The golden guess
Is morning star to the full round of truth.
Barlasch was never more sober in his life than when he emerged a minute
later from his room, while Lisa was still feverishly bolting the door.
He had not wasted much time at his toilet. In his flannel shirt, his
arms bare to the elbow, knotted and muscular, he looked like some rude
son of toil.
“One thinks of one's self,” he hastened to explain to Desiree, fearing
that she might ascribe some other motive to his action. “Some day the
patron may be in power again, and then he will remember a poor soldier.
It is good to think of the future.”
He shook his head pessimistically at Lisa as belonging to a sex liable
to error: instanced in this case by bolting the door too eagerly.
“Now,” he said, turning to Desiree again, “have you any in Dantzig to
help you?”
“Yes,” she answered rather slowly.
“Then send for him.”
“I cannot do that.”
“Then go for him yourself,” snapped Barlasch impatiently.
He looked at her fiercely beneath his shaggy eyebrows.
“It is no use to be afraid,” he said; “you are afraid--I see it in your
face. And it is never any use. Before they hammered on that door there,
my legs shook. For I am easily afraid--I. But it is never any use. And
when one opens the door, it goes.”
He looked at her with a puzzled frown, seeking in vain, it may have
been, the ordinary symptoms of fear. She was hesitating but not afraid.
There ran blood in her veins which will for all time be associated by
history with a gay and indomitable courage.
“Come,” he said sharply; “there is nothing else to do.”
“I will go,” said Desiree, at length, deciding suddenly to do the one
thing that is left to a woman once or twice in her life--to go to the
one man and trust him.
“By the back way,” said Barlasch, helping her with the cloak that Lisa
had brought, and pulling the hood forward over her face with a jerk.
“Ah, I know that way. The patron is hiding in the yard. An old soldier
looks to the retreat--though the Emperor has saved us that, so far.
Come, I will help you over the wall, for the door is rusted.”
The way, which Barlasch had perceived, led through the room at the back
of the kitchen to a yard, and thence through a door not opened by the
present occupiers of the old house, into a very labyrinth of narrow
alleys running downward to the river and round the tall houses that
stand against the cathedral walls.
The wall was taller than Barlasch, but he ran at it like a cat,
and Desiree standing below could see the black outline of his limbs
crouching on the top. He stooped down, and grasping her hands, lifted
her by the sheer strength of one arm, balanced her for an instant on the
wall, and then lowered her on the outer side.
“Run,” he whispered.
She knew the way, and although the night was dark, and these narrow
alleys between high walls had no lamps, Desiree lost no time. The
Krahn-Thor is quite near to the Frauengasse. Indeed, the whole
of Dantzig occupied but a small space between the rivers in those
straitened days. The town was quieter than it had been for months, and
Desiree passed unmolested through the narrow streets. She made her way
to the quay, passing through the low gateway known as the door of the
Holy Ghost, and here found people still astir. For the commerce that
thrives on a northern river is paralyzed all the winter, and feverishly
active when the ice has gone.
“The Elsa,” replied a woman, who had been selling bread all day on the
quay, and was now packing up her stall, “you ask for the Elsa. There is
such a ship, I know. But how can I say which she is? See, they lie right
across the river like a bridge. Besides, it is late, and sailors are
rough men.”
Desiree hurried on. Louis d'Arragon had said that the ship was lying
near to the Krahn-Thor, of which the great hooded roof loomed darkly
against the stars above her. She was looking about her when a man came
forward with the hesitating step of one who has been told to wait the
arrival of some one unknown to him.
“The Elsa,” she said to him; “which ship is it?”
“Come along with me, Mademoiselle,” the man replied; “though I was not
told to look for a woman.”
He spoke in English, which Desiree hardly understood; for she had never
heard it from English lips, and looked for the first time on one of that
race upon which all the world waited now for salvation. For the
English, of all the nations, were the only men who from the first had
consistently defied Napoleon.
The sailor led the way towards the river. As he passed the lamp burning
dimly above some steps, Desiree saw that he was little more than a boy.
He turned and offered her his hand with a shy laugh, and together they
stood at the bottom of the steps with the water lapping at their feet.
“Have you a letter,” he said, “or will you come on board?”
Then perceiving that she did not understand, he repeated the question in
German.
“I will come on board,” she answered.
The Elsa was lying in the middle of the river, and the boat into which
Desiree stepped shot across the water without sound of oars. The sailor
was paddling it noiselessly at the stern. Desiree was not unused to
boats, and when they came alongside the Elsa she climbed on board
without help.
“This way,” said the sailor, leading her towards the deckhouse where
a light burned dimly behind red curtains. He knocked at the door and
opened it without awaiting a reply. In the little cabin two men sat at a
table, and one of them was Louis d'Arragon dressed in the rough clothes
of a merchant seaman. He seemed to recognize Desiree at once, though she
still stood without the door, in the darkness.
“You?” he said in surprise. “I did not expect you, madame. You want me?”
“Yes,” answered Desiree, stepping over the combing. Louis's companion,
who was also a sailor, coarsely clad, rose and, awkwardly taking off his
cap, hurried to the door, murmuring some vague apology. It is not always
the roughest men who have the worst manners towards women.
He closed the door behind him, leaving Desiree and Louis looking at each
other by the light of an oil lamp that flickered and gave forth a greasy
smell. The little cabin was smoke-ridden, and smelt of ancient tar. It
was no bigger than the table in the drawing-room in the Frauengasse,
across which he had bowed to her in farewell a few days earlier, little
knowing when and where they were to meet again. For fate can always turn
a surprise better than the human fancy.
Behind the curtain, the window stood open, and the high, clear song of
the wind through the rigging filled the little cabin with a continuous
minor note of warning which must have been part of his life; for he must
have heard it, as all sailors do, sleeping or waking, night and day.
He was probably so accustomed to it that he never heeded it. But it
filled Desiree's ears, and whenever she heard it in after-life, in
memory this moment came again to her, and she looked back to it, as a
traveller may look back to a milestone at a cross-road, and wonder where
his journey might have ended had he taken another turning.
“My father,” she said quickly, “is in danger. There is no one else in
Dantzig to whom we can turn, and--”
She paused. What was she going to add? She hesitated, and then was
silent. There was no reason why she should have elected to come to him.
At all events she gave none.
“I am glad I was in Dantzig when it happened,” he said, turning to take
up his cap, which was of rough dark fur, such as seamen wear even in
summer at night in the Northern seas.
“Come,” he added, “you can tell me as we go ashore.”
But they did not speak while the sailor sculled the boat to the steps.
On the quay they would probably pass unnoticed, for there were many
strange sailors at this time in Dantzig, and Louis d'Arragon might
easily be mistaken for one of the French seamen who had brought stores
by sea from Bordeaux and Brest and Cherbourg.
“Now tell me,” he said, as they walked side by side; and in voluble
French, Desiree launched into her story. It was rather incoherent, by
reason, perhaps, of its frankness.
“Stop--stop,” he interrupted gravely, “who is Barlasch?”
Louis walked rather slowly in his stiff sea-boots at her side, and she
instinctively spoke less rapidly as she explained the part that Barlasch
had played.
“And you trust him?”
“Of course,” she answered.
“But why?”
“Oh, you are so matter-of-fact,” she exclaimed; “I do not know. Because
he is trustworthy, I suppose.”
She continued the story, but suddenly stopped and looked up at him under
the shadow of her hood.
“You are silent,” she said. “Do you know something about my father of
which I am ignorant? Is that it?”
“No,” he answered, “I am trying to follow--that is all. You leave so
much to my imagination.”
“But I have no time to explain things,” she protested. “Every moment
is of value. I will explain all those things some other time. At this
moment all I can think of is my father and the danger he is in. If it
had not been for Barlasch, he would have been in prison by now. And as
it is, the danger is only half averted. For he, himself, is so little
help. All must be done for him. He will do nothing for himself while
this humour is upon him; you understand?”
“Partly,” he answered slowly.
“Oh!” she exclaimed half-impatiently, “one sees that you are an
Englishman.”
And she found time, even in her hurry, to laugh. For she was young
enough to float buoyant upon that sea of hope which ebbs in the course
of years and leaves men stranded on the hard facts of life.
“You forget,” he said in self-defence.
“I forget what?”
“That a week ago I had never seen Dantzig, or your father, or your
sister, or the Frauengasse. A week ago I did not know that there was
anybody called Sebastian in the world--and did not care.”
“Yes,” she admitted thoughtfully, “I had forgotten that.”
And they walked on in silence, a long way, till they came to the Gate of
the Holy Ghost.
“But you can help him to escape?” she said at length, as if following
the course of her own thoughts.
“Yes,” he answered, and that was all.
They passed through the smaller streets in silence, and Desiree led the
way into a narrow alley running between the street of the Holy Ghost and
the Frauengasse.
“There is the wall to be climbed,” she said; but, as she spoke, the door
giving exit to the alley was cautiously opened by Barlasch.
“A little oil,” he whispered, “and it was soon done.”
The yard was dark within, for there might be watchers at any of the
windows above them in the pointed gables that made patterns against the
star-lit sky.
“All is well,” said Barlasch; “those sons of dogs have not returned, and
the patron is waiting in the kitchen, cloaked and ready for a journey.
He has collected himself--the patron.”
He led the way through his own room, which was dark, save for a shaft
of lamp-light coming from the kitchen. He looked back keenly at Louis
d'Arragon.
“Salut!” he growled, scowling at his boots. “A sailor,” he muttered
after a pause. “Good. She has her wits at the top of the basket--that
child.”
Desiree was throwing back her hood and looking at her father with a
reassuring smile.
“I have brought Monsieur d'Arragon,” she said, “to help us.”
For Sebastian has not recognized the new-comer. He now bowed in his
stiff way, and began a formal apology, which D'Arragon cut short with a
quick gesture.
“It is the least I could do,” he said, “in the absence of Charles. Have
you money?”
“Yes--a little.”
“You will require money and a few clothes. I can get you a passage to
Riga or to Helsingborg to-night. From there you can communicate with
your daughter. Events will follow each other rapidly. One never knows
what a week may bring forth in time of war. It may be safe for you to
return soon. Come, monsieur, we must go.”
Sebastian made a gesture with his outspread arms, half of protestation,
half of acquiescence. It was plain that he had no sympathy with these
modern, hurried methods of meeting the emergencies of daily life. A
valise, packed and strapped, lay on the table. D'Arragon weighed it in
his hand, and then lifted it to his shoulder.
“Come, monsieur,” he repeated leading the way through Barlasch's room to
the yard. “And you,” he added, addressing himself to that soldier, “shut
the door behind us.”
With another gesture of protest Sebastian gathered his cloak round him
and followed. D'Arragon had taken Desiree so literally at her word
that he allowed her father no time for hesitation, nor a moment to say
farewell.
She was alone in the kitchen before she had realized that they were
going. In a minute Barlasch returned. She could hear him setting in
order the room which had been hurriedly disorganized in order to open
the door leading to the yard, where her father had concealed himself. He
was muttering to himself as he lifted the furniture.
Coming back into the kitchen, he found Desiree standing where he had
left her. Glancing at her, he scratched his grey head in a plebeian way,
and gave a little laugh.
“Yes,” he said, pointing to the spot where D'Arragon had stood. “That
was a man, that you fetched to help us--a man. It makes a difference
when such as that goes out of the room--eh?”
He busied himself in the kitchen, setting in order that which remained
of the mise en scene of his violent reception of the secret police.
Suddenly he turned in his emphatic manner, and threw out his rugged
forefinger to hold her attention.
“If there had been some like that in Paris, there would have been no
Revolution. Za-za, za-za!” he concluded, imitating effectively the
buzz of many voices in an assembly. “Words and not deeds,” Barlasch
protested. Whereas to-night, he clearly showed by two gestures, they had
met a man of deeds.