"I have found out a gift for my fair."
There was nothing to keep me in Paris. I could not see mademoiselle; she would not let me help her in her flight. I was restless and impatient to be off. No boat would sail from Le Havre for nearly a week. It would not take a week either by horse, as Cæsar and I would go, or by the river, where my baggage was to be floated down in a small yawl in the charge of a trusty boatman. But if I stayed in Paris I would be eating my heart out; it was better to be on the way and taking the route by slow stages.
So I made the plea to my aunt and uncle that I feared some unforeseen delay might cause me to miss my ship, and with feverish haste I made all arrangements for departure that very night. To my aunt my impatience seemed only natural. She herself was greatly distressed at the news of my father's illness, and would have accompanied me to America if it had been possible.
My first act on reaching home after leaving mademoiselle had been to tear off my gorgeous uniform,with such a mingling of loathing and regret as rarely comes to a man. If my suspicions of the contents of mademoiselle's note were correct, then I could not quickly enough rid myself of every emblem of the allegiance I had once owed to the First Consul. And yet when I remembered his invariable kindness to me, the magnanimity he had shown for what must have seemed to him criminal eavesdropping, the tenderness of heart I had seen displayed more than once, the wonderful powers of the man, master alike of the arts of peace and war, the idolatry in which his soldiers held him and in which I had hitherto shared, my heart lamented bitterly that its idol should have been so shattered.
Since we had time to spare and it was now the meridian of summer, I had decided to use only the cool of evening and the early morning hours for travel, as much, I think, for the sake of sparing Fatima as Cæsar and myself. Our first stage was to be to the same little inn, twenty miles out, which we had left only that morning to come into the city. It was not, perhaps, on the most direct route to Le Havre, but a large part of the way would lead through the forests of Montmorency and Chantilly and would be pleasant riding, and the inn was almost the cleanest and most comfortable of its kind I had found in France. My weeks under Bonaparte bearing messages to every little river big enough to build a boat upon had taught me the roads well; all this northern France was like an open book to me and I would find no difficulty in cutting across from the forest of Chantilly to thebanks of the Seine, if I preferred to follow its windings to Le Havre.
So the long shadows of the late afternoon saw us riding under the Porte St. Martin; at sunset we were passing the hoary Basilique of St. Denis, tomb of the kings; through the long twilight we skirted the forest of Montmorency; and by moonrise we were entering the forest of Chantilly. Not more beautiful by early dawn and dew had been this ride, than it was through lengthening shadows, and violet glow of sunset, and silvery light of moon, the peaches ripening on sunny walls, and the odors of mint and sweet-smelling herbs rising through the gathering damps of evening, the birds singing their vesper songs, and in the deep forest glades the lonely nightingale pouring out his soul to the moon.
Yet my heart was heavier. On my long ride from Antwerp, with the buoyancy of youth, I had passed through all the phases from anguished fear to the almost certitude of hope, and I had entered Paris feeling sure that I would find my father well again when I should reach America. I had entered Paris also joyous with the thought of seeing mademoiselle once more, and with the unconfessed hope that the budget I was bearing from the great Bonaparte might be the means of bringing me the crowning happiness of my life. I was leaving it now with one word ringing in my ears as the death-knell to all my hopes—Farewell!
The hour was still early and my inn but a little way off on the western borders of the forest; I would make a little detour and see the château and park andstill be not too late for a good supper and a comfortable night's rest. I left the "old road" (which crossed the forest directly) at the Carrefour de la Table, where twelve roads met in an open circular space surrounding a great stone table. From there I took one leading straight to the Grille d'Honneur. We crossed a little bridge that spanned the moat, and looking down into its waters, we heard the splash of the ancient carp that filled it. Then through the Grille d'Honneur and between two stone dogs at the foot of the slope that led up to the ruins of the Grande Château. There I drew rein and looked over the beautiful domain.
At my right was the ruined château; in front of me the châtelet, in perfect preservation, apparently floating on the bosom of a silvery lake that entirely surrounded it. Beyond were the famous stables of the Great Condé, holding two hundred and sixty horses in his lifetime. Beside them was the chapel, and everywhere a network of basins and canals gleaming white under the flooding moonlight. At my back were the gloomy towers of the Château d'Enghien, built to house the guests of the Condés who overflowed the Grande Château and the châtelet; and beyond was a mass of rich foliage belonging to the Park of Sylvie.
As I gazed a thousand thoughts crowded into my mind. This was the home of mademoiselle's ancestors; it should now be the home of the Duc d'Enghien; perhaps when mademoiselle came into her own it would be hers. No doubt in these very parks she had played in infancy. Generations of grandeur, of princelysplendor, were behind her. How had I dared to dream of her! How had I dared to think she would stoop to my lowly rank!
I gave Fatima's bridle to Cæsar and told him to wait for me while I walked down the green slope into the Park of Sylvie. Enchanting vistas opened before me, the moonlight filtering through arched canopies of foliage just enough to show me the way. Old tales of the Duchesse "Sylvie" and the poet-lover, condemned to death, whom she had hidden in this park and its little château floated through my mind strangely mingled with dreams of a later daughter of Montmorency.
And then suddenly I came upon something that for a moment I almost believed to be a continuation of my dreams. I had turned to my right and a new vista had opened before me, closed by the little "Château of Sylvie." On the wide lawn before it, half hidden by the shadow of the château, half in the broad moonlight, was a strange group: a carriage and what seemed to me many horses and many men. I thought for a moment I had landed upon a nest of bandits such as might easily infest a forest like this, and it would behoove me to steal silently back to the horses and make good my escape; but I caught a glimpse of petticoats: they were not bandits; they must be Gipsies.
Then as I gazed there stepped out into the full moonlight a man leading a powerful black horse with one white stocking and a white star in his forehead. I heard the man call some brief order to some one in the shadow, and there was a slight lisp in his voice. Ina moment I understood it all, although the man was no longer wearing a countryman's coat, but the livery of a gentleman's servant. It was Pelagie and her party fleeing to Baden and the Duc d'Enghien!
I knew not whether I would be a welcome guest or an intruder, but I knew I was not going to miss this opportunity of seeing Pelagie once more. I stepped out boldly from under the shadows of the trees into the moonlight, and in so doing came near losing my life. There was the click of a lock and the flash of a gun-barrel in the countryman's hands.
"Don't shoot, Monsieur," I cried; "it is a friend."
There was a short, sharp cry, half suppressed, and Pelagie came running out of the shadow, both hands extended and her face glowing in the moonlight.
"Is it you, Monsieur?" she cried. "How came you here?"
I suppose I answered her in some fashion. I know I took her hands in mine and looked down into her beautiful eyes, but I know not what I said. She was wearing the cap and apron and simple gown of a lady's waiting-maid, and as she saw me look curiously at it she said, with the shrug of her pretty little shoulders that I had learned to know so well in St. Louis:
"It is a fright, is it not, Monsieur? But I am no longer the Comtesse de Baloit: I am Susanne, the maid of Madame du Bois, with whom I am traveling."
Her voice had the happy ring of a child's, as if she were glad to be free, even if only for a time, from the cares of rank and position; or, perhaps more truly, glad to be away from the surveillance of the duchesse,happy that she need no longer fear the chevalier and the First Consul. I longed to think that a part of the gladness was in seeing me once more so unexpectedly; but I knew this was only my foolish vanity, and I steadied my brain by saying over to myself, "She is a princess of Condé in her ancestral home; you are only the son of a plain American gentleman." So I made her such a speech as I would have made to a princess of Condé.
"If Mademoiselle were not the Comtesse de Baloit I could wish she were always Susanne the maid of Madame du Bois. 'Tis a bewitching costume."
It was, and she knew it, as I could see by her dancing eyes and the smile (that she vainly tried to suppress) playing hide-and-seek with the roses in her cheek as I spoke. Being a man, I could not name each article of her costume; but what I saw was a vision of little ringlets escaping from under a coquettish cap, dainty ankles that the short blue skirt did not pretend to hide, a snowy apron that almost covered the blue skirt, and a handkerchief demurely crossed over the beautiful shoulders.
She turned quickly, as if to escape my gaze, and called to the countryman: "Monsieur le Prince, this is the friend of whom I have spoken; I want him to meet the Prince de Polignac."
The prince came forward at once; and as we grasped each other's hands and looked into each other's eyes, I think he knew that he need no longer regard me with suspicion, and I knew that here was a man to whom I could trust even Pelagie.
We laughed a little over our first meeting, and I told him how Cæsar had detected his weapon; and then out of the shadows came other figures: Henriette, to whom, as her mistress, Madame du Bois, Pelagie gaily presented me; a man in the costume of a well-to-do bourgeois, whom they called Monsieur du Bois, but who, Pelagie whispered to me, was the prince's trusted body-servant; and Clotilde, whom I had not seen since I had seen her on La Belle Rivière, and who wept at the sight of me, a tribute to the memory of other days. Last of all there came out of the shadows my burly host of last night's inn. He had brought over to the little château a relay of fresh horses and a hamper of supper. All arrangements had been made at his inn the night before by the Prince de Polignac in the guise of a countryman; for careless Boniface as my host had seemed to be, he was devotedly attached to his old masters, the Bourbon princes, and could be trusted to the death.
It amazed me greatly that they should have accomplished this journey in a shorter time than I, and still more that they should have succeeded in getting safely, out of Paris with so large a party, and I so expressed myself to the prince.
"It had been all carefully planned, Monsieur," he told me. "My man, 'Monsieur du Bois,' had a traveling-carriage waiting at a little house near the Porte St. Denis, where an old servitor of the family lives. He had passports made out for Madame and Monsieur du Bois from New Orleans, traveling with their negro servant Clotilde, and with a maid Susanne, and a manFrançois. Mademoiselle la Comtesse arranged to try her hunter at three o'clock in the Bois, accompanied by her companion, Henriette (who in these few weeks has become devotedly attached to the comtesse), and by the countryman who had brought her the horse and understood him more thoroughly than a groom from the stables of the duchesse would have done. At the same hour the negro maid of the comtesse strolled out into a quiet street at the rear of the hôtel, where she was met by my man and conducted to the little house near the Porte St. Denis. At a little before four we had all gathered there; by half-past four the transformation had been made and we were leaving the house, Madame du Bois and her two maids in the carriage, Monsieur du Bois on the comtesse's hunter, I on my own horse and leading the one Henriette had ridden. We had arranged to meet Pierre here with fresh horses and provisions, and spend half an hour in changing horses, resting, and supper. Your unexpected appearance, Monsieur, has alarmed me. I had thought the Park of Sylvie sufficiently secluded to insure us secrecy, but if you have found it, others may whom we would be less glad to see, and I think I will form my little company into marching order at once. The comtesse is taking it all as a grand adventure; her spirits have risen with every step away from Paris: that is the princely blood of Condé that loves deeds of daring, and I would not say a word to dampen her ardor; but we know, Monsieur, it is a serious matter, and so, though our half-hour is not quite up, I think I will order the advance."
"You are quite right, Monsieur le Prince," I replied. "My man is waiting for me with our horses in the Court d'Honneur; will you permit me to ride a little way with you?"
The prince hesitated a moment, and then in his courtliest manner he replied to my request:
"I am sure Monsieur will not misunderstand me when I say nothing could give us greater pleasure if it seemed safe. But Monsieur's size and—appearance," with a bow and a smile flattering no doubt, but discouraging, "have made him well known in France. Moreover, Monsieur's friendship for the comtesse (which does him honor) is known also, and should a pursuing party make inquiries along the road, and should our party be described with you in attendance, I fear they will be able to identify us at once."
"I understand, Monsieur le Prince," I answered, much crestfallen. And then into my slow brain there popped another question.
"But will not the negro maid Clotilde betray you also?"
"Monsieur is very astute," answered the prince. "He has touched upon our weak point, and I am going to prove my friendly regard for Monsieur by asking of him a great service. We could not leave the negress behind in Paris: the comtesse would not stir one step without her, fearing that she would be very unhappy, if not come to want and suffering in a strange city. All the way from Paris I have been revolving plans in my mind as to how best to separate her from our party. I had thought of letting Pierre take chargeof her, but that would not do; for should she be discovered, that would make Pierre 'suspect,' and he would be thrown into prison for aiding and abetting the flight of the comtesse, and it would be a clue to trace us. When I saw you, Monsieur, I said, 'There is a way out of our dilemma. If Monsieur will take Clotilde back with him to America, we are safe.'"
Joy filled my heart that I was at last to be allowed to do something for the comtesse.
"Gladly, Monsieur!" I exclaimed; "and it can be very easily arranged. We will strike across country to Pontoise and the forest of St. Germain, and head off my boatman. He was to tie up for the night at a little village near Marly-le-Roi. I will find him there and put Clotilde in his wife's care. His wife accompanies him, for the voyage and to cook his meals."
The prince's gratitude seemed to me incommensurate with so small a service, and so I told him. And then another difficulty suggested itself to me.
"Monsieur le Prince," I said, "I recognized you from the hunter of Mademoiselle la Comtesse; will not perhaps others also?"
"I have thought of this, Monsieur," he said; "but it seemed even more difficult to arrange than the other. It is necessary that the comtesse should have a swift and powerful horse, for if we are pursued, she and I will take to our horses and leave the others to shift for themselves. I had thought of asking Pierre to try to find another as good as this (though for speed and endurance I do not believe he has his equal in France), but even then I should not know what to do with thisone. I could not give him to Pierre: that again would bring him under suspicion. I should have to shoot and bury him. However, it is too late now to make the change; we will even have to take the risk."
"Monsieur," I said slowly, for willingly as I would make any sacrifice for mademoiselle, even to my life I could not lightly do that which I was about to do—"Monsieur, I have a horse who for speed and endurance has hardly her equal in the whole world. She knows Mademoiselle la Comtesse well and will do her bidding as she does mine. I will change horses with you. The comtesse shall have my chestnut mare and I will take her black beauty."
The prince did not know that this was a far greater sacrifice on my part than taking charge of Clotilde had been, yet he knew a man loves his own mare well, and in so far he appreciated the service and thanked me for it.
But the matter of separating Clotilde from her mistress had to be broached to mademoiselle, and the prince begged me to undertake the difficult task. All the time while the prince, and I had been holding our conversation together aside from the others, she had been exploring the purlieus of the little château with frequent exclamations of delight, not one of which fell unheeded on my ears, although I was deep in consultation. Now she came running up to me joyously.
"Monsieur, Monsieur," she exclaimed, "I have found the little arbor where I used to take my dolls and play at housekeeping! Ah, how well I remember it! How often I have thought of it! And how littleI ever expected to see it again!" and her eyes were as bright and as soft as the waters of the little lake stretching from our feet to the Grille d'Honneur and shining in the misty moonlight. I knew how quickly those eyes could change from dewy softness to lightning flashes, and it is not to be wondered at that I plunged into my subject with nervous haste.
"Mademoiselle," I said (and I thought the prince liked not the lack of formality in my address), "the Prince de Polignac has assigned to me an unpleasant duty; it is to tell you that we find it necessary for your safety to take away Clotilde."
Perhaps I was too abrupt; at any rate, much as I had expected a tempest I was not prepared for the tornado that ensued.
"Take away my Clotilde!" she interrupted. "Never! never! never!" And then there followed a torrent of tears mingled with reproaches as she threw herself upon Clotilde's breast—the breast she had wept upon since she was a babe of six. But Clotilde's cries were stormier than her mistress's: she literally lifted up her voice and wept. The prince was the picture of distress and dismay: there was danger that the sound of weeping might penetrate to unfriendly ears. Mademoiselle in tears was ever more formidable to me than an army with banners, but there was no help for it; I took my courage in my hand.
"Mademoiselle la Comtesse," I said sternly, "you are causing the Prince de Polignac great distress. You are in danger any moment of betraying his retreatto an enemy, and if he is captured, his life is forfeit, as you know."
I spoke thus to arouse her from a contemplation of her own woes to his danger, for well I knew her generous soul would respond at once to such a plea, and I was not mistaken. Her sobs ceased instantly and she stilled Clotilde with a word; then she turned and looked at me quietly while I went on with what I had to say:
"It is to anticipate the danger of such discovery that we remove Clotilde, who, being almost the only negress in France, would betray your identity at once. I will take her with me to America, and from Philadelphia I will send her under safe escort to Dr. Saugrain in St. Louis, and when you are safely established in your own home you can send for her again."
I think the thought of seeing St. Louis once more half consoled Clotilde for the parting, though she was a faithful creature and loved her mistress, and would have followed her to the ends of the earth. I know it helped to console Pelagie, for it was the thought of leaving Clotilde alone and unprotected in a foreign country that disturbed her most.
But all this had taken much time, and the half-hour the prince had allowed for rest was more than up. They had had their supper, the carriage-horses had been changed, the saddle-horses had been fed and watered, and the prince was in feverish haste to be off. I ran swiftly to the Court d'Honneur, where I had left Cæsar, and found him wondering anxiously what had kept me so long. He had fed and wateredboth horses and was now letting them crop a little of the luxuriant grass at their feet. I did not stop for explanations, but bidding him follow me with his horse, I led Fatima by a shorter and more direct route straight from the Grille d'Honneur to the little château. I found the carriage with "Monsieur and Madame du Bois"; the coachman and outriders had already started. Pierre had set out a luncheon on the little stone table for Cæsar and me (for since we were not to go to his inn there was no prospect for supper for us), and was getting the two carriage-horses ready to take them back with him. Clotilde was silently weeping and Pelagie was trying to comfort her. I led Fatima straight to Pelagie.
"Mademoiselle," I said, "the Prince de Polignac permits me to give you a farewell present. Will you take Fatima and keep her for me? She will bear you to your destination, I believe, more safely and more surely than any horse in the world."
"Oh, Monsieur, Monsieur!" she said, and then could say nothing more, her little chin quivering piteously. I could not bear to see it. I had motioned to Cæsar to put on Fatima the side-saddle lying on the grass, and now I said,
"Let me put you on her back," and bent to lift her; but she drew back.
"Oh, no, no, Monsieur!" she cried. "I know why you do it, and I know what a sacrifice it is to you. I cannot let you give up Fatima!"
"Then you are depriving me of a great happiness," I softly answered. "I had hoped you would take herand keep her and love her. It would be a great comfort to me in distant America to think of you as being kind to her sometimes for the sake of old St. Louis memories."
I looked steadily into her eyes.
"Mademoiselle, may I put you on her back?"
She bowed her head, and I lifted her to her seat, put her foot in the stirrup and the bridle in her hand. Then I threw my arm over Fatima's neck.
"Good-by, Sweetheart," I whispered, "take good care of your mistress," and kissed her on the white star on her forehead. Still with my arm over her neck I reached up my hand to mademoiselle.
She put her hand in mine, and I kissed it as I had kissed it when she chose me her king; then I lifted my eyes and looked straight into hers.
"Good-by, Mademoiselle, and au revoir," I said, and dropped her hand.
She could not answer for the same piteous quivering of the chin, but her lips formed "Au revoir"; and then she turned Fatima and rode slowly under the leafy arch that led through a long tunnel of foliage, due east.
"Monsieur," said the prince, and I started; for a moment I had forgotten his existence.
He had withdrawn courteously while I was making my adieus with mademoiselle, busying himself with little preparations for departure. Now he had mounted and drawn his horse to my side.
"Monsieur, you have taught me to honor and admire all American gentlemen. If there is any serviceI can ever do you, I hope you will give me the opportunity of showing you how much I appreciate the great service you have done us this night."
"Monsieur le Prince," I answered quickly, too eager with my own thoughts to thank him for his kind words, "there is one kindness you can show me that will more than repay me for anything I have ever done or ever could do. Write me of mademoiselle's safe arrival when you reach Baden. I will give you my address," and I tore a leaf from my memorandum-book, wrote my address upon it, and thrust it into his hand.
"It is a small commission, Monsieur," he answered, "but I will be most happy to execute it."
He grasped my hand, said "Au revoir," and cantered quickly away after mademoiselle.
I watched them riding side by side under the leafy dome until their figures were lost in the darkness, mademoiselle still with bent head, and he with his face turned courteously away as if not to seem to see should she be softly crying. And if there was for a moment in my heart a jealous envy that he should ride by mademoiselle's side and I be left behind, I put it quickly away, for I knew him to be a noble and courteous gentleman, and one to whose honor I could trust the dearest thing in life.
"The King of France with forty thousand men,Went up a hill, and so came down agen."
Clothilde, Cæsar, and I had ridden late into the night before we had reached the little village on the Seine where my boatman, Gustave, was to tie up. But it was moonlight and we rode through a beautiful country dotted with royal châteaus,—the birthplaces of illustrious kings,—and I had my thoughts, and Clotilde and Cæsar had each other: for Cæsar was the first of her kind Clotilde had seen since coming to France, and much as she might enjoy the attentions of footmen in gorgeous liveries, after all they were only "white trash," and she loved best her own color. Clotilde was rapidly becoming consoled; and though she only spoke creole French, and Cæsar only English, save for the few words he had picked up since coming to Paris, they seemed to make themselves very well understood.
So the ride had not been so tedious as it might have been. And when we had found Gustave's boat tied to the bank and had routed up him and his wife, and delivered Clotilde into their care (and their admirationand awe of the black lady was wonderful to see), and Cæsar and I had hunted up a fairly comfortable inn and had two or three hours of sleep, we were all quite ready to start on again.
Feeling that Clotilde was a sacred trust, I was anxious both for her safety and for her welfare, and thus it was that the early morning found me following the windings of the Seine by a little bridle-path on its banks, hardly twenty feet from Gustave's boat dropping down with the tide. Gustave's wife was in the forward part of the boat, preparing breakfast for the three, and the savory odor of her bacon and coffee was borne by the breeze straight to my nostrils on the high bank above her. Gustave himself was in the stern of the boat, lazily managing the steering-oar and waiting for his breakfast, and incidentally grinning from ear to ear at Cæsar, riding a pace behind me and casting longing glances at the thatched roof of the little boat's cabin, whence issued in rich negro tones the creole love-song Yorke had sung to Clotilde on the Ohio boat:
"Every springtimeAll the loversChange their sweethearts;Let change who will,I keep mine."
"Every springtimeAll the loversChange their sweethearts;Let change who will,I keep mine."
I had straitly charged Clotilde that she must keep herself closely concealed within the cabin, but I had said nothing to her about also keeping quiet. Now I was idly thinking that perhaps I had better give her instructions upon that point also, when down thestony road some three feet higher than the bridle-path, and separated from it by a bank of turf, came the thunder of hoofs. I glanced up quickly. A little party of horsemen, five or six in number, were dashing down the road toward us, and in the lead was the Chevalier Le Moyne! At sight of us they drew rein, and the chevalier, looking down on me (for the first time in his life), brought his hat to his saddle-bow with a flourish.
"Good morning, Monsieur. I hear you are off for America."
"Good morning," I answered coolly, merely touching my own hat. "You have heard correctly"; and I wished with all my heart that I had had time to tell Clotilde to keep still, for up from the boat below, louder and clearer than ever, it seemed to me, came the refrain of her foolish song:
"Tous les printemps,Tous les amantsChangent de maîtresses;Qu'ils changent qui voudront,Pour moi, je garde la mienne."
"Tous les printemps,Tous les amantsChangent de maîtresses;Qu'ils changent qui voudront,Pour moi, je garde la mienne."
The chevalier was listening pointedly.
"An old song, Monsieur, that I have often heard in St. Louis. And the voice, too, I think is familiar. It is the black maid of the Comtesse de Baloit, is it not? Perhaps her mistress is with her; if so, our quest is at an end."
"What do you mean, Monsieur le Chevalier!" I exclaimed, affecting virtuous indignation, and feeling a little of it, too, for I liked not the chevalier's manner.
"You have heard, I suppose," he answered, with a light sneer, "that the comtesse has disappeared from Paris. At almost the same moment it was announced that monsieur had started for America, and some of the comtesse's friends thought it not impossible that they had gone together. From the warbling of that nightingale yonder I judge they were not far wrong."
Not until this moment had it occurred to me that any one would connect the flight of the comtesse with my departure, and I hardly knew whether I was more ragingly angry at the thought or secretly glad. There was no question as to my state of mind toward the chevalier. That he should speak in such a light and sneering tone of any lady, but most of all that he should so speak of the loveliest lady on earth, was not to be borne. Yet I was glad, for some reasons, that such a mistaken surmise had arisen: it would throw pursuit off the track until Pelagie was well on her way to the German frontier, and the truth would come out later and my lady not suffer in her reputation (which indeed I could not have endured).
So instead of giving free vent to the anger that raged in my heart, as I longed to do, I thought it wise to dally with the chevalier and keep him as long as possible on the wrong scent, for every moment of delay to the chevalier was setting mademoiselle farther on her way.
"Your news, Monsieur," I said, "is most astonishing, but your insinuations also most insulting to a lady whose honor and reputation shall ever be my dearest care."
Now the chevalier was five to one (for I could not count upon Cæsar for fighting, as I might have counted upon Yorke). I do not say that that fact made the chevalier more bold or less careful in his manner, but I certainly think that had we been man to man he would not have answered as he did.
"Your virtuous indignation is pretty to see, Monsieur," he answered; "but I have the warrant of the republic to search whatever domains I may suspect of harboring the comtesse, and I think I will use my rights on yonder boat, where I see the face of her maid at the window."
I glanced quickly at the boat. Sure enough, in the little square of glass that formed the window of the cabin was framed Clotilde's black face. And her nose (already broad enough) being flattened against the glass, and her eyes rolling wildly with curiosity and fear as she gazed at the party of armed horsemen on the bank, she made a ludicrous picture indeed. I would have liked to laugh heartily but that it was my rôle to display chagrin and anxiety rather than a careless levity.
"Monsieur," I said seriously, "you are quite right: that is Clotilde, the maid of Mademoiselle la Comtesse. I was requested last evening to take her back to America and return her to her friends in St. Louis. It will always be my greatest pleasure to render the comtesse any service within my power, and I did not stop to question why she wished to get rid of her maid."
"Your explanation is most plausible, Monsieur,"—thechevalier's tone was intentionally insulting, and, but that I had mademoiselle's interests more at heart than my own sensitive self-esteem, would have been hard to brook,—"but since I hold a warrant of search, if Monsieur permits, I will do myself the honor of visiting his boat."
Now I cared not at all whether the chevalier visited the boat or not, knowing well he would not find the comtesse there. My only anxiety was to temporize as long as possible and keep him still suspicious of my complicity with mademoiselle's flight, that she might profit by his delay in discovering the true scent. So I answered sternly:
"Monsieur, that boat is for the time being United States territory. You step upon its planks without my consent at your peril. I will at once report the matter to our minister at Paris, Mr. Livingston, and if a war between the United States and France is the result, you will have to give an account to the First Consul of your acts which caused that war."
I was not enough of a diplomat to know whether I was speaking within my rights or not, but I trusted to the chevalier being no better informed than I, and at the best I was but speaking against time. The effect of my speech was all that I could have desired. The chevalier looked immediately crestfallen, and turned to consult with his comrades. For full five minutes (I could have wished it ten times five) they carried on a conference that at times appeared to be heated, though always low-toned. Then the chevalier turned to me again, and his manner was no longerinsulting, but of such respect as is due one gentleman from another.
"Monsieur," he said, "perhaps I have no right todemandthat I be allowed to search a boat belonging to an American gentleman, but if Monsieur will permit me to do so he will oblige me greatly, and it will be the means of clearing him at once of suspicions that may have unjustly accrued to him."
There was no wisdom in delaying longer.
"Since Monsieur puts it in that way," I said, "I can have no object in refusing his request. I shall have to ask you, however, that you wait a few minutes until I step aboard and warn Gustave and his wife of the purpose of your visit, lest they be unnecessarily alarmed."
The chevalier showed that he liked not the last part of my speech. He no doubt thought that my purpose in going aboard first was to find a secure hiding-place for the comtesse. However, he had no alternative but to acquiesce. My real purpose was to warn Gustave and his wife that on no account were they to betray at what hour or where Clotilde had come aboard. She was to have come aboard at Paris at four o'clock the day before; and they, having no inkling of the true state of the case, but suspecting, I believe, some intrigue between the "dark lady" and her lovers, sympathetically promised implicit obedience. With Clotilde I was even more strenuous. Her story must agree with Gustave's: she had boarded the boat in Paris at four of the afternoon; but especially was she to know nothing of her mistress's plans—why orwhere she had gone. With her I appealed to her love for her mistress, and warned her that the comtesse's liberty, possibly her life, might depend upon her discretion. With the others a promise of liberal rewards if they proved true, and dire threats should they betray me, I believed secured their fidelity.
I had had Gustave tie the boat to the bank before boarding it myself; I now invited the chevalier and his friends to come aboard. Leaving two of their comrades to hold their horses, the three others climbed down the bank and hastened to comply with my invitation. As they did so I saw Cæsar dismount, tie his own horse and mine securely to two saplings, and clamber up the bank beside the horsemen. I thought his motive was probably to take advantage of this opportunity to stretch his legs, and perhaps also to indulge his curiosity with a nearer view of the French gentlemen, and I saw no reason to interfere—especially as the two gentlemen, young blades whom I knew by sight, not only offered no objections, but began at once to amuse themselves with his clownish manners and outlandish speech.
Of course the chevalier's quest was futile, as also was his examination of his three witnesses. They all stuck to their text,—the embarkation of Clotilde at four o'clock on the afternoon previous in Paris,—and Clotilde was as stupid as heart could desire, professing absolute ignorance of her mistress's plans, and knowing only that she herself was being sent home to America because she was homesick; and with a negress's love of gratuitous insult when she thinksshe is safe in offering it, she added in her creole dialect:
"De Lord knows, I's sick o' white trash anyhow. I's mighty glad to be gittin' back to a country ob ladies and gen'lemen."
"De Lord knows, I's sick o' white trash anyhow. I's mighty glad to be gittin' back to a country ob ladies and gen'lemen."
The chevalier's two companions laughed, but the chevalier looked perplexed.
"Monsieur," he said, with an air of exaggerated deference, "I have discovered nothing on your boat, either by search or by examination of the witnesses, that can implicate you in any way with the flight of the Comtesse de Baloit. But will you permit me to ask you one important question? How does it happen that you are not riding Fatima, and that you are riding the horse which answers exactly to the description of the one the comtesse was riding when she disappeared?" and the chevalier could not quite keep the tone of triumph out of his voice as he propounded his question. I had been expecting it, and I was prepared for it. I should have been much disappointed if he had not asked it.
"Monsieur," I answered, "Fatima met with a serious accident just after leaving Paris. I was obliged to leave her in the hands of a veterinary surgeon on the outskirts of St. Denis, who has also a small farm connected with his establishment for the care of sick horses. He promised me to take the best of care of her and to return her to me in America as soon as she was sufficiently recovered. I bought this horse from a dealer to whom the surgeon directed me. I cannot say whether it resembles the horse on which theComtesse de Baloit left Paris; I did not see the comtesse when she left Paris."
Which was the only truth in my statement; but I did not for a moment consider that I had told a lie, but only that I had employed a ruse, perfectly permissible in war, to throw the enemy off the track. He snatched at the bait.
"Will Monsieur give me the address of that horse-dealer?"
"With pleasure, as nearly as I am able," and thereupon I described minutely a place in St. Denis that never existed. But St. Denis was only four miles this side of Paris, and should the chevalier go all the way back to find out from the mythical horse-dealer where he had procured my horse, much valuable time would be lost and mademoiselle would, I hoped, be beyond all risk of being overtaken.
By one little artifice and another we had already managed to delay them for a good three quarters of an hour, and now, by an apparently happy accident, as long a delay again was promised. A great noise of shouting and trampling of horses' hoofs arose on the bank above us.
We looked up and saw the five horses plunging frantically, with the two Frenchmen uttering excited cries as they tried to hold them, and Cæsar doing his share in trying to hold the horses and more than his share in making a noise. As we looked, one of the horses broke away and started up the road toward Paris. The two Frenchmen dashed wildly in pursuit, each man leading a horse with him, and Cæsarrunning on behind gesticulating madly, and bellowing at the top of his lungs.
I had taken advantage of the excitement of the fracas to slip from the post the rope that held us to the bank. We glided gently away down the river, with no one (unless it might have been Gustave, but he said nothing) noticing that we were moving until we were many yards below our mooring-place. The anger of the chevalier and his friends when they discovered it knew no bounds. Gustave was full of apologies for his carelessness, as he called it; I was dignified.
"Gustave," I said severely, "make a mooring as quickly as possible, that Monsieur le Chevalier and his friends may rejoin their horses."
Gustave made all haste apparently, but without doubt he fumbled, and we were some two or three hundred yards farther down the river before we were finally tied to the bank.
"Good-by, Messieurs," I said politely as the three hastened to leap ashore. "I trust you will have no difficulty in recovering your horses."
They stayed not upon the order of their going, as Mr. Shakspere says, but scrambled up the bank and on to the hot and stony road, and the sun, now well up in the sky, beating strongly on their backs, they started at a round pace toward Paris, their horses by this time out of sight around a distant bend in the road.
Cæsar had given up the pursuit and returned to where he had tied our horses. I signaled to him tobring them down the river, and mounting his and leading mine, he was soon at our mooring-place.
Riding down the soft turf of the shady bridle-path a few minutes later, I heard Cæsar chuckling behind me. I turned in my saddle:
"What is it, Cæsar?"
"I done it, Marsa!"
"Did what, Cæsar?"
"Done mek dat hoss run away. I put a burr un'er his girth. Den when he plunged I cotched de bridle and let him loose. He, he, he! Hi, hi, hi!" and Cæsar rolled in his saddle in convulsions of mirth, while the shore echoed to his guffaws.
I looked at him in astonishment for a moment. Then he had planned it all: tying the two horses, clambering up to the road, making himself the jest of the two Frenchmen, and all the time the burr concealed in his hand, no doubt, waiting his chance.
"Cæsar, you are a general!" I said. "Yorke could not have done better." And then, his mirth being contagious, I threw back my head and laughed as long and as loud as he.
I turned in my saddle once more and looked up the road. Through the hot sun plodded the three figures: the chevalier with bent head and, I doubted not, with gnashing teeth. I waved my hand toward him and called, though he could neither see nor hear:
"Good-by, Chevalier Le Moyne; this cancels a few debts!"
I have never seen him since.
"And many an eye has danced to seeThat banner in the sky."
It was in the early days of March, some eight months later, that the big barge in which I had come down the Ohio, and thus far on the Mississippi, put me ashore at New Madrid with my saddle-bags and my horse Bourbon Prince; for so I had promptly named the black beauty for whom I had exchanged my chestnut mare. He could never quite take the place of Fatima in my affections, but I had grown very fond of him: partly for his virtues, for he was a thoroughbred of famous lineage, and partly, I have no doubt, because he had once belonged to mademoiselle.
Of mademoiselle I had not heard for many months. I had arrived at home in the late summer, to find my father a physical and almost a mental wreck from the stroke of paralysis that had laid him low nearly three months before. Yet I had never loved my strong, stern father in the prime of manhood, managing great business enterprises, occupying places of honor and responsibility in the State, as I loved thisfeeble and broken old man with the face and the manner of a little child. As the weeks went on and he gradually grew able to move about, it was my pride and my joy to walk slowly down Chestnut Street, my father leaning heavily on my arm, and looking up into my face to comment with childish delight upon whatever pleased him in the streets.
I had had to assume, to the best of my ability, his heavy business responsibilities, and the charge of his great properties, and but that my mother was herself a fine business woman and thoroughly informed on my father's affairs I might have made shipwreck of it all. It was not the life I had chosen for myself, but it lay so directly in the path of duty there was no escaping it, and it kept every moment so fully occupied there was no time left for brooding over private troubles.
I had received a letter from the Prince de Polignac about two weeks after my return home, telling me of the safe arrival in Baden of the Comtesse de Baloit. It was a very courteous letter, thanking me once more for the great services I had rendered them on that eventful night in the Chantilly parks, and inclosing a pleasant message of acknowledgment from the Duc d'Enghien for the kindness shown his cousin the countess. Mademoiselle had added a line in her own writing: