“Aline, my dearest!” he said in a low, vibrating voice.
With a quick-caught breath she drew away from him, sore trouble in her eyes.
“Wait!” she panted. Oh, where was her courage? Why had she not thought, planned? What could she say? “Oh, please wait!”
There was a long pause, whilst he held her hands and looked into her face.
“There is something—something I must tell you,” she murmured at last, her colour coming and going.
The pressure upon her hands became suddenly agonising.
“Ah, mon Dieu! he has not harmed you? Aline, Aline—for God’s sake——”
She said, “No, no,” hastily, relieved to have something to answer, wondering that he should be so moved, frightened by the great sob that shook him. Then—
“How do you know about—him?” and the words came hardly from her.
“Rosalie,” he said, catching at his self-control,—“Rosalie told me—curse him—curse him! Thank God you are safe. He cannot touch you now. What is it, then, my dear?” and the voice that had cursed Hébert seemed to caress her.
“If you know—that”—the word came on a shudder—“you know why I did—what I did—yesterday. But no—I forget; no one knew it all, no one knew the worst. I could n’t say it, but now I must—I must.”
“My dear, leave it—leave it. Why should you say anything?”
But she took a long breath and went on, speaking very low, and hurriedly, with bent head, and cheeks that flamed with a shamed, crimson patch.
“He is a devil, I think; and when I said I would die, he said—oh, mon Dieu!—he said his turn came first, he had friends, he could get me into his power after I was condemned.”
Dangeau’s arm went up—the arm with which he would have killed Hébert had he stood before him—and then fell protectingly about her shoulders.
“Aline, let him go—don’t think of him again. You are safe—Death has given you back to me.” But she shrank away.
“Oh, Monsieur,” she said, with a quick gasp, “it was not death that I feared—indeed it was not death. I could have died, I should have died, before I betrayed—everything—as I did yesterday. I should have died, but there are some things too hard to bear. Oh, I do not think God can expect a woman to bear—that!” Again the deep shudder shook her. “Then you came, and I took the one way out, or let you take it.”
“Aline!”
“No, no,” she cried,—“no, no, you must understand—surely you understand that there is too much between us—we can never be—never be—oh, don’t you understand?”
Dangeau’s face hardened. The tenderness went out of it, and his eyes were cold as steel. How cruelly she was stabbing him she did not know. Her mind held dazed to its one idea. She had betrayed the honour of her race, to save her own. That red river of which she had spoken long months before, it lay between them still, only now she had stained her very soul with it. But not for profit of safety, not for pleasure of love, not even for life, bare life, but to escape the last, worst insult life holds—insult of which it is no disgrace to be afraid. She must make that clear to him, but it was so hard, so hard to find words, and she was so tired, so bruised, she hungered so for peace. How easy to yield, to take life’s sweetness with the bitterness, love’s promise with love’s pain! But no, it were too base; the bitterness and the pain were her portion. His part escaped her.
When he spoke his changed voice startled her ears.
“So it comes to this,” he said, with a short, bitter laugh; “having to choose between me and Hébert, you chose me. Had the choice lain between me and death, you would have gone to the guillotine without soiling your fingers by touching me.”
She looked at him—a bewildered, frightened look.
Pain spurred him on.
“Oh, you make it very clear, my wife. Ah! that makes you wince? Yes, you are my wife, and you have just told me that you would rather have died than have married me. Yesterday I kissed your forehead. Is there a stain there? Suppose I were to kiss you now? Suppose I were to claim what is mine? What then, Aline, what then?”
A look she had never seen before was in his eyes, as he bent them upon her. His breath came fast, and for a moment her mind was terrified by the realisation that her power to hold, to check him, was gone. This was a new Dangeau—one she had never seen. She had been so sure of him. All her fears had been for herself, for that rebel in her own heart; but she had thought her self-control could give the law to his, and had never for a moment dreamed that his could break down thus, leaving her face to face with—what? Was it the brute?
She shrank, waiting.
“I am your husband, Aline,” he said in a strange voice. “I could compel your kisses. If I bade you come to me now, what then? Does your Church not order wives to obey their husbands?”
She looked at him piteously.
“Yes, Monsieur.”
“Yes, Monsieur? Very well, then, since I order it, and the Church tells you to obey me, come here and kiss me, my wife.”
That drew a shiver from her, but she came slowly and stood before him with such a look of appeal as smote him through all his bitter anger.
“You will obey?”
She spoke, agonised.
“You can compel me. Ah! you have been good to me—I have thought you good—you will not——”
He laid his hands heavily upon her shoulders and felt her shrink. Oh death—the pain of it! He thought of her lying in the moonlight, and the confiding innocence of her face. How changed now!—all drawn and terrified. Hébert had seen it so. He spoke his thought roughly.
“Is that how you looked at him?” he said, bending over her, and she felt her whole body quiver as he spoke. She half closed her eyes, and looked about to swoon.
“Yes, I can compel you,” he said again, low and bitterly. “I can compel you, but I’m not Hébert, Aline, and I shan’t ask you to choose between me and death.” He took his hands away and stepped back from her, breathing hard.
“I kissed you once, but I shall never kiss you again. I shall never touch you against your will, you need not be afraid. That I have loved you will not harm you,—you can forget it. That you must call yourself Dangeau, instead of Roche, need not matter to you so greatly. I shall not trouble you again, so you need not wish you had chosen my rival, Death. Child, child! don’t look at me like that!”
As he spoke Aline sank into a chair, and laying her arms upon the table, she put her head down on them with a sharp, broken cry:
“Oh God, what have I done—what have I done?”
Dangeau looked at her with a sort of strained pity. Then he laughed again that short, hard laugh, which comes to some men instead of a sob.
“Mlle de Rochambeau has married out of her order, but since her plebeian husband quite understands his place, quite understands that a touch from him would be worse than death, and since he is fool enough to accept this proud position, there is not so much harm done, and you may console yourself, poor child.”
Every word stabbed deep, and deeper. How she had hurt him—oh, how she had hurt him! She pressed her burning forehead against her trembling hands, and felt the tears run hot, as if they came from her very heart.
Dangeau had reached the door when he turned suddenly, came back and laid his hand for a moment on her shoulder. Even at that moment, to touch her was a poignant and wonderful thing, but he drew back instantly, and spoke in a harsh tone.
“One thing I have a right to ask—that you remember that you bear my name, that you bear in mind that I have pledged my honour for you. You have been at the Abbaye; I hear the place is honeycombed with plots. My wife must not plot. If I have saved your honour, remember you hold mine. I pledged it to the people yesterday, I pledged it to Danton to-day.”
Aline raised her head proudly. Her eyes were steady behind the brimming tears.
“Monsieur, your honour is safe,” she said, with a thrill in her voice.
Dangeau gazed long at her—somethi
ng of the look upon his face with which a man takes his farewell of the beloved dead. Then his whole face set cool and hard, and without another word he turned and strode out, his dreamed-of home in ruins—love’s ashes heaped and dusty on the cold and broken hearth.
CHAPTER XX
A ROYALIST PLOT
CHARLOTTE LEBOEUF WAS ONE of the people who would certainly have set cleanliness above godliness, and she sacrificed comfort to it with a certain ruthless pleasure. The house she declared to be a sty, impossible to cleanse, but she would do her best, and her best apparently involved a perpetual steam of hot water, and a continual reek of soap-suds. Dangeau put up more than one sigh at the shrine of the absent Rosalie as he stumbled over pails and brooms, or slipped on the damp floor. For the rest, the old life had begun again, but with a dead, dreary weight upon it.
Dangeau at his busy writing, at his nightly pacings, and Aline at her old task of embroidering, felt the burden of life press heavily, chafed at it for a moment, perhaps, and turned again with a sigh to toil, unsweetened by that nameless something which is the salt of life. Once he ventured on a half-angry remonstrance on the long hours of stitching, which left her face so pale and her eyes so tired. It was not necessary for his wife, he began, but at the first word so painful a colour stained her cheek, eyes so proudly distressed looked at him between imploring and defiance, that he stammered, drew a long breath, and turned away with a sound, half groan, half curse. Aline wept bitterly when he was gone, worked harder than before, and life went drearily enough for a week or so.
Then one day in July Dangeau received orders to go South again. He had known they would come, and the call to action was what he craved, and yet what to do with the girl who bore his name he could not tell.
He was walking homewards, revolving a plan in his mind, when to his surprise he saw Aline before him, and not alone. Beside her walked a man in workman’s dress, and they were in close conversation. As he caught sight of them they turned down a small side street, and after a moment’s amazed hesitation he took the same direction, walking slowly, but ready to interfere if he saw cause.
Earlier in the afternoon, Aline having finished her work, had tied it up neatly and gone out. The streets were a horror to her, but she was obliged to take her embroidery to the woman who disposed of it, and on these hot days she craved for air. She accomplished her business, and started homewards, walking slowly, and enjoying the cool breeze which had sprung up. As she turned out of the more frequented thoroughfares, a man, roughly dressed, passed her, hung on his footsteps a little, and as she came up to him, looked sharply at her, and said in a low voice, “Mlle de Rochambeau?”
She started, her heart beating violently, and was about to walk on, when coming still nearer her, he glanced all round and rapidly made the sign of the cross in the air. With a sudden shock she recognised the Abbé Loisel.
“It is M. l’Abbé?” she said in a voice as low as his own.
“Yes, it is I. Walk on quietly, and do not appear to be specially attentive. I saw you last at the Abbaye, how is it that I meet you here?”
A slight colour rose to Aline’s cheek. Her tone became distant.
“I think you are too well informed as to what passes in Paris not to know, M. l’Abbé,” she said.
They came out into a little crowd of people as she spoke, and he walked on without replying, his thoughts busy.
Part saint, part conspirator, he had enough of the busybody in his composition to make his position as arch manipulator of Royalist plots a thoroughly congenial one. In Mlle de Rochambeau he saw a ravelled thread, and hastened to pick it up, with the laudable intention of working it into his network of intrigue. They came clear of the press, and he turned to her, his pale face austerely plump, his restless eyes hard.
“I heard what I could hardly believe,” he returned. “I heard that Henri de Rochambeau’s daughter had bought her life by accepting marriage with an atheist and a regicide, a Republican Deputy of the name of Dangeau.”
Aline bit her lip, her eyes stung. She would not justify herself to this man. There was only one man alive who mattered enough for that, but it was bitter enough to hear, for this was what all would say. She had known it all along, but realisation was keen, and she shrank from the pictured scorn of Mme de Matigny’s eyes and from Marguerite’s imagined recoil. She walked on a little way before she could say quietly:
“It is true that I am married to M. Dangeau.”
But the Abbé had seen her face quiver, and drew his own conclusions. He was versed in reading between the lines.
“Mme de Matigny suffered yesterday,” he said with intentional abruptness, and Aline gave a low cry.
“Marguerite—not Marguerite!” she cried out, and he touched her arm warningly.
“Not quite so loud, if you please, Madame, and control your features better. Yes, that is not so bad. And now allow me to ask you a question. Why should Mlle de Matigny’s fate interest the wife of the regicide Dangeau?”
“M. l’Abbé, for pity’s sake, tell me, she is not dead—little Marguerite?”
“Not this time, Madame, but who knows when the blow will fall? But there, it can matter very little to you.”
“To me?” She sighed heavily. “It matters greatly. M. l’Abbé; I do not forget my friends. I have not so many that I can forget them.”
“You remember?”
“Oh, M. l’Abbé!”
“And you would help them?”
“If I could.”
He paused, scrutinising her earnest face. Then he said slowly:
“You bought your life at a great price, and something is due to those whom you left behind you in peril whilst you went out to safety. I knew your father. It is well that he is dead—yes, I say that it is well; but there is an atonement possible. In that you are happy. From where you are, you can hold out a hand to those who are in danger; you may do more, if you have the courage, and—if we can trust you.”
His keen look dwelt on her, and saw her face change suddenly, the eager light go out of it.
“M. l’Abbé, you must not tell me anything,” she said quickly, catching her breath; for Dangeau’s voice had sounded suddenly in her memory:
“I have pledged my honour”; and she heard the ring of her own response—“Monsieur, your honour is safe.” She had answered so confidently, and now, whatever she did, dishonour seemed imminent, unavoidable.
“You have indeed gone far,” he said. “You must not hear—I must not tell. What does it mean? Who forbids?”
Aline turned to him desperately.
“M. l’Abbé, my hands are tied. You spoke just now of M. Dangeau, but you do not know him. He is a good man—an honourable man. He has protected me from worse than death, and in order to do this he risked his own life, and he pledged his honour for me that I would engage in no plots—do nothing against the Republic. When I let him make that pledge, and what drove me to do so, lies between me and my own conscience. I accepted a trust, and I cannot betray it.”
“Fine words,” said Loisel curtly. “Fine words. Dutiful words from a daughter of the Church. Let me remind you that an oath taken under compulsion is not binding.”
“He said that he had pledged his honour, and I told him that his honour was safe. I do not break a pledge, M. l’Abbé.”
“So for a word spoken in haste to this atheist, to this traitor stained with your King’s blood, you will allow your friends to perish, you will throw away their lives and your own chance of atoning for the scandal of your marriage—” he began; but she lifted her head with a quick, proud gesture.
“M. l’Abbé, I cannot hear such words.”
“You only have to raise your voice a little more and you will hear no more words of mine. See, there is a municipal guard. Tell him that this is the Abbé Loisel, non-juring priest, and you will be rid of me easily enough. You will find it harder to stifle the voice of your own conscience. Remember, Madame, that there is a worse thing even than dishonour of the body, and t
hat is damnation of the soul. If you have been preserved from the one, take care how you fall into the other. What do you owe to this man who has seduced you from your duty? Nothing, I tell you. And what do you owe to your Church and to your order? Can you doubt? Your obedience, your help, your repentance.”
The Abbé had raised his voice a little as he spoke. The street before them was empty, and he was unaware that they were being followed. A portion of what he said reached Dangeau’s ears, for the prolonged conversation had made him uneasy, and he had hastened his steps. Up to now he had caught no word of what was passing, but Aline’s gestures were familiar to him, and he recognised that lift of the head which was always with her a signal of distress. Now he had caught enough, and more than enough, and a couple of strides brought him level with them. Aline started violently, and looked quickly from Dangeau to the priest, and back again at Dangeau. He was very stern, and wore an expression of indignant contempt which was new to her.
“Good-day, Citizen,” he said, with a sarcastic inflexion. “I will relieve you of the trouble of escorting my wife any farther.”
Loisel was wondering how much had been overheard, and wished himself well out of the situation. He was not in the least afraid of going to prison or to the guillotine, but there were reasons enough and to spare why his liberty at the present juncture was imperative. One of the many plots for releasing the Queen was in progress, and he carried upon him papers of the first importance. It was to serve this plot that he had made a bid for Aline’s help. In her unique position she might have rendered priceless services, but it was not to be, and he hastened to extricate himself from a position which threatened disaster to his central scheme.
“Good-day,” he returned with composure, and was moving off, when Dangeau detained him with a gesture.
“One moment, Citizen. I neither know your name nor do I wish to know it, but it seemed to me that your conversation was distressing to my wife. I very earnestly deprecate any renewal of it, and should my wishes in the matter be disregarded I should conceive it my duty to inform myself more fully—but I think you understand me, Citizen?”
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