MAÎTRE JACQUES PROCEEDS TO KEEP THE OATH HE MADE
TO AUBIN COURTE-JOIE.
The sound which Baron Michel and Petit-Pierre now heard in the
direction by which Courtin had left them changed presently into a loud
noise approaching rapidly; and two minutes later a dozen chasseurs,
riding at a gallop in pursuit of the trail, or rather the noise made
by the running horse, which was snorting and neighing as it ran,
passed like a flash, not ten steps from Petit-Pierre and her
companion, who, rising slightly after the horsemen had passed, watched
their wild rush into the distance.
"They ride well," said Petit-Pierre; "but I doubt if they catch up
with that horse."
"They are making straight for the place where our friends are awaiting
us, and I think the marquis is in just the humor to put a stop to
their course."
"Then it is battle!" cried Petit-Pierre. "Well, water yesterday, fire
to-day; for my part, I prefer the latter."
And she tried to hurry Michel in the direction where the fight would
take place.
"No, no, no!" said Michel, resisting; "I entreat you not to go there."
"Don't you wish to win your spurs under the eyes of your lady, baron?
She is there, you know."
"I think she is," said the young man, sadly. "But troops are scattered
over the country in every direction; at the first shots they will all
converge toward the firing. We may fall in with one of their
detachments, and if, unfortunately, the mission with which I am
charged should end disastrously I shall never dare to appear again
before the marquis--"
"Say before his daughter."
"Well, yes,--before his daughter."
"Then, in order not to bring trouble into your love affairs I consent
to obey you."
"Oh, thank you! thank you!" cried Michel, seizing Petit-Pierre's hand
vehemently. Then perceiving the impropriety of his action, he
exclaimed, stepping backward, "Oh, pardon me; pray, pardon me!"
"Never mind," said Petit-Pierre; "don't think of it. Where did the
Marquis de Souday intend to shelter me?"
"In a farmhouse of mine."
"Not that of your man Courtin, I hope?"
"No, in another, perfectly isolated, hidden in the woods beyond Légé.
You know the village where Tinguy lived?"
"Yes; but do you know the way there?"
"Perfectly."
"I distrust that adverb in France. My poor Bonneville said he knew the
way perfectly, but he lost it." Petit-Pierre sighed as she added, in a
lower tone, "Poor Bonneville! alas! it may have been that very mistake
that led to his death."
The topic brought back the melancholy thoughts that filled her mind as
she left the cottage where the catastrophe that cost her the life of
her first companion had taken place. She was silent, and after making
a gesture of consent, she followed her new guide, replying only by
monosyllables to the few remarks which Michel addressed to her.
As for the latter, he performed his new functions with more ability
and success than might have been expected of him. He turned to the
left, and crossing some fields, reached a brook where he had often
fished for shrimps in his childhood. This brook runs through the
valley of the Benaste from end to end, rises toward the south and
falls again toward the north, where it joins the Boulogne near
Saint-Colombin. Either bank, bordered with fields, gave a safe and
easy path to pedestrians. Michel took to the brook itself, and
followed it for some distance, carrying Petit-Pierre on his shoulders
as poor Bonneville had done.
Presently, leaving the brook after following it for about a kilometre,
he bore again to the left, crossed the brow of a hill, and showed
Petit-Pierre the dark masses of the forest of Touvois, which were
visible in the dim light, looming up from the foot of the hill on
which they now stood.
"Is that where your farmhouse is?" asked Petit-Pierre.
"We have still to cross the forest," he said; "but we shall get there
in about three quarters of an hour."
"You are not afraid of losing your way?"
"No; for we do not have to plunge into the thicket. In fact, we shall
not enter the wood at all till we reach the road from Machecoul to
Légé. By skirting the edge of the forest to the eastward we must
strike that road soon."
"And then?"
"Then all we have to do is to follow it."
"Well, well," said Petit-Pierre, cheerfully, "I'll give a good account
of you, my young guide; and faith, it shall not be Petit-Pierre's
fault if you don't obtain the reward you covet! But here is rather a
well-beaten path. Isn't this the one you are looking for?"
"I can easily tell," replied Michel, "for there ought to be a post on
the right--There! here it is! we are all right. And now, Petit-Pierre,
I can promise you a good night's rest."
"Ah! that is a comfort," said Petit-Pierre, smiling; "for I don't deny
that the terrible emotions of the day have not relieved the fatigues
of last night."
The words were hardly out of her lips before a black outline rose from
the other side of the ditch, bounded into the road, and a man seized
Petit-Pierre violently by the collar of the peasant's jacket which she
wore, crying out in a voice of thunder:--
"Stop, or you're a dead man!"
Michel sprang to the assistance of his young companion by bringing
down a vigorous blow with the butt-end of his whip on her assailant.
He was near paying dear for his intervention. The man, without letting
go of Petit-Pierre, whom he held with his left arm, drew a pistol from
his jacket and fired at the young baron. Happily for the latter, in
spite of Petit-Pierre's feebleness she was not of a stuff to keep as
passive as her captor expected. With a rapid gesture she struck the
arm that fired the weapon, and the ball, which would otherwise have
gone straight to Michel's breast, only wounded him in the shoulder. He
returned to the charge, and their assailant was just pulling a second
pistol from his belt when two other men sprang from the bushes and
seized Michel from behind.
Then the first assailant, seeing that the young man could interfere no
longer, contented himself by saying to his companions:--
"Secure that fellow first; and then come and rid me of this one."
"But," said Petit-Pierre, "by what right do you stop us in this way?"
"This right," said the man, striking the carbine, which he carried on
his shoulder. "If you want to know why, you will find out presently.
Bind that man securely," he said to his men. "As for this one," he
added contemptuously, "it isn't worth while; I think there'll be no
trouble in mastering him."
"But I wish to know where you are taking us," insisted Petit-Pierre.
"You are very inquisitive, my young friend," replied the man.
"But--"
"Damn it! come on, and you'll find out. You shall see with your own
eyes where you are going in a very few minutes."
And the man, taking Petit-Pierre by the arm, dragged her into the
bushes, while Michel, struggling violently, was pushed by the two
assistants in the same direction.
They walked thus for about ten minutes, at the end of which time they
reached the open where, as we know, was the burrow of Maître Jacques
and his bandits. For it was he, bent on sacredly keeping his oath to
Aubin Courte-Joie, who had stopped the two travellers whom luck had
sent in his way; and it was his pistol-shot which, as we have already
seen at the close of a preceding chapter, put the whole camp of the
refractories on the _qui vive_.