Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman

by Stanley J Weyman

  He bent his head and muttered something of which her sister caught not a word. Then, “But we must not waste time,” he continued briskly. “Let us — with the Vicomte’s permission — to the field! To the field!” And he turned his horse as he spoke into the sled-road that led around the courtyard wall; and by a gesture he bade his men follow. It was evident to Bonne, evident to her father, that he had had a spy on the house, and knew where his quarry harboured.

  The girl wondered whether by flying through the house and dropping from the corner of the garden wall she could even now give the alarm. Then M. le Vicomte spoke. “I will come with you,” he said in a surly tone that betrayed his sense of his position. “The times are indeed out of joint, and persons out of their places, but — Solomon, my staff! Daughter,” to the Abbess, “a hold of your stirrup-leather! It is but a step, and I can still walk so far. If the field be unsafe for the guest,” — he added grimly— “it is fit the host should share the danger.”

  Bonne could have blessed him for the thought, for his offer bound the party to a walking pace, and something might happen. Vlaye, beyond doubt, had the same thought. But without breaking openly with the Vicomte — which for various reasons he was loth to do — he could not reject his company nor outpace him.

  He raised no objection, therefore, and in displeased silence the Vicomte walked beside his daughter’s horse, Bonne accompanying him on the other hand. She knew more than he, and had reason to fear more; she was almost sick with anxiety. But he, perhaps, suffered more. Forced on his own ground to do that which he did not wish to do, forced to play a sorry farce, he felt, as he trudged in the van of the party, that he walked the captive in a Roman triumph. And he could have smitten the Captain of Vlaye across the face.

  They passed only too quickly from the shelter of the house to the open meadows and the hot sunshine, and so over the stone bridge. Bonne knew that at this point they must become visible to the workers in the hay-field, and she counted on an interval of a few minutes during which the fugitives might take steps to hide themselves, or even to get over the river and bury themselves in the woods. She could have cried, therefore, when, without apparent order, a party from the rear cantered past the leaders and, putting their horses into a sharp hand-gallop, preceded them in their advance upon the panic-stricken haymakers, in the midst of whom they drew rein in something less than a minute.

  The Vicomte halted as the meaning of the manœuvre broke upon him, and, striking his staff into the ground, he followed them with his eyes. “You seem fearful indeed,” he growled, his high nose wrinkled with anger.

  “Things happen very quickly at times,” Vlaye answered, ignoring the tone.

  “Take care, sir, take care!” the Abbess of Vlaye cried, addressing her lover. She little thought in her easy insouciance how near the truth she was treading. “If you show yourself so very anxious for the Countess’s safety, I warn you I shall grow jealous.”

  “You have seen her,” M. de Vlaye answered in a low tone, meant only for her ear; and he hung slightly towards her. “You know how little cause you have to fear.”

  “Fear?” the Abbess retorted rather sharply. “Know, sir,” with a quick defiant glance, “that I fear no one!”

  Apparently the handful of riders who had preceded the main body had no order but to stand guard over the workers. For having halted in the midst of the startled servants, who gazed on them in stupefaction, they remained motionless in their saddles. Meanwhile the Vicomte, with a surly face, was drawing slowly up to them. When no more than thirty or forty paces divided the two parties, the leader of the van wheeled about, and trotting to M. de Vlaye’s side, saluted him.

  “I do not see them, my lord,” he muttered in a low tone.

  The captain of Vlaye reined in his horse, and sitting at ease, cast an eagle glance over the terrified haymakers, who had instinctively fallen into three or four groups. In one part of the field the hay had been got into heaps, but these were of small size, and barely adequate to the hiding of a child. Nevertheless, look where he would — and his lowering brow bespoke his disappointment — he could detect no one at all resembling a Countess. A moment, and his glance passed from the open meadow to the ruined buildings, which stood on the brink of the stream. It remained fixed on them.

  “Search that!” he said in a low tone. And raising his hand he pointed to the old barn. “They must be there! Go about it carefully, Ampoule.”

  The man he addressed turned, and summoning his party, cantered across the sward — never so green as after mowing — towards the building. As the riders drew near the river, Bonne could command herself no longer. She uttered a low groan. Her face bespoke her anguish.

  M. de Vlaye did not see her face — it was turned from him — but he caught the sound and understood it. “The sun is hot,” he said in a tone of polite irony. “You find it so, mademoiselle? Doubtless the Countess has sought protection from it — in the barn. She will be there, take my word for it!”

  Bonne made no reply. She could not have spoken for her life; and he and they watched, shading their eyes from the sun, she, poor girl, with a hand which shook. The horsemen were by this time near the end of the building, and all but one proceeded to alight. The rest were in the act of delivering up their reins, and one had already vanished within the building, when in full view of the company, who were watching from the middle of the field, a man sprang from an opening at the other end of the barn, reached in three bounds the brink of the stream, and even as Vlaye’s shout of warning startled the field, plunged from the bank, and was lost to sight.

  “Holà! Holà!” M. de Vlaye cried in stentorian tones, and, with his rowels in his horse’s flanks, he was away racing to the spot before his followers had taken the alarm. The next moment they were thundering emulously at his heels, their charge shaking the earth. Even the men who had alighted beside the barn, and as yet knew nothing of the evasion, saw that something was wrong, took the alarm, and hurried round the building to the river.

  “He is there!” cried one, as they pulled up along the bank of the stream. And the speaker, in his desire to show his zeal, wheeled his horse about so suddenly that he well-nigh knocked down his neighbour.

  “No, there! There!” cried another. And “There!” cried a third, as the fugitive dived, otter fashion, the willows of the stream affording him some protection.

  Suddenly M. de Vlaye’s voice rang above all. “After him!” he cried. “After him, fools, and seize him on the other side!”

  In a twinkling three or four of the more courageous forced their horses into the stream, and began to swim across. Sixty yards below the spot where he had entered the water, the swimmer’s head could be seen. He was being borne on a current towards a willow-bed which projected from the opposite bank, and offered a hiding-place. With wild cries those who had not entered the stream followed him along the bank, jostling and crossing one another, and marked him here and marked him there, while the baying of the excited hounds, restrained by their couples, filled the woods beyond the river with the fierce music of the chase.

  Meantime the Vicomte and his younger daughter remained alone in the middle of the meadow; for the Abbess’s horse had carried her after the others, whether she would or no, with her hawk clinging and screaming on her sleeve. Of the two who remained, the Vicomte was in a high rage. To be used after this fashion by his guests! To see strangers taking the law into their own hands on his land! To be afoot while hireling troopers spurned his own clods in his face, and all without leave or license, all where he and his forebears had exercised the low justice and the high for centuries! It was too much!

  “What is it? Who is it?” he cried, adding in his passion oaths and execrations then too common. “That is not the Countess! Are they mad?”

  “It is Charles,” she answered, weeping bitterly. “He was hiding there. And he thought that they were in search of him. Oh, they will kill him! They will kill him!”

  “Charles?” the Vicomte exclaimed, and stood
turned to stone. “Charles?”

  “Yes!” she panted. “And, oh, sir, a word! He is your son, and a word may save him! He has done nothing — nothing that they should hunt him like a rat!”

  But the Vicomte was another man now, moved, wrought on by Heaven knows what devils of pride and shame. “My son!” he cried, his rage diverted. “That my son? You lie, girl!” coarsely. “He is no son of mine. You wander. It is some skulking Crocan they have unharboured. Son of mine? Hiding on my land? No! You rave, girl!”

  “Oh, sir!” she panted.

  “Not a word!” He gripped her wrist fiercely and forced her to silence. “Do you hear me? Not a word. He is no son of mine!”

  She clung to him, still imploring him, still trying to soften him. But he shook her off, roughly, brutally, raising his stick to her; and, blinded by her tears, unable to do more, she sank to the ground and buried her face, that she might not see, in a mass of hay. He, without a word, turned his back on her, on the crowd beside the river, on the groups of frightened haymakers — turned his back on all and strode away in the direction of the château, with those devils of shame and pride, which he had pampered so long, riding him hard. He had drained at last the cup of humiliation to the dregs. He had seen his son hunted like a beast of vermin on his own land in his presence. And his one desire was to be gone. Rage with the cause of this last and worst disgrace dried up all natural feeling, all thought for his flesh and blood, all pity. He cared not whether his son lived or died. His only longing was to escape in his own person; to be gone from the place and scene of degradation, to set himself once more in a position, to — to be himself!

  There are tones of the voice that in the lowest depth inspire something of confidence. Bonne, as she lay crushed under the weight of her misery, with the merciless sun beating down upon her neck, heard such a tone whispering low in her ear.

  “Lie still, mademoiselle,” it murmured. “Lie still! Where you are, you are unseen, and I must speak to you. The man, whoever he is, is taken. They have seized him.”

  She tried to rise. He laid his hand on her shoulder and held her down.

  “I must go!” she gasped, still struggling to rise. “I must go! It is my brother!”

  The Lieutenant — for he it was — muttered, it is to be feared, an oath. “Your brother!” he said. “It is your brother, is it? Ah, if you had trusted me! But all is not lost! Listen!” he continued urgently. “M. de Vlaye has bidden the men who have taken him — on the farther side of the river — to convey him along that bank to the ford, and so by the road to Vlaye. And — will you trust me now, mademoiselle?”

  “I will, I will!” she sobbed. She showed him for one moment her tear-stained, impassioned face. “If you will help me! If you will help my brother!”

  “I will!” he said, and then, and abruptly, he laid his hand on her and violently pressed her down. “Be still!” he muttered in a tone of sharp warning. “I have no more wish to be seen by Vlaye than your brother had!” Lying beside her, he peeped warily over the hay by which he was partly hidden; a slight hollow in which that particular cock rested served to shelter them somewhat, but the screen was slight. “I fear they are coming this way,” he continued, his voice not quite steady. “I would I had my horse here, and sound, and I would trouble them little. But all is not lost, all is not lost,” he repeated slowly, “till their hands are on us! Nor, may-be, even then!”

  She understood, and lay trembling and hiding her face, unable to face this new terror. The thunder of hoofs, coming nearer and nearer, once more shook the earth. The horsemen were returning from the river.

  “Lie low!” he repeated, more coolly. “They have spied the Countess. I feared they would. And they are hot foot after her — so ho! And we are saved! Yes,” he continued, peeping again and more boldly, “we are saved, I think. They have stopped her, just as Roger and her man — clever Roger, he will make a general yet — were about to pass her over the bridge. Another minute and they had got her to cover in the house, and it had been my fate to be taken.”

  She did not answer, her agitation was too great. And after a brief silence during which the Lieutenant watched what went forward at the end of the meadow: “Now, mademoiselle,” he said in a more gentle tone, “it is for the Countess I want your help. I will answer for your brother. If no accident befall him he shall be free before many hours are over his head. Remember that! But with Mademoiselle de Rochechouart — if she be once removed to Vlaye, and cast into this man’s power, it will go hard. She is a child, little able to resist. Do you go to her, support her, speak for her, fight for her even — only gain time. Gain time! He will not resort to violence at once, or I am mistaken. He will not drag her away by force until he has exhausted all other means. He will suffer her to stay awhile if you play your part well. And you must play it well!”

  “I will!” Bonne cried, all her forces rallied by hope. “I do not know who you are, but save my brother — —”

  “I will save him!”

  “And I will bless you!”

  “Do you save the Countess, and she will bless you!” he answered cheerfully. “Now to her, mademoiselle, and do not leave her. Go! Show yourself as brave there as here, and — —”

  He did not finish the sentence, but as she rose his hand, through some accident, or some impulse that surprised him — for such weaknesses were not in his nature — met hers through the hay and clasped it. The girl reddened to the brow, sprang up, and in a trice was hastening across the field towards the crowd that in a confused medley of horse and foot, peasants and troopers, was gathered about the stone bridge which spanned the brook. The sun beat hotly down on the little mob, but in the interest of the scene which was passing in their midst no one thought twice of the heat.

  Bonne’s spirits were in a tumult. She hardly knew what she thought or how she felt, or what she was going to do.

  But one thing she knew. On one thing she set her foot with every step, and that was fear. A new courage, and a new feeling, filled the girl with an excitement half-painful, half-delightful. Whence this was she did not ask herself, nor why she rested so confidently on the guarantee of her brother’s safety, which an untried stranger had given her. It was enough that he had given it. She did not go beyond that.

  When she came, hot and panting, to the skirts of the crowd, she found that she must push her way between the horses of the troopers if she would see anything of what was passing. In the act she noticed that half the men were grinning, the others exchanging sly looks and winks. But she was through at last. Now she could see what was afoot.

  On the bridge, three paces before her, stood M. de Vlaye with his back to her. He had dismounted, and had his hat in his hand. Beyond him, standing at bay, as it seemed, against the low side wall of the bridge, was the Countess, her small face white, and puckered, and sullen, and behind her again stood Roger, and Fulbert, the steward, with a wild-beast glare in his eyes.

  “Surely, mademoiselle,” Bonne heard M. de Vlaye say in honeyed accents, as she emerged from the crowd, “surely it were better you mounted here — —”

  “No!”

  “And rode to the château. And then at your leisure — —”

  “No, I thank you. I will walk.”

  “But, Countess, you are not safe,” he persisted, “on foot and in the open, after what has passed.”

  “Then I will go to the château,” she replied, “but I can walk, I thank you.” It was strange to see the firmness, ay, and dignity, that awoke in her in this extremity.

  “That, of course,” M, de Vlaye replied lightly. “Of course. But seeing the Abbess on horseback, I thought that you might prefer to ride with her — —”

  “It is but a step.”

  “And I am walking,” Bonne struck in, pushing to the front. “I will go with the Countess to the house.” She spoke with a firmness which surprised herself, and certainly surprised M. de Vlaye, who had not seen her at his elbow. He hesitated, and partly in view of the Countess’s attitude, p
artly of the fact that he had not precisely defined his next step if he got her mounted — he gave way.

  “By all means,” he said. “And we will form your guard.”

  Bonne passed her arm round the young Countess. “Come,” she said. “I see my sister has preceded us to the house. The sun is hot, and the sooner we are under cover the better.”

  It was not the heat of the sun, however, that had driven the Abbess from the scene, but a spirit of temper. She had no suspicion of the truth — as yet. But the fuss which M. de Vlaye seemed bent on making about the little countess piqued her, and after looking on a minute or two, and finding herself still left in the background, she had let her jealousy have vent, had struck spur to her horse and ridden back to the house in a rage. This was the last thing she would have done had her eyes been open. Had she guessed how welcome to her admirer her retreat at that moment was, she would have risked a hundred sunstrokes before she went!

  She had no notion of the real situation, however, and Bonne, who had, and with a woman’s wit saw in her a potent ally, was too late to call her back, though she longed to do it. Between the bridge and the house-gate lay three hundred yards, every yard, it seemed to Bonne, a yard of peril to her charge; and the girl nerved herself accordingly. For Vlaye’s darkening face sufficiently declared his perplexity. At any instant, at any point, he might throw off the mask of courtesy, use force, and ride off with his prey. And what could she do?

  Only with a brave face walk slowly, slowly, talking as she went! Talking and making believe to be at ease; repressing both the treacherous flutter of her own heart and the little Countess’s tendency to start at every movement M. de Vlaye made — as the lamb starts when the wolf bares its teeth! Bonne felt that to let him see that they expected violence was to invite it; and though, if he made a movement to seize her companion, she was prepared to cling and scream and fight with her very nails — she knew that such methods were the last desperate resource, to resort to which portended defeat.