Under the possibility of immediate departure, Morgan’s horse, after
being washed, rubbed down and dried, had been fed a double ration of
oats and been resaddled and bridled. The young man had only to ask for
it and spring upon its back. He was no sooner in the saddle than the
gate opened as if by magic; the horse neighed and darted out swiftly,
having forgotten its first trip, and ready for another.
At the gate of the Chartreuse, Morgan paused an instant, undecided
whether to turn to the right or left. He finally turned to the right,
followed the road which leads from Bourg to Seillon for a few moments,
wheeled rapidly a second time to the right, cut across country, plunged
into an angle of the forest which was on his way, reappeared before long
on the other side, reached the main road to Pont-d’Ain, followed it for
about a mile and a half, and halted near a group of houses now called
the Maison des Gardes. One of these houses bore for sign a cluster of
holly, which indicated one of those wayside halting places where the
pedestrians quench their thirst, and rest for an instant to recover
strength before continuing the long fatiguing voyage of life. Morgan
stopped at the door, drew a pistol from its holster and rapped with the
butt end as he had done at the Chartreuse. Only as, in all probability,
the good folks at the humble tavern were far from being conspirators,
the traveller was kept waiting longer than he had been at the monastery.
At last he heard the echo of the stable boy’s clumsy sabots. The gate
creaked, but the worthy man who opened it no sooner perceived the
horseman with his drawn pistol than he instinctively tried to, close it
again.
“It is I, Patout,” said the young man; “don’t be afraid.”
“Ah! sure enough,” said the peasant, “it is really you, Monsieur
Charles. I’m not afraid now; but you know, as the curé used to tell
us, in the days when there was a good God, ‘Caution is the mother of
safety.’”
“Yes, Patout, yes,” said the young man, slipping a piece of silver into
the stable boy’s hand, “but be easy; the good God will return, and M. le
Curé also.”
“Oh, as for that,” said the good man, “it is easy to see that there is
no one left on high by the way things go. Will this last much longer, M.
Charles?”
“Patout, I promise, in my honor, to do my best to be rid of all that
annoys you. I am no less impatient than you; so I’ll ask you not to go
to bed, my good Patout.”
“Ah! You know well, monsieur, that when you come I don’t often go to
bed. As for the horse--Goodness! You change them every day? The time
before last it was a chestnut, the last time a dapple-gray, now a black
one.”
“Yes, I’m somewhat capricious by nature. As to the horse, as you say,
my dear Patout, he wants nothing. You need only remove his bridle; leave
him saddled. Oh, wait; put this pistol back in the holsters and take
care of these other two for me.” And the young man removed the two from
his belt and handed them to the hostler.
“Well,” exclaimed the latter, laughing, “any more barkers?”
“You know, Patout, they say the roads are unsafe.”
“Ah! I should think they weren’t safe! We’re up to our necks in regular
highway robberies, M. Charles. Why, no later than last week they stopped
and robbed the diligence between Geneva and Bourg!”
“Indeed!” exclaimed Morgan; “and whom do they accuse of the robbery?”
“Oh, it’s such a farce! Just fancy; they say it was the Companions of
Jesus. I don’t believe a word of it, of course. Who are the Companions
of Jesus if not the twelve apostles?”
“Of course,” said Morgan, with his eternally joyous smile, “I don’t know
of any others.”
“Well!” continued Patout, “to accuse the twelve apostles of robbing a
diligence, that’s the limit. Oh! I tell you, M. Charles, we’re living in
times when nobody respects anything.”
And shaking his head like a misanthrope, disgusted, if not with life, at
least with men, Patout led the horse to the stable.
As for Morgan, he watched Patout till he saw him disappear down the
courtyard and enter the dark stable; then, skirting the hedge which
bordered the garden, he went toward a large clump of trees whose lofty
tops were silhouetted against the darkness of the night, with the
majesty of things immovable, the while their shadows fell upon a
charming little country house known in the neighborhood as the Château
des Noires-Fontaines. As Morgan reached the château wall, the hour
chimed from the belfry of the village of Montagnac. The young man
counted the strokes vibrating in the calm silent atmosphere of the
autumn night. It was eleven o’clock. Many things, as we have seen, had
happened during the last two hours.
Morgan advanced a few steps farther, examined the wall, apparently in
search of a familiar spot, then, having found it, inserted the tip of
his boot in a cleft between two stones. He sprang up like a man mounting
a horse, seized the top of the wall with the left hand, and with a
second spring seated himself astride the wall, from which, with the
rapidity of lightning, he lowered himself on the other side. All this
was done with such rapidity, such dexterity and agility, that any one
chancing to pass at that instant would have thought himself the puppet
of a vision. Morgan stopped, as on the other side of the wall, to
listen, while his eyes tried to pierce the darkness made deeper by the
foliage of poplars and aspens, and the heavy shadows of the little
wood. All was silent and solitary. Morgan ventured on his path. We
say ventured, because the young man, since nearing the Château des
Noires-Fontaines, revealed in all his movement a timidity and hesitation
so foreign to his character that it was evident that if he feared it was
not for himself alone.
He gained the edge of the wood, still moving cautiously. Coming to a
lawn, at the end of which was the little château, he paused. Then he
examined the front of the house. Only one of the twelve windows which
dotted the three floors was lighted. This was on the second floor at the
corner of the house. A little balcony, covered with virgin vines which
climbed the walls, twining themselves around the iron railing and
falling thence in festoons from the window, overhung the garden. On both
sides of the windows, close to the balcony, large-leafed trees met and
formed above the cornice a bower of verdure. A Venetian blind, which was
raised and lowered by cords, separated the balcony from the window, a
separation which disappeared at will. It was through the interstices of
this blind that Morgan had seen the light.
The young man’s first impulse was to cross the lawn in a straight line;
but again, the fears of which we spoke restrained him. A path shaded
by lindens skirted the wall and led to the house. He turned aside and
entered its dark leafy covert. When he had reached the end of the path,
he crossed, like a frightened doe, the open space which led to the house
wall, and stood for a moment in the deep shadow of the house. Then, when
he had reached the spot he had calculated upon, he clapped his hands
three times.
At this call a shadow darted from the end of the apartment and clung,
lithe, graceful, almost transparent, to the window.
Morgan repeated the signal. The window was opened immediately, the blind
was raised, and a ravishing young girl, in a night dress, her fair hair
rippling over her shoulders, appeared in the frame of verdure.
The young man stretched out his arms to her, whose arms were stretched
out to him, and two names, or rather two cries from the heart, crossed
from one to the other.
“Charles!”
“Amélie!”
Then the young man sprang against the wall, caught at the vine shoots,
the jagged edges of the rock, the jutting cornice, and in an instant was
on the balcony.
What these two beautiful young beings said to each other was only a
murmur of love lost in an endless kiss. Then, by gentle effort, the
young man drew the girl with one hand to her chamber, while with the
other he loosened the cords of the blind, which fell noisily
behind them. The window closed behind the blind. Then the lamp was
extinguished, and the front of the Château des Noires-Fontaines was
again in darkness.
This darkness had lasted for about a quarter of an hour, when the
rolling of a carriage was heard along the road leading from the highway
of Pont-d’Ain to the entrance of the château. There the sound ceased; it
was evident that the carriage had stopped before the gates.