THE LAUNDRY DOOR
After a while Deventer and I went back to our joint study, where we
essayed to do some work. But mostly we spoke apart, with lips that
hardly moved, of our plans and all that lay in liberty-land beyond the
walls. Deventer would go nowhere but to his father's house, and though I
meant to end up with the red blouse of Garibaldi on my chest, I did not
see how I could fail him at such a time.
We had to wait till night, and the time was almost unendurably long. The
lines in our text-books which our eyes followed did not bite upon our
minds. We were thinking so hard of other things that philosophies slid
aside impotent and discomfited.
We began immediately to plan our escape, or at least I planned and
Deventer, his great shaggy head on his hands and his eyes tight shut to
concentrate thought, gave himself to the task of spotting the weak
points.
At the bottom of the junior promenade was a door which opened upon the
river, and on the opposite side dwelt a man who owned a skiff. The
elders of the upper school used to employ this man, Jules Rameau by
name, to ferry them across as often as they had enough money for a
secret supper at a cabaret in some shy street. But some ill-paid _pion_
must be bribed to allow the key to be "lifted" from the inside of his
door. He must also take care to be in the deepest of sleep when it was
returned. But this would not do for us. We were not coming back at all,
and we could not allow any wretched usher to be sent about his business
on our account.
In our leisure time we had studied the whole of the ground plan of St.
Andre. The school buildings occupied an enormous amount of space, far
more than was needed for educational purposes. By sticking to it we made
some astonishing discoveries. For instance, after passing through the
kitchen, by descending a flight of steps which led to an unoccupied
wing, where all sorts of educational rubbish had been
accumulated--globes, wall-maps, ancient copy-books with headlines set by
hand, and a good bust of the first Napoleon--we reached a
clean-smelling, brightly lighted range of offices all set out with tubs,
soap, boiling vats, and blue stains which ran over smooth boards.
We had come upon the laundry of the college. On pegs, which ran all
round, overalls were hung. There was even a shawl here and there, or a
bonnet or two, as it were, flaunting their sex in this temple of the
masculine virtues.
Not Crusoe on his island was more astonished when he came on the
footprint. For it was not known to any of us, not even to the _pions_,
that a single feminine foot profaned any part of the _lycee_.
But, whatever our surprise, it did not prevent us from locking the door
and extracting the key of one of the range of exits which led out from
the fixed washtubs upon the narrow drying ground, a terrace wholly
invisible and unsuspected from our quarters on the opposite waterfront
of the building.
Of course, Deventer and I said nothing about our discovery. We did not
want the whole upper school playing leap-frog through the kitchens, or
telling lies as to their conquests among the laundry maids.
It was possible that the lock of the door might be changed immediately,
but we considered it more likely that the forewoman or caretaker in
charge would say nothing at all about the loss, and trust to the key
turning up.
We thought the whole matter well over, and considered it probable that a
gate in the wall would be left permanently open to facilitate the
comings and goings of the workwomen in the early morning. Such an
opening in the wall must lead immediately out upon the main road that
wound circuitously up the hill, and by which all stores and provisions
were brought to the porter's lodge.
Then we made ready for the trip, laying out our most comfortable and
inconspicuous town-going suits to take the place of the brass-buttoned
_lycee_ uniform.
With our door carefully locked, we raised a piece of the skirting board
of our study and examined our store of arms, a couple of revolvers
procured by Deventer in some vague inexplicable way at the works, three
packets of ammunition apiece, and a couple of "surins," or long Apache
knives--the use of which we had learned from the sous-prefet's son, a
youth precondemned to the gallows, who before expulsion had sojourned an
eventful and long-remembered three months at St. Andre.
We profited by his instructions as to guards and undercuts by practising
with models whittled in wood. This we were enabled to do in open
playground by the simple expedient of calling the exercise legerdemain.
Except what we could carry in our pockets, and the warlike accoutrement
mentioned above, we left the whole of our property at the college. At
the last minute Deventer packed away a Globe Shakespeare, and I found
room for a limp Bagster Bible of small size, which my father had given
me.
The clatter of the bedward-driven flocks began to tramp past our study
door. The hum of lesson preparation in the schoolrooms ceased. We
carefully set our house in order, for it was time for our evening visit
from Professor Renard. But he was called "Renard by Name and Renard by
Nature" among the Juniors whose small deceits he had the knack of seeing
through, even before the explanation was well under way. He was a Jesuit
of the newer school, of an educated candour, which seemed natural to our
young eyes, and a ready sympathy for our misdemeanours, which made him
the most popular professor in the _lycee_ of St. Andre.
He always tapped at our door before entering. He never listened nor made
use of the information of the common school spy. These things counted
for much.
"Well, gentlemen," he said, as he came in and sat down in our one
arm-chair, "you were too long on the terrace to-day to have a good
report of your studies!"
We convinced him to the contrary. For we had always gone on the
principle that who does his work early and well has his way made plain
for him, and in him a thousand things are overlooked for which a
"slacker" would get himself jumped upon.
After he had examined our exercises and approved of them, he looked up
at us suddenly from under his overhanging brows.
"You understood what the disturbance was about over there?" he demanded.
"I knew," said Deventer, before I could stop him, "that if my father was
left behind with his factories to look after, he would find himself
mightily short-handed. He would have only the English staff to support
him."
"Ah," said Professor Renard, "you look at it from a personal point of
view, as is natural. Your father----"
"I have also a mother and sisters over there----"
"I think I can promise that they will be safe whatever happens to your
father. And you can trust to my judgment. By custom and training my
class, the clergy of France, parochial and regular, are royalists. The
fight over yonder was only tiger eating leopard. The reds of Gambetta's
hue were chased out by the deeper scarlet of the Commune. Did you see
that flag of theirs to-night, just before sunset? It glowed with the
true hell-fire light."
I had been in the habit of arguing in favour of the working men who were
to constitute the brain and brawn of the Commune, but to-night I said
nothing. Renard did not notice my silence, however, but continued his
diatribe.
"We have had Napoleons of victory and Napoleons of disaster--republics
of guillotine and republics of veiled Caesarism. And now we have a third
which is a house divided against itself. Listen well, young men--the
Bible speaks the truth--it cannot stand. Even now the time for its fall
is almost come. The little financier Thiers will pay off the Germans
from the chimney-corner hoards of the peasants. Oh, make no mistake,
lads, we are beaten as a nation, because we have not obeyed God and His
anointed king. The atheist Garibaldi, spoiler of churches and enemy of
the Pope, will do nothing for France, except to widen the area over
which the German flood will spread. Their armies of Rouen, of the Loire,
and of the South-East are condemned in advance. It is as if the Lord of
Hosts had said, 'I am against thee, O France! Thou wast once the eldest
daughter of the Church. Now thou hast defiled thyself with the
unbeliever, with the captains of Assyria, and art become a castaway.'"
He seemed to recall himself. He was speaking as he did in the pulpit.
The glow faded from his features. He smiled a little contemptuously at
himself.
"I am gabbling like a novice of the first year, and withal to a couple
of Protestants," he said, getting up and extending his hands, one to
each, as was his habit. "Forgive me!"
Cramming our special themes into his pocket for after-consideration, he
went downstairs with a heavy regular tread, and the noisy dormitories
hushed at the sound. The Renard could not be taken in with the usual
explanation that they had been reciting their prayers. Not till he was
safe in his own room did the hum and clatter begin all over again.
It was past midnight before we judged it prudent to begin our descent.
Safe of course it was not, nor could ever be. In a school directed by
clerical influences, supervision is personal and unceasing. The two of
us owed our comparative immunity to our having passed our recent
_baccalaureat_, and to having done honour to the college in the national
examinations, but still more to the fact that we were English heretics,
whose eternal damnation was assured beforehand, and whose lesser
transgressions, therefore, mattered little, so long as they did not
flaunt themselves before the pupils, devout, Catholic, and Roman.
There was a faint sufficient light from the southern windows, for the
moon was nearly full. The empty class-rooms smelt heavy and sour, and
their doors stood open like the portholes of a battery, setting our
hearts fluttering. We did not mean to let anything stand in the way of
our purpose, but as we had been on good terms with the heads of the
_lycee_ of St. Andre, we did not want any trouble now at the eleventh
hour, or rather when for us the time was close on the stroke of twelve.
We passed through the schoolrooms unchallenged. The dormitories were
hushed and silent. We could see the dim light of the _pions'_
watch-candles under the doors. We considered that we had passed the zone
of danger, and were hurrying forward with less precaution, when a light
in the open door of the kitchen pulled us up all standing.
I was lighter than Deventer, so I slipped my shoes and went forward on
my stocking-soles to spy out the land.
A "mitron," or cook-boy, was writing a letter to his sweetheart with
incredible pains. He wrote with his hands, with his body, with the
wrinkles on his brow, and the tongue which stuck out of his mouth,
responsively vibrant as a compass-needle to the spirit of his
composition.
Here was a pretty pass. We must wait on this white-capped, dirty-aproned
rascal who seemed in no hurry to finish his task. He had a file of
feuilletons bound in brown paper before him, and he turned over the
leaves of these in search of expressions which had pleased him, and
which he now desired to appropriate. There seemed no end to his literary
zeal, and if he was not hurried morning might come before we could get
clear.
Then I remembered that among Deventer's accomplishments was that of
being able to imitate the wheezy asthmatic breathing and hollow cough of
the _proviseur_. So I sent him back with instructions to carry out his
imitation at the foot of the kitchen stairs.
At the first wheeze and accompanying shuffle of a hand on the smooth
wooden stair-rail, out went the "mitron's" candle. I could hear him
gathering up his home-bound books of feuilletons, and whisking away his
letter paper. I drew back as close to the wall as possible, for I
suspected he would pass my way in order to reach his bedroom. I was no
more than in time, for he stumbled over my foot, which had been
carelessly thrust forward into the passage way. He did not stop to
inquire into this, probably thinking that someone had put out their
shoes to be cleaned in the morning. It was a narrow escape, for if it
had chanced to be the boot-boy instead of an amorous 'prentice-cook we
might not have escaped so easily.
Deventer and I crossed the kitchen quickly. The wick of the "mitron's"
candle was still smoking red, as we stole down the corkscrew stair which
led to the laundry. Everything here smelt strongly of damp clothes and
lye, but somewhere a window was open, for the current of air was
pronounced, and suggested possible alternative if the lock of our door
had been changed.
But in this we were fortunate. The key which I had carried so long in
the inner pocket of my jacket turned easily. The door swung noiselessly
inwards, and the clean breath of the salt breeze from the Camargue
marshes made our faces pleasantly chill and our lips sticky. We locked
the door on the outside, and in another minute stood in the roadway,
looking back at the great ghostly pile of the Palace of the Monks--as
Louis the XIV had called it, when he cut down the plans so that it
should not rival in dimensions that "abyss of expenditure" which was
Versailles.
But it was no time to stand sentimentalising upon architecture. We
turned and went down the vacant white road as fast as our legs would
serve us.