The Last Hope

by Henry Seton Merriman

  CHAPTER X

  IN THE ITALIAN HOUSE

  The Abbe Touvent was not a courageous man, and the perspiration, inducedby the climb from the high-road up that which had once been the ramp tothe Chateau of Gemosac, ran cold when he had turned the key in the rustylock of the great gate. It was not a dark night, for the moon sailedserenely behind fleecy clouds, but the shadows cast by her silvery lightmight harbour any terror.

  It is easy enough to be philosophic at home in a chair beside the lamp.Under those circumstances, the Abbe had reflected that no one would robhim, because he possessed nothing worth stealing. But now, out here inthe dark, he recalled a hundred instances of wanton murder duly recordedin the newspaper which he shared with three parishioners in Gemosac.

  He paused to wipe his brow with a blue cotton handkerchief before pushingopen the gate, and, being alone, was not too proud to peep through thekeyhole before laying his shoulder against the solid and weather-beatenoak. He glanced nervously at the loopholes in the flanking towers andupward at the machicolated battlement overhanging him, as if anycrumbling peep-hole might harbour gleaming eyes. He hurried through thepassage beneath the vaulted roof without daring to glance to either side,where doorways and steps to the towers were rendered more fearsome byheavy curtains of ivy.

  The enceinte of the castle of Gemosac is three-sided, with four towersjutting out at the corners, from which to throw a flanking fire upon anywho should raise a ladder against the great curtains, built of thatsmooth, white stone which is quarried at Brantome and on the banks of theDordogne. The fourth side of the enceinte stands on a solid rock, abovethe little river that loses itself in the flatlands bordering theGironde, so that it can scarce be called a tributary of that wide water.A moss-grown path round the walls will give a quick walker ten minutes'exercise to make the round from one tower of the gateway to the other.

  Within the enciente are the remains of the old castle, still solid andupright; erected, it is recorded, by the English during their longoccupation of this country. A more modern chateau, built after the finalexpulsion of the invader, adjoins the ancient structure, and in thecentre of the vast enclosure, raised above the walls, stands a squarehouse, in the Italian style, built in the time of Marie de Medici, andnever yet completed. There are, also, gardens and shaded walks and vaststables, a chapel, two crypts, and many crumbling remains inside thewalls, that offered a passive resistance to the foe in olden time, and assuccessfully hold their own to-day against the prying eye of a democraticcuriosity.

  Above the stables, quite close to the gate, half a dozen rooms were inthe occupation of the Marquis de Gemosac; but it was not to these thatthe Abbe Touvent directed his tremulous steps.

  Instead, he went toward the square, isolated house, standing in themiddle of that which had once been the great court, and was now halfgarden, half hayfield. The hay had been cut, and the scent of the newstack, standing against the walls of the oldest chateau and under itsleaking roof, came warm and aromatic to mix with the breath of theevening primrose and rosemary clustering in disorder on the ill-definedborders. The grim walls, that had defended the Gemosacs against frankerenemies in other days, served now to hide from the eyes of the villagersthe fact--which must, however, have been known to them--that the Marquisde Gemosac, in gloves, kept this garden himself, and had made the haywith no other help than that of his old coachman and Marie, that capable,brown-faced _bonne-a-tout-faire_, who is assuredly the best man in Franceto-day.

  In this clear, southern atmosphere the moon has twice the strength ofthat to which we are accustomed in mistier lands, and the Abbe lookedabout him with more confidence as he crossed the great court. There werefrogs in a rainwater tank constructed many years ago, when someenterprising foe had been known to cut off the water-supply of a besiegedchateau, and their friendly croak brought a sense of company and comfortto the Abbe's timid soul.

  The door of the Italian house stood open, for the interior had never beencompleted, and only one apartment, a lofty banqueting-hall, had ever beenfurnished. Within the doorway, the Abbe fumbled in the pocket of hissoutane and rattled a box of matches. He carried a parcel in his hand,which he now unfolded, and laid out on the lid of a mouldy chest half adozen candles. When he struck a match a flight of bats whirred out of thedoorway, and the Abbe's breath whistled through his teeth.

  He lighted two candles, and carrying them, alight, in one hand--notwithout dexterity, for candles played an important part in his life--hewent forward. The flickering light showed his face to be a fat one, kindenough, gleaming now with perspiration and fear, but shiny at other timeswith that Christian tolerance which makes men kind to their own failings.It was very dark within the house, for all the shutters were closed.

  The Abbe lighted a third candle and fixed it, with a drop of its own wax,on the high mantel of the great banqueting-hall. There were four or fivecandlesticks on side-tables, and a candelabra stood in the centre of along table, running the length of the room. In a few minutes the Abbe hadilluminated the apartment, which smelt of dust and the days of a deadmonarchy. Above his head, the bats were describing complicated figuresagainst a ceiling which had once been painted in the Italian style, torepresent a trellis roof, with roses and vines entwined. Half a dozenportraits of men, in armour and wigs, looked down from the walls. One ortwo of them were rotting from their frames, and dangled a despondentcorner out into the room.

  There were chairs round the table, set as if for a phantom banquet amidthese mouldering environments, and their high carved backs threwfantastic shadows on the wall.

  While the Abbe was still employed with the candles, he heard a heavy stepand loud breathing in the hall without, where he had carefully left alight.

  "Why did you not wait for me on the hill, _malhonnete_?" asked a thickvoice, like the voice of a man, but the manner was the manner of a woman."I am sure you must have heard me. One hears me like a locomotive, nowthat I have lost my slimness."

  She came into the room as she spoke, unwinding a number of black, knittedshawls, in which she was enveloped. There were so many of them, and ofsuch different shape and texture, that some confusion ensued. The Abberan to her assistance.

  "But, Madame," he cried, "how can you suspect me of such a crime? I cameearly to make these preparations. And as for hearing you--would to HeavenI had! For it needs courage to be a Royalist in these days--especially inthe dark, by one's self."

  He seemed to know the shawls, for he disentangled them with skill andlaid them aside, one by one.

  The Comtesse de Chantonnay breathed a little more freely, but no friendlyhand could disencumber her of the mountains of flesh, which must haveweighed down any heart less buoyant and courageous.

  "Ah, bah!" she cried, gaily. "Who is afraid? What could they do to an oldwoman? Ah! you hold up your hands. That is kind of you. But I am nolonger young, and there is my Albert--with those stupid whiskers. It isunfilial to wear whiskers, and I have told him so. And you--who couldharm you--a priest? Besides, no one could be a priest, and not aRoyalist, Abbe!"

  "I know it, Madame, and that is why I am one. Have we been seen, Madamela Comtesse? The village was quiet, as you came through?"

  "Quiet as my poor husband in his grave. Tell me? Abbe, now, honestly, amI thinner? I have deprived myself of coffee these two days."

  The Abbe walked gravely round her. It was quite an excursion.

  "Who would have you different, Madame, to what you are?" he temporized."To be thin is so ungenerous. And Albert--where is he? You have notsurely come alone?"

  "Heaven forbid!--and I a widow!" replied Madame de Chantonnay, arranging,with a stout hand, the priceless lace on her dress. "Albert is coming. Webrought a lantern, although it is a moon. It is better. Besides, it isalways done by those who conspire. And Albert had his great cloak, and hefell up a step in the courtyard and dropped the lantern, and lost it inthe long grass. I left him looking for it, in the dark. He was notafraid, my brave Albert!"

  "He has the dauntless heart of his mother," mur
mured the Abbe,gracefully, as he ran round the table setting the chairs in order. He hadalready offered the largest and strongest to the Comtesse, and it wascreaking under her now, as she moved to set her dress in order.

  "Assuredly," she admitted, complacently. "Has not France produced aJeanne d'Arc and a Duchesse de Berri? It was not from his father, at allevents, that he inherited his courage. For he was a poltroon, that man.Yes, my dear Abbe, let us be honest, and look at life as it is. He was apoltroon, and I thought I loved him--for two or three days only, however.And I was a child then. I was beautiful."

  "Was?" echoed the Abbe, reproachfully.

  "Silence, wicked one! And you a priest."

  "Even an ecclesiastic, Madame, may have eyes," he said, darkly, as hesnuffed a candle and, subsequently, gave himself a mechanical thump onthe chest, in the region of the heart.

  "Then they should wear blinkers, like a horse," said Madame, severely, asif wearied by an admiration so universal that it palled.

  At this moment, Albert de Chantonnay entered the room. He was envelopedin a long black cloak, which he threw off his shoulders and cast over theback of a chair, not without an obvious appreciation of its possibilitiesof the picturesque. He looked round the room with a mild eye, whichrefused to lend itself to mystery or a martial ruthlessness.

  He was a young man with a very thin neck, and the whiskers, of which hismother made complaint, were scarcely visible by the light of the Abbe'scandles.

  "Good!" he said, in a thin tenor voice. "We are in time."

  He came forward to the table, with long, nervous strides. He was notexactly impressive, but his manner gave the assurance of a distinctearnestness of purpose. The majority of us are unfortunately situatedtoward the world, as regards personal appearance. Many could pass forgreat if their physical proportions were less mean. There are thousandsof worthy and virtuous young men who never receive their due in sociallife because they have red hair or stand four-feet-six high, or happen tobe the victim of an inefficient dentist. The world, it would seem, doesnot want virtue or solid worth. It prefers appearance to either. Albertde Chantonnay would, for instance, have carried twice the weight inRoyalist councils if his neck had been thicker.

  He nodded to the Abbe.

  "I received your message," he said, in the curt manner of the man whoselife is in his hand, or is understood, in French theatrical circles, tobe thus uncomfortably situated. "The letter?"

  "It is here, Monsieur Albert," replied the Abbe, who was commonplace, andcould not see himself as he wished others to see him. There was only oneAbbe Touvent, for morning or afternoon, for church or fete, for thechateau or the cottage. There were a dozen Albert de Chantonnays, fierceor tender, gay or sad, a poet or a soldier--a light persifleur, who hadpassed through the mill, and had emerged hard and shining, or a young manof soul, capable of high ideals. To-night, he was the politician--theconspirator--quick of eye, curt of speech.

  He held out his hand for the letter.

  "You are to read it, as Monsieur le Marquis instructs me, MonsieurAlbert," hazarded the Abbe, touching the breast pocket of his soutane,where Monsieur de Gemosac's letter lay hidden, "to those assembled."

  "But, surely, I am to read it to myself first," was the retort; "or elsehow can I give it proper value?"