodging and

food for herself and wife. She had adopted this plan once or twice

before, and with good success; for her father had been a tailor in

Rouen, and as a girl she had often helped him with his work, and knew

the tailors' slang and habits, down to the particular whistle and cry

which in France tells so much to those of a trade. At this

blacksmith's, as at most other solitary houses far away from a town,

there was not only a store of men's clothes laid by as wanting mending

when the housewife could afford time, but there was a natural craving

after news from a distance, such news as a wandering tailor is bound to

furnish. The early November afternoon was closing into evening, as we

sat down, she cross-legged on the great table in the blacksmith's

kitchen, drawn close to the window, I close behind her, sewing at

another part of the same garment, and from time to time well scolded by

my seeming husband. All at once she turned round to speak to me. It was

only one word, 'Courage!' I had seen nothing; I sat out of the light;

but I turned sick for an instant, and then I braced myself up into a

strange strength of endurance to go through I knew not what.

The blacksmith's forge was in a shed beside the house, and fronting the

road. I heard the hammers stop plying their continual rhythmical beat.

She had seen why they ceased. A rider had come up to the forge and

dismounted, leading his horse in to be re-shod. The broad red light of

the forge-fire had revealed the face of the rider to Amante, and she

apprehended the consequence that really ensued.

The rider, after some words with the blacksmith, was ushered in by him

into the house-place where we sat.

'Here, good wife, a cup of wine and some galette for this gentleman.'

'Anything, anything, madame, that I can eat and drink in my hand while

my horse is being shod. I am in haste, and must get on to Forbach

to-night.'

The blacksmith's wife lighted her lamp; Amante had asked her for it

five minutes before. How thankful we were that she had not more

speedily complied with our request! As it was, we sat in dusk shadow,

pretending to stitch away, but scarcely able to see. The lamp was

placed on the stove, near which my husband, for it was he, stood and

warmed himself. By-and-by he turned round, and looked all over the room,

taking us in with about the same degree of interest as the inanimate

furniture. Amante, cross-legged, fronting him, stooped over her work,

whistling softly all the while. He turned again to the stove,

impatiently rubbing his hands. He had finished his wine and galette,

and wanted to be off.

'I am in haste, my good woman. Ask thy husband to get on more quickly.

I will pay him double if he makes haste.'

The woman went out to do his bidding; and he once more turned round to

face us. Amante went on to the second part of the tune. He took it up,

whistled a second for an instant or so, and then the blacksmith's wife

re-entering, he moved towards her, as if to receive her answer the more

speedily.

'One moment, monsieur--only one moment. There was a nail out of the

off-foreshoe which my husband is replacing; it would delay monsieur

again if that shoe also came off.'

'Madame is right,' said he, 'but my haste is urgent. If madame knew my

reasons, she would pardon my impatience. Once a happy husband, now a

deserted and betrayed man, I pursue a wife on whom I lavished all my

love, but who has abused my confidence, and fled from my house,

doubtless to some paramour; carrying off with her all the jewels and

money on which she could lay her hands. It is possible madame may have

heard or seen something of her; she was accompanied in her flight by a

base, profligate woman from Paris, whom I, unhappy man, had myself

engaged for my wife's waiting-maid, little dreaming what corruption I

was bringing into my house!'

'Is it possible?' said the good woman, throwing up her hands.

Amante went on whistling a little lower, out of respect to the

conversation.

'However, I am tracing the wicked fugitives; I am on their track' (and

the handsome, effeminate face looked as ferocious as any demon's).

'They will not escape me; but every minute is a minute of misery to me,

till I meet my wife. Madame has sympathy, has she not?'

He drew his face into a hard, unnatural smile, and then both went out

to the forge, as if once more to hasten the blacksmith over his work.

Amante stopped her whistling for one instant.

'Go on as you are, without change of an eyelid even; in a few minutes

he will be gone, and it will be over!'

It was a necessary caution, for I was on the point of giving way, and

throwing myself weakly upon her neck. We went on; she whistling and

stitching, I making semblance to sew. And it was well we did so; for

almost directly he came back for his whip, which he had laid down and

forgotten; and again I felt one of those sharp, quick-scanning glances,

sent all round the room, and taking in all.

Then we heard him ride away; and then, it had been long too dark to see

well, I dropped my work, and gave way to my trembling and shuddering.

The blacksmith's wife returned. She was a good creature. Amante told

her I was cold and weary, and she insisted on my stopping my work, and

going to sit near the stove; hastening, at the same time, her

preparations for supper, which, in honour of us, and of monsieur's

liberal payment, was to be a little less frugal than ordinary. It was

well for me that she made me taste a little of the cider-soup she was

preparing, or I could not have held up, in spite of Amante's warning

look, and the remembrance of her frequent exhortations to act

resolutely up to the characters we had assumed, whatever befell. To

cover my agitation, Amante stopped her whistling, and began to talk;

and, by the time the blacksmith came in, she and the good woman of the

house were in full flow. He began at once upon the handsome gentleman,

who had paid him so well; all his sympathy was with him, and both he

and his wife only wished he might overtake his wicked wife, and punish

her as she deserved. And then the conversation took a turn, not

uncommon to those whose lives are quiet and monotonous; every one

seemed to vie with each other in telling about some horror; and the

savage and mysterious band of robbers called the Chauffeurs, who

infested all the roads leading to the Rhine, with Schinderhannes at

their head, furnished many a tale which made the very marrow of my

bones run cold, and quenched even Amante's power of talking. Her eyes

grew large and wild, her cheeks blanched, and for once she sought by

her looks help from me. The new call upon me roused me. I rose and

said, with their permission my husband and I would seek our bed, for

that we had travelled far and were early risers. I added that we would

get up betimes, and finish our piece of work. The blacksmith said we

should be early birds if we rose before him; and the good wife seconded

my proposal with kindly bustle. One other such story as those they had

been relating, and I do believe Amante would have fainted.

As it was, a night's rest set her up; we arose and finished our work

betimes, and shared the plentiful breakfast of the family. Then we had

to set forth again; only knowing that to Forbach we must not go, yet

believing, as was indeed the case, that Forbach lay between us and that

Germany to which we were directing our course. Two days more we

wandered on, making a round, I suspect, and returning upon the road to

Forbach, a league or two nearer to that town than the blacksmith's

house. But as we never made inquiries I hardly knew where we were, when

we came one night to a small town, with a good large rambling inn in

the very centre of the principal street. We had begun to feel as if

there were more safety in towns than in the loneliness of the country.

As we had parted with a ring of mine not many days before to a

travelling jeweller, who was too glad to purchase it far below its real

value to make many inquiries as to how it came into the possession of a

poor working tailor, such as Amante seemed to be, we resolved to stay

at this inn all night, and gather such particulars and information as

we could by which to direct our onward course.

We took our supper in the darkest corner of the salle-à-manger, having

previously bargained for a small bedroom across the court, and over the

stables. We needed food sorely; but we hurried on our meal from dread

of any one entering that public room who might recognize us. Just in

the middle of our meal, the public diligence drove lumbering up under

the _porte-cochère_, and disgorged its passengers. Most of them turned

into the room where we sat, cowering and fearful, for the door was

opposite to the porter's lodge, and both opened on to the wide-covered

entrance from the street. Among the passengers came in a young,

fair-haired lady, attended by an elderly French maid. The poor young

creature tossed her head, and shrank away from the common room, full of

evil smells and promiscuous company, and demanded, in German French, to

be taken to some private apartment. We heard that she and her maid had

come in the coupé, and, probably from pride, poor young lady! she had

avoided all association with her fellow-passengers, thereby exciting

their dislike and ridicule. All these little pieces of hearsay had a

significance to us afterwards, though, at the time, the only remark

made that bore upon the future was Amante's whisper to me that the

young lady's hair was exactly the colour of mine, which she had cut off

and burnt in the stove in the miller's kitchen in one of her descents

from our hiding-place in the loft.

As soon as we could, we struck round in the shadow, leaving the

boisterous and merry fellow-passengers to their supper. We crossed the

court, borrowed a lantern from the ostler, and scrambled up the rude

step to our chamber above the stable. There was no door into it; the

entrance was the hole into which the ladder fitted. The window looked

into the court. We were tired and soon fell asleep. I was wakened by a

noise in the stable below. One instant of listening, and I wakened

Amante, placing my hand on her mouth, to prevent any exclamation in her

half-roused state. We heard my husband speaking about his horse to the

ostler. It was his voice. I am sure of it. Amante said so too. We durst

not move to rise and satisfy ourselves. For five minutes or so he went

on giving directions. Then he left the stable, and, softly stealing to

our window, we saw him cross the court and re-enter the inn. We

consulted as to what we should do. We feared to excite remark or

suspicion by descending and leaving our chamber, or else immediate

escape was our strongest idea. Then the ostler left the stable, locking

the door on the outside.

'We must try and drop through the window--if, indeed, it is well to go

at all,' said Amante.

With reflection came wisdom. We should excite suspicion by leaving

without paying our bill. We were on foot, and might easily be pursued.

So we sat on our bed's edge, talking and shivering, while from across

the court the laughter rang merrily, and the company slowly dispersed

one by one, their lights flitting past the windows as they went

upstairs and settled each one to his rest.

We crept into our bed, holding each other tight, and listening to every

sound, as if we thought we were tracked, and might meet our death at

any moment. In the dead of night, just at the profound stillness

preceding the turn into another day, we heard a soft, cautious step

crossing the yard. The key into the stable was turned--some one came

into the stable--we felt rather than heard him there. A horse started a

little, and made a restless movement with his feet, then whinnied

recognition. He who had entered made two or three low sounds to the

animal, and then led him into the court. Amante sprang to the window

with the noiseless activity of a cat. She looked out, but dared not

speak a word. We heard the great door into the street open--a pause for

mounting, and the horse's footsteps were lost in distance.

Then Amante came back to me. 'It was he! he is gone!' said she, and

once more we lay down, trembling and shaking.

This time we fell sound asleep. We slept long and late. We were wakened

by many hurrying feet, and many confused voices; all the world seemed

awake and astir. We rose and dressed ourselves, and coming down we

looked around among the crowd collected in the court-yard, in order to

assure ourselves _he_ was not there before we left the shelter of the

stable.

The instant we were seen, two or three people rushed to us.

'Have you heard?--Do you know?--That poor young lady--oh, come and

see!' and so we were hurried, almost in spite of ourselves, across the

court, and up the great open stairs of the main building of the inn,

into a bed-chamber, where lay the beautiful young German lady, so full

of graceful pride the night before, now white and still in death. By

her stood the French maid, crying and gesticulating.

'Oh, madame! if you had but suffered me to stay with you! Oh! the

baron, what will he say?' and so she went on. Her state had but just

been discovered; it had been supposed that she was fatigued, and was

sleeping late, until a few minutes before. The surgeon of the town had

been sent for, and the landlord of the inn was trying vainly to enforce

order until he came, and, from time to time, drinking little cups of

brandy, and offering them to the guests, who were all assembled there,

pretty much as the servants were doing in the court-yard.

At last the surgeon came. All fell back, and hung on the words that

were to fall from his lips.

'See!' said the landlord. 'This lady came last night by the diligence

with her maid. Doubtless, a great lady, for she must have a private

sitting-room--'

'She was Madame the Baroness de Roeder,' said the French maid.

--'And was difficult to please in the matter of supper, and a

sleeping-room. She went to bed well, though fatigued. Her maid left

her--'

'I begged to be allowed to sleep in her room, as we were in a strange

inn, of the character of which we knew nothing; but she would not let

me, my mistress was such a great lady.'

--'And slept with my servants,' continued the landlord. 'This morning

we thought madame was still slumbering; but when eight, nine, ten, and

near eleven o'clock came, I bade her maid use my pass-key, and enter

her room----'

'The door was not locked, only closed. And here she was found--dead is

she not, monsieur?--with her face down on her pillow, and her beautiful

hair all scattered wild; she never would let me tie it up, saying it

made her head ache. Such hair!' said the waiting-maid, lifting up a

long golden tress, and letting it fall again.

I remembered Amante's words the night before, and crept close up to

her.

Meanwhile, the doctor was examining the body underneath the

bed-clothes, which the landlord, until now, had not allowed to be

disarranged. The surgeon drew out his hand, all bathed and stained with

blood; and holding up a short, sharp knife, with a piece of paper

fastened round it.

'Here has been foul play,' he said. 'The deceased lady has been

murdered. This dagger was aimed straight at her heart.' Then putting on

his spectacles, he read the writing on the bloody paper, dimmed and

horribly obscured as it was:

NUMÉRO UN.

Ainsi les Chauffeurs se vengent.

'Let us go!' said I to Amante. 'Oh, let us leave this horrible place!'

'Wait a little,' said she. 'Only a few minutes more. It will be

better.'

Immediately the voices of all proclaimed their suspicions of the

cavalier who had arrived last the night before. He had, they said, made

so many inquiries about the young lady, whose supercilious conduct all

in the _salle-à-manger_ had been discussing on his entrance. They were

talking about her as we left the room; he must have come in directly

afterwards, and not until he had learnt all about her, had he spoken of

the business which necessitated his departure at dawn of day, and made

his arrangements with both landlord and ostler for the possession of

the keys of the stable and _porte-cochère_. In short, there was no

doubt as to the murderer, even before the arrival of the legal

functionary who had been sent for by the surgeon; but the word on the

paper chilled every one with terror. Les Chauffeurs, who were they? No

one knew, some of the gang might even then be in the room overhearing,

and noting down fresh objects for vengeance. In Germany, I had heard

little of this terrible gang, and I had paid no greater heed to the

stories related once or twice about them in Carlsruhe than one does to

tales about ogres. But here in their very haunts, I learnt the full

amount of the terror they inspired. No one would be legally responsible

for any evidence criminating the murderer. The public prosecutor shrank

from the duties of his office. What do I say? Neither Amante nor I,

knowing far more of the actual guilt of the man who had killed that

poor sleeping young lady, durst breathe a word. We appeared to be

wholly ignorant of everything: we, who might have told so much. But how

could we? we were broken down with terrific anxiety and fatigue, with

the knowledge that we, above all, were doomed victims; and that the

blood, heavily dripping from the bed-clothes on to the floor, was

dripping thus out of the poor dead body, because, when living, she had

been mistaken for me.

At length Amante went up to the landlord, and asked permission to leave

his inn, doing all openly and humbly, so as to excite neither ill-will

nor suspicion. Indeed, suspicion was otherwise directed, and he

willingly gave us leave to depart. A few days afterwards we were across

the Rhine, in Germany, making our way towards Frankfort, but still

keeping our disguises, and Amante still working at her trade.

On the way, we met a young man, a wandering journeyman from Heidelberg.

I knew him, although I did not choose that he should know me. I asked

him, as carelessly as I could, how the old miller was now? He told me

he was dead. This realization of the worst apprehensions caused by his

long silence shocked me inexpressibly. It seemed as though every prop

gave way from under me. I had been talking to Amante only that very day

of the safety and comfort of the home that awaited her in my father's

house; of the gratitude which the old man would feel towards her; and

how there, in that peaceful dwelling, far away from the terrible land

of France, she should find ease and security for all the rest of her

life. All this I thought I had to promise, and even yet more had I

looked for, for myself. I looked to the unburdening of my heart and

conscience by telling all I knew to my best and wisest friend. I looked

to his love as a sure guidance as well as a comforting stay, and,

behold, he was gone away from me for ever!

I had left the room hastily on hearing of this sad news from the

Heidelberger. Presently, Amante followed.

'Poor madame,' said she, consoling me to the best of her ability. And

then she told me by degrees what more she had learned respecting my

home, about which she knew almost as much as I did, from my frequent

talks on the subject both at Les Rochers and on the dreary, doleful

road we had come along. She had continued the conversation after I

left, by asking about my brother and his wife. Of course, they lived on

at the mill, but the man said (with what truth I know not, but I

believed it firmly at the time) that Babette had completely got the

upper hand of my brother, who only saw through her eyes and heard with

her ears. That there had been much Heidelberg gossip of late days about

her sudden intimacy with a grand French gentleman who had appeared at

the mill--a relation, by marriage--married, in fact, to the miller's

sister, who, by all accounts, had behaved abominably and ungratefully.

But that was no reason for Babette's extreme and sudden intimacy with

him, going about everywhere with the French gentleman; and since he

left (as the Heidelberger said he knew for a fact) corresponding with

him constantly. Yet her husband saw no harm in it all, seemingly;

though, to be sure, he was so out of spirits, what with his father's

death and the news of his sister's infamy, that he hardly knew how to

hold up his head.

'Now,' said Amante, 'all this proves that M. de la Tourelle has

suspected that you would go back to the nest in which you were reared,

and that he has been there, and found that you have not yet returned;

but probably he still imagines that you will do so, and has accordingly

engaged your sister-in-law as a kind of informant. Madame has said that

her sister-in-law bore her no extreme good-will; and the defamatory

story he has got the start of us in spreading, will not tend to

increase the favour in which your sister-in-law holds you. No doubt the

assassin was retracing his steps when we met him near Forbach, and

having heard of the poor German lady, with her French maid, and her

pretty blonde complexion, he followed her. If madame will still be

guided by me--and, my child, I beg of you still to trust me,' said

Amante, breaking out of her respectful formality into the way of

talking more natural to those who had shared and escaped from common

dangers--more natural, too, where the speaker was conscious of a power

of protection which the other did not possess--'we will go on to

Frankfort, and lose ourselves, for a time, at least, in the numbers of

people who throng a great town; and you have told me that Frankfort is

a great town. We will still be husband and wife; we will take a small

lodging, and you shall house-keep and live in-doors. I, as the rougher

and the more alert, will continue my father's trade, and seek work at

the tailors' shops.'

I could think of no better plan, so we followed this out. In a back

street at Frankfort we found two furnished rooms to let on a sixth

story. The one we entered had no light from day; a dingy lamp swung

perpetually from the ceiling, and from that, or from the open door

leading into the bedroom beyond, came our only light. The bedroom was

more cheerful, but very small. Such as it was, it almost exceeded our

possible means. The money from the sale of my ring was almost

exhausted, and Amante was a stranger in the place, speaking only

French, moreover, and the good Germans were hating the French people

right heartily. However, we succeeded better than our hopes, and even

laid by a little against the time of my confinement. I never stirred

abroad, and saw no one, and Amante's want of knowledge of German kept

her in a state of comparative isolation.

At length my child was born--my poor worse than fatherless child. It

was a girl, as I had prayed for. I had feared lest a boy might have

something of the tiger nature of its father, but a girl seemed all my

own. And yet not all my own, for the faithful Amante's delight and

glory in the babe almost exceeded mine; in outward show it certainly

did.

We had not been able to afford any attendance beyond what a

neighbouring sage-femme could give, and she came frequently, bringing

in with her a little store of gossip, and wonderful tales culled out of

her own experience, every time. One day she began to tell me about a

great lady in whose service her daughter had lived as scullion, or some

such thing. Such a beautiful lady! with such a handsome husband. But

grief comes to the palace as well as to the garret, and why or

wherefore no one knew, but somehow the Baron de Roeder must have

incurred the vengeance of the terrible Chauffeurs; for not many months

ago, as madame was going to see her relations in Alsace, she was

stabbed dead as she lay in bed at some hotel on the road. Had I not

seen it in the _Gazette_? Had I not heard? Why, she had been told that

as far off as Lyons there were placards offering a heavy reward on the

part of the Baron de Roeder for information respecting the murderer of

his wife. But no one could help him, for all who could bear evidence

were in such terror of the Chauffeurs; there were hundreds of them she

had been told, rich and poor, great gentlemen and peasants, all leagued

together by most frightful oaths to hunt to the death any one who bore

witness against them; so that even they who survived the tortures to

which the Chauffeurs subjected many of the people whom they plundered,

dared not to recognise them again, would not dare, even did they see

them at the bar of a court of justice; for, if one were condemned, were

there not hundreds sworn to avenge his death?

I told all this to Amante, and we began to fear that if M. de la

Tourelle, or Lefebvre, or any of the gang at Les Rochers, had seen

these placards, they would know that the poor lady stabbed by the

former was the Baroness de Roeder, and that they would set forth again

in search of me.

This fresh apprehension told on my health and impeded my recovery. We

had so little money we could not call in a physician, at least, not one

in established practice. But Amante found out a young doctor for whom,

indeed, she had sometimes worked; and offering to pay him in kind, she

brought him to see me, her sick wife. He was very gentle and

thoughtful, though, like ourselves, very poor. But he gave much time

and consideration to the case, saying once to Amante that he saw my

constitution had experienced some severe shock from which it was

probable that my nerves would never entirely recover. By-and-by I shall

name this doctor, and then you will know, better than I can describe,

his character.

I grew strong in time--stronger, at least. I was able to work a little

at home, and to sun myself and my baby at the garret-window in the

roof. It was all the air I dared to take. I constantly wore the

disguise I had first set out with; as constantly had I renewed the

disfiguring dye which changed my hair and complexion. But the perpetual

state of terror in which I had been during the whole months succeeding

my escape from Les Rochers made me loathe the idea of ever again

walking in the open daylight, exposed to the sight and recognition of

every passer-by. In vain Amante reasoned--in vain the doctor urged.

Docile in every other thing, in this I was obstinate. I would not stir

out. One day Amante returned from her work, full of news--some of it

good, some such as to cause us apprehension. The good news was this;

the master for whom she worked as journeyman was going to send her with

some others to a great house at the other side of Frankfort, where

there were to be private theatricals, and where many new dresses and

much alteration of old ones would be required. The tailors employed

were all to stay at this house until the day of representation was

over, as it was at some distance from the town, and no one could tell

when their work would be ended. But the pay was to be proportionately

good.

The other thing she had to say was this: she had that day met the

travelling jeweller to whom she and I had sold my ring. It was rather a

peculiar one, given to me by my husband; we had felt at the time that

it might be the means of tracing us, but we were penniless and

starving, and what else could we do? She had seen that this Frenchman

had recognised her at the same instant that she did him, and she

thought at the same time that there was a gleam of more than common

intelligence on his face as he did so. This idea had been confirmed by

his following her for some way on the other side of the street; but she

had evaded him with her better knowledge of the town, and the

increasing darkness of the night. Still it was well that she was going

to such a distance from our dwelling on the next day; and she had

brought me in a stock of provisions, begging me to keep within doors,

with a strange kind of fearful oblivion of the fact that I had never

set foot beyond the threshold of the house since I had first entered

it--scarce ever ventured down the stairs. But, although my poor, my

dear, very faithful Amante was like one possessed that last night, she

spoke continually of the dead, which is a bad sign for the living. She

kissed you--yes! it was you, my daughter, my darling, whom I bore

beneath my bosom away from the fearful castle of your father--I call

him so for the first time, I must call him so once again before I have

done--Amante kissed you, sweet baby, blessed little comforter, as if

she never could leave off. And then she went away, alive.

Two days, three days passed away. That third evening I was sitting

within my bolted doors--you asleep on your pillow by my side--when a

step came up the stair, and I knew it must be for me; for ours were the

top-most rooms. Some one knocked; I held my very breath. But some one

spoke, and I knew it was the good Doctor Voss. Then I crept to the

door, and answered.

'Are you alone?' asked I.

'Yes,' said he, in a still lower voice. 'Let me in.' I let him in, and

he was as alert as I in bolting and barring the door. Then he came and

whispered to me his doleful tale. He had come from the hospital in the

opposite quarter of the town, the hospital which he visited; he should

have been with me sooner, but he had feared lest he should be watched.

He had come from Amante's death-bed. Her fears of the jeweller were too

well founded. She had left the house where she was employed that

morning, to transact some errand connected with her work in the town;

she must have been followed, and dogged on her way back through

solitary wood-paths, for some of the wood-rangers belonging to the

great house had found her lying there, stabbed to death, but not dead;

with the poniard again plunged through the fatal writing, once more;

but this time with the word 'un' underlined, so as to show that the

assassin was aware of his precious mistake.

Numéro _Un_.

Ainsi les Chauffeurs se vengent.

They had carried her to the house, and given her restoratives till she

had recovered the feeble use of her speech. But, oh, faithful, dear

friend and sister! even then she remembered me, and refused to tell

(what no one else among her fellow workmen knew), where she lived or

with whom. Life was ebbing away fast, and they had no resource but to

carry her to the nearest hospital, where, of course, the fact of her

sex was made known. Fortunately both for her and for me, the doctor in

attendance was the very Doctor Voss whom we already knew. To him, while

awaiting her confessor, she told enough to enable him to understand the

position in which I was left; before the priest had heard half her tale

Amante was dead.

Doctor Voss told me he had made all sorts of _détours_, and waited

thus, late at night, for fear of being watched and followed. But I do

not think he was. At any rate, as I afterwards learnt from him, the

Baron Roeder, on hearing of the similitude of this murder with that of

his wife in every particular, made such a search after the assassins,

that, although they were not discovered, they were compelled to take to

flight for the time.

I can hardly tell you now by what arguments Dr. Voss, at first merely

my benefactor, sparing me a portion of his small modicum, at length

persuaded me to become his wife. His wife he called it, I called it;

for we went through the religious ceremony too much slighted at the

time, and as we were both Lutherans, and M. de la Tourelle had

pretended to be of the reformed religion, a divorce from the latter

would have been easily procurable by German law both ecclesiastical and

legal, could we have summoned so fearful a man into any court.

The good doctor took me and my child by stealth to his modest dwelling;

and there I lived in the same deep refinement, never seeing the full

light of day, although when the dye had once passed away from my face

my husband did not wish me to renew it. There was no need; my yellow

hair was grey, my complexion was ashen-coloured, no creature could have

recognized the fresh-coloured, bright-haired young woman of eighteen

months before. The few people whom I saw knew me only as Madame Voss; a

widow much older than himself, whom Dr. Voss had secretly married. They

called me the Grey Woman.

He made me give you his surname. Till now you have known no other

father--while he lived you needed no father's love. Once only, only

once more, did the old terror come upon me. For some reason which I

forget, I broke through my usual custom, and went to the window of my

room for some purpose, either to shut or to open it. Looking out into

the street for an instant, I was fascinated by the sight of M. de la

Tourelle, gay, young, elegant as ever, walking along on the opposite

side of the street. The noise I had made with the window caused him to

look up; he saw me, an old grey woman, and he did not recognize me! Yet

it was not three years since we had parted, and his eyes were keen and

dreadful like those of the lynx.

I told M. Voss, on his return home, and he tried to cheer me, but the

shock of seeing M. de la Tourelle had been too terrible for me. I was

ill for long months afterwards.

Once again I saw him. Dead. He and Lefebvre were at last caught; hunted

down by the Baron de Roeder in some of their crimes. Dr. Voss had heard

of their arrest; their condemnation, their death; but he never said a

word to me, until one day he bade me show him that I loved him by my

obedience and my trust. He took me a long carriage journey, where to I

know not, for we never spoke of that day again; I was led through a

prison, into a closed court-yard, where, decently draped in the last

robes of death, concealing the marks of decapitation, lay M. de la

Tourelle, and two or three others, whom I had known at Les Rochers.

After that conviction Dr. Voss tried to persuade me to return to a more

natural mode of life, and to go out more. But although I sometimes

complied with his wish, yet the old terror was ever strong upon me, and

he, seeing what an effort it was, gave up urging me at last.

You know all the rest. How we both mourned bitterly the loss of that

dear husband and father--for such I will call him ever--and as such you

must consider him, my child, after this one revelation is over.

Why has it been made, you ask. For this reason, my child. The lover,

whom you have only known as M. Lebrun, a French artist, told me but

yesterday his real name, dropped because the blood-thirsty republicans

might consider it as too aristocratic. It is Maurice de Poissy.

CURIOUS, IF TRUE

(EXTRACT FROM A LETTER FROM RICHARD WHITTINGHAM, ESQ.)

You were formerly so much amused at my pride in my descent from that

sister of Calvin's, who married a Whittingham, Dean of Durham, that I

doubt if you will be able to enter into the regard for my distinguished

relation that has led me to France, in order to examine registers and

archives, which, I thought, might enable me to discover collateral

descendants of the great reformer, with whom I might call cousins. I

shall not tell you of my troubles and adventures in this research; you

are not worthy to hear of them; but something so curious befell me one

evening last August, that if I had not been perfectly certain I was

wide awake, I might have taken it for a dream.

For the purpose I have named, it was necessary that I should make Tours

my head-quarters for a time. I had traced descendants of the Calvin

family out of Normandy into the centre of France; but I found it was

necessary to have a kind of permission from the bishop of the diocese

before I could see certain family papers, which had fallen into the

possession of the Church; and, as I had several English friends at

Tours, I awaited the answer to my request to Monseigneur de----, at

that town. I was ready to accept any invitation; but I received very

few; and was sometimes a little at a loss what to do with my evenings.

The _table d'hôte_ was at five o'clock; I did not wish to go to the

expense of a private sitting-room, disliked the dinnery atmosphere of

the _salle à manger_, could not play either at pool or billiards, and

the aspect of my fellow guests was unprepossessing enough to make me

unwilling to enter into any _tête-à-tête_ gamblings with them. So I

usually rose from table early, and tried to make the most of the

remaining light of the August evenings in walking briskly off to

explore the surrounding country; the middle of the day was too hot for

this purpose, and better employed in lounging on a bench in the

Boulevards, lazily listening to the distant band, and noticing with

equal laziness the faces and figures of the women who passed by.

One Thursday evening, the 18th of August it was, I think, I had gone

further than usual in my walk, and I found that it was later than I had

imagined when I paused to turn back. I fancied I could make a round; I

had enough notion of the direction in which I was, to see that by

turning up a narrow straight lane to my left I should shorten my way

back to Tours. And so I believe I should have done, could I have found

an outlet at the right place, but field-paths are almost unknown in

that part of France, and my lane, stiff and straight as any street, and

marked into terribly vanishing perspective by the regular row of

poplars on each side, seemed interminable. Of course night came on, and

I was in darkness. In England I might have had a chance of seeing a

light in some cottage only a field or two off, and asking my way from

the inhabitants; but here I could see no such welcome sight; indeed, I

believe French peasants go to bed with the summer daylight, so if there

were any habitations in the neighbourhood I never saw them. At last--I

believe I must have walked two hours in the darkness,--I saw the dusky

outline of a wood on one side of the weariful lane, and, impatiently

careless of all forest laws and penalties for trespassers, I made my

way to it, thinking that if the worst came to the worst, I could find

some covert--some shelter where I could lie down and rest, until the

morning light gave me a chance of finding my way back to Tours. But the

plantation, on the outskirts of what appeared to me a dense wood, was

of young trees, too closely planted to be more than slender stems

growing up to a good height, with scanty foliage on their summits. On I

went towards the thicker forest, and once there I slackened my pace,

and began to look about me for a good lair. I was as dainty as

Lochiel's grandchild, who made his grandsire indignant at the luxury of

his pillow of snow: this brake was too full of brambles, that felt damp

with dew; there was no hurry, since I had given up all hope of passing

the night between four walls; and I went leisurely groping about, and

trusting that there were no wolves to be poked up out of their summer

drowsiness by my stick, when all at once I saw a château before me, not

a quarter of a mile off, at the end of what seemed to be an ancient

avenue (now overgrown and irregular), which I happened to be crossing,

when I looked to my right, and saw the welcome sight. Large, stately,

and dark was its outline against the dusky night-sky; there were

pepper-boxes and tourelles and what-not fantastically going up into the

dim starlight. And more to the purpose still, though I could not see

the details of the building that I was now facing, it was plain enough

that there were lights in many windows, as if some great entertainment

was going on.

'They are hospitable people, at any rate,' thought I. 'Perhaps they

will give me a bed. I don't suppose French propriétaires have traps and

horses quite as plentiful as English gentlemen; but they are evidently

having a large party, and some of their guests may be from Tours, and

will give me a cast back to the Lion d'Or. I am not proud, and I am

dog-tired. I am not above hanging on behind, if need be.'

So, putting a little briskness and spirit into my walk, I went up to

the door, which was standing open, most hospitably, and showing a large

lighted hall, all hung round with spoils of the chase, armour, &c., the

details of which I had not time to notice, for the instant I stood on

the threshold a huge porter appeared, in a strange, old-fashioned

dress, a kind of livery which well befitted the general appearance of

the house. He asked me, in French (so curiously pronounced that I

thought I had hit upon a new kind of patois), my name, and whence I

came. I thought he would not be much the wiser, still it was but civil

to give it before I made my request for assistance; so, in reply, I

said:

'My name is Whittingham--Richard Whittingham, an English gentleman,

staying at ----.' To my infinite surprise, a light of pleased

intelligence came over the giant's face; he made me a low bow, and said

(still in the same curious dialect) that I was welcome, that I was long

expected.

'Long expected!' What could the fellow mean? Had I stumbled on a nest

of relations by John Calvin's side, who had heard of my genealogical

inquiries, and were gratified and interested by them? But I was too

much pleased to be under shelter for the night to think it necessary to

account for my agreeable reception before I enjoyed it. Just as he was

opening the great heavy _battants_ of the door that led from the hall

to the interior, he turned round and said:

'Apparently Monsieur le Géanquilleur is not come with you.'

'No! I am all alone; I have lost my way,'--and I was going on with my

explanation, when he, as if quite indifferent to it, led the way up a

great stone staircase, as wide as many rooms, and having on each

landing-place massive iron wickets, in a heavy framework; these the

porter unlocked with the solemn slowness of age. Indeed, a strange,

mysterious awe of the centuries that had passed away since this château

was built, came over me as I waited for the turning of the ponderous

keys in the ancient locks. I could almost have fancied that I heard a

mighty rushing murmur (like the ceaseless sound of a distant sea,

ebbing and flowing for ever and for ever), coming forth from the great

vacant galleries that opened out on each side of the broad staircase,

and were to be dimly perceived in the darkness above us. It was as if

the voices of generations of men yet echoed and eddied in the silent

air. It was strange, too, that my friend the porter going before me,

ponderously infirm, with his feeble old hands striving in vain to keep

the tall flambeau he held steadily before him,--strange, I say, that he

was the only domestic I saw in the vast halls and passages, or met with

on the grand staircase. At length we stood before the gilded doors that

led into the saloon where the family--or it might be the company, so

great was the buzz of voices--was assembled. I would have remonstrated

when I found he was going to introduce me, dusty and travel-smeared, in

a morning costume that was not even my best, into this grand _salon_,

with nobody knew how many ladies and gentlemen assembled; but the

obstinate old man was evidently bent upon taking me straight to his

master, and paid no heed to my words.

The doors flew open, and I was ushered into a saloon curiously full of

pale light, which did not culminate on any spot, nor proceed from any

centre, nor flicker with any motion of the air, but filled every nook

and corner, making all things deliciously distinct; different from our

light of gas or candle, as is the difference between a clear southern

atmosphere and that of our misty England.

At the first moment, my arrival excited no attention, the apartment was

so full of people, all intent on their own conversation. But my friend

the porter went up to a handsome lady of middle age, richly attired in

that antique manner which fashion has brought round again of late

years, and, waiting first in an attitude of deep respect till her

attention fell upon him, told her my name and something about me, as

far as I could guess from the gestures of the one and the sudden glance

of the eye of the other.

She immediately came towards me with the most friendly actions of

greeting, even before she had advanced near enough to speak. Then,--and

was it not strange?--her words and accent were that of the commonest

peasant of the country. Yet she herself looked highbred, and would have

been dignified had she been a shade less restless, had her countenance

worn a little less lively and inquisitive expression. I had been poking

a good deal about the old parts of Tours, and had had to understand the

dialect of the people who dwelt in the Marché au Vendredi and similar

places, or I really should not have understood my handsome hostess, as

she offered to present me to her husband, a henpecked, gentlemanly man,

who was more quaintly attired than she in the very extreme of that

style of dress. I thought to myself that in France, as in England, it

is the provincials who carry fashion to such an excess as to become

ridiculous.

However, he spoke (still in the _patois_) of his pleasure in making my

acquaintance, and led me to a strange uneasy easy-chair, much of a

piece with the rest of the furniture, which might have taken its place

without any anachronism by the side of that in the Hôtel Cluny. Then

again began the clatter of French voices, which my arrival had for an

instant interrupted, and I had leisure to look about me. Opposite to me

sat a very sweet-looking lady, who must have been a great beauty in her

youth, I should think, and would be charming in old age, from the

sweetness of her countenance. She was, however, extremely fat, and on

seeing her feet laid up before her on a cushion, I at once perceived

that they were so swollen as to render her incapable of walking, which

probably brought on her excessive _embonpoint_. Her hands were plump

and small, but rather coarse-grained in texture, not quite so clean as

they might have been, and altogether not so aristocratic-looking as the

charming face. Her dress was of superb black velvet, ermine-trimmed,

with diamonds thrown all abroad over it.

Not far from her stood the least little man I had ever seen; of such

admirable proportions no one could call him a dwarf, because with that

word we usually associate something of deformity; but yet with an elfin

look of shrewd, hard, worldly wisdom in his face that marred the

impression which his delicate regular little features would otherwise

have conveyed. Indeed, I do not think he was quite of equal rank with

the rest of the company, for his dress was inappropriate to the

occasion (and he apparently was an invited, while I was an involuntary

guest); and one or two of his gestures and actions were more like the

tricks of an uneducated rustic than anything else. To explain what I

mean: his boots had evidently seen much service, and had been

re-topped, re-heeled, re-soled to the extent of cobbler's powers. Why

should he have come in them if they were not his best--his only pair?

And what can be more ungenteel than poverty? Then again he had an

uneasy trick of putting his hand up to his throat, as if he expected to

find something the matter with it; and he had the awkward habit--which

I do not think he could have copied from Dr. Johnson, because most

probably he had never heard of him--of trying always to retrace his

steps on the exact boards on which he had trodden to arrive at any

particular part of the room. Besides, to settle the question, I once

heard him addressed as Monsieur Poucet, without any aristocratic 'de'

for a prefix; and nearly every one else in the room was a marquis, at

any rate.

I say, 'nearly every one;' for some strange people had the entrée;

unless, indeed, they were, like me, benighted. One of the guests I

should have taken for a servant, but for the extraordinary influence he

seemed to have over the man I took for his master, and who never did

anything without, apparently, being urged thereto by this follower. The

master, magnificently dressed, but ill at ease in his clothes as if

they had been made for some one else, was a weak-looking, handsome man,

continually sauntering about, and I almost guessed an object of

suspicion to some of the gentlemen present, which, perhaps, drove him

on the companionship of his follower, who was dressed something in the

style of an ambassador's chasseur; yet it was not a chasseur's dress

after all; it was something more thoroughly old-world; boots half way

up his ridiculously small legs, which clattered as he walked along, as

if they were too large for his little feet; and a great quantity of

grey fur, as trimming to coat, court mantle, boots, cap--everything.

You know the way in which certain countenances remind you perpetually

of some animal, be it bird or beast! Well, this chasseur (as I will

call him for want of a better name) was exceedingly like the great

Tom-cat that you have seen so often in my chambers, and laughed at

almost as often for his uncanny gravity of demeanour. Grey whiskers has

my Tom--grey whiskers had the chasseur: grey hair overshadows the upper

lip of my Tom--grey mustachios hid that of the chasseur. The pupils of

Tom's eyes dilate and contract as I had thought cats' pupils only could

do, until I saw those of the chasseur. To be sure, canny as Tom is, the

chasseur had the advantage in the more intelligent expression. He

seemed to have obtained most complete sway over his master or patron,

whose looks he watched, and whose steps he followed, with a kind of

distrustful interest that puzzled me greatly.

There were several other groups in the more distant part of the saloon,

all of the stately old school, all grand and noble, I conjectured from

their bearing. They seemed perfectly well acquainted with each other,

as if they were in the habit of meeting. But I was interrupted in my

observations by the tiny little gentleman on the opposite side of the

room coming across to take a place beside me. It is no difficult matter

to a Frenchman to slide into conversation, and so gracefully did my

pigmy friend keep up the character of the nation, that we were almost

confidential before ten minutes had elapsed.

Now I was quite aware that the welcome which all had extended to me,

from the porter up to the vivacious lady and meek lord of the castle,

was intended for some other person. But it required either a degree of

moral courage, of which I cannot boast, or the self-reliance and

conversational powers of a bolder and cleverer man than I, to undeceive

people who had fallen into so fortunate a mistake for me. Yet the

little man by my side insinuated himself so much into my confidence,

that I had half a mind to tell him of my exact situation, and to turn

him into a friend and an ally.

'Madame is perceptibly growing older,' said he, in the midst of my

perplexity, glancing at our hostess.

'Madame is still a very fine woman,' replied I.

'Now, is it not strange,' continued he, lowering his voice, 'how women

almost invariably praise the absent, or departed, as if they were

angels of light while as for the present, or the living'--here he

shrugged up his little shoulders, and made an expressive pause. 'Would

you believe it! Madame is always praising her late husband to

monsieur's face; till, in fact, we guests are quite perplexed how to

look: for, you know, the late M. de Retz's character was quite

notorious,--everybody has heard of him.' All the world of Touraine,

thought I, but I made an assenting noise.

At this instant, monsieur our host came up to me, and with a civil look

of tender interest (such as some people put on when they inquire after

your mother, about whom they do not care one straw), asked if I had

heard lately how my cat was? 'How my cat was!' What could the man mean?

My cat! Could he mean the tailless Tom, born in the Isle of Man, and

now supposed to be keeping guard against the incursions of rats and

mice into my chambers in London? Tom is, as you know, on pretty good

terms with some of my friends, using their legs for rubbing-posts

without scruple, and highly esteemed by them for his gravity of

demeanour, and wise manner of winking his eyes. But could his fame have

reached across the Channel? However, an answer must be returned to the

inquiry, as monsieur's face was bent down to mine with a look of polite

anxiety; so I, in my turn, assumed an expression of gratitude, and

assured him that, to the best of my belief, my cat was in remarkably

good health.

'And the climate agrees with her?'

'Perfectly,' said I, in a maze of wonder at this deep solicitude in a

tailless cat who had lost one foot and half an ear in some cruel trap.

My host smiled a sweet smile, and, addressing a few words to my little

neighbour, passed on.

'How wearisome those aristocrats are!' quoth my neighbour, with a

slight sneer. 'Monsieur's conversation rarely extends to more than two

sentences to any one. By that time his faculties are exhausted, and he

needs the refreshment of silence. You and I, monsieur, are, at any

rate, indebted to our own wits for our rise in the world!'

Here again I was bewildered! As you know, I am rather proud of my

descent from families which, if not noble themselves, are allied to

nobility,--and as to my 'rise in the world'--if I had risen, it would

have been rather for balloon-like qualities than for mother-wit, to

being unencumbered with heavy ballast either in my head or my pockets.

However, it was my cue to agree: so I smiled again.

'For my part,' said he, 'if a man does not stick at trifles, if he

knows how to judiciously add to, or withhold facts, and is not

sentimental in his parade of humanity, he is sure to do well; sure to

affix a _de_ or _von_ to his name, and end his days in comfort. There

is an example of what I am saying'--and he glanced furtively at the

weak-looking master of the sharp, intelligent servant, whom I have

called the chasseur.

'Monsieur le Marquis would never have been anything but a miller's son,

if it had not been for the talents of his servant. Of course you know

his antecedents?'

I was going to make some remarks on the changes in the order of the

peerage since the days of Louis XVI.--going, in fact, to be very

sensible and historical--when there was a slight commotion among the

people at the other end of the room. Lacqueys in quaint liveries must

have come in from behind the tapestry, I suppose (for I never saw them

enter, though I sate right opposite to the doors), and were handing

about the slight beverages and slighter viands which are considered

sufficient refreshments, but which looked rather meagre to my hungry

appetite. These footmen were standing solemnly opposite to a

lady,--beautiful, splendid as the dawn, but--sound asleep in a

magnificent settee. A gentleman who showed so much irritation at her

ill-timed slumbers, that I think he must have been her husband, was

trying to awaken her with actions not far removed from shakings. All in

vain; she was quite unconscious of his annoyance, or the smiles of the

company, or the automatic solemnity of the waiting footman, or the

perplexed anxiety of monsieur and madame.

My little friend sat down with a sneer, as if his curiosity was

quenched in contempt.

'Moralists would make an infinity of wise remarks on that scene,' said

he. 'In the first place, note the ridiculous position into which their

superstitious reverence for rank and title puts all these people.

Because monsieur is a reigning prince over some minute principality,

the exact situation of which no one has as yet discovered, no one must

venture to take their glass of eau sucré till Madame la Princesse

awakens; and, judging from past experience, those poor lacqueys may

have to stand for a century before that happens. Next--always speaking

as a moralist, you will observe--note how difficult it is to break off

bad habits acquired in youth!'

Just then the prince succeeded, by what means I did not see, in awaking

the beautiful sleeper. But at first she did not remember where she was,

and looking up at her husband with loving eyes, she smiled and said:

'Is it you, my prince?'

But he was too conscious of the suppressed amusement of the spectators

and his own consequent annoyance, to be reciprocally tender, and turned

away with some little French expression, best rendered into English by

'Pooh, pooh, my dear!'

After I had had a glass of delicious wine of some unknown quality, my

courage was in rather better plight than before, and I told my cynical

little neighbour--whom I must say I was beginning to dislike--that I

had lost my way in the wood, and had arrived at the château quite by

mistake.

He seemed mightily amused at my story; said that the same thing had

happened to himself more than once; and told me that I had better luck

than he had on one of these occasions, when, from his account, he must

have been in considerable danger of his life. He ended his story by

making me admire his boots, which he said he still wore, patched though

they were, and all their excellent quality lost by patching, because

they were of such a first-rate make for long pedestrian excursions.

'Though, indeed,' he wound up by saying, 'the new fashion of railroads

would seem to supersede the necessity for this description of boots.'

When I consulted him as to whether I ought to make myself known to my

host and hostess as a benighted traveller, instead of the guest whom

they had taken me for, he exclaimed, 'By no means! I hate such

squeamish morality.' And he seemed much offended by my innocent

question, as if it seemed by implication to condemn something in

himself. He was offended and silent; and just at this moment I caught

the sweet, attractive eyes of the lady opposite--that lady whom I named

at first as being no longer in the bloom of youth, but as being

somewhat infirm about the feet, which were supported on a raised

cushion before her. Her looks seemed to say, 'Come here, and let us

have some conversation together;' and, with a bow of silent excuse to

my little companion, I went across to the lame old lady. She

acknowledged my coming with the prettiest gesture of thanks possible;

and, half apologetically, said, 'It is a little dull to be unable to

move about on such evenings as this; but it is a just punishment to me

for my early vanities. My poor feet, that were by nature so small, are

now taking their revenge for my cruelty in forcing them into such

little slippers ... Besides, monsieur,' with a pleasant smile, 'I

thought it was possible you might be weary of the malicious sayings of

your little neighbour. He has not borne the best character in his

youth, and such men are sure to be cynical in their old age.'

'Who is he?' asked I, with English abruptness.

'His name is Poucet, and his father was, I believe, a woodcutter, or

charcoal burner, or something of the sort. They do tell sad stories of

connivance at murder, ingratitude, and obtaining money on false

pretences--but you will think me as bad as he if I go on with my

slanders. Rather let us admire the lovely lady coming up towards us,

with the roses in her hand--I never see her without roses, they are so

closely connected with her past history, as you are doubtless aware.

Ah, beauty!' said my companion to the lady drawing near to us, 'it is

like you to come to me, now that I can no longer go to you.' Then

turning to me, and gracefully drawing me into the conversation, she

said, 'You must know that, although we never met until we were both

married, we have been almost like sisters ever since. There have been

so many points of resemblance in our circumstances, and I think I may

say in our characters. We had each two elder sisters--mine were but

half-sisters, though--who were not so kind to us as they might have

been.'

'But have been sorry for it since,' put in the other lady.

'Since we have married princes,' continued the same lady, with an arch

smile that had nothing of unkindness in it, 'for we both have married

far above our original stations in life; we are both unpunctual in our

habits, and, in consequence of this failing of ours, we have both had

to suffer mortification and pain.'

'And both are charming,' said a whisper close behind me. 'My lord the

marquis, say it--say, "And both are charming."'

'And both are charming,' was spoken aloud by another voice. I turned,

and saw the wily cat-like chasseur, prompting his master to make civil

speeches.

The ladies bowed with that kind of haughty acknowledgement which shows

that compliments from such a source are distasteful. But our trio of

conversation was broken up, and I was sorry for it. The marquis looked

as if he had been stirred up to make that one speech, and hoped that he

would not be expected to say more; while behind him stood the chasseur,

half impertinent and half servile in his ways and attitudes. The

ladies, who were real ladies, seemed to be sorry for the awkwardness of

the marquis, and addressed some trifling questions to him, adapting

themselves to the subjects on which he could have no trouble in

answering. The chasseur, meanwhile, was talking to himself in a

growling tone of voice. I had fallen a little into the background at

this interruption in a conversation which promised to be so pleasant,

and I could not help hearing his words.

'Really, De Carabas grows more stupid every day. I have a great mind to

throw off his boots, and leave him to his fate. I was intended for a

court, and to a court I will go, and make my own fortune as I have made

his. The emperor will appreciate my talents.'

And such are the habits of the French, or such his forgetfulness of

good manners in his anger, that he spat right and left on the

parquetted floor.

Just then a very ugly, very pleasant-looking man, came towards the two

ladies to whom I had lately been speaking, leading up to them a

delicate, fair woman, dressed all in the softest white, as if she were

_vouée au blanc_. I do not think there was a bit of colour about her. I

thought I heard her making, as she came along, a little noise of

pleasure, not exactly like the singing of a tea-kettle, nor yet like

the cooing of a dove, but reminding me of each sound.

'Madame de Mioumiou was anxious to see you,' said he, addressing the

lady with the roses, 'so I have brought her across to give you a

pleasure!' What an honest, good face! but oh! how ugly! And yet I liked

his ugliness better than most persons' beauty. There was a look of

pathetic acknowledgement of his ugliness, and a deprecation of your too

hasty judgement, in his countenance that was positively winning. The

soft, white lady kept glancing at my neighbour the chasseur, as if they

had had some former acquaintance, which puzzled me very much, as they

were of such different rank. However, their nerves were evidently

strung to the same tune, for at a sound behind the tapestry, which was

more like the scuttering of rats and mice than anything else, both

Madame de Mioumiou and the chasseur started with the most eager look of

anxiety on their countenances, and by their restless movements--madame's

panting, and the fiery dilation of his eyes--one might see that

commonplace sounds affected them both in a manner very different to the

rest of the company. The ugly husband of the lovely lady with the roses

now addressed himself to me.

'We are much disappointed,' he said, 'in finding that monsieur is not

accompanied by his countryman--le grand Jean d'Angleterre; I cannot

pronounce his name rightly'--and he looked at me to help him out.

'Le grand Jean d'Angleterre!' now who was le grand Jean d'Angleterre?

John Bull? John Russell? John Bright?

'Jean--Jean'--continued the gentleman, seeing my embarrassment. 'Ah,

these terrible English names--"Jean de Géanquilleur!"'

I was as wise as ever. And yet the name struck me as familiar, but

slightly disguised. I repeated it to myself. It was mighty like John

the Giant-killer, only his friends always call that worthy 'Jack'. I

said the name aloud.

'Ah, that is it!' said he. 'But why has he not accompanied you to our

little reunion to-night?'

I had been rather puzzled once or twice before, but this serious

question added considerably to my perplexity. Jack the Giant-killer had

once, it is true, been rather an intimate friend of mine, as far as

(printer's) ink and paper can keep up a friendship, but I had not heard

his name mentioned for years; and for aught I knew he lay enchanted

with King Arthur's knights, who lie entranced until the blast of the

trumpets of four mighty kings shall call them to help at England's

need. But the question had been asked in serious earnest by that

gentleman, whom I more wished to think well of me than I did any other

person in the room. So I answered respectfully that it was long since I

had heard anything of my countryman; but that I was sure it would have

given him as much pleasure as it was doing myself to have been present

at such an agreeable gathering of friends. He bowed, and then the lame

lady took up the word.

'To-night is the night when, of all the year, this great old forest

surrounding the castle is said to be haunted by the phantom of a little

peasant girl who once lived hereabouts; the tradition is that she was

devoured by a wolf. In former days I have seen her on this night out of

yonder window at the end of the gallery. Will you, ma belle, take

monsieur to see the view outside by the moonlight (you may possibly see

the phantom-child); and leave me to a little _tête-à-tête_ with your

husband?'

With a gentle movement the lady with the roses complied with the

other's request, and we went to a great window, looking down on the

forest, in which I had lost my way. The tops of the far-spreading and

leafy trees lay motionless beneath us in the pale, wan light, which

shows objects almost as distinct in form, though not in colour, as by

day. We looked down on the countless avenues, which seemed to converge

from all quarters to the great old castle; and suddenly across one,

quite near to us, there passed the figure of a little girl, with the

'capuchon' on, that takes the place of a peasant girl's bonnet in

France. She had a basket on one arm, and by her, on the side to which

her head was turned, there went a wolf. I could almost have said it was

licking her hand, as if in penitent love, if either penitence or love

had ever been a quality of wolves,--but though not of living, perhaps

it may be of phantom wolves.

'There, we have seen her!' exclaimed my beautiful companion. 'Though so

long dead, her simple story of household goodness and trustful

simplicity still lingers in the hearts of all who have ever heard of

her; and the country-people about here say that seeing that

phantom-child on this anniversary brings good luck for the year. Let us

hope that we shall share in the traditionary good fortune. Ah! here is

Madame de Retz--she retains the name of her first husband, you know, as

he was of higher rank than the present.' We were joined by our hostess.

'If monsieur is fond of the beauties of nature and art,' said she,

perceiving that I had been looking at the view from the great window,

'he will perhaps take pleasure in seeing the picture.' Here she sighed,

with a little affectation of grief. 'You know the picture I allude to,'

addressing my companion, who bowed assent, and smiled a little

maliciously, as I followed the lead of madame.

I went after her to the other end of the saloon, noting by the way with

what keen curiosity she caught up what was passing either in word or

action on each side of her. When we stood opposite to the end wall, I

perceived a full-length picture of a handsome, peculiar-looking man,

with--in spite of his good looks--a very fierce and scowling

expression. My hostess clasped her hands together as her arms hung down

in front, and sighed once more. Then, half in soliloquy, she said:

'He was the love of my youth; his stern yet manly character first

touched this heart of mine. When--when shall I cease to deplore his

loss!'

Not being acquainted with her enough to answer this question (if,

indeed, it were not sufficiently answered by the fact of her second

marriage), I felt awkward; and, by way of saying something, I remarked:

'The countenance strikes me as resembling something I have seen

before--in an engraving from an historical picture, I think; only, it

is there the principal figure in a group: he is holding a lady by her

hair, and threatening her with his scimitar, while two cavaliers are

rushing up the stairs, apparently only just in time to save her life.'

'Alas, alas!' said she, 'you too accurately describe a miserable

passage in my life, which has often been represented in a false light.

The best of husbands'--here she sobbed, and became slightly

inarticulate with her grief--'will sometimes be displeased. I was young

and curious, he was justly angry with my disobedience--my brothers were

too hasty--the consequence is, I became a widow!'

After due respect for her tears, I ventured to suggest some commonplace

consolation. She turned round sharply:--

'No, monsieur: my only comfort is that I have never forgiven the

brothers who interfered so cruelly, in such an uncalled-for manner,

between my dear husband and myself. To quote my friend Monsieur

Sganarelle--"Ce sont petites choses qui sont de temps en temps

nécessaires dans l'amitié; et cinq ou six coups d'épée entre gens qui

s'aiment ne font que ragaillardir l'affection." You observe the

colouring is not quite what it should be?'

'In this light the beard is of rather a peculiar tint,' said I.

'Yes: the painter did not do it justice. It was most lovely, and gave

him such a distinguished air, quite different from the common herd.

Stay, I will show you the exact colour, if you will come near this

flambeau!' And going near the light, she took off a bracelet of hair,

with a magnificent clasp of pearls. It was peculiar, certainly. I did

not know what to say. 'His precious lovely beard!' said she. 'And the

pearls go so well with the delicate blue!'

Her husband, who had come up to us, and waited till her eye fell upon

him before venturing to speak, now said, 'It is strange Monsieur Ogre

is not yet arrived!'

'Not at all strange,' said she, tartly. 'He was always very stupid, and

constantly falls into mistakes, in which he comes worse off; and it is

very well he does, for he is credulous and cowardly fellow. Not at all

strange! If you will'--turning to her husband, so that I hardly heard

her words, until I caught--'Then everybody would have their rights, and

we should have no more trouble. Is it not, monsieur?' addressing me.

'If I were in England, I should imagine madame was speaking of the

reform bill, or the millennium,--but I am in ignorance.'

And just as I spoke, the great folding-doors were thrown open wide, and

every one started to their feet to greet a little old lady, leaning on

a thin black wand--and--

'Madame la Féemarraine,' was announced by a chorus of sweet shrill

voices.

And in a moment I was lying in the grass close by a hollow oak-tree,

with the slanting glory of the dawning day shining full in my face, and

thousands of little birds and delicate insects piping and warbling out

their welcome to the ruddy splendour.