The day of the wedding there was a gay procession through the parish of the friends and constituents of Magon Farcinelle. When they came to his home he joined them, and marched at the head of the procession as had done many a forefather of his, with ribbons on his hat and others at his button-hole. After stopping for exchange of courtesies at several houses in the parish, the procession came to the homestead of the Lavilettes, and the crowd were now enough excited to forget the pride which had repelled and offended them for many years.
Monsieur Lavilette made a polite speech, sending round cider and “white wine” (as native whiskey was called) when he had finished. Later, Nicolas furnished some good brandy, and Farcinelle sent more. A good number of people had come out of curiosity to see what manner of man the Englishman was, well prepared to resent his overbearing snobbishness—they were inclined to believe every Englishman snobbish. But Ferrol was so entirely affable, and he drank so freely with everyone that came to say “A votre sante, M’sieu’ le Baron,” and kept such a steady head in spite of all those quantities of white wine, brandy and cider, that they were almost ready to carry him on their shoulders; though, with their racial prejudice, they would probably have repented of that indiscretion on the morrow.
Presently, dancing began in a paddock just across the road from the house; and when Madame Lavilette saw that Mr. Ferrol gave such undisguised countenance to the primitive rejoicings, she encouraged the revellers and enlarged her hospitality, sending down hampers of eatables. She preened with pleasure when she saw Ferrol walking up and down in very confidential conversation with Christine. If she had been really observant she would have seen that Ferrol’s tendency was towards an appearance of confidential friendliness with almost everybody. Great ideas had entered Madame’s head, but they were vaguely defining themselves in Christine’s mind also. Where might not this friendship with Ferrol lead her?
Something occurred in the midst of the dancing which gave a new turn to affairs. In one of the pauses a song came monotonously lilting down the street; yet it was not a song, it was only a sort of humming or chanting. Immediately there was a clapping of hands, a flutter of female voices, and delighted exclamations of children.
“Oh, it’s a dancing bear, it’s a dancing bear!” they cried.
“Is it Pito?” asked one.
“Is it Adrienne?” cried another.
“But no; I’ll bet it’s Victor!” exclaimed a third. As the man and the bear came nearer, they saw it was neither of these. The man’s voice was not unpleasant; it had a rolling, crooning sort of sound, a little weird, as though he had lived where men see few of their kind and have much to do with animals.
He was bearded, but young; his hair grew low on his forehead, and, although it was summer time, a fur cap was set far back, like a fez, upon his black curly hair. His forehead was corrugated, like that of a man of sixty who had lived a hard life; his eyes were small, black and piercing. He wore a thick, short coat, a red sash about his waist, a blue flannel shirt, and a loose red scarf, like a handkerchief, at his throat. His feet were bare, and his trousers were rolled half way up to his knee. In one hand he carried a short pole with a steel pike in it, in the other a rope fastened to a ring in the bear’s nose.
The bear, a huge brown animal, upright on his hind legs, was dancing sideways along the road, keeping time to the lazy notes of his leader’s voice.
In front of the Hotel France they halted, and the bear danced round and round in a ring, his eyes rolling savagely, his head shaking from side to side in a bad-tempered way.
Suddenly some one cried out: “It’s Vanne Castine! It’s Vanne!”
People crowded nearer: there was a flurry of exclamations, and then Christine took a few steps forward where she could see the man’s face, and as swiftly drew back into the crowd, pale and distraite.
The man watched her until she drew away behind a group, which was composed of Ferrol, her brother and her sister Sophie. He dropped no note of his song, and the bear kept jigging on. Children and elders threw coppers, which he picked up, with a little nod of his head, a malicious sort of smile on his lips. He kept a vigilant eye on the bear, however, and his pole was pointed constantly towards it. After about five minutes of this entertainment he moved along up the road. He spoke no word to anybody though there were some cries of greeting, but passed on, still singing the monotonous song, followed by a crowd of children. Presently he turned a corner, and was lost to sight. For a moment longer the lullaby floated across the garden and the green fields, then the cornet and the concertina began again, and Ferrol turned towards Christine.
He had seen her paleness and her look of consternation, had observed the sulky, penetrating look of the bear-leader’s eye, and he knew that he was stumbling upon a story. Her eye met his, then swiftly turned away. When her look came to his face again it was filled with defiant laughter, and a hot brilliancy showed where the paleness had been.
“Will you dance with me?” Ferrol asked.
“Dance with you here?” she responded incredulously.
“Yes, just here,” he said, with a dry little laugh, as he ran his arm round her waist and drew her out upon the green.
“And who is Vanne Castine?” he asked as they swung away in time with the music.
The rest stopped dancing when they saw these two appear in the ring-through curiosity or through courtesy.
She did not answer immediately. They danced a little longer, then he said:
“An old friend, eh?”
After a moment, with a masked defiance still, and a hard laugh, she answered in English, though his question had been in French:
“De frien’ of an ol frien’.”
“You seem to be strangers now,” he suggested. She did not answer at all, but suddenly stopped dancing, saying: “I’m tired.”
The dance went on without them. Sophie and Farcinelle presently withdrew also. In five minutes the crowd had scattered, and the Lavilettes and Mr. Ferrol returned to the house.
Meanwhile, as they passed up the street, the droning, vibrating voice of the bear-leader came floating along the air and through the voices of the crowd like the thread of motive in the movement of an opera.
That night, while gaiety and feasting went on at the Lavilettes’, there was another sort of feasting under way at the house of Shangois, the notary.
On one side of a tiny fire in the chimney, over which hung a little black kettle, sat Shangois and Vanne Castine. Castine was blowing clouds of smoke from his pipe, and Shangois was pouring some tea leaves into a little tin pot, humming to himself snatches of an old song as he did so:
“What shall we do when the King comes home?What shall we do when he rides alongWith his slaves of Greece and his serfs of Rome?What shall we sing for a song—When the King comes home?“What shall we do when the King comes home?What shall we do when he speaks so fair?Shall we give him the house with the silver domeAnd the maid with the crimson hairWhen the King comes home?”
A long, heavy sigh filled the room, but it was not the breath of Vanne Castine. The sound came from the corner where the huge brown bear huddled in savage ease. When it stirred, as if in response to Shangois’s song, the chains rattled. He was fastened by two chains to a staple driven into the foundation timbers of the house. Castine’s bear might easily be allowed too much liberty!
Once he had killed a man in the open street of the City of Quebec, and once also he had nearly killed Castine. They had had a fight and struggle, out of which the man came with a lacerated chest; but since that time he had become the master of the bear. It feared him; yet, as he travelled with it, he scarcely ever took his eyes off it, and he never trusted it. That was why, although Michael was always near him, sleeping or waking, he kept him chained at night.
As Shangois sang, Castine’s brow knotted and twitched and his hand clinched on his pipe with a sudden ferocity.
“Name of a black cat, what do you sing that song for, notary?” he broke out peevishly. “Nose of a little god, are you making fun of me?”
Shangois handed him some tea. “There’s no one to laugh—why should I make fun of you?” he asked, jeeringly, in English, for his English was almost as good as his French, save in the turn of certain idioms. “Come, my little punchinello, tell me, now, why have you come back?”
Castine laughed bitterly.
“Ha, ha, why do I come back? I’ll tell you.” He sucked at his pipe. “Bon’venture is a good place to come to-yes. I have been to Quebec, to St. John, to Fort Garry, to Detroit, up in Maine and down to New York. I have ride a horse in a circus, I have drive a horse and sleigh in a shanty, I have play in a brass band, I have drink whiskey every night for a month—enough whiskey. I have drink water every night for a year—it is not enough. I have learn how to speak English; I have lose all my money when I go to play a game of cards. I go back to de circus; de circus smash; I have no pay. I take dat damn bear Michael as my share—yes. I walk trough de State of New York, all trough de State of Maine to Quebec, all de leetla village, all de big city—yes. I learn dat damn funny song to sing to Michael. Ha, why do I come to Bon’venture? What is there to Bon’venture? Ha! you ask that? I know and you know, M’sieu’ Shangois. There is nosing like Bon’venture in all de worl’.
“What is it you would have? Do you want nice warm house in winter, plenty pork, molass’, patat, leetla drop whiskey ‘hind de door in de morning? Ha! you come to Bon’venture. Where else you fin’ it? You want people say: ‘How you do, Vanne Castine—how you are? Adieu, Vanne Castine; to see you again ver’ happy, Vanne Castine.’ Ha, that is what you get in Bon’venture. Who say ‘God bless you’ in New York! They say ‘Damn you!’—yes, I know.
“Where have you a church so warm, so ver’ nice, and everybody say him mass and God-have-mercy? Where you fin’ it like that leetla place on de hill in Bon’venture? Yes. There is anoser place in Bon’venture, ver’ nice place—yes, ha! On de side of de hill. You have small-pox, scarlet fev’, difthere; you get smash your head, you get break your leg, you fall down, you go to die. Ha, who is there in all de worl’ like M’sieu’ Vallier, the Cure? Who will say to you like him: ‘Vanne Castine, you have break all de commandments: you have swear, you have steal, you have kill, you have drink. Ver’ well, now, you will be sorry for dat, and say your prayer. Perhaps, after hunder fifty tousen’ years of purgator’, you will be forgive and go to Heaven. But first, when you die, we will put you way down in de leetla warm house in de ground, on de side of de hill, in de Parish of Bon’venture, because it is de only place for a gipsy like Vanne Castine.’
“You ask me-ah! I see you look at me, M’sieu’ le Notaire, you look at me like a leetla dev’. You t’ink I come for somet’ing else”—his black eyes flashed under his brow, he shook his head, and his hands clinched—“You ask me why I come back? I come back because there is one thing I care for mos’ in all de worl’. You t’ink I am happy to go about with a damn brown bear and dance trough de village? Moi?—no, no, no! What a Jack I look when I sing—ah, that fool’s song all down de street! I come back for one thing only, M’sieu’ Shangois.
“You know that night—ah, four, five years ago? You remember, M’sieu’ Shangois? Ah! she was so beautiful, so sweet; her hair it fall down about her face, her eyes all black, her cheeks like the snow, her lips, her lips!—You rememb’ her father curse me, tell me to go. Why? Because I have kill a man! Eh bien, what if I kill a man! He would have kill me: I do it to save myself. I say I am not guilty; but her father say I am a sc’undrel, and turn me out de house.
“De girl, Christine, she love me. Yes, she love Vanne Castine. She say to me, ‘I will go with you. Go anywhere, and I will go!’
“It is night and it is all dark. I wait at de place, an’ she come. We start to walk to Montreal. Ah! dat night, it is like fire in my heart. Well, a great storm come down, and we have to come back. We come to your house here, light a fire, and sit just in de spot where I am, one hour, two hour, three hour. Saprie, how I love her! She is in me like fire, like de wind and de sea. Well, I am happy like no other man. I sit here and look at her, and t’ink of to-morrow-for ever. She look at me; oh, de love of God, she look at me! So I kneel down on de floor here beside her and say, ‘Who shall take you from me, Christine, my leetla Christine?’
“She look at me and say: ‘Who shall take you from me, my big Vanne?’
“All at once the door open, and—”
“And a little black notary take her from you,” said Shangois, dryly, and with a touch of malice also. “You, yes, you lawyer dev’, you take her from me! You say to her it is wicked. You tell her how her father will weep and her mother’s heart will break. You tell her how she will be ashame’, and a curse will fall on her. Then she begin to cry, for she is afraid. Ah, where is de wrong? I love her; I would go to marry her—but no, what is that to you! She turn on me and say, ‘I will go back to my father.’ And she go back. After that I try to see her; but she will not see me. Then I go away, and I am gone five years; yes.”
Shangois came over, and with his thin beautiful hand (for despite the ill-kept finger nails, it was the one fine feature of his body-long, shapely, artistic) tapped Castine’s knee.
“I did right to save Christine. She hates you now. If she had gone with you that night, do you suppose she would have been happy as your wife? No, she is not for Vanne Castine.”
Suddenly Shangois’s manner changed; he laid his hand upon the other’s shoulder.
“My poor, wicked, good-for-nothing Vanne Castine, Christine Lavilette was not made for you. You are a poor vaurien, always a poor vaurien. I knew your father and your two grandfathers. They were all vauriens; all as handsome as you can think, and all died, not in their beds. Your grandfather killed a man, your father drank and killed a man. Your grandfather drove his wife to her grave, your father broke your mother’s heart. Why should you break the heart of any girl in the world? Leave her alone. Is it love to a woman when you break all the commandments, and shame her and bring her down to where you are—a bad vaurien? When a man loves a woman with the true love, he will try to do good for her sake. Go back to that crazy New York—it is the place for you. Ma’m’selle Christine is not for you.”
“Who is she for, m’sieu’ le dev’?”
“Perhaps for the English Irishman,” answered Shangois, in a low suggestive tone, as he dropped a little brandy in his tea with light fingers.
“Ah, sacre! we shall see. There is vaurien in her too,” was the half-triumphant reply.
“There is more woman,” retorted Shangois; “much more.”
“We’ll see about that, m’sieu’!” exclaimed Castine, as he turned towards the bear, which was clawing at his chain.
An hour later, a scene quite as important occurred at Lavilette’s great farmhouse.
It was about ten o’clock. Lights were burning in every window. At a table in the dining-room sat Monsieur and Madame Lavilette, the father of Magon Farcinelle, and Shangois, the notary. The marriage contract was before them. They had reached a point of difficulty. Farcinelle was stipulating for five acres of river-land as another item in Sophie’s dot.
The corners tightened around Madame’s mouth. Lavilette scratched his head, so that the hair stood up like flying tassels of corn. The land in question lay next a portion of Farcinelle’s own farm, with a river frontage. On it was a little house and shed, and no better garden-stuff grew in the parish than on this same five acres.
“But I do not own the land,” said Lavilette. “You’ve got a mortgage on it,” answered Farcinelle. “Foreclose it.”
“Suppose I did foreclose; you couldn’t put the land in the marriage contract until it was mine.”
The notary shrugged his shoulder ironically, and dropped his chin in his hand as he furtively eyed the two men. Farcinelle was ready for the emergency. He turned to Shangois.
“I’ve got everything ready for the foreclosure,” said he. “Couldn’t it be done to-night, Shangois?”
“Hardly to-night. You might foreclose, but the property couldn’t be Monsieur Lavilette’s until it is duly sold under the mortgage.”
“Here, I’ll tell you what can be done,” said Farcinelle. “You can put the mortgage in the contract as her dot, and, name of a little man! I’ll foreclose it, I can tell you. Come, now, Lavilette, is it a bargain?” Shangois sat back in his chair, the fingers of both hands drumming on the table before him, his head twisted a little to one side. His little reflective eyes sparkled with malicious interest, and his little voice said, as though he were speaking to himself:
“Excuse, but the land belongs to the young Vanne Castine—eh?”
“That’s it,” exclaimed Farcinelle.
“Well, why not give the poor vaurien a chance to take up the mortgage?”
“Why, he hasn’t paid the interest in five years!” said Lavilette.
“But—ah—you have had the use of the land, I think, monsieur. That should meet the interest.” Lavilette scowled a little; Farcinelle grunted and laughed.
“How can I give him a chance to pay the mortgage?” said Lavilette. “He never had a penny. Besides, he hasn’t been seen for five years.”
A faint smile passed over Shangois’s face. “Yesterday,” he said, “he had not been seen for five years, but to-day he is in Bonaventure.”
“The devil!” said Lavilette, dropping a fist on the table, and staring at the notary; for he was not present in the afternoon when Castine passed by.
“What difference does that make?” snarled Farcinelle. “I’ll bet he’s got nothing more than what he went away with, and that wasn’t a sou markee!”
A provoking smile flickered at the corners of Shangois’s mouth, and he said, with a dry inflection, as he dipped and redipped his quill pen in the inkhorn:
“He has a bear, my friends, which dances very well.” Farcinelle guffawed. “St. Mary!” said he, slapping his leg, “we’ll have the bear at the wedding, and I’ll have that farm of Vanne Castine’s. What does he want of a farm? He’s got a bear. Come, is it a bargain? Am I to have the mortgage? If you don’t stick it in, I’ll not let my boy marry your girl, Lavilette. There, now, that’s my last word.”
“‘Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, nor his wife, nor his maid, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is his,”’ said the notary, abstractedly, drawing the picture of a fat Jew on the paper before him.
The irony was lost upon his hearers. Madame Lavilette had been thinking, however, and she saw further than her husband.
“It amounts to the same thing,” she said. “You see it doesn’t go away from Sophie; so let him have it, Louis.”
“All right,” responded monsieur at last, “Sophie gets the acres and the house in her dot.”
“You won’t give young Vanne Castine a chance?” asked the notary. “The mortgage is for four hundred dollars and the place is worth seven hundred!”
No one replied. “Very well, my Israelites,” added Shangois, bending over the contract.
An hour later, Nicolas Lavilette was in the big storeroom of the farmhouse, which was reached by a covered passage from the hall between the kitchen and the dining-room. In his off-hand way he was getting out some flour, dried fruit and preserves for the cook, who stood near as he loaded up her arms. He laughingly thrust a string of green peppers under her chin, and added a couple of sprigs of summer-savoury, then suddenly turned round, with a start, for a peculiar low whistle came to him through the half-open window. It was followed by heavy stertorous breathing.
He turned back again to the cook, gaily took her by the shoulders, and pushed her to the door. Closing it behind her, he shot the bolt and ran back to the window. As he did so, a hand appeared on the windowsill, and a face followed the hand.
“Ha! Nicolas Lavilette, is that you? So, you know my leetla whistle again!”
Nicolas’s brow darkened. In old days he and this same Vanne Castine had been in many a scrape together, and Vanne, the elder, had always borne the responsibility of their adventures. Nicolas had had enough of those old days; other ambitions and habits governed him now. He was not exactly the man to go back on a friend, but Castine no longer had any particular claims to friendship. The last time he had heard Vanne’s whistle was a night five years before, when they both joined a gang of river-drivers, and made a raid on some sham American speculators and surveyors and labourers, who were exploiting an oil-well on the property of the old seigneur. The two had come out of the melee with bruised heads, and Vanne with a bullet in his calf. But soon afterwards came Christine’s elopement with Vanne, of which no one knew save her father, Nicolas, Shangois and Vanne himself. That ended their compact, and, after a bitter quarrel, they had parted and had never met nor seen each other till this very afternoon.
“Yes, I know your whistle all right,” answered Nicolas, with a twist of the shoulder.
“Aren’t you going to shake hands?” asked Castine, with a sort of sneer on his face.
Nicolas thrust his hands down in his pockets. “I’m not so glad to see you as all that,” he answered, with a contemptuous laugh.
The black eyes of the bear-leader were alive with anger.
“You’re a damn’ fool, Nic Lavilette. You think because I lead a bear—eh? Pshaw! you shall see. I am nothing, eh? I am to walk on! Nic Lavilette, once he steal the Cure’s pig and—”
“See you there, Castine, I’ve had enough of that,” was the half-angry, half-amused interruption. “What are you after here?”
“What was I after five years ago?” was the meaning reply.
Lavilette’s face suddenly flushed with fury. He gripped the window with both hands, and made as if he would leap out; but beside Castine’s face there appeared another, with glaring eyes, red tongue, white vicious teeth, and two huge claws which dropped on the ledge of the window in much the same way as did Lavilette’s.
There was a moment’s silence as the man and the beast looked at each other, and then Castine began laughing in a low, sneering sort of way.
“I’ll shoot the beast, and I’ll break your neck if ever I see you on this farm again,” said Lavilette, with wild anger.
“Break my neck—that’s all right; but shoot this leetla Michael! When you do that you will not have to wait for a British bullet to kill you. I will do it with a knife—just where you can hear it sing under your ear!”
“British bullet!” said Lavilette, excitedly; “what about a British bullet—eh—what?”
“Only that the Rebellion’s coming quick now,” answered Castine, his manner changing, and a look of cunning crossing his face. “You’ve given your name to the great Papineau, and I am here, as you see.”
“You—you—what have you got to do with the Revolution? with Papineau?”
“Pah! do you think a Lavilette is the only patriot! Papineau is my friend, and—”
“Your friend—”
“My friend. I am carrying his message all through the parishes. Bon’venture is the last—almost. The great General Papineau sends you a word, Nic Lavilette—here.”
He drew from his pocket a letter and handed it over. Lavilette tore it open. It was a captain’s commission for M. Nicolas Lavilette, with a call for money and a company of men and horses.
“Maybe there’s a leetla noose hanging from the tail of that, but then—it is the glory—eh? Captain Lavilette—eh?” There was covert malice in Castine’s voice. “If the English whip us, they won’t shoot us like grand seigneurs, they will hang us like dogs.”
Lavilette scarcely noticed the sneer. He was seeing visions of a captain’s sword and epaulettes, and planning to get men, money and horses together—for this matter had been brooding for nearly a year, and he had been the active leader in Bonaventure.
“We’ve been near a hundred years, we Frenchmen, eating dirt in the country we owned from the start; and I’d rather die fighting to get back the old citadel than live with the English heel on my nose,” said Lavilette, with a play-acting attempt at oratory.
“Yes, an’ dey call us Johnny Pea-soups,” said Castine, with a furtive grin. “An’ perhaps that British Colborne will hang us to our barn doors—eh?”
There was silence for a moment, in which Lavilette read the letter over again with gloating eyes. Presently Castine started and looked round.
“What’s that?” he said in a whisper. “I heard nothing.”
“I heard the feet of a man—yes.”
They both stood moveless, listening. There was no sound; but, at the same time, the Hon. Mr. Ferrol had the secret of the Rebellion in his hands.
A moment later Castine and his bear were out in the road. Lavilette leaned out of the window and mused. Castine’s words of a few moments before came to him:
“That British Colborne will hang us to our barn doors—eh?”
He shuddered, and struck a light.
Mr. Ferrol slept in the large guest-chamber of the house. Above it was Christine’s bedroom. Thick as were the timbers and boards of the floor, Christine could hear one sound, painfully monotonous and frequent, coming from his room the whole night—the hacking, rending cough which she had heard so often since he came. The fear of Vanne Castine, the memories of the wild, half animal-like love she had had for him in the old days, the excitement of the new events which had come into her life; these kept her awake, and she tossed and turned in feverish unrest. All that had happened since Ferrol had arrived, every word that he had spoken, every motion that he had made, every look of his face, she recalled vividly. All that he was, which was different from the people she had known, she magnified, so that to her he had a distant, overwhelming sort of grandeur. She beat the bedclothes in her restlessness. Suddenly she sat up straight in bed.
“Oh, if I hadn’t been a Lavilette! If I’d only been born and brought up with the sort of people he comes from, I’d not have been ashamed of myself or him of me.”
The plush bodice she had worn that day danced before her eyes. She knew how horribly ugly it was. Her fingers ran over the patchwork quilt on her bed; and although she could not see it, she loathed it, because she knew it was a painful mess of colours. With a little touch of dramatic extravagance, she leaned over and down, and drew her fingers contemptuously along the rag-carpet on the floor. Then she cried a little hysterically:
“He never saw anything like that before. How he must laugh as he sits there in that room!”
As if in reply, the hacking cough came faintly through the time-worn floor.
“That cough’s going to kill him, to kill him,” she said.
Then, with a little start and with a sort of cry, which she stopped by putting both hands over her mouth, she said to herself, brokenly:
“Why shouldn’t he—why shouldn’t he love me! I could take care of him; I could nurse him; I could wait on him; I could be better to him than any one else in the world. And it wouldn’t make any difference to him at all in the end. He’s going to die before long—I know it. Well, what does it matter what becomes of me afterwards? I should have had him; I should have loved him; he should have been mine for a little while anyway. I’d be good to him; oh, I’d be good to him! Who else is there? He’ll get worse and worse; and what will any of the fine ladies do for him then, I’d like to know. Why aren’t they here? Why isn’t he with them? He’s poor—Nic says so—and they’re rich. Why don’t they help him? I would. I’d give him my last penny and the last drop of blood in my heart. What do they know about love?”
Her little teeth clinched, she shook her brown hair back in a sort of fury.
“What do they know about love? What would they do for it? I’d have my fingers chopped off one by one for it. I’d break every one of the ten commandments for it. I’d lose my soul for it.
“I’ve got twenty times as much heart as any one of them, I don’t care who they are. I’d lie for him; I’d steal for him; I’d kill for him. I’d watch everything that he says, and I’d say it as he says it. I’d be angry when he was angry, miserable when he was miserable, happy when he was happy. Vanne Castine—what was he! What was it that made me care for him then? And now—now he travels with a bear, and they toss coppers to him; a beggar, a tramp—a dirty, lazy tramp! He hates me, I know—or else he loves me, and that’s worse. And I’m afraid of him; I know I’m afraid of him. Oh, how will it all end? I know there’s going to be trouble. I could see it in Vanne’s face. But I don’t care, I don’t care, if Mr. Ferrol—”
The cough came droning through the floor.
“If he’d only—ah! I’d do anything for him, anything; anybody would. I saw Sophie look at him as she never looked at Magon. If she did—if she dared to care for him—”
All at once she shivered as if with shame and fright, drew the bedclothes about her head, and burst into a fit of weeping. When it passed, she lay still and nerveless between the coarse sheets, and sank into a deep sleep just as the dawn crept through the cracks of the blind.
The weeks went by. Sophie had become the wife of the member for the country, and had instantly settled down to a quiet life. This was disconcerting to Madame Lavilette, who had hoped that out of Farcinelle’s official position she might reap some praise and pence of ambition. Meanwhile, Ferrol became more and more a cherished and important figure in the Manor Casimbault, where the Lavilettes had made their home soon after the wedding. The old farmhouse had also secretly become a rendezvous for the mysterious Nicolas Lavilette and his rebel comrades. This was known to Mr. Ferrol. One evening he stopped Nic as he was leaving the house, and said:
“See, Nic, my boy, what’s up? I know a thing or so—what’s the use of playing peek-a-boo?”
“What do you know, Ferrol?”
“What’s between you and Vanne Castine, for instance. Come, now, own up and tell me all about it. I’m British; but I’m Nic Lavilette’s friend anyhow.”
He insinuated into his tone that little touch of brogue which he used when particularly persuasive. Nic put out his hand with a burst of good-natured frankness.
“Meet me in the store-room of the old farmhouse at nine o’clock, and I’ll tell you. Here’s a key.” Handing over the key, he grasped Ferrol’s hand with an effusive confidence, and hurried out. Nic Lavilette was now an important person in his own sight and in the sight of others in Bonaventure. In him the pomp of his family took an individual form.
Earlier than the appointed time, Ferrol turned the key and stepped inside the big despoiled hallway of the old farmhouse. His footsteps sounded hollow in the empty rooms. Already dust had gathered, and an air of desertion and decay filled the place in spite of the solid timbers and sound floors and window-sills. He took out his watch; it was ten minutes to nine. Passing through the little hallway to the store-room, he opened the door. It was dark inside. Striking a match, he saw a candle on the window-sill, and, going to it, he lighted it with a flint and steel lying near. The window was shut tight. From curiosity only he tried to open the shutter, but it was immovable. Looking round, he saw another candle on the window-sill opposite. He lighted it also, and mechanically tried to force the shutters of the window, but they were tight also.
Going to the door, which opened into the farmyard, he found it securely fastened. Although he turned the lock, the door would not open.
Presently his attention was drawn by the glitter of something upon one of the crosspieces of timber halfway up the wall. Going over, he examined it, and found it to be a broken bayonet—left there by a careless rebel. Placing the steel again upon the ledge, he began walking up and down thoughtfully.
Presently he was seized with a fit of coughing. The paroxysm lasted a minute or more, and he placed his arm upon the window-sill, leaning his head upon it. Presently, as the paroxysm lessened, he thought he heard the click of a lock. He raised his head, but his eyes were misty, and, seeing nothing, he leaned his head on his arm again.
Suddenly he felt something near him. He swung round swiftly, and saw Vanne Castine’s bear not fifteen-feet away from him! It raised itself on its hind legs, its red eyes rolling, and started towards him. He picked up the candle from the window-sill, threw it in the animal’s face, and dashed towards the door.
It was locked. He swung round. The huge beast, with a loud snarl, was coming down upon him.
Here he was, shut within four solid walls, with a wild beast hungry for his life. All his instincts were alive. He had little hope of saving himself, but he was determined to do what lay in his power.
His first impulse was to blow out the other candle. That would leave him in the dark, and it struck him that his advantage would be greater if there were no light. He came straight towards the bear, then suddenly made a swift movement to the left, trusting to his greater quickness of movement. The beast was nearly as quick as he, and as he dashed along the wall towards the candle, he could hear its breath just behind him.
As he passed the window, he caught the candle in his hands, and was about to throw it on the floor or in the bear’s face, when he remembered that, in the dark, the bear’s sense of smell would be as effective as eyesight, while he himself would be no better off.
He ran suddenly to the centre of the room, the candle still in his hand, and turned to meet his foe. It came savagely at him. He dodged, ran past it, turned, doubled on it, and dodged again. A half-dozen times this was repeated, the candle still flaring. It could not last long. The bear was enraged. Its movements became swifter, its vicious teeth and lips were covered with froth, which dripped to the floor, and sometimes spattered Ferrol’s clothes as he ran past. No matador ever played with the horns of a mad bull as Ferrol played his deadly game with Michael, the dancing bear. His breath was becoming shorter and shorter; he had a stifling sensation, a terrible tightness across his chest. He did not cough, however, but once or twice he tasted warm drops of his heart’s blood in his mouth. Once he drew the back of his hand across his lips mechanically, and a red stain showed upon it.
In his boyhood and early manhood he had been a good sportsman; had been quick of eye, swift of foot, and fearless. But what could fearlessness avail him in this strait? With the best of rifles he would have felt himself at a disadvantage. He was certain his time had come; and with that conviction upon him, the terror of the thing and the horrible physical shrinking almost passed away from him. The disease, eating away his life, had diminished that revolt against death which is in the healthy flesh of every man. He was levying upon the vital forces remaining in him, which, distributed naturally, might cover a year or so, to give him here and now a few moments of unnatural strength for the completion of a hopeless struggle.
It was also as if two brains in him were working: one busy with all the chances and details of his wild contest, the other with the events of his life.
Pictures flashed before him. Some having to do with the earliest days of his childhood; some with fighting on the Danube, before he left the army, impoverished and ashamed; some with idle hours in the North Tower in Stavely Castle; and one with the day he and his sister left the old castle, never to return, and looked back upon it from the top of Farcalladen Moor, waving a “God bless you” to it. The thought of his sister filled him with a desire, a pitiful desire to live.
Just then another picture flashed before his eyes. It was he himself, riding the mad stallion, Bolingbroke, the first year he followed the hounds: how the brute tried to smash his leg against a stone wall; how it reared until it almost toppled over and backwards; how it jibbed at a gate, and nearly dashed its own brains out against a tree; and how, after an hour’s hard fighting, he made it take the stiffest fence and water-course in the county.
This thought gave him courage now. He suddenly remembered the broken bayonet upon the ledge against the wall. If he could reach it there might be a chance—chance to strike one blow for life. As his eye glanced towards the wall he saw the steel flash in the light of the candle.
The bear was between him and it. He made a feint towards the left, then as quickly to the right. But doing so, he slipped and fell. The candle dropped to the floor and went out. With a lightning-like instinct of self-preservation he swung over upon his face just as the bear, in its wild rush, passed over his head. He remembered afterwards the odour of the hot, rank body, and the sprawling huge feet and claws. Scrambling to his feet swiftly, he ran to the wall. Fortune was with him. His hand almost instantly clutched the broken bayonet. He whipped out his handkerchief, tore the scarf from his neck, and wound them around his hand, that the broken bayonet should not tear the flesh as he fought for his life; then, seizing it, he stood waiting for the bear to come on. His body was bent forwards, his eyes straining into the dark, his hot face dripping, dripping sweat, his breath coming hard and laboured from his throat.
For a minute there was absolute silence, save for the breathing of the man and the savage panting of the beast. Presently he felt exactly where the bear was, and listened intently. He knew that it was now but a question of minutes, perhaps seconds. Suddenly it occurred to him that if he could but climb upon the ledge where the bayonet had been, there might be safety. Yet again, in getting up, the bear might seize him, and there would be an end to all immediately. It was worth trying, however.
Two things happened at that moment to prevent the trial: the sound of knocking on a door somewhere, and the roaring rush of the bear upon him. He sprang to one side, striking at the beast as he did so. The bayonet went in and out again. There came voices from the outside; evidently somebody was trying to get in.
The bear roared again and came on. It was all a blind man’s game. But his scent, like the animal’s, was keen. He had taken off his coat, and he now swung it out before him in a half-circle, and as it struck the bear it covered his own position. He swung aside once more and drove his arm into the dark. The bayonet struck the nose of the beast.
Now there was a knocking and a hammering at the window, and the wrenching of the shutters. He gathered himself together for the next assault. Suddenly he felt that every particle of strength had gone out of him. He pulled himself up with a last effort. His legs would not support him; he shivered and swayed. God, would they never get that window open!
His senses were abnormally acute. Another sound attracted him: the opening of the door, and a voice—Vanne Castine’s—calling to the bear.
His heart seemed to give a leap, then slowly to roll over with a thud, and he fell to the floor as the bear lunged forwards upon him.
A minute afterwards Vanne Castine was goading the savage beast through the door and out to the hallway into the yard as Nic swung through the open window into the room.
Castine’s lantern stood in the middle of the floor, and between it and the window lay Ferrol, the broken bayonet still clutched in his right hand. Lavilette dropped on his knees beside him and felt his heart. It was beating, but the shirt and the waistcoat were dripping with blood where the bear had set its claws and teeth in the shoulder of its victim.
An hour later Nic Lavilette stood outside the door of Ferrol’s bedroom in the Manor Casimbault, talking to the Regimental Surgeon, as Christine, pale and wildeyed, came running towards them.