Edward Langdale rode on from place to place, sometimes quickly,
sometimes slowly, as the condition of the roads and the nature of the
country required; and, strangely enough for a journey in those days,
neither accident nor adventure befell him. One thing excited his
curiosity and suspicion, however. At Trapes, where he passed the first
night after leaving the house of Madame de Chevreuse, when he had
finished his supper and was just retiring to rest, he caught for a
moment, on the somewhat darksome stairs, one glance of a face he thought
he had seen before. He could not identify it, indeed, for it was lost as
soon as seen; but it instantly carried his mind back to his adventure
with the two Savoyards, and he felt almost sure that face belonged to
one of them. But neither of the two strangers appeared the next morning;
and Pierrot and Jacques both assured him that their horses were not in
the stable.
There are faces that haunt us both in night and daydreams; and Edward
was almost led to believe that one of these spectres of the imagination
had taken possession of him; for twice or three times before he reached
Gray that face again crossed him for a moment, and always when no one
else was present who could confirm or remove his suspicions.
Those were not pleasant days to live in; and it is a very difficult
thing for any one born in and accustomed to the bad comfortable modern
days to realize those _good old times_. Espionage was then a great
science, an honorable profession, practised by great dignitaries and men
of high degree. Words brought men's heads to the block, and thoughts
often conducted to a prison. There was no need of overt acts: intentions
were quite sufficient; and friends and foes were so continually changing
places that no one could tell that the thoughts uttered in the
confidence of familiar intercourse would not be brought forward a few
days or weeks later to lead one to the dungeon and the rack. Yet it is
wonderful, unaccountable, how freely and daringly men spoke their
mind,--how the grave condemnation, the witty lampoon, or the hideous
libel, was disseminated without ceremony. Men laughed and had their
heads chopped off,--and would have laughed still if they could have been
fixed on again, I do believe; for nothing seemed a warning or a
restraint.
Edward, however, born in a country where neither the reign of the Tudor
nor of the Stuart had been able to crush out the spirit of liberty,
loved not to be watched; and there is always something more alarming in
the indefinite than the definite danger. He could not divine what was
the object of the two strangers, if, indeed, they had any object, in
thus persisting in following him. The cardinal had lacked no opportunity
of detaining him at Nantes, or of arresting him on his journey, if he
had thought fit; and yet he could not clear his mind from suspicion till
he reached Franche Comté and found himself beyond the power of the
French minister.
It may be necessary to remind the reader that Franche Comté was not
annexed to France till the year 1668; and at the time of which I now
write the important town of Gray was a fortified place, consisting of
the city on the high ground strongly walled, and a suburb on the bank of
the Saône, defended merely by a small battery. For a long period of
troublous times, so frequent had been the visits of French exiles to
Lorraine, Burgundy, and Franche Comté, that safe-conducts or passports
from one country to another were very generally dispensed with in the
country and in open towns; but in fortresses some trouble was
experienced; and it is probable that the directions which the Duchesse
de Chevreuse had given Edward Langdale to stop in the faubourg were
intended to guard against his detention. The inn which she had named to
him was good, however,--perhaps better than that in the upper town; and
the appointed two days of Edward's stay passed dully but not
unpleasantly. The horses were refreshed and the two men none the worse
for the repose. For Edward himself, too, perhaps two days of thought
were beneficial. Every man, in the toil and tumult and hurry of the
world, requires some moment to pause and consider his position, to
decide upon his future course, to apply the lesson of past errors, to
take breath as it were amidst the bustle of existence. Edward was like a
stout swimmer who had been suddenly plunged into a torrent, and was
likely to be carried away by the flood which for the last three months
had been whirling confusedly round him; and those two days at Gray were
like a little island of dry ground where he could rest and scan his way
to the opposite bank, avoiding the rocks and eddies which might impede
or destroy him. It is a quaint old proverb, but a true one, that "a man
who does not look clearly before him will often have to look sadly
behind him;" and happy is he who has both the will and the time to do
so.
Those two days then with Edward passed in almost uninterrupted thought;
but at last the night of the second day came, and yet neither message
nor letter had arrived. Supper had been eaten, and the horses had been
ordered for daybreak on the following morning to proceed to Turin, when,
toward nine o'clock, the landlord brought in a scrap of writing, asking
Edward if that was intended for him. It was addressed in
English,--"Master Edward Langdale,"--and underneath was written, "Join
me at Chambéry or Aix. I shall be there from the twenty-ninth till the
first."
No name was signed, but the writing was Lord Montagu's; and the
landlord, on being questioned, said the paper had been given to him by a
courier from Arnay le Duc going to Vesoul, who had gone on his way as
soon as he had left it.
Now, Edward's knowledge of geography was considerable, and, as far as
France and England were concerned, minute; but he had at Gray got
somewhat out of his latitude, and the landlord had to be consulted as
to the road to Aix and Chambéry. The good man was learned upon the
subject, however, knew every inch of the road, he said, and could find
his way in the dark. It was true, he added, that it was rather a wild
way, and carriages could hardly go one-half the distance; but, as the
gentleman had horses, it would be easily managed. He must first go
straight to Dole, then from Dole to Lons-le-Saulnier, from
Lons-le-Saulnier to Bourg or Nantua, and thence to the Pont du Sault.
After that, he said, came Bellay and Aix and Chambéry; but there the
traveller would have to ask every step of his way. It was a five days'
journey, he remarked, and, ride as hard as you would, it would take four
and a half.
Edward did ride hard, and the first part of the way was overcome in a
much shorter space of time than the good host had anticipated; nor was
it till the party had passed Bourg that any thing like difficulties
occurred. It is as pleasant a ride in fine weather as any one can take,
for the roads are now good and the scenery exceedingly picturesque
without being fatiguingly grand; but neither Edward nor ourselves have
any time to pause upon the beauties of nature. The roads, however, were
then in a very different condition from that which they now display;
and, indeed, the wonder-working eighteenth and nineteenth centuries have
done more for few countries than for the districts lying between the
Jura and the Rhone and Saône.
On the twenty-seventh of July, Edward Langdale and his party were within
one short day's journey of Aix, and the early morning when they set out
was fresh and beautiful. The hot summer sun was shaded by the rocks and
forests, and the air was cooled by the mountain-breeze. As he was
earlier than the first of the days named by Lord Montagu, the young
traveller suffered his horses to proceed leisurely. But in this he made
a mistake. Man always wants more money and time than he calculates upon;
and nobody can tell what the want of an hour or a guinea may bring
about.
As every one knows, the country which Edward had now to traverse is a
land of rocks and mountains, of rivers and lakes. Not three miles can be
passed without encountering some stream or torrent hurrying down to
join the great Rhone; and at every mile, as the road then went, was some
steep ascent or descent, flanked with rugged cliffs, sometimes covered
with dark forests, sometimes naked and gray, with immense masses of
stone impending over the traveller's head without the root of a single
tree to bind them to the crag, while high up in front the Mont du Chat
was seen from time to time rearing its rugged front and seeming to close
the pass. About one o'clock, over the edges of the hills some heavy
clouds were seen rising, knotty and dull, and of a deep lead-color,
except where the sun tipped their edges with an ochrey yellow. The wind
was from the northeast, and the clouds were coming from the south. But
they did not heed the breeze, which soon began to fail before them.
"Let us ride faster," said Edward: "the road is good here." And on he
went, keeping his eye on the heavy masses, but fearing no greater
inconvenience than a wetting. He had never travelled in Savoy before.
However, by quick trotting he saved himself and his followers for about
two hours; but by the end of that time the sun was hidden and great
drops began to fall. Then came the thunder echoing through the hills,
and then a complete deluge. Every thing turned gray, and the old castles
which strew that part of the country could hardly be distinguished from
the rocks on which they stood.
Two more hours were passed by the travellers under an overhanging shelf
of rock, which afforded some shelter, not only to themselves, but also
to their horses. But at the end of that time the rain had had the effect
of loosening some parts of the cliff, and several large masses of stone
began to fall, giving them warning to retreat as soon as possible.
The thunder was now more distant and the flashes of lightning farther
apart; but the rain continued to fall, not so heavily, but in a dull,
incessant pour. There was nothing to be done but to ride on, and, even
then, but slow progress could be made; for the roads were cut up in a
terrible manner, the smaller streams were swollen so as to be well nigh
impassable, and here and there the way was nearly blocked up by piles of
rock and gravel. Night was rapidly coming on; no human habitation was
in sight except a scattered old tower here and there, and that in ruins.
At length, just as the sun sank, a more formidable obstacle than ever
presented itself. Where the road took a rapid descent between some high
rocky ground on the right and the Rhone in flood upon the left, just at
the spot where one of the branches of the Guiers joins the larger river,
an immense mass of rock, undermined by the torrent, had fallen across
the mouth of the stream, which, thus blocked up, had flooded the whole
road. By the side of the water, gazing disconsolately at the rushing and
whirling current, was a group of men, some four in number. It was too
dark for Edward to distinguish who they were at any distance, but when
he came nearer he perceived his two old friends the Savoyard
blacksmiths, and two laborers of the country, whom the fall of the rock
and the consequent inundation had, it seemed, cut off from their own
cottages on the other side.
"Ah! bon jour, bon jour, seigneur!" said one of the blacksmiths, who had
dismounted, and was holding his horse by the bridle: "we came all along
the road with you, after all, but we kept out of your way for fear of
your pistols. Here is a pretty pass! We shall not get over to-night,
these men say."
"Can we find no place of shelter this side?" asked Edward, whose
suspicion of the two men had been greatly abated by finding they had
quietly pursued their way to Savoy. The blacksmith shook his head.
"I saw an old castle about half a mile back," said the young Englishman:
"it was not far up the mountain."
"All ruined! No roof," replied the other. "Ask them yourself."
But Edward could not make either of the peasants comprehend a word he
said. "We must do something," he remarked. "It is growing darker every
moment, and it would give us some sort of covering, were it but under an
old arch. Hark! there are horses coming on the other side. Those men
will be into the torrent if they do not mind." And, raising his voice,
he shouted aloud to warn the horsemen, who were dashing on at furious
pace from the side of Aix.
The wind set the other way, and the roaring of the water was loud, so
that it is probable his shout was not heard, for the next moment there
was a plunge into the water and then a loud cry for help.
Edward sprang instantly from his horse and advanced to the very verge of
the stream.
"For Heaven's sake, Master Ned, for Heaven's sake, do not try it!" cried
Pierrot, catching his arm.
"Here, take the horse," said Edward, sharply. "Let go my arm."
A flash of lightning came at that moment, faint, indeed, but sufficient
to show him a horse carried away toward the Rhone, a horseman who had
pulled up just in time upon the other brink, and a man struggling in the
water and trying to hold by a smooth mass of fallen rock, just in the
middle of the torrent, about twelve yards from him. He paused not to
consider, but ran as far as he could up the water, dashed in, and swam
with all his strength toward the drowning man, whom he could just
distinguish. Borne down by the current, he drifted right to the rock,
calling aloud, in French, "Do not touch me, and I will save you!"
Such warnings are usually vain. The man's first effort was to clutch
him; but Edward was prepared, and kept him off, catching him tightly by
the back of the neck. We have said that he was a good and practised
swimmer; but neither skill nor strength would probably have carried him
across that small space of twelve yards against that powerful current.
But Jacques Beaupré caught sight of him, and exclaimed, "Here, Pierrot,
catch my hand. Let us all be drowned in company." And, running in till
the water reached his shoulders and almost carried him off his feet, he
contrived to grasp Edward's arm and pull him on till he could touch
ground.
The young lad was almost exhausted, for the man, of whom he had never
loosed his hold, had struggled to the last to grasp him, and the few
moments since he had left the rock had been all one confused scene of
strife amongst the dark and eddying waters.
"Here; let me take him, sir," said Jacques: "if ever a man's life was
nobly saved, it is his." And, throwing his brawny arms round the
stranger, who struggled still, he carried him on to the road.
Edward paused for a moment, as soon as he could resist the stream, to
draw breath, and then slowly joined the rest. They had laid the stranger
down on the bank, and for a moment or two he remained quite still,
though his panting breath showed that his life was in no danger.
"Here, moosoo, take some of this," said one of the blacksmiths, pouring
some spirit out of a bottle into the stranger's mouth: "you owe that
young seigneur something; for if he had not been here you would have
been out of Savoy by this time."
"I know it; I know it," said the rescued man, faintly. "Where is he?
which is he?"
"Look! look!" cried Pierrot: "there is a light up there, in one, two,
three windows. That must be in the old chateau which these fellows said
was all in ruins. Let us go up. We shall none of us ever get dry here,
it is raining so hard."
"Are you able, sir, to walk up to that castle?" asked Edward, speaking
to the stranger, who had now raised himself upon his arm. "I fear your
poor horse is lost beyond all hope."
"Let the fiery brute go," said the other, petulantly: "if he would have
obeyed the rein I should not have been in this plight. I will try to
accompany you in a moment. But what castle is that? It must be Groslie,
I think."
He did not speak very good French; but, calling to one of the Savoyard
peasants, he addressed him in his own language, of which he seemed to
have a perfect command.
The good man instantly began to speak fast and gesticulate vehemently;
and, translating as best he could the language of signs, Edward
concluded that the Savoyard was trying to dissuade the gentleman from
going to the old chateau he had seen.
"What does he say?" asked the young Englishman: "he seems unwilling we
should go."
"Oh, he talks nonsense," answered the stranger: "he will have it that
the place is haunted, and says that no one is ever seen there by day,
but that those lights appear from time to time at night,--smugglers,
more likely, or coiners; but we are too many for them to do us any
harm." As he spoke he raised himself slowly upon his feet and said to
the friendly blacksmith, "Give me some more of those strong waters, my
friend. I will pay you well for them."
The man readily supplied him, and he professed himself ready to proceed;
but the two peasants could not be induced by any means to accompany the
rest. One of the blacksmiths, however, produced a lantern and candle
from the packs which each carried behind his saddle, and the party set
out, not without fresh remonstrances from the boors.
"If they be devils, we do not fear them," replied the stranger, and then
added some directions which probably referred to the servant, who had
been able to stop his horse in time and remained on the other side of
the torrent.
The peasants seemed to treat the stranger with much respect; but even
when, by the aid of a flint and steel, the lantern was lighted, it was
impossible for Edward to discern more of the other's person than
sufficient to satisfy him that he was a man of distinguished appearance,
tall and well formed though slight, and clothed as one of the higher
classes.
The ascent was somewhat laborious but not long, after they had once
discovered the right road; and about twenty minutes brought the party to
an old bridge and gate under a deep arch. By the faint light of the
candle, which was by this time wellnigh burned out, the place looked
fully as ruinous and desolate as the peasants had represented it to be.
The rugged outlines of some of the towers showed that much of the
masonry had fallen, and the key-stone of the arch and a large mass of
rubbish only left room for the horses to pass one at a time. Still,
however, the light they had seen from below continued to stream from
three windows in a great, dark, shapeless mass of buildings, and the
approach of the new-comers did not seem to have been discovered by the
persons within, if there were any.
"Stop a moment," said Edward, pausing under the arch. "As we do not
know what sort of persons we shall find within, it is well to be
prepared. The priming of my pistols may be damp, though the holsters are
made as tight as possible." And, standing under the shelter of the
walls, he took the weapon from his saddle-bow, threw the powder out of
the pans, and primed them anew. He then took the very useful precautions
of ascertaining that no water had entered the barrels and that the balls
were still in their places.
"Ay, he has got two lives there," said Pierrot, keeping close to his
master; and then, fastening the horses to some chains which hung about
the bridge, the whole party advanced toward the building in which the
lights were seen. A low and narrow door admitted them to the foot of a
small stone staircase, and, lighted by the blinking lantern, they began
to ascend. They had hardly gone half-way up--Edward with one pistol in
his belt and the other in his hand--when they heard a clear, merry peal
of laughter; and, somewhat hurrying his pace, lest the little candle
should go out before they reached the object of their search, the young
Englishman reached a little ante-room with a door on the opposite side,
through the large key-hole of which a ray of light streamed out upon the
floor.
The door was thrown open without ceremony; but the scene which the
interior of the large hall or chamber presented was what none of the
party expected. Seated round a table, on which were the remains of an
abundant meal, with plenty of wine, and sundry papers and maps, was a
party of gentlemen, richly dressed, with the exception of one who
occupied the top of the board and who was habited as an ecclesiastic. A
gentleman on the abbé's right hand was in the very act of speaking with
some gesticulation when the door was flung open; but he instantly
stopped. The party at the door stopped, also, in much surprise, and each
group gazed upon the other for a moment in silence.