When I waked I was alone. At first nothing was clear to me; my brain
was dancing in my head, my sight was obscured, my body painful, my
senses were blunted. I was in darkness, yet through an open door
there showed a light, which, from the smell and flickering, I knew
to be a torch. This, creeping into my senses, helped me to remember
that the last thing I saw in the Intendant's courtyard was a burning
torch, which suddenly multiplied to dancing hundreds and then went
out. I now stretched forth a hand, and it touched a stone wall; I
moved, and felt straw under me. Then I fixed my eyes steadily on
the open door and the shaking light, and presently it all came to
me: the events of the night, and that I was now in a cell of the
citadel. Stirring, I found that the wound in my body had been bound
and cared for. A loosely tied scarf round my arm showed that some
one had lately left me, and would return to finish the bandaging. I
raised myself with difficulty, and saw a basin of water, a sponge,
bits of cloth, and a pocket-knife. Stupid and dazed though I was,
the instinct of self-preservation lived, and I picked up the knife
and hid it in my coat. I did it, I believe, mechanically, for a
hundred things were going through my mind at the time.
All at once there rushed in on me the thought of Juste Duvarney as
I saw him last--how long ago was it?--his white face turned to the
sky, his arms stretched out, his body dabbled in blood. I groaned
aloud. Fool, fool! to be trapped by these lying French! To be
tricked into playing their shameless games for them, to have a
broken body, to have killed the brother of the mistress of my heart,
and so cut myself off from her and ruined my life for nothing--for
worse than nothing! I had swaggered, boasted, had taken a challenge
for a bout and a quarrel like any hanger-on of a tavern.
Suddenly I heard footsteps and voices outside; then one voice,
louder than the other, saying, "He hasn't stirred a peg--lies like
a log!" It was Gabord.
Doltaire's voice replied, "You will not need a surgeon--no?" His
tone, as it seemed to me, was less careless than usual.
Gabord answered, "I know the trick of it all--what can a surgeon do?
This brandy will fetch him to his intellects. And by-and-bye crack'll
go his spine--aho!"
You have heard a lion growling on a bone. That is how Gabord's voice
sounded to me then--a brutal rawness; but it came to my mind also
that this was the man who had brought Voban to do me service!
"Come, come, Gabord, crack your jaws less, and see you fetch him on
his feet again," said Doltaire. "From the seats of the mighty they
have said that he must live--to die another day; and see to it, or
the mighty folk will say that you must die to live another day--in a
better world, my Gabord."
There was a moment in which the only sound was that of tearing
linen, and I could see the shadows of the two upon the stone wall of
the corridor wavering to the light of the torch; then the shadows
shifted entirely, and their footsteps came on towards my door. I
was lying on my back as when I came to, and, therefore, probably as
Gabord had left me, and I determined to appear still in a faint.
Through nearly closed eyelids however I saw Gabord enter. Doltaire
stood in the doorway watching as the soldier knelt and lifted my arm
to take off the bloody scarf. His manner was imperturbable as ever.
Even then I wondered what his thoughts were, what pungent phrase
he was suiting to the time and to me. I do not know to this day
which more interested him--that very pungency of phrase, or the
critical events which inspired his reflections. He had no sense of
responsibility; his mind loved talent, skill, and cleverness, and
though it was scathing of all usual ethics, for the crude, honest
life of the poor it had sympathy. I remember remarks of his in the
market-place a year before, as he and I watched the peasant in his
sabots and the good-wife in her homespun cloth.
"These are they," said he, "who will save the earth one day, for
they are like it, kin to it. When they are born they lie close to
it, and when they die they fall no height to reach their graves. The
rest--the world--are like ourselves in dreams: we do not walk; we
think we fly, over houses, over trees, over mountains; and then one
blessed instant the spring breaks, or the dream gets twisted, and we
go falling, falling, in a sickening fear, and, waking up, we find we
are and have been on the earth all the while, and yet can make no
claim on it, and have no kin with it, and no right to ask anything
of it--quelle vie--quelle vie!"
Sick as I was, I thought of that as he stood there, looking in at
me; and though I knew I ought to hate him, I admired him in spite
of all.
Presently he said to Gabord, "You'll come to me at noon to-morrow,
and see you bring good news. He breathes?"
Gabord put a hand on my chest and at my neck, and said at once,
"Breath for balloons--aho!"
Doltaire threw his cloak over his shoulder and walked away, his
footsteps sounding loud in the passages. Gabord began humming to
himself as he tied the bandages, and then he reached down for the
knife to cut the flying strings. I could see this out of a little
corner of my eye. When he did not find it, he settled back on his
haunches and looked at me. I could feel his lips puffing out, and
I was ready for the "Poom!" that came from him. Then I could feel
him stooping over me, and his hot strong breath in my face. I was
so near to unconsciousness at that moment by a sudden anxiety that
perhaps my feigning had the look of reality. In any case, he thought
me unconscious and fancied that he had taken the knife away with
him; for he tucked in the strings of the bandage. Then, lifting
my head, he held the flask to my lips; for which I was most
grateful--I was dizzy and miserably faint.
I think I came to with rather more alacrity than was wise, but he
was deceived, and his first words were, "Ho, ho! the devil's
knocking; who's for home, angels?"
It was his way to put all things allusively, using strange figures
and metaphors. Yet, when one was used to him and to them, their
potency seemed greater than polished speech and ordinary phrase.
He offered me more brandy, and then, without preface, I asked him the
one question which sank back on my heart like a load of ice even as I
sent it forth. "Is he alive?" I inquired. "Is Monsieur Juste Duvarney
alive?"
With exasperating coolness he winked an eye, to connect the event
with what he knew of the letter I had sent to Alixe, and, cocking
his head, he blew out his lips with a soundless laugh, and said:
"To whisk the brother off to heaven is to say good-bye to sister
and pack yourself to Father Peter."
"For God's sake, tell me, is the boy dead?" I asked, my voice
cracking in my throat.
"He's not mounted for the journey yet," he answered, with a shrug,
"but the Beast is at the door."
I plied my man with questions, and learned that they had carried
Juste into the palace for dead, but found life in him, and
straightway used all means to save him. A surgeon came, his father
and mother were sent for, and when Doltaire had left there was
hope that he would live.
I learned also that Voban had carried word to the Governor of the
deed to be done that night; had for a long time failed to get
admittance to him, but was at last permitted to tell his story;
and Vaudreuil had gone to Bigot's palace to have me hurried to
the citadel, and had come just too late.
After answering my first few questions, Gabord say nothing more,
and presently he took the torch from the wall and with a gruff
good-night prepared to go. When I asked that a light be left, he
shook his head, said he had no orders. Whereupon he left me, the
heavy door clanging to, the bolts were shot, and I was alone in
darkness with my wounds and misery. My cloak had been put into the
cell beside my couch, and this I now drew over me, and I lay and
thought upon my condition and my prospects, which, as may be seen,
were not cheering. I did not suffer great pain from my wounds--only
a stiffness that troubled me not at all if I lay still. After an
hour or so passed--for it is hard to keep count of time when one's
thoughts are the only timekeeper--I fell asleep.
I know not how long I slept, but I awoke refreshed. I stretched
forth my uninjured arm, moving it about. In spite of will a sort of
hopelessness went through me, for I could feel long blades of corn
grown up about my couch, an unnatural meadow, springing from the
earth floor of my dungeon. I drew the blades between my fingers,
feeling towards them as if they were things of life out of place
like myself. I wondered what colour they were. Surely, said I
to myself, they can not be green, but rather a yellowish white,
bloodless, having only fibre, the heart all pinched to death. Last
night I had not noted them, yet now, looking back, I saw, as in
a picture, Gabord the soldier feeling among them for the knife
that I had taken. So may we see things, and yet not be conscious
of them at the time, waking to their knowledge afterwards. So may
we for years look upon a face without understanding, and then,
suddenly, one day it comes flashing out, and we read its hidden
story like a book.
I put my hand out farther, then brought it back near to my couch,
feeling towards its foot mechanically, and now I touched an earthen
pan. A small board lay across its top, and moving my fingers along
it I found a piece of bread. Then I felt the jar, and knew it was
filled with water. Sitting back, I thought hard for a moment. Of
this I was sure: the pan and bread were not there when I went to
sleep, for this was the spot where my eyes fell naturally while I
lay in bed looking towards Doltaire; and I should have remembered
it now, even if I had not noted it then. My jailer had brought
these while I slept. But it was still dark. I waked again as though
out of sleep, startled: I was in a dungeon that had no window!
Here I was, packed away in a farthest corner of the citadel, in a
deep hole that maybe had not been used for years, to be, no doubt,
denied all contact with the outer world--I was going to say FRIENDS,
but whom could I name among them save that dear soul who, by last
night's madness, should her brother be dead, was forever made dumb
and blind to me? Whom had I but her and Voban!--and Voban was yet to
be proved. The Seigneur Duvarney had paid all debts he may have owed
me, and he now might, because of the injury to his son, leave me to
my fate. On Gabord the soldier I could not count at all.
There I was, as Doltaire had said, like a rat in a trap. But I would
not let panic seize me. So I sat and ate the stale but sweet bread,
took a long drink of the good water from the earthen jar, and then,
stretching myself out, drew my cloak up to my chin, and settled
myself for sleep again. And that I might keep up a kind delusion
that I was not quite alone in the bowels of the earth, I reached out
my hand and affectionately drew the blades of corn between my
fingers.
Presently I drew my chin down to my shoulder, and let myself drift
out of painful consciousness almost as easily as a sort of woman can
call up tears at will. When I waked again, it was without a start
or moving, without confusion, and I was bitterly hungry. Beside my
couch, with his hands on his hips and his feet thrust out, stood
Gabord, looking down at me in a quizzical and unsatisfied way. A
torch was burning near him.
"Wake up, my dickey-bird," said he in his rough, mocking voice, "and
we'll snuggle you into the pot. You've been long hiding; come out of
the bush--aho!"
I drew myself up painfully. "What is the hour?" I asked, and
meanwhile I looked for the earthen jar and the bread.
"Hour since when?" said he.
"Since it was twelve o'clock last night," I answered.
"Fourteen hours since THEN," said he.
The emphasis arrested my attention. "I mean," I added, "since the
fighting in the courtyard."
"Thirty-six hours and more since then, m'sieu' the dormouse," was
his reply.
I had slept a day and a half since the doors of this cell closed on
me. It was Friday then; now it was Sunday afternoon. Gabord had
come to me three times, and seeing how sound asleep I was had not
disturbed me, but had brought bread and water--my prescribed diet.
He stood there, his feet buried in the blanched corn--I could see
the long yellowish-white blades--the torch throwing shadows about
him, his back against the wall. I looked carefully round my dungeon.
There was no a sign of a window; I was to live in darkness. Yet if
I were but allowed candles, or a lantern, or a torch, some books,
paper, pencil, and tobacco, and the knowledge that I had not killed
Juste Duvarney, I could abide the worst with some sort of calmness.
How much might have happened, must have happened, in all these hours
of sleep! My letter to Alixe should have been delivered long ere
this; my trial, no doubt, had been decided on. What had Voban done?
Had he any word for me? Dear Lord! here was a mass of questions
tumbling one upon the other in my head, while my heart thumped
behind my waistcoat like a rubber ball to a prize-fighter's fist.
Misfortunes may be so great and many that one may find grim humour
and grotesqueness in their impossible conjunction and multiplicity.
I remembered at that moment a friend of mine in Virginia, the
most unfortunate man I ever knew. Death, desertion, money losses,
political defeat, flood, came one upon the other all in two years,
and coupled with this was loss of health. One day he said to me:
"Robert, I have a perforated lung, my liver is a swelling sponge,
eating crowds my waistband like a balloon, I have a swimming in
my head and a sinking at my heart, and I can not say litany for
happy release from these for my knees creak with rheumatism. The
devil has done his worst, Robert, for these are his--plague and
pestilence, being final, are the will of God--and, upon my soul,
it is an absurd comedy of ills!" At that he had a fit of coughing,
and I gave him a glass of spirits, which eased him.
"That's better," said I cheerily to him.
"It's robbing Peter to pay Paul," he answered; "for I owed it to my
head to put the quid refert there, and here it's gone to my lungs to
hurry up my breathing. Did you ever think, Robert," he added, "that
this breathing of ours is a labor, and that we have to work every
second to keep ourselves alive? We have to pump air in and out like
a blacksmith's boy." He said it so drolly, though he was deadly ill,
that I laughed for half an hour at the stretch, wiping away my tears
as I did it; for his pale gray face looked so sorry, with its quaint
smile and that odd, dry voice of his.
As I sat there in my dungeon, with Gabord cocking his head and his
eyes rolling, that scene flashed on me, and I laughed freely--so
much so that Gabord sulkily puffed out his lips, and flamed like
bunting on a coast-guard's hut. The more he scowled and spluttered,
the more I laughed, till my wounded side hurt me and my arm had
twinges. But my mood changed suddenly, and I politely begged his
pardon, telling him frankly then and there what had made me laugh,
and how I had come to think of it. The flame passed out of his
cheeks, the revolving fire of his eyes dimmed, his lips broke into
a soundless laugh, and then, in his big voice, he said:
"You've got your knees to pray on yet, and crack my bones, but
you'll have need to con your penitentials if tattle in the town
be true."
"Before you tell of that," said I, "how is young Monsieur Duvarney?
Is--is he alive?" I added, as I saw his face look lower.
"The Beast was at door again last night, wild to be off, and foot of
young Seigneur was in the stirrup, when along comes sister with drug
got from an Indian squaw who nursed her when a child. She gives it
him, and he drinks; they carry him back, sleeping, and Beast must
stand there tugging at the leathers yet."
"His sister--it was his sister," said I, "that brought him back to
life?"
"Like that--aho! They said she must not come, but she will have her
way. Straight she goes to the palace at night, no one knowing
but--guess who? You can't--but no!"
A light broke in on me. "With the Scarlet Woman--with Mathilde,"
I said, hoping in my heart that it was so, for somehow I felt even
then that she, poor vagrant, would play a part in the history of
Alixe's life and mine.
"At the first shot," he said. "'Twas the crimson one, as quiet as
a baby chick, not hanging to ma'm'selle's skirts, but watching and
whispering a little now and then--and she there in Bigot's palace,
and he not knowing it! And maids do not tell him, for they knew the
poor wench in better days--aho!"
I got up with effort and pain, and made to grasp his hand in
gratitude, but he drew back, putting his arms behind him.
"No, no," said he, "I am your jailer. They've put you here to break
your high spirits, and I'm to help the breaking."
"But I thank you just the same," I answered him; "and I promise to
give you as little trouble as may be while you are my jailer--which,
with all my heart, I hope may be as long as I'm a prisoner."
He waved out his hands to the dungeon walls, and lifted his shoulders
as if to say that I might as well be docile, for the prison was safe
enough. "Poom!" said he, as if in genial disdain of my suggestion.
I smiled, and then, after putting my hands on the walls here and
there to see if they were, as they seemed, quite dry, I drew back to
my couch and sat down. Presently I stooped to tip the earthen jar
of water to my lips, for I could not lift it with one hand, but my
humane jailer took it from me and held it to my mouth. When I had
drunk, "Do you know," asked I as calmly as I could, "if our barber
gave the letter to Mademoiselle?"
"M'sieu', you've travelled far to reach that question," said he,
jangling his keys as if he enjoyed it. "And if he had--?"