FAR IN THE FOREST
(1)
"'O Richard, ô mon roi,
L'univers t'abandonne;
Sur la terre il n'y a que moi
Qui s'intéresse à ta personne,'"
sang a clear tenor voice in the forest next morning--the once famous
air out of that opera of _Richard Cœur-de-Lion_ which had served
the Royalists of three or four years ago as a rallying-cry. The
singer, a fair-haired young Breton with a face of refinement and
intelligence, was busy polishing his English musket. He was, or
had been, a law student at Rennes, and now was one of 'Monsieur
Augustin's' lieutenants. A little way off Anne-Hilarion was crouched
in a patch of primroses, which he was adding one by one to the tight,
hot bunch in his hand. Grain d'Orge and another Chouan of about the
same standard of personal cleanliness, sitting on a fallen trunk,
their muskets resting against them, regarded his labours with a
wide, admiring grin. And under a beech-tree, a fresh bandage round
his head, La Vireville himself lay propped on his elbows, reading
and re-reading a letter. A map lay open on the ground beside him.
Over this peaceful and almost pastoral scene shone the young green
of April's trees and the soft blue of her sky, a setting with which
the child plucking flowers was more consonant than the armed peasants.
But the latter, by the attention which they paid to his movements,
did not seem to find it so.
La Vireville suddenly rolled over and sat up. "Le Goffic, come
here a moment, will you?"
The young Breton ceased his song, put down his weapon, and obeyed.
His leader motioned to him to sit down beside him.
"You know, of course, Charles, that 'M. Alexis,' the leader of
the Carhoët division, was killed the other day while I was away?"
"Yes, Monsieur Augustin."
"He seems to have been killed by treachery," said La Vireville,
referring to the letter in his hand, "at a farm near Lanrivain.
Let me see, where is that exactly?" He searched on the map lying
beside him.
"Grain d'Orge knows that neighbourhood well," suggested his lieutenant.
"Yes, of course he does," assented the émigré, relinquishing the
search. "I will ask him in a moment, since I shall have further
need of his topographical knowledge. For there is another matter
in this letter of M. du Boishardy's. He wishes me to take over the
command of the Carhoët division, now vacant through 'M. Alexis'
death."
Now M. du Boishardy commanded the whole department of the Côtes-du-Nord
for the King, and La Vireville was consequently more or less under
his orders. The young Breton's face fell.
"And leave us?" he exclaimed.
"No, no! M. du Boishardy wishes me to combine the two if possible.
I should have to appoint a subordinate in any case. The pressing
need, however, seems to be that I should go over there in person
as soon as possible, for it appears that they are all at sixes
and sevens since their leader's death. I must proceed to Carhoët
directly I return from Jersey--for to Jersey I must go, to see the
Prince de Bouillon, even if I had not the infant there to convoy
into British hands. The best plan, I take it, would be to sail
direct from Jersey to that part of the coast, if it is possible
to land there. Grain d'Orge!"
In front of that warrior, fingering his musket with one hand, was
now standing Anne-Hilarion, who had abandoned his primrose-plucking,
though still retaining his spoil. The old Chouan's French was very
limited, for which reason conversation with him, for those ignorant
of Breton, was difficult; but he and the Comte de Flavigny did
appear to be holding discourse of some kind. La Vireville's summons
brought not only him but Anne and his flowers also.
"Thank you, my child," said La Vireville, accepting the hot nosegay.
"Now you can go back and pick some for Grain d'Orge."
The Chouan grinned. "You wanted me, Monsieur Augustin?"
"Yes. Sit down there. You know the Carhoët division well, don't you?"
"Like the palm of my hand, Monsieur Augustin." He began to arrange
some of Anne's primroses on the ground. "See, here is Porhoët,
the little fishing village, in the Bay of St. Guénaël, and there
is Carhoët, seven miles inland, and there is the wood of Roscanvel,
and there is Lanrivain, and close by there, I think, is the farm
where 'M. Alexis' was killed the other day, as we heard. There
is a path leading to it through a copse, and it was doubtless by
that that the Blues came when they surprised him. . . . Yes, I
know it well, though I cannot read the map. My sister lives at
Carhoët, and I have a nephew at Roscanvel."
"Good," said La Vireville, studying the chart of blossoms. "Well,
mon gars, I want to go to Carhoët directly I return from Jersey.
You could meet me at the fishing village, Porhoët, I suppose, and
conduct me to Carhoët and some other places that I want to visit
there? Can one land with any measure of safety at Porhoët?"
Grain d'Orge nodded his great head. "Surely, Monsieur Augustin. 'M.
Alexis' had an agent of some kind living at Porhoët for the Jersey
correspondence, so that once I get into touch with him it should
not be difficult. One should take precautions, though, in spite
of the truce; is it not so, Monsieur Augustin?"
"The headache which I have at this moment, mon vieux, supplies a
sufficient answer to that question."
"You will not go to the peace conferences at La Prévalaye, then,
Monsieur Augustin?" asked his younger lieutenant.
La Vireville shrugged his shoulders. "Do you think, my dear Le
Goffic, that I am a particularly good exemplar of peace--a man
who has been fired on during this truce which Grain d'Orge so
rightly distrusts? No, I do not believe in the possibility of a
lasting peace at present, and I am sure that even if it is concluded
it will be broken in a month or two. Neither side really wants it;
they are merely deluded if they think they do. M. du Boishardy--he
writes to me from La Prévalaye itself--is young and enthusiastic,
and believes too readily in the good in other people. But he
recognises that he is not likely to see me there--otherwise he
would hardly have suggested my going over to Carhoët."
"Monsieur Augustin is right," said Grain d'Orge sagely, shaking
his grizzled locks. "Nobody wants a peace, and it will not last."
"Well, you shall guide me to Carhoët from Porhoët in a day or two.
I must make a try for Jersey to-night if the wind serves. Burn the
flare at ten o'clock, for I think we shall find that the Jersey
lugger will be off the point. I know that the Prince is impatient
to see me, and it is possible that he may have forgotten I was
coming from Southampton, not from here."
"I will see to the matter," said Le Goffic.
"There is something else of importance that I want to discuss with
you two," went on La Vireville, lowering his voice; and his two
dissimilar lieutenants, seated on the beech-mast like himself,
brought themselves nearer. "If--note that I only say _if_--there
were to be an émigré landing, supported by the British Government
this summer, somewhere in the Morbihan, do you think that our gars
could be relied on to follow me to Southern Brittany to co-operate
with it?"
(2)
Anne-Hilarion had picked primroses, as suggested, for Grain d'Orge,
but he had not given them to him, for, sensible little boy that he
was, he knew the signs of a grown-up being really too absorbed to
attend to him, since Grandpapa himself sometimes exhibited them. The
most unmistakable of these were written now upon the three men who
sat, talking so earnestly, under the beech-tree. He had approached
them tentatively once or twice, but even M. le Chevalier took no
notice of him--did not, in fact, appear to be aware that he was
there--so in the end he presented his second harvest to the other
Chouan, who received it with testimonies of extreme gratitude,
and arranged some of the flowers round his greasy wide-brimmed
hat. This man could not speak a word of French, so all he and Anne
could do was to sit side by side on the log and smile spasmodically
at each other. Anne regretted that his foreign shell with the
stripes was in M. le Chevalier's pocket, for a scheme had just
visited him of filling it with water and putting primroses into
it. He gave a sudden little yawn. What a long, long time M. le
Chevalier was talking. . . .
His head was all but nodding when he felt a hand on his shoulder,
and there was M. le Chevalier bending over him.
"Are you bored to death, my child, or asleep?" he asked kindly.
"I have been a terrible while talking, have I not? It is Grain
d'Orge's fault; he is so obstinate. Now, would you like to come
for a little walk in the wood before we have our next meal? There
is just time, and I have something to show you."
Anne-Hilarion jumped up from the log with much alacrity.
"What is it that we are going to see, M. le Chevalier?" he asked,
as he set off, his hand in his friend's. "Do ogres live in this
forest--or giants? Or perhaps there is buried treasure? You know,
I have never seen so many trees all together at one time as this.
I could not count them, _possibly_!"
"No, I should think not," agreed La Vireville. "You cannot even
see them all. This is the way, where the little path strikes off.
I am going to show you, Anne, the château of Kerdronan, where I
lived when I was a boy like you."
"Oh, M. le Chevalier, I shall like that!"
"Wait till you see it!" said Fortuné.
And they went along the path, little more than a track, that
wound between the trees. Over and about them were the fledgling
beech-leaves, of the loveliest green of hope and innocence, so
young and untried that they resembled gleams of bright water rather
than anything more palpable; and underfoot, crackling like paper,
were their fellows of last year.
"Then you used to come and play in this wood when you were a boy,
M. le Chevalier?" began Anne-Hilarion again.
"I knew every inch of it once," replied the émigré.
Anne-Hilarion gave a sigh of envy. "But you ran away to sea, did
you not?" he asked, and there was a strong suggestion of reproach
in his tone.
La Vireville smiled. "Never!" he said. "What put such an idea into
your head? I was in the navy once, it is true--I served under
Suffren--but I assure you that I got there by the most legitimate
channels. Mind that root, child!"
"Papa said that you had been a sailor," explained Anne, "and I
thought----"
"I see," said his friend, amused.
"Are there as many trees as this in Jersey?" was Anne-Hilarion's
next question.
"No, nephew, there are not. By the way, I don't believe I have
ever told you where I am going to take you when we get to St.
Helier--to Jersey, that is?"
"Perhaps to the house of a pirate?" suggested Anne-Hilarion hopefully.
This time La Vireville laughed outright. "My child, what an imagination
you have! No; to the house of my mother. She lives there."
"Why?" inquired his charge.
La Vireville did not answer for a moment. "For various reasons,"
he replied, at length. "One of them you will see in a few minutes."
"I should think," observed Anne, looking about him as they went
on, "that it was in a big wood like this, where nobody could see
them, that the two brothers of Liddesdale met and fought."
"Who were they?" asked the Frenchman. "I never heard of them."
"They are in a story of Elspeth's that she told me once. They
fought about a lady, and the lady was false to both of them. Is
that why people generally fight duels, M. le Chevalier?"
La Vireville switched at an anemone with a hazel twig that he
had pulled off.
"Good God!" he exclaimed to himself. "It is not the only reason,
child," he returned. "But duels are not subjects for little boys
to talk about."
Ordinarily Anne-Hilarion would have been deterred at once by a
tone and a phraseology so foreign to the speaker, as he knew him,
but he was undeniably wrought upon by his surroundings, and pursued
the forbidden topic.
"I expect you have fought a duel, have you not, M. le Chevalier?"
he said tentatively, looking up at his tall companion. But La
Vireville was silent.
"Perhaps several?" suggested the inquirer; and though he still
got no answer, went on, "Were any of them here, in this wood?"
"No," said the Chouan, walking very fast. "--Now leave the subject
alone, there's a good child! You will see in a moment what we have
come to see. Here the wood ends, but it goes on again afterwards."
They had come, in fact, to the edge of the forest--or, rather,
to an extensive clearing crossed by a deep-rutted woodland road.
The émigré led the way along this for twenty yards or so, and
the stopped.
There in front of them, at the end of a grass-grown avenue of
larches, now swaying in all their first delicate green joy, stood
the corpse of a large seventeenth century manor-house. Not decay,
but violence, had slain it; it was gutted from end to end, so that
with its blackened, jagged walls, its grinning rafters, and the
few tall chimneys that yet stood, it looked, between those arcades
of feathery mirth, like a skeleton in fairyland.
"Oh, poor house!" exclaimed Anne-Hilarion compassionately. "What
has happened to it? Whose is it?"
"Mine," replied La Vireville. His mouth was rather grim.
"Is that Ker-where you lived?"
La Vireville nodded. "The Blues burnt it down two years ago. It
does not look very pretty now, does it? Yet it was beautiful once."
"Oh, M. le Chevalier, you must have been very sorry!"
"Sorry? Of course I was sorry, Anne. I was born there, and my
father and grandfather before me. . . . Well, there are no more
of us, so perhaps it does not much matter. We must go back now."
The little boy stood with a very grave face under the larches, and
looked at the irremediable havoc towards which they led. Then he
thrust his hand silently into his friend's, and they both turned
back into the wood.
(3)
"So, after all, Anne, your good-bye to France is a very peaceful
one," observed La Vireville some hours later.
He spoke the truth. The deck of the _Aristocrate_, one of the
armed luggers employed in the Jersey correspondence, was under
their feet, and the _Aristocrate_ herself, her sail ready to go
up to the favouring wind, lay gently rolling on a tranquil sea.
The little boat, manned by La Vireville's own gars, which had
brought them out without adventure to the lugger, was just pulling
away. La Vireville, standing by the side, looked after her.
"Yes, this is really your farewell to France. God knows when you
will see it again."
"I think, perhaps," replied the Comte de Flavigny in his uncompromising
treble, "that I would rather live in England. Though I like the
Chouans. . . . But you will, no doubt, be going back to France,
M. le Chevalier?"
"I? Yes, in a couple of days, most probably," answered the émigré
rather absently, gazing at the moon-silvered coast, dear and
implacable, where one day, as he well knew, he should land for
the last time.
"And what the devil is this, M. de la Vireville?" demanded a voice
behind him, and La Vireville turned to see Lieutenant Gosset, the
Jerseyman who commanded the _Aristocrate_. "Have you kidnapped
it, or is it, perchance, your own?" went on the sailor.
"Neither," answered La Vireville. "Let me make known to you the
Comte Anne-Hilarion de Flavigny. We have been making a little
tour of Northern France together." And Anne made a bow, while
Gosset laughed, half puzzled, and the lugger's mainsail went up.
"May I stay on deck with you a little quarter of an hour?" begged
Anne, snuggling down by La Vireville's side in the moonlight. "And
tell me, please, M. le Chevalier, about Madame your mother, to
whom we are going. Is she--is she old?"
"That depends on what you consider old, my pigeon. She does not
seem so to me. But perhaps I am old myself; I expect you think so,
don't you? Her hair is grey, it is true--but so would mine be,
Anne, if I had to look after you much longer."
Anne smiled, recognising this for a jest, not to be taken seriously.
He studied his friend, whose bandaged head was bare in the windy
moonlight.
"I like your hair," he observed thoughtfully. "But already--is
it rude of me to say so?--there are some grey hairs there . . .
only a few." He laid a small finger on La Vireville's temple.
"I saw them when you were asleep in the cave."
"I have so many cares," sighed the Chouan. "You have seen, Anne,
what a quantity of people I have to look after in Brittany. Then
there is my mother--and, lately, a certain small boy. . . . And,
by the way, it is time that small boy went to bed. We shall not
reach St. Helier till morning."
He went off to see what accommodation had been prepared for the
child. When he returned, he found Anne giving an account of his
adventures to the interested Gosset, who was standing looking down
at him with his hands on his hips.
"And now," finished Anne, "M. le Chevalier is going to take me to
Mme. de la Vireville in Jersey, and then I shall go home to my
Grandpapa in London."
"You seem to have had a stirring time, by gad!" commented the
sailor. "But I did not know that you had a wife, La Vireville!
Since when are you married, may I ask, and who is the fortunate
lady?"
The Frenchman frowned. "You are misinformed," he said shortly. "I
have never had a wife. It is my mother to whom I am taking him."
"I beg your pardon!" exclaimed Gosset, struck by the sudden change
in his face, and La Vireville turned and walked away.