“Mademoiselle,” he said with some audacity, “if I am to follow M. le

Duc’s example in salutation to Mme de Trélan, after the hand comes . . .

the cheek. But there, too, I would be content with the left!”

“That also,” said Marthe with dignity, “is reserved for someone else!”

And she provokingly held it up to her brother, who kissed her on both.

“Did I hear you singing _Sur le Seuil_ just now, ma petite?” he

enquired. “That was why you never heard us riding up. You were making

such a to-do among those low notes, for Death battering on the gate,

that he really might have been battering for all you heard.”

But, presently, with a little wise smile, Artamène drifted out of the

salon. He went into the garden and climbed up into an apple tree which

he knew of, where he could lie at his ease in a fork and try some of the

small green apples. “Maman and I,” he thought, “are de trop in this

establishment. M. le Marquis—his pardon, M. le Duc—and his

resuscitated spouse (who is worthy of him) in the arbour, Roland and

Marthe in the salon . . . Je me fais hermite.”

But his departure had not greatly facilitated matters, for presently Mme

de la Vergne came in and carried off Marthe on some business concerned

with the nourishment of the gentlemen who had descended on her, and a

moment or two later, when Roland stood irresolute and alone by the

window, he perceived his leader coming in search of his hostess.

“Go and talk to Mme de Trélan, my boy,” said the Duc. “She is in the

arbour. I imagine you still have memories of Mirabel to discuss.”

So Roland went to the arbour, where Valentine was, and having at her

request fetched her embroidery, sat himself down precariously at her

feet on an overturned wateringpot.

“Madame, I have a grievance against M. le Duc,” he began. “I must lay it

before you, for you are the only person who can do anything for me in

the matter.”

Valentine looked up. “What is it, my child?”

“My locket!” said Roland. “The locket you gave me. He has never returned

it since that night!”

“Have you ever asked him?”

Roland shook his head, and his eyes said plainly who he proposed should

perform that office. Valentine met them—and her needle slipped. The

memory of another garden came back to her. He _was_ like Gaston in just

that light, when he wore just that expression. . . .

“Blood!” cried the young man. “Madame, you are quite pale! If you would

allow me——” And out came his handkerchief.

She shook her head, and twisted her own round the scratch, which had

already flecked the silk of the scarf. Suppose her first impression had

been correct after all? Well, it was part of the pain of the past,

stretching onwards, which she must face. And did it hurt so much in this

wonderful present? But her look was grave when she said lightly, “Is

there not some other person’s locket you would prefer to the

concierge’s, Roland?”

He flushed a little. “Even if she would have me, if Mme de la Vergne and

her brother—and my grandfather—would give their consents, I am more or

less penniless, Madame. My estates were sequestrated when my father died

two years ago.”

His father! Her heart leapt up again. And yet . . . Was it possible that

she _wished_ he were Gaston’s son?

“Sequestrated by the Government, I suppose? You never told me that.

Where are they, Roland—in Brittany also?”

“No, Madame; right down in the south, near Avignon.”

Quite abruptly the Duchesse de Trélan stood up, dropping the scarf; and

the youth, trying to follow her example with the alacrity which

politeness demanded, all but rolled off the wateringcan. And Valentine

apologised. “I suddenly felt it too hot here. I will go under the trees,

I think.”

Near Avignon! So was Saint-Chamans. She really felt faint, and yet it

was not exactly with distaste. But she must know. And since nothing, not

even _that_, had power to come between them now she would ask Gaston

himself at the first opportunity. She did not even feel that she must

have time to reflect on this.

But perhaps Gaston meant to tell her of his own free will . . .

Then she saw him and Marthe coming that way through the sunshine, under

the apple trees, and she went towards him, followed by Roland. And in

his hermitage the Chevalier de la Vergne, making a wry face over a sour

apple, roused himself to peer down at the sound of voices.

“Everything that there is of a family party!” he observed softly. And

with that, judging it time to discover himself, he dropped down from his

tree and joined the quartet.

“Oh, there you are, young gentleman,” remarked M. de Trélan.

“Mademoiselle and I have been looking for you. How far did you say it

was to the sea, Mademoiselle?”

“About five miles, Monsieur le Duc.”

“Then you shall lend me your horse after déjeuner, Artamène, and Mme de

Trélan shall ride Zéphyr. He prefers to carry a lady, does he not,

Mademoiselle?”

“I could not vouch for that, Monsieur le Duc. He has been more honoured

since he ceased to do so.”

“You perhaps have not had time to realise, Valentine,” said Gaston,

addressing his wife with a smile creeping round his mouth, “that, as in

Eastern countries—and not only there, I fancy—where an accused,

fearing an adverse judgment, is prompt to send a substantial present to

the judge beforehand, so Zéphyr (himself of Eastern origin) came to me

as a . . . bribe . . . and my hands, I fear, are somewhat stained by

corruption.”

“How is that?” asked the Duchesse, glancing from her husband to the

laughing girl.

“But my lips, by the same token, are sealed,” finished M. de Trélan.

“Mesdames, Messieurs, le déjeuner est servi,” announced the recently

promoted Séraphin, approaching with the gait of a rustic and the livery

of a major-domo.

CHAPTER II

THE YELLOW POPPY

So Gaston and Valentine rode alone to the sea.

They went at first through deep lanes, scarcely wide enough to ride

abreast, where they lost sight of their goal, then, mounting a rise of

sandy turf, came on it spread gloriously before them. A fresh breeze was

blowing off the land, and the water was of a hundred vivid, changing

hues—the clearest green, purple that was almost rose, and blue that was

more than the blue of heaven. It was flecked with myriad little tips of

foam that looked like sea-birds, for ever vanishing and reappearing, and

the offshore wind ran over it in sudden violent caresses. Far out, it

was the colour of a distant wood of hyacinths.

They checked their horses. Valentine drew a long breath before the

pulsating wonder of it, the freedom and the joy. She stretched out her

hand in silence to her husband, and he took it as simply; so they sat on

their horses hand in hand like two children at their first sight of the

ocean.

Then he suggested their going down to the shore, and they went down

among the shelving dunes, their horses’ hoofs sinking deep in the loose

blown sand. At the verge were the stem and ribs of an abandoned boat,

conveniently embedded there, to which they could tether their horses,

and Gaston, dismounting, did so and held out his arms to her. But Zéphyr

whinnied after them; sand and rotting timbers pleased him not.

Down here, on the shore itself, the sandhills gave some shelter, and

they could walk in comfort, especially when they went nearer to the

water where the sand was firm and ribbed. Despite the offshore wind, the

curling waves shook off from their edges a breeze of their own, the

essence of the sea. Clinging to her husband’s arm, Valentine leant her

head against his shoulder and half closed her eyes.

“Here,” he said softly, looking down at her, “here one forgets wars and

anxieties, the past and the future—everything but the present. We were

right to come.”

The breeze of the sea’s own seemed to freshen. Down here one could not

see in the same way as from the verge above the whole extent of that

moving field of rapture, all the rainbow thoughts that ran over its

surface, but one was nearer to its incommunicable magic.

“You will be cold, my darling. Let us walk along by the waves.”

The little seas, tumbling in foam at their feet, bending in mock homage

before them, racing slily to entrap them, laughed their undying laugh

whose meaning the heart of man is not deep enough to seize. Starfish,

fluted shells, trails of seaweed, all their careless treasures were

displayed there. . . . They would laugh with just the same fresh joy

to-morrow . . . when Gaston would be here no longer . . . O, terrible,

that eternal youth and indifference!

“Gaston,” she said, gripping his arm more closely, “you are not going

alone to La Jonchère, surely? You spoke of sending the young men back.”

“No, my heart,” said he, putting his hand over hers. “I am not going

alone. M. du Ménars and another officer will meet me to-morrow on the

road, with an escort as well. When we meet I shall send my aides-de-camp

back to the Clos-aux-Grives. That was all I meant.”

A few paces more, and he added, “Unless I take one of them with me to La

Jonchère in order to use him as a messenger to you. Which of them, in

that case, would you rather have as Mercury?”

Why did he ask her that? She forgot the sea and glanced at him, but he

was looking at the waves.

She answered as she would have answered in any case. “I would rather

have Roland. He is a charming boy . . . I was already fond of him at

Mirabel.” If Gaston meant to tell her without being asked, which was her

great hope, she would make it as easy as possible for him. She paused,

and went on lightly, “Mme de la Vergne, however, might prefer her own

son. As for Marthe . . . well, I know Roland’s mind at least on that

matter.”

Her husband stopped in his walk. “Valentine,” he said, turning his head

towards her, “I have something to tell you about Roland.”

She stopped too, and loosed his arm. For a moment her heart seemed to

pause also. He had paled a little, his voice was very grave and not free

from difficulty, but he did not try to escape her gaze. On the contrary

he looked straight at her.

(“_I have something to tell you about Roland!_” echoed the waves,

laughing.)

And then Valentine de Trélan knew that she wanted to spare him the

explicit avowal, because she saw how much it would cost him to utter to

her face what was, by implication, an insult to her—though an insult

twenty years old.

“I guessed it, Gaston,” she said, very quietly. “But I hoped that you

would tell me. It is right that I should know . . . but I want to learn

nothing further . . . I only wished it not to lie, unspoken, between

us. . . . Now we need never speak of it again, save as it affects the

boy himself.”

“I hate that you should know it,” he said with emotion. “And yet I hated

even more to keep you in ignorance. I thought, too, that you might

guess, and that was worse . . . Valentine, Valentine, I cannot wish it

undone, because I love him . . . but if only I need not have given you

this pain!”

Yet he was suffering more than she; she knew that. Once again, as in the

arbour this morning, it came to her as strange that she should feel it

so little. And, only eager for the moment to allay the deep distress in

his eyes and voice, she put her hands on his arm. “It does not pain me

now, Gaston. No, no, believe me! I am speaking the truth! It is so long

ago, in that other life which we have forgotten. Why remember it now, in

this?”

He caught her hands and raised them to his lips. “Generous! generous!”

he murmured. “Why must I choose to-day to wound you so?”

“But you have chosen the right day, the right place!” she cried. The

vanishing of the dread that he might not tell her had almost irradiated

her. “The . . . the past—see, it can be forgotten, as a pebble would

be, cast into those great waters . . . and that there is no pain

now—_I_ love him, too. Will not that convince you, my husband?”

Perhaps it did. He bowed his forehead silently upon her hands as he held

them.

“But as for guessing,” she went on, “—O Gaston, my very dear, it is

over now—as for guessing, the first moment that I saw him, lying in the

garden at Mirabel, I was startled . . . but I thought it was

imagination. And I grew so fond of him in those few days, innocent and

gallant as he was. Yet I put the idea away at once because . . . because

he had not your eyes . . . and now, after all . . .” She stopped; speech

was suddenly failing her. “O Gaston,” she said in a breaking whisper,

“Gaston, if only he had _mine_!”

And pulling her hands away she put them before her own face, weeping.

“My darling, my darling!” he cried, and strained her in his arms, saying

no more than that, beyond speech indeed himself, pierced once more by

the memory of his own words at their parting, which came back even now

to stab him. But as, with her face covered, she wept upon his heart, he

knew that it was not of his unworthy reproach that she was thinking.

Hers was a deeper and more mysterious pain. It seemed so to throb

through her as he held her, there on the sandy shore, that the very

waves were full of it; and he could do nothing save hold her more

tenderly still, and kiss the yet beautiful hair.

After a little she ceased to sob, and dried her eyes.

“Only one thing more,” she said unsteadily. “Does Roland know?”

“I gave my word to his grandfather that I would not tell him before he

was one-and-twenty. I have tried to keep it in the spirit as well as in

the letter. I do not think he guesses. What others may guess I do not

know.”

“It is plain,” said Valentine, “that he worships you. But they all do

that, those young men—and with reason.”

They were still standing at the edge of the waves when she put the seal

on her forgiveness. For she said, looking at him with her clear eyes,

“Gaston, when I see him and speak with him I am glad that he is your

son!”

* * * * *

Later on they sat at the base of the sandhills, and spoke of many

things—even of M. de Brencourt, so sore a subject to her husband that,

till now, Valentine had scarcely dared to mention the Comte’s name.

Particularly had this been the case since he had learnt, at the

Clos-aux-Grives, of the lie told at Mirabel about his own death. Most of

the tale of treachery Valentine had gleaned, not from Gaston at all, but

from the Abbé Chassin. Yet it seemed to her a better thing that Gaston

should say openly now, as with cold passion he did, “_He took my hand

after I had gone out with him, and yet went on with the worst treason of

all! It is impossible for a man to forgive an act so absolutely base!_”

than that he should nurse his just resentment in secret and never speak

of it. But though through the Comte de Brencourt she had so nearly lost

him before ever he was found, though now, realising it afresh, she

caught to her breast the arm which the false comrade had pierced, this

day and place seemed to spread healing hands even over that madness and

treachery. And when she looked at him, holding him thus, the frown went

from Gaston’s brow, and adding, “At least, then, I will try to forget,”

he gave her a long kiss.

But soon, too soon, it was time to return. The wind was dropping; the

gulls which had been soaring high on its strength were now beginning to

ride on the little waves, or to stalk along by the edge of the tide. The

brief hour was over, the hour that seemed more particularly set between

the old life and the new, in this place of wild air and rapture, where

the years of pain and surmise were forgotten, and the hazard of the

sword and what the future might bring yet unweighed. It was time to go.

And as, very close together, the two went slowly along the dry sand at

the bottom of the dunes, they saw at a little distance a small patch of

colour there—a pool of faint green, touched with blots of pale, swaying

yellow that caught and held the sunlight. They came to it.

“Flowers even here!” exclaimed Valentine.

It was the bride of the waves, the beautiful yellow sea-poppy, that

blossoms so late, and is so soon scattered. They both stood and looked

down at it, not without wonder, as those who come on a jewel in a dusty

place—at the strong, abundant, deeply-cut foliage, silvery green in the

sunset, fashioned to defy wind and wave, that had yet given birth to

such an ethereal marvel of a flower, whose every petal was a miracle of

delicacy, a flower so frail that a breath could put out its cup of

light. Already the plant at their feet bore the tokens of the passing of

many of its blossoms, in the long curving horns, treasures of next

year’s promise, which had succeeded the fallen petals.

Valentine, who had never seen the horned poppy before, knelt down by it.

“How wonderful to bloom so late, and in so inclement a place!” she said.

“Look how the wind beats on these flowers!”

“And yet they do not fall,” said her husband. “You shall give me one, my

dearest heart, for this our second betrothal.”

So she plucked a poppy and held it up to him. It seemed almost to have

light in itself, like a fragile golden lamp half enclosed between the

open, guarding hands of its leaves. He took it, and bending, kissed the

hand that gave it him. Next moment, either because it was caught by a

puff of wind, or because its brief life was already over, he held

nothing in his hand but the stem with its sturdy foliage, and the pistil

set within its fringe of orange-yellow stamens. The four lovely shining

petals were blown away. One only rested over his heart, caught there on

the cross of white and gold.

Valentine turned pale. What had suggested to her that this wonder was

like their love, so late in blossoming, so little favoured in its

surroundings, so exquisite . . . and, perhaps, so short-lived?

“Wait, and I will give you another,” she said with a rather forced

gaiety. “I will choose a younger flower this time.”

“No, no,” cried Gaston de Trélan. “I want no other.” And, gently taking

off the bright, clinging thing from his breast and closing it in his

hand, he stooped and recovered the other three—two from the sand, the

fourth from Valentine’s habit, and lifted them to his lips. At the base

of each pale golden petal was the faintest stain. Then he put them

carefully, almost reverently away in a little leather case, and replaced

it inside his uniform.

“You look quite white, my darling!” he exclaimed, catching sight of her

face as she rose. “What is the matter?”

But she would not tell him; she only came for the last time in that

place into the strong circle of his arms. Her cheek rested where the

poppy petal had lain, on the guerdon of valour; against her side she

felt the hilt of his sword—a sweet discomfort.

“O Gaston, my heart, my only love! It was worth those years—this hour!

Only, with so much happiness upon me, I think I would rather die

to-day.”

“Are you afraid?” he asked in a low voice, holding her as if he meant to

hold her for ever. “Are you afraid, my saint, my strong saint? I am not.

This place that we have come to, after such bitter wanderings, shall

hold us always now—be sure of it—in life or death!”

And though the yellow poppy shone and shivered at their feet—the

sea-poppy that flowers so late and is so soon scattered—she knew that

it was true.

CHAPTER III

THE COST OF ANSWERED PRAYER

So it was Roland, now openly betrothed to Marthe, who came to La Vergne

a week later, bringing Gaston’s letter announcing that the die was cast,

and it was Roland who told Valentine more fully of the great gathering

of Royalist chiefs at La Jonchère, surrounded by almost inaccessible

forest, and guarded by more than a thousand peasants. The young man,

though not himself admitted to the conferences, had seen some of the

leaders, Châtillon and Bourmont and La Prévalaye and Sol de Grisolles,

and d’Autichamp the Vendean, and Georges Cadoudal whom he had missed at

Hennebont. Their three days of deliberation had resulted in a decision

for a general levy of arms in the West. The date fixed was the fifteenth

of October. “Not very long to wait, Madame!” said Hermes

enthusiastically.

No, for Gaston’s wife the time was all too short till the clash of

arms,—but all too long till his promised visit. For in his letter he

had said that before the hour of action broke he should, please God,

come and show her all that was in his heart for her. And Valentine

looked at the words every day, as September, full of rumours, ripened

towards October.

In the first week in October came the news that fighting had already

begun in Northern Brittany, and with success, for the Chevalier de la

Nougarède, “Achille le brun,” had hardly got back from La Jonchère than

he raised the standard, and beat, at Argentré, the Republican general

Schildt who had come out of Rennes to attack him. And even before that

d’Andigné, the Comte de Châtillon’s very competent chief of staff, had

inflicted a severe little defeat at Noyant on eight hundred of the old,

tried soldiers who had formed part of the garrison of Milan.

On the other hand there was bad news from Holland, where Brune had

defeated the allied Anglo-Russian forces of the Texel expedition on

September 19; and worse from Switzerland, where, six days later, Masséna

inflicted such a severe defeat on Korsakoff at Zurich that Suwaroff,

coming from Italy to join his countryman, had difficulty in saving his

own army. Valentine was uneasy at these tidings of the Republic’s

triumph on a large scale, but neither she nor the other two women fully

comprehended how they isolated the Royalists of the West. And though she

wondered why the forty-five thousand English and Russians could not have

been landed directly on the soil of France, in Brittany or Vendée,

instead of in Holland, she could not foresee that a little later Brune’s

whole army, set free by the capitulation of Alkmaar, would be employed

against the Chouans. She worked at the last golden fleur-de-lys on

Gaston’s scarf, and helped Mme de la Vergne and Marthe in their

household employments and in the orchard, for there were fewer men than

ever, Séraphin and two of the farm boys having gone to join the Lilies.

And once or twice, in that St. Luke’s summer come before its time, she

found her steps turning towards the sea. She went there twice with

Marthe. She would have liked to go there again with Gaston, but she knew

that desire unlikely of fulfilment. And the sea was so changed—calm

with an unearthly calm; shining with a pure, still radiance, and warded

by great slow-moving fleets of cloud galleons like mother-of-pearl, that

were reflected, far-gleaming, in the water over which they sailed. Yes,

this October sea was as far removed from a tranquil blue sea of summer

as from that beautiful September sea, where there had been wind and

rainbow shadows—and the yellow poppy, which bloomed no longer. There

shone instead the golden leaves of the poplars at La Vergne, incredibly

yellow against the distant sea, on the one or two days that the sea had

colour. But mostly it was of that indescribable hue of nacre.

And when would Gaston come?

When he did come Valentine would have given everything in the world that

he had not.

Old Colette, the cook, who had gone to the tiny village for her

marketing, came back on one of these still mornings rather flustered,

reporting that there were soldiers there. It was a most startling as

well as a most unpleasant novelty. In none of the previous risings had

Blues ever been seen at La Vergne. The ancient woman at first reported

the invaders to be about a hundred; later she came down to a dozen.

But half that number could terrorise the place. And why were they there?

The three ladies at the château had nothing to hide—as yet, nothing,

for themselves, to fear; nevertheless they were in a fever. If word

could only be sent to the “Marquis de Kersaint” in case he were on his

road! But word could not be sent. Valentine comforted herself and them

by the assurance that he would not come without an escort, and would

therefore have nothing to fear from a handful of Blues. He would never

come alone.

But that was precisely what her husband did, riding in quietly to the

stable-yard at dusk of that October day, and, finding no one there,

putting up his horse with his own hands. And Marthe, hearing unwonted

sounds, ran out from the kitchen and found him in the act, with Zéphyr

very much at home, and pulling down hay from his old rack.

“O, Monsieur le Duc! Monsieur le Duc!” she cried.

“Mademoiselle,” said Gaston, laughing, “I do indeed apologise for making

free of your provender without permission. May I plead that it is for

your own horse?”

She darted at him while Zéphyr whinnied for recognition. “Why did you

choose to-day to come, Monsieur de Trélan? We have been so praying that

you would not. Do not say that you are alone, unescorted! For . . . did

you not know it? . . . there are soldiers in the village!”

There was a moment’s silence. “No, I did not know it,” said the Duc

quietly. “Had I known, I should not have come alone. But I did not enter

the village, so they will not have seen me.” He paused, passing his hand

once or twice over Zéphyr’s neck, and said in a voice which, despite

himself, revealed how intensely he disliked the idea, “I do not wish to

involve you in unpleasantness. Perhaps the simplest thing would be to

ride away again at once.”

Marthe shook her head. Now that he was here, risk or no risk, he must

see his wife. Perhaps indeed there was greater risk in going back.

“You must stay,” she said. “And we have taken certain precautions. Come

to the house, Monsieur le Duc, and I will show you, even before you see

Mme de Trélan.”

“And Zéphyr—if they should search? He becomes your horse once more, I

suppose? But my saddle, Mademoiselle, what of that? Unless you can

persuade them that you always use a man’s!”

“Here is mine quite near,” she said, pointing to it, “and it fits him,

of course. Yours—it has holsters, too!—we must hide in the loft.” They

hid it, and in a few minutes she was showing M. de Trélan the old

hiding-place in the dining-room. “It is very ingenious, the way one gets

there,” she added.

It _was_ very ingenious. Against the painted panels stood a massive

sideboard which four men could scarcely have stirred from its place. But

when Marthe touched a spring a section of it turned upon itself and gave

access to a tiny room behind, whose door formed part of the panelling.

“A very charming little retreat,” observed the Duc, smiling. “But I hope

that you do not expect me to deprive myself of your society,

Mademoiselle, by spending all my time in there?”

“We should be the last to wish to banish you, Monsieur. But there it is

ready, if you—get tired of us! Yet I think you have run all the risk

you are likely to run . . . unless they _know_.”

“That, I think, is impossible,” said Gaston. And then Valentine,

attracted by voices, entered. Marthe slipped out with the speed of a

swallow.

“O my darling, my darling, why have you come?” was her first word.

“Ma foi,” returned her husband gaily, as he kissed her, “apparently to

be put aside, like the bread, in that sort of garde-manger there—at

least that is the fate Mlle Marthe designs for me. It is not my

intention, however.”

“Gaston, you should not have come!” she repeated.

“Chère amie, what a greeting. Shall I go again?”

“No, no!” She clung to his arm. “You did not know, of course!”

“No,” he said more gravely, “I did not know. It would not have been

right for me to come if I had known.” Then he looked at her and said

with deliberation, “I am only thankful that I did not know!”

They had all of them that in the blood which responds to the stimulus of

danger, and supper, in the room whence the hiding-place was so easily

accessible, was a cheerful meal. During its course news arrived that the

soldiers had left the village altogether. So they went with light hearts

into the salon, and there the leader of Finistère told the three ladies

what in a few days they would divine for themselves, the outline of the

main plan of campaign, and why what seemed the hazardous plan of

attacking large towns instead of small was the better. For in the small

towns, violently anti-royalist as they were, the whole population was

armed, and the walls and palisades loopholed, so that the losses

involved in the capture of such positions, without artillery, would be

too heavy to be worth incurring. On the other hand the large towns were

often insufficiently garrisoned for their size, opinion therein was more

moderate, sometimes secretly favourable, and even an unsuccessful attack

would benefit the Royalists, since it would draw off the Republican

troops from the country districts.

“It is a good thing that we are going to begin fighting in earnest,” he

concluded, “for soon I shall not be able to hold in my followers. Do you

know what Lucien and Roland did the other day for a wager—strolled, in

full uniform, through the streets of Lanvennec in broad daylight! The

Republicans were just changing guard, and were, I fancy, too much

petrified by their audacity to take in what was happening. Anyhow my

young sparks had completed their promenade before the chase began. It

was _I_ who had them arrested.”

He had barely finished the story when steps came flying down the

passage, the door was unceremoniously opened, and Marthe’s maid,

shutting it behind her, stood there panting. “Soldiers!” she gasped,

“they are in the house . . . some in the garden . . . they are coming

here now.” Indeed, through the closed door could clearly be heard

approaching feet and the clank of spurs—feet that cut off the

possibility of swift retreat to the cachette in the dining-room. In

another moment their owners would be in the salon.

Valentine, turning quite white, went to her husband’s side, and Gaston,

who had jumped up, looked quickly round the room. “The window,” he

suggested; but at the same moment came a blow on the shutters outside.

“No, no!” exclaimed Marthe, as pale as Mme de Trélan. “Behind you—the

hangings!” And she all but pushed him to the wall, parted the hangings

of woven Indian stuff, and with her little hands drew them hastily over

him again. Then she ran to the long window, on which repeated blows were

raining. Mme de la Vergne, nervous but collected, went to the door. And

Valentine was left by the hearth to see that Marthe’s work was not

completed. For under the thin gay riot of branches, birds and flowers

that concealed him, were only too plainly visible Gaston’s boots—the

hangings did not quite reach the floor. It seemed to her that in that

second she knew the concentrated anguish of a lifetime—for Marthe’s

quick wit had been right; it was the only possible place in the room.

Yet she had seized a brocaded cushion from the sofa, had cast it down

against the hangings on her husband’s feet as though it had fallen

there, and, placing a low chair in front of it, had herself sat down as

a living screen, all before the door actually opened and the Republican

officer and his men came in.

* * * * *

If the search had been anything but perfunctory, Gaston de Trélan must

have been discovered. But the officer, it was obvious, had no idea whom

the Château de la Vergne was harbouring, nor indeed, that it was

specifically harbouring anybody, and he was almost apologetic at

disturbing the ladies. But—orders were orders. Round the salon,

therefore, he merely took a long glance, and when they had searched the

rest of the house with about the same particularity, the Blues went

away, and the inmates of the château could sleep in perfect security.

But not Valentine. For all her courage and resource she came near

breaking down when she was at last alone with her husband.

“I feel as if I should never sleep again!” she said, pressing the palms

of her hands over her eyes. “I see nothing but those men’s faces and the

way they looked round the room. Gaston, Gaston, I am not fit to be your

wife!”

“Never would I have come,” said he remorsefully, holding her in his arms

as they stood by the hearth in her room, “never would I have come had I

known it would be to put you to such strain!”

“Gaston, is it true that the Royalists have no artillery?”

“Yes,” he replied unwillingly.

“And these Republican victories in Holland and Switzerland—are they not

very unfortunate?”

“They are not fortunate, certainly. But the greater the odds, the

greater the glory.”

“Gaston, I . . . I do not think I can let you go!”

To this he said nothing, but very tenderly kissed her hair, as he held

her. And now she began to see the price that every woman pays who stands

where she did.

“You know,” she said, after a pause, “I think I must be, ordinarily,

without imagination. I think of you and danger always, every moment that

I breathe, but they never seem together, and only to-night, when danger

was in the room with you and I sat there pretending to sew—thank God it

was not your scarf that I had—thinking every moment that one of them

would pick up that cushion and you would be dragged out—it was only

then that I realised what danger is. . . .”

But all night she realised it, and all night, whether she woke, or slept

in snatches, she saw the price that she must pay, although he was safe

for the moment at her side. Gaston, too, lay long awake, and they

talked; but he must rise and ride away before sunrise, and, campaigning

having given him the gift of sleep at will, after a while he slept.

He could sleep, yes; for though reluctant to leave her he was going to

what he desired, to what she—strange irony—had prayed, years ago, that

he might desire—a man’s work, a man’s hazards, a man’s endurances. Long

unanswered, that slow prayer of hers had found ample fulfilment now

. . . and she was beginning to learn the cost of its realisation. His

hand held at last the hilt of a blade that was worthy of him—but its

point was in her heart.

Once in her torment she slipped out of bed and wandered distractedly

round the dark room. She went, without conscious purpose, towards the

deep recessed window, and, feeling her way to the curtains, met on the

window-seat something long and hard and cold. Her fingers told her that

it was Gaston’s sword, which he had laid there. And, hating it and

loving it at once, she knelt down and laid her forehead against the

scabbard. “Bring him back to me! bring him back!” But what could a sword

do against a bullet?

Valentine looked out. The night had been dull and cloudy, but it was now

getting towards dawn. She had a desire to see Gaston more clearly, and,

leaving the curtain half drawn, she went back towards the bed. Then she

wished she had left the window veiled. In that grey light how pale he

looked, lying there motionless in the ancient bed, whose twisted posts

recalled the great candlesticks she had set out at Mirabel for the

requiem mass that was never said. Ah, what horrible presentiments seized

one in this wan, uncourageous hour! She had a yearning to wake him, to

hear him speak; she even pressed her hand over her mouth as she stood

there by him lest she should do it, but all the time she knew that an

impulse such as that had no chance against the deep, protective instinct

which immediately overrode it. He must sleep, because he would have need

of strength to-day whither he went.

Cold and heartsick, she crept back at last into bed and lay there, still

wakeful, in agony. How often in the weeks of tension that were coming

would she not lie and crave for the pain that she had now—the

anticipated pain of parting. For a little time longer she could listen

to his quiet breathing. To have done that to-morrow and the morrow after

would be the whole of bliss, for she would have known that he was safe.

But to-morrow night——

She did fall asleep in the end. A slight sound woke her. Gaston, fully

dressed, was kneeling by her side.

“O, my heart, is it time already?”

“It wants five minutes, beloved.”

In that black night Valentine had determined that, if it killed her, she

would not fail him at the moment of parting. “I must get up, then, and

give you your scarf,” she said, raising herself.

“You must fasten it on for me,” said he.

“No, Gaston, not over your uniform—and you without an escort! It is too

conspicuous . . . I wish now that I had not worked the ends in gold. No;

hide it in your breast, and put it on when you are back!” She had

slipped out of bed, had found the symbol, and was holding it close to

her.

“Very well, most dear,” said he, smiling. “I wanted your fingers to knot

it round me, but perhaps you are right. It is from your hands that I

receive it, which is all that matters.” He knelt and took it from her,

kissed the folded silk, and opening the breast of his uniform, put it

over his heart. She stooped over him suddenly.

“I am not worthy of you, my dearest, for last night . . . if I could

have kept you back, I would. This morning I . . . I desire you to go.

But I am weak, Gaston; only promise me that you will think of me as I

wish to be in this, and not as I . . . as I am!”

Still kneeling, he caught her hands. “Have you then so little knowledge

of what you are to me, Valentine—you, my star, my standard with the

Lilies, my oriflamme itself!”

CHAPTER IV

WAR . . . AND TREATIES

(1)

And now at last the West was really ablaze, and in a few days, as

department after department lit up with the carefully prepared flame,

the Republicans began to suffer more serious reverses than they had

known since the days of the _grande guerre_, the Vendée proper, six

years before. For the Chouannerie which the dying Directory had to face

was very different from what it had been in the days of Hoche and the

Convention; it was no longer a swarm of small peasant uprisings led,

sometimes, by nameless chiefs as uneducated as the men who followed

them. The leaders of this war were gentlemen, returned émigrés, with

enrolled levies at their disposal; with a system of requisition, a

network of espionage and intelligence throughout the country districts;

with, here and there, white-plumed staff officers wearing the cross of

St. Louis, with uniforms, now and then with fifes and drums, and even,

in one or two cases, with a little cavalry.

And their tactics were new and more formidable. No longer did they

content themselves with overrunning the country districts, avoiding the

neighbourhood of towns; on the contrary, as M. de Kersaint had told the

ladies of La Vergne, they were in such force that they threatened—and

did more than threaten—those centres of Republicanism.

At the voice of Cadoudal the country between Vannes and Auray had risen

as one man. Not vainly had he boasted in the spring of his careful

organisation. And while he himself successively took Landévant between

Auray and Hennebont, Port Navalo at the outlet of the inland sea of the

Morbihan, and other places between that and the mouth of the Vilaine,

his lieutenant Sol de Grisolles raised the districts between the mouth

of the Vilaine and that of the Loire. To him fell La Roche-Bernard on

the river itself, Pontchâteau and Guérande with its mediæval walls and

towers, a formidable triangle of possessions above St. Nazaire and the

Loire mouth. And these were only some of the Republican losses in

Brittany.

Maine fought under the young Comte de Bourmont, seconded by the veteran

Chevalier de Tercier, and Chappedelaine, and the Chevalier de

Châteauneuf—who was “Achille le blond.” Another of Bourmont’s

lieutenants, La Fregeolière, pushed as far as Le Lude and La Flèche on

the borders of the Angoumois and Touraine. Anjou obeyed the old Comte de

Châtillon, and, after the brilliant initial success of his chief of

staff, d’Andigné, at Noyant in September, the Angevins made rapid

incursions into the districts of Segré, Candé and Châteauneuf.

Ingrandes, Varades on the Loire, garrisoned towns, were threatened. From

the Loire right up to the Côtes-du-Nord the Republican cantonments and

posts were submerged under a flood of insurgents.

But far more resounding than all these widespread successes were the

audacious _coups de main_ carried out on large towns. St. Brieuc on its

bay in the Côtes-du-Nord was not, it is true, a large town, but it was

garrisoned; yet Mercier, Cadoudal’s young alter ego, and Saint-Régent

took and held it for a night while General Casabianca barricaded himself

in his hotel. The Chouans set free three hundred Royalists imprisoned

there, and took muskets. But, ten days before this, a much more daring

capture had been made—nothing less than the city of Le Mans which, at

three o’clock on the morning of October 15, Bourmont’s forces entered at

five points simultaneously. He held it for three days before he

withdrew. Even more than Le Mans, Nantes, that great city, proud of its

resistance to the Vendean army, might have seemed secure. But while

Grigny, commanding there, went out in the wrong direction to encounter

the Angevins, Châtillon and d’Andigné, under cover of a thick fog,

slipped in at four o’clock in the morning of October 20 with no more

than two thousand followers, of whom only half were accustomed to arms.

The taking of Nantes, though the place had to be evacuated before

daylight, and though it did not give the captors any material advantage

in the way of arms and powder, as did the seizure of Le Mans, had,

equally with that exploit, exactly the effect on public opinion that the

Royalists had hoped, creating such a terror in the large towns that they

could not be left without adequate garrisons, and thus immobilising a

number of Republican troops, and leaving the country districts freer for

the operations of the Royalists. Before either of these feats, however,

the example had been set in Finistère—and was not Valentine proud of

it?—when her husband, with a smaller force than any, seized and held

for two days and nights the pleasant cathedral city of Quimper, the

_chef-lieu_ of the department. Yet she could hardly have been prouder

than ‘les jeunes,’ who played a most conspicuous part in the enterprise.

To the Republicans of Quimper the sudden inroad of a hitherto unknown

phenomenon, Chouan cavalry—not very wonderfully mounted, it is true,

nor smartly equipped, but making a terrific noise on the cobbled

streets—was little short of apocalyptic. The Chevalier de la Vergne,

the commander of this small body, observed to his two intimates that

they had a right to give themselves airs, since the capture of Quimper

was undoubtedly due in the main to “Charlemagne’s Horse,” as he had

christened his corps; but Roland reminded him that, if such were the

case, it was really Mirabel which had taken the town, for Mirabel had

mounted and armed those cavaliers, as it had armed the greater part of

M. de Kersaint’s _gars_.

And, after leaving Quimper, before the troops sent in haste from the

Morbihan could fall upon him, the Marquis de Kersaint was up threatening

Châteaulin, while M. du Ménars with “Charlemagne’s Horse” marched

rapidly towards Carhaix. A force was then ordered out of Brest in the

hopes of catching the Royalists between two fires, but, nobody knew how,

M. de Kersaint and his men slipped through, and, effecting a junction

with his subordinate, plunged into the wild, broken country round

Huelgoat, where the Blues did not dare to follow them. Finally, in

retiring unsatisfied to Brest, the Republicans were fallen upon in the

rear by a perfectly unexpected body of Chouans from the north, which

they had believed quiet. Their leader was one “Sincère.” And the

authorities, completely misinformed as they had been about the supposed

quiescence of Finistère, were at their wits’ end to know where the flame

would next break out in the department.

But south of the Loire things did not go so well. There were no great

generals left there; the majority even of the former officers were

missing. Forestier, the most popular, was still recovering from his

terrible wound of August, and his ill-success then made a new levy still

more difficult. Yet d’Autichamp, Suzannet, and Grignon, who divided the

three Vendean commands, did their best. The Republicans had few forces

on the left bank of the Loire, and one brilliant success might have

raised Vendée from ruins. The success did not come. Suzannet attacked

Montaigu, was beaten off and severely wounded, a misfortune which led

directly to the dispersal of his men. D’Autichamp, who had got together

a rather larger force, fell in at Les Aubiers with two hundred and fifty

Blues whose commander stationed some of them in the church tower, whence

they killed and wounded some forty Royalists. It was proposed to burn

them out, but this would have offended the religious scruples of the

Vendeans, and they were besieged instead. After twenty-four hours

without food or water they were still holding out. Meanwhile the

Republican _chef de brigade_ at Bressuire was on the march. D’Autichamp

went to Nueil to defend the passage of the little river Argenton against

him, left the command there to a peasant subordinate, and returned to

Les Aubiers. He had better have stayed at Nueil. The Vendeans, according

to their incorrigible habit, neglected to put sentries, the Blues from

Bressuire surprised them, and they were put to flight.

The affair did not cost many men, but it had a most unfortunate moral

effect. Five thousand Vendeans had allowed themselves to be surprised

and routed by eight hundred Blues. “Where is Cathelineau?” was the

universal cry. And in fact this miserable affray of Les Aubiers decided

the fate of the whole campaign in Vendée, for after it d’Autichamp could

only skirmish, and Grignon, in the centre, was never able to get

together many men. Much, certainly, had hung on the valour of the Blues

in the church tower and the religious scruples of their opponents.

But the failure of Vendée and the startling successes in Brittany alike

paled before a much greater event. On the 9th of October, the very day

that Gaston de Trélan had ridden away alone from La Vergne at sunrise,

General Bonaparte, abandoning his army in Egypt, landed at Fréjus. On

the 16th, the day after the taking of Le Mans, he was at Paris. In a

month from the date of his landing, the 9th of November, the Directory

lay in the dust, and he was acclaimed First Consul of the temporary

Consulate, and the saviour of France. Across the path of the Bourbons

there no longer sprawled a hydra-headed incompetence. One man of genius,

with a vehement, implacable will stood there, armed.

The road to power had been made easy for him. France was only crying out

for a deliverer to raise her from the state of mud and blood in which

she lay. Attempts had already been made to find one in Joubert or

Moreau. It was conceivable that even had a Bourbon appeared he might

very well have been accepted. But it was too late now.

Yet this moment was the very apogee of the Royalist revival in the West.

Never had they been better organised, better recognised as a military

force. What they had taken or threatened in three weeks was amazing. In

the Morbihan they were entirely masters of the countryside; in

Ille-et-Vilaine they had strong detachments near Rennes, Fougères, and

Vitré; Bourmont in Maine occupied the bourgs and even the little towns

on the banks of the Sarthe and the Loire; and distant Finistère had

become almost volcanic.

On account of these very successes, overtures of peace had already been

made, from the side of the Directory, before the great change of

Brumaire. With them was charged the Republican general-in-chief in the

West, the Comte de Hédouville, a gentleman with the manners and

predilections of his caste, and he, in his headquarters at Angers, was

actually in conference with the chosen go-between—a Royalist lady, Mme

Turpin de Crissé—on the day of the _coup d’état_ itself, so that his

success was announced to a Government already overthrown. For he

naturally directed his powers of conciliation towards the least

victorious wing of the Royalist forces. It was with aversion and

amazement, therefore, that the leaders of Brittany, Maine and Anjou

heard that an armistice had been signed on November 25 for the left bank

of the Loire. And during the cessation of hostilities the Comte de

Grignon was surprised and killed by the Republicans, so that since

d’Autichamp, who had always opposed the taking up of arms, was more than

willing, and Suzannet was _hors de combat_, there remained no obstacle

to the pacification of Vendée. A conference for that object was

imminent.

But a suspension of arms on the left bank of the Loire almost of

necessity brought about one on the right also, whether the leaders were

anxious for it or no. Châtillon indeed was of the former for he was old

and ill. But Cadoudal and Mercier received it with great disfavour. Yet,

whether it were to result in peace or no, the armistice for the purpose

of treating of pacification was promulgated on December 9, and Pouancé

in Anjou was appointed as the place of meeting.

The Marquis de Kersaint, away in unvanquished Finistère, was too

bitterly disgusted to attend these conferences in person. But, unless he

wished to lose touch with the other leaders, he was obliged to be

represented there, and he sent to Pouancé two delegates, his chief of

staff, the Chevalier du Ménars, and the Abbé Chassin.

(2)

=From the Abbé Chassin’s Diary.=

_Pouancé, Christmas Eve, 1799._—A good occasion for reviewing, before I

say my first Mass of the feast, these brief notes that I have been

keeping since M. du Ménars and I came here a fortnight ago. Yet really

all that I can say is that we are still here, discussing, discussing

. . . The energy expended on these conferences might have launched a

battle or a siege. Perhaps in its way it is as usefully spent.

The party for continuing the war is in a minority, that is clear. But it

is a very strong minority—Cadoudal, our mainstay here, Mercier, the

Comte de Bourmont, one or two minor chiefs, and, of course, through our

voices, the “Marquis de Kersaint.” That the Vendean leaders cry for

peace one cannot wonder, for Vendée is exhausted. They say they have not

even enough munitions for a headquarters guard. But the war minority

would more than once have liked to break off the conferences, and it was

only after stormy discussions that M. de Bourmont was named as delegate

to Hédouville at Angers. He has others with him now. I have hardly dared

inform Gaston how things were tending, though I was sent here for that

purpose.

There is this to be said, that we began with a moral victory, since we

obtained that the Government should send no more troops into the West

during the armistice. And our military position—except in Vendée—is so

good that we have every right to hope to gain our points. Moreover the

acts of the new Government, particularly the abrogation of the

abominable Law of Hostages, have disposed many minds towards

conciliation. Some of the more warlike leaders, even, are not opposed to

a respite, provided that they can remain in arms, as they are doing. And

then there is this widespread idea among them that Bonaparte intends to

play the part of a Monk, and use his power for a restoration of royalty.

I must confess I do not share it, but M. du Ménars does. At any rate

time to penetrate the First Consul’s intentions is no loss—we sent the

Chevalier d’Andigné to Paris on December 18 to sound him. Moreover we

want to be certain of Monseigneur le Comte d’Artois’ wishes.

So time is really what we are playing for in these negotiations with

Hédouville. The worst of it is that Hédouville is so accommodating that

he makes this difficult! All our just demands are on the way to being

accepted—complete freedom for religion, no oath or formal submission,

no disarmament, oblivion of the past, and no conscription. If this is

really so then we should lay down—but not give up—our arms on an

honourable peace. But would the terms be observed afterwards by the

Government? Georges, I know, doubts it. . . .

It is time to prepare for my Mass. I shall say all three in a disused

church, with the leaders who are here and our Breton guard for

congregation. The proper season for thoughts of peace. . . .

_December 29._—All those dreams of peace are scattered. Yesterday, like

a thunderbolt from a clear sky, without warning, without justification,

appeared a most violent and provocative proclamation from the three

Consuls to the inhabitants of the West, denouncing our chiefs—who at

the very moment are in treaty with their representative—but professing

a tenderness for those who had been “led astray” by them. The Government

will pardon those who repent, but will strike down those who, after this

warning, dare still to resist.

Everyone is burning with indignation. Most certainly the First Consul is

not going to play Monk! One begins to see him, a menacing figure, behind

the conciliatory form of General Hédouville, who wishes us well and has

always acted as an honourable opponent—and who has written, evidently

with regret, that if we cannot come to an agreement with him by the 15th

(he means of their new-fangled Nivôse, of which to-day is the 8th)

hostilities must begin again, as a result of orders he has received from

Paris.

And, as if Fate had determined that they should, M. de Châtillon has

this very day received a letter from Monseigneur le Comte d’Artois

confirming the instructions he had already sent, not to make peace

unless it were part of a plan for the general pacification of Europe,

and saying that help is on the way, and that he himself will soon be

here. Will he?

If he do come our forces will be doubled in the twinkling of an eye.

Probably the First Consul knows that, and wishes to have done with us

before he could arrive. Bonaparte must know, too, of our division of

opinion, our want of arms and ammunition and artillery. I feel that he

intends to have victory at any price, and that he would prefer to crush

us rather than to placate—it would give him more advertisement.

So ends the conference of Pouancé. Georges has already left for the

Morbihan; La Prévalaye and Bourmont have returned, or are returning, to

their divisions. We hear that the victorious army of Holland, under the

detestable Brune, is on the way to Brittany. M. du Ménars and I start

back on our journey to Finistère in an hour’s time.

* * * * *

_Quimperlé, January 4._—We have taken longer than I expected to reach

the soil of Finistère, but we have gone slowly on purpose, not wishing

to get out of touch with possible developments, for we believe that the

indefatigable Hédouville is trying to get together a new conference in

spite of the shock which slew the first. Yet, if he does, M. du Ménars

and I should not return without an authorisation which we know well

enough Gaston will never give.

And now that we have seen with our own eyes to-day a copy of the far

more violent manifesto, signed by the First Consul, to the Army of the

West, we think that the sooner we are back at the Clos-aux-Grives the

better, for that does not sound like conferences. “The majority of good

citizens,” runs this proclamation, “have already laid down their arms;

there remain only brigands, émigrés, men in the pay of

England—Frenchmen in the pay of England! March against them; you will

not be called upon to display much valour . . . Let me soon learn that

the chiefs of the rebels have ceased to exist!”

Such are a few phrases culled from it. That “Frenchmen in the pay of

England” is a clever and a galling touch. Indeed, it is the great

misfortune of our party to be mixed up so inextricably with the

foreigner. And yet it is not our fault; it is the fault of

circumstances. England alone, with Austria, continues the struggle; she

is rich; it is she who disposes of the persons of most of our princes,

since they live under her protection. . . . Yet it pleases me to think

that epithet does not apply to Gaston, at any rate. The promised English

subsidy amounted to very little; it is his own gold, from his own house,

which has made it possible for him to do the wonders he has done.

I do not like that “Let me learn that the chiefs of the rebels have

ceased to exist”; it savours, somehow, of methods unworthy of a soldier.

* * * * *

_January 6._—Back at Le Clos-aux-Grives. Gaston (as I thought I should

find him) determined to continue the struggle, whatever the rest decide.

He has the advantage of the remotest and wildest country, and Georges,

his nearest neighbour, will certainly do as he is doing. But the forces

of Finistère are pitifully small compared to the enemy’s. If only he

could get help by sea from England!

_January 7._—We hear that there is to be a new conference opened on the

10th at Candé. Gaston refuses to have anything to do with it, and indeed

it would be impossible to get there in time now.

_January 10._—Decidedly we are returning to the worst days of the

Directory. A decree has just come down declaring the departments of the

West outlawed.

_January 15._—Negotiations were reopened two days ago at Candé.

_January 18._—Nothing settled yet at Candé, we hear, but the rupture of

the truce is postponed till January 22. Gaston speaks of sending me to

England.

_January 20._—Most disastrous news. Two days ago, at

Montfaucon-sur-Moine, the officers of Vendée signed a separate peace.

Alas for the glorious shades of La Roche-jaquelein and Lescure!

_January 22._—The truce expires to-day. Anjou is disbanding.

_January 24._—Brune’s army is getting nearer every day, and it is said

that he is to replace Hédouville as general-in-chief. We hear that

Bourmont was defeated two days ago by Chabot at Meslay; unless he can

recover, that means that Maine, too, is gone. Brisk fighting is going on

indeed in the Côtes-du-Nord, but our hopes rest on Cadoudal, the

unbeaten and unyielding. Gaston has sent M. du Ménars with what men he

can spare southwards.

_January 25._—A report that yesterday or the day before Cadoudal fought

an indecisive action with Harty, commanding the troops at Vannes, at

Pont-du-Loc. Georges is not beaten, that is clear, but, if he is not

victorious, it may menace his bold plan of pushing on, after crushing

Harty, to the banks of the Vilaine, and joining hands with Sol de

Grisolles, there to await Brune’s onset—and after that, perhaps, of

joining hands with Gaston.

_January 26._—Only too true. Georges has sent a courier to warn Gaston.

His plan is hopeless. He fears, too, that Sol de Grisolles is not in a

state to defend the passage of the Vilaine. And Bourmont has given in.

Doubtless there _is_ something in race, and ancient blood. The prospect

before us, once so bright, is hourly more gloomy, and I know, none

better, what failure means to Gaston. Yet he keeps his profound

discouragement wonderfully to himself, and his little army is still as

well disciplined as it is possible for a Chouan force to be. It is

already unsafe for us to make the Clos-aux-Grives our permanent

headquarters. We live dispersed in the forest, only meeting there

occasionally by day, never by night. I write this, in fact, seated on a

fallen stone of the dolmen where that memorable meeting—about which I

have never been told—took place last August. I wonder what has become

of that misguided madman, the Comte de Brencourt?

Gaston had a letter from the Duchesse to-day, sent by a stable-boy from

La Vergne. I say to myself still, that whatever happens he can never be

captured, in such proximity to the sea as he will be if we are forced to

retire when Brune enters the Morbihan. He and she can always take ship

for England at the eleventh hour.

_January 27._—The garrison of Quimper has evidently been reinforced. A

hot brush to-day on the Lanvennec road. We have lost forty-three killed

and wounded, among them, alas, two of our few remaining officers. Roland

has got a scratch of which he is rather proud. I have just been dressing

it. Gaston, I could see, was on tenterhooks about it.

_January 28._—Very bad news indeed. Cadoudal has had to disband his

men, for fear of being crushed by Brune’s advance. These disastrous

tidings, getting through by unknown channels as things do here, have

caused some desertions. Rumours that M. du Ménars is killed. It is very

cold in the forest.

_January 29._—Brune entered Vannes yesterday, and made a great

requisition of money, overcoats and shoes for his troops. I _am_ to go

to England. Would I were not!

_January 30._—Last night a party of Blues from Lanvennec sacked and

burnt the Clos-aux-Grives. There was no one there, and it was not worth

throwing away lives in its defence, as it was of little use to us. ‘Les

jeunes’ of course wanted to defend their nursery. The night was red with

the flames of it. Farewell, old house!

It is true about M. du Ménars. He was a brave man and a good officer.

R.I.P. His men no longer exist as a force.

I want Gaston to make for La Vergne. But he will not, principally, I

think, because all his desire is there. But it would be an excellent

headquarters—or more accurately, I fear, place of retreat—for a time.

_February 4._—Cadoudal is reported to be actually treating with Brune,

and the terms, alas, include disarmament. In a day or two Gaston will

find himself literally alone, with his mere handful of men, against

Brune’s whole army. He still hopes for help from England, and for some

outcome of those ambitious plans which—too late—the Prince’s council

have made, and says that so long as he can keep open a part of the coast

of Finistère for that purpose, so long he is doing his duty and not

sacrificing men uselessly; and that it will take Brune considerable time

to advance across the Morbihan into Finistère. This is true. I start for

England with his despatches to-morrow morning. My admiration for him

knows no bounds; he _has_ broken those “_aspera fata_.”

But this evening I had a letter from Paris, from “Paul Berry,” which has

made me very uneasy. He says—and he should know, if anyone—that the

First Consul is furious against the “Marquis de Kersaint,”—“that

insolent without an army who still holds out”—and they say that he has

sworn to make an example of one Chouan leader at least. A horrible fear

possesses me that that example may be made of the last in arms, the

highest in rank, and . . . his foe of Rivoli. Does Bonaparte remember

that, I wonder?

Much troubled by this letter, which I received after seeing Gaston and

getting my last instructions I went to him again. The Allée des Vieilles

has such a bad reputation after dark in the district that we have been

able to use it undisturbed as a bivouac. (It makes a detestable one,

owing to the wind on the lande.) I found Gaston walking up and down in

the darkness by the ghostly stones, muffled in his cloak. I told him

what I had just heard from Paris. He laughed.

“Is the young man from Corsica a bugbear who has frightened even you,

Pierre?” he asked. “I promise you he shall not have me to ‘make an

example of,’ if that is his phrase, till the last possible moment. And

when I have done all I can—what does it matter if he succeeds?”

Seeing him in that mood, and feeling that I was leaving him—with what a

heavy heart!—to I know not what imminent perils, I said, “You need

never fall into his hands, Gaston, whatever of defeat happens. Here the

door is always open behind you. The sea——”

He interrupted me, in that suddenly freezing voice he has when he is

displeased. “I am surprised at you, Pierre,” he said, and turned his

back on me.

I was a little hurt; of course I knew better than to insult him by

suggesting that he should desert his men. I only meant to remind him

that should it come to submission—and in my heart, I can see nothing

else before him—once the formalities over, he can so easily take ship

for England. I explained this, and, though I did not like using this

weapon, I am so afraid of what I may be leaving him to—and most of all

his own indomitable pride—that I added, “Gaston, remember that you

would not sail alone!”

A little quiver went through him, almost as if I had struck him. He said

never a word, but I saw his face for a second in the light of the camp

fire. I presumed, I daresay, for there is perfect understanding between

them on all things—yet, for all that, surely she should have some

consideration shown her! In that thought lies my best hope.

But I wish to God I were not going to England. . . .

CHAPTER V

ALONE IN ARMS

(1)

About midnight on the 14th of February—her name-day, which the ladies

of La Vergne had celebrated, though with heavy hearts, by a little

feast—Mme de Trélan was awakened by a commotion in the hall below. Many

people seemed to be there, and she heard the jingle of accoutrements.

For a moment she thought the invaders might be Republicans; then, with a

leap of the heart, that it might conceivably be . . . someone else. She

opened her door and listened, and, since sounds floated very clearly up

the great staircase, she did catch the sound she craved for. She flung

on a cloak and went out into the gallery.

Down in the hall, in the midst of his remaining staff, her husband was

apologising with great courtesy for taking possession of Mme de la

Vergne’s house without leave. Nothing, he declared, but necessity would

have made him do so. As she must be aware, he had his back fairly to the

wall now; there were only sixty men with him, but it was possible that

by using La Vergne as a centre he might succeed in rallying the broken

remnants of the late M. du Ménars’ force. On the morrow he would lay

before the three ladies the arrangements he proposed for their

conveyance to a place of safety—though he had no intention, he assured

her, of allowing himself to be attacked in the château.

But Valentine heard Mme de la Vergne, a perfectly dignified figure,

despite her hastily donned _déshabillé_, in the little crowd of

uniformed and booted and lantern-bearing men, reply quite calmly that

there was no need to waste time over such a discussion. “My daughter and

I shall have the honour to entertain you in our house, Monsieur le . . .

Marquis, for as long as you require it. All we have is at your disposal.

But we do not intend to leave it.”

Valentine did not wait for Gaston’s reply; she knew he would not argue

the point then in front of his officers, including, as they did, his

hostess’s son. Returning to her room, she began to rekindle the dying

fire there, to warm him when he came. She felt a little stunned. She had

not known that things were going as ill as this.

Half an hour later she heard his knock at her door. As he entered she

saw how his air was changed—for it was not only that his uniform was

worn and stained, his boots covered with mud, the scarf she had

embroidered soiled—and the change went like a knife through her heart.

But all he did, the first greetings over, was to apologise for his

state—the gentleman of the great world ashamed for appearing so in the

presence of a woman.

“I am not fit to be in your room, Valentine,” he said, looking down at

himself with distaste. “I have not had my clothes off for the last week.

You must forgive this unceremonious visit.”

She was sitting in her chair again now, and he stood by her in the

firelight. Pride and anguish strove together in her as she looked up at

him.

“Gaston, I heard what you said in the hall. Tell me the worst, my

darling! We have heard that Cadoudal is treating with the Republicans,

but we cannot believe it. But if it should be true, if he should submit,

would there be no one left in arms at all—no one in the Côtes-du-Nord

even——no one but you . . . no one?”

She could only see his profile. He was fingering a little Chinese figure

that stood on her mantelpiece.

“Where does this mandarin come from, I wonder? It reminds me of one we

had at Mirabel. We had several, I think . . .” Then he looked down at

her. “Yes, Valentine, it is the last act. Cadoudal _has_ submitted. He

signed near Vannes yesterday . . . I _am_ alone in arms; there is no one

else left. Unless help comes from England in the next few days——”

He broke off, turned back to the mandarin, and then, abruptly, his sword

clanking against the floor as he did so, knelt down and buried his face

on her knees. And, fighting back the sob that rose in her own throat,

she folded her arms round his neck and kissed the wet, iron-grey hair.

“My darling, my darling, how tired you are!” She smoothed the bowed head

as she would have smoothed a child’s, terribly conscious all the time of

the restraint he was putting on himself not to break down altogether.

For his hands were gripping the arms of her chair on either side of her,

and every now and again a shudder went through him.

“I will never consent to the disarmament of Finistère,

never—never—never!” he said in a smothered voice. “I will die first!”

Her hand stopped. “Is that what you fear, Gaston? Is that it? O my

knight without reproach, you shall do what you think best. If it is

necessary—if you must in honour—you shall . . . die.”

“I will not hold you back.” But she had no need to add that, and she did

not. Her husband lifted his head, almost frightened at the sublimity of

her self-forgetfulness.

“Valentine,” he exclaimed, “is it possible that you—a

woman—_understand_?”

“I love you,” she said simply.

He knelt there staring at her, the firelight showing, on his sad and

weary features, an expression that was almost awe. Then he made a

movement and caught her to him.

“I said you were my oriflamme. I shall fight to the last as long as I

have the means, and with how much more courage if you give me leave to

die! . . . But I shall not let them attack La Vergne, though you, I

know, would not fear it.”

“Nor would the others,” she answered. “Then will you not make it your

headquarters?”

“I do not know yet. When Brune’s advance begins . . . But though I do

not intend to stand a siege here, I fear I must send you and the other

ladies away.”

Valentine said nothing, but a little shiver went through her in her

turn.

“It is true,” said Gaston, feeling it, “that Mme de la Vergne has

already refused to go. And you, my darling——”

“You must do as you think best,” she said again. She would not give open

utterance to the wild prayer that was ringing through her.

He sighed, and loosing his hold of her hands, got to his feet, drawing

her up with him.

“Gaston, you will sleep now?”

He shook his head. “I must go round the sentries again first. All my

officers—all that are left, that is—are as weary as I. As for a bed, I

have not seen one for weeks. Something harder will be more familiar. I

shall sleep in the hall; there is a bearskin rug there that promises

well.”

“Where did you sleep last night, Gaston?”

His voice changed. “In a very holy place, beloved—the place where you

came back to me from the dead—the Allée des Vieilles.”

He kissed her on the brow and went out.

* * * * *

“I never thought,” said Artamène next day to Roland, with one of his old

flashes of gaiety, not so frequent now as of yore. “I never thought that

I should live to admire my own mother more than Cleopatra or la Grande

Mademoiselle and other determined ladies! Imagine her standing up to M.

le Duc like that—and routing him! It is for you to tremble, Roland, at

these unsuspected qualities, since as your future mother-in-law . . .”

For before the unshakable determination of Mme de la Vergne not to be

turned out of her own house, as evinced in a private interview with the

friendly invader that morning, the determination—perhaps not quite so

strong—of the Duc de Trélan to turn her out was baffled.

“I think,” said Lucien, “that there are disadvantages in being a

gentleman. M. le Marquis is always grand seigneur; had he been one of

these sans-culotte generals he would have bundled her out without

ceremony—excuse the verb, mon cher.”

“There are compensations, too,” observed Roland. “Thanks to the

admirable—or ominous—firmness of Mme de la Vergne, the Duchesse can

remain also.”

“You pointedly omit the advantage to yourself, I notice,” said Marthe’s

brother, “It will be my duty to call you out for that, Roland, to-morrow

morning. There being no . . . no Moulin-aux-Fées handy, I suggest rakes,

in the poultry-yard; but you shall be buried in the arbour of famous

memory.”

“I wonder how long any of us will stay here,” observed Lucien

thoughtfully. “And as to being buried—we may not have much choice in

the matter of locality.”

The other two looked at him with equal thoughtfulness, for in this ebb

of fortune the idea was not by now a new one.

“I make only one stipulation about my death,” announced the Chevalier de

la Vergne with composure, “and that is, to fall at the same moment as M.

le Duc. And you, Roland, have you chosen yours? You look as if you were

selecting it.”

“No, I was thinking about Mme la Duchesse,” answered the young man

rather unexpectedly.

(2)

It is a terrible hour when a man of superlative pride and self-will

learns that Destiny—or another man—has a stronger will than he.

And this hour struck for Gaston de Trélan the very day after his arrival

at La Vergne, when he received an ultimatum from General Brune giving

him twenty-four hours in which to consent to an unconditional surrender,

involving disarmament as well as disbandment. Otherwise the army of

Holland, already on the march, would enter Finistère at several

points—Finistère laid open to them not only by the capitulation of her

more formidable neighbours, the Morbihan and the Côtes-du-Nord, but also

by the dispersal of her own defenders. Never very numerous, they had

quite forsaken the standard now, returning to their farms or going into

hiding, and during the last few days it had become abundantly clear that

all “M. de Kersaint’s” careful organisation was in ruins; despairing

reports from subordinates, gentlemen or Chouans, in the outlying

districts, each said that their little bands had melted away like snow.

His own personal followers were, indeed, more than ever devoted, but the

flame he had lit through Finistère was out, and he stood, a beaten man,

among its ashes.

Yet though he might be overwhelmed by numbers and his men scattered, so

long as the arms he had been at such pains to procure for them were not

given up to the enemy but hidden (as was the case) he had not utterly

failed, since Finistère would not be defenceless for the future. And to

disarmament he had said that he would never consent—he would rather

die. Now it was required of him to give the order for it immediately.

More, within less than ten days he was to surrender his own sword in

person to the Republican commander-in-chief.

On this culminating humiliation Brune—or rather, that intense and

vehement personality in Paris of whom Brune was but the

mouthpiece—insisted absolutely. The Marquis de Kersaint, he wrote

(following his instructions) must not only submit at once, and

effectually disarm his men, but he must also be at Vannes on February 24

to give up his sword and ratify the whole transaction. If not, the

preceding evidences of submission would go for nothing, and Finistère

would be laid waste without the loss of a day: every man known to have

fought under him would be shot, every fifth house burnt in the insurgent

villages. Nothing would avail him unless he regularised the situation by

giving up his own sword; and to that end Brune sent him, with the

ultimatum, safe-conducts for himself and an escort of three or four

persons.

There was no choice, no shadow of a possible alternative. It was not

merely that Gaston de Trélan’s military situation was hopeless—almost

ludicrously so—alone with a few score men not merely against Brune,

but, since the submission of the other leaders, against La Barolière and

Chabot as well; it was that if he refused the terms he was condemning

Finistère to the fate that had been Vendée’s years ago under Turreau’s

_colonnes infernales_. If he had any heart in him, any humanity, he must

drink this bitter cup. The chance of dying had not been granted him; to

kill himself was tantamount to refusing. No help, no word of help, had

come from England; he did not even know whether the Abbé had reached his

destination. Besides, no help could possibly come in time now.

Nothing, nothing was left save the desperate honour of having been the

last to uphold the splendid hopes with which, in the autumn, this

business had begun—that, and a woman’s love and admiration and succour.

It was Valentine who saw the dark waters close above his head and went

down with him to the depths; and, when the moment came that the words

were wrenched from him, as from a man on the rack—“_There is no way out

of it—no possible way out; I must do it!_” it was she who wrote at his

dictation the letter to Brune saying that, for the sake of the lives of

others, he agreed to the terms of surrender, would give the necessary

orders, and afterwards, availing himself of the safe-conduct, would

reach Vannes by the day appointed to give up his sword in person to the

General-in-chief.

(3)

The same night that this letter arrived at its destination, a young

Republican officer was lying in his bed at the Hôtel de l’Epée at

Vannes, not unmindful of his good fortune in having it to himself. The

town was crammed with Republican troops, and was likely to be even

fuller in a few days, when the drafts _en route_ for Finistère were

recalled, as they presumably would be now that the Marquis de Kersaint

had agreed to submit, which recent piece of news was known to the young

officer—his name was Marcel Poulain—because he was on Brune’s staff.

He was nearly asleep when the door was suddenly opened, and the

landlord’s apologetic voice informed him that an aide-de-camp of the

First Consul’s had just come in dead-beat, and, having delivered his

urgent despatches to the General, must be given a bed at once.

Unfortunately there was not a bed in the place which had not two

occupants already except——

“Yes there is,” interrupted the young man angrily, “Next door. Put him

there!”

“I cannot, sir,” retorted the landlord. “The gentleman next door is

indisposed, and is also, I think, a Royalist. And the aide-de-camp has

scarcely drawn rein since leaving Paris. . . .”

“Oh, very well,” groaned Marcel resignedly, and almost immediately the

heavy, stumbling steps of the exhausted courier could be heard along the

corridor, and in another moment he staggered in and fell with a jangle

of spurs and a groan on to a chair. Marcel, on his elbow, scrutinised

him.

“Why,” he exclaimed, “I’m damned if it’s not Adolphe Bergeron!”

“I scarcely know who I am,” returned the other hoarsely. “I only know

that I am absolutely in pieces. I killed one horse . . . and all

for——” He did not say for what.

And presently, his friend having made room for him, he stretched himself

out beside him with more groans, and complaints of the hardness of the

bed.

“Poor devil!” said Marcel sympathetically. “And so you knew what was in

your despatches. I hope it was worth flaying yourself for?”

“I did not know when I left Paris,” answered the rider, moving

restlessly. “Nor when I got here. But Brune has just let it out.”

“Well, was it worth it?”

There was no reply. “Adolphe, you need not be so deuced discreet! I’m on

the staff, you know.”

“Yes, the staff at least will know it to-morrow,” muttered Adolphe.

“—Don’t let anyone guess that you have been told already, that’s all

. . . You know that man who organised Finistère, de Kersaint?”

“I should think I did!” responded Marcel with animation. “The General

has been getting furious despatches about him almost every day of late

from the First Consul, saying that he must be finished with at once, by

whatever means. His being the only one of the Royalist leaders who would

have nothing to do with the idea of pacification—even Cadoudal came

down to it in the end—has, I suppose, enraged Bonaparte. However, Brune

has got him in a cleft stick at last, and he has agreed to all the

terms, including the surrender of his sword. I saw the letter myself

this afternoon—in a woman’s hand it was. Have your despatches to do

with him?”

“They have,” said Adolphe. “Exclusively. He is coming under a

safe-conduct, I take it?”

“Yes. The General sent it some days ago.”

“Well, it . . . it is to be withdrawn. That’s what I have flayed myself

for.”

“_What!_ O, but that’s a mistake; it can’t be withdrawn now. De Kersaint

has accepted it; he is going to use it.”

“To be frank,” said Adolphe, gazing at the still-burning candle, “I only

said ‘withdrawn’ to make it sound better. It really comes to this, that

it will not be observed.”

The other bounded up in bed. “But, great God, man——”

“I know, I know! But I can’t help it—it is the First Consul’s

orders. . . . The fact is, Bonaparte means to have this Marquis de

Kersaint alive or dead—you have said as much yourself—and now, I

suppose, he will get him.”

“My God!” said his friend, and lay down again in silence.

“If I had known what I was carrying,” said Adolphe after a little, “I

might have had—an accident. But I had no idea, and it is done now. The

order will be sent on to Auray and other places to-morrow.”

“_Order!_ But it’s impossible—one can’t send an order like that! Surely

a safe-conduct, once given, is the most sacred thing a soldier knows. If

he does not observe it—O, it’s the dirtiest, most damnable treachery I

ever heard of! Pah! is that the way they do things in Corsica?”

“Chut, mon ami, walls have ears,” said the aide-de-camp wearily. “But

you are right; it is infamous. They say in Paris that _he_ has all along

wanted someone of whom to make an example, for the sake of the

impression. Yet all the other leaders submitted, as you say. But this

man who has held out so, besides that he put Bonaparte to inconvenience

at Rivoli—ah, I forgot, you were there—is also, it appears, a

ci-devant of the ci-devants; no less than the Duc de Trélan, in fact.

Brune let that out too; Fouché, it seems, discovered it. So he would be

worth capturing, and Brune, not being troubled with scruples, will obey

orders. . . . And _I_ brought them!”

“I wish now you had not told me,” said Brune’s young staff-officer.

* * * * *

Another than he had been told also, for walls _have_ ears, and that by

the side of their bed happened to be merely a cracked wooden partition.

The officer of Bourmont’s disbanded army who lay ill in the next room

had, therefore, heard every word of their conversation. He was Artus de

Brencourt.

CHAPTER VI

“SWORD, THY NOBLER USE IS DONE!”

“_Le vin est versé; il faut le boire._” The words of the old adage rang

in Valentine’s head to-night. Not long ago Gaston had quoted them. She

had never before so felt their inexorable quality—for to-morrow he must

set out to Vannes to drink it. . . . He had said farewell to his very

few remaining officers, disbanded, of his handful of men, all but a few

sentries, and wanted to ride alone to his surrender, but ‘les jeunes’

had made such an outcry at this, and begged so hard to be his escort,

that, as the other safe-conducts were blank, he consented.

It was past midnight, and he was still writing, by the light of a couple

of candles, at a table in the embrasure of the large window in their

room at La Vergne. Despite the cold, Valentine was sitting on the seat

in the space between her husband and the heavily curtained window—the

seat where, that October night, she had found and kissed his sword. Now,

that same sword. . . . She looked between the candle-flames at his

downbent face. One hand supported his head as he wrote, the fingers

running up into the thick, rippling hair. The last three months of

strain had aged him a little; but she saw nothing there that she did not

love and honour.

The château was very still. Now and again, even through the closed

window, Valentine could hear the footfall of the sentry on the flags

below. But, after the recent armed occupation, this was like the last

moments before death. To-morrow there would be no sentry—nothing to

guard. It would all be over.

She pulled aside the curtain and looked out. There was a royal moon; she

had forgotten it. The terrace sparkled with thinly fallen snow, and she

could see how it powdered the bare, pleached boughs of the arbour where,

in the spring, Roland and the son and daughter of the house had planned

the invasion of Mirabel. And she saw, too, in the distance—or was it

fancy?—a silver streak, the sea.

Ah, if they were there, embarking—if Gaston could but be spared the

purgatory that lay before him first. She glanced at him again. He had

death in his soul; she knew that. _Le vin est versé_ . . .

It was not merely that he shrank, as any soldier might, from the

personal humiliation of surrendering his sword; it was also that he had

given to this enterprise, so nearly successful, not only his arm, but

his heart. Only lately had she come to see what the overthrow of the

cause meant to him; indeed she had not fully learnt it yet. Was he

writing to the Comte d’Artois, she wondered now—to the Prince who, once

again, had never come? If _she_ had held the pen there were words,

burning words, that she would have written to that royal laggard! O, how

could the man exist who knew that a whole population was sacrificing

itself for him and his family, that for years they had been dying for

him on the battlefield and the scaffold, that his appearance was the one

thing they asked of life, and his presence would cause all that

suffering and sacrifice to be forgotten—how could he know all this

. . . and not come!

Valentine clenched her hands. He whom she loved was driven to this pass

through Charles of Bourbon. He had fought to keep open a harbour for the

sails that never came, and was now left, deserted and alone, to drink

this bitter wine. . . . The tears began to creep down her face—tears of

wrath. She did not want Gaston to see them, and turning away, her

forehead against the cold glass, she swallowed them down, trying to fix

her thoughts instead on that silver gleam of sea, which, when the

surrender was consummated, would bear them both away from the land of

the once more lost cause.

When she had regained her self-control she dropped the curtain and

turned back into the room. Her husband had laid down his pen and was

leaning back in his chair, his hands along the arms. His look was remote

and very grave. She rose from the seat, knelt down beside him and took

his right hand in both of hers. His gaze came from far off and rested on

her—still very grave.

“Gaston, I believe I can see the sea—the moon is so bright.”

“Yes?” said he, with a note of enquiry.

“I wish we were down there now,” she went on rather unsteadily, “—where

the yellow poppies bloomed last autumn. Do you remember?”

“Do I remember? Do I ever forget? I have them safe—what you gave me.”

He touched his breast with his other hand.

“My darling, if they could only bring you forgetfulness—forgetfulness

of to-morrow!”

He shook his head. “They will not easily do that.” From her his glance

strayed to the sheathed sword lying on the table. She could not bear to

see his face when he looked at it, and hid her own.

He seemed then to make an effort to turn his thoughts. “You were

speaking of the sea, beloved. When this . . . this business is over, the

sea shall take us away at last to happiness.”

Valentine raised her head quickly. “At last! Gaston, no happiness over

the sea, in tranquillity, can ever have the taste of this I have known,

in warfare, since last summer! It can never be better, even as this,

come what may, can never be less. If it ended to-morrow, you know that I

have lived to see all that I dreamt of—more than I dreamt of! O, my

knight, when the utmost has been wrought, what matters the broken sword!

Please God there are many more happy days before us . . . but not

better, not happier days!”

Their lips met in silence. Then, as she knelt there, he bowed his head

till it rested on her shoulder. Grief and love were one.

* * * * *

The promise of the serene moon of the night was not fulfilled. Flurries

of sleet were sweeping over the countryside next morning; the strip of

sea was the colour of slate, and the wind howled in all the tall

chimneys.

In this tumult Gaston bade farewell to Valentine upstairs. He and his

escort calculated to reach Quimperlé that night, and Vannes the next, so

that, unless the roads were in very bad condition, she might hope to see

him back on the fourth day.

Downstairs in the wide hall with the young men were Mme de la Vergne and

Marthe, the former as if she clung to the fiction of speeding a parting

guest. But they were all very quiet, looking silently at the staircase

when the Duc de Trélan, pale and upright, came down it pulling on his

gauntlets.

“You have your safe-conducts on you, gentlemen, I hope?” he said as he

descended.

“Have _you_ your safe-conduct, Monsieur le Duc?” asked Marthe

impulsively, coming to the foot of the stairs. Her little hands were

clenched; she hated this business almost as much as he.

But Gaston reassured the impetuous girl, and saluted Mme de la Vergne

while Artamène went down the steps to the horses, already there in

charge of Lucien and a groom. Roland remained, the Duc’s riding cloak

over his arm.

“I hate this day more than any God ever made!” said his betrothed to him

under her breath. Her eyes looked as if she had not slept. Roland took

her hands and drew her to him, but he could not give her any verbal

comfort.

And then, just as M. de Trélan was bending in farewell over Mme de la

Vergne’s fingers, there came with the cold wind through the open door

the sound of a galloping horse stayed at the very perron, expostulatory

voices at the bottom, and feet running up the steps. Next moment,

breathing hard, a man burst into the hall with Artamène behind him.

“Thank God, I am in time!” he jerked out—pulled off his hat as he saw

the ladies, and revealed the features of the Comte de Brencourt.

He was spattered with mud and half melted snow up to his very shoulders;

his riding boots were one cake of it. But he went straight towards the

Duc de Trélan, disregarding every one else.

“Don’t go to Vannes, de Kersaint!” (the old name was evidently still the

more natural). “Don’t go, for God’s sake—there is treachery!”

Marthe gave a cry that went unheeded.

“Treachery!” ejaculated Gaston. His eyes lit up. “You dare to come and

use that word in front of me—_you!_—But, perhaps, as an expert, you

feel privileged?”

The Comte at that terrible rebuff stood a moment rigid, then he reeled a

step backwards exactly as if he had been struck. Encountering a

high-backed chair he gripped it with one hand, steadied himself, and

said, in a voice that the air seemed to dissipate, “Your safe-conduct is

waste paper.” His face was quite grey.

The Duc surveyed him pitilessly for a second or two; then he slightly

shrugged his shoulders and turned away. “I am afraid that you have

ridden very hard to no purpose, Monsieur,” he observed. “Roland, my

cloak, please!”

The Comte flung out his free hand. “You are going to your death!” he

said wildly. “You are mad—I have warned you . . . Where is Mme de

Trélan, she might——”

“Leave my wife’s name out of your fabrications, if you please!” said

Gaston like a rapier thrust, turning on his heel towards him for a brief

instant. “Well, Roland?”

The thunderstruck young man approached with the cloak, and put it on his

leader’s shoulders in the midst of an extraordinary silence which even

Artamène did not dare to break. It was the messenger of destiny himself

who broke it, with something between a sob and a laugh.

“You are all mad here, I think . . . Madame—or you, Mademoiselle,

perhaps you have some influence? As there is a God above us, it is a

matter of this gentleman’s life. Orders have come from the First Consul

to Brune that his safe-conduct is not to be observed, and those orders

have been transmitted at least as far as Auray, and probably further by

this time. Can you not stop him?”

And at that Gaston flung his cloak back on to Roland’s arm, went up to

Mme de la Vergne, said something to her in a low tone which caused her

and Marthe to withdraw to the other end of the hall, motioned Roland and

Artamène also away, and, going up to the Comte, looked him in the eyes

and said in a voice vibrating with anger, “No man or woman living keeps

me from doing what I intend to do—have you not learnt that yet,

Monsieur de Brencourt? And, as for your story, I certainly put more

faith in Brune’s honour than in yours!”

The Comte, livid, swallowed something in his throat. “Your safe-conduct

is waste paper,” he repeated. “I heard it with my own ears.” Then he

broke out with some of his old vehemence, “Good God, de Trélan, why

won’t you believe me?—If this were not true, why do you think I have

ridden nearly eighty miles, ill as I am, in this mad haste?”

The man he had so treacherously used continued to look at him. He had

not raised his own voice at all, and it was low now, unhurried, and

colder than the wind from glaciers. “That is a question which only you

can answer, Monsieur le Comte. I cannot pretend to fathom the motives of

a man so utterly false as you. I can only suppose that having failed in

the past to deprive me of my life . . . and more than my life . . . you

are now trying to take from me something more precious than either, my

honour. But I am not to be frightened by talk of treachery into breaking

my pledged word. You have failed this time also, Monsieur de

Brencourt.—Come, gentlemen, it is time to start.”

He had finally turned his back. The Comte, speechless, bowed his head

against the high chair to which he was holding. What could he do against

this attitude? He had anticipated contempt, hatred, but never disbelief.

He lifted his head once more, tried to say, “For your wife’s sake!” but

the words stuck in his throat, and besides, the Duc was at the door now

with the young men—was descending the steps. All that came to his dry

lips was the old tag, “Your blood be on your own head!” Then his limbs

gave way beneath him, and he collapsed into the chair, hiding his face

in his hands. Outside there were sounds of mounting and of riding away;

then silence.

* * * * *

Marthe and her mother, with rather pale faces, looked at each other, and

then at the mudstained figure huddled in the chair, the elder woman

uneasily, Marthe with distaste. Since the Duc so disbelieved his story,

they disbelieved it too. Then Mme de la Vergne, mindful as ever of the

claims of hospitality, addressed the stranger.

“May I not order some refreshment for you after your ride, Monsieur?”

At her voice de Brencourt roused himself, and rose stiffly. But he

responded by a question.

“This is your house, Madame, I think—not the Duc de Trélan’s?”

“Certainly it is my house,” responded Mme de la Vergne. The gentleman

looked ghastly ill, as she now saw.

“Then I should be very glad of a glass of wine . . . before I ride away

again. My mission . . . has been fruitless, but I am . . . I have . . .”

His voice tailed off into nothing.

“Monsieur, sit down again—you are unwell!” cried Mme de la Vergne

sharply. Whatever the subject of disagreement between him and M. de

Trélan—and it must have been very acute—she did not want to have him

fainting in her hall. “Marthe, go and order something to be brought at

once—and pray give yourself the trouble to come to the fire, Monsieur;

you must be frozen.”

M. de Brencourt obeyed, but with difficulty, and sank into a great chair

that she pushed forward. “You do not object to my being in your house a

little? The treachery—you heard that?—is not what you probably think.

O, my God, my God, why did I come myself? He might have listened to

someone else!”

But he found himself alone. He put his cold hand over his eyes and

groaned aloud. Yes, the desperate fight he had had with himself to do

this thing in person, after his failure to find a trustworthy

messenger—and the result, the reward! Surely, in the few minutes that

had passed, he had paid to the full. But he had paid in vain. . . .

His head was swimming; his body frozen. A tray appeared beside him,

brought by that scornful girl herself. She vanished again. He seized and

drained the glass of wine upon it, and a little warmth stole into him.

He heard a footstep, the flow of a robe; the lady of the house back

again, no doubt. But, when he looked round, there, gazing at him in

astonishment, was the Duchesse de Trélan.

He got up and flung himself towards her.

“I did it for your sake,” he cried, hardly knowing what he said, “—and

he repulsed me like a dog. I was told I should live to do you a service

. . . and I thought the day had come. But he . . . he affected to think

it was . . . false . . . and he has gone, despite my warning.”

“Warning!” stammered Valentine, blanching. “Warning of what? I was

above—I did not know that you were here.”

“I imagine so,” he retorted bitterly. But she had no room in her mind

for any emotion but one.

“You came to warn M. de Trélan?” she said, and he saw that she was

twisting her fingers together. “That was . . . I thank you. But—what is

the danger? . . . _because he is gone!_” The last four words came out

with little less than terror behind them.

He could do her the immense, deliberate, though defeated wrong that he

had done, but, face to face with her again, after all he had sinned and

suffered, he shrank from dealing her the blow his undiluted knowledge

must deal. And it was too late now for any benefit to come of it, for,

as she had said, the Duc was gone.

He dropped his eyes. “I heard a rumour,” he said, “that there was a

regiment of the soldiers from Holland somewhere on the Vannes road, and

that they might not be too particular in the observance of a

safe-conduct. That was all; and no doubt it was false . . . and at any

rate,” he added, his bitterness getting the better of him again, “M. de

Trélan saw fit not only to disregard my warning, but to insult me into

the bargain.”

“Not to observe the safe-conduct!” exclaimed the Duchesse sharply. “But

that is unthinkable!”

(Yes, anything but _his_ peril had passed her by; that was clear.)

“You are right, it is really unthinkable,” he answered wearily. “I was a

fool to come, and I will relieve you of my presence.”

He meant, indeed, on that to walk straight out of the place. But he was

not a young man; he had been ill; he had asked too much of his body. His

head turned once more, and violently; he caught at the arm of the chair

from which he had risen, and, not to fall altogether, slid back into it.

And then the mud, the pallor, the deadly fatigue were all visible to

Valentine, and she realised with a shock the thing he had done—for her.

He saw it in her face as she came to him.

“You do believe me then, Valentine? It may not be true, but I believed

it!” he said confusedly, forgetting that he had not revealed the heart

of the peril. “And I tried to stop him—against my will, yes, against my

will! But you do believe me,—in spite of the past?”

The hoarse words were torn out of him, and when she let him have her

hand as she bent over him, he put his head down on it and broke into a

moment’s strangled sobbing.

CHAPTER VII

HOW AT THE LAST THE WINE WAS NOT DRUNK

(1)

By very hard going the four riders got to Quimperlé that night, despite

the state of the roads. They slept there entirely unmolested; a small

detachment of troops indeed occupied the town, but the mere sight of

Brune’s signature was enough. And the anxiety of ‘les jeunes’ at

least—the Duc would not discuss the matter—‘les jeunes’ who had only

half heard, was much allayed. It did not strike them that they were

still within the confines of Finistère, and that possibly the

disgraceful orders had not yet crossed the Scorff. Yet, all unknown to

their leader, they took that night in the hôtel a certain precaution

which might have remained unknown to him, had he not, waking in the dark

of the early morning, and perplexed by a sound outside his door for

which he could not account, lit a candle and softly opened it; and so

come on his own son stretched out there asleep across the threshold, his

pistols within reach of his hand, and his drawn sword beneath his head.

Gaston looked down, not a little moved, at that embodiment of his own

youth guarding him, and, shading the light, contemplated the sleeping

boy as he had done last year in the attic at Hennebont. Laure’s face,

grown so shadowy now, came back for a moment to haunt him. “I wish I

could tell him,” he said to himself. But there was his promise; and with

a sigh he went in and closed the door again.

The Duc made no reference next morning to his discovery, and thus never

learnt that they had all taken their turns in devotion. When they

reached Pont-Scorff they were already in the Morbihan, but through

Pont-Scorff they rode without even having to show their safe-conducts.

As Auray was rather too long a stage before the mid-day meal, and as the

horses, with the exception of Zéphyr, were now going none too well, they

decided to eat déjeuner at Hennebont, and about noon they drew rein

before the chief inn in the little town which had seen them creep into

it like thieves in the dusk, nearly a year ago. But though they came

openly now they were incomparably heavier-hearted.

As they dismounted, Gaston desired two of them to look after the tired

horses while he ordered the meal. Lucien and Artamène detached

themselves for this duty, and disappeared down a dark entry with the

four steeds. The Duc, followed by Roland, entered the inn.

Evidently Hennebont was full of soldiers; officers of all arms were

lounging outside and inside the door of the hostelry, but, though they

looked with extreme curiosity at the Royalists, no one seemed to find

their presence unnatural, or made the faintest show of asking for some

authorisation of it. Not even to Gaston did it occur that here, in the

Morbihan, they were being taken for officers of Cadoudal’s disbanded

army who had presumably not yet divested themselves of their uniforms,

but who were none the less amnestied. To Roland it was an extraordinary

experience to pass through these throngs of Blues as if they possessed

some charm; they did not even need to show those safe-conducts. But of

course they were safe with an honourable foe; were their enemies not

fellow-countrymen?

The inn parlour, with its small round tables, was crowded with guests,

both civil and military. As M. de Trélan came in, followed by the young

man, not a few looked up at the two handsome Chouan officers, of whom

Gaston’s high rank could only be guessed at by the air of distinction

that never left him, for he was not openly wearing his scarf, and the

little cross on his breast was too rare a decoration to be widely known.

They sat down at the only unoccupied table, one in a corner opposite the

door, and the Duc ordered four covers. The be-coiffed peasant girl who

received his commands asked for indulgence if there were delay, for, as

the gentlemen could see, they were very busy.

“Shall I go out then, and help the others with the horses, Sir?”

suggested Roland. His leader nodded, and Roland got up, still thinking

how odd it was to sit down placidly and eat in a room full of Blues.

There were quite a dozen officers there—hussars, dragoons and infantry.

The eyes of some of these officers followed him as he threaded his way

between the tables. Possibly they also found it piquant to see a former

foe moving about unmolested.

Feminine eyes followed him, too, appreciative of his youth and looks,

eyes set in the face of a youngish, buxom woman wearing an extravagant

bonnet and luxurious furs of marten who sat—strangely enough, with her

back to most of the company—at a table in one of the other corners.

With her was a big florid man over whose air of importance, every time

he looked at his companion, there passed a milder and obscuring gleam,

even as a light cloud drifts over the face of the moon. Any guests who

had noticed them decided that they were probably bride and bridegroom,

and all the more sentimental because they were neither of them in their

first youth. And newly wed in fact they were—M. and Mme Georges Camain,

on their way to Lorient, at which port M. Camain had to inspect some

warehouses for the Government. By taking his Rose with him he hoped to

combine pleasure with business.

Mme Camain’s eyes, therefore, travelled after the young man, as he

entered her sphere of vision just before going through the door. Her

husband thereupon leant over the table and tapped her on the pretty,

plump hand with the new wedding ring.

“Eyes right, please!” he said jocosely. “You are only allowed to look at

me now.”

“He reminds me of someone, that child,” observed the lady reflectively.

“A long time ago . . .”

“Eat your partridge, ma mie, and never mind about the days before the

Flood,” commanded Camain, setting her the example. “Remember, too, that

we have ordered the carriage to be at the door by one o’clock, and that

time is getting on.”

Rose pouted. “I suppose you think you have a right to be jealous now,

vieux monstre!”

“It is not only a right, but a duty!” returned the monster cheerfully,

going on eating, however, with a very care-free appetite.

But Rose was intrigued by the passage of the young man. “I wonder if he

was alone?” she murmured, and, between taking pecks at her partridge,

continually turned her head and craned her neck towards that quarter of

the room from which she divined that he had come. But it was in vain;

for, short of getting up and turning round altogether, she could not see

it.

And Gaston de Trélan, at that table in the corner, his head on his hand,

his thoughts far away, sat waiting for the advent of the meal and the

return of his aides-de-camp. The two nearest officers, dragoons, with

their heads close together over their wine, alternately looked at him

and whispered to one another. Meanwhile people ate steadily.

All at once Rose, whose curiosity, though almost motiveless, was proving

too strong for her, saying to her astonished husband, “I think I must

have dropped my handkerchief from my reticule as I came in,” got up from

her place before he had time to protest, and walked, her eyes on the

floor as though searching for something, till she came to a spot whence

she could conveniently glance at that one table in the corner which she

could not see when seated. Having arrived there, she sped a look at

it—at the Royalist officer sitting there alone who, as she moved across

the room, raised preoccupied eyes in her direction. . . .

Next moment the entire company was electrified to see the pretty little

woman in the marten furs clasp her hands suddenly together, and give a

tiny scream which penetrated through all the clatter of knives and the

babel of conversation. And then, more or less of silence having

descended, she broke out with a name—

“Monsieur de Trélan! Is it possible!”

And not to realise who was the object of this touching recognition was

difficult, for the solitary Chouan officer in the corner, after staring

a moment, rose slowly to his feet and bowed—as a man bows to an unknown

lady. Yet Rose stood there, her face quite white under her preposterous

bonnet, apparently oblivious that every eye was either on her, or on the

man to whom she had drawn attention. Then the wave of mild universal

surprise was broken into and flung aside by a billow of a much more

menacing kind. For, with an exclamation, one of the neighbouring

officers of dragoons leapt to his feet, his chair falling backwards

behind him, and strode in front of the Royalist’s table.

“Monsieur de Trélan—or Monsieur de Kersaint, as you prefer—will you

have the kindness to follow me?”

Gaston, coldly amused, surveyed him for a moment. “No, Monsieur, I must

beg to decline,” he said. “Your zeal is admirable, but misplaced.” And

he laid his hand on the back of his chair, with a view, evidently, to

sitting down again.

“You deny then that you are de Kersaint, the general of Finistère?”

“Not for a moment!”

“Then,” said the officer with a gesture, “it is my unpleasant duty to

arrest you. You will be wise, as you see, not to resist.”

The Duc de Trélan relinquished his hold of the chair and drew himself

up. “You must be dreaming, Monsieur,” he retorted. “You have no power to

arrest me. I am on my way to Vannes under General Brune’s safe-conduct.

You must know that, since you know who I am.”

For all reply the officer turned and beckoned to the rest. But his

companion was already there beside him, and from every quarter of the

room the other Republicans were hurrying, between the tables, to that

table in the corner behind which stood their quarry, alone.

“I have a safe-conduct,” repeated Gaston very haughtily. “Am I not

speaking to Frenchmen?—I have this also!” He took a step or two

backwards, and his sword sprang out.

“You had better come without resistance, Monsieur de Kersaint,” said the

officer of dragoons menacingly. “I have a squadron of my men out there

within hail, and these gentlemen, you can see, are in receipt of the

same orders. As for your aide-de-camp——” He snapped his fingers.

But Camain, pushing his bulky form through the onlookers, here broke in.

“Look here, gentlemen, this officer says he has a safe-conduct. Give him

at least the chance of showing it!”

“Who are you?” asked the dragoon rudely over his shoulder. “A damned

civilian! This is a matter for the military, thanks! The Chouan general

de Kersaint is to be arrested, safe-conduct or no safe-conduct; those

are the orders of the First Consul himself!”

Camain drew up his imposing figure. “I am deputy for the department of

Maine-et-Loire,” he declared in his deepest voice. “(Be quiet, Rose!)

What you are proposing to do is atrocious, and I protest!”

“Go back to your department then, and protest there!” retorted the

officer insolently. “Now that Madame has so obligingly furnished the

identification we wanted . . . Once more, Monsieur de Kersaint, will you

come, or will you have a useless mêlée here?”

Gaston set his teeth. It was true after all, this incredible infamy! If

he had listened to de Brencourt! . . . Valentine—should he ever see her

again? The room, seething now with excitement, swam for a second. . . .

No, they should not take him alive! This, the last, would be a good

fight—one against how many . . . twelve, thirteen? He slipped a couple

of feet further backwards still, till he was almost in the angle of the

wall, the blade he had never thought to use again glittering in his

hand. Then he smiled, not altogether scornfully. His intention was

obvious.

In the ring now round him several other swords slid out. Most of the

guests, vociferating, had already made a bolt for the door, but Rose was

clinging to her husband in a frenzy. “Georges! Georges! don’t let them

do it! It is the Duc, it is indeed! Tell them you had charge of

Mirabel—tell them . . .” But her words, vain in any case, could not

penetrate the uproar. And, even as she spoke, the officer of dragoons

drew and cocked a pistol. “Now, for the last time, Monsieur de Kersaint!

See, we do not want to harm your escort, if you have one—our business

is not with them—but if you drive us to use force, you will certainly

get them killed as well as yourself!”

His escort! that escort for the moment, mercifully, out of hearing. In

the imminent prospect of combat Gaston had forgotten them. Good God,

that was only too true—they would certainly get themselves cut to

pieces for him! Roland—_Roland_!—and those other boys slaughtered for

his sake . . . and uselessly! The idea was too horrible. He must let

them take him—quickly. His face grew sombre, and he lowered his point a

little.

“So this is the First Consul’s honour!” he said, but his voice cut like

a sword, “—and yours, soldiers and Frenchmen! I was warned of this—but

I would not believe such a thing possible!”

“It is orders!” a chorus answered him.

“Swear that you will let my escort go unharmed—no, how can I rely on

your word?” he said, looking contemptuously round, and this time no one

answered him. “At least I shall never give up my sword now, since there

is no one left worthy to receive it.” And before anyone had moved he had

put his left hand to the naked blade, and, bending his knee, snapped the

weapon across. Then he threw the two halves at his feet and folded his

arms. “I am at your disposal . . . _gentlemen_ . . . only be quick about

it!”

They had no desire to be other than speedy. There was a travelling

carriage just drawn up at the inn door; small matter that it belonged to

the Deputy who had tried to interfere. Five minutes later, with fifty

dragoons round it, that carriage had started for Auray and Vannes, while

the remaining officers, having thrust aside the doubly infuriated

Camain, were dealing in the passage with the distracted young men of

their prisoner’s escort, to whom news of the catastrophe had meanwhile

penetrated. The short and furious mêlée was indeed none of the

Republicans’ seeking, but its end was just as inevitable as if it had

been. . . . For Artamène, his head laid open by a sabre, having

stumbled, blinded with blood, into the eating-room, and fallen his

length among the tables, lay there without stirring; while Lucien, his

arm fractured, leant with shut eyes against the doorpost, his uniform

torn on one side from shoulder to waist. And in the now emptied setting

of the drama which she had unwittingly brought about, Rose Camain,

kneeling by the bleeding and unconscious boy on the floor, but not

trying in any way to succour him, her hands to the sides of her head in

approved theatrical fashion, was sending forth shriek after

shriek. . . .

(2)

But Roland, uninjured though almost crazy, was in the yard, his hands

shaking so much as he re-saddled Zéphyr that he could hardly pull the

girths. Even so, he had enough wits left to realise that the large stout

man, himself greatly discomposed, who had, as far as he remembered,

dragged him bodily out of the affray, was right when he said that it was

perfectly useless to follow the vanished carriage along the Auray road.

The best thing that he could do was to hasten back to Finistère and

spread the news. Roland was conscious that his adviser was helping him

now, keeping up, as he put on Zéphyr’s bridle, a running accompaniment

of wrath—“Disgraceful . . . infamous . . . to purloin a carriage

too. . . .”

“Look here, boy,” he said suddenly, throwing the reins over the Arab’s

neck, “—by the way, I suppose you’re his son, are you not?”

Roland, too dazed and wretched to be surprised at the idea, shook his

head, and put his foot in the stirrup.

“You’re devilish like him,” said Camain explanatorily. “Wait a minute—I

want to say something. The Duchesse de Trélan—if you see her, tell her

she can command my services. Camain, my name is; she knew me at Mirabel

. . . I expect you have heard about that. Hôtel du Lion d’Or at Lorient

will find me.”

Roland, in the saddle now, nodded. _O God, O God, they had let him be

taken!_

“I’ll see that your comrades are looked after,” added the Deputy kindly,

looking up at his young, desperate face. “I hope it is all a

mistake—damn it all, it must be! and that they will release him when

they get to Vannes. Yet it is best not to count on it. Good luck to

you!”

Roland bent down and seized the hand of the ex-administrator of Mirabel,

who so little divined in him the “marauder” of last April, and next

moment was out of the courtyard.

But even as he passed under the tunnel leading to the street he heard

this Camain calling after him, and impatiently reined up again.

“Look here, young man,” said the Deputy in a lowered tone, “as it was

owing to my—as I feel a sort of interest in the Trélan family, I’m

damned if I don’t follow those scoundrels to Vannes to-night, just to

keep an eye on the business. Tell the Duchesse that—and should she come

to Vannes in person, tell her to go to the Hôtel de l’Epée, and if I am

not still there myself I will leave a message for her.”

“God bless you!” said Roland, with tears in his eyes. Then he was in the

street, and a moment or two later, riding like mad back along the road

to Finistère.

For some miles he galloped on almost without thought, he was so numb

with misery and incredulity. Zéphyr, the incomparable, seemed quite

fresh, despite the distance he had come since yesterday morning. That

was why he had taken him. . . . A rescue—how was it to be brought

about? It all seemed to rest on his shoulders. A terrible feeling of

helplessness began to wrap him round as he pushed on through the cold

rain which was now beating on him. Was he really acting for the best in

returning like this, and what was to be done when he got back—the men

all disbanded? If only the Abbé were there! And how should he ever tell

the Duchesse? The clouds about him seemed thick with the shame and

anguish in his heart. And Zéphyr was not so fresh after all.

What did they mean to do with the Duc? Hold him as a hostage? They dared

do nothing worse, in the face of that full safe-conduct. Even the First

Consul would not dare. It was a mistake; yes, a piece of bravado. Yet if

only they had listened to M. de Brencourt!

He had covered many miles without drawing rein. The night was beginning,

the early February night. And Zéphyr, the tireless and surefooted, had

stumbled twice. “O Zéphyr, don’t you fail too, as we have failed!” cried

his rider.

Over the border at last into Finistère, and through Quimperlé, where

they had slept yesterday. It was dark now, and snowing a little. He

meant to ride all night, but at Bannalec it was plain that it was an

impossibility both for him and his gallant horse. He tried to get

another; could not, and fell asleep from exhaustion even as he argued

about it with the people of the inn. They carried him up and put him to

bed. He had covered not quite half of the distance back.

It was afternoon of the next day when at last he got to La Vergne, and

he could hardly get out of the saddle, hardly drag himself up the steps.

No sentry now. He lifted the great knocker; the door swung open. Someone

had heard the hoofs. It was Marthe. She caught at him as he stumbled

into the hall. “Roland, what is it? O, what has happened?”

“Bad news,” said he, so weary he could scarcely frame the words. “The

Duc——” A cold mist suddenly drove at him across the hall; when it

cleared he saw Mme de la Vergne hurrying towards him, and that Marthe

had her arms round him, half supporting him. And who was the man rising

from a chair by the hearth? But he saw also the Duchesse de Trélan, who

must have been coming down the great staircase, standing as if turned to

marble in her descent, a few feet from the bottom. . . . And he broke

away from Marthe, for he knew he must tell her at once.

“Madame, they have arrested the Duc at Hennebont—they have taken him to

Vannes . . . it was true about the safe-conduct . . . the others are

hurt—killed, perhaps . . .” And sobbing out, “How can we save him?”

clutching at her dress, he sank forward exhausted on the stairs, his

head against her very feet.

CHAPTER VIII

WHAT WAS LEARNT AT VANNES

Two nights later, in the dark and the cold, they drove into

Vannes—Valentine, Roland and the Comte de Brencourt—having left Mme de

la Vergne at Hennebont as they passed through, to tend her son. All

thought of raising in Finistère a force large enough for rescue had been

abandoned. Indeed they could never have got together enough men to

assault Vannes, held as it now was, and the mere attempt might be

extremely prejudicial to M. de Trélan. Since Finistère had capitulated,

it might indeed be the very consummation at which the First Consul was

aiming, in order to have a good pretext for disposing of Finistère’s

leader, now that he had him in his hands. It was better to hurry to

Vannes and trust to organising a rescue by means of some of Cadoudal’s

Chouans.