TO DO OR NOT TO DO?
To do or not to do? How many a one has turned the question in his
mind; this one in the solitude of his locked room, seated with
frowning face and eyes fixed on nothingness; that one amid the babble
of voices and laughter, masking anxious thought under set smiles. How
many a one has viewed the act she meditated this way and that, askance
and across, in the hope of making the worse appear the better, and so
of doing her pleasure with a light heart. Others again, trampling the
scruple under foot, have none the less hesitated, counting the cost
and striving to view dispassionately--with eyes that, the thing done,
will never see it in that light again--how it will be with them
afterwards, how much better outwardly, how much worse inwardly, and so
to strike a balance for or against--to do or not to do. And some with
burning eyes, and minds unswervingly bent on the thing they desire
have yet felt hands pluck at them, and something--be it God or the
last instinct of good--whispering them to pause--to pause, and not to
do!
The Abbess pondered, while the Duke, reclining in the opening of his
hut, from which the screen had been drawn back that he might enjoy the
air, had no more accurate notion of her thoughts than had the
Lieutenant's dog sleeping a few paces away. The missal had fallen from
her hands and lay in her lap. Her eyes fixed on the green slope before
her betrayed naught that was not dove-like; while the profound
stillness of her form which permitted the Duke to gaze at will
breathed only the peace of the cloister and the altar, the peace that
no change of outward things can long disturb. Or so the Duke fancied;
and eyeing her with secret rapture, felt himself uplifted in her
presence. He felt that here was a being congenial with his better
self, and a beauty as far above the beauty to which he had been a
slave all his life as his higher moods rose above his worst excesses.
He had gained strength in the three days which had elapsed since his
arrival in the camp. He could now sit up for a short time and even
stand, though giddily and with precaution. Nor were these the only
changes which the short interval had produced. The Countess's spears,
to the number of thirty, were here, and their presence augmented the
safety of the Vicomte's party. But indirectly, in so far as it fed the
peasants' suspicions, it had a contrary effect. The Crocans submitted
indeed to be drilled, sometimes by the Bat, sometimes by his master;
and reasonable orders were not openly disobeyed. But the fear of
treachery which a life-time of ill-usage had instilled was deepened by
the presence of the Countess's men. The slightest movements on des
Ageaux' part were scanned with jealousy. If he conferred too long with
the Villeneuves or the Countess men exchanged black looks, or muttered
in their beards. If he strayed a hundred paces down the valley a score
were at his heels. Nor were there wanting those who, moving secretly
between the camp and the savage horde upon the hill--the Old Crocans,
as they were called--kept these apprised of their doubts and fears.
To eyes that could see, the position was critical, even dangerous. Nor
was it rendered more easy by a feat of M. de Vlaye's men, who,
reconnoitring up to the gates one evening, cut off a dozen peasants.
The morning light discovered the bodies of six of these hanged on a
tree below the Old Crocans' station, and well within view from the
ridge about the camp. That the disaster might not have occurred had
des Ageaux been in his quarters, instead of being a virtual prisoner,
went for nothing. He bore the blame, some even thought him privy to
the matter. From that hour the gloom grew deeper. Everywhere, and at
all times, the more fanatical or the more suspicious drew together in
corners, and while simpler clowns cursed low or muttered of treachery,
darker spirits whispered devilish plans. Those who had their eyes open
noted the more frequent presence of the Old Crocans, who wandered by
twos and threes through the camp; and though these, when des Ageaux'
eye fell on them, fawned and cringed, or hastened to withdraw
themselves, they spat when his back was turned, and with stealthy
gestures they gave him to hideous deaths.
In a word, fear like a dark presence lay upon the camp; and to add to
the prevailing irritation, the heat was great. The giant earth-wall
which permitted the Lieutenant to mature his plans and await his
reinforcements shut out the evening breezes. Noon grilled his men as
in a frying-pan; all night the air was hot and heavy. The peasants
sighed for the cool streams of Brantome and the voices of the frogs.
The troopers, accustomed to lord it and impatient of discomfort, were
quick with word and hand, and prone to strike, when a blow was as
dangerous as a light behind a powder screen. Without was Vlaye, within
was fear; while, like ravens waiting for the carnage, the horde of Old
Crocans on the hill looked down from their filthy eyrie.
No one knew better than the Abbess that the least thing might serve
for a spark. And she pondered. Not for an hour since its birth had the
plan she had imagined been out of her mind; and still--there was so
much good in her, so much truth--she recoiled. The two whom she
doomed, if she acted, were her enemies; and yet she hesitated. Her own
safety, her father's, her sister's, the safety of all, those two
excepted, was secured by the Rochechouart reinforcement. Only her
enemies would perish, and perhaps the poor fool whose presence she
must disclose. And yet she could not make up her mind. To do or not to
do?
It might suffice to detach Joyeuse. But the time was short, and the
Duke's opinion of her high; and she shrank from risking it by a
premature move. He had placed her on a pinnacle and worshipped her: if
she descended from the pinnacle he might worship no longer. Meantime,
if she waited until his troopers rode in, and on their heels a second
levy from Rochechouart, it might be too late to act, too late to
detach him, too late to save Vlaye. To do or not to do?
A dozen paces from her, old Solomon was pouring garrulous inventions
into the ear of the Countess's steward; who, dull, faithful man, took
all for granted, and gaped more widely at every lie. Insensibly her
mind began to follow and take in the sense of their words.
"Six on one tree!" Solomon was saying, in the contemptuous tone of one
to whom Montfaucon was an every-day affair. "'Tis nothing. You never
saw the like at Rochechouart, say you? Perhaps not. Your lady is
merciful."
"Three I have!"
"And who were they?" Solomon asked, with a sniff of contempt.
"Cattle-stealers. At least so it was said. But the wife of one came
down next day and put it on another, and it was complained that they
had suffered wrongfully. But three they were."
"Three?" Solomon's nose rose in scorn. "If you had seen the elm at
Villeneuve in my lord's father's time! They were as acorns on an oak.
Ay, they were! Fifteen in one forenoon."
"God ha' mercy on us!"
"And ten more when he had dined!"
"God ha' mercy on us!" Fulbert replied, staring in stricken surprise.
"And what had they done?"
"Done?" Solomon answered, shrugging his shoulders after a careless
fashion. "Just displeased him. And why should he not?" he continued,
bristling up. "What worse could they do? Was he not lord of
Villeneuve?"
And she was making a scruple of two lives. Of two lives that stood in
her path! Still--life was life. But what was that they were saying
now? Hang Vlaye? Hang--the Captain of Vlaye?
It was Solomon had the word; and this time the astonishment was on his
side. "What is that you say?" he repeated. "Hang M. de Vlaye?"
"And why for not?" the steward replied doggedly, his face red with
passion, his dull intelligence sharpened by his lady's wrongs. "And
why for not?"
Solomon was scandalised by the mere mention of it. Hang like any clod
or clown a man who had been a constant visitor at his master's house!
"Oh, but he--you don't hang such as he!" he retorted. "The Captain of
Vlaye? Tut, tut! You are a fool!"
"A fool? Not I! They will hang him!"
"Tut, tut!"
"Wait until _he_ speaks!" Fulbert replied, nodding mysteriously in the
direction of the Lieutenant, who, at no great distance from the group,
was watching a band of peasants at their drill. "When he speaks 'tis
the King speaks. And when the King speaks, it is hang a man must,
whoever he be!"
"Tut, tut!"
"Whoever he be!" Fulbert repeated with stolid obstinacy. And then, "It
is not for nothing," he added with a menacing gesture, "that a man
stops the Countess of Rochechouart on the King's road! No, no!"
Not for nothing? No, and it is not for nothing, the Abbess cried in
her heart, that you threaten the man I love with the death of a dog!
Dogs yourselves! Dogs!
It was well that the Duke was not looking at her at that moment, for
her heaving bosom, her glowing eyes, the rush of colour to her face
all betrayed the force of her passion. Hang him? Hang her lover? So
that was what they were saying, thinking, planning behind her back,
was it! That was the camp talk! That!
She could have borne it better had the Lieutenant proclaimed his aim
aloud. It was the sedateness of his preparations, the slow stealth of
his sap, the unswerving calmness of his approaches at which her soul
revolted. The ceaseless drilling, the arming, the watch by day and
night, all the life about her, every act, every thought had her
lover's ruin for their aim, his death for their end! A loathing, a
horror seized her. She felt a net closing about her, a net that
enmeshed her and fettered her, and threatened to hold her motionless
and powerless, while they worked their will on him before her eyes!
But she could still break the net. She could still act. Two lives?
What were two lives, lives of his enemies, in comparison of his life?
At the thought a spring of savage passion welled up in her heart, and
clouded her eyes. The die was cast. It remained only to do. To do!
But softly--softly. As she rose, having as yet no formed plan, a last
doubt stayed her. It was not a doubt of his enemies' intentions, but
of their power. He whose words had opened her eyes to their grim
purpose was a dullard, almost an imbecile. He could be no judge of the
means they possessed, or of their chances of success. The swarm of
unkempt, ill-armed peasants, who disgusted her eyes, the troop of
spears, who even now barely sufficed to secure the safety of her
party, what chance had they against M. de Vlaye and the four or five
hundred men-at-arms who for years had lorded it over the marches of
the province, and made themselves the terror of a country-side? Surely
a small chance if it deserved the name. Surely she was permitting a
shadow to frighten her.
"Something," the Duke murmured near her ear, "has interrupted the even
current of your thoughts, mademoiselle. What is it, I pray?"
"I feel the heat," she answered, holding her hand to her brow, that
behind its shelter she might recover her composure. "Do not you?"
"It is like an oven," he answered, "within these earth-walls."
"How I hate them!" she cried, unable to repress the spirit of
irritation.
"Do you? Well, so do I," he replied. "But within them--it is nowhere
cooler than here."
"I will put that to the proof, my lord," she returned with a smile.
And, gliding from him, in spite of the effort he made to detain her,
she crossed the grass to her father. Sinking on the sward beside his
stool, she began to fan herself.
The Vicomte was in an ill-humour of some days' standing; nor without
reason. Dragged, will he nill he, from the house in which his whim had
been law, he found himself not only without his comforts, but a cipher
in the camp. Not once, but three or four times he had let his judgment
be known, and he had looked to see it followed. He might have spoken
to the winds. No one, not even his sons, though they listened
respectfully, took heed of it. It followed that he saw himself exposed
to dangers against which he was not allowed to guard himself, and to a
catastrophe which he must await in inaction; while all he possessed
stood risked on a venture that for him had neither interest nor
motive.
In such a position a man of easier temper and less vanity might be
pardoned if he complained. For the Vicomte, fits of senile rage shook
him two or three times a day. He learned what it was to be thwarted:
and if he hated any one or anything more than the filthy peasants on
whom his breeding taught him to look with loathing, it was the man
with whose success his safety was bound up, the man who had forced him
into this ignominious position.
Of him he could believe no good. When the Abbess, after fanning
herself in silence, mentioned the arrival of the Countess's troopers,
and asked him if he thought that the Lieutenant was now strong enough
to attack, he derided the notion.
"M. de Vlaye will blow this rabble to the winds," he said, with a
contemptuous gesture. "We may grill here as long as we please, but the
moment we show ourselves outside, pouf! It will be over! What can a
handful of riders do against five hundred men as good as themselves?"
"But the peasants?" she suggested, willing to know the worst. "There
are some hundreds of them."
"Food for steel!" he answered, with the same contemptuous pantomime.
"Then you think--we were wrong to come here?"
"I think, girl, that we were mad to come here. But not so mad," he
continued spitefully, "as those who brought us!"
"Yet Charles thinks that the Governor of Perigord will prevail."
"Charles had his own neck in the noose," the Vicomte growled, "and was
glad of company. Since Coutras it is the young lead the old, and the
issue you will see. Lieutenant of Perigord? What has the Lieutenant of
Perigord or any other governor to do with canaille such as this?"
Odette heaved a sigh of relief and her face lightened. "It will be
better so," she said softly. "M. de Vlaye knows, sir, that we had no
desire to hurt him, and he will not reckon it against us."
The Vicomte fidgeted in his stool. "I wish I could think so," he
answered with a groan. "Curse him! Who is more to blame? If he had
left the Countess alone, this would not have happened. They are no
better one than the other! But what is this? Faugh!" And he spat on
the ground.
There was excuse for his disgust. Across the open ground a group of
men were making their way in the direction of the Lieutenant's
quarters. They were the same men who had met him at the entrance on
his return with the Abbess and Joyeuse: nor had the lapse of four or
five days lessened the foulness of their aspect, or robbed them of the
slinking yet savage bearing--as of beasts of prey half tamed--which
bade beware of them. They shambled forward until they neared des
Ageaux, who was writing at an improvised table not far from the
Vicomte; then cringing they saluted him. Their eyes squinting this way
and that from under matted locks--as if at a gesture they were ready
to leap back--added to their beast-like appearance.
The Lieutenant's voice, as he asked the men with asperity what they
needed, came clearly to the ears of the group about the Vicomte. But
the Old Crocans' answer, expressed at length in a patois of the
country, was not audible.
"Foul carrion!" the Vicomte muttered. "What do they here?" while the
Abbess and Bonne, who had joined her, contemplated them with eyes of
shuddering dislike.
"What, indeed?" Bonne muttered, her cheek pale. She seemed to be
unable to take her eyes from them. "They frighten me! Oh, I hope they
will not be suffered to remain in the camp!"
"Is it that they wish?" the Vicomte asked.
"Yes, my lord," Solomon answered: he had gone forward, listened awhile
and returned. "They say that eleven more of their people were
surprised by Vlaye's men three hours ago, and cut to pieces. This is
the second time it has happened. They think that they are no longer
safe on the hill, and wish to join us."
"God forbid!" Bonne cried, with a strange insistence.
The Abbess looked at her. "Why so frightened?" she said
contemptuously. "One might suppose you were in greater danger than
others, girl!"
Bonne did not answer, but her distended eyes betrayed the impression
which the wretches' appearance made on her. Nor when Charles--who was
seldom off the ridge which was his special charge--remarked that after
all a man was a man, and they had not too many, could she refrain from
a word. "But not those!" she murmured. "Not those!"
Charles, who in these days saw more of the Bat than of any one else,
shrugged his shoulders. "I shall be surprised if he does not receive
them," he answered. "They are vermin and may give us trouble. But we
must run the risk. If we are to succeed we must run some risks."
Not that risk, however, it appeared. For he had scarcely uttered the
words when des Ageaux was seen to raise his hand, and point with stern
meaning to the entrance. "No," he said, his voice high and clear.
"Begone to your own and look to yourselves! You chose to go your own
way and a bloody one! Now your blood be on your own heads! Here is no
place for you, nor will I cover you!"
"My lord!" one cried in protest. "My lord, hear us!"
"No!" the Lieutenant replied harshly. "You had your warning and did
not heed it! M. de Villeneuve, when he came to you, warned you, and I
warned you. It was your own will to withdraw yourselves. You would
have naught but blood. You would burn and kill! Now, on your own
heads," he concluded with severity, "be your blood!"
They would have protested anew, but he dismissed them with a gesture
which permitted no denial. And sullenly, with stealthy gestures of
menace, they retreated towards the entrance; and gabbling more loudly
as they approached it, seemed to be imprecating vengeance on those who
cast them out. In the gate they lingered awhile, turning about and
scolding the man on guard. Then they passed out of sight, and were
gone.
As the last of them disappeared des Ageaux, who had kept a vigilant
eye on their retreat, approached the group about the Vicomte. The old
man, though he approved the action, could not refrain from giving his
temper vent.
"You are sure that you can do without them," he said, with a sneer.
His shaking hand betrayed his dislike of the man to whom he spoke.
"I believe I can," the Lieutenant answered. He spoke with unusual
gravity, but the next moment a smile--smiles had been rare with him of
late--curved the corners of his mouth. His eyes travelled from one to
another, and in a low voice, but one that betrayed his relief, "I will
tell you why, if you wish to know, M. le Vicomte."
"Why?"
Des Ageaux' smile grew broader, but his tone remained low. "Because I
have news," he returned. "And it is good news. I have had word
within the last hour that I may expect M. de Joyeuse's levies about
nightfall to-morrow, and a day or two later a reinforcement beyond my
hope--fifty men-at-arms whom the Governor of Agen has lent me, and
fifty from my garrison of Perigueux. With those we should have
enough--though not too many."
They received the news with words of congratulation or with grunts of
disdain, according as each felt about it. And all began to discuss the
tidings, though still in the tone of caution which the Lieutenant's
look enjoined. One only was silent, and with averted face saw the cup
of respite dashed from her lips. A hundred men beyond those looked
for! Such an accession must change hope to certainty, hazard to
surety. A few days would enable the Lieutenant to match rider for
rider with Vlaye, and still boast a reserve of four or five hundred
undisciplined allies. While jubilant voices hummed in her ears, and
those whom she was ready to kill because they hated him rejoiced, the
Abbess rose slowly and, detaching herself from the group, walked away.
No one followed her even with the eye; for the Duke, fatigued, and a
little hurt that she did not return, had retired into his quarters.
Nor would the most watchful have learned much from her movements, or,
unless jealous beyond the ordinary, have found aught to suspect in
what she did.
She strolled very slowly along the foot of the slope, as if in pure
idleness or to stretch limbs cramped by over-long sitting. Presently
she came to some tethered horses, and stood and patted them, and
looked them over; nor could any but the horses tell--and they could
not speak--that while her hand was on them her eyes were roving the
camp. Perhaps she found what she sought; perhaps it was chance only
that guided her steps in the direction of the tall young man with pale
eyes, whose violence had raised him to a certain leadership among the
peasants.
It must have been chance, for when she reached his neighbourhood she
did not address him. She stooped and--what could be more womanly or
more natural?--she spoke to a naked child that rolled on the trampled
turf within arm's length of him. What she said--in French or patois,
or that infant language of which no woman's tongue is ignorant--the
baby could not say, for, like the horses, it could not speak. Yet it
must have found something unusual in her face, for it cowered from
her, as in terror. And what she said could have no interest for the
man who lounged near, though he seemed disturbed by it.
She toyed with the shrinking child a moment, then turned and walked
slowly back to the Vicomte's quarters. Her manner was careless, but
her face was pale. No wonder. For she had taken a step--and she knew
it--which she could never retrace. She had done that which she could
not undo. Between her and Bonne and Roger and Charles was a gulf
henceforth, though they might not know it. And the Duke? She winced a
little, recognising more plainly than before how far she stood below
the notion he had of her.
Yet she felt no remorse. On the contrary, the uppermost feeling in her
mind--and it ran riot there--was a stormy exultation. They who had
dragged her at their chariot wheels would learn that in forcing her to
take part against her lover they had made the most fatal of mistakes.
They triumphed now. They counted on sure success now. They thought to
hang him, as they would hang any low-bred thief! Very good! Let them
wait until morning, and talk then of hanging!
Once or twice, indeed, in the afternoon she was visited by misgivings.
The man she had seen was a mere savage; he might not have understood.
Or he might betray her, though that could hurt her little since no one
would believe him. Or the peasants, though wrought to fury, might
recoil at the last like the cowards they were!
But these and the like doubts arose not from compunction, but from
mistrust. Compunction was to come later, when evening fell and from
the door of the Duke's quarters she viewed the scene, now familiar, of
the hostages' departure in the dusk--saw the horses drawn up and the
two whom she was dooming in act to mount. It was then that a sudden
horror of what she was about seized her--she was young, a mere
girl--and she rose with a stifled cry from her stool. It was not yet
too late. A cry, a word would save them. Would save them still!
Impulsively she moved a pace towards them, intending--ay, for a
moment, intending to say that word.
But she stopped. A word would save them, but--she was forgetting--it
would doom her lover! And on that thought, and to reinforce it,
there rose before her mind's eye the pale puling features of the
Countess--her rival! Was she to be put aside for a thing like that?
Was it to such a half-formed child as that she must surrender her
lover? She pressed her hands together, and, returning to her seat, she
turned it about that her eyes might not see them as they went through
the dusk.