THE ROPE LADDER
The night was starlit, though the moon would come later. We hoped to be
away from the chateau before it rose. There was a gentle breeze, which
we rather welcomed as likely to cover what little noise we might make.
Leaving our horses tied in the forest, and taking the cross-bow and
other things, we stole along the moat skirting the Western wall, till we
were opposite the great tower. It rose toward the sky, sheer from the
black water that separated us from it by so few yards. We gazed upward,
and I pointed out the window which I thought, from its situation, must
be that of the Countess, if she still occupied her former prison.
Our first plan depended upon her still occupying that prison, or some
other with an unbarred window in that side of the tower; and upon her
being still accompanied by Mathilde.
If the man on top of the tower were to look down now, thought I! We had
considered that chance. It was not likely he would come to the edge of
the tower and look straight down. His business apparently was to watch
the road at a distance and in both directions. He could do this best
from the Northeastern part of the tower. From what I knew now, I could
guess why the Count had stationed him there: a conspirator never knows
when he is safe from belated detection and a visit of royal guards. This
accounted also, perhaps as much as the Count's jealousy, for his
inhospitality to strangers, and for the half-military character of his
household.
Hugues uttered a bird-call, which had been one of his signals to
Mathilde in their meetings. We waited, looking up and wishing the night
were blacker. He repeated the cry.
Something faintly whitish appeared in the dark slit which I had taken to
be the Countess's window. It was a face.
"Mathilde," whispered Hugues to me.
Keeping his gaze upon her, he held up the cross-bow for her notice; then
the bolt, to which we had attached the slender cord. Next, before
adjusting the bolt, he aimed the unbent bow at her window: this was to
indicate what he was about to do. Then he lowered the bow, and looked at
her without further motion, awaiting some sign of understanding from
her. She nodded her head emphatically, and drew it in.
Hugues fitted the string and the bolt, raised the bow, and stood
motionless for I know not how many seconds; at last the string twanged;
the bolt sang through the air. It did not fall, nor strike stone, and
the cord remained suspended from above: the bolt had gone through the
window.
"Good!" I whispered in elation; and truly Hugues deserved praise, for he
had had to allow both for the wind and for the cord fastened to the
bolt.
The cord was soon pulled upward. Our end of it was tied to the rope
ladder, which Hugues unfolded as it continued to be drawn up by
Mathilde. At the junction of cord and ladder was fixed the paper with
instructions. Mathilde could not overlook this nor mistake its purpose.
When the ladder was nearly all in the air, its movement ceased. We knew
then that Mathilde had the other end of it. Presently the window became
faintly alight.
"They have lighted a candle, to read the note," I whispered.
Hugues kept a careful hold upon our end of the ladder, to which there
was fastened another cord, shorter and stronger than the first. My note
gave instructions to attach the ladder securely to a bed, or some other
suitable object, which, if movable, should then be placed close to the
window, but not so as to impede my entrance. It announced my intention
of visiting the Countess for a purpose of supreme importance to us both.
When the ladder was adjusted, a handkerchief should be waved up and down
in the window.
"The Countess surely will not refuse to let me come and say what I have
to," I whispered, to reassure myself after we had waited some time.
"Surely not, Monsieur. She does not know yet what it is," replied
Hugues.
At that moment the handkerchief waved in the window.
Hugues drew the ladder taut and braced himself. I grasped one of the
rounds, found a lower one with my foot, and began to mount. The ladder
formed, of course, an incline over the moat. When I had ascended some
way, Hugues, as we had agreed, allowed the ladder to swing gradually
across the moat and hang against the tower, he retaining hold of the
cord by which to draw the lower end back at the fit time. I now climbed
perpendicularly, close to the tower. It was a laborious business,
requiring great patience. Once I ran my eyes up along the tall tower and
saw the stars in the sky; once I looked down and saw them reflected in
the moat: but as these diversions made my task appear the longer, and
had a qualmish effect upon me, I thereafter studied only each immediate
round of the ladder as I came to it. As I got higher, I felt the wind
more; but it only refreshed me. Toward the end I had some misgiving lest
the ladder should lie too tight against the bottom of the window for me
to grasp the last rounds. But this fear proved groundless. Mathilde had
placed a pillow at the outer edge of the sill, for the ladder to run
over; and I had no sooner thrust my hand into the window than it was
caught in a firm grasp and guided to the proper round. Another step
brought my head above the sill: at the next, I had two arms inside the
long, shaft-like opening; my body followed, as Mathilde's receded. I
crawled through; lowered myself, hands and knees, to the couch beneath;
leaped to the floor, and kneeling before the Countess, kissed her hand.
She was standing, and her dress was the same blue robe in which I had
seen her in the same room two nights before. The candle was on a small
table, which held also an illuminated book and an image of the Virgin,
and above which a crucifix hung against the wall. Besides the bed at the
window, there were another bed, a trunk, a chair, and a three-legged
stool.
The Countess's face was all anxiety and question.
"Thank God you are still safe!" said I.
"And you!" she replied. "Brigitte told us you had escaped. I had prayed
your life might be saved. But now you put yourself in peril again. I had
hoped you were far away. Oh, Monsieur, what is it brings you back to
this house of danger?"
"My going has surely made it a house of greater danger to you. It is a
marvel the Count has not already taken revenge upon you for my escape. I
thank God I am here while you still live."
"My life is in God's hands. Was it to say this that you have risked
yours again, Monsieur? Oh, your coming here but adds to my sorrow."
"Hear what sorrow you will cause, Madame, if you refuse to be saved
while there is yet time. I ask you to consider others. Below, waiting
for us, is Hugues, who has enabled me to come here to-night. You know
how that good brave fellow loves Mathilde. And you know that if you die,
Mathilde will share your fate, for the Count will wish to give his own
story of your death."
"But Mathilde must not stay to share my fate. She must go away with you
now, while there is opportunity."
"I will not stir from your side, Madame,--they will have to tear me away
when they come to kill you," said Mathilde, and then to me, "They have
not sent Madame any food to-day. I think the plan is to starve us."
"Horrible!" I said. "That, no doubt, is because of my escape. But who
knows when the Count, in one of the rages caused by his fancies, may
turn to some method still more fearful. Madame, how can you endure this?
Why, it is to encourage his crime, when you might escape!"
"Monsieur, you cannot tempt me with sophistries. What God permits--"
"Has not God permitted me to come here, with the means of escape? Avail
yourself of them--see if God will not permit that."
"We know that God permits sin, Monsieur, for his own good reasons. It is
for us to see that we are not they to whom it is permitted."
"But can you think it a sin to save yourself?"
"It is always a sin to break vows, Monsieur. And now--to go with you, of
all men--would be doubly a sin." She had lowered her voice, and she
lowered her eyes, too, and drew slightly back from me.
"Then go with Hugues, Madame," said I, my own voice softened almost to a
whisper. "Only let me follow at a little distance to see that you are
safe. And when you are safe, finally and surely, I will go away, and we
shall be as strangers."
Tears were in her eyes. But she answered:
"No, Monsieur; I should still be a truant wife--still a breaker of vows
made to the Church and heaven."
"Then you would rather die, and have poor Mathilde die after
you--Mathilde, who has no such scruples?"
"Mathilde must go away with you to-night. I command her--she will not
disobey what may be the last orders I shall ever give her."
"Madame, I have never disobeyed yet, but I will disobey this time. I
will not leave you." So said Mathilde, with quiet firmness.
"Ah, Mathilde, it is unkind, unfair! You will save yourself for Hugues's
sake."
"I will save myself when you save yourself, Madame; not before."
The Countess sank upon the chair, and turning to the Virgin's image,
said despairingly:
"Oh, Mother of heaven, save this child from her own fidelity!"
"It is not Mathilde alone that you doom," I now said, thinking it time
to try my last means. "It is not only that you will darken the life of
poor Hugues. There is another who will not leave Lavardin if you will
not: one who will stay near, sharing your danger; and who, if you die,
will seek his own death in avenging you."
"Oh, no, Monsieur!" she entreated. "I was so glad to learn you had
escaped. Do not rob me of that consolation. Do not stay at Lavardin.
Live!--live and be happy, for my sake. So brave--so tender--the world
needs you; and you must not die for me--I forbid you!"
"You will find me as immovable as Mathilde," said I.
She looked from one to the other of us, and put forth her hands
pleadingly; then broke down into weeping.
"Oh, will you make my duty the harder?" she said. "God knows I would
gladly die to save you."
"It is not dying that will save us. The only way is to save yourself."
"Monsieur, you shall not drive me to sin by your temptations! Heaven
will save you both in spite of yourselves. That will be my reward for
putting this sin from me."
"You persist in calling it a sin, Madame: very well. But is it not
selfish to go free from sin at the expense of others? If one can save
others by a sin of one's own, is it not nobler to take that sin upon
one's soul? Nay, is it not the greater sin to let others suffer, that
one's own hands may be clean?"
"Oh, you tempt me with worldly reasoning, Monsieur. Kind mother of
Christ," she said, fixing her eyes upon the image of Mary, "what shall I
do? Be thou my guide--speak to my soul--tell me what to do!"
After a moment, the Countess again turned to me, still perplexed,
agitated, unpersuaded.
"Madame," said I, "when one considers how soon the Count de Lavardin
must surely suffer for crimes of which you know nothing, your death at
his hands seems the more grievous a fate. Do you know that he is a
traitor?--that his treason will soon be known to the King's ministers?
If his jealousy had only waited a short while, or if my discovery had
occurred a little earlier, his death would have spared you all this. But
now, if you are not starved or slain before he is arrested, he will
surely kill you when he finds himself about to be taken.--My God, I had
not thought of that when I resolved to go to Paris at once! Oh, Madame,
fly now while there is chance! I assure you that doom is hovering over
the Count's head; if you stay here, I cannot go to Paris; but Hugues
shall go with this paper in my stead."
"What is the paper, Monsieur? What do you mean by this talk of the Count
and treason?" she asked in sheer wonder.
"It is a proof of the Count's participation in the late conspiracy. I
found it in the room where I was imprisoned. And come what may, I will
see that it goes to Paris for the inspection of the Duke de Sully. And
then there will be a short shrift for the Count de Lavardin, I promise
you."
"But in that case, it would be you that caused his death, Monsieur!" she
exclaimed.
"The executioner would cause his death--and the law. I should be but the
humble instrument of heaven to bring it to pass."
"But you would be the instrument of my husband's death, Monsieur! That
must not be. You, of all men! No, no. Why, it would be an eternal
barrier between us--in thought and kind feeling, I mean,--in the next
world too. Oh, no; you must not use that paper, nor cause it to be
used."
"But, Madame, he is a traitor. What matters it whether I or another--it
is only justice--my duty to the King."
"But you do not understand. I should not dare even pray for you! And I
must not let you denounce him--I must prevent your using that paper. I
am his wife, Monsieur,--I must prevent. Otherwise, I should be
consenting to my husband's death!"
"He has no scruples about consenting to yours, Madame."
"The sin is on his part, then, not on mine. Come, Monsieur, you must let
me destroy that paper." She advanced toward me.
"No, Madame; not I. Nay, I will use force to keep it, if need be! It is
my one weapon, my one means of vengeance." I tore my wrist from her
hand, and put the paper back into my inner pocket.
"Then, Monsieur, I have said my last to you. I must put you out of my
thoughts, out of my prayers even. And if I find means, I must warn my
husband."
"Listen, Madame. There is one condition upon which I will destroy this
paper and keep silence."
She uttered a joyful cry. I knew that what she thought of was not her
husband's fate, but the barrier she had mentioned.
"It is that you will escape with me at once," I said.
The joy passed out of her face; but she was silent.
"Consider," I went on. "Not merely your own life, not merely mine, not
merely Mathilde's, and the happiness of Hugues: it is in your power to
save your husband's life also, and to save his soul from the crime of
your murder, if there be any degree between act and intent. Is it not a
sin and a folly to refuse? Think of the blood already shed by reason of
this matter. Why should there be more?"
At last she wavered. I turned to Mathilde, to speak of the order in
which we should descend the ladder.
At that instant I heard the key begin to grate in the lock.
"Some one is coming in!" whispered the Countess in alarm.
Instantly I pushed Mathilde upon the couch beneath the window, in a
sitting posture, so that her body would conceal the end of the rope
ladder. The next moment I had pulled the other bed a little way out from
the wall, and was crouching behind it.
The door opened, and I heard the noise of men entering with heavy tread.
Then the door closed. There was a sound of swift movement, then a scream
from Mathilde and a terrified cry from the Countess, both voices being
suddenly silenced at their height. I raised my head, and saw two
powerful men in black masks, one of whom was grasping the Countess by
the throat with his left hand while, with his right assisted by his
teeth, he was endeavouring to pass a looped cord around her neck. The
other man had both hands about the neck of Mathilde, that he might
sufficiently overpower her to apply a similar cord.
I leaped over the bed, and upon the man who was trying to strangle the
Countess. Mad to save and avenge her, I sank my dagger into the back of
his shoulder, and he fell without having seen who had attacked him. The
murderer who was struggling with Mathilde immediately turned from her
and drew sword to attack me, at the same time crying out, "Garoche, to
the rescue!"
[Illustration: "I LEAPED OVER THE BED, AND UPON THE MAN WHO WAS TRYING
TO STRANGLE THE COUNTESS."]
As I could not get the dagger out of the other man's shoulder joint in
time, I drew my sword, and parried my new antagonist's thrust. The door
now opened, and in came another man with drawn sword, not masked: he
was, I suppose, the man on guard on the landing. Seeing how matters
stood, he joined in the attack upon me. I backed into a corner, knocking
over the chair of the Countess, who had run to Mathilde. The two women
stood clasping each other, in terror. Suddenly my first assailant cried,
"I leave him to you for a moment, Garoche," and ran and transferred the
key from the outside to the inside of the door, which he then closed, so
as to lock us all in. This was doubtless to prevent the exit of the
Countess and Mathilde, the purpose being to keep the night's doings in
that room as secret as possible even from the rest of the household.
This man then pocketed the key, and, while Garoche continued to keep me
occupied in my corner, ran to a side of the cell and began working with
an iron wedge at a stone in the floor. He soon raised this, showing it
to be a thin slab, and left exposed a dark hole. He then turned to the
Countess, seized her around the waist, and tried to drag her toward the
opening. His instructions had been, no doubt, to slay the women without
bloodshed and drop the bodies through this secret aperture, but the
unexpected turn of affairs had made him decide to precipitate the end
and not strangle them first. Wild with horror at the prospect of their
meeting so hideous a death, I sprang into the air, and ran my sword
straight into the panting mouth of Garoche, so that the point came out
at the back of his neck. He dropped, and I disengaged my weapon barely
in time to check the onslaught of the other man, who, seeing Garoche's
fate, had left the Countess and come at me again. I was out of breath
after the violent thrusts I had made, and a mist now clouded my eyes. I
know not how this last contest would have gone, had not Mathilde,
recovering her self-command, drawn the sword of the man who had fallen
first, and, holding it with both hands, pushed it with all her strength
into my adversary's back.
I wiped my weapons on the clothes of the slain murderers. The Countess
fell on her knees and thanked heaven for our preservation. I then went
to the opening made by the removal of the stone slab: peering down, I
could see nothing. I took the key of the door from the pocket of its
last holder, and dropped it through the hole, while the Countess and
Mathilde leaned over me, listening. Some moments passed before we heard
anything; then there came the sound of the key striking mud in the black
depths far below. The secret shaft, then, led to the bottom of the
tower.
The Countess shuddered, and whispered: "Come, let us not lose a moment."
I first lifted the masks, and recognized the murderers as fellows I had
seen lounging in the court-yard. Then I gave directions for descending
the ladder. I should have preferred being the last to leave the room but
that I thought it necessary to support the Countess in her descent and
Mathilde firmly refused to precede us. As the ladder might not hold the
weight of three, Mathilde would see us to the ground, and then follow.
Two could not go out of the window at once, so I backed through first,
and waited when my feet were planted on the ladder, my breast being then
against the edge of the window sill. Madame followed me. I guided her
feet with one hand, and placed them on the ladder, having descended just
sufficiently to make room for her. I then lowered myself another round,
and she, holding on to a round in the window shaft with one hand,
grasped the first round outside with the other, emerged entirely from
the opening, and let me guide her foot a step lower. We then proceeded
downward in this manner, I holding my head and body well back from the
ladder so that her feet were usually on a level with my breast: thus if
she showed any sign of weakness, I could throw an arm around her. I had
first thought of having her clasp me around the neck, and so descending
with her, but once upon the ladder, I saw no safe way for her to get
behind me, or indeed to turn from facing the ladder. So we came down as
I say, while I kept as well as I could between her and the possibility
of falling. Frequently I asked in a whisper if all was well with her,
and she answered yes.
When we were near the moat, I felt the ladder move from the wall and
knew that Hugues was drawing it toward him. I warned the Countess of our
change from a vertical to an inclined position, and so we were swung
across, and found ourselves above solid earth, on which we presently set
foot.
"Best take Madame the Countess to the horses while I wait for Mathilde,"
whispered Hugues to me, letting the ladder swing back; but Madame would
not go till the maid was safe beside us. Mathilde, who had watched our
descent, now drew her head in, and speedily we saw her feet emerge in
its stead. She came down the ladder with ease and rapidity, such were
her strength and self-possession. As soon as she touched the ground,
Hugues swung back the ladder to stay, and took up his cross-bow.
"Come," I whispered, and we turned our backs to that grim tower and
hastened along the moat to the forest, passing on the way the high gable
window of what had been my prison, the postern which I had such good
reason to remember, and the oak from which I had seen Hugues display the
handkerchief. Scarce a word was spoken till we came to the horses. I
assisted the Countess to mount one of Hugues's two, she making no
difficulty about accommodating herself to a man's saddle. By that time
Hugues and Mathilde were on his second horse. I got upon my own, and we
started. Our immediate purpose was to go to Hugues's house by the woods
and lanes, fording the river below Montoire.
As we came out of the forest, beyond St. Outrille, the moon rose, and
against the luminous Eastern sky we could see the dark tower we had left
behind,--tower of blood and death, on which I hoped never to set eyes
again.