Now, Edward Langdale was a very acute and intelligent lad before he
touched the shores of France on that journey. He had learned more of the
world and mankind in the few years he had been page to Lord Montagu than
many another youth does in a dozen. His previous education had fitted
him for such acquisition; and the circumstances in which he had
afterward been placed--circumstances which required the exercise of
every faculty--had acuminated every faculty. But, strange to say, each
sense seemed to acquire more acuteness after he left Lucette. He had no
notion in the world how it was so. He thought of those valuable leathern
bags of his, and of the letters which were in them, and of the chance
there was of their falling into an enemy's hands. He believed that was
all; but still, as the reader has a right to be let into all secrets, a
vague, indefinite, misty idea of danger to Lucette mingled with all
other considerations and sharpened every perception.
With Pierrot by his side, and taking advantage of every thing which
could screen his approach, he advanced as close to the king's lines as
he could without being perceived. He then rode along, seeing groups of
soldiers and sappers lying on the ground by their watch-fires, without
one man seemingly wakeful enough to have killed a rat had it invaded his
quarters. The end of the line on the right was soon reached; but now
there were evident signs of completed trenches and a more strict guard;
and, retreating a little to get under cover of the trees, which had
become both taller and closer in that quarter, he turned his course
toward the left, where the lines tended toward the Sevre Niortaise.
Still, nothing stirred; and at length Edward, to his great satisfaction,
perceived the spot where the rapidly-progressing works had been
abandoned at the set of sun, and where shovels and pickaxes and hatchets
were piled up after the labors of the day. Beyond was a wide extent of
moor and brushwood; and, after having gazed for a minute or two, he
determined to push his horse far enough round to make sure that the
passage was free before he went back for Lucette. His course was through
some marshy ground broken by brushes. The last fire of the French lines
was at a full quarter of a mile's distance, and every moment Edward
became more and more convinced that the way was quite open and the
passage safe. Suddenly, however, he checked his horse, making a sign to
Pierrot to stop, and saying, "Hark!"
"Horse, on my life!" cried Pierrot.
"Coming up from the left," replied Master Ned. "Down, down! and amongst
the bushes! Let the beasts take their own course. It may mislead them."
Each sprang to the ground in a moment. The horses, cast loose with a
sharp blow in the flank, scampered across the moor, and the youth and
Pierrot kneeled down amongst the shrubs. But the manoeuvre was in
vain. The moon was still shining brightly: they had been marked; and the
pursuers but too plainly perceived that the two horses which scampered
off were now without riders. There was a momentary search amongst the
bushes, and then a hard hand was laid upon Master Ned's shoulder. It
might have been a dangerous experiment at another moment; but there were
so many soldiers round as to render resistance hopeless; and Master Ned
rose quietly without uttering a word.
It was a somewhat lawless age; and in lawless ages some men's fingers
have a strange affection for other men's pockets. The worthy trooper,
whose right hand still retained its grasp of Edward's shoulder, felt his
left impelled by irresistible powers toward the spot where purses in
those days were generally carried; but he suddenly found his wrist
grasped with a strength which he had no idea lay in the slight-looking
limbs of his prisoner, who at the same time raised his voice aloud,
shouting, in the French tongue, "Officer! officer!"
The trooper had either miscalculated his distance from his companions,
or Master Ned's powers of endurance; for, while he struggled to free his
wrist from the clinging fingers which grasped it, half a dozen more
soldiers came up, with a gentleman in a handsome buff coat, or buffle,
laced with gold, who was evidently the leader of the band.
"How now, young man? how now?" cried the officer, regarding him by the
moonlight. "What! resisting the king's authority?"
"By no means, seigneur," replied Edward, who still held the soldier fast
by the wrist. "I am merely resisting plunder, which I know is not by the
king's authority. This man's hand was in my pocket. His intention might
be to take my purse,--which I should care little about, as there is not
much in it, and I can get more; but it might be to take my safe-conduct,
which I will not part with, but for proper examination, to any one."
"Ho, ho! a safe-conduct!" said the officer. "How dare you try to rob
him, Guillaume Bheel? Let him go, this instant."
"I can't," answered the man, with a good-humored roar of laughter: "the
young devil has got my wrist as tight as if every finger was a vice. My
hand was not in his pocket; for, by St. Ann, he did not let me get it
fairly in. I was only going to search him."
"Let the man's hand go, young gentleman," said the officer. "You mention
a safe-conduct. Let me see it."
"It is here," said Edward Langdale, drawing forth a handsome gilt
leather case. "I beg you to promise that it shall be returned to me when
you have examined it."
"It shall, if I find it all in proper form," replied the other; "but, in
the mean time, you will have to go to the lines, for I cannot examine
passes by moonlight. Some one see and catch the two horses. Have you
found the other man? Ah, there he is. Catch the horses, I say."
In the mean time he had opened the case and taken out the passport,
which, when spread out in the pale light, showed all the appearance of
an ordinary safe-conduct; and Edward, anxious to prevent any search for
Lucette and her guard, observed, in a quiet tone, "You will remark that
the paper covers more than myself and my servant; but, hearing that
there was danger on the road to Niort, we left the others behind."
"Then tell me, sir," said the officer, gravely, "how came it, when you
were furnished with such a safe-conduct as this, you attempted to pass
the lines without showing it, and tried to hide yourself when you saw my
party?"
"Oh, in Rochelle they tell very bloody tales of you gentlemen up here,"
replied Edward, laughing; "and I thought that at Niort I could show it
with less trouble."
"Then you come from Rochelle, do you?" said the officer. "Probably you
came over in Lord Denbigh's fleet?"
"No," answered the young man, boldly. "I came over before, in a
merchant-vessel; but I was obliged to stay some days in Rochelle to hire
servants and to get well; for I was ill there."
"Indeed," said the officer,--not in any tone of interest, but merely as
one of those insignificant ejaculations which men employ to stop a gap
when they have nothing else to say; and he continued humming some of the
Parisian airs which are now technically known as _Pont neufs_, till the
horses were caught,--which was not till after half an hour's ineffectual
effort; for they had some spirit and some skittishness. Indeed, it might
have been as well--under fear of the critics--to tell the reader that
the part of the country which we are now treading is rather famous for
the sale of horses, which, though not so good as the Limousin, are of
the same race, very hardy and sometimes very fleet.
At length the beasts were inveigled by some of the many methods of
deceit which men use to entrap bipeds or quadrupeds; and, mounted on
that which he indicated as his own, Master Ned, between two soldiers,
was led to the end of the trench, followed by Pierrot, as well guarded,
who had the good sense to keep his tongue under a rigorous rein. The two
were civilly inducted into a small building constructed of unplaned
boards, and, with a sentinel at the door, were left together while the
officer went to examine the safe-conduct: at least, so he said. In
truth, he went to show it to a superior officer.
Edward Langdale, however, took the opportunity, in a hurried manner, of
indoctrinating Pierrot in regard to what he was to say and what not to
say. He could have done it quite at leisure, it is true, for the officer
was full two hours absent; but the time was occupied with various
comments and discussions which might, under most circumstances, have
been of great use. Man almost always makes calculations in vain. He
stands upon a small point, unable to see an inch before his nose, while
Fate is working in the background beyond his sight, weaving round him a
web of fine threads, through which he cannot break, let him flutter as
hard as he will.
At length the officer reappeared, with the passport in its case. He
returned it to the young gentleman with a polite bow, saying, "Sir, your
safe-conduct seems in good form, and signed by the cardinal himself."
There he paused for a moment, and Edward replied, "Then I suppose I am
at liberty to proceed. Now you see, sir, how much better it would have
been for me to ride on straight to Niort, where in half an hour I could
have had a good supper and a bottle of wine."
"Your pardon, sir," said the other. "We can give you the bottle of wine
here,--though all you can have for supper, I am afraid, will be some
sardines, d'Olonne, and bread. But, as to proceeding, you will have to
make a little turn out of your way and go to Nantes. You will have four
soldiers out of my troop for protection,--merely for protection."
"As a prisoner, in short," said Edward, gravely. "I had thought the
cardinal's name was more potent in France."
"It is very potent," replied the officer, with a smile. "But he knows
his signature better than we do; and the truth is, although the seal is
certainly official, we had an intimation yesterday, about three o'clock,
that a young English gentleman, with three attendants, would endeavor to
pass the lines, and that it was necessary to stop him, as he was an
agent of the enemy. You have but one attendant; but your pass says
three, and you have yourself acknowledged that you have left two
behind."
"This is the work of some private enemy," said Master Ned, gravely; for
the situation was not at all pleasant. "The intimation, of course, came
from Rochelle?"
The officer nodded. "Then," continued the youth, "you put faith in your
enemies rather than in the signature of your own prime minister."
"Jargeau," whispered Pierrot. But the officer cut discussion short,
saying, "I act under orders, gentlemen, and can only say further that
you do not exactly go as prisoners, and may regulate your marches as you
please. You can set out at once if you please, or you can wait till
daybreak."
"At once," said Edward, somewhat sternly: "the end of my journey is
Geneva or Savoy, and I am anxious to get out of a country as soon as
possible where even a regular passport does not protect one from
detention."
"But the wine and the sardines?" said Pierrot.
"They can be brought while the men are making ready," replied the
officer; and, with a polite bow, he left them still under guard.
The wine and the sardines d'Olonne were brought and rapidly consumed.
Their horses' feet were heard before the door, and, mounting, Pierrot
and Master Ned, with four soldiers accompanying them, rode away in the
direction of Nantes. It is a long and rather dreary ride at all times,
and to Edward it was particularly unpleasant, for he had to remember a
fact which the reader has probably forgotten, namely, that people who
took advantage without right of other people's safe-conducts were in
those days very frequently hanged. Now, Master Ned had a mortal aversion
to hemp. All depends upon the application of things. An old saw well
applied is excellent, detestable when wrongly introduced. A
Burgundy-pitch plaster on the chest is a capital remedy for incipient
bronchitis, but has quite a contrary effect when applied to the mouth
and nose. It is all the same with hemp. Used in rigging a ship, it is
all very well; in the abstract it is a soft though somewhat tenacious
fibre, which would not much hurt a fly; but when twisted into several
strands and used as a tight cravat it is unpleasant, and often
dangerous. In this light it was viewed by Edward Langdale; but he had
run a good many hair's-breadth risks since he had been Lord Montagu's
page, and the idea of the hemp did not exclude from his mind the idea of
Lucette. (There are two "ideas" in the last sentence, which the verbal
critics may call tautologous; but I will let them both stand, for it
were well if there were as many ideas in most people's noddles.)
However, as it is a very dreary road from Mauzé toward Nantes, and as
the reflections of poor Edward Langdale were drearier still, I will not
pause upon the details, but merely say that thought after thought
followed each other through his head,--sometimes of the danger which he
himself ran, sometimes of the dangers which surrounded Lucette, and
sometimes of the chances of making his escape. This continued for some
three hours, during which time the body was suffering hardly less than
the mind. Barely recovered from severe illness, he had quitted Rochelle
too early: he had since undergone the fatigues of a storm at sea, a long
anxious ride, a short imprisonment, and now a three hours' journey, with
little food and only one hour's sleep out of thirty-six, upon the banks
of the Sevre Niortaise. As day began faintly to dawn, fatigue and
drowsiness overpowered him; and twice he swung to the side of his horse
as if he were about to fall.
The soldier who rode by his side, and who was well aware that his
superiors had considerable doubt as to whether they were right or wrong
in sending the young gentleman to Nantes at all, seeing his state,
addressed him civilly, telling him that two miles in advance there was
the village of Le Breuil Bertin, where he would find a good clean
cabaret and could both have an excellent breakfast and repose for a few
hours in comfort.
"I thought we were to go to Nantes as fast as we could," said Master
Ned.
"Monsieur is the master," replied the man. "I was only told to see you
safe to Nantes and show you all attention on the road. So I shall
certainly take your orders as to where we shall stop, and how long. At
all events, we must feed the horses at Le Breuil."
"Well, then, I will stay and rest there," said Edward, very glad to
obtain time for somewhat clearer and more composed reflection than the
state of his brain had heretofore permitted; and at Le Breuil they
accordingly paused.
In the two hundred and odd revolutions of the great humming-top which
have since taken place, Le Breuil Bertin, which was then a very
flourishing village, with a pretty church, a very tolerable inn, and, at
a little distance, a royal abbey, has become a mere hamlet; but then the
cabaret appeared a blessed haven of repose to Edward Langdale: every
thing had a clean and smiling air, and the very sight was a refreshment.
He ordered breakfast, which was in those days always accompanied by
wine, and, though he ate little, he felt stronger for the meal. Then,
after calling Pierrot apart and admonishing him in regard to brandy, he
said he should like to rest for a few hours, and was shown to a chamber
where was a bed of wool as soft as down. It is true that there was but
one staircase leading to the room assigned him, and that, Le Breuil
being built upon a gentle hill, and the inn upon the edge of the hill,
the window had a fall of thirty feet below it,--quite as good, under all
ordinary circumstances, as iron bars. But Edward did not meditate escape
just then, and all he expected was thought and repose.
Weariness and wakefulness are sometimes strangely combined. "Too tired
to sleep," say people very often; and they say rightly; but it generally
happens--at least in my own case--that fatigue of mind has been added to
fatigue of body when we cannot woo to our pillow "tired nature's sweet
restorer." We have in short been spurring both horses so hard that their
sides are sore. So it was with Edward Langdale. He could not close an
eye: he could not think,--at least collectedly. His mind went rambling
about, first to one subject of consideration, then to another, without
resting upon any. This continued for about two hours; but when the
sergeant, corporal, lunce prisade, or whatever he was, looked in to see
whether he would like to go to mass, the young gentleman was as sound
asleep as he could be, and did not hear the opening or closing door.
Now, the soldier was a native of Le Breuil Bertin, and, moreover, he had
been brought up a Protestant,--born a Protestant, I had better have
said; for I fear me much that, both in regard to religion and politics,
birth has a good deal to do with the matter. However, being but an
indifferent controversialist, and meeting with a wise Catholic priest,
and having some interest in the army, and the greater part of the
population being of the Romish Church, he had four good reasons for
being converted; and he was so. But the worthy man was mild in his
apostasy, and, as a native of Le Breuil, did not care how long a
gentleman, whether Huguenot or Papist, kept him there, nor whether he
went to mass or conventicle.
Thus Edward was suffered to slumber undisturbed from nine till one, when
he turned on his other side without waking, and then from one till six,
when a little noise about the inn made some impression on his senses.
The sun by this time was so far down as to have left an eye of gray in
the sky; but it was not yet dark; and Edward had just swung his feet
over the edge of the bed, and was rubbing his eyes with a certain
doubtfulness whether he would lie down again or not, when his door
opened, and the soldier appeared, supporting a boy dressed in a loose
black velvet overcoat, and asking, "Pray, sir, is this your page?"
Edward started forward at once and took her hand, answering, "Certainly.
How came he here?"
The man was about to reply; but as he uttered the first words Lucette
began to sink, and the color quite forsook her lips. Edward caught her
in his arms before she fell and laid her gently on the bed from which he
had just risen, saying, "Send Pierrot here, good sir,--my servant, I
mean."
The man smiled slightly, but departed; and, before Pierrot appeared,
Lucette somewhat revived, saying, in a low, faint voice, "I am so tired,
Edward, and have been so frightened. I fear I may have betrayed you by
my weakness."
"Get some wine, Pierrot!" exclaimed the lad, as the man entered. "Or
stay you here, and I will see for it myself. Fear not, dear Lucette. All
will go well."
They were vague words of comfort enough,--such as a man speaks when his
only trust is in Providence; yet they comforted Lucette. And some water
which Pierrot held to her lips did her good also; but, to tell the
truth, that which revived her most was the reappearance of Edward
Langdale. He brought wine with him,--the first he could find; but he
could hardly pour out a glassful when the good mistress of the house
entered and stayed his hand, saying, "Leave her to me, young gentleman.
Do not be foolish. Your secret shall be safe with me, upon my honor,--if
it be a secret; but all the world can see this is no boy. I have girls
myself, and will treat her like a daughter." And, gently putting the two
men out, she shut and locked the door.