CHAPTER XLIX.THE ESCAPE.
There were not as many visitors as usual that season in Lintz, and those who did come were mostly English or French, who did not spend their money as freely as the Americans were accustomed to do, so that it was a matter of rejoicing to the master of the Rother Krebs when one afternoon in October the stage brought from the station two passengers whom, with his quick eye, he set down as Americans, and bustled out to meet them, deciding that they were people who would not stand for a few thalers more or less. Beatrice was very tired, for they had not stopped at all since landing in Liverpool, but had crossed at once to the Continent, and traveled day and night until they reached Lintz, where Yulah was waiting for them. She had sought and obtained the situation as chambermaid in the hotel, and, like the master, had watched impatiently for Americans, though from a very different reason. And whenherAmericans came, she knew them as if by instinct, taking Mr. Morton, however, for Everard, and feeling greatly disappointed when she learned that it was a Mr. and Mrs. Morton, who were occupying No. —, the great room in the house where princes had dined and slept. Still, something told her that Beatrice was the lady she was looking for, and when the latter retired to her room after dinner she found a sad-faced woman pretending to be busy with somethingabout the washstand, though everything seemed in its place. Suddenly she faced about, and the eyes of the two women met and looked into each other with an eager, questioning gaze.
“You are Yulah,” Beatrice said, in German, and the girl answered with a cry of joy, “Yes, and you are the Lady Beatrice she talks so much about, and he is not Mr. Everard.”
“No, my husband, Mr. Morton. We were married just before we sailed. Where is she? When did you see her last, and how soon can we have her? Will they let her go without any trouble, and what are we to do?”
Beatrice asked her questions so rapidly as to confuse and bewilder the girl, who shook her head, and answered in English:
“You ask so many, I don’t know quite all. But I go to-morrow and tell her, and see how we can do best. He will never let her go, there is too much money in her. That doctor pay big sums. We must take her, that’s all, and be so careful. You stay here till I come or send some word: not to-morrow, but next day, perhaps. I not talk more now. I be at my duties.”
She left the room then, and Beatrice saw no more of her until the day but one following, when about dark she came into the room, flushed and excited, and evidently a little shaken out of her usual quiet, composed manner. She had been to Haelder-Strauchsen; she had seen Rossie, but had not told her of her friends’ arrival.
“I did not dare,” she said, “she’s so weak and sick, no heart, no courage, but stands by the window all the day, looking to the west, and whispering, sometimes, ‘Oh, Everard, why do you not come, and I waiting so long?’ But we’ll get her sure. God fixed it for us, and he,—the doctor, I mean,—is awful with something they think is cholera, and all is fright and confusion, for the nurses is afraid and leaving, and Miss Rossie’s attendant is glad to have me take her place. So I am going back to-morrow, and you must go with me and stay in the town a mile away, until I send or bring you word what you do next. You are not afraid of cholera? Americans mostly is.”
Beewasmortally afraid of it, but she would have faced death itself for the sake of recovering Rossie, and it was arranged that they should take the boat the next day for the little town near theMaison de Sante, where Yulah told them there was a comfortable inn, where they could remain in quiet as long as they liked. Travelers, especially Americans, often stopped there, she said, and their being there would awaken no suspicion. Accordingly, the next afternoon found them occupants of a pleasant chamber in the inn, with an outlook to the river and another to the road which led out toLa Maison de Sante. Yulah had come with them on the boat as a second-class passenger, and had held no communication whatever with them, lest suspicion might in some way be aroused; and immediately after landing had taken the road to the Sanitarium, while Beatrice tried in vain to keep composed and quiet, and await the turn of events. That she should actually see Rossie that night she could not realize, and when about dark a note was brought her by a little boy, her limbs trembled so violently, and she felt so faint and giddy, as to be scarcely able to read it.
The note was as follows:
“Have a big carriage at the south gate, one little ways off, at eleven to-night. Get Michel Fahen,—he my friend; this his little boy; he keep the carriages.”
That seemed to bring Rossie very near, and Bee’s face was white as ashes as she questioned the boy, who said Michael Fahen was his father, and rented carriages to people, and if she liked he would bring him to the room. Michel was a powerfully-built man, who looked as if he could keep a whole army at bay by the sheer strength of his fists, and when told what was wanted of him, or rather that he was to wait with them near the south gate of theMaison de Santeat eleven that night, shot at them a keen, quick glance of intelligence and comprehension which made Beatrice sick with fear, lest, after all, they should fail. But his words and manner were reassuring. He could guess what they wanted, and he was the man to do it. He did not believe in the place; there were many there who ought to be out. Yes, he’d help her; he’d drive them to Vienna, if necessary;he knew the south gate, in the rear of the house, opening on a lonesome and unfrequented road.
“And I shall succeed,” he said. “Michel Fahen never fails; arms strong, horses fleet, and Yulah cunning as the very ——.”
His confidence in himself inspired them with confidence in him, and at the time appointed they were in his carriage, and entering the narrow road which lay to the rear of theMaison de Sante, and more than a quarter of a mile distant. That portion of the grounds was filled with trees and shrubbery, and was not often used either for convenience or pleasure by the inmates of the house, the chimneys of which were by daylight just perceptible through the tall, thick trees.
Bee could see nothing in the darkness except the occasional glimmer of a light moving from point to point, as she sat, half-fainting with nervous fear and impatience, while the clock in the tower told first the hour of eleven, and then the quarter, and then the half, and then,—surely there was a footstep in the direction of the gate, and a voice she recognized as Yulah’s called softly, “Michel, Michel, are you there? Help me lift her; she is dead, or fainted, and I’ve brought her all the way.”
“Can one of you hold my horses?” Michel asked, and in an instant Beatrice was at their heads, patting, and caressing, and talking to them in the language all brutes recognize, whether in English or German, while Mr. Morton and Michel were at the gate, which was high and locked, and over which they lifted bodily a figure which lay perfectly motionless in the arms of Michel, who bore it to the carriage, and laid it down gently, but not until Beatrice, with a woman’s forethought, had made sure who it was.
She had risked too much to be disappointed now, and bidding Michel wait a moment, she struck a match with which she had prepared herself, and holding it close to the inanimate form in his arms, saw the face she knew, but so white, and worn, and still, with the long, curling lashes lasting on the pallid cheeks, where tears and suffering had left their traces in dark, purplish rings, that with a gasping cry she said: “Oh, Theo, it’s Rossie, but dead; I am sure she is dead.”
“Now, Michel, drive for your life!” Yulah exclaimed, as she sprang to the box beside him, after having seen Rossie carefully lifted into the carriage, where she lay supported mostly by Mr. Morton, though her head was in Beatrice’s lap, and Beatrice’s hands were busy unfastening the waterproof hood, and her tears were flowing like rain on the face which, even in the darkness, looked ghostly white and corpse-like.
The manner of escape had been as follows: The doctor had died that afternoon, and as his disease had undoubtedly been cholera in its most malignant form, great consternation had prevailed in the building among the employees, some of whom had left, and most of whom kept as far as possible from the wing where he had died, and where Rossie’s room was situated. Yulah alone was fearless, and came and went as usual, in her capacity of attendant in place of Margotte, who had fled to the town. To prevent contagion, it was thought best to bury the body at midnight, with as little ceremony as possible, and thus everything was in confusion, of which Yulah took advantage. She was very popular in the house, and when she asked permission to go out for the evening and take one of the nurses with her, it was readily granted her, with the injunction that she should wait until her patient was asleep, or at least quiet for the night. To this she readily assented, saying that she would lock her in the room so as to prevent the possibility of her venturing into the hall while the body was being removed. This arranged, her next business was to prepare Rossie, who had recently sunk into a state of despondency amounting almost to insanity itself, and who spent most of her time sitting or standing by the window, with her face toward the setting sun, and such a hopeless, weary expression upon it as was very touching to see. She was standing thus, although it was already too dark to see more than the lights in the distant town, when Yulah came hurriedly in, and, bolting the door, went up to her and said, in broken English:
“Cheer up, petite, joy and glad at last. They are come; they here for you!”
“Not Everard! Oh, has he come?” and a low cry broke from Rossie’s quivering lips.
But Yulah stifled it at once by putting her hand over her mouth, and saying:
“Careful, much careful. They must not hear. I fix it for you, and you be still and listen.”
Very rapidly she told her that Mrs. Morton and her husband, whom she called anything but Morton, were at the inn waiting for them, and detailed her plan of escape, to which Rossie listened in a kind of apathetic way, which showed that she did not clearly comprehend what was meant, or who was waiting for her. Certainly she never thought of Beatrice, but she understood that all she had to do was to obey orders, and taking the seat which Yulah bade her take, she sat as immovable as a stone, with her great, black eyes following every movement of her nurse, who, alarmed at last at their expression and the rigid attitude of the figure, which scarcely seemed to breathe, tried to rouse her to something like sense and feeling, but all in vain.
One idea and one alone had possession of Rossie. If she would escape she must bestill, and she sometimes held her breath lest she should be heard by the men, who, at the far end of the long hall, were passing in and out of the room where the dead body lay. No one came near No. —, or paid any attention when, about half-past ten, two female figures emerged from the door,—one wrapped in a blue waterproof, with the hood drawn closely over the face; the other unmistakably Yulah, who, locking the door behind her and putting the key in her pocket, hurried with her companion down the two long flights of stairs, and through a back, winding piazza, to the rear of the house, where the door she had unfastened an hour before stood partly open, and through which she went, dragging her companion after her. It was literally dragging until the safety of the thick shrubbery was reached, when Rossie gave out and sank down at Yulah’s feet unconscious, and fainted entirely away. To add to Yulah’s alarm, there was a sound of footsteps near. Somebody was in the wood besides herself, and she waited breathlessly until the sound ceased in the distance, as the person or persons, for there seemed to be two, hurried on. Then, taking Rossie in her arms, she made what progress shecould, groping through the dark and underbrush, as she dared not keep to the path. But the gate was reached at last, and with Michel’s strong hands to help, Rossie was lifted over it and into the carriage, which was driven rapidly in the direction of the nearest railway station.