THE NAKED SWORD.
A man who has been posting all day long, and changing the air he
breathes every half hour, who is well pleased with himself, and
has nothing on earth to trouble him, and who sits alone by a fire
in a comfortable chair after having eaten a hearty supper, may be
pardoned if he takes an accidental nap.
I had filled my fourth glass when I fell asleep. My head, I
daresay, hung uncomfortably; and it is admitted, that a variety
of French dishes is not the most favourable precursor to pleasant
dreams.
I had a dream as I took mine ease in mine inn on this occasion. I
fancied myself in a huge cathedral, without light, except from
four tapers that stood at the corners of a raised platform hung
with black, on which lay, draped also in black, what seemed to me
the dead body of the Countess de St. Alyre. The place seemed
empty, it was cold, and I could see only (in the halo of the
candles) a little way round.
The little I saw bore the character of Gothic gloom, and helped
my fancy to shape and furnish the black void that yawned all
round me. I heard a sound like the slow tread of two persons
walking up the flagged aisle. A faint echo told of the vastness
of the place. An awful sense of expectation was upon me, and I
was horribly frightened when the body that lay on the catafalque
said (without stirring), in a whisper that froze me, "They come
to place me in the grave alive; save me."
I found that I could neither speak nor move. I was horribly
frightened.
The two people who approached now emerged from the darkness. One,
the Count de St. Alyre glided to the head of the figure and
placed his long thin hands under it. The white-faced Colonel,
with the scar across his face, and a look of infernal triumph,
placed his hands under her feet, and they began to raise her.
With an indescribable effort I broke the spell that bound me, and
started to my feet with a gasp.
I was wide awake, but the broad, wicked face of Colonel Gaillarde
was staring, white as death, at me, from the other side of the
hearth. "Where is she?" I shuddered.
"That depends on who she is, Monsieur," replied the Colonel,
curtly.
"Good heavens!" I gasped, looking about me.
The Colonel, who was eyeing me sarcastically, had had his
_demi-tasse_ of _café noir_, and now drank his _tasse_, diffusing
a pleasant perfume of brandy.
"I fell asleep and was dreaming," I said, least any strong
language, founded on the _rôle_ he played in my dream, should
have escaped me. "I did not know for some moments where I was."
"You are the young gentleman who has the apartments over the
Count and Countess de St. Alyre?" he said, winking one eye, close
in meditation, and glaring at me with the other.
"I believe so--yes," I answered.
"Well, younker, take care you have not worse dreams than that
some night," he said, enigmatically, and wagged his head with a
chuckle. "Worse dreams," he repeated.
"What does Monsieur the Colonel mean?" I inquired.
"I am trying to find that out myself," said the Colonel; "and I think I
shall. When _I_ get the first inch of the thread fast between my finger
and thumb, it goes hard but I follow it up, bit by bit, little by
little, tracing it this way and that, and up and down, and round about,
until the whole clue is wound up on my thumb, and the end, and its
secret, fast in my fingers. Ingenious! Crafty as five foxes! wide awake
as a weazel! _Parbleu!_ if I had descended to that occupation I should
have made my fortune as a spy. Good wine here?" he glanced
interrogatively at my bottle.
"Very good," said I, "Will Monsieur the Colonel try a glass?"
He took the largest he could find, and filled it, raised it with
a bow, and drank it slowly. "Ah! ah! Bah! That is not it," he
exclaimed, with some disgust, filling it again. "You ought to
have told _me_ to order your Burgundy, and they would not have
brought you that stuff."
I got away from this man as soon as I civilly could, and, putting
on my hat, I walked out with no other company than my sturdy
walking stick. I visited the inn-yard, and looked up to the
windows of the Countess's apartments. They were closed, however,
and I had not even the unsubstantial consolation of contemplating
the light in which that beautiful lady was at that moment
writing, or reading, or sitting and thinking of--any one you
please.
I bore this serious privation as well as I could, and took a
little saunter through the town. I shan't bore you with moonlight
effects, nor with the maunderings of a man who has fallen in
love at first sight with a beautiful face. My ramble, it is
enough to say, occupied about half-an-hour, and, returning by a
slight _détour_, I found myself in a little square, with about
two high gabled houses on each side, and a rude stone statue,
worn by centuries of rain, on a pedestal in the centre of the
pavement. Looking at this statue was a slight and rather tall
man, whom I instantly recognized as the Marquis d'Harmonville: he
knew me almost as quickly. He walked a step towards me, shrugged
and laughed:
"You are surprised to find Monsieur Droqville staring at that old
stone figure by moonlight. Anything to pass the time. You, I see,
suffer from _ennui_, as I do. These little provincial towns!
Heavens! what an effort it is to live in them! If I could regret
having formed in early life a friendship that does me honour, I
think its condemning me to a sojourn in such a place would make
me do so. You go on towards Paris, I suppose, in the morning?"
"I have ordered horses."
"As for me I await a letter, or an arrival, either would
emancipate me; but I can't say how soon either event will
happen."
"Can I be of any use in this matter?" I began.
"None, Monsieur, I thank you a thousand times. No, this is a
piece in which every _rôle_ is already cast. I am but an amateur,
and induced, solely by friendship, to take a part."
So he talked on, for a time, as we walked slowly toward the Belle
Etoile, and then came a silence, which I broke by asking him if
he knew anything of Colonel Gaillarde.
"Oh! yes, to be sure. He is a little mad; he has had some bad
injuries of the head. He used to plague the people in the War
Office to death. He has always some delusion. They contrived some
employment for him--not regimental, of course--but in this
campaign Napoleon, who could spare nobody, placed him in command
of a regiment. He was always a desperate fighter, and such men
were more than ever needed."
There is, or was, a second inn, in this town, called l'Ecu de
France. At its door the Marquis stopped, bade me a mysterious
good-night, and disappeared.
As I walked slowly toward my inn, I met, in the shadow of a row
of poplars, the _garçon_ who had brought me my Burgundy a little
time ago. I was thinking of Colonel Gaillarde, and I stopped the
little waiter as he passed me.
"You said, I think, that Colonel Gaillarde was at the Belle
Etoile for a week at one time."
"Yes, Monsieur."
"Is he perfectly in his right mind?"
The waiter stared. "Perfectly, Monsieur."
"Has he been suspected at any time of being out of his mind?"
"Never, Monsieur; he is a little noisy, but a very shrewd man."
"What is a fellow to think?" I muttered, as I walked on.
I was soon within sight of the lights of the Belle Etoile. A
carriage, with four horses, stood in the moonlight at the door,
and a furious altercation was going on in the hall, in which the
yell of Colonel Gaillarde out-topped all other sounds.
Most young men like, at least, to witness a row. But,
intuitively, I felt that this would interest me in a very special
manner. I had only fifty yards to run, when I found myself in the
hall of the old inn. The principal actor in this strange drama
was, indeed, the Colonel, who stood facing the old Count de St.
Alyre, who, in his travelling costume, with his black silk scarf
covering the lower part of his face, confronted him; he had
evidently been intercepted in an endeavour to reach his carriage.
A little in the rear of the Count stood the Countess, also in
travelling costume, with her thick black veil down, and holding
in her delicate fingers a white rose. You can't conceive a more
diabolical effigy of hate and fury than the Colonel; the knotted
veins stood out on his forehead, his eyes were leaping from their
sockets, he was grinding his teeth, and froth was on his lips.
His sword was drawn, in his hand, and he accompanied his yelling
denunciations with stamps upon the floor and flourishes of his
weapon in the air.
The host of the Belle Etoile was talking to the Colonel in
soothing terms utterly thrown away. Two waiters, pale with fear,
stared uselessly from behind. The Colonel screamed, and
thundered, and whirled his sword. "I was not sure of your red
birds of prey; I could not believe you would have the audacity to
travel on high roads, and to stop at honest inns, and lie under
the same roof with honest men. You! _you! both_--vampires,
wolves, ghouls. Summon the _gendarmes_, I say. By St. Peter and
all the devils, if either of you try to get out of that door I'll
take your heads off."
For a moment I had stood aghast. Here was a situation! I walked
up to the lady; she laid her hand wildly upon my arm. "Oh!
Monsieur," she whispered, in great agitation, "that dreadful
madman! What are we to do? He won't let us pass; he will kill my
husband."
"Fear nothing, Madame," I answered, with romantic devotion, and
stepping between the Count and Gaillarde, as he shrieked his
invective, "Hold your tongue, and clear the way, you ruffian,
you bully, you coward!" I roared.
A faint cry escaped the lady, which more than repaid the risk I
ran, as the sword of the frantic soldier, after a moment's
astonished pause, flashed in the air to cut me down.