'You would blow this door open?'
'Precisely.'
'But you would explode the magazine.'
It was true, but I was not at the end of my resources.
'We will blow open the store-room door,' I cried.
I ran back and seized a tin box which had been filled with candles. It
was about the size of my busby--large enough to hold several pounds of
powder. Duroc filled it while I cut off the end of a candle. When we had
finished, it would have puzzled a colonel of engineers to make a better
petard. I put three cheeses on the top of each other and placed it above
them, so as to lean against the lock. Then we lit our candle-end and ran
for shelter, shutting the door of the magazine behind us.
It is no joke, my friends, to be among all those tons of powder, with
the knowledge that if the flame of the explosion should penetrate
through one thin door our blackened limbs would be shot higher than the
Castle keep. Who could have believed that a half-inch of candle could
take so long to burn? My ears were straining all the time for the
thudding of the hoofs of the Cossacks who were coming to destroy us. I
had almost made up my mind that the candle must have gone out when there
was a smack like a bursting bomb, our door flew to bits, and pieces of
cheese, with a shower of turnips, apples, and splinters of cases, were
shot in among us. As we rushed out we had to stagger through an
impenetrable smoke, with all sorts of débris beneath our feet, but there
was a glimmering square where the dark door had been. The petard had
done its work.
In fact, it had done more for us than we had even ventured to hope. It
had shattered gaolers as well as gaol. The first thing that I saw as I
came out into the hall was a man with a butcher's axe in his hand, lying
flat upon his back, with a gaping wound across his forehead. The second
was a huge dog, with two of its legs broken, twisting in agony upon the
floor. As it raised itself up I saw the two broken ends flapping like
flails. At the same instant I heard a cry, and there was Duroc, thrown
against the wall, with the other hound's teeth in his throat. He pushed
it off with his left hand, while again and again he passed his sabre
through its body, but it was not until I blew out its brains with my
pistol that the iron jaws relaxed, and the fierce, bloodshot eyes were
glazed in death.
There was no time for us to pause. A woman's scream from in front--a
scream of mortal terror--told us that even now we might be too late.
There were two other men in the hall, but they cowered away from our
drawn swords and furious faces. The blood was streaming from Duroc's
neck and dyeing the grey fur of his pelisse. Such was the lad's fire,
however, that he shot in front of me, and it was only over his shoulder
that I caught a glimpse of the scene as we rushed into the chamber in
which we had first seen the master of the Castle of Gloom.
The Baron was standing in the middle of the room, his tangled mane
bristling like an angry lion. He was, as I have said, a huge man with
enormous shoulders; and as he stood there, with his face flushed with
rage and his sword advanced, I could not but think that, in spite of all
his villainies, he had a proper figure for a grenadier. The lady lay
cowering in a chair behind him. A weal across one of her white arms and
a dog-whip upon the floor were enough to show that our escape had hardly
been in time to save her from his brutality. He gave a howl like a wolf
as we broke in, and was upon us in an instant, hacking and driving, with
a curse at every blow.
I have already said that the room gave no space for swordsmanship. My
young companion was in front of me in the narrow passage between the
table and the wall, so that I could only look on without being able to
aid him. The lad knew something of his weapon, and was as fierce and
active as a wild cat, but in so narrow a space the weight and strength
of the giant gave him the advantage. Besides, he was an admirable
swordsman. His parade and riposte were as quick as lightning. Twice he
touched Duroc upon the shoulder, and then, as the lad slipped on a
lunge, he whirled up his sword to finish him before he could recover his
feet. I was quicker than he, however, and took the cut upon the pommel
of my sabre.
'Excuse me,' said I, 'but you have still to deal with Etienne Gerard.'
He drew back and leaned against the tapestry-covered wall, breathing in
little, hoarse gasps, for his foul living was against him.
'Take your breath,' said I. 'I will await your convenience.'
'You have no cause of quarrel against me,' he panted.
'I owe you some little attention,' said I, 'for having shut me up in
your store-room. Besides, if all other were wanting, I see cause enough
upon that lady's arm.'
'Have your way, then!' he snarled, and leaped at me like a madman. For
a minute I saw only the blazing blue eyes, and the red glazed point
which stabbed and stabbed, rasping off to right or to left, and yet ever
back at my throat and my breast. I had never thought that such good
sword-play was to be found at Paris in the days of the Revolution. I do
not suppose that in all my little affairs I have met six men who had a
better knowledge of their weapon. But he knew that I was his master. He
read death in my eyes, and I could see that he read it. The flush died
from his face. His breath came in shorter and in thicker gasps. Yet he
fought on, even after the final thrust had come, and died still hacking
and cursing, with foul cries upon his lips, and his blood clotting upon
his orange beard. I who speak to you have seen so many battles, that my
old memory can scarce contain their names, and yet of all the terrible
sights which these eyes have rested upon, there is none which I care to
think of less than of that orange beard with the crimson stain in the
centre, from which I had drawn my sword-point.
It was only afterwards that I had time to think of all this. His
monstrous body had hardly crashed down upon the floor before the woman
in the corner sprang to her feet, clapping her hands together and
screaming out in her delight. For my part I was disgusted to see a woman
take such delight in a deed of blood, and I gave no thought as to the
terrible wrongs which must have befallen her before she could so far
forget the gentleness of her sex. It was on my tongue to tell her
sharply to be silent, when a strange, choking smell took the breath from
my nostrils, and a sudden, yellow glare brought out the figures upon the
faded hangings.
'Duroc, Duroc!' I shouted, tugging at his shoulder. 'The Castle is on
fire!'
The boy lay senseless upon the ground, exhausted by his wounds. I rushed
out into the hall to see whence the danger came. It was our explosion
which had set alight to the dry frame-work of the door. Inside the
store-room some of the boxes were already blazing. I glanced in, and as
I did so my blood was turned to water by the sight of the powder barrels
beyond, and of the loose heap upon the floor. It might be seconds, it
could not be more than minutes, before the flames would be at the edge
of it. These eyes will be closed in death, my friends, before they cease
to see those crawling lines of fire and the black heap beyond.
How little I can remember what followed. Vaguely I can recall how I
rushed into the chamber of death, how I seized Duroc by one limp hand
and dragged him down the hall, the woman keeping pace with me and
pulling at the other arm. Out of the gateway we rushed, and on down the
snow-covered path until we were on the fringe of the fir forest. It was
at that moment that I heard a crash behind me, and, glancing round, saw
a great spout of fire shoot up into the wintry sky. An instant later
there seemed to come a second crash, far louder than the first. I saw
the fir trees and the stars whirling round me, and I fell unconscious
across the body of my comrade.
* * * * *
It was some weeks before I came to myself in the post-house of
Arensdorf, and longer still before I could be told all that had befallen
me. It was Duroc, already able to go soldiering, who came to my bedside
and gave me an account of it. He it was who told me how a piece of
timber had struck me on the head and laid me almost dead upon the
ground. From him, too, I learned how the Polish girl had run to
Arensdorf, how she had roused our hussars, and how she had only just
brought them back in time to save us from the spears of the Cossacks who
had been summoned from their bivouac by that same black-bearded
secretary whom we had seen galloping so swiftly over the snow. As to the
brave lady who had twice saved our lives, I could not learn very much
about her at that moment from Duroc, but when I chanced to meet him in
Paris two years later, after the campaign of Wagram, I was not very
much surprised to find that I needed no introduction to his bride, and
that by the queer turns of fortune he had himself, had he chosen to use
it, that very name and title of the Baron Straubenthal, which showed him
to be the owner of the blackened ruins of the Castle of Gloom.