“What do you advise?”
“Seigneur! Don’t put it on me. What is there to advise?”
As she spoke, with a shrug of her plump shoulders, Marguerite came forward. In her white undergarment, with her brown hair loose and curling, and her brown eyes brimmed with tears, she looked like a punished child. Even the smuts on her face seemed to add somehow to the youth and pathos of her appearance.
“Oh, Aline,” she said, with a half sob, “where am I to go? What am I to do?” And in a moment the mother in Madelon melted in her.
“There, there, little Ma’mselle,” she said quickly, “there’s nothing to cry about. You shall come along with me, and if I can’t give you as fine a bed as you had in this old gloomy place, at any rate it will be a safer one, and, please the Saints, you’ll not be burnt out of it.”
“No, no, Madelon, you mustn’t,” said Mlle Ange.
“And why not, chère Ma’mselle?”
“The danger—your father—your good husband. It would not be fair. I will not let you do what you have just said would be so dangerous.”
“Dangerous for you, but not for me. Who is going to suspect me? As to Jean Jacques, you need n’t be afraid of him. Thank God he is no meddler, and what I do is right in his eyes.”
“Dear child, he is a good husband; but—but just now you should not have anxiety or run any risks.”
Madelon laughed, and then grew suddenly grave.
“Ah, you mean my baby. Why, you are just like Anne; but there, Ma’mselle, do you really think le bon Dieu would let my baby suffer because I tried to help poor little Ma’mselle here, who does n’t look much more than a baby herself?”
Ange kissed her impulsively.
“God bless you, my dear,” she said. “You are a good woman, Madelon.”
“Well, then, it is settled. Here, take my cloak, Ma’mselle. What is your name? Ma’mselle Marguerite, then—no, not yours; it is much better that you should not come into the matter any more, Ma’mselle Ange, nor you, Madame. Ma’mselle Marguerite will put on my cloak and come along with me, and as quickly as possible, since Jean Jacques will be getting impatient.”
“Where is he, then?” asked Aline.
“Oh, yonder behind the big cypress. I left him there to keep a look-out and tell us if any one came this way. He has probably gone to sleep, my poor Jean Jacques. It took me a quarter of an hour to wake him, the great sleepy head. He had no desire to come, not he, and will be only too thankful to be allowed to go back to bed again.”
“Now, Ma’mselle, are you ready?”
They went off together into the shadows, and Ange and Aline took their way home to remove the smoke and grime, and to tell Mlle Marthe the events of the night.
CHAPTER XXV
ESCAPE OF TWO MADCAPS
“WELL, IT IS A MERCY, only what’s to happen next?” said Mlle Marthe in the morning.
“I don’t know,” said Aline doubtfully.
Marthe caught her sister’s hand.
“Now, Ange, promise me to keep out of it, and you, Aline, I require you to do the same. Madelon is a most capable young woman, and if she and Jean Jacques can’t contrive something, yes, and run next to no risk in doing so, you may be sure that you won’t do any better. The sooner the girl is got out of the place the better, and while she’s here, for Heaven’s sake act with prudence, and don’t go sniffing round the secret, like a dog with a hidden bone, until every one knows it’s there.”
“My dearest, you forget we can’t desert Madelon.”
“My dear Ange, you may be a good woman, but sometimes I think you’re a bit of a fool. Don’t you see that Madelon is not in the least danger as long as you keep well away from her? Who does Mathieu suspect? Us. Well, and if you and Aline are always in Madelon’s pocket, do you think he will put it all down to an interest in that impending infant of hers? He’s not such a fool,—and I wish to Heaven you weren’t.”
This adjuration produced sufficient effect to make Mlle Ange pass Madelon on the road that very afternoon with no more than a dozen words on either side.
“Approve of me,” she said laughingly on her return. “It was really very, very good of me, for there were a hundred things I was simply dying to say.”
Mlle Marthe was pleased to smile.
“Oh, you can be very angelic when you like, my Angel. Kindly remember that goodness is your rôle, and stick to this particular version of it.”
“Madelon says the poor child is rested. She has put her in the loft where she stored her winter apples.”
“Sensible girl. Now you would have given her the best bed, if it meant everybody’s arrest next moment.”
“Oh, if it pleases you to say so, you may, but I’m not really quite so foolish as you try to make me out. Mathieu thinks everyone was burnt.”
“Well, one hoped he would. For Heaven’s sake keep out of the whole matter, and he’ll continue to think so.”
“Yes, I will. I see you are right, dearest. Jean Jacques has a plan. After a few days he thinks he could get her out of the place. Madelon would not tell me more.”
“Oho, Mademoiselle Virtue, then it was Madelon who was good, not you.”
“We were both good,” asserted Ange demurely.
After that there were no further confidences between Madelon and the ladies of the white house. If they met on the road, they nodded, passed a friendly greeting, and went each on her own way without further words.
Ten days went by and brought them to the first week of March. It came in like the proverbial lamb, with dewy nights which sparkled into tender sunny days. The brushwood tangles reddened with innumerable buds; here and there in the hedgerow a white violet appeared like a belated snowflake, and in the undergrowth primrose leaves showed fresh and green. Aline gave herself up to these first prophecies of spring. She roamed the woods and lanes for hours, finding in every budded tree, in every promised flower, not only the sweetest memories of her childhood, but also, God knows what, of elusive beckoning hopes that played on the spring stirring in her blood, as softly as the Lent breeze, which brought a new blush to her cheek. One exquisite afternoon found her still miles from home. So many birds were singing that no one could have felt the loneliness of the countryside. She turned with regret to make her way towards Rancy, taking here a well-known and there an unfamiliar path. Nearer home she struck into the woods by a new and interesting track. It wandered a good deal, winding this way and that until she lost her bearings and had no longer any clear notion of what direction she was taking. Presently a sweetness met her, and with a little exclamation of pleasure she went on her knees before the first purple violets of the year. It seemed a shame to pick, but impossible to leave them, and by searching carefully she obtained quite a bunch, salving her conscience with the thought of what pleasure they would give Mlle Marthe, who seemed so much more suffering of late.
“It is the spring—it will pass,” Ange said repeatedly.
Aline walked on, violets in hand, wondering why the spring, which brought new life to all Nature, should bring—she caught herself up with a shiver—Death? Of course there was no question of death. How foolish of her to think of it, but having thought, the thought clung until she dwelt painfully upon it, and every moment it needed a stronger effort to turn her mind away. So immersed was she that she did not notice at all where she was going. The little path climbed on, pursued a tortuous way, and suddenly brought her out to the east of the château, and in full view of its ruined pile, where the blackened mass of it still smoked faintly, and one high skeleton wall towered gaunt and bare, its empty window spaces like the eyeless stare of a skull.
The sun was behind it, throwing it into strong relief, and the sight brought back the sort of terror which the place had always had for Aline. She walked on quickly, skirting the ruins and keeping to the outer edge of the wide terraces, on her way to the familiar bridle-path, which was her quickest way home. When she came into the Italian garden she paused, remembering the nightmare of that
struggle for Marguerite’s life. The pool with its low stone rim reflected nothing more terrible than sunset clouds now, but she still shuddered as she thought how the smoke and flame had woven strange spirals on its clear, passive mirror. She stooped now, and dipped her violets in the water to keep them fresh. Her own eyes looked back at her, very bright and clear, and she smiled a little as she put up a hand to smooth a straying curl. Then, of a sudden she saw her own eyes change, grow frightened. A step sounded on the path behind her, and another face appeared in the pool,—a man’s face—and a stranger’s.
Aline got up quickly and turned to see a tall young man in a riding-dress, who slapped his boot with a silver-headed cane and exclaimed gallantly:
“Venus her mirror, no less! Faith, my lady Venus, can you tell me where I have the good fortune to find myself?”
His voice was a deep, pleasant one, but it carried Aline back oddly to her convent days, and it seemed to her that she had heard Sister Marie Séraphine say, “Attention, then, my child.”
Then she remembered that Sister Marie Séraphine in religion was Nora O’Connor in the world, and realised that it was the kindly Irish touch upon French consonants and vowels which she had in common with this young man, who was surely as unlike a nun as he could be. She looked at him with great attention, and saw red unpowdered hair cut to a soldier’s (or a Republican’s) length, a face all freckles, and queer twinkling eyes, a great deal too light for his skin.
“Monsieur my cousin, or I’m much mistaken,” she said to herself, but aloud she answered:
“And do you not know where you are then, Citizen?”
“I know where I want to be, but I hope I have n’t got there,” said the young man, coming closer.
“And why is that, Citizen?”
He made a quick impatient gesture.
“Oh, a little less of the Citizen, my dear. I know I’m an ugly devil, but do I look like a Jacobin?”
Aline was amazed at his recklessness.
“Monsieur is a very imprudent person,” she said warningly.
“Monsieur would like to know where he is,” responded the young man, laughing.
She fixed her eyes on him.
“You are at Rancy-les-Bois, Monsieur.”
He bit his lip, made a half turn, and indicated the blackened ruins above them.
“And this?”
“This is, or was, the Château de Montenay.”
In a minute all the freckles seemed to be accentuated by the pallor of the skin below. The hand that held the cane gripped it until the knuckles whitened. He stared a minute or two at the faintly rising vapour that told of heat not yet exhausted, and then said sharply:
“When was it burned?”
“Ten days ago.”
“Any—lives—lost?”
“It is believed so,” said Aline, watching him.
He put his hand to his face a moment, then let it fall, and stood rigid, his queer eyes suddenly tragic, and Aline could not forbear any longer.
“Marguerite is safe,” she cried quickly and saw him colour to the roots of his hair.
“Marguerite—mon Dieu! I thought she was gone!” and with that he sat down on the coping, put his head down upon his arms, and a long sobbing breath or two heaved his broad shoulders in a fashion that at once touched and embarrassed Aline.
She drew nearer and watched uneasily, her own breathing a little quicker than usual. A woman’s tears are of small account to a woman, but when a man sobs, it stirs in her the strangest mixture of pity, repulsion, gentleness, and contempt.
“She is quite safe,” she repeated nervously, whereupon the young man raised his head, exclaiming in impulsive tones:
“And a thousand blessings on you for saying it, my dear,” whilst in the same moment he slipped an arm about her waist, pulled her a little down, and before she could draw back, had kissed her very heartily upon the cheek.
It had hardly happened before she was free, and a yard away, with her head up, and a look in her eyes that brought him to his feet, flushing and bowing.
“I ask a thousand pardons,” he stammered. “Indeed if it had been the blessed Saint Bridget herself that gave me that news, I’d have kissed her, and meant no disrespect. For it was out of hell you took me, with the best word I ever heard spoken. You see, when I found Marguerite gone with that old mad lady, her aunt, I was ready to cut my throat, only I thought I’d do more good by following her. Then when I saw these ruins, my heart went cold, till it was all I could do to ask the name. And when you said it, and I pictured her there under all these hot cinders—well, if you’ve a heart in you, you’ll know what I felt, and the blessed relief of hearing she was safe. Wouldn’t you have kissed the first person handy yourself, now?”
He regarded her with such complete earnestness that Aline could hardly refrain from smiling. She bent her head a little and said:
“I can understand that Monsieur le Chevalier did not know what he was doing.”
He stared.
“What, you know me?”
“And do you perhaps think that I go about volunteering information about Mlle de Matigny to every stranger I come across? Every one is not so imprudent as M. Desmond.”
“I’ll not deny my name, but that I’m imprudent—yes, with my last breath.”
Aline could not repress a smile.
“Do you talk to all strangers as you did to me?” she inquired.
“Come, now, how do you think I got here?” he returned.
“I am wondering,” she said drily.
“Well, it’s a simple plan, and all my own. When I see an honest face I let myself go, and tell the whole truth. Not a woman has failed me yet, and if I’ve told the moving tale of my pursuit of Marguerite to one between this and Bâle, I’ve told it to half a dozen.”
Aline gasped.
“Oh, it’s a jewel of a plan,” he said easily, “and much simpler than telling lies. There are some who can manage their lies, but mine have a way of disagreeing amongst themselves that beats cock-fighting. No, no, it’s the truth for me, and see how well it’s served me. So now you know all about me, but I’ve no notion who you are.”
“I am a friend of Marguerite’s, fortunately,” she said, “and, I believe, M. le Chevalier, that I am a cousin of yours.”
Mr. Desmond looked disappointed.
“My dear lady, it would be so much more wonderful if you were n’t. You see my great-grandfather had sixteen daughters, besides sons to the number of eight or so, and between them they married into every family in Europe, or nearly every one. Marguerite is n’t a cousin, bless her. Now, I wonder, would you be a grand-daughter of my Aunt Elizabeth, who ran away with her French dancing-master, in the year of grace 1740?”
The blood of the Rochambeau rose to Aline’s cheeks in a becoming blush, as she answered with rather an indignant negative.
“No?” said Mr. Desmond regretfully. “Well, then, a pity it is too, for never a one of my Aunt Elizabeth’s descendants have I met with yet, and I’m beginning to be afraid that she was so lost to all sense of the family traditions as to die without leaving any.”
“If she so far forgot,” Aline began a little haughtily, and then, remembering, blushed a very vivid crimson, and was silent.
“Well, well, I’m afraid she did,” sighed Mr. Desmond; “and now I come to think of it you’ll be Conor Desmond’s granddaughter, he that was proscribed, and racketed all over Europe. His daughter married a M. de—Roche—Roche——”
“Rochambeau, Monsieur. Yes, I was Aline de Rochambeau.”
“Was?” said Mr. Desmond curiously, and then fell to whistling.
“Oh, my faith, yes, I remember,—Marguerite told me,” and there was a slight embarrassed pause which Desmond broke into with a laugh.
“After all, now, that kiss was not so out of place,” he said, with a twinkle in his green eyes. “Cousins may kiss all the world over.”
His glance was too frank to warrant offence, and Aline answered it with a smile.<
br />
“With Monsieur’s permission I shall wait until I can kiss Madame ma cousine,” she said, and dropped him a little curtsey.
Mr. Desmond sighed.
“I wish we were all well out of this,” he said gloomily; “but how in the devil’s name, or the saints’ names, or any one else’s name, we are to get out of it, I don’t know. Well, well, the sooner it’s tried the better; so where is Marguerite, Madame my cousin?”
Aline considered.
“I can’t take you to her without asking leave of the friend she is with,” she said at last; “but if you will wait here I will go and speak to her, and come back again when we have talked things over. We shall have to wait till it is quite dark, and you’ll be careful, won’t you?”
“I will,” said Mr. Desmond, without hesitation. He kissed his hand to Aline as she went off, and she frowned at him, then smiled to herself, and disappeared amongst the trees, walking quickly and wondering what was to come next.
At eleven o’clock that night a council of four sat in the apple loft at the mill. Marguerite, perched on a pile of hay, was leaning against Aline, who sat beside her. Every now and then she let one hand fall within reach of Mr. Desmond, who, reclining at her feet, invariably kissed it, and was invariably scolded for doing so. Madelon sat on the edge of the trap-door, her feet supported by the top rungs of the ladder which led to the barn below. She and Aline were grave, Marguerite pouting, and Mr. Desmond very much at his ease.
“But what plan have you?” Aline was asking.
“Oh, a hundred,” he said carelessly.
Marguerite pulled her hand away with a jerk.
“Then you might at least tell us one,” she said.
“Ah, now I’d tell you anything when you look at me like that,” he said with fervour.
“Then, tell me. No, now,—at once.”
He sat up and extracted a paper from his waistcoat pocket. It set forth that the Citizen Lemoine and his wife were at liberty to travel in France at their pleasure.
“In France,” said Aline.
“Why, yes, one can’t advertise oneself as an emigré. Once on the frontier, one must make a dash for it,—it’s done every day.”
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