Mme. la Marquise's incredulity with regard to her niece's assertion lasted well into the afternoon. She could not bring herself to believe that de Maurel's hostile attitude towards all the inmates of Courson, which he had so steadily maintained since his first unfortunate visit, could have undergone such a material change in so short a time.
She had looked on Fernande's childish boasting as mere nonsense, and during the past week had been eating out her heart in vain regret and remorse at her own folly, her own insentient pride, which had undoubtedly precipitated the catastrophe, and turned into an open feud what had, after all, only been a kind of skulking neutrality before. Mme. la Marquise was quite sure in her own mind that if she had been present throughout the interview between the two brothers, she would have known how to avert the quarrel. Once it had occurred, she felt that nothing would ever bridge it over. The short glimpse which she had that day of Ronnay de Maurel had told her plainly that he was, indeed, the son of his father—endowed with the same passionate and violent temperament and the same obstinacy. Some latent impulse—or perhaps mere idle curiosity, she thought—had prompted him to come the once. But unfortunatelyhe had been made unwelcome, and Madame la Marquise knew that he would resent this most bitterly, and that he would prove as irreconcilable as her husband had been, as old Gaston de Maurel still was.
Was it likely, therefore, that he would surrender at a word from a mere girl, and come and eat that humble pie at Courson which was bound to be very distasteful to him? Madame thought not; and in this she proved herself as ignorant of male temperament as her son was of feminine wiles. But Fernande was so positive that M. de Maurel would come, that something of her confidence communicated itself to the others. Her appearance in a new frock of delicate muslin, with tiny puffed sleeves and the shortest of waists, the folds of her long skirt clinging very closely to her girlish figure, finally brought Madame's incredulity to an end, and though nothing was done this time in preparation of M. de Maurel's coming, the excitement which pervaded the château was none the less acute.
The weather continued to smile the whole afternoon. It had been the warmest day of the young year, and Madame—still pretending that she was not expecting her son—ordered Annette to bring some semblance of order in the vast circular veranda that overlooked the park. In olden days this veranda had been a favourite spot on warm afternoons; the view between the stone pillars right over the ornamental water and the English garden beyond was magnificent. In those days the flagged floor was covered with soft carpets, chairs and lounges stood around, with one or two card-tables and stands for wines or coffee. Now there were neither carpets nor lounges; a few garden seats of stout wood had alone survived the years of disrepair. But after Annette had scrubbed the floor and the chairs, after Madame had ordered a table or two to be brought out and light refreshments to be disposed on them, after she had spread a couple of gaily-coloured Paisley shawls—remnants of her own depleted wardrobe—over the seats, the place looked inviting enough, and nothing could spoil the view across thepark, right over an apple orchard aglow with blossom to the distant wooded heights beyond.
Madame took her seat beside the coffee-urn, her knitting in her hand. M. de Courson, feeling unaccountably restless, joined her after a while, making pretence to read theMoniteur—a week old—which a courier from Paris had brought that morning. Soon afterwards Laurent and Fernande were seen coming round the ornamental water. They came up the stone steps to the veranda, Fernande's unconcerned prattle and her merry laugh raising the echoes of the old walls.
Laurent was moody, as he always was when his brother's name was so much as mentioned; but Fernande was in the highest possible spirits, even though she masked her gaiety behind a look of sober demureness.
Everyone's nerves were on the jar. The paper rattled in M. de Courson's hands; Madame's knitting needles clicked jerkily.
Laurent sat with his two hands tightly clasped between his knees, staring down most of the time at Fernande's little feet, which were stretched out before her. They were encased in a delicious pair of heelless black alpaca sandals, with satin ribbons criss-crossing over the instep and tied in a bow just above the ankle. Her fingers were busy with a delicate piece of embroidery, and she was expounding her views to Laurent on the subject of the rearing of chickens.
At half-past three Annette came rushing from the house on to the veranda.
"The General!" she cried excitedly. "He is just coming up the avenue. Matthieu sent me to ask if Mme. la Marquise will receive him."
Madame looked up from her work and turned cold, reproving eyes on worthy, perspiring Annette.
"The General?" she queried calmly. "I know noGeneral in the King's army who is like to pay me a visit to-day."
Whereupon Annette, thus rebuked, was covered with confusion, from which it took her some time to recover.
"I beg a thousand pardons, Mme. la Marquise," she stammered ruefully, as she wiped her hot, red hands on her apron. "I have known the Gen—I mean M. de Maurel all these years, and ... I ... I was meaning that...."
"That what, my good woman?" asked Madame tartly.
She appeared very detached and haughty, but Fernande, who shot one of her keen, mischievous glances at her aunt from beneath her long lashes, noted with vast amusement that though Madame was not working for the moment, the knitting needles in her hands were clicking audibly one against the other.
"I mean, Madame la Marquise, that M. le Comte de Maurel is coming down the avenue," Annette was at last able to blurt out. "Will Mme. la Marquise receive him?"
"Of course I will receive M. le Comte," replied Madame with perfect dignity. "Tell Matthieu to show M. le Comte up here."
"Yes, Madame la Marquise," murmured Annette, who felt a little awed by the atmosphere of pomp which had so unaccountably descended on the old veranda and its inmates, and to which she—poor soul!—was wholly unaccustomed. "And Matthieu says, Madame la Marquise, what is he to do about the horse?"
"The horse?"
"The Gen ... I ... I mean M. le Comte is on horseback and the stable roof fell in six years ago."
"My good Annette," here interposed M. de Courson with marked irritability, "do not worry Madame la Marquise with such trifles. Surely Matthieu can look after a horse for an hour or so while a visitor pays his respects up here!"
"Well ... Matthieu says," muttered Annette, whosetemper was none too equable at any time, "that he cannot come up and announce a visitor and look after a horse at one and the same time."
An exclamation of impatience came from Laurent as he rose from his seat.
"Why all this pother, I wonder?" he said. "I'll go and see after the man's horse. One of his own vanners, I suppose. He must look funny on horseback with that linen blouse of his flopping round him in the wind."
He crossed the veranda, ready to follow Annette. The worthy woman, having shrugged her fat shoulders and thrown up her hands with an expressive gesture of complete detachment from the doings of her betters, started to shuffle back the way she came. But before either she or Laurent had reached the wide glass portières which gave on the principal State apartments of the château, a firm tread, with a curious drag in it and accompanied by the click of spurs, was heard to cross the hall and then to resound on the parquet floor of the vast reception-room which led directly to the veranda.
"Too late,mon cousin," said Fernande in her tantalizingly demure way. "M. de Maurel has apparently been too impatient to await your welcome. He...."
She paused—the next words dying upon her lips—her hands poised in mid-air holding her work and the embroidery thread. Even she could not repress a slight gasp of astonishment as Ronnay de Maurel's tall figure appeared under the lintel of the door.
He wore the uniform of a General of Division in the army of the Emperor—the uniform which he had last worn at Austerlitz, and which he had since laid aside for the blue linen blouse. He carried hischapeau-brasunder his arm, and there was, indeed, nothing visible now of the slouchy attire which had so offended against Madame la Marquise de Mortain's ideas of what was picturesque.The gorgeous uniform, though worn and patched, became the tall, massive figure admirably, and though the gold of collar and epaulettes was so tarnished that it looked almost black, and the cloth of tunic and breeches so faded that their original dark green colour was almost unrecognizable, they lent a certain barbaric splendour to this last descendant of an ancient lineage turned democrat from conviction and temperament. From out the tall, stiff collar, covered with tarnished gold, the neck rose erect and firm, and the shoulders were squared as on parade. Ronnay de Maurel had halted on the threshold, and with a rigid military salute had greeted the assembled company. Instinctively, and on the spur of the moment, M. de Courson had risen in order to greet the new-comer; he now advanced with hand extended. Madame la Marquise could scarce believe her eyes; a change had, indeed, come over the uncouth figure of a week ago. Her cold and quizzical eyes took in at a glance all that was fine and picturesque in her eldest son's demeanour. The gold-embroidered tunic pleased her, despite the stains on it caused by the grime and smoke of powder, and a quick look of compassion, which was almost furtive, so unwonted was it, crept into her grey eyes when they caught sight of the large stain and the obvious patch in the left leg of his breeches—there where the cloth had been torn away, when a bullet from the Austrian gun had laid this splendid soldier low.
As Ronnay came forward Madame rose slightly from her seat.
"It is a pleasure to see you, my son," she said graciously.
She gave him her hand, which he did not take. Obviously he did not see it, nor yet M. de Courson's kindly gesture. But he took Laurent's hand. The awkwardness which he felt was manifested in all his movements and in the few vague words of thanks which he uttered. Then suddenly Fernande's clear, young voice rang out merrily through the constrained atmosphere whichde Maurel's appearance had produced on everyone present.
"Eh,mon cousin," she said gaily, "am I then so small or so insignificant that I alone am not worthy of your regard?"
She did not move from her seat, but this time de Maurel was not slow either in coming to her side or in taking the tiny hand which she held out to him. With a clumsy gesture, though without the slightest hesitation, he raised it to his lips. Laurent smothered an exclamation of wrath; but into Madame la Marquise's cold, grey eyes there came a sudden light of satisfaction.
"Will you not sit down, my son?" she said, with a well-bred air of condescension. "I trust that you have come to pay us a nice long visit. My brother-in-law is no worse, I hope?"
She pointed to a chair which, though at some distance from Fernande, would afford the sitter a clear view of the charming picture which the girl presented. That something more than a mere casual rencontre had taken place between her eldest son and her niece she no longer doubted; the child went up in her estimation at once, for obviously she had played her cards well. Nothing would suit Madame la Marquise's plans better than that de Maurel should evince an ardent admiration for Fernande de Courson; and if that admiration warmed into love—well, so much the better for the cause of the King. The bear was certainly beginning to dance, thought Madame, whilst the smile of satisfaction lingered round her lips and her thoughts went off roaming in the realms of fancy. Laurent would have to console himself with a rich heiress for the loss of his charming fiancée. At best, Madame herself did not greatly favour the match. M. de Courson had not a sou wherewith to endow his daughter, and Madame la Marquise had oft expressed her doubts as to His Majesty—even when he came to his throne again—being ever rich enough to compensate all his loyal adherents for the losses which they had sustained. Laurent was so handsome, that any rich girlwould only be too proud to regild his escutcheon for him in exchange for all the advantages which his gallant bearing and his sixteen quarterings would bestow upon her. Indeed, everything was shaping out for the best. Madame, while talking platitudes to de Maurel to which he only listened with half an ear, was able to note with practised eye every symptom of profound attention which he bestowed on the slightest word or movement from Fernande.
In her mind she had already appraised the enormous advantages that would accrue to the King's cause if a marriage between a de Courson and this wealthy adherent of Bonaparte could be effected. Madame la Marquise de Mortain belonged to a generation which had often seen petticoat government ruling the destinies of nations. And though—Ronnay being what he was, the true son of his father, and having perhaps inherited his father's temperament as well as his democratic ideals—she could not fail to appreciate the possibility of a de Courson once again reducing a de Maurel to complete, if short-lived, slavery.
"You have not suffered from the result of your accident, Mademoiselle Fernande?"
"Not at all,mon cousin, I thank you."
A pause. Then a pair of blue eyes were once more raised from what seemed very absorbing work.
"The woods round La Frontenay are very beautiful,mon cousin."
"Very beautiful, Mademoiselle."
"I had never visited the silent pool in the early morning before."
Another pause, necessitated by an intricate stitch in the embroidery.
"The silent pool is a very romantic spot, do you not think so,mon cousin?"
"I know so little about romance, Mademoiselle."
"The woods will teach you,mon cousin."
"I would be grateful."
"Laurent and I often wander in the woods—don't we, Laurent?"
Laurent, sitting on the edge of the stone balustrade, with his arms folded over his chest and a sinister scowl upon his face, did not vouchsafe an answer to the direct query.
"We have been as far as the silent pool," continued Fernande unconcernedly.
"It is a short walk from Courson," rejoined de Maurel.
"A very long one, I think ... over six kilomètres."
"Over six kilomètres.... Yes."
"Therefore, we have never been further than the pool."
Yet another pause. Madame la Marquise had resumed her knitting. M. de Courson tried not to appear ill at ease, and Laurent, whose exasperation became more and more obvious every moment, jumped down from the balustrade and began pacing up and down the veranda, hoping thereby to keep his nerves under control.
"But from the distance I have seen the smoke of your foundries,mon cousin," again resumed Fernande, wholly unperturbed.
"!!"
"I have never seen the interior of a foundry in my life."
"It is not a romantic sight, Mademoiselle."
"Oh, que si, mon cousin!" she retorted with sudden seriousness. "There is nothing more romantic than to see a man toiling with his body and with his brain, using his intelligence and the power which his mind has given him, in order to overcome the many difficulties which God has laid in his path, in face of the great natural advantages which He has assigned to His brute creation. And then to see hundreds of men all working together in the same way and for the same end—working in order to wrest from Nature her manifold secrets and enchainthem in the service of Man. Oh, it must, indeed, be a very inspiring sight, and one I would dearly love to see!"
She had spoken with an air of quaint earnestness which became the spiritual aspect of her personality to perfection. De Maurel had listened to her with grave intentness, his brows knit together as if he was afraid to miss some hidden meaning in her words. Laurent, on the other hand, had found it difficult to contain himself while she delivered herself of her somewhat pompous little speech. Now before his brother could reply he broke in with a harsh laugh:
"An inspiring sight, mayhap, but also a mightily unpleasant smell. Smoke, grime, dirt," he added tartly, "mingled with perspiring humanity, make up a sum total of unpleasant odours which you, Fernande, would be the first to resent if my brother Ronnay were so foolish as to accede to your whim."
"You must leave me to judge, my dear Laurent," retorted Fernande, with one of her demure little pouts, "as to what I would resent and what not. Well,mon cousin," she added once more, turning to de Maurel, "you hear what Laurent says. Are you going to be sufficiently foolish to gratify my curiosity?"
"Nay, do not appeal to Ronnay, dear cousin," rejoined the young man testily. "He hath no liking for women's company. Rumour hath it that the foundries are encircled by a wall beyond which no feminine foot hath ever trod, and anxious wives are not even allowed to bring hard-working husbands their dinner. 'Tis said that all the jail-birds in France are employed in forging cannon and manufacturing gunpowder, and that the overseers have to stand over them with flails and loaded muskets, for fear that the spirit of insubordination which is always rampant should break into open riot, and the foundries of La Frontenay be blown up sky-high by rebellious hands."
De Maurel had waited with outward patience and in his own calm somewhat sullen way until his young brotherhad come to an end with his tirade; then he interposed curtly:
"Rumour hath lied as usual."
"You cannot deny, anyhow," retorted Laurent, "that all the deserters out of the army are made to slave in your factories."
"There are not enough deserters in the armies of France to keep a single foundry going," rejoined de Maurel simply. "But these days, when foreign enemies threaten the country on every side, we cannot afford to keep even jail-birds idle. So we employ them in the powder factory, where the work is hard and full of danger, and where accidents, alas! are frequent. But the pay is good, and men who have a crime upon their conscience can redeem their past by toiling for their country, who hath need of their brain and of their muscle. Many pass out of the workshops into the army, and the Emperor had no finer soldiers than a company of our jail-birds, as you call them, who fought under my command at Austerlitz."
He paused, for, as usual, every reference to the army and to his Emperor, whom he worshipped, was apt to stir his blood, so that his words became less sober and less measured. And he had come here this afternoon with the firm determination not to lose control over himself as he had done the other day.
"If Mademoiselle Fernande desires to see the foundry," he said quite quietly after a while, "I will accompany her and show her all that there is to see."
"If accidents in your works are frequent, my good Ronnay," rejoined Laurent, who was vainly trying to conceal the irritability of his nerves, "'tis obviously not fit that our cousin should visit them."
"I would not take her there where there is any danger," retorted de Maurel curtly.
"There is always danger for a refined woman in the propinquity of men who have been nurtured in class-hatred. The sight of a delicate and aristocratic girl is like to rouse the same resentment in your jail-birds thatled to the atrocities of the Revolution. Fernande would certainly run the risk of insults, if not worse. I for one marvel at you, my dear brother, that you should think of exposing our cousin to the danger of hearing the blasphemous and obscene language which I am told is the only one spoken inside the foundries of La Frontenay."
"There is neither blasphemous nor obscene language spoken inside my workshops when I am present. If Mademoiselle Fernande deigns to entrust herself to my guidance, I'll pledge mine honour that she shall neither hear nor see a single thing that may offend her eyes or her ears."
"But, indeed,mon cousin, I am over-ready ..." began Fernande, when Madame la Marquise interposed in her wonted decisive way:
"Hoity-toity!" she said. "Here are you young people discussing projects which obviously cannot be put into execution without the consent of your elders. 'Tis I and my brother who alone can decide whether Fernande might go to visit the foundry or not. Nor hath M. le Comte Gaston been consulted as to his wishes in the matter."
"My uncle would raise no objections," said Ronnay moodily. "The inspection of the foundry is open to the public...."
"'Tis not a case of objections, my son," rejoined Madame with quiet condescension; "nor is your cousin Fernande to be classed among the public to whom casual permission might thus be given."
De Maurel frowned and that old look of churlish obstinacy once more crept into his face.
"I don't understand what you mean," he said.
"Yet 'tis simple enough, my good de Maurel," interposed M. de Courson in his turn. "There are certain usages of good society which forbid a young girl to go about alone in the company of a man other than her father or her brother."
"Surely you knew that?" queried Laurent ironically.
"No, I did not," replied de Maurel curtly. "Whyshould not Mademoiselle Fernande come with me to visit my foundries, if she desires to see them?"
"Because ... because ..." said Madame somewhat haltingly, obviously at a loss how to explain to this unsophisticated rustic the manners and usages of good society.
"I would see that she came to no harm."
"I am sure of that,mon cousin," quoth Fernande with a little sigh and a glance of complete understanding directed at de Maurel. "I should feel perfectly safe in your company."
"Fernande!" exclaimed Laurent hotly.
"There, you see?" she said, with a shrug of her pretty shoulders. "La jeune filleis a regular slave to a multiplicity of senseless conventions. Do not argue about it,mon cousin, it is quite useless.Ma tantewill hurl the proprieties at your head till she has made you feel that you are a dangerous Don Juan, and unfit to be left alone in the company of an innocent young girl like me."
"Fernande!" This time the exclamation came from Madame la Marquise, and it was uttered in a tone of stern reproach.
"A thousand pardons,ma tante! please call my words unsaid. And you,mon cousin, I entreat take no heed of the sighings of a young captive chafing against her fetters. Indeed, I am a very happy slave and only resent my chain on rare occasions, when it is pulled more tightly than suits my fancy. Otherwise my gaolers are passing lenient, and I am given plenty of liberty, so long as I indulge in it alone; and when in the early morning I take my favourite walks in the woods, I am even allowed to wander as far as the silent pool and listen to the pigeons of St. Front, unattended by a chaperone."
Fernande, while she spoke, appeared deeply engrossed in disentangling a knot in her embroidery silk; this, no doubt, accounted for the fact that her words came somewhat jerkily, and with what seemed like deliberate slowness and emphasis. Laurent, lost in the whirl of hisown jealousy, watched her less keenly than he was wont to do. Certainly he did not notice the glance which accompanied those words—a glance which de Maurel, on the other hand, did not fail to catch. It was directed at him, and was accompanied by an enigmatical little smile which he was not slow to interpret—so much guile had a pair of blue eyes already poured into the soul of this unsophisticated barbarian! Twenty-four hours ago he would have been intolerant of a young woman's diatribe on the subject of conventions, with which he had neither sympathy nor patience; to-day he heard in it certain tones which for him were full of meaning and of a vague promise.
The feeling, too, that this exquisite creature took him, as it were, into her confidence, that she implied—by that one glance of her blue eyes—that a secret understanding existed between her and him, was one that filled him with an extraordinary sense of happiness—of detachment from everything else around him—of walking on air, and of seeing the blue ether above him, open to show him a vision of intoxicating bliss.
The minutes after that went by leaden-footed. Ronnay de Maurel was longing to take his leave, to ride home as fast as he could, and in the privacy of his bare, uncomfortable room to think over every minute of this eventful day, and to anticipate as patiently as possible the hour when it might reasonably be supposed that an angel would take its morning walk abroad. Madame la Marquise made great efforts to keep the ball of conversation rolling pleasantly; but she found it difficult owing to the fact that de Maurel scarcely opened his lips again. Fernande, too, had become silent and tantalizingly demure. Her aunt thought that she was sulking owing to the veto put upon the proposed visit to the foundries. Madame would have wished to reopen that subject, for, of a truth, she would not have beenaltogether averse to going over to La Frontenay or La Vieuville, or even to bearding old Gaston de Maurel in his own lair; but Ronnay, after his one suggestion that he would take Fernande over the works, did not again renew his offer. Laurent, too, had become indescribably morose, and for once in her life Madame found it in her heart to be actually angry with her beloved son. Obviously the rapprochement with the de Maurels would be impossible if Laurent remained so persistently on the brink of a quarrel with his brother.
Though after a while Annette brought wine and biscuits on a tray, and M. de Courson and Madame la Marquise performed miracles of patience in trying to remain genial, the atmosphere became more and more constrained every moment.
Fortunately, after a while de Maurel appeared quite as eager to go as was his mother to be rid of him. He rose to take his leave, and beyond making a clumsy bow in the direction where Fernande was sitting, silent and industrious, he took no more intimate farewell of her than he did of the others. This had the effect of allaying in a slight measure Laurent's irritation. He even unbent to the extent of accompanying his brother to the gates of the château, an act of courtesy in which M. de Courson also joined.
But the moment that de Maurel's back was turned, and the steps of the three men had ceased to echo through the house, Fernande threw down her work and ran over to her aunt. She stood before the older woman, holding herself very erect, her little head held up with a remarkable air of dignity, her hands clasped behind her back.
"Ma tante, tell me," she said abruptly, "for, of a truth, I have become confused—which of the two things in life do you prize the most—the cause of our King or the fetish of social conventions?"
"Fernande," retorted Madame sternly, "meseems that for the past day or two you have taken leave of your senses. I will not be questioned in this fashion by a childlike you...."
"Ma tante," broke in the young girl solemnly, "I entreat you to believe that I am asking no idle question. I beg of you most earnestly to answer the question which I have put to you."
"The question hath no need of answer. It is answered already. And you, Fernande, are impertinent to put the question to me."
"Nevertheless,ma tante, I ask it in all seriousness, and I beg for an answer in the name of the cause which we all hold dear."
"If you put it that way, child," rejoined Madame coldly, "I cannot help but reply: you are foolish and impertinent, and I almost feel bemeaned by pandering to your foolishness."
"Ma tante," pleaded Fernande insistently.
"What is it you want me to say,enfin?"
"Tell me plainly and simply,ma tante, which you prize most: a few hollow conventions or the success of our arms in the cause of our King."
"Tush, child! of course you know that I prize the cause of our King above all else on earth."
"And you are ready to make any sacrifice for its success?"
"Of course I am! What nonsense has got into that childish head of yours, I wonder?"
"One moment,ma tante. Tell me one thing more."
"Well?"
"In your opinion, do you think that every one of us should be ready for any sacrifice that might help to further the cause of our King?"
"Of course, child. I trust you are prepared to make whatever sacrifice the cause of the King may demand from you. I know that your father is more than prepared, and so is Laurent."
"And so am I,ma tante," said Fernande firmly. "Therefore, one day soon I'll go to meet M. de Maurel in the woods of La Frontenay, and together we'll visit the Maurel foundries—all in the name of the King,ma tante."
But it was close on a fortnight before Ronnay de Maurel saw Fernande again. He went every morning to the silent pool, soon after break of day, and every morning he waited for her until the sun was high in the heavens, and he was obliged to go back to his work. He spent his time in gazing into the pool or listening to the murmur of the woods. He knew the note of every bird, he knew where each tiny couple had built its nest; he watched the crimson tips of the young chestnut unfold and turn to bronze and then to green; he read every morning in the book which God hath laid out in springtime for every one of His creatures to read. He also spent a considerable amount of time in gazing at a silk stocking and a tiny sandal shoe, which happily he thought Fernande had forgotten to claim. He would draw these treasures from out the breast pocket of his blouse and hold them in his hands and toy with them, and gaze till a mist would come to his eyes and a curious, impatient sigh would come through his parted lips.
But he never tired while he lay in wait for the beautiful fairy-like creature who had so graciously intimated to him that one day she would come. It never occurred to him to give up waiting for her; that was not his nature. The same dogged obstinacy of the de Maurels,which had driven Denise de Courson well-nigh distraught, brought Ronnay daily to the spot where he knew that he must one day meet Fernande.
Often he would wax impatient and at times anxious, but never weary; nor did he ever lose hope. He would grow anxious when two days went by and he could glean no news of her; then perhaps that self-same afternoon he would tramp over after work as far as Courson and hear from one or other of the villagers that they had seen Mademoiselle walking to church or in the orchard, or else, mayhap, he himself would catch a glimpse of her through the gates of the park or in the carriole of Père Lebrun, and he would go home satisfied.
And he would wax impatient when the sun was specially bright overhead and glinted through the trees till every tender fibre of moss looked like a tiny emerald, and the wings of the dragon-flies glistened with myriads of iridescent colours as they skimmed the surface of the pool. Then he would long for Fernande with a longing which was akin to physical pain; he longed to point out to her the play of the sun upon the tender leaves of the alder, and show her just where the white-throats had built their nest.
Then one day the sun rose behind a veil of rain-clouds, and all morning the sky was overcast. It had rained heavily during the night, and a boisterous wind stirred the branches of the trees and shook down from them the cold showers of raindrops that had lingered on the leaves. De Maurel had started out later than usual. He had no hope of meeting Fernande on such a grey day, when the clouds overhead still threatened and no gleam of sunshine came to cheer.
Yet this was the very day which she had selected for her walk in the wood. He saw her the moment he reached the clearing. She was moving slowly between the trees towards the pool. She had thrown a shawl over her shoulders and a hood over her hair; from between its folds her fair young face peeped out somewhat sober and demure.
Directly she saw him she gave a little cry of surprise and held out her hand to him.
"'Tis strange to meet again,mon cousin," she said lightly, "and on such a day as this. Brr!" she added, with a little shiver as with the other hand she drew the shawl more closely round her shoulders, "I am perished with cold. It seems more like December than May."
She noticed, with a little smile of satisfaction, that he was not slow this time in taking her hand, or clumsy in raising it to his lips.
"From what you said, Mademoiselle Fernande," he said in his abrupt way, "I knew that you would come one morning. Was I like to stay away?"
"From what I said?" she retorted with perfect surprise. "Why! What did I say,mon cousin?"
His direct and searching look brought a hot flush to her cheeks. Yet she did not know why she should blush, and was greatly angered with herself for letting him see that she was, of a truth, covered with confusion.
"Ma tantegave me leave to visit the foundries of La Frontenay," she said, with a quaint assumption of dignity, "so I came this morning, thinking, mayhap, that you would remember your promise to conduct me round the workshops ... and that perchance I might meet you here."
"I came here every morning for the past fortnight," he rejoined simply. "I hoped that you would come."
"I had to wait," she said unblushingly, "tillma tantegave me leave."
"I am sorry," he said curtly.
"Sorry? Why?"
"I loved the idea of meeting you here ... in secret ... unknown to any one...."
For some reason which she could not have accounted for, this—his first really bold speech—angered her, and she retorted coldly:
"I would not have come at all, if Laurent had not approved."
"Ah! It was Laurent then who gave you leave?"
"Yes," she replied, "it was Laurent."
Somehow she felt strangely out of tune this morning, and wished heartily that she had not come. For one thing, she hated to see him in that odious blouse which he wore; it seemed to have the effect of making him, not only clumsy and loutish, but dictatorial and arrogant. The other afternoon, when he came to Courson, she had thought him passable—in a rough and picturesque way. The faded and tarnished uniform had lent, she grudgingly admitted, a certain look of grandeur to his fine physique. To-day he looked positively ugly—one of "the great unwashed," she thought, and despised him for a demagogue—he who bore one of the finest names in France.
"Are you prepared to come to the foundry this morning?" he asked abruptly.
For the moment she had a mind to say "No!" then remembered her folk at home and the boast she had made about taming this bear. It would have been passing foolish to give up the enterprise at the first check.
"Yes, I'll come," she said, as graciously as she felt able.
He, too, felt the constraint which seemed to stand like a solid wall between her and him, and in his rough, untutored way he was seized with a sudden, wild desire to pick her up again, as he had done that other morning a fortnight ago, and to carry her through the woods which were dripping wet with the rain. He wanted to carry her through the tangled undergrowth, so that her little feet brushed against the low branches of the trees, and caused them to send down a shower of cool drops over his head, which felt hot and aching all of a sudden, as if some unseen and heavy hand had dealt him a blow between the eyes.
The exquisite fairy of two sennights ago looked like a haughty and unapproachable woman to-day, sedate and grave, with that dark shawl folded primly round her shoulders, and the folds of her hood hiding her golden hair and casting a shadow over her limpid blue eyes.
"Will you not give me your arm,mon cousin?" she asked after a while, just as he was beginning to wonder whether he would not turn on his heel and run away as the simplest way out of his present misery. He looked at her—puzzled at the sudden graciousness of her mood, and then he encountered her blue eyes, from whence all sternness had vanished as swiftly as does a snowflake under the warm kiss of the sun. He held out his arm and she placed her hand on it.
For a brief moment their eyes met, with strange, inward questioning on both sides. Even she—Fernande—with all her hatred, all her contempt for this traitor to his King, this enemy to his kindred and his caste, could not help but feel that here was no ordinary man with whose passions and whose feelings she could toy with impunity. That subtle intuition which comes to every woman even before she has stepped over the threshold of childhood, had told her before now that Ronnay de Maurel's rough and unbridled nature had already been stirred to its depths by her beauty, and that he loved her at this moment with a love all the more ardent that he himself was as yet scarce conscious of its glow.
A sense of triumph chased all other thoughts from her mind. She had it in her power—she, Fernande de Courson, who had seen kindred, friends, her own father, driven to poverty and exile by the brutal excesses of these democrats—she had it in her power to bring this protagonist of those revolutionary ideals to humiliation and suffering. Not one spark of pity did she feel for the man who was doomed to suffer for her sake. That he would suffer—keenly, grievously—was plainly writ in those deep-set eyes of his which, she now noticed for the first time, were of that mysterious violet colour which reveals a passionate soul. It was writ, too, on thatsensitive mouth round which the lines of pleasure and of pain were wont to chase one another so swiftly. Yes, he would suffer and at her hands—suffer quite as much, mayhap, as her father had suffered when he had to flee from his home at dead of night, leaving his one motherless baby to the care of a sister as helpless, as homeless as himself. He would suffer less, at any rate, than did the martyred Queen, when her royal husband was torn brutally from her arms by that revolutionary mob whose ideals Ronnay de Maurel would uphold.
It was, indeed, the law of reprisals which was pursuing its course with ruthless impartiality, and Fernande, with the fire of an ardent patriotism filling her entire soul, could not find a spark of pity for the enemy of her cause. She hated him as she never thought that she had it in her to hate any man; she longed for that freedom of thought and of action when she need no longer dissemble, when she need not endure the look of boundless admiration wherewith he dared to envelop her as with a caress, and when she could tell him to his face, the utter contempt, the hopeless loathing wherewith he inspired her.
The intensity of her feelings at the moment literally swept her off her feet. Her heart was so full that tears of self-pity welled up to her eyes; and he, seeing her tears, was clumsy enough to misinterpret them.
"Mademoiselle Fernande," he said, with a soft tone of entreaty in his rugged voice, "meseems that you are sad to-day. Will you not tell me if aught hath angered you, or caused you distress?"
Then, as she made no reply—for, of a truth, she felt that the next words which she uttered would choke her—he added more gruffly: "Will you believe me, I wonder, when I say that I would give my life to save you a moment's pain?"
She would have liked to withdraw her hand from his arm, for she was afraid that he would perceive how it trembled. But he held her close, and she felt too numbed to struggle. But he—poor wretch!—once again felt that wild, mad longing to pick her off the ground, andto carry her away—away out of this world of sordid quarrels and of strife, away to a land of which his ignorant, uneducated soul had only vaguely dreamed—a land where the trees were always of a tender green, wherein the mating birds sang a never-ending anthem—a land where there were no tears, no clouds, and wherein the sunlight danced for ever on the golden tendrils of her hair and the flower-like tips of her toes ... away to a lonely spot where only fairies and angels dwelt, and where he could lay her down on a bed of dewy moss and kiss away the tears that hung upon her lashes ... one by one.
And as with a sigh that came from the depths of his overfull heart, he made a motion to lead her away from this enchanted spot, wherein he had tasted the first bitter-sweet fruit of unending love, it seemed to him that from out the limpid mirror of the silent pool there came a call as of many living, breathing creatures in pain. The call rose and fell as if on the unseen bosom of gently lapping water, and overhead the tender branches of birch and chestnut whispered softly to one another, stirred by a newly-awakened breeze. Fernande, too, had paused—she, too, evidently had heard, for she turned inquiring, almost frightened eyes up at de Maurel. The call was so like the cooing of innumerable wood-pigeons—mournful, soul-stirring, and with a tender wail in it that spoke of sorrow, of heart-ache and of farewells.
"The pigeons of St. Front!" she murmured under her breath.
For a moment both stood still, until the melancholy plaint was wafted away on the wings of the wind. A strange feeling of awe had descended upon them. It seemed as if the Fates sitting in their eyrie far away had taken up the threads of their destiny, and were weaving and weaving, until their spindles came into a tangle which nothing but godlike hands could ever straighten out again.
"It was fancy, of course," said de Maurel after a while, seeing that Fernande had turned very white andthat she clung with a pathetic unspoken appeal for support to his arm. "I have often heard this melancholy call when the wind stirred among the trees. 'Tis no wonder the poor folk of the country-side fly from this place in terror! There is something spectral in the sound."
"You don't believe," murmured Fernande, "you don't believe in the pigeons of St. Front?"
"What is there to believe in such an ancient legend?"
"That the cooing of the pigeons foretells disaster to those that hear it?"
"No," he replied decisively. "I do not believe it in this case, Mademoiselle Fernande. The world would be topsy-turvy, indeed, and God asleep in the heavens, if disaster were to overtake so perfect a creature as you."
She broke into a low, little laugh, which to a more sophisticated ear would have sounded mirthless and forced.
"Eh,mon cousin," she said, "you attribute to the world certain desires for my welfare which, of a truth, scarcely concern it, and God, I imagine, when He endowed us with free-will, left us to be the architects of our own destiny."
"With an overseer, mayhap," he added with earnest significance, "to watch over the safety of the building."
She chose to misinterpret his meaning and not to see the look which accompanied his words.
"Is it not time we went to the foundry?" she asked.
The spell was broken. Fernande de Courson became the self-possessed young woman of the world once more, and Ronnay de Maurel the clumsy rustic, who is greatly honoured by the condescension of a great lady infinitely above him in station. They turned away from the pool, which seemed more absolutely silent now that the cooing of the pigeons had been merged in the ceaseless murmurings of the woods. Fernande leaned on Ronnay's arm, and he guided her along the paths and through the clearings, walking silently by her side.
When they reached the open, he pointed to the left where the main country road wound its smooth ribbon at the foot of the distant hills. Here a small one-horsed vehicle was standing, some few metres away from the edge of the wood.
"It is another five or six kilomètres to the foundries from here, Mademoiselle," he said, "so every morning, always hoping that you would come, I ventured to order a carriole to await you here; one of our men will drive you by the road."
Fernande was conscious of a slight feeling of vexation. "But you,mon cousin?" she asked.
"I walk across the fields," he replied curtly, "they are ploughed and ankle-deep in mud; but I will be at the foundry in time to await your coming."
She had it on the tip of her tongue to demand that he should sit beside her in the carriole, or to insist on walking across the ploughed fields with him, but her pride would not permit her to do either. Perhaps, also, she thought that having been intermittently out of tune in the woods, an hour's jolting in a rickety carriole would shake away the cobwebs that clung persistently round her mood. The carriole proved to be of very modern build, high and comfortable; a perfect English cob—priceless in value these days—was in the shafts, looking a picture of gloss and experienced grooming. A young man in sombre livery coat sat with the reins in his hand.
De Maurel lifted Fernande into the vehicle, then stood by, giving a comprehensive glance to the turn-out with an obviously experienced and critical eye. Then, as the driver gave a click of the tongue and the cob started off at a smart trot, he turned brusquely on his heel, and Fernande for a long time could see his tall figure making its way, with its peculiar, halting gait, across the ploughed fields, till a group of trees that marked a homestead hid him from her view.
It was a strange experience for Fernande to see Ronnay de Maurel in the midst of the men who worked under his orders. Outwardly—by dress and appearance—one of themselves, there was obviously an inward force and authority in him which the workers readily recognized. Somehow her visit to the foundries discouraged and disappointed her. Not that Ronnay was in any way less under her sway than he had been in the romantic atmosphere of the woods. On the contrary, every time that her eyes met his, she read in them more and more clearly the progress which his passion for her was making in the subjugation of his will-power and of his senses; and every time that in the course of his demonstrations to her, of the various processes which went to the making of the "mouths of fire," his hand came in contact with hers, she could feel the tremor which went through him at her touch.
No, indeed! she had no cause to think that the untamed bear would not be ready to dance the moment she began to pipe; but here, in the foundries where he ruled as lord and master, where thousands of men obeyed at a word or sign from him, she first realized that between enslaving a man like de Maurel, through his passions or his sensibilities, to the chariot wheel of her beauty, and gaining a real mastery over his thoughts and actions,there was the immeasurable gulf of ingrained convictions and of the fetish of intellectual freedom.
That de Maurel was the real master in the foundries of La Frontenay Fernande could not doubt for a moment.
"Keep your eyes and ears open, child," Madame la Marquise had said to her, when she at last expressed reluctant approval of her niece's plan to visit the ogre in his lair. "We hear many rumours of discontent at the works—of insubordination—of open revolt. It would serve an abominable democrat like my son Ronnay right, if the proletariat which he upholds against his own traditions and his own caste were to turn against him now as they turned against us in '89. Keep your eyes and ears open, Fernande; the discontent of which we hear may prove a splendid card in our hands."
Fernande had not altogether understood what Madame la Marquise was driving at.
"Of what use can discontent among M. de Maurel's workmen be to us?" she had asked, wondering.
"If they were to turn against their master, my dear," quoth Madame dryly.
"Oh!"
"And rally round to us...."
"Do you think it likely,ma tante?"
"More than likely. Laurent and your father and I have a plan ..." said Madame with some hesitation; "we have put it before de Puisaye and our other leaders.... I can't speak of it just yet, child," she added somewhat impatiently, "but it is most important that you should keep your eyes and ears open to-day. We must reckon, remember, that King Mob, in whose name these execrable revolutionists have murdered their King and hundreds of innocent men, women and children, has felt the power of his own will. He has tasted the sweets of open revolt against constituted authority, and he has been given a free hand to murder, to pillage and to outrage. He is not likely to be so easily curbed again; he will rebel as he has rebelled before. His so-called Emperor has placed an iron heel upon his neck ... andRonnay de Maurel and his like think that they can quench the flame of lawlessness which they themselves have kindled. Bah! methinks that it is King Mob who will avenge us all one day, by turning against the hands that first led him to strike against imaginary tyrants, and then forged the chains that made a slave of him."
And Fernande de Courson, as she wandered through the workshops of La Frontenay, thought of Madame la Marquise's impassioned tirade. How little revolt was there in these ordered places wherein men toiled and sweated in order that the Emperor might have all the cannons and powder he wanted wherewith to conquer the enemies of France! Here were no murmurings, no rebellion over authority; every man knew, as de Maurel passed him by and gave a look to the work in hand, that here was the master whose word and will must be law if all the toil, the patriotism, the enthusiasm which went to the making of these "mouths of fire" were to prove useful to the State.
The place was not picturesque. It was not inviting. The men, stripped to the waist, were covered with grime. But on their bearded faces they wore the same look of energy and of determination which glowed in the eyes of the soldiers who followed the young General Bonaparte over the Alps and across the Danube, through the snows of Poland and the sands of the desert from victory to victory. There was the same spirit—of that there could be no doubt—which had roused the whole nation to defend itself against the foreigners—the same spirit that made every man, woman and child, who could not fight the foe, toil in order to help subjugate him.
That de Maurel understood how to deal with the men was equally obvious. They evidently looked up to and trusted him, and Madame la Marquise's dream of seeing the proletariat turn against the hands that fed it would certainly not come true at La Frontenay.
Not that every cog-wheel of the gigantic machinery worked with equal smoothness. Though, for the most part, de Maurel's progress through his workshops wasaccompanied by looks of deference and at times of genuine affection and gratitude, there were murmurings, too. More than once Fernande caught the drift of a muttered complaint: "The heaviness of the toil, the unhealthy conditions, the dearness of food at home." De Maurel, however, had only one answer for all and sundry: "France," he said, and his ringing voice sounded above the din of hammers and heavy tools, above the roar of furnaces and bellows, "France has her back up against the wall, my men! the whole of Europe is up in arms against her! every one of her sons must either fight or toil till victory is assured. After that ... well ... toil will be less hard ... life more healthy ... food less dear!"
"My wife and children have not tasted meat for a month," retorted one man moodily.
"I have not tasted any for half a year," was de Maurel's cheerful reply. "My uncle and I up at La Vieuville live as you do down here; we toil as you do, suffer as much as you. When the Emperor hath brought the Prussian to his knees and compelled Austria to sue for peace, we'll all feast together ... and not before."
"'Tis dog's work sweating in front of these furnaces all the day ..." growled another man.
"Try sweating in front of the Prussian cannon,mon ami," retorted "the General," with a careless shrug of his broad shoulders.
He passed on and in his wake the murmurings somehow died down. He had a way with him, and he was so full of energy and breathed vitality from every pore to such a degree, that instinctively toil appeared lighter, and it seemed a humiliation to grumble.
It was only in the powder factory that the tempers of the men appeared of a different mettle.
The factory stood some little way from the smelting works. It was surrounded by a high wall, and its numerous sheds and imposing magazine, surmounted by a clock-tower, nestled at the foot of the hills some distance back from the road.
Mathurin, the chief overseer—a burly giant, who followed de Maurel's every movement with the look of a faithful watchdog—ventured to lay a restraining hand on his master's arm when he was told to lead the way to that more risky and dangerous portion of the great armament works.
"Leroux," he said, and there was a tone of anxiety in his gruff voice, "is in one of his most surly moods. He has given a deal of trouble lately."
"All the more reason why I should speak with him," retorted de Maurel.
"But the lady,mon général," rejoined Mathurin, as he indicated Fernande.
De Maurel turned to the young girl. "Would you care to wait, Mademoiselle Fernande," he asked, "till I have spoken to the recalcitrants? Mathurin will make you comfortable in his office...."
"Eh,mon cousin," she said boldly, with a toss of her pretty head, "are you thinking that I am afraid?"
"Indeed not, Mademoiselle," he rejoined; "nor would I allow you to enter the factory if there was the slightest cause for anxiety. But the men in there are rough; they are," he added with a harsh laugh, "the jail-birds for whom my brother Laurent hath such great contempt. They rebel against their work—and it is hard and dangerous work, I own—but the State hath need of it, and ... well, someone has to do it. But, of course, some of them hate their taskmaster, and I for one cannot altogether blame them."
"And," queried Fernande, "do they hate you,mon cousin?"
"Of course," he replied with a smile; "I am the taskmaster."
"But ... in that case ..." she hazarded, somewhat timidly this time, "are you not exposing yourself to unnecessary danger by...."
She hesitated, then paused abruptly, as he broke in with a loud laugh. "Danger!" he exclaimed. "I? In my own workshops? Why, I fought at Austerlitz, Mademoiselle."
She said nothing more, for already she was ashamed of her sudden access of sensibility. Mathurin, once more ordered to lead the way to the factory, obeyed in silence.
No doubt that here the men wore a sullen and glowering aspect which had been wholly absent in the foundries. The risky nature of the work, when the slightest inattention or carelessness might cause the most terrible accident, the rank smell of the black carbon, of the saltpetre and sulphur, together with the dirt and the mud and the weight of the mortars, all seemed to produce an ill-effect upon the tempers of the men, and as de Maurel entered the first and most important workshed, the looks which greeted him and which swept over Fernande were furtive, if not openly hostile.
It was clear that muttered discontent was in the air, and as de Maurel went from one group to another of the workers, and either praised or criticized what was done, murmurings were only suppressed by the awe which his personality obviously inspired. Mathurin stuck close to his heels, and the look of faithful watch-dog became more marked on his large, ruddy face.
A word of severe blame from the master for grave contravention of rules set the spark to the smouldering fire of discontent. A short, thick-set man, with tousled red hair and tawny beard, on whom the blame had fallen, threw down his tool at de Maurel's feet.
"Blame? Blame?" he snarled, showing his yellowteeth like an ill-conditioned cur, "nothing but blame in this place of malediction. Are we beasts that we should be made to work and risk our lives for a tyranny that would make a slave of every free citizen?"
"You'll soon become a beast,mon ami," retorted de Maurel coolly, "if you refuse to work; a useless beast and a burden to the State, fit only to be cast into a ditch, or thrown as food for foreign cannon. Pick up your tool and show that you are a man and a free citizen by doing your duty for France."
"Not another stroke will I do," growled Leroux sullenly, "till I've eaten and drunk my fill, which I've not done these past twenty days. Not another stroke, do you hear? And if I lift that accursed tool again it will be to crack your skull with it! Do you hear,mon Général? I am under one sentence for murder already—another cannot do me much more harm. So look to yourself—what? for not another stroke of work will I do ...Foi dePaul Leroux."
"Then by all means go and eat and drink your fill, friend Leroux," rejoined de Maurel imperturbably; "go, and wait as leisurely as you please for the hour when the Emperor's orders send you to join your battalion in Poland. Never another stroke of work will you do in this factory,mon ami, but 'tis the Russian cannons who will eat their fill of you."
Then he turned to the overseer.
"Mathurin!" he called peremptorily.
"Yes,mon Général!"
"Give Leroux the money that is due to him. He is no longer in my employ."
"Name of a dog ..." came with an ominous imprecation from Leroux, "is this the way to treat an honest citizen?..."
"There is no honest citizen, my man," spoke de Maurel firmly, "save he who toils for France. Get you gone! Get you gone, I say! France has no use for slackers."
"You'll rue that, General, on my faith," here interposed one of Leroux' mates in tones that held an overt threat."No one can finish this crushing save Leroux. If you dismiss him now, some of us go with him ... and the twelve hundred cannon-balls of this high calibre which the Emperor hath ordered will not be completed for want of a few skilled men."
"Those of you who wish to go," retorted de Maurel loudly, "can go hence at once, and to hell with the lot of you," he added, with a sudden outburst of contemptuous anger. "Have I not said that France hath no use for slackers? You grumblers! you miserable, dissatisfied curs! Go an you wish! The workshop stinks of your treachery!"
Then as some of the men, somewhat awed by his aspect and by the flame of unbridled wrath which shot from his glowing eyes, congregated in a little group of malcontents, egging one another on to more open revolt, he went close up to them, forcing the group to scatter before him, till he stood right in the midst of them, looking down from his great height on the skulking heads which were obstinately turned away from him and on the furtive glances which equally stubbornly avoided his own.
"You miserable cowards!" he exclaimed. "Have you no entrails, no hearts, no mind? When the sons of France—her true sons—bleed and die on the fields of Prussia and in the mountains of Italy—sometimes unfed, always ill-clothed, under a grilling sun or in snowstorms and blizzards—dragging half-shattered limbs up the precipitous heights of the Alps, or falling uncared for, unattended and unshriven, into the nearest ditch—when your brothers and your sons die for France with a 'Vive l'Empereur' upon their lips, with the unsullied flag held victorious in their dying hands, you murmur here because food is dear and work heavy! To hell, I say! to hell! Give me that, tool, Mathurin. The Emperor shall not lack for gunpowder because a few traitors refuse to toil for France!"
To Fernande, who watched this scene from a remote and dark angle of the workshop, to which she had crepton tiptoe, terrified lest her presence be noticed and considered an outrage in the midst of these turbulent quarrels—to Fernande, it seemed as if the whole personality of de Maurel had undergone an awesome change. There was something almost supernatural in that huge, massive figure with the proud head thrown back, the face lit up by the grey light which came through the skylight above.
Then suddenly, with a quick, impatient gesture, he cast off his blouse and shirt and stood there in the midst of the sullen and threatening crowd—a workman among his kindred—a man amongst men; stripped to the waist as they were, with huge, powerful torso bare, and massive arms whereon the muscles stood out as if carved in stone, as he lifted from the floor the enormous iron pestle which Leroux had flung down, and wielded it as if it were a stick. And Fernande bethought herself of all the mythological heroes of old of which she had read as a child in her story-books; of men who were as strong and mighty as the gods; of those who defied Jupiter and Mars and dared to look into the sun, or to enslave the hidden forces of the earth to their will.
For a while Leroux and the others looked on "the General" with shifty eyes wherein hatred and murder had kindled an ill-omened light. But in the mighty figure which towered above them there was not the slightest tremor of fear; in the commanding glance that met their own there was not a quiver and not the remotest sign of submission. The intrepid soldier, who at Austerlitz, bleeding, muddy, with leg shattered by a bullet, a sabre-slash across his forehead, a broken sword in his hand, had with two thousand men—some of them ex-jail-birds, as he said—held ten thousand Russians and their young Czar at bay, until the arrival of Rapp and his reinforcements, and then fell with shattered leg almost beneath the hoofs of the victorious cavalry still shouting: "Vive la France!"—he was not like to give in or to retreat before a few murderous threats from a sulky crowd of dissatisfied workmen. No, not thoughhe knew that in the hip-pocket of more than one pair of breeches there was—always ready—the clasp-knife of the ex-jail-bird made to toil in the defence of the country which his crimes had outraged, and still at war with the authority which he had once defied. Rumour in this had not lied; it was with flails that some of these men were kept to their work—the flails of the mighty will-power of one man, of his burning patriotism and of his boundless energy. Even now his look of withering contempt, his open scorn of their threats, his appropriation of Leroux' tool and the skill and strength wherewith he wielded it, whipped them like a lash. In a moment Leroux, the leader of the malcontents, found himself alone, a hang-dog expression in his face, hatred still lurking in his narrow eyes, but subdued and held in submission by a power which he could not attack save by the united will of his mates.
"I'll finish my work," he muttered after a while.
"You'll do double shift at half-pay for ten days," said de Maurel, ere he handed him back his tool, "and one month in the black carbon factory for insubordination."
For a moment it looked as if the men would rebel again. A murmur went round the workshop.
"Another sound," said the General loudly and firmly, "and I send the lot of you back to rot in jail."
He threw Leroux' tool down and quietly struggled back into his shirt and blouse. The incident was obviously closed. A minute or two later the men were back at their work, with renewed energy, perhaps, certainly in perfect silence and discipline. Mathurin, the overseer, shrugged his shoulders as he conducted Fernande and "the General" out of the workshop.
"That means peace and quiet for a few weeks," he said gruffly, "but Leroux is a real malcontent, and gives me any amount of trouble. He was condemned to deportation for murder and arson—one of the worst characters we have in the place. I wouldn't trust that man, General...."
"He is a good workman," was de Maurel's only comment.
"A good workman? Yes," Mathurin admitted, "but he is always ready with his knife. We have had two or three affrays with him. He gave me a nasty cut on the forearm less than a week ago."
"You did not tell me."
"Why should I? The cut will heal all right."
"And I would have had the fellow thrashed like the cur he is," came with a harsh oath from de Maurel. "So no doubt you were wise not to tell me—good old Mathurin," he added, and placed his hand affectionately on the workman's shoulder.
"It would be better to have him sent elsewhere," suggested the overseer.
"No one would have him."
"Let him join the army. He is good fodder for Prussian cannon."
"A mischief-maker in the army is more dangerous than here at home. And if he is a skilled workman, the Emperor hath more need of him just now at La Frontenay than in Poland."
Mathurin was silent for a moment or two, then he muttered between his teeth:
"We ought to have a couple of military overseers here, as they have at Nevers and at Ruelle. The Minister of War is ready to send us help whenever we want it."
"Are we puling infants," rejoined de Maurel lightly, "that we want nurses to look after us? You must have a poor opinion of your employer, my good Mathurin, if you think he cannot keep a few recalcitrant workmen in order."
"No one can guard against a madman striking in the dark."
"If a madman chooses to strike at me in the dark," rejoined de Maurel coolly, "all the military representatives in the world could not ward off the blow."
"But...."
"Enough, my good friend," broke in the other, witha slight tone of impatience. "You know my feelings in the matter well enough. I do not intend to have military overseers in my works, whilst I have the strength to look after them myself. When the Emperor allows me to rejoin the army I'll write to the Minister of War, for a couple of representatives to take my place during my absence ... but not before."