OUR CITY OF REFUGE
At last the rumbling of wheels was heard and a large traveling chaise
appeared. It was at once stopped by a Russian officer, but we saw that
he permitted Madame Riano to alight, and another person--a slim young
figure in a crimson mantle--and that, I knew, was Francezka Capello.
There was a parley between Madame Riano and the officer, but he
escorted her and Mademoiselle Capello to the drawbridge, Gaston
Cheverny standing his ground until the ladies were well in the
courtyard. Then he dismounted, and advancing, bent and whispered in
Mademoiselle Capello's ear, as she followed Madame Riano, who stalked
ahead. The Russian officer remained on the farther edge of the bridge.
I could not see Francezka's face clearly, as it was shaded by her
large black hat and she kept her eyes downcast. I think she was not
without embarrassment at the position in which she found herself, for
Madame Riano was insisting on accompanying Count Saxe in his retreat
to Uzmaiz. These were her words as she marched up to him:
"Well, Maurice of Saxe, I told you long ago, that this Courland
business was an egg that would never hatch. Lacy, the old fox, will
bag you yet, if you are not very sharp. I warned you to beware of
him--for he is a Scotchman, is Lacy--and his great-great aunt married
the wife's cousin of an ancestor of mine. However, I don't care to
trust myself to those blessed Russians and Courlanders, and I have
determined to cast my lot, and my niece's, and my man Peter, and my
two waiting maids, and my chaise, and my horses, with you."
Here was a pretty addition to men supposed to be in the lightest
possible marching order, and expecting to flee for their lives. I
never saw Count Saxe disconcerted by any woman except Madame
Riano--but she could disconcert a graven image.
"But, Madame," said my master lamely, "we shall be running great
risks; we have a fight on our hands at this moment; for we shall not
be allowed to depart in peace."
"No Kirkpatrick has ever yet avoided a fight," replied Madame Riano,
firmly. "Life with us was ever a battle."
"But, Madame, it is not only a fight but a flight, I am looking for."
"Well, the Kirkpatricks were ever better at fighting than running
away, but I will agree to stand my ground, so as to give you a chance
to run!"
This she said to Count Saxe, the greatest warrior in the world! And
she looked like Bellona as she spoke.
"The Russian officer allowed me to speak with you," she continued,
"upon my promise to return; so I must go back, but only for a moment.
I will have the traveling chaise brought here, but, if need be, both
my niece and myself can ride a-horseback."
With that, she turned back, and walked across the drawbridge, Count
Saxe accompanying her to the middle of it, where the Russian officer
met her, and escorted her to where the chaise still stood.
Meanwhile, Francezka and Gaston had withdrawn into the shadow of the
courtyard wall, where Gaston continued to whisper in her ear. Count
Saxe, however, speaking to me by name, Francezka glanced up, and
instantly coming toward me, laid her hand on my arm.
"This is my good friend Babache," she said, smiling into my face.
"Yes, Mademoiselle," I answered, "this is your good friend Babache."
I saw her face plainly by the light of the lantern swinging overhead.
She was handsomer than she had been the year before, her features
having lost the sharp outline of immaturity; her eyes were wells of
light, her eloquent red mouth wore a charming smile; the child had
become a woman.
"It seems my destiny always to trouble you," she said, smiling, and
yet blushing a little; for her pride was offended at being thus thrown
upon us, as it were.
I replied as well as I could, and then we heard Madame Riano's voice
raised on the other side of the drawbridge. She was giving the Russian
officer the worst rating in her repertoire. Everything Russian, from
their religion to their cookery, she heaped anathema on, when,
suddenly, this farce became a tragedy. The Russians closed about her;
her voice ran high, and then suddenly stopped as if she had been
gagged. We saw her thrust into the chaise; a Russian soldier jumped
on the box, and it rattled off.
And, at the same moment, there was a rush for the drawbridge, but we
were too quick for them; it was up and fast before they knew it. Count
Saxe then turned to Mademoiselle Capello, and offering her his hand as
if he were at the king's levee, said:
"Mademoiselle, permit me to conduct you to a place of comfort--I will
not say safety, for all is safe here; the walls are nine feet thick
and our friends, the Russians, have nothing but musketry."
Francezka's face grew very pale, but her eyes did not falter. Her
courage was in truth greater than Madame Riano's, for madame loved
battle; Francezka did not love it, neither did she fear it.
She accepted Count Saxe's hand, and he led her across the courtyard
and up the stairway, where she disappeared within the door, first
making a curtsy to us all as well as to Count Saxe.
My master came down the stairway three steps at a time.
"The Russians are but poor tacticians," he said, "or they would never
have freed us from Peggy Kirkpatrick. As it is, we must not be
captured with this fair girl among us. Fancy what story of it would go
forth to the world. No; we must save her or die with her."
"Yes," repeated Gaston Cheverny, standing near us, "we must save her
or die with her."
For, in spite of Count Saxe's reassuring words to Mademoiselle
Capello, that was really the sum of it. The Russians had begun a heavy
fusillade which, in truth, was no more than hail against our nine feet
of stone walls. Could we but exist without ammunition and food, and
could we do without sleep, we twenty men could laugh at the eight
hundred Russians. But, unluckily, men must eat and sleep. I was
turning this over in my mind while our men were replying briskly out
of the loopholes--and with effect, for soon cries went up to the
heavens; our bullets had found their billets. At the first sight of
blood the Russians howled like hungry wolves. I believe they would
have torn us limb from limb could they have caught us. There is
nothing on earth more horrible, or more terrifying, than a great and
loud cry for blood.
I, Babache, a soldier from my fourteenth year, trembled behind nine
feet of stone, at this yell from the beast in man. Nor is it without
its effect on the most seasoned soldiers. They, the common men, laugh
at it at first, but it soon penetrates to the marrow of their bones,
and they perform miracles of valor under the spur of _fear_--for it is
as often fear as courage that drives a storming party into the breach.
I have read in the essays of Monsieur Michel Eyquem de Montaigne, of
Perigord, that he feared nothing but _fear_--and it is a wise saying
of that Perigord gentleman. So it was in the schloss at Mitau that
August night--we were afraid of nothing but fear, for we were
certainly not afraid to meet death in any shape. There was plenty for
all of us to do, Count Saxe himself shouldering a musket, and firing
through the slits of windows; but I knew that he was not the man to be
trapped like a rat in a hole, and I made sure he had some scheme in
his head by which we were to be saved from hoisting a handkerchief on
a ramrod--and waited for him to tell us what it was.
Meanwhile, the demoniac yelling kept up, together with the volleys of
musketry. The Russians had not then learned to transport light guns on
wheels, the King of Prussia having to teach them that trick near
twenty years later; so that we knew, what men do not often know in our
circumstances, exactly what we had to contend against. After an hour
of this volleying and yelling on the part of the Russians to which we
replied by putting leaden bullets in them, Count Saxe came up to me.
It was then after one o'clock--in those latitudes a time that is
neither day nor night, nor morning, nor evening, but a ghostlike hour,
in which all shapes, all things, the very sky and earth, are strange
to human beings. I saw by the faint half-light a smile on my master's
face; he was ever the handsomest man alive, and when he had the light
of battle in his eye, he was more beautiful than Apollo, lord of the
unerring bow. He was still in his court costume, but there was a great
rent in his velvet coat made by the musket he had occasionally used,
his gem-embroidered waistcoat was soiled with powder, and his lace
cravat and ruffles were in rags.
"Babache," said he, "I have it. Do you see yonder brick wall to the
left where the Russians have just tethered thirty or forty horses? The
moon is sinking fast,--and as soon as it fades, the drawbridge goes
down like lightning; you and I and Beauvais on horseback dash across
it to the left, the other sixteen men rush after us, seize each man a
horse, and make for the highway to Uzmaiz, not a quarter of a mile
away. I believe every man of us stands a good chance to escape."
"And Mademoiselle Capello and Gaston Cheverny?" I asked.
"They must go by way of the tunnel. It will bring them out at the
market-place, where there will be a crowd long before sunrise and they
may easily escape notice. Gaston will take Mademoiselle Capello to the
palace, and presenting himself boldly, ask refuge for her, which could
hardly be refused. As for himself, he may be thrown in prison, he may
be torn limb from limb; he must take his desperate chance, as the rest
of us take ours."
"He takes it cheerfully," said Gaston, at my elbow. He was grimed with
powder, and was rubbing his shoulder, which his piece had greatly
bruised, but I never saw a more smiling countenance. At the idea of
being charged with Mademoiselle Capello's safety, he looked as if he
had just come into a great estate.
Count Saxe then gave him a pocket map, and took him within to give him
a considerable sum of money. When they were gone, I heard a soft voice
behind me whispering my name, and, turning, I saw Francezka's fair
face at a lower window, near to me.
"So we have met but to part," she said, leaning out of the window, her
delicate round chin on her hand.
"We shall perhaps meet again, Mademoiselle," said I. "I think it will
not be long before you will be setting out for Paris with Madame
Riano. This, no doubt, will cure Madame Riano of traveling for the
present."
Francezka shook her head. "You do not know my aunt. As long as she can
have adventures, she is in heaven. And I like adventures, too. I have
heard of some one who said he cared not much which way the coach was
going, so it went at a rattling gait and he was inside. So do I
feel."
"If you like adventures, Mademoiselle, you will always have them," I
replied.
"Do you think," she said, after a pause, "that in taking care of me
Monsieur Cheverny is running a greater risk than any of you?"
"No, Mademoiselle. His chance seems to me rather the better. At best,
he can demand to be sent to the palace, while for us, we must run the
gantlet of the Russians; sixteen men must take their chances of
getting horses, and we must travel in company. But Count Saxe is with
us, and he is the favorite of fortune as well as of nature."
She remained silent a while, then spoke again:
"So this may be the last time we shall speak together in this world."
"I hope not, Mademoiselle," I replied. "I hope to have the honor of
speaking to you in Paris before the year is out."
"No, not Paris, but at my chateau of Capello. It is only twelve miles
from the highroad between Brussels and Paris. I would not be boastful,
but it is the charmingest place, at the foot of the Ardennes. I
have not seen it since I was a child. Monsieur Gaston Cheverny
remembers it better than I. He says he even remembers me, a little
child but six years old, and so did Monsieur Regnard Cheverny tell me
that at Paris last year. I think I remember Monsieur Gaston
Cheverny a little--perhaps because he is nearer my age."
"Then," said I, humoring her as a child, "we shall stop and dine with
you on our way to Paris, for, of course, I can not go anywhere unless
my master, Count Saxe, be asked, too."
"He will be asked, never fear. Good fortune will attend us all, no
doubt. I do not feel the least afraid of what is before me, unless the
tunnel be damp, and there be toads in it, then I shall die of fright,
for all that I am a Kirkpatrick."
How light-hearted she was, in the midst of things terrifying to most
women!
Count Saxe, wishing to spare her the sight of our outrush, then
returned with Gaston Cheverny, who had received his money and
instructions. Gaston wore a black hat and cloak of Count Saxe's; and,
since the count is a very tall man, and Gaston only of the middle
height, the cloak hung down upon his heels, and we could but smile at
the figure he made. Yet he looked not ungraceful. Then Mademoiselle
Capello came out, wearing her hat and mantle. She said to Count Saxe,
very earnestly:
"Monsieur, you may depend upon it, that whatever dangers encompass
Monsieur Cheverny and me, I will not play the coward."
"I am sure of it, Mademoiselle," replied Count Saxe, smiling, "but I
do not look for any dangers for either of you."
This was not strictly true, for there was great danger for Gaston
Cheverny, although little, if any, for Mademoiselle Capello, as we
then thought.
"Do you mean, Monsieur," asked Francezka, "you think we shall be
suffered to walk quietly from the market-place to the palace?"
"Yes, Mademoiselle."
"And if we reach the palace, there will not be a price put upon our
heads?"
"No, indeed, Mademoiselle. I think you will find Madame Riano at the
palace, and may resume your journey to-morrow."
"Then," cried Francezka, rather crossly, "the only real danger seems
to be from the toads in the tunnel! Come, Monsieur Cheverny, let us
begin our promenade."
"Certainly, Mademoiselle," said Gaston, and then to Count Saxe:
"Monsieur, may we meet at Uzmaiz, and may we return in triumph to
Mitau, to take our own. Good by, Babache--the next time I see you I
hope your face will be washed, for it is like a blackamoor's now, with
burnt powder."
Mademoiselle curtsied low to Count Saxe, and said sweetly, as if in
amends for her pettishness:
"Good by, and a thousand thanks for your goodness, Monsieur de Saxe.
My house of Capello is yours whenever you are in its neighborhood.
Good by, Captain Babache. When my eyes rest on you again, you will be
the welcomest sight in the world."
If I had been a ready man, like Francois Marie Voltaire, for example,
I could have replied to this kind speech with something handsome. But
being only Babache, a Tatar prince from the Marais, all I could think
of to say was:
"Good by, Mademoiselle; may God help you."
I saw them depart and my heart was heavy. True, it would require some
ingenuity on their part to get them into trouble, but I suspected both
of them had talents as well as a taste in that line.
But now we had serious business of our own on hand. Beauvais brought
us the three horses, which had been tethered in the courtyard.
Everything was arranged; the firing kept up to the last, although our
last was done with bits of broken nails and of silver pieces of money.
At last the great dusky moon showed only a rim upon the far horizon,
and then seemed suddenly engulfed in a great abyss of darkness.
At a signal, the drawbridge fell with a crash. We were already on
horseback, and dashed across the bridge into the open place and toward
the brick wall. Every man of ours was at our heels. The Russians were
completely dazed. Half of them rushed into the courtyard only to find
it empty. The rest ran hither and thither, afraid to fire in the
darkness, and before they could rally, or could find out what we were
really after, every man of us was mounted and away. We had a good
twenty minutes' start, for the noise among the Russians drowned the
sound of our hoofbeats. We had only one street of the town to traverse
before we struck the highway. The Russians had no inkling that we were
making for Uzmaiz, and not half an hour from the time we started came
a deluge of rain, the welcomest imaginable; for in that downpour the
Russians lost us and never found us again. We fared on, knowing every
foot of the way, for Count Saxe had made himself thoroughly familiar
with this road to his island fortress. Bridges were down, and the
roads were mere quagmires, but these were small difficulties to
nineteen seasoned men, riding for their lives.
We bivouacked that night, and for four other nights, in those rocky
and almost impassable woods with which that country abounds, and
which seem devised for the security of the hunted. It was easy enough
to get food and forage, for we were well supplied with money. The
argument of gold was supplemented by another argument of death, if the
seller was disobliging; we had twenty good horse pistols, and their
united reasoning never failed to convince. From the first day until
the last but one of our flight, the weather was bad: torrents of rain,
wild winds roaring, nature in a tumult night and day. At last the air
grew soft, the sun shone, and on a heavenly August evening, after
passing through a country green with deep-embosoming woods, and with
sunny, verdant slopes and many trickling crystal waters, we came upon
a great mirror of a lake, with a fair, wooded island in the midst of
it; and that was our city of refuge--the lake and island of Uzmaiz.