The old man fixed his eyes on me most strangely, and then, stretching
out his finger and leaning forward, he said, with a voice of senile
wildness, “Ah, ah, the coat of our little Jean!”
I stood there like any criminal caught in his shameful act. Though I had
not forgotten that I wore the dead man’s clothes, I could not think
that they would be recognized, for they seemed like others of the French
army--white, with violet facings. I can not tell to this day what it was
that enabled them to detect the coat; but there I stood condemned before
them.
The wife sprang to her feet, came to me with a set face, and stared
stonily at the coat for an instant. Then, with a cry of alarm, she made
for the door; but I stepped quickly before her, and bade her wait till
she heard what I had to say. Like lightning it all went through my
brain. I was ruined if she gave an alarm: all Quebec would be at my
heels, and my purposes would be defeated. There was but one thing to
do--tell her the whole truth, and trust her; for I had at least done
fairly by her and by the dead man.
So I told them how Jean Labrouk had met his death; told them who I was,
and why I was in Quebec--how Jean died in my arms; and, taking from my
breast the cross that Mathilde had given me, I swore by it that every
word which I said was true. The wife scarcely stirred while I spoke, but
with wide dry eyes and hands clasping and unclasping heard me through. I
told her how I might have left Jean to die without a sign or message to
them, how I had put the cross to his lips as he went forth, and how by
coming here at all I placed my safety in her hands, and now, by telling
my story, my life itself.
It was a daring and a difficult task. When I had finished, both sat
silent for a moment, and then the old man said, “Ay, ay, Jean’s father
and his uncle Marmon were killed a-horseback, and by the knife. Ay,
ay, it is our way. Jean was good company--none better, mass over, on
a Sunday. Come, we will light candles for Jean, and comb his hair back
sweet, and masses shall be said, and--”
Again the woman interrupted, quieting him. Then she turned to me, and I
awaited her words with a desperate sort of courage.
“I believe you,” she said. “I remember you now. My sister was the wife
of your keeper at the common jail. You shall be safe. Alas! my Jean
might have died without a word to me all alone in the night. Merci mille
fois, monsieur!” Then she rocked a little to and fro, and the old man
looked at her like a curious child. At last, “I must go to him,” she
said. “My poor Jean must be brought home.”
I told her I had already left word concerning the body at headquarters.
She thanked me again. Overcome as she was, she went and brought me a
peasant’s hat and coat. Such trust and kindness touched me. Trembling,
she took from me the coat and hat I had worn, and she put her hands
before her eyes when she saw a little spot of blood upon the flap of
a pocket. The old man reached out his hands, and, taking them, he held
them on his knees, whispering to himself.
“You will be safe here,” the wife said to me. “The loft above is small,
but it will hide you, if you have no better place.”
I was thankful that I had told her all the truth. I should be snug here,
awaiting the affair in the cathedral on the morrow. There was Voban, but
I knew not of him, or whether he was open to aid or shelter me. His
own safety had been long in peril; he might be dead, for all I knew. I
thanked the poor woman warmly, and then asked her if the old man might
not betray me to strangers. She bade me leave all that to her--that I
should be safe for a while, at least.
Soon afterwards I went abroad, and made my way by a devious route to
Voban’s house. As I did so, I could see the lights of our fleet in
the Basin, and the camp-fires of our army on the Levis shore, on Isle
Orleans, and even at Montmorenci, and the myriad lights in the French
encampment at Beauport. How impossible it all looked--to unseat from
this high rock the Empire of France! Ay, and how hard it would be to get
out of this same city with Alixe!
Voban’s house stood amid a mass of ruins, itself broken a little, but
still sound enough to live in. There was no light. I clambered over
debris, made my way to his bedroom window, and tapped on the shutter.
There was no response. I tried to open it, but it would not stir. So
I thrust beneath it, on the chance of his finding it if he opened the
casement in the morning, a little piece of paper, with one word upon
it--the name of his brother. He knew my handwriting, and he would guess
where to-morrow would find me, for I had also hastily drawn upon the
paper the entrance of the cathedral.
I went back to the little house by the cathedral, and was admitted by
the stricken wife. The old man was abed. I climbed up to the small loft,
and lay there wide-awake for hours. At last came the sounds that I
had waited for, and presently I knew by the tramp beneath, and by low
laments floating up, that a wife was mourning over the dead body of her
husband. I lay long and listened to the varying sounds, but at last all
became still, and I fell asleep.
XXV. IN THE CATHEDRAL.
I awoke with the dawn, and, dressing, looked out of the window, seeing
the brindled light spread over the battered roofs and ruins of the Lower
Town. A bell was calling to prayers in the Jesuit College not far away,
and bugle-calls told of the stirring garrison. Soldiers and stragglers
passed down the street near by, and a few starved peasants crept about
the cathedral with downcast eyes, eager for crumbs that a well-fed
soldier might cast aside. Yet I knew that in the Intendant’s Palace and
among the officers of the army there was abundance, with revelry and
dissipation.
Presently I drew to the trap-door of my loft, and, raising it gently,
came down the ladder to the little hallway, and softly opened the door
of the room where Labrouk’s body lay. Candles were burning at his head
and his feet, and two peasants sat dozing in chairs near by. I could see
Labrouk’s face plainly in the flickering light: a rough, wholesome face
it was, refined by death, yet unshaven and unkempt, too. Here was work
for Voban’s shears and razor. Presently there was a footstep behind me,
and, turning, I saw in the half-light the widowed wife.
“Madame,” said I in a whisper, “I too weep with you. I pray for as true
an end for myself.”
“He was of the true faith, thank the good God,” she said sincerely. She
passed into the room, and the two watchers, after taking refreshment,
left the house. Suddenly she hastened to the door, called one back, and,
pointing to the body, whispered something. The peasant nodded and turned
away. She came back into the room, stood looking at the face of the dead
man for a moment, and bent over and kissed the crucifix clasped in the
cold hands. Then she stepped about the room, moving a chair and sweeping
up a speck of dust in a mechanical way. Presently, as if she again
remembered me, she asked me to enter the room. Then she bolted the outer
door of the house. I stood looking at the body of her husband, and said,
“Were it not well to have Voban the barber?”
“I have sent for him and for Gabord,” she replied. “Gabord was Jean’s
good friend. He is with General Montcalm. The Governor put him in prison
because of the marriage of Mademoiselle Duvarney, but Monsieur Doltaire
set him free, and now he serves General Montcalm.
“I have work in the cathedral,” continued the poor woman, “and I shall
go to it this morning as I have always gone. There is a little unused
closet in a gallery where you may hide, and still see all that happens.
It is your last look at the lady, and I will give it to you, as you gave
me to know of my Jean.”
“My last look?” I asked eagerly.
“She goes into the nunnery to-morrow, they say,” was the reply. “Her
marriage is to be set aside by the bishop to-day--in the cathedral. This
is her last night to live as such as I--but no, she will be happier so.”
“Madame,” said I, “I am a heretic, but I listened when your husband
said, ‘Mon grand homme de Calvaire, bon soir!’ Was the cross less
a cross because a heretic put it to his lips? Is a marriage less a
marriage because a heretic is the husband? Madame, you loved your Jean;
if he were living now, what would you do to keep him. Think, madame, is
not love more than all?”
She turned to the dead body. “Mon petit Jean!” she murmured, but made
no reply to me, and for many minutes the room was silent. At last she
turned, and said, “You must come at once, for soon the priests will be
at the church. A little later I will bring you some breakfast, and you
must not stir from there till I come to fetch you--no.”
“I wish to see Voban,” said I.
She thought a moment. “I will try to fetch him to you by-and-bye,” she
said. She did not speak further, but finished the sentence by pointing
to the body.
Presently, hearing footsteps, she drew me into another little room. “It
is the grandfather,” she said. “He has forgotten you already, and he
must not see you again.”
We saw the old man hobble into the room we had left, carrying in one arm
Jean’s coat and hat. He stood still, and nodded at the body and mumbled
to himself; then he went over and touched the hands and forehead,
nodding wisely; after which he came to his armchair, and, sitting down,
spread the coat over his knees, put the cap on it, and gossiped with
himself:
“In eild our idle fancies all return,
The mind’s eye cradled by the open grave.”
A moment later, the woman passed from the rear of the house to the
vestry door of the cathedral. After a minute, seeing no one near, I
followed, came to the front door, entered, and passed up a side aisle
towards the choir. There was no one to be seen, but soon the woman came
out of the vestry and beckoned to me nervously. I followed her quick
movements, and was soon in a narrow stairway, coming, after fifty
steps or so, to a sort of cloister, from which we went into a little
cubiculum, or cell, with a wooden lattice door which opened on a small
gallery. Through the lattices the nave amid choir could be viewed
distinctly.
Without a word the woman turned and left me, and I sat down on a little
stone bench and waited. I saw the acolytes come and go, and priests move
back and forth before the altar; I smelt the grateful incense as it rose
when mass was said; I watched the people gather in little clusters at
the different shrines, or seek the confessional, or kneel to receive the
blessed sacrament. Many who came were familiar--among them Mademoiselle
Lucie Lotbiniere. Lucie prayed long before a shrine of the Virgin, and
when she rose at last her face bore signs of weeping. Also I noticed her
suddenly start as she moved down the aisle, for a figure came forward
from seclusion and touched her arm. As he half turned I saw that it was
Juste Duvarney. The girl drew back from him, raising her hand as if in
protest, and it struck me that her grief and her repulse of him had to
do with putting Alixe away into a nunnery.
I sat hungry and thirsty for quite three hours, and then the church
became empty, and only an old verger kept a seat by the door, half
asleep, though the artillery of both armies was at work, and the air
was laden with the smell of powder. (Until this time our batteries had
avoided firing on the churches.) At last I heard footsteps near me in
the dark stairway, and I felt for my pistols, for the feet were not
those of Labrouk’s wife. I waited anxiously, and was overjoyed to see
Voban enter my hiding-place, bearing some food. I greeted him warmly,
but he made little demonstration. He was like one who, occupied with
some great matter, passed through the usual affairs of life with a
distant eye. Immediately he handed me a letter, saying:
“M’sieu’, I give my word to hand you this--in a day or a year, as I am
able. I get your message to me this morning, and then I come to care for
Jean Labrouk, and so I find you here, and I give the letter. It come to
me last night.”
The letter was from Alixe. I opened it with haste, and, in the dim
light, read:
MY BELOVED HUSBAND: Oh, was there no power in earth or heaven to bring
me to your arms to-day?
To-morow they come to see my marriage annulled by the Church. And every
one will say it is annulled--every one but me. I, in God’s name, will
say no, though it break my heart to oppose myself to them all.
Why did my brother come back? He has been hard--O, Robert, he has been
hard upon me, and yet I was ever kind to him! My father, too, he listens
to the Church, and, though he likes not Monsieur Doltaire, he works for
him in a hundred ways without seeing it. I, alas! see it too well,
and my brother is as wax in monsieur’s hands. Juste loves Lucie
Lotbiniere--that should make him kind. She, sweet friend, does not
desert me, but is kept from me. She says she will not yield to Juste’s
suit until he yields to me. If--oh, if Madame Jamond had not gone to
Montreal!
... As I was writing the foregoing sentence, my father asked to see me,
and we have had a talk--ah, a most bitter talk!
“Alixe,” said he, “this is our last evening together, and I would have
it peaceful.”
“My father,” said I, “it is not my will that this evening be our last;
and for peace, I long for it with all my heart.”
He frowned, and answered, “You have brought me trouble and sorrow.
Mother of God! was it not possible for you to be as your sister
Georgette? I gave her less love, yet she honours me more.”
“She honours you, my father, by a sweet, good life, and by marriage into
an honourable family, and at your word she gives her hand to Monsieur
Auguste de la Darante. She marries to your pleasure, therefore she
has peace and your love. I marry a man of my own choosing, a bitterly
wronged gentleman, and you treat me as some wicked thing. Is that like a
father who loves his child?”
“The wronged gentleman, as you call him, invaded that which is the pride
of every honest gentleman,” he said.
“And what is that?” asked I quietly, though I felt the blood beating at
my temples.
“My family honour, the good name and virtue of my daughter.”
I got to my feet, and looked my father in the eyes with an anger and a
coldness that hurts me now when I think of it, and I said, “I will not
let you speak so to me. Friendless though I be, you shall not. You have
the power to oppress me, but you shall not slander me to my face. Can
not you leave insults to my enemies?”
“I will never leave you to the insults of this mock marriage,” answered
he, angrily also. “Two days hence I take command of five thousand
burghers, and your brother Juste serves with General Montcalm. There is
to be last fighting soon between us and the English. I do not doubt
of the result, but I may fall, and your brother also, and, should
the English win, I will not leave you to him you call your husband.
Therefore you shall be kept safe where no alien hands may reach you. The
Church will hold you close.”
I calmed myself again while listening to him, and I asked, “Is there no
other way?”
He shook his head.
“Is there no Monsieur Doltaire?” said I. “He has a king’s blood in his
veins!”
He looked sharply at me. “You are mocking,” he replied. “No, no, that is
no way, either. Monsieur Doltaire must never mate with daughter of mine.
I will take care of that; the Church is a perfect if gentle jailer.”
I could bear it no longer. I knelt to him. I begged him to have pity on
me. I pleaded with him; I recalled the days when, as a child, I sat upon
his knee and listened to the wonderful tales he told; I begged him, by
the memory of all the years when he and I were such true friends to
be kind to me now, to be merciful--even though he thought I had done
wrong--to be merciful. I asked him to remember that I was a motherless
girl, and that if I had missed the way to happiness he ought not to make
my path bitter to the end. I begged him to give me back his love and
confidence, and, if I must for evermore be parted from you, to let me be
with him, not to put me away into a convent.
Oh, how my heart leaped when I saw his face soften! “Well, well,” he
said, “if I live, you shall be taken from the convent; but for the
present, till this fighting is over, it is the only safe place. There,
too, you shall be safe from Monsieur Doltaire.”
It was poor comfort. “But should you be killed, and the English take
Quebec?” said I.
“When I am dead,” he answered, “when I am dead, then there is your
brother.”
“And if he speaks for Monsieur Doltaire?” asked I.
“There is the Church and God always,” he answered.
“And my own husband, the man who saved your life, my father,” I urged
gently; and when he would have spoken I threw myself into his arms--the
first time in such long, long weeks!--and, stopping his lips with my
fingers, burst into tears on his breast. I think much of his anger
against me passed, yet before he left he said he could not now prevent
the annulment of the marriage, even if he would, for other powers were
at work; which powers I supposed to be the Governor, for certain reasons
of enmity to my father and me--alas! how changed is he, the vain old
man!--and Monsieur Doltaire, whose ends I knew so well. So they will
unwed us to-morrow, Robert; but be sure that I shall never be unwed in
my own eyes, and that I will wait till I die, hoping you will come and
take me--oh, Robert, my husband--take me home.
If I had one hundred men, I would fight my way out of this city, and to
you; but, dear, I have none, not even Gabord, who is not let come near
me. There is but Voban. Yet he will bear you this, if it be possible,
for he comes to-night to adorn my fashionable brother. The poor Mathilde
I have not seen of late. She has vanished. When they began to keep
me close, and carried me off at last into the country, where we were
captured by the English, I could not see her, and my heart aches for
her.
God bless you, Robert, and farewell. How we shall smile, when all this
misery is done! Oh, say we shall, say we shall smile, and all this
misery cease. Will you not take me home? Do you still love thy wife, thy