Beyond the Inn there ran, or rather rambled, a long garden, the more
neglected part of which was grown with flowers, while the better-attended
portion was devoted to the cultivation of vegetables. Where the garden
ceased a little orchard of apple-trees, pear-trees, and plum-trees began,
and this orchard was followed by a small open space of grassed land which
joined the river. Here a diminutive landing-stage had been built, which
was now crazy enough with age and dilapidation, and attached to this
stage were a couple of ancient rowing-boats, against whose gaunt ribs the
ripples lapped. Sometimes this garden and orchard had their visitors: the
landlord and his friends would often smoke their pipes and drink their
wine under the shade of the trees, and even passing clients would
occasionally indulge themselves with the privilege of a stroll in the
untidy garden. But to-day the place was quite deserted--as desolate as a
garden in a dream. Every one who could go had gone to the fair, and those
travellers who paused to drink in passing took their liquor quickly and
hurried on to share in the fair's festivity. The landlord was kept busy
enough attending to those passers-by in the early part of the day, and,
now that the stream had ceased and custom slackened, he was glad enough
to take his ease in-doors and leave his garden to its loneliness.
When, therefore, Lagardere and Æsop entered the garden they found it as
quiet and as uninhabited as any pair of swordsmen could desire. They
walked in silence along the path between the flowers and the vegetables,
Lagardere only pausing for a moment to pluck a wild rose which he
proposed in the serenity of his confidence to present to Gabrielle, and
while he paused Æsop eyed him maliciously and amused himself by kicking
with his heel at a turnip and hacking it into fragments. Lagardere put
his flower into the lapel of his coat, and the pair resumed their silent
progress through the orchard till they came to a halt upon the
river-bank.
Lagardere looked about him and seemed pleased with what he saw. There was
no one in sight, either hard by or upon the opposite bank of the river,
and he felt that it might be taken for granted that there was no one
within hearing. He turned to Æsop and addressed him, very pleasantly:
"This, I think, will serve our purpose as well as any place in the
world."
Æsop grinned malignly. "It would suit my purpose," he said, "to get you
out of the way in any place in the world."
Lagardere laughed softly and shook his head. "One or other of us has to
be got out of the way," he said, quietly, "but I think, Master Æsop, that
I am not the man. I have been waiting a long time for this chance; but I
always felt sure that the time would bring the chance, and I mean to make
an end of you."
Æsop scowled. "You talk very big, Little Parisian," he said, "but you
will find that in me you deal with a fellow of another temper to those
poor hirelings you have been lucky enough to kill. They were common
rogues enough, that handled their swords like broom-handles. I was always
a master, and my skill has grown more perfect since we last met at
Caylus. I think you will regret this meeting, Captain Lagardere."
Now, Lagardere had been listening very patiently while Æsop spoke, and
while he listened a thought came into his mind which at first seemed too
fantastic for consideration, but which grew more tempting and more
entertainable with every second. To thrust Æsop from his path was one
thing, and a thing that must be done if Lagardere's life-purposes were to
be accomplished. But to get rid of Æsop and yet to use him--at once to
obliterate him and yet to recreate him, so that he should prove the most
deadly enemy of the base cause that he was paid to serve--here was a
scheme, a dream, that if it could be made a reality would be fruitful of
good uses. It was therefore with a strange smile that he listened while
Æsop menaced him with regret for the meeting, and it was with a strange
smile that he spoke:
"I do not think so," he answered, maturing his plan even while he talked,
and finding it the more feasible and the more pleasing. "You are a
haggard rascal, Master Æsop, and the world should have no use for you. I
believe that by what I am about to do I shall render the world and France
and myself a service. You are nothing more than a rabid wild beast, and
it is well to be quit of you." As he spoke he drew his sword and came on
guard.
Something in the composed manner and the mocking speech of Lagardere
seemed to bid Æsop pause. He let his weapon remain in its sheath and
began to parley.
"Come, come, Captain Lagardere," he began, "is it necessary, after all,
that we should quarrel? You have got Nevers's girl--there is no denying
that--but we do not want her. We have a girl of our own. Now I know well
enough, for I have not studied love books and read love books for
nothing," and he grinned hideously as he spoke, "that you are in love
with the girl you carry about with you. Well and good. How if we call a
truce, make a peace? You shall keep your girl, and do as you please with
her; we will produce our girl, and do as we please with her. You shall
have as much money as you want, I can promise that for the Prince of
Gonzague, and you can live in Madrid or where you please with your pretty
minion. Make a bargain, man, and shake hands on it."
Lagardere eyed the hunchback with something of the compassion and
curiosity of a surgeon about to deal with an ugly case. He saw now his
enemy's hand and the strength of his enemy's cards and the cleverness of
his enemy's plan, and was not in the least abashed by its audacity or his
own isolation.
"Master Æsop," he said, briefly, "if it ever came to pass that I should
find myself making terms or shaking hands with such as you, or the knave
that uses you for his base purpose, I should very swiftly go and hang
myself, I should be so ashamed of my own bad company. We have talked long
enough; it is time for action." He saluted quickly as he spoke, according
to the code of the fencing-schools.
And Æsop, in answer to the challenge, drew his own sword and answered the
salutation. "Gallant captain," he sneered, "I have been in training for
this chance these many years, and I think I will teach you to weep for
your heroics." As he spoke he came on guard, and the blades met.
The place that had been chosen for the combat was suitable enough, quite
apart from its solitude. The morning air was clear and even; the sun's
height caused no diverting rays to disturb either adversary; the grass
was smooth and supple to the feet; there was ample ground to break in all
directions.
The moment that Lagardere's steel touched that of Æsop's, he knew that
Æsop's boast had not been made in vain. Though it was a long time now
since that afternoon in the frontier Inn when he and Æsop had joined
blades before, he remembered the time well enough to appreciate the
difference between the sword he then encountered and the sword he
encountered now. Clearly Æsop had spoken the truth when he had talked of
his daily practice and his steady advance towards perfection. But, and
Lagardere smiled as he remembered this, Æsop had forgotten or overlooked
the possibility that Lagardere's own sword-play would improve with
time--that Lagardere's own sword-play was little likely to rust for lack
of usage.
The few minutes that followed upon the encounter of the hostile steels
were minutes of sheer enjoyment to Lagardere. Æsop was a worthy
antagonist, that he frankly admitted from the first, and he wished, as he
fought, that he could divide his personality and admire, as a spectator,
the passage at arms between two such champions. Of the result, from the
first, Lagardere had not the slightest doubt. He was honestly convinced,
by his simple logic of steel, that it was his mission to avenge Nevers
and to expiate his murder. He was, as it were, a kind of seventeenth
century crusader, with a sealed and sacred mission to follow; and while,
as a stout-hearted and honest soldier of fortune, he had no more
hesitation about killing a venomous thing like Æsop than he would have
had about killing a snake, he was in this special instance exulted by the
belief that in killing one of the men of the moat of Caylus his sword was
the sword of justice, his sword was the sword of God.
If, therefore, it was soon plain to him that the boast of the hunchback
was true enough, and that his skill with his weapon had greatly bettered
in the years that had elapsed since their previous encounter, Lagardere
was rejoiced to find it so, as it gave a greater difficulty and a greater
honor to his achievement. It was clear, too, from the expression on
Æsop's face, after the first few instants of the engagement, that he was
made aware that his skill was not as the skill of Lagardere. He fought
desperately, and yet warily, knowing that he was fighting for his life,
and trying without success every cunning trick that he had learned in the
fencing-schools of Spain. The thrust of Nevers he did not attempt, for of
that he knew Lagardere commanded the parry, but there were other thrusts
on which he relied to gain the victory, and each of these he tried in
succession, only to be baffled by Lagardere's instinctive steel.
Lagardere, watching him while they fought, hated his adversary for his
own sake apart from his complicity in the crime of Caylus. Æsop was the
incarnation of everything that was detestable in the eyes of a man like
Lagardere. A splendid swordsman, his sword was always lightly sold to
evil causes. He prostituted the noble weapon that Lagardere idolized to
the service of the assassin, the advantage of the bully, and the revenge
of the coward. He would have felt no scruple about slaying him, even if
Æsop had not been, as now he was, a dangerous and unexpected enemy in his
path.
Æsop, unable to make Lagardere break ground, and unable to get within
Lagardere's guard, now began to taunt his antagonist savagely, calling
him a child-stealer and a woman-wronger, with other foul terms of abuse
that rolled glibly from his lips in the ugliness of his rage and fear.
Lagardere listened with his quiet smile, and when the hunchback made a
pause he answered him with scornful good-humor. "You waste your breath,
Master Æsop," he said, "and you should be saving it for your prayers, if
you know any, or for your fighting wind, if there is nothing of salvation
in you. You are a very base knave. I do not think you ever did an honest,
a kindly, or a generous deed in your life. I know that you have done many
vile things, and would do more if time were given to you; but the time is
denied, Master Æsop, and yet you may serve a good cause in your death."
Even as he spoke Lagardere's tranquillity of defence suddenly changed
into rapidity of attack. His blade leaped forward, made sudden swift
movements which the bravo strove in vain to parry, and then Æsop dropped
his sword and fell heavily upon the grass. He was dead, dead of the
thrust in the face, exactly between the eyes, the thrust of Nevers.
Lagardere leaned over his dead enemy and smiled. His account against the
assassins of Caylus was being slowly paid; but never had any item of that
account been annulled with less regret. The others--Staupitz, Saldagno,
Pinto, and the rest--had been ruffianly creatures enough, but there was
a kind of honesty, a measure of courage in their ruffianism. They were,
at least some of them, good-hearted in their way, true to their comrades
and their leaders; but of the ignoble wretch that now lay a huddle of
black at his feet, Lagardere knew nothing that was not loathsome, and he
knew much of Master Æsop.
Lagardere stooped and gathered a handful of grass, wiped his sword and
sheathed it.
"Yes," he said, apostrophizing the dead body, "you shall serve a good
cause now, Master Æsop, if you have never served a good cause yet."
He looked anxiously about him as he spoke to make sure that the solitude
was still undisturbed. There was not a human being within sight on either
bank of the river. This quiet, this isolation, were very welcome to his
temper just then, for the purpose that had come into Lagardere's mind at
the commencement of the combat had matured, had ripened during its course
into a feasible plan. It had its risks, but what did that matter in an
enterprise that was all risk; and if it succeeded, as, thanks to its very
daring, it might succeed, it promised a magnificent reward. That it
involved the despoiling of a dead body in no way harassed Lagardere. He
was never one to let himself be squeamish over trifles where a great
cause was at stake, and, though much that was inevitable to the success
of his scheme was repellent to him, he choked down his disgust and faced
his duty with a smile. Quickly he dragged the body of his dead enemy
into the shelter and seclusion of the orchard-trees. There, rolling Æsop
on his face, he proceeded nimbly and dexterously to strip his clothes
from his body. Soon the black coat, black vest, black breeches, black
stockings, black boots, and black hat lay in a pile of sable raiment on
the orchard grass. As he garnered his spoil, a little book dropped from
the pocket of the black coat and lay upon the grass. Lagardere picked it
up and opened it with a look of curiosity that speedily changed to one of
aversion, for the book was a copy in Italian of the _Luxurious Sonnets_
of Messer Pietro Arentino, which Lagardere, who knew Italian, found at a
glance to be in no way to his taste, and the little book had pictures in
it which pleased him still less. With a grunt of disgust at this strange
proof of the dead man's taste in literature, Lagardere stepped to the
edge of the orchard, and, holding the volume in his finger and thumb,
pitched it over the open space into the river, where it sank. Having thus
easily got rid of the book, Lagardere began to cast about him for some
way to dispose of the body.
The boats that lay alongside of the little landing-stage caught his eye.
Lifting Master Æsop's corpse from the ground, he trailed it to the crazy
structure, and placed it in the oldest and most ramshackle of the two
weather-worn vessels. After untying the rope that fastened the boat to
its wharf, Lagardere caught up a boat-hook that lay hard by, and, raising
it as if it were a spear, he drove it with all his strength against the
bottom of the boat and knocked a ragged hole in its rotting timbers.
Then, with a vigorous push, he sent the boat out upon the smooth, swift
river.
The vigor of its impetus carried the boat nearly out to the middle of the
stream before the river could take advantage of the leak. Then, in a few
minutes, Lagardere saw the strangely burdened craft slowly sink and
finally settle beneath the surface of the stream.
When the boat and its burden were out of sight, and the water ran as
smoothly as if it were troubled with no such secret, Lagardere turned,
and, gathering up the garments of his antagonist as a Homeric hero would
have collected his fallen enemy's armor, rolled them into as small a
bundle as possible, and, putting them under his arm, made his way
cautiously back to the Inn.
He gained its shelter unperceived. Unperceived and noiselessly he
ascended the stairs which led to his room, and, opening the door, flung
his bundle upon the ground. He then closed the door again, and, going a
little farther down the corridor, knocked at an adjoining door, which
immediately opened, and Gabrielle stood before him looking pale and
anxious. Lagardere smiled cheerfully at her, and, taking from his coat
the white rose which he had plucked in the garden, offered it to her.
The girl caught it and pressed it to her lips, and then asked, eagerly:
"The man--where is the man? What has become of him?"
Lagardere affected an air of surprise, and then, with the manner of one
who thought the matter of no importance, answered her: "You mean my
friend in black who spoke to me just now?"