In counsel it is good to see dangers; and in execution not to
see them unless they be very great.
Mathilde had told Desiree that Colonel de Casimir made no mention of
Charles in his letter to her. Barlasch was able to supply but little
further information on the matter.
“It was given to me by the Captain Louis d'Arragon at Thorn,” he said.
“He handled it as if it were not too clean. And he had nothing to say
about it. You know his way, for the rest. He says little; but he knows
the look of things. It seemed that he had promised to deliver the
letter--for some reason, who knows what? and he kept his promise. The
man was not dying by any chance--that De Casimir?”
And his little sharp eyes, reddened by the smoke of camp-fires, inflamed
by the glare of sun on snow, searched her face. He was thinking of the
treasure.
“Oh no!”
“Was he ill at all?”
“He was in bed,” answered Desiree, doubtfully.
Barlasch scratched his head without ceremony, and fell into a long train
of thought.
“Do you know what I think?” he said at length. “I think that De Casimir
was not ill at all--any more than I am; I, Barlasch. Not so ill,
perhaps, as I am, for I have an indigestion. It is always there at the
summit of the stomach. It is horse without salt.”
He paused and rubbed his chest tenderly.
“Never eat horse without salt,” he put in parenthetically.
“I hope never to eat it at all,” answered Desiree. “What about Colonel
de Casimir?”
He waved her aside as a babbler who broke in upon his thoughts. These
seemed to be lodged in his mouth, for, when reflecting, he chewed and
mumbled with his lips.
“Listen,” he said at length. “This is De Casimir. He goes to bed and
lets his beard grow--half an inch of beard will keep any man in the
hospital. You nod your head. Yes; I thought so. He knows that the
viceroy, with the last of the army, is at Thorn. He keeps quiet. He
waits in his roadside inn until the last of the army has gone. He
waits until the Russians come, and to them he hands over the Emperor's
possessions--all the papers, the maps, the despatches. For that he will
be rewarded by the Emperor Alexander, who has already promised pardon to
all Poles who have taken arms against Russia and now submit. De Casimir
will be allowed to retain his own baggage. He has no loot taken at
Moscow--oh no! Only his own baggage. Ah--that man! See, I spit him out.”
And it is painful to record that he here resorted to graphic
illustration.
“Ah!” he went on triumphantly, “I know. I can see right into the mind
of such a man. I will tell you why. It is because I am that sort of man
myself.”
“You do not seem to have been so successful--since you are poor,” said
Desiree, with a laugh.
He frowned at her apparently in speechless anger, seeking an answer. But
for the moment he could think of none, so he turned to the knives again,
which he was cleaning on a board on the kitchen-table. At length he
paused and glanced at Desiree.
“And your husband,” he said slowly. “Remember that he is a partner with
this De Casimir. They hunt together. I know it; for I was in Moscow. Ah!
that makes you stand stiffly, and push your chin out.”
He went on cleaning the knives, and, without looking at her, seemed to
be speaking his own thoughts aloud.
“Yes! He is a traitor. And he is worse than the other; for he is no
Pole, but a Frenchman. And if he returns to France, the Emperor will
say: 'Where are my despatches, my maps, my papers, which were given into
your care?'”
He finished the thought with three gestures, which seemed to illustrate
the placing of a man against a wall and shooting him. His meaning could
not be mistaken.
“And that is what the patron means when he says that Monsieur Charles
Darragon will not return to Dantzig. I knew that he meant that last
night, when he was so angry--on the mat.”
“And why did you not tell me?”
Barlasch looked at her thoughtfully for a moment, before replying slowly
and impressively.
“Because, if I had told you, you might have decided to quit Dantzig with
Mademoiselle Mathilde, and go hunting your husband in a country overrun
by desperate fugitives and untamed Cossacks. And I did not want that. I
want you here--in Dantzig; in the Frauengasse; in this kitchen; under my
hand--so that I can take care of you till the war is over. I--who speak
to you--Papa Barlasch, at your service. And there is not another man in
the world who will do it so well. No; not one.”
And his eyes flashed as he threw the knives into a drawer.
“But why should you do all this for me?” asked Desiree. “You could have
gone home to France--quite easily--and have left us to our fate here in
Dantzig. Why did you not go home?”
Barlasch looked at her with surprise, not unmixed with a sudden dumb
disappointment. He was preparing to go out according to his wont
immediately after breakfast; for Lisa had unconsciously hit the mark
when she compared him to a cat. He had the regular and self-contained
habits of that unobtrusive friend. He buttoned his rough coat slowly,
and looked round the kitchen with eyes dimly wistful. He was very old
and ragged and homeless.
“Is it not enough,” he said, “that we are friends?”
He went towards the door, but came back and warned her by the familiar
upheld finger not to let her attention wander from his words.
“You will be glad yet that I have stayed. It is because I speak a little
plainly of your husband that you wish me gone. Bah! What does it matter?
All men are alike. We are only men--not angels. And you can go on
loving him all the same. You are not particular, you women. You can love
anything--even a man like that.”
And he went out muttering anathemas on the hearts of all women.
“It seems,” he said, “that a woman can love anything.”
Which is true; and a very good thing for some of us. For without that
Heaven-sent capacity the world could not go on at all.
It was later in the day when Barlasch made his way into the low and
smoke-grimed Bier Halle of the Weissen Ross'l. He must have known
Sebastian's habits, for he went straight to that corner of the great
room where the violin-player usually sat. The stout waitress--a country
girl of no intelligence, smiled broadly at the sight of such a ragged
customer as she followed him down the length of the sawdust-strewn
floor.
Sebastian's face showed no surprise when he looked up and recognized the
new-comer. The surrounding tables were empty. It was too early in the
evening for the regular customers, whose numbers, moreover, had been
sadly thinned during the last few months. For the peaceful Dantzigers,
remembering the siege of seven years ago, had mostly fled at the first
mention of the word.
Sebastian nodded in answer to Barlasch's somewhat ceremonious bow, and
by a gesture invited him to be seated on the chair upon which he had
already laid his hand. The atmosphere of the room was warm, and Barlasch
laid aside his sheepskin coat, as he had seen the great and the rich
divest themselves of their sables. He turned sharply and caught the
waitress with an amused smile still on her face. He drew her attention
to a little pool of beer on the table, and stood until she had made good
this lapse in her duty. Then he pointed to Sebastian's mug of beer
and dismissed her giggling, to get one for him of the same size and
contents.
Making sure that there was no one within earshot, he waited until
Sebastian's dreamy eye met his, and then said--
“It is time we understood each other.”
A light of surprise--passing and half-indifferent--flashed into
Sebastian's eyes and vanished again at once when he saw Barlasch had
meant nothing: made no sign or countersign with his hand.
“By all means, my friend,” he answered.
“I delivered your letters,” said Barlasch, “at Thorn and at the other
places.”
“I know; I have already had answers. You would be wise to forget the
incident.”
Barlasch shrugged his shoulders.
“You were paid,” said Sebastian, jumping to a natural conclusion.
“A little,” admitted Barlasch, “a small little--but it was not that. I
always get paid in advance, when I can. Except by the Emperor. He
owes me some--that citizen. It was another question. In the house I am
friends with all--with Lisa who has gone--with Mademoiselle Mathilde
who has gone--with Mademoiselle Desiree, so-called Madame Darragon, who
remains. With all except you. Why should we not be friends?”
“But we are friends--” protested Sebastian, with a bow. As if in
confirmation of the statement, he held out his beer-mug, and Barlasch
touched it with the rim of his own before drinking. Sebastian's
attitude, his bow, his manner of drinking, were those of the Court;
Barlasch was distinctly of the camp. But these were strange days, and
all society had been turned topsy-turvy by one man.
“Then,” said Barlasch, licking his lips, “let us understand one another.
You say there will be no siege. I say you are wrong. You think that the
Dantzigers will rise in answer to the Emperor Alexander's proclamations,
and turn the French out. I say the Dantzigers' stomachs are too big. I
say that Rapp will hold Dantzig, and that the Russians will not take it
by storm, because they are too weak. There will be a siege, and a
long one. Are you and Mademoiselle and I going to sit it out in the
Frauengasse together?”
“We shall be honoured to have you as our guest,” answered Sebastian,
with that levity which went before the Revolution, and was never
understood of the people.
Barlasch did not understand it. He glanced doubtfully at his companion,
and sipped his beer.
“Then I will begin to-night.”
“Begin what, my friend?”
Barlasch waved aside all petty detail.
“My preparations. I go out about ten o'clock--after you are in. I will
take the key of the front door, and let myself in when I come back.
I shall make two journeys. Under the kitchen floor is a large hollow
space. I fill that with bags of corn.”
“But where will you get the corn, my friend?”
“I know where to get it--corn and other things. Salt I have
already--enough for a year. Other things I can get for three months.”
“But we have no money to pay for them.”
“Bah!”
“You mean you will steal them,” suggested Sebastian, not without a ring
of contempt in his mincing voice.
“A soldier never steals,” answered Barlasch, carelessly announcing a
great truth.
Sebastian laughed. It was obvious that his mind, absorbed in great
thought, heeded small things not at all. His companion pushed his fur
cap to the back of his head, and ruffled his hair forward.
“That is not all,” he said at length. He looked round the vast room,
which was almost deserted. The stout waitress was polishing pewter mugs
at the bar. “You say you have already had answers to those letters. It
is a great organization--your secret society--whatever it is called. It
delivers letters all over Prussia--eh? and Poland perhaps--or farther
still.”
Sebastian shrugged one shoulder, and made no answer for some time.
“I have already told you,” he said impatiently, at length, “to forget
the incident; you were paid.”
By way of reply, the old soldier laboriously emptied his pockets,
searching the most remote of them for small copper coins. He counted
slowly and carefully until he had made up a thaler.
“But it is not my turn to be paid this time. It is I who pay.”
He held out his hand with a pound weight of base metal in it, but
Sebastian refused the money with a sudden assumption of his cold and
scornful manner, oddly out of keeping with his humble surroundings.
“As between friends--” suggested Barlasch, and, on receiving a more
decided negative, returned the coins to his pocket, not without
satisfaction.
“I want your friends to pass on a letter for me--I am willing to pay,”
he said in a whisper. “A letter to Captain Louis d'Arragon--it concerns
the happiness of Mademoiselle Desiree. Do not shake your head. Think
before you refuse. The letter will be an open one--six words or
so--telling the Captain that his cousin, Mademoiselle's husband, is not
in Dantzig, and cannot now return here since the last of the rearguard
entered the city this morning.”
Sebastian seemed to be considering the matter, and Barlasch was quick to
combat possible objections.
“The Captain went to Konigsberg. He is there now. Your friends can
easily find him, and give him the letter. It is of great importance to
Mademoiselle. The Captain is not looking for Monsieur Charles Darragon,
because he thinks that he is here in Dantzig. Colonel de Casimir assured
him that Mademoiselle would find him here. Where is he--that Monsieur
Charles--I wonder? It is of great importance to Mademoiselle. The
Captain would perhaps continue his search.”
“Where is your letter?” asked Sebastian.
By way of reply, Barlasch laid on the table a sheet of paper.
“You must write it,” he said. “My hand is injured. I write not badly,
you understand. But this evening I do not feel that my hand is well
enough.”
So, with the sticky, thick ink of the Weissen Ross'l, Sebastian wrote
the letter, and Barlasch, forgetting his scholarly acquirements, took
the pen and made a mark beneath his own name written at the foot of it.
Then he went out, and left Sebastian to pay for the beer.