THE PARTISAN’S REVELATION.
The gloomy-looking partisan crossed the threshold, grounded the butt of
his rifle, and faced the count without a word.
De Cavannes rose to his feet, and his eye gleamed, as he said:
“I knew you would come. After all you are no coward, if you are a
villain, Pierce.”
The partisan laughed sardonically.
“Do you render that much justice to me, Alphonse? You are growing
rational. I remember when you would not hear a word, and murdered an
innocent woman in your frenzy.”
The count shook his head, and all the fire died out of his eyes.
“Pierce Harley,” he said, “if you could prove that, no living man would
be more glad than I to spend the rest of my life in the torments of
hell on earth, that I might see her once more, to ask her forgiveness
one moment. But it is useless. Traitor and false friend, who bit the
hand that fed you, it is vain to defend her from what I know.”
“Let it pass then,” said Butler--or Harley as he must now be
called--gloomily. “Your words are true as regards me. You can not
believe what I say about her, of course. Let it pass.”
“Tell me then,” said the count, doubtfully, “why you came here.”
“To die,” was the laconic reply.
De Cavannes laughed scornfully.
“Have you realized that? Why did you not come before? You knew I was
not dead, though you once thought I was. The day of Saratoga told you
that I was no ghost, if you half suspected before. Did you fear to meet
me, that you waited till my rangers drove you from your hut, and chased
you here?”
“I did,” said Harley, with the same sullen manner.
“I wish you had come alone,” said the count, in his grand manner. “It
would have saved me the trouble of pitying you, for I do not care to
kill a man that fears death.”
Again Harley laughed sardonically.
“You are wrong, Alphonse, as wrong as you once were about your wife. I
don’t fear you. I waited to see if you hated me enough to take trouble
for my death.”
“And you are satisfied that you deserve it?” said the count, gravely.
“I suppose so, according to one law,” returned Harley, coldly. “By the
law of vengeance you have your rights. Take them. I’m weary of life.”
“Pierce Harley,” said the count, solemnly, “my men are round you, and
you are doomed to die. In the presence of God, tell the truth. What had
I done to you that you should turn traitor to me as you did, trying
your best to ruin one who never done you aught but benefits.”
Harley turned his eyes gloomily round the apartment till they rested on
the lovely face of Diana. Then he said:
“You see that girl. As she looks now, thirty-five years ago looked her
mother, and I loved her before she ever saw you. You have your answer.”
“This is no answer,” said the count, fiercely. “What had I done to you
to provoke such treason?”
“I loved Diana Harley, fool. She was my cousin by blood, and I loved
her before you saw her. I was poor, you were rich. She went to France,
secretly betrothed to me, and she broke her troth, forced to it by
Oxford, her father. You knew she did not love _you_. What do you
Frenchmen care for love in a young wife? She loved me first, and I
loved her. If I had not, do you think I could have forgiven her the
wrong she did me? I did forgive her, when I saw her in Paris, but I
swore revenge on you and I have kept my oath.”
The count had listened to the other with iron composure, but with
perfect courtesy, not seeking to interrupt him in any manner. When
Harley had finished there was a short silence, broken by the count.
“Then I am to understand, monsieur, that you do me the honor to avow
that you sought my house for the deliberate purpose of destroying my
happiness and ruining my wife.”
“The man that says that Diana Harley was ruined by me, lies,” said
the partisan, in harsh tones. “I loved her, but you--curse you--had
her--she was your wife. From that moment I swore to kill _you_, but
nothing would have tempted me to stain _her_ by so much as one word a
maiden or chaste wife might not hear.”
De Cavannes, for the first time looked incredulous, and Harley,
noticing the look, laughed a strange, hollow, despairing laugh.
“You Frenchmen could not understand that of a cold, brutal Englishman,
could you? Fool; in the apathetic seeming hearts of the North, love
burns with a fervor you mincing dancing-masters never dreamed of, as
white as the furnace flame that melts steel and as pure of dross. I
tell you I _loved_ Diana. In that love an angel might have gloried.
It was pure at least. If I sinned it was like Lucifer, not like your
gentlemen of the court, who counted every woman fair prey.”
Here, for the first time, the count interposed.
“Stop, monsieur; you know better than that with me. Besides, you who
boast of your purity in love, what meant that scene I witnessed, Diana
in your arms before my very face? Ha, monsieur, does that make you
wince?”
The iron firmness which had so far distinguished Harley was indeed
giving way to all seeming. The strong man trembled violently, and
turned a gaze, half piteous half fierce on the second Diana, whose
marvelous likeness to the first had been declared. Then he suddenly
ground his teeth and turned on the count with a ferocity that bordered
on insanity, while he burst out:
“Ay, glory in it, Alphonse. I ruined you, and you detected me. My
defeat and disgrace were complete, and in that disgrace she pitied
me and allowed her long-smothered love to burst forth. And I, weak
fool that I was, lost control of myself when I saw her tears. In one
mad moment I told her all my long love, and that moment was her last.
You saw us, and stabbed her. Do you know why I did not kill you then,
Alphonse de Cavannes? Because you would have gone to meet her. You were
a noble man, then. Now, you have stained your hands with blood, and are
doomed. I hate you now, as I always did. Now take my curse and speed to
hottest hell, to meet me when I come!”
As he spoke he flung his rifle into the palm of his hand with a clash,
and the flash and report instantly followed.
That moment would have been the last of the Count de Cavannes, but for
the promptitude of Adrian Schuyler. The active hussar had been watching
the partisan keenly, and in the nick of time his saber left its sheath
striking up the barrel of the piece, to be plunged the next instant
into the very heart of Pierce Harley.
Without a groan, the grim partisan dropped dead, as Diana threw her
arms round her father’s deliverer with a shriek.
* * * * *
There is but little more to add to our tale now.
The reader will comprehend how Adrian, meeting De Cavannes and Diana at
Bennington, and taken into the confidence of the former, had assisted
him in the ghostly manifestations in the cavern by the aid of De
Cavannes’ thorough knowledge of the locality and ropes fixed to some of
the stalactites for the purpose of executing their aërial flight over
the lake, shining in suits covered with phosphorus.
It only remains to add that Adrian and Diana were married the year
after, and departed with the count to Europe. By this time the count’s
estates had paid off their incumbrances by the rents in the course of
twenty years, and De Cavannes was once more a rich man.
He was one of the few nobles of France who took the popular side along
with Lafayette during the French Revolution, and lived to see Adrian
a General under the Empire. But all his subsequent fortunes never
wiped out the memories of the past, and he often recounted to his
grandchildren the pranks he played the savages in America under the
name of BLACK NICK.
THE END.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Now Manchester.
[2] Historically correct.
Transcriber’s Notes
Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations
in hyphenation and accents have been standardised but all other
spelling and punctuation remains unchanged.
Italics are represented thus _italic_.