THE FOWLERS
I
In order to reach the Carrefour de la Poissonnerie the two men had to
skirt the whole edifice of Le Bouffay, walk a little along the quay and
turn up the narrow alley opposite the bridge. They walked on in silence,
each absorbed in his own thoughts.
The house occupied by the citizeness Adet lay back a little from the
others in the street. It was one of an irregular row of mean, squalid,
tumble-down houses, some of them little more than lean-to sheds built
into the walls of Le Bouffay. Most of them had overhanging roofs which
stretched out like awnings more than half way across the road, and even
at midday shut out any little ray of sunshine which might have a
tendency to peep into the street below.
In this year II of the Republic the Carrefour de la Poissonnerie was
unpaved, dark and evil-smelling. For two thirds of the year it was
ankle-deep in mud: the rest of the time the mud was baked into cakes and
emitted clouds of sticky dust under the shuffling feet of the
passers-by. At night it was dimly lighted by one or two broken-down
lanthorns which were hung on transverse chains overhead from house to
house. These lanthorns only made a very small circle of light
immediately below them: the rest of the street was left in darkness,
save for the faint glimmer which filtrated through an occasional
ill-fitting doorway or through the chinks of some insecurely fastened
shutter.
The Carrefour de la Poissonnerie was practically deserted in the
daytime; only a few children--miserable little atoms of humanity showing
their meagre, emaciated bodies through the scanty rags which failed to
cover their nakedness--played weird, mirthless games in the mud and
filth of the street. But at night it became strangely peopled with vague
and furtive forms that were wont to glide swiftly by, beneath the
hanging lanthorns, in order to lose themselves again in the welcome
obscurity beyond: men and women--ill-clothed and unshod, with hands
buried in pockets or beneath scanty shawls--their feet, oft-times bare,
making no sound as they went squishing through the mud. A perpetual
silence used to reign in this kingdom of squalor and of darkness, where
night-hawks alone fluttered their wings; only from time to time a
joyless greeting of boon-companions, or the hoarse cough of some
wretched consumptive would wake the dormant echoes that lingered in the
gloom.
II
Martin-Roget knew his way about the murky street well enough. He went up
to the house which lay a little back from the others. It appeared even
more squalid than the rest, not a sound came from within--hardly a
light--only a narrow glimmer found its way through the chink of a
shutter on the floor above. To right and left of it the houses were
tall, with walls that reeked of damp and of filth: from one of
these--the one on the left--an iron sign dangled and creaked dismally as
it swung in the wind. Just above the sign there was a window with
partially closed shutters: through it came the sound of two husky voices
raised in heated argument.
In the open space in front of Louise Adet's house vague forms standing
about or lounging against the walls of the neighbouring houses were
vaguely discernible in the gloom. Martin-Roget and Chauvelin as they
approached were challenged by a raucous voice which came to them out of
the inky blackness around.
"Halt! who goes there?"
"Friends!" replied Martin-Roget promptly. "Is citizeness Adet within?"
"Yes! she is!" retorted the man bluntly; "excuse me, friend Adet--I did
not know you in this confounded darkness."
"No harm done," said Martin-Roget. "And it is I who am grateful to you
all for your vigilance."
"Oh!" said the other with a laugh, "there's not much fear of your bird
getting out of its cage. Have no fear, friend Adet! That Kernogan rabble
is well looked after."
The small group dispersed in the darkness and Martin-Roget rapped
against the door of his sister's house with his knuckles.
"That is the Rat Mort," he said, indicating the building on his left
with a nod of the head. "A very unpleasant neighbourhood for my sister,
and she has oft complained of it--but name of a dog! won't it prove
useful this night?"
Chauvelin had as usual followed his colleague in silence, but his keen
eyes had not failed to note the presence of the village lads of whom
Martin-Roget had spoken. There are no eyes so watchful as those of hate,
nor is there aught so incorruptible. Every one of these men here had an
old wrong to avenge, an old score to settle with those ci-devant
Kernogans who had once been their masters and who were so completely in
their power now. Louise Adet had gathered round her a far more
efficient bodyguard than even the proconsul could hope to have.
A moment or two later the door was opened, softly and cautiously, and
Martin-Roget asked: "Is that you, Louise?" for of a truth the darkness
was almost deeper within than without, and he could not see who it was
that was standing by the door.
"Yes! it is," replied a weary and querulous voice. "Enter quickly. The
wind is cruel, and I can't keep myself warm. Who is with you, Pierre?"
"A friend," said Martin-Roget drily. "We want to see the aristo."
The woman without further comment closed the door behind the new-comers.
The place now was as dark as pitch, but she seemed to know her way about
like a cat, for her shuffling footsteps were heard moving about
unerringly. A moment or two later she opened another door opposite the
front entrance, revealing an inner room--a sort of kitchen--which was
lighted by a small lamp.
"You can go straight up," she called curtly to the two men.
The narrow, winding staircase was divided from this kitchen by a wooden
partition. Martin-Roget, closely followed by Chauvelin, went up the
stairs. On the top of these there was a tiny landing with a door on
either side of it. Martin-Roget without any ceremony pushed open the
door on his right with his foot.
A tallow candle fixed in a bottle and placed in the centre of a table in
the middle of the room flickered in the draught as the door flew open.
It was bare of everything save a table and a chair, and a bundle of
straw in one corner. The tiny window at right angles to the door was
innocent of glass, and the north-westerly wind came in an icy stream
through the aperture. On the table, in addition to the candle, there was
a broken pitcher half-filled with water, and a small chunk of brown
bread blotched with stains of mould.
On the chair beside the table and immediately facing the door sat Yvonne
Lady Dewhurst. On the wall above her head a hand unused to calligraphy
had traced in clumsy characters the words: "Liberte! Fraternite!
Egalite!" and below that "ou la Mort."
III
The men entered the narrow room and Chauvelin carefully closed the door
behind him. He at once withdrew into a remote comer of the room and
stood there quite still, wrapped in his mantle, a small, silent,
mysterious figure on which Yvonne fixed dark, inquiring eyes.
Martin-Roget, restless and excited, paced up and down the small space
like a wild animal in a cage. From time to time exclamations of
impatience escaped him and he struck one fist repeatedly against his
open palm. Yvonne followed his movements with a quiet, uninterested
glance, but Chauvelin paid no heed whatever to him.
He was watching Yvonne ceaselessly, and closely.
Three days' incarceration in this wind-swept attic, the lack of decent
food and of warmth, the want of sleep and the horror of her present
position all following upon the soul-agony which she had endured when
she was forcibly torn away from her dear milor, had left their mark on
Yvonne Dewhurst's fresh young face. The look of gravity which had always
sat so quaintly on her piquant features had now changed to one of deep
and abiding sorrow; her large dark eyes were circled and sunk; they had
in them the unnatural glow of fever, as well as the settled look of
horror and of pathetic resignation. Her soft brown hair had lost its
lustre; her cheeks were drawn and absolutely colourless.
Martin-Roget paused in his restless walk. For a moment he stood silent
and absorbed, contemplating by the flickering light of the candle all
the havoc which his brutality had wrought upon Yvonne's dainty face.
But Yvonne after a while ceased to look at him--she appeared to be
unconscious of the gaze of these two men, each of whom was at this
moment only thinking of the evil which he meant to inflict upon
her--each of whom only thought of her as a helpless bird whom he had at
last ensnared and whom he could crush to death as soon as he felt so
inclined.
She kept her lips tightly closed and her head averted. She was gazing
across at the unglazed window into the obscurity beyond, marvelling in
what direction lay the sea and the shores of England.
Martin-Roget crossed his arms over his broad chest and clutched his
elbows with his hands with an obvious effort to keep control over his
movements and his temper in check. The quiet, almost indifferent
attitude of the girl was exasperating to his over-strung nerves.
"Look here, my girl," he said at last, roughly and peremptorily, "I had
an interview with the proconsul this afternoon. He chides me for my
leniency toward you. Three days he thinks is far too long to keep
traitors eating the bread of honest citizens and taking up valuable
space in our city. Yesterday I made a proposal to you. Have you thought
on it?"
Yvonne made no reply. She was still gazing out into nothingness and just
at that moment she was very far away from the narrow, squalid room and
the company of these two inhuman brutes. She was thinking of her dear
milor and of that lovely home at Combwich wherein she had spent three
such unforgettable days. She was remembering how beautiful had been the
colour of the bare twigs in the chestnut coppice when the wintry sun
danced through and in between them and drew fantastic patterns of living
gold upon the carpet of dead leaves; and she remembered too how
exquisite were the tints of russet and blue on the distant hills, and
how quaintly the thrushes had called: "Kiss me quick!" She saw again
those trembling leaves of a delicious faintly crimson hue which still
hung upon the branches of the scarlet oak, and the early flowering heath
which clothed the moors with a gorgeous mantle of rosy amethyst.
Martin-Roget's harsh voice brought her abruptly back to the hideous
reality of the moment.
"Your obstinacy will avail you nothing," he said, speaking quietly, even
though a note of intense irritation was distinctly perceptible in his
voice. "The proconsul has given me a further delay wherein to deal
leniently with you and with your father if I am so minded. You know what
I have proposed to you: Life with me as my wife--in which case your
father will be free to return to England or to go to the devil as he
pleases--or the death of a malefactor for you both in the company of all
the thieves and evil-doers who are mouldering in the prisons of Nantes
at this moment. Another delay wherein to choose between an honourable
life and a shameful death. The proconsul waits. But to-night he must
have his answer."
Then Yvonne turned her head slowly and looked calmly on her enemy.
"The tyrant who murders innocent men, women and children," she said,
"can have his answer now. I choose death which is inevitable in
preference to a life of shame."
"You seem," he retorted, "to have lost sight of the fact that the law
gives me the right to take by force that which you so obstinately
refuse."
"Have I not said," she replied, "that death is my choice? Life with you
would be a life of shame."
"I can get a priest to marry us without your consent: and your religion
forbids you to take your own life," he said with a sneer.
To this she made no reply, but he knew that he had his answer.
Smothering a curse, he resumed after a while:
"So you prefer to drag your father to death with you? Yet he has begged
you to consider your decision and to listen to reason. He has given his
consent to our marriage."
"Let me see my father," she retorted firmly, "and hear him say that with
his own lips.
"Ah!" she added quickly, for at her words Martin-Roget had turned his
head away and shrugged his shoulders with well-assumed indifference,
"you cannot and dare not let me see him. For three days now you have
kept us apart and no doubt fed us both up with your lies. My father is
duc de Kernogan, Marquis de Trentemoult," she added proudly, "he would
far rather die side by side with his daughter than see her wedded to a
criminal."
"And you, my girl," rejoined Martin-Roget coldly, "would you see your
father branded as a malefactor, linked to a thief and sent to perish in
the Loire?"
"My father," she retorted, "will die as he has lived, a brave and
honourable gentleman. The brand of a malefactor cannot cling to his
name. Sorrow we are ready to endure--death is less than nothing to
us--we will but follow in the footsteps of our King and of our Queen
and of many whom we care for and whom you and your proconsul and your
colleagues have brutally murdered. Shame cannot touch us, and our honour
and our pride are so far beyond your reach that your impious and
blood-stained hands can never sully them."
She had spoken very slowly and very quietly. There were no heroics about
her attitude. Even Martin-Roget--callous brute though he was--felt that
she had only spoken just as she felt, and that nothing that he might
say, no plea that he might urge, would ever shake her determination.
"Then it seems to me," he said, "that I am only wasting my time by
trying to make you see reason and common-sense. You look upon me as a
brute. Well! perhaps I am. At any rate I am that which your father and
you have made me. Four years ago, when you had power over me and over
mine, you brutalised us. To-day we--the people--are your masters and we
make you suffer, not for all--that were impossible--but for part of what
you made us suffer. That, after all, is only bare justice. By making you
my wife I would have saved you from death--not from humiliation, for
that you must endure, and at my hands in a full measure--but I would
have made you my wife because I still have pleasant recollections of
that kiss which I snatched from you on that never-to-be-forgotten night
and in the darkness--a kiss for which you would gladly have seen me hang
then, if you could have laid hands on me."
He paused, trying to read what was going on behind those fine eyes of
hers, with their vacant, far-seeing gaze which seemed like another
barrier between her and him. At this rough allusion to that moment of
horror and of shame, she had not moved a muscle, nor did her gaze lose
its fixity.
He laughed.
"It is an unpleasant recollection, eh, my proud lady? The first kiss of
passion was not implanted on your exquisite lips by that fine gentleman
whom you deemed worthy of your hand and your love, but by Pierre Adet,
the miller's son, what? a creature not quite so human as your horse or
your pet dog. Neither you nor I are like to forget that methinks...."
Yvonne vouchsafed no reply to the taunt, and for a moment there was
silence in the room, until Chauvelin's thin, suave voice broke in quite
gently:
"Do not lose your patience with the wench, citizen Martin-Roget. Your
time is too precious to be wasted in useless recriminations."
"I have finished with her," retorted the other sullenly. "She shall be
dealt with now as I think best. I agree with citizen Carrier. He is
right after all. To the Loire with the lot of that foul brood!"
"Nay!" here rejoined Chauvelin with placid urbanity, "are you not a
little harsh, citizen, with our fair Yvonne? Remember! Women have moods
and megrims. What they indignantly refuse to yield to us one day, they
will grant with a smile the next. Our beautiful Yvonne is no exception
to this rule, I'll warrant."
Even while he spoke he threw a glance of warning on his colleague. There
was something enigmatic in his manner at this moment, in the strange
suavity wherewith he spoke these words of conciliation and of
gentleness. Martin-Roget was as usual ready with an impatient retort. He
was in a mood to bully and to brutalise, to heap threat upon threat, to
win by frightfulness that which he could not gain by persuasion. Perhaps
that at this moment he desired Yvonne de Kernogan for wife, more even
than he desired her death. At any rate his headstrong temper was ready
to chafe against any warning or advice. But once again Chauvelin's
stronger mentality dominated over his less resolute colleague.
Martin-Roget--the fowler--was in his turn caught in the net of a keener
snarer than himself, and whilst--with the obstinacy of the weak--he was
making mental resolutions to rebuke Chauvelin for his interference later
on, he had already fallen in with the latter's attitude.
"The wench has had three whole days wherein to alter her present mood,"
he said more quietly, "and you know yourself, citizen, that the
proconsul will not wait after to-day."
"The day is young yet," rejoined Chauvelin. "It still hath six hours to
its credit.... Six hours.... Three hundred and sixty minutes!" he
continued with a pleasant little laugh; "time enough for a woman to
change her mind three hundred and sixty times. Let me advise you,
citizen, to leave the wench to her own meditations for the present, and
I trust that she will accept the advice of a man who has a sincere
regard for her beauty and her charms and who is old enough to be her
father, and seriously think the situation over in a conciliatory spirit.
M. le duc de Kernogan will be grateful to her, for of a truth he is not
over happy either at the moment ... and will be still less happy in the
depot to-morrow: it is over-crowded, and typhus, I fear me, is rampant
among the prisoners. He has, I am convinced--in spite of what the
citizeness says to the contrary--a rooted objection to being hurled into
the Loire, or to be arraigned before the bar of the Convention, not as
an aristocrat and a traitor but as an unit of an undesirable herd of
criminals sent up to Paris for trial, by an anxious and harried
proconsul. There! there!" he added benignly, "we will not worry our fair
Yvonne any longer, will we, citizen? I think she has grasped the
alternative and will soon realise that marriage with an honourable
patriot is not such an untoward fate after all."
"And now, citizen Martin-Roget," he concluded, "I pray you allow me to
take my leave of the fair lady and to give you the wise recommendation
to do likewise. She will be far better alone for awhile. Night brings
good counsel, so they say."
He watched the girl keenly while he spoke. Her impassivity had not
deserted her for a single moment: but whether her calmness was of hope
or of despair he was unable to decide. On the whole he thought it must
be the latter: hope would have kindled a spark in those dark,
purple-rimmed eyes, it would have brought moisture to the lips, a tremor
to the hand.
The Scarlet Pimpernel was in Nantes--that fact was established beyond a
doubt--but Chauvelin had come to the conclusion that so far as Yvonne
Dewhurst herself was concerned, she knew nothing of the mysterious
agencies that were working on her behalf.
Chauvelin's hand closed with a nervous contraction over the packet of
papers in his pocket. Something of the secret of that enigmatic English
adventurer lay revealed within its folds. Chauvelin had not yet had the
opportunity of examining them: the interview with Yvonne had been the
most important business for the moment.
From somewhere in the distance a city clock struck six. The afternoon
was wearing on. The keenest brain in Europe was on the watch to drag one
woman and one man from the deadly trap which had been so successfully
set for them. A few hours more and Chauvelin in his turn would be
pitting his wits against the resources of that intricate brain, and he
felt like a war-horse scenting blood and battle. He was aching to get
to work--aching to form his plans--to lay his snares--to dispose his
trap so that the noble English quarry should not fail to be caught
within its meshes.
He gave a last look to Yvonne, who was still sitting quite impassive,
gazing through the squalid walls into some beautiful distance, the
reflection of which gave to her pale, wan face an added beauty.
"Let us go, citizen Martin-Roget," he said peremptorily. "There is
nothing else that we can do here."
And Martin-Roget, the weaker morally of the two, yielded to the stronger
personality of his colleague. He would have liked to stay on for awhile,
to gloat for a few moments longer over the helplessness of the woman who
to him represented the root of every evil which had ever befallen him
and his family. But Chauvelin commanded and he felt impelled to obey. He
gave one long, last look on Yvonne--a look that was as full of triumph
as of mockery--he looked round the four dank walls, the unglazed window,
the broken pitcher, the mouldy bread. Revenge was of a truth the
sweetest emotion of the human heart. Pierre Adet--son of the miller who
had been hanged by orders of the Duc de Kernogan for a crime which he
had never committed--would not at this moment have changed places with
Fortune's Benjamin.
IV
Downstairs in Louise Adet's kitchen, Martin-Roget seized his colleague
by the arm.
"Sit down a moment, citizen," he said persuasively, "and tell me what
you think of it all."
Chauvelin sat down at the other's invitation. All his movements were
slow, deliberate, perfectly calm.
"I think," he said drily, "as far as your marriage with the wench is
concerned, that you are beaten, my friend."
"Tshaw!" The exclamation, raucous and surcharged with hate came from
Louise Adet. She, too, like Pierre--more so than Pierre mayhap--had
cause to hate the Kernogans. She, too, like Pierre had lived the last
three days in the full enjoyment of the thought that Fate and Chance
were about to level things at last between herself and those detested
aristos. Silent and sullen she was shuffling about in the room, among
her pots and pans, but she kept an eye upon her brother's movements and
an ear on what he said. Men were apt to lose grit where a pretty wench
was concerned. It takes a woman's rancour and a woman's determination to
carry a scheme of vengeance against another to a successful end.
Martin-Roget rejoined more calmly:
"I knew that she would still be obstinate," he said. "If I forced her
into a marriage, which I have the right to do, she might take her own
life and make me look a fool. So I don't want to do that. I believe in
the persuasiveness of the Rat Mort to-night," he added with a cynical
laugh, "and if that fails.... Well! I was never really in love with the
fair Yvonne, and now she has even ceased to be desirable.... If the Rat
Mort fails to act on her sensibilities as I would wish, I can easily
console myself by following Carrier's herd to Paris. Louise shall come
with me--eh, little sister?--and we'll give ourselves the satisfaction
of seeing M. le duc de Kernogan and his exquisite daughter stand in the
felon's dock--tried for malpractices and for evil living. We'll see them
branded as convicts and packed off like so much cattle to Cayenne. That
will be a sight," he concluded with a deep sigh of satisfaction, "which
will bring rest to my soul."
He paused: his face looked sullen and evil under the domination of that
passion which tortured him.
Louise Adet had shuffled up close to her brother. In one hand she held
the wooden spoon wherewith she had been stirring the soup: with the
other she brushed away the dark, lank hair which hung in strands over
her high, pale forehead. In appearance she was a woman immeasurably
older than her years. Her face had the colour of yellow parchment, her
skin was stretched tightly over her high cheekbones--her lips were
colourless and her eyes large, wide-open, were pale in hue and circled
with red. Just now a deep frown of puzzlement between her brows added a
sinister expression to her cadaverous face:
"The Rat Mort?" she queried in that tired voice of hers, "Cayenne? What
is all that about?"
"A splendid scheme of Carrier's, my Louise," replied Martin-Roget
airily. "We convey the Kernogan woman to the Rat Mort. To-night a
descent will be made on that tavern of ill-fame by a company of Marats
and every man, woman and child within it will be arrested and sent to
Paris as undesirable inhabitants of this most moral city: in Paris they
will be tried as malefactors or evil-doers--cut throats, thieves, what?
and deported as convicts to Cayenne, or else sent to the guillotine. The
Kernogans among that herd! What sayest thou to that, little sister? Thy
father, thy lover, hung as thieves! M. le Duc and Mademoiselle branded
as convicts! 'Tis pleasant to think on, eh?"
Louise made no reply. She stood looking at her brother, her pale,
red-rimmed eyes seemed to drink in every word that he uttered, while her
bony hand wandered mechanically across and across her forehead as if in
a pathetic endeavour to clear the brain from everything save of the
satisfying thoughts which this prospect of revenge had engendered.
Chauvelin's gentle voice broke in on her meditations.
"In the meanwhile," he said placidly, "remember my warning, citizen
Martin-Roget. There are passing clever and mighty agencies at work, even
at this hour, to wrest your prey from you. How will you convey the wench
to the Rat Mort? Carrier has warned you of spies--but I have warned you
against a crowd of English adventurers far more dangerous than an army
of spies. Three pairs of eyes--probably more, and one pair the keenest
in Europe--will be on the watch to seize upon the woman and to carry her
off under your very nose."
Martin-Roget uttered a savage oath.
"That brute Carrier has left me in the lurch," he said roughly. "I don't
believe in your nightmares and your English adventurers, still it would
have been better if I could have had the woman conveyed to the tavern
under armed escort."
"Armed escort has been denied you, and anyway it would not be much use.
You and I, citizen Martin-Roget, must act independently of Carrier. Your
friends down there," he added, indicating the street with a jerk of the
head, "must redouble their watchfulness. The village lads of Vertou are
of a truth no match intellectually with our English adventurers, but
they have vigorous fists in case there is an attack on the wench while
she walks across to the Rat Mort."
"It would be simpler," here interposed Louise roughly, "if we were to
knock the wench on the head and then let the lads carry her across."
"It would not be simpler," retorted Chauvelin drily, "for Carrier might
at any moment turn against us. Commandant Fleury with half a company of
Marats will be posted round the Rat Mort, remember. They may interfere
with the lads and arrest them and snatch the wench from us, when all our
plans may fall to the ground ... one never knows what double game
Carrier may be playing. No! no! the girl must not be dragged or carried
to the Rat Mort. She must walk into the trap of her own free will."
"But name of a dog! how is it to be done?" ejaculated Martin-Roget, and
he brought his clenched fist crashing down upon the table. "The woman
will not follow me--or Louise either--anywhere willingly."
"She must follow a stranger then--or one whom she thinks a
stranger--some one who will have gained her confidence...."
"Impossible."
"Oh! nothing is impossible, citizen," rejoined Chauvelin blandly.
"Do you know a way then?" queried the other with a sneer.
"I think I do. If you will trust me that is----"
"I don't know that I do. Your mind is so intent on those English
adventurers, you are like as not to let the aristos slip through your
fingers."
"Well, citizen," retorted Chauvelin imperturbably, "will you take the
risk of conveying the fair Yvonne to the Rat Mort by twelve o'clock
to-night? I have very many things to see to, I confess that I should be
glad if you will ease me from that responsibility."
"I have already told you that I see no way," retorted Martin-Roget with
a snarl.
"Then why not let me act?"
"What are you going to do?"
"For the moment I am going for a walk on the quay and once more will
commune with the North-West wind."
"Tshaw!" ejaculated Martin-Roget savagely.
"Nay, citizen," resumed Chauvelin blandly, "the winds of heaven are
excellent counsellors. I told you so just now and you agreed with me.
They blow away the cobwebs of the mind and clear the brain for serious
thinking. You want the Kernogan girl to be arrested inside the Rat Mort
and you see no way of conveying her thither save by the use of violence,
which for obvious reasons is to be deprecated: Carrier, for equally
obvious reasons, will not have her taken to the place by force. On the
other hand you admit that the wench would not follow you
willingly----Well, citizen, we must find a way out of that impasse, for
it is too unimportant an one to stand in the way of our plans: for this
I must hold a consultation with the North-West wind."
"I won't allow you to do anything without consulting me."
"Am I likely to do that? To begin with I shall have need of your
co-operation and that of the citizeness."
"In that case ..." muttered Martin-Roget grudgingly. "But remember," he
added with a return to his usual self-assured manner, "remember that
Yvonne and her father belong to me and not to you. I brought them into
Nantes for mine own purposes--not for yours. I will not have my revenge
jeopardised so that your schemes may be furthered."
"Who spoke of my schemes, citizen Martin-Roget?" broke in Chauvelin with
perfect urbanity. "Surely not I? What am I but an humble tool in the
service of the Republic?... a tool that has proved useless--a failure,
what? My only desire is to help you to the best of my abilities. Your
enemies are the enemies of the Republic: my ambition is to help you in
destroying them."
For a moment longer Martin-Roget hesitated: he abominated this
suggestion of becoming a mere instrument in the hands of this man whom
he still would have affected to despise--had he dared. But here came the
difficulty: he no longer dared to despise Chauvelin. He felt the
strength of the man--the clearness of his intellect, and though
he--Martin-Roget--still chose to disregard every warning in connexion
with the English spies, he could not wholly divest his mind from the
possibility of their presence in Nantes. Carrier's scheme was so
magnificent, so satisfying, that the ex-miller's son was ready to humble
his pride and set his arrogance aside in order to see it carried through
successfully.
So after a moment or two, despite the fact that he positively ached to
shut Chauvelin out of the whole business, Martin-Roget gave a grudging
assent to his proposal.
"Very well!" he said, "you see to it. So long as it does not interfere
with my plans...."
"It can but help them," rejoined Chauvelin suavely. "If you will act as
I shall direct I pledge you my word that the wench will walk to the Rat
Mort of her free will and at the hour when you want her. What else is
there to say?"
"When and where shall we meet again?"
"Within the hour I will return here and explain to you and to the
citizeness what I want you to do. We will get the aristos inside the Rat
Mort, never fear; and after that I think that we may safely leave
Carrier to do the rest, what?"
He picked up his hat and wrapped his mantle round him. He took no
further heed of Martin-Roget or of Louise, for suddenly he had felt the
crackling of crisp paper inside the breast-pocket of his coat and in a
moment the spirit of the man had gone a-roaming out of the narrow
confines of this squalid abode. It had crossed the English Channel and
wandered once more into a brilliantly-lighted ball-room where an
exquisitely dressed dandy declaimed inanities and doggrel rhymes for the
delectation of a flippant assembly: it heard once more the lazy,
drawling speech, the inane, affected laugh, it caught the glance of a
pair of lazy, grey eyes fixed mockingly upon him. Chauvelin's thin
claw-like hand went back to his pocket: it felt that packet of papers,
it closed over it like a vulture's talon does upon a prey. He no longer
heard Martin-Roget's obstinate murmurings, he no longer felt himself to
be the disgraced, humiliated servant of the State: rather did he feel
once more the master, the leader, the successful weaver of an hundred
clever intrigues. The enemy who had baffled him so often had chosen once
more to throw down the glove of mocking defiance. So be it! The battle
would be fought this night--a decisive one--and long live the Republic
and the power of the people!
With a curt nod of the head Chauvelin turned on his heel and without
waiting for Martin-Roget to follow him, or for Louise to light him on
his way, he strode from the room, and out of the house, and had soon
disappeared in the darkness in the direction of the quay.
V
Once more free from the encumbering companionship of Martin-Roget,
Chauvelin felt free to breathe and to think. He, the obscure and
impassive servant of the Republic, the cold-blooded Terrorist who had
gone through every phrase of an exciting career without moving a muscle
of his grave countenance, felt as if every one of his arteries was on
fire. He strode along the quay in the teeth of the north-westerly wind,
grateful for the cold blast which lashed his face and cooled his
throbbing temples.
The packet of papers inside his coat seemed to sear his breast.
Before turning to go along the quay he paused, hesitating for a moment
what he would do. His very humble lodgings were at the far end of the
town, and every minute of time was precious. Inside Le Bouffay, where he
had a small room allotted to him as a minor representative in Nantes of
the Committee of Public Safety, there was the ever present danger of
prying eyes.
On the whole--since time was so precious--he decided on returning to Le
Bouffay. The concierge and the clerk fortunately let him through without
those official delays which he--Chauvelin--was wont to find so galling
ever since his disgrace had put a bar against the opening of every door
at the bare mention of his name or the display of his tricolour scarf.
He strode rapidly across the hall: the men on guard eyed him with lazy
indifference as he passed. Once inside his own sanctum he looked
carefully around him; he drew the curtain closer across the window and
dragged the table and a chair well away from the range which might be
covered by an eye at the keyhole. It was only when he had thoroughly
assured himself that no searching eye or inquisitive ear could possibly
be watching over him that he at last drew the precious packet of papers
from his pocket. He undid the red ribbon which held it together and
spread the papers out on the table before him. Then he examined them
carefully one by one.
As he did so an exclamation of wrath or of impatience escaped him from
time to time, once he laughed--involuntarily--aloud.
The examination of the papers took him some time. When he had finished
he gathered them all together again, retied the bit of ribbon round them
and slipped the packet back into the pocket of his coat. There was a
look of grim determination on his face, even though a bitter sigh
escaped his set lips.
"Oh! for the power," he muttered to himself, "which I had a year ago!
for the power to deal with mine enemy myself. So you have come to
Nantes, my valiant Sir Percy Blakeney?" he added while a short, sardonic
laugh escaped his thin, set lips: "and you are determined that I shall
know how and why you came! Do you reckon, I wonder, that I have no
longer the power to deal with you? Well!..."
He sighed again but with more satisfaction this time.
"Well!..." he reiterated with obvious complacency. "Unless that oaf
Carrier is a bigger fool than I imagine him to be I think I have you
this time, my elusive Scarlet Pimpernel."