Chapter XVIII.

A

As Bontet the inn-keeper set the wine on the table before the Duke of Saint-Maclou, the big clock in the hall of the inn struck noon. It is strange to me, even now when the story has grown old in my memory, to recall all that happened before the hands of that clock pointed again to twelve. And last year when I revisited the neighborhood and found a neat new house standing on the site of the ramshackle inn, I could not pass by without a queer feeling in my throat; for it was there that the results of the duchess’ indiscretion finally worked themselves out to their unexpected, fatal, and momentous ending. Seldom, as I should suppose, has such a mixed skein of good and evil, of fatality and happiness, been spun from material no more substantial than a sportive lady’s idle freak.

“By the way, Mr. Aycon,” said the duke, after we had drunk our toast, “I have had a message from the magistrate at Avranches requesting our presence to-morrow morning at eleven o’clock. An inquiry has to be held into the death of that rascal Lafleur, and our evidence must be taken. It is a mere formality, the magistrate is good enough to assure me, and I have assured him that we shall neither of us allow anything to interfere with our waiting on him, if we can possibly do so.”

“I could have sent no other message myself,” said I.

“I will also,” continued the duke, “send word by Bontet here to those two friends of mine at Pontorson. It would be dull for you to dine alone with me, and, as the evening promises to be fine, I will ask them to be here by five o’clock, and we will have a stroll on the sands and a nearer look at the Mount before our meal. They are officers who are quartered there.”

“Their presence,” said I, “will add greatly to the pleasure of the evening.”

“Meanwhile, if you will excuse me, I shall take an hour or two’s rest. We missed our sleep last night, and we should wish to be fresh when our guests arrive. If I might advise you—”

“I am about to breakfast, after that I may follow your advice.”

“Ah, you’ve not breakfasted? You can’t do better, then.Au revoir;” and with a bow he left me, calling to Bontet to follow him upstairs and wait for the note which was to go to the officers at Pontorson. It must be admitted that the duke conducted the necessary arrangements with much tact.

In a quarter of an hour my breakfast was before me, and I seated myself with my back to the door and my face to the window. I had plenty to think about as I ate; but my chief anxiety was by some means to obtain an interview with Marie Delhasse, not with a view to persuading her to attempt escape with me before the evening—for I had made up my mind that the issue with the duke must be faced now, once for all—but in the hope of discovering why she had allowed herself to be persuaded into leaving the convent. Until I knew that, I was a prey to wretched doubts and despondency, which even my deep-seated confidence in her could not overcome. Fortunately I had a small sum of money in my pocket, and I felt sure that Bontet’s devotion to the duke would not be proof against an adequate bribe: perhaps he would be able to assist me in eluding the vigilance of Madame Delhasse and obtaining speech with her daughter.

Bontet, detained as I supposed by the duke, had left a kitchen-girl to attend on me; but I soon saw him come out into the yard, carrying a letter in his hand. He walked slowly across to the stable door, at which the face, suddenly presented and withdrawn, had caught my attention. He stopped before the door a moment, then the door opened. I could not see whether he opened it or whether it was unlocked from within, for his burly frame obstructed my view; but the pause was long enough to show that more than the lifting of a latch was necessary. And that I thought worth notice. The door closed after Bontet. I rose, opened my window and listened; but the yard was broad and no sound reached me from the stable.

I waited there five minutes perhaps. The inn-keeper did not reappear, so I returned to my place. I had finished my meal before he came out. This time I was tolerably sure that the door was closed behind him by another hand, and I fancied that I heard the click of a lock. Also I noticed that the letter was no longer visible—of course, he might have put it in his pocket. Jumping up suddenly as though I had just chanced to notice him, I asked him if he were off to Pontorson, or, if not, had he a moment for conversation.

“I am going in a few minutes, sir,” he answered; “but I am at your service now.”

The words were civil enough, but his manner was surly and suspicious. Lighting a cigarette, I sat down on the window-sill, while he stood just outside.

“I want a bedroom,” said I. “Have you one for me?”

“I have given you the room on the first floor, immediately opposite that of the duke.”

“Good. And where are the ladies lodged?”

He made no difficulty about giving me an answer.

“They have a sitting room on the first floor,” he answered, “but hitherto they have not used it. They have two bedrooms, connected by an interior door, on the second floor, and they have not left them since their arrival.”

“Has the duke visited them there?”

“I don’t think he has seen them. They had a conversation on their arrival;” and the fellow grinned.

Now was my time. I took a hundred-franc note out of my pocket and held it in my hand so that he could see the figures on it. I hoped that he would not be exorbitant, for I had but one more and some loose napoleons in my pocket.

“What was the conversation about?” I asked.

He put out his hand for the note; but I kept my grasp on it. Honesty was not written large—no, nor plain to read—on Bontet’s fat face.

“I heard little of it; but the young lady said, as they hurried upstairs: ‘Where is he? Where is he?’”

“Yes, yes!”

And I held out the note to him. He had earned it. And greedily he clutched it, and stowed it in his breeches pocket under his blouse.

“I heard no more; they hurried her up; the old lady had her by one arm and the duke by the other. She looked distressed—why, I know not; for I suppose”—here a sly grin spread over the fellow’s face—“that the pretty present I saw is for her.”

“It’s the property of the duke,” I said.

“But gentlemen sometimes make presents to ladies,” he suggested.

“It may be his purpose to do so. Bontet, I want to see the young lady.”

He laughed insolently, kicking his toe against the wall.

“What use, unless you have a better present, sir? But it’s nothing to me. If you can manage it, you’re welcome.”

“But how am I to manage it? Come, earn your money, and perhaps you’ll earn more.”

“You’re liberal, sir;” and he stared at me as though he were trying to look into my pocket and see how much money was there. I was glad that his glance was not so penetrating. “But I can’t help you. Stay, though. The old lady has ordered coffee for two in the sitting-room, and bids me rouse the duke when it is ready: so perhaps the young lady will be left alone for a time. If you could steal up—”

I was not in the mood to stand on a punctilio. My brain was kindled by Marie’s words, “Where is he?” Already I was searching for their meaning and finding what I wished. If I could see her, and learn the longed-for truth from her, I should go in good heart to my conflict with the duke.

“Go to your room,” said Bontet, whom my prospectivelargessehad persuaded to civility and almost to eagerness, “and wait. If madame and the duke go there, I’ll let you know. But you must risk meeting them.”

“I don’t mind about that,” said I; and, in truth, nothing could make my relations with the pair more hostile than they were already.

My business with Bontet was finished; but I indulged my curiosity for a moment.

“You have a good stable over there, I see,” I remarked. “How many horses have you there?”

The fellow turned very red: all signs of good humor vanished from his face; my bribe evidently gave me no right to question him on that subject.

“There are no horses there,” he grunted. “The horses are in the new stable facing the road. This one is disused.”

“Oh, I saw you come out from there, and I thought—”

“I keep some stores there,” he said sullenly.

“And that’s why it’s kept locked?” I asked at a venture.

“Precisely, sir,” he replied. But his uneasy air confirmed my suspicions as to the stable. It hid some secret, I was sure. Nay, I began to be sure that my eyes had not played me false, and that I had indeed seen the face I seemed to see. If that were so, friend Bontet was playing a double game and probably enjoying more than one paymaster.

However, I had no leisure to follow that track, nor was I much concerned to attempt the task. The next day would be time—if I were alive the next day: and I cared little if the secret were never revealed. It was nothing to me—for it never crossed my mind that fresh designs might be hatched in the stable. Dismissing the matter, I did as Bontet advised, and walked upstairs to my room; and as luck would have it, I met Mme. Delhasse plump on the landing, she being on her way to the sitting room. I bowed low. Madame gave me a look of hatred and passed by me. As she displayed no surprise, it was evident that the duke had carried or sent word of my arrival. I was not minded to let her go without a word or two.

“Madame—” I began; but she was too quick for me. She burst out in a torrent of angry abuse. Her resentment, dammed so long for want of opportunity, carried her away. To speak soberly and by the card, the woman was a hideous thing to see and hear; for in her wrath at me, she spared not to set forth in unshamed plainness her designs, nor to declare of what rewards, promised by the duke, my interference had gone near to rob her and still rendered uncertain. Her voice rose, for all her efforts to keep it low, and she mingled foul words of the duchess and of me with scornful curses on the virtue of her daughter. I could say nothing; I stood there wondering that such creatures lived, amazed that Marie Delhasse must call such an one her mother.

Then in the midst of her tirade, the duke, roused without Bontet’s help, came out of his room, and waited a moment listening to the flow of the torrent. And, strange as it seemed, he smiled at me and shrugged his shoulders, and I found myself smiling also; for disgusting as the woman was, she was amusing, too. And the duke went and caught her by the shoulder and said:

“Come, don’t be silly, mother. We can settle our accounts with Mr. Aycon in another way than this.”

His touch and words seemed to sober her—or perhaps her passion had run its course. She turned to him, and her lips parted with a smile, a cunning and—if my opinion be asked—loathsome smile; and she caressed the lapel of his coat with her hand. And the duke, who was smoking, smoked on, so that the smoke blew in her face, and she coughed and choked: whereat the duke also smiled. He set the right value on his instrument, and took pleasure in showing how he despised her.

“My dear, dear duke, I have such news for you—such news?” she said, ignoring, as perforce she must, his rudeness. “Come in here, and leave that man.”

At this the duke suddenly bent forward, his scornful, insolent toleration giving place to interest.

“News?” he cried, and he drew her toward the door to which she had been going, neither of them paying any more attention to me. And the door closed upon them.

The duke had not needed Bontet’s rousing. I did not need Bontet to tell me that the coast was clear. With a last alert glance at the door, I trod softly across the landing and reached the stairs by which Mlle. Delhasse had descended. Gently I mounted, and on reaching the top of the flight found a door directly facing me. I turned the handle, but the door was locked. I rattled the handle cautiously—and then again, and again. And presently I heard a light, timid, hesitating step inside; and through the door came, in the voice of Marie Delhasse:

“Who’s there?”

And I answered at once, boldly, but in a low voice:

“It is I. Open the door.”

She, in her turn, knew my voice; for the door was opened, and Marie Delhasse stood before me, her face pale with weariness and sorrow, and her eyes wide with wonder. She drew back before me, and I stepped in and shut the door, finding myself in a rather large, sparely furnished room. A door opposite was half-open. On the bed lay a bonnet and a jacket which certainly did not belong to Marie.

Most undoubtedly I had intruded into the bedchamber of that highly respectable lady, Mme. Delhasse. I can only plead that the circumstances were peculiar.

Return to Table of Contents

F

For a moment Marie Delhasse stood looking at me; then she uttered a low cry, full of relief, of security, of joy; and coming to me stretched out her hands, saying:

“You are here then, after all!”

Charmed to see how she greeted me, I had not the heart to tell her that her peril was not past; nor did she give me the opportunity, for went on directly:

“And you are wounded? But not badly, not badly, Mr. Aycon?”

“Who told you I was wounded?”

“Why, the duke. He said that you had been shot by a thief, and were very badly hurt; and—and—” She stopped, blushing.

(“Where is he?” I remembered the words; my forecast of their meaning had been true.)

“And did what he told you,” I asked softly, “make you leave the convent and come to find me?”

“Yes,” she answered, taking courage and meeting my eyes. “And then you were not here, and I thought it was a trap.”

“You were right; it was a trap. I came to find you at the convent, but you were gone: only by the chance of meeting with a friend who saw the duke’s carriage standing here have I found you.”

“You were seeking for me?”

“Yes, I was seeking for you.”

I spoke slowly, as though hours were open for our talk; but suddenly I remembered that at any moment the old witch might return. And I had much to say before she came.

“Marie—” I began eagerly, never thinking that the name she had come to bear in my thoughts could be new and strange from my lips. But the moment I had uttered it I perceived what I had done, for she drew back further, gazing at me with inquiring eyes, and her breath seemed arrested. Then, answering the question in her eyes, I said simply:

“For what else am I here, Marie?” and I caught her hand in my left hand.

She stood motionless, still silently asking what I would. And I kissed her hand. And again the low cry, lower still—half a cry and half a sigh—came from her, and she drew timidly nearer to me; and I drew her yet nearer, whispering, in a broken word or two, that I loved her.

But she, still dazed, looked up at me, whispering, “When, when?”

And I could not tell her when I had come to love her, for I did not know then—nor can I recollect now; nor have I any opinion about it, save that it speaks ill for me that it was not when first I set my eyes upon her. But she doubted, remembering that I had seemed fancy-struck with the little duchess, and cold, maybe stern, to her; and because, I think, she knew that I had seen her tempted. And to silence her doubts, I kissed her lips. She did not return my kiss, but stood with wondering eyes. Then in an instant a change came over her face. I felt her press my hand, and for an instant or two her lips moved, but I heard no words, nor do I think that the unheard words were for my ear; and I bowed my head.

Yet time pressed. Again I collected my thoughts from this sweet reverie—wherein what gave me not least joy was the perfect trust she showed in me, for that is perhaps the one thing in this world that a man may be proud to win—and said to her:

“Marie, you must listen. I have something to tell you.”

“Oh, you’ll take me away from them?” she cried, clutching my hand in both of hers.

“I can’t now,” I answered. “You must be brave. Listen: if I try to take you away now, it may be that I should be killed and you left defenseless. But this evening you can be safe, whatever befalls me.”

“Why, what should befall you?” she asked, with a swift movement that brought her closer to me.

I had to tell her the truth, or my plan for her salvation would not be carried out.

“To-night I fight the duke. Hush! hush! Yes, I must fight with the duke—yes, wounded arm, my darling, notwithstanding. We shall leave here about five and go down to the bay toward the Mount, and there on the sands we shall fight. And—listen now—you must follow us, about half an hour after we have gone.”

“But they will not let me go.”

“Go you must. Marie, here is a pistol. Take it; and if anyone stops you, use it. But I think none will; for the duke will be with me, and I do not think Bontet will interfere.”

“But my mother?”

“You are as strong as she.”

“Yes, yes, I’ll come. You’ll be on the sands; I’ll come!” The help she had found in me made her brave now.

“You will get there as we are fighting or soon after. Do not look for me or for the duke, but look for two gentlemen whom you do not know, they will be there—French officers—and to their honor you must trust.”

“But why not to you?”

“If I am alive and well, I shall not fail you; but if I come not, go to them and demand their protection from the duke, telling them how he has snared you here. And they will not suffer him to carry you off against your will. Do you see? Do you understand?”

“Yes, I see. But must you fight?”

“Yes, dear, I must fight. The duke will not trouble you again, I think, before the evening; and if you remember what I have told you, all will be well.”

So I tried to comfort her, believing as I did that no two French gentlemen would desire or dare to refuse her their protection against the duke. But she was clinging to me now, in great distress that I must fight—and indeed I had rather have fought at another time myself—and in fresh terror of her mother’s anger, seeing that I should not be there to bear it for her.

“For,” she said, “we have had a terrible quarrel just before you came. I told her that unless I saw you within an hour nothing but force should keep me here, and that if they kept me here by force, I would find means to kill myself; and that I would not see nor speak to the duke unless he brought me to you, according to his promise; and that if he sent his necklace again—for he sent it here half an hour ago—I would not send it back as I did then, but would fling it out of the window yonder into the cattle pond, where he could go and fetch it out himself.”

And my dearest Marie, finding increased courage from reciting her courageous speech, and from my friendly hearing of it, raised her voice, and her eyes flashed, so that she looked yet more beautiful; and again did I forget inexorable time. But it struck me that there was small wonder that Mme. Delhasse’s temper had not been of the best nor calculated to endure patiently such a vexatious encounter as befell her when she ran against me on the landing outside her door.

Yet Marie’s courage failed again; and I told her that before we fought I would tell my second of her state, so that if she came not and I were wounded (of worse I did not speak), he would come to the inn and bring her to me. And this comforted her more, so that she grew calmer, and, passing from our present difficulties, she gave herself to persuading me (nor would the poor girl believe that I needed no persuading) that in no case would she have yielded to the duke, and that her mother had left her in wrath born of an utter despair that Marie’s will in the matter could ever be broken down.

“For I told her,” Marie repeated, “that I would sooner die!”

She paused, and raising her eyes to mine, said to me (and here I think courage was not lacking in her):

“Yes, although once I had hesitated, now I had rather die. For when I hesitated, God sent you to my door, that in love I might find salvation.”

Well, I do not know that a man does well to describe all that passes at times like this. There are things rather meet to be left dwelling in his own heart, sweetening all his life, and causing him to marvel that sinners have such joys conceded to them this side of Heaven; so that in their recollection he may find, mingling with his delight, an occasion for humility such as it little harms any of us to light on now and then.

Enough then—for the telling of it; but enough in the passing of it there was not nor could be. Yet at last, because needs must when the devil—or a son—aye, or an elderly daughter of his—drives, I found myself outside the door of Mme. Delhasse’s room. With the turning of the lock Marie whispered a last word to me, and full of hope I turned to descend the stairs. For I had upon me the feeling which, oftener perhaps than we think, gave to the righteous cause a victory against odds when ordeal of battle held sway. Now, such a feeling is, I take it, of small use in a court of law.

But Fortune lost no time in checking my presumption by an accident which at first gave me great concern. For, even as I turned away from the door of the room, there was Mme. Delhasse coming up the stairs. I was fairly caught, there was no doubt about it; and for Marie’s sake I was deeply grieved, for I feared that my discovery would mean another stormy scene for her. Nevertheless, to make the best of it, I assumed a jaunty air as I said to Mlle. Delhasse:

“The duke will be witness that you were not in your room, madame. You will not be compromised.”

I fully expected that an outburst of anger would follow on this pleasantry of mine—which was, I confess, rather in the taste best suited to Mme. Delhasse than in the best as judged by an abstract standard—but to my surprise the old creature did nothing worse than bestow on me a sour grin. Apparently, if I were well-pleased with the last half-hour, she had found time pass no less pleasantly. All traces of her exasperation and ill humor had gone, and she looked as pleased and contented as though she had been an exemplary mother, rewarded (as such deserve to be) by complete love and peace in her family circle.

“You’ve been slinking in behind my back, have you?” she asked, but still with a grin.

“It would have been rude to force an entrance to your face,” I observed.

“And I suppose you’ve been making love to the girl?”

“At the proper time, madame,” said I, with much courtesy, “I shall no doubt ask you for an interview with regard to that matter. I shall omit no respect that you deserve.”

As I spoke, I stood on one side to let her pass. I cannot make up my mind whether her recent fury or her present good humor repelled me more.

“You’d have a fine fool for a wife,” said she, with a jerk of her thumb toward the room where the daughter was.

“I should be compensated by a very clever mother-in-law,” said I.

The old woman paused for an instant at the top of the stairs, and looked me up and down.

“Aye,” said she, “you men think yourselves mighty clever, but a woman gets the better of you all now and then.”

I was utterly puzzled by her evident exultation. The duke could not have consented to accept her society in place of her daughter’s; but I risked the impropriety and hazarded the suggestion to Mme. Delhasse. Her face curled in cunning wrinkles. She seemed to be about to speak, but then she shut her lips with a snap, and suspicion betrayed itself again in her eyes. She had a secret—a fresh secret—I could have sworn, and in her triumph she had come near to saying something that might have cast light on it.

“By the way,” I said, “your daughter did not expect my coming.” It was perhaps a vain hope, but I thought that I might save Marie from a tirade.

The old woman shrugged her shoulders, and observed carelessly:

“The fool may do what she likes;” and with this she knocked at the door.

I did not wait to see it opened—to confess the truth, I felt not sure of my temper were I forced to see her and Marie together—but went downstairs and into my own room. There I sat down in a chair by the window close to a small table, for I meant to write a letter or two to friends at home, in case the duke’s left hand should prove more skillful than mine when we met that evening. But, finding that I could hardly write with my right hand and couldn’t write at all with the other, I contented myself with scrawling laboriously a short note to Gustave de Berensac, which I put in my pocket, having indorsed on it a direction for its delivery in case I should meet with an accident. Then I lay back in my chair, regretting, I recollect, that, as my luggage was left at Avranches, I had not a clean shirt to fight in; and then, becoming drowsy, I began to stare idly along the road in front of the window, rehearsing the events of the last few days in my mind, but coming back to Marie Delhasse.

So an hour passed away. Then I rose and stretched myself, and gave a glance out of the window to see if we were likely to have a fine evening for our sport, for clouds had been gathering up all day. And when I had made up my mind that the rain would hold off long enough for our purpose, I looked down at the road again, and there I saw two figures which I knew. From the direction of Pontorson came Jacques Bontet the inn-keeper, slouching along and smoking a thin black cigar.

“Ah! he has been to deliver the note to our friends the officers,” said I to myself.

And then I looked at the other familiar figure, which was that of Mme. Delhasse. She wore the bonnet and cloak which had been lying on the bed in her room at the time of my intrusion. She was just leaving the premises of the inn strolling, nay dawdling, along. She met Bontet and stopped for a moment in conversation with him. Then she pursued her leisurely walk in the direction of Pontorson, and I watched her till she was about three hundred yards off. But her form had no charms, and, growing tired of the prospect, I turned away remarking to myself:

“I suppose the old lady wants just a little stroll before dinner.”

Nor did I see any reason to be dissatisfied with either of my inferences—at the moment. So I disturbed myself no more, but rang the bell and ordered some coffee and a little glass of the least bad brandy in the inn. For it could not be long before I was presented with the Duke of Saint-Maclou’s compliments and an intimation that he would be glad to have my company on a walk in the cool of the evening.

Return to Table of Contents

S

Slowly the afternoon wore away. My content had given place to urgent impatience, and I longed every moment for the summons to action. None came; and a quarter to five I went downstairs, hoping to find some means of whiling away the interval of time. Pushing open the door of the littlesalle-à-manger, I was presented with a back view of my host M. Bontet, who was leaning out of the window. Just as I entered, he shouted “Ready at six!” Then he turned swiftly round, having, I suppose, heard my entrance; at the same moment, the sound of a door violently slammed struck on my ear across the yard. I moved quickly up to the window. The stable door was shut; and Bontet faced me with a surly frown on his brow.

“What is to be ready at six?” I asked.

“Some refreshments for Mme. Delhasse,” he answered readily.

“You order refreshments from the stable?”

“I was shouting to the scullery: the door is, as you will perceive, sir, there to the left.”

Now I knew that this was a lie, and I might very likely have said as much, had not the Duke of Saint-Maclou at this moment come into the room. He bowed to me, but addressed himself to Bontet.

“Well, are the gentlemen to be here at five?” he asked.

Bontet, with an air of relief, began an explanation. One of the gentlemen—M. de Vieuville, he believed—had read out the note in his presence, and had desired him to tell the duke that he and the other gentleman would meet the duke and his friend on the sands at a quarter to six. They would be where the road ceased and the sand began at that hour.

“He seems to think,” Bontet explained, “that less attention would thus be directed to the affair.”

The precaution seemed wise enough; but why had M. de Vieuville taken Bontet so much into his confidence? The same thought struck the duke, for he asked sharply:

“Why did he read the note to you?”

“Oh, he thought nothing of that,” said Bontet easily. “The gentlemen at Pontorson know me very well: several affairs have been arranged from this house.”

“You ought to keep a private cemetery,” said the duke with a grim smile.

“The sands are there,” laughed the fellow, with a wave of his hand.

Nobody appeared to desire to continue this cheerful conversation, and silence fell upon us for some moments. Then the duke observed:

“Bontet, I want you for a few minutes. Mr. Aycon, shall you be ready to start in half an hour? Our friends will probably bring pistols: failing that, I can provide you, if you have no objection to using mine.”

I bowed, and they left me alone. And then, having nothing better to do, I lit a cigar, vaulted out of the window, and strolled toward the stable. My curiosity about the stable had been growing rapidly. I cast a glance round, and saw nobody in the yard. Then, with a careless air, I turned the handle of the door. Nothing occurred. I turned it more violently; still nothing happened. I bent down suddenly and looked through the keyhole. And I saw—not a key, but—an eye! And for ten seconds I looked at the eye. Then the eye disappeared; and I heard that little unmistakable “click.” The eye had a pistol—and had cocked it! Was that because it saw through the keyhole strange garments, instead of the friendly bright blue of Bontet’s blouse? And why had the eye such a dislike to strangers? I straightened myself again and took a walk along the length of the stable, considering these questions and, incidentally, looking for a window; but the only window was a clear four feet above my head.

I am puzzled even now to say whether I regret not having listened to the suspicion that was strong in my breast. Had I forecast, in the least degree, the result of my neglecting to pay heed to its warning, I should not have hesitated for a moment. But in the absence of such a presage, I felt rather indifferent about the matter. My predominant desire was to avoid the necessity of postponing the settlement of the issue between the duke and myself; and a delay to that must needs follow, if I took action in regard to the stable. Moreover, why should I stir in the matter? I had a right to waive any grievance of my own; for the rest, it seemed to me that justice was not much concerned in the matter; the merits or demerits of the parties were, in my view, pretty equal; and I questioned the obligation to incur, not only the delay which I detested, but, in all probability, a very risky adventure in a cause which I had very little at heart.

If “the eye” could, by being “ready at six,” get out of the stable while the duke and I were engaged otherwise and elsewhere, why—“Let him,” said I, “and go to the devil his own way. He’s sure to get there at last!” So I reasoned—or perhaps, I should rather say, so I felt; and I must repeat that I find it difficult now to be very sorry that my mood was what it was.

My half hour was passing. I crossed back to the window and got in again. The duke, whose impatience rivaled my own, was waiting for me. A case of pistols lay on the table and, having held them up for me to see, he slipped them inside his coat.

“Are you ready, sir?” he asked. “We may as well be starting.”

I bowed and motioned him to precede me. He also, in spite of his impatience, seemed to me to be in a better humor than earlier in the day. The interview with Mme. Delhasse must have been satisfactory to both parties. Had not his face showed me the improvement in his temper, his first words after we left the premises of the inn (at a quarter past five exactly) would have declared it; for he turned to me and said:

“Look here, Mr. Aycon. You’re running a great risk for nothing. Be a sensible man. Go back to Avranches, thence to Cherbourg, and thence to where you live—and leave me to settle my own affairs.”

“Before I accept that proposal,” said I, “I must know what ‘your own affairs’ include.”

“You’re making a fool of yourself—or being made a fool of—which you please,” he assured me; and his face wore for the moment an almost friendly look. I saw clearly that he believed he had won the day. The old lady had managed to make him think that—by what artifice I knew not. But what I did know was that I believed not a jot of the insinuation he was conveying to me, and had not a doubt of the truth, and sincerity of Marie Delhasse.

“The best of us do that sometimes,” I answered. “And when one has begun, it is best to go through.”

“As you please. Have you ever practiced with your left hand?”

“No,” said I.

“Then,” said he, “you’ve not long to live.”

To do him justice, he said it in no boasting way, but like a man who would warn me, and earnestly.

“I have never practiced with my right either,” I remarked. “I think I get rather a pull by the arrangement.”

He walked on in silence for a few yards. Then he asked:

“You’re resolved on it?”

“Absolutely,” I returned. For I understood that he did but offer the same terms as before—terms which included the abandonment of Marie Delhasse.

On we went, our faces set toward the great Mount, and with the sinking sun on our left hands. We met few people, and as we reached the sands yet fewer. When we came to a stand, just where the causeway now begins (it was not built then), nobody was in sight. The duke took out his watch.

“We are punctual to the minute,” said he. “I hope those fellows won’t be very late, or the best of the light will be gone.”

There were some large flat blocks of stone lying by the roadside, and we sat down on them and waited. We were both smoking, and we found little to say to one another. For my part, I thought less of our coming encounter than of the success of the scheme which I had laid for Marie’s safety. And I believe that the duke, on his part, gave equally small heed to the fight; for the smile of triumph or satisfaction flitted now and again across his face, called forth, I made no doubt, by the pleasant conviction which Mlle. Delhasse had instilled into his mind, and which had caused him to dub me a fool for risking my life in the service of a woman who had promised all he asked of her.

But the sun sank; the best of the light went; and the officers from Pontorson did not come. It was hard on six.

“If we fight to-night, we must fight now!” cried the duke suddenly. “What the plague has become of the fellows?”

“It’s not too dark for me,” said I.

“But it soon will be for me,” he answered. “Come, are we to wait till to-morrow?”

“We’ll wait till to-morrow,” said I, “if you’ll promise not to seek to see or speak to Mlle. Delhasse till to-morrow. Otherwise we’ll fight tonight, seconds or no seconds, light or no light!”

I never understood perfectly the temper of the man, nor the sudden gusts of passion to which, at a word that chanced to touch him, he was subject. Such a storm caught him now, and he bounded up from where he sat, cursing me for an insolent fellow who dared to put him under terms—for a fool who flattered himself that all women loved him—and for many other things which it is not well to repeat. So that at last I said:

“Lead the way, then: you know the best place, I suppose.”

Still muttering in fury, cursing now me, now the neglectful seconds, he strode rapidly on to the sands and led the way at a quick pace, walking nearly toward the setting sun. The land trended the least bit outward here, and the direction kept us well under the lee of a rough stone wall that fringed the sands on the landward side. Stunted bushes raised their heads above the wall, and the whole made a perfect screen. Thus we walked for some ten minutes with the sun in our eyes and the murmur of the sea in our ears. Then at a spot where the bushes rose highest the duke abruptly stopped, saying, “Here,” and took the case of pistols out of his pocket. He examined the loading, handing each in turn to me. While this was being done neither of us spoke. Then he held them both out, the stocks towards me; and I took the one nearest to my hand. The duke laid the other down on the sands and motioned me to follow his example; and he took his handkerchief out of his pocket and wound it round his right hand, confining the fingers closely.

“Tie the knot, if you can,” said he, holding out his hand thus bound.

“So far I am willing to trust you,” said I; but he bowed ironically as he answered:

“It will be awkward enough anyhow for the one of us that chances to kill the other, seeing that we have no seconds or witnesses; but it would look too black against me, if my right hand were free while yours is in a sling. So pray, Mr. Aycon, do not insist on trusting me too much, but tie the knot if your wounded arm will let you.”

Engrossed with my thoughts and my schemes, I had not dwelt on the danger to which he called my attention, and I admit that I hesitated.

“I have no wish to be called a murderer,” said I. “Shall we not wait again for M. de Vieuville and his friend?”

“Curse them!” said he, fury in his eye again. “By Heavens, if I live, I’ll have a word with them for playing me such a trick! The light is all but gone now. Come, take your place. There is little choice.”

“You mean to fight, then?”

“Not if you will leave me in peace: but if not—”

“Let us go back to the inn and fight to-morrow: and meanwhile things shall stand as they are,” said I, repeating my offer, in the hope that he would now be more reasonable.

He looked at me sullenly; then his rage came again upon him, and he cried:

“Take your place: stand where you like, and, in God’s name, be quick!” And he paused, and then added: “I cannot live another night—” And he broke off again, and finished by crying: “Quick! Are you ready?”

Seeing there was no help for it, I took up a position. No more words passed between us, but with a gesture he signed to me to move a little: and thus he adjusted our places till we were opposite one another, about two yards between us, and each presenting his side direct to the sun, so that its slanting rays troubled each of us equally, and that but little. Then he said:

“I will step back five paces, and do you do the like. When we are at the distance, do you count slowly, ‘One—two—three,’ and at ‘Three’ we will fire.”

I did not like having to count, but it was necessary that one of us should; and he, when I pressed him, would not. Therefore it was arranged as he said. And I began to step back, but for an instant he stayed me. He was calm now, and he spoke in quiet tones.

“Even now, if you will go!” said he. “For the girl is mine; and I think that, and not my life or death, is what you care about.”

“The girl is not yours and never will be,” said I. But then I remembered that, the seconds not having come, my scheme had gone astray, and that if he lived in strength, Marie would be well-nigh at his mercy. And on that I grew stern, and the desire for his blood came on me; and he, I think, saw it in my face, for he smiled, and without more turned and walked to his place. And I did the like; and we turned round again and stood facing one another.

All this time my pistol had hung in the fingers of my right hand. I took it now in my left, and looked to it, and cried to the duke:

“Are you ready?”

And he answered easily:

“Yes, I’m ready.”

Then I raised my arm and took my aim,—and if the aim were not true on his heart, my hand and not my will deserves the praise of Mercy,—and I cried aloud:

“One!” and paused; and cried “Two!”

And as the word left my lips—before the final fatal “Three!” was so much as ready to my tongue—while I yet looked at the duke to see that I was not taking him unawares—loud and sharp two shots rang out at the same instant in the still air: I felt the whizz of a bullet, as it shaved my ear; and the duke, without a sound, fell forward on the sands, his pistol exploding as he fell.

After all we had our witnesses!

Return to Table of Contents

F

For a moment I stood in amazement, gazing at my opponent where he lay prostrate on the sands. Then, guided by the smoke which issued from the bushes, I darted across to the low stone wall and vaulted on to the top of it. I dived into the bushes, parting them with head and hand: I was conscious of a man’s form rushing by me, but I could pay no heed to him, for right in front of me, in the act of re-loading his pistol, I saw the burly inn-keeper Jacques Bontet. When his eyes fell on me, as I leaped out almost at his very feet, he swore an oath and turned to run. I raised my hand and fired. Alas! the Duke of Saint-Maclou had been justified in his confidence; for, to speak honestly, I do not believe my bullet went within a yard of the fugitive. Hearing the shot and knowing himself unhurt, he halted and faced me. There was no time for re-loading. I took my pistol by the muzzle and ran at him. My right arm was nearly useless; but I took it out of the sling and had it ready, for what it was worth. I saw that the fellow’s face was pale and that he displayed no pleasure in the game. But he stood his ground; and I, made wary by the recollection of my maimed state, would not rush on him, but came to a stand about a yard from him, reconnoitering how I might best spring on him. Thus we rested for a moment till remembering that the duke, if he were not already dead, lay at the mercy of the other scoundrel, I gathered myself together and threw myself at Jacques Bontet. He also had clubbed his weapon, and he struck wildly at me as I came on. My head he missed, and the blow fell on my right shoulder, settling once for all the question whether my right arm was to be of any use or not. Yet its uselessness mattered not, for I countered his blow with a better, and the butt of my pistol fell full and square on his forehead. For a moment he stood looking at me, with hatred and fear in his eyes: then, as it seemed to me, quite slowly his knees gave way under him; his face dropped down from mine; he might have been sinking into the ground, till at last, his knees being bent right under him, uttering a low groan, he toppled over and lay on the ground.

Spending on him and his state no more thought that they deserved, I snatched his pistol from him (for mine was broken at the junction of barrel and stock), and, without waiting to load (and indeed with one hand helpless and in the agitation which I was suffering it would have taken me more than a moment), I hastened back to the wall, and, parting the bushes, looked over. It was a strange sight that I saw. The duke was no longer prone on his face, as he had fallen, but lay on his back, with his arms stretched out, crosswise; and by his side knelt a small spare man, who searched, hunted, and rummaged with hasty, yet cool and methodical, touch, every inch of his clothing. Up and down, across and across, into every pocket, along every lining, aye, down to the boots, ran the nimble fingers; and in the still of the evening, which seemed not broken but rather emphasized by the rumble of the tide that had begun to come in over the sands from the Mount, his passionate curses struck my ears. I recollect that I smiled—nay, I believe that I laughed—for the man was my old acquaintance Pierre—and Pierre was still on the track of the Cardinal’s Necklace; and he had not doubted, any more than I had doubted, that the duke carried it upon his person. Yet Pierre found it not, for he was growing angry now; he seemed to worry the still body, pushing it and tossing the arms of it to and fro as a puppy tosses a slipper or a cushion. And all the while the unconscious face of the Duke of Saint-Maclou was turned up to heaven, and a stiff smile seemed to mock the baffled plunderer. And I also wondered where the necklace was.

Then I let myself down on to the noiseless sands and stole across to the spot where the pair were. Pierre’s hands were searching desperately and wildly now; he no longer expected to find, but he could not yet believe that the search was in very truth in vain. Absorbed in his task, he heard me not; and coming up I set my foot on the pistol that lay by him, and caught him, as the duke had caught Lafleur his comrade, by the nape of the neck, and said to him, in a bantering tone:

“Well, is it not there, my friend?”

He wriggled; but the strength of the little man in a struggle at close quarters was as nothing, and I held him easily with my one sound hand. And I mocked him, exhorting him to look again, telling him that everything was not to be seen from a stable, and bidding him call Lafleur from hell to help him. And under my grip he grew quiet and ceased to search; and I heard nothing but his quick breathing. And I laughed at him as I plucked him off the duke and flung him on his back on the sands, and stood looking down on him. But he asked no mercy of me; his small eyes answered defiance back to me, and he glanced still wistfully at the quiet man beside us.

Yet he was to escape me—with small pain to me, I confess. For at the moment a cry rang loud in my ear: I knew the voice; and though I kept my foot on Pierre’s pistol, yet I turned my head. And on the instant the fellow sprang to his feet, and, with an agility that I could not have matched, started running across the sands toward the Mount. Before I had realized what he was about, he had thirty yards’ start of me. I heard the water rushing in now; he must wade deep, nay, he must swim to win the Mount. But from me he was safe, for I was no such runner as he. Yet, had he and I been alone, I would have pursued him. But the cry rang out again, and, giving no more thought to him, I turned whither Marie Delhasse, come in pursuance of my directions, stood with a hand pointed in questioning at the duke, and the pistol that I had given her fallen from her fingers on the sand. And she swayed to and fro, till I set my arm round her and steadied her.

“Have you killed him?” she asked in a frightened whisper.

“I did not so much as fire at him,” I answered. “We were attacked by thieves.”

“By thieves?”

“The inn-keeper and another. They thought that he carried the necklace, and tracked us here.”

“And did they take it?”

“It was not on him,” I answered, looking into her eyes.

She raised them to mine and said simply:

“I have it not;” and with that, asking no more, she drew near to the duke, and sat down by him on the sand, and lifted his head on to her lap, and wiped his brow with her handkerchief, saying in a low voice, “Is he dead?”

Now, whether it be, as some say, that the voice a man loves will rouse him when none else will, or that the duke’s swoon had merely come to its natural end, I know not; but, as she spoke, he, who had slept through Pierre’s rough handling, opened his eyes, and, seeing where he was, tried to raise his hand, groping after hers: and he spoke, with difficulty indeed, yet plainly enough, saying:

“The rascals thought I had the necklace. They did not know how kind you had been, my darling.”

I started where I stood. Marie grew red and then white, and looked down at him no longer with pity, but with scorn and anger on her face.

“I have it not,” she said again. “For all heaven, I would not touch it!”

And she looked up to me as she said it, praying me with her eyes to believe.

But her words roused and stung the duke to an effort and an activity that I thought impossible to him; for he rolled himself from her lap, and, raising himself on his hand, with half his body lifted from the ground, said in a loud voice:

“You have it not? You haven’t the necklace? Why, your message told me that you would never part from it again?”

“I sent no message,” she answered in a hard voice, devoid of pity for him; how should she pity him? “I sent no message, save that I would sooner die than see you again.”

Amazement spread over his face even in the hour of his agony.

“You sent,” said he, “to say that you would await me to-night, and to ask for the necklace to adorn yourself for my coming.”

Though he was dying, I could hardly control myself to hear him speak such words. But Marie, in the same calm scornful voice asked:

“By whom did the message come?”

“By your mother,” said he, gazing at her eagerly. “And I sent mine—the one I told you—by her. Marie, was it not true?” he cried, dragging himself nearer to her.

“True!” she echoed—and no more.

But it was enough. For an instant he glared at her; then he cried:

“That old fiend has played a trick on me! She has got the necklace!”

And I began to understand the smile that I had seen on Mme. Delhasse’s face, and her marvelous good humor; and I began to have my opinion concerning her evening stroll to Pontorson. Bontet and Pierre had been matched against more than they thought.

The duke, painfully supported on his hand, drew nearer still to Marie; but she rose to her feet and retreated a pace as he advanced. And he said:

“But you love me, Marie? You would have—”

She interrupted him.

“Above all men I loathe you!” she said, looking on him with shrinking and horror in her face.

His wound was heavy on him—he was shot in the stomach and was bleeding inwardly—and had drawn his features; his pain brought a sweat on his brow, and his arm, trembling, scarce held him. Yet none of these things made the anguish in his eyes as he looked at her.

“This is the man I love,” said she in calm relentlessness.

And she put out her hand and took mine, and drew me to her, passing her arm through mine. The Duke of Saint-Maclou looked up at us; then he dropped his head, heavily and with a thud on the sand, and so lay till we thought he was dead.

Yet it might be that his life could be saved, and I said to Marie:

“Stay by him, while I run for help.”

“I will not stay by him,” she said.

“Then do you go,” said I. “Stop the first people you meet; or, if you see none, go to the inn. And bid them bring help to carry a wounded man and procure a doctor.”

She nodded her head, and, without a glance at him, started running along the sands toward the road. And I, left alone with him, sat down and raised him, as well as I could, turning his face upward again and resting it on my thigh. And I wiped his brow. And, after a time, he opened his eyes.

“Help will be here soon,” I said. “She has gone to bring help.”

Full ten minutes passed slowly; he lay breathing with difficulty, and from time to time I wiped his brow. At last he spoke.

“There’s some brandy in my pocket. Give it me,” he said.

I found the flask and gave him some of its contents, which kept the life in him for a little longer. And I was glad to feel that he settled himself, as though more comfortably, against me.

“What happened?” he asked very faintly.

And I told him what had happened, as I conceived it—how that Bontet must have given shelter to Pierre, till such time as escape might be possible; but how that, when Bontet discovered that the necklace was in the inn, the two scoundrels, thinking that they might as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb, had determined to make another attempt to secure the coveted spoil; how, in pursuance of this scheme, Bontet had, as I believed, suppressed the duke’s message to his friends at Pontorson, with the intent to attack us, as they had done, on the sands; and I added that he himself knew, better than I, what was likely to have become of the necklace in the hands of Mme. Delhasse.

“For my part,” I concluded, “I doubt if Madame will be at the inn to welcome us on our return.”

“She came to me and told me that Marie would give all I asked, and I gave her the necklace to give to Marie; and believing what she told me, I was anxious not to fight you, for I thought you had nothing to gain by fighting. Yet you angered me, so I resolved to fight.”

He seemed to have strength for nothing more; yet at the end, before life left him, one strange last change came over him. Both his rough passion and the terrible abasement of defeat seemed to leave him, and his face became again the face of a well-bred, self-controlled man. There was a helpless effort at a shrug of his shoulders, a scornful slight smile on his lips, and a look of recognition, almost of friendliness, almost of humor, in his eyes, as he said to me, who still held his head:

“Mon Dieu, but I’ve made a mess of it, Mr. Aycon!”

And I do not know that anyone could better this epitaph which the Duke of Saint-Maclou composed for himself in the last words he spoke this side the grave.

Return to Table of Contents

Back to IndexNext