"No, no," he assented somewhat dubiously, "but remember, dear heart, that you are infinitely precious and that I shall scarce live for sheer anxiety until I have you here, safe, once more in my arms."
"I'll send you a courier this evening," she rejoined, as she extricated herself gently from his embrace, "and if I can come back to-morrow...."
"I'll ride over to Bath in any case in the morning so that I may escort you back if you really can come."
"I will come if I am reassured about father. Oh, my[116] dear lord," she added with a wistful little sigh, "I knew yesterday morning that I was too happy, and that something would happen to mar the perfect felicity of these last few days."
"You are not seriously anxious about M. le duc's health, dear heart?"
"No, not seriously anxious. Farewell, milor. It is au revoir ... a few hours and we'll resume our dream."
V
There was nothing in all that to arouse my lord Tony's suspicions. All day he was miserable and forlorn because Yvonne was not there—but he was not suspicious.
Fate had a blow in store for him, from which he was destined never wholly to recover, but she gave him no warning, no premonition. He spent the day in making up arrears of correspondence, for he had a large private fortune to administer—trust funds on behalf of brothers and sisters who were minors—and he always did it conscientiously and to the best of his ability. The last few days he had lived in a dream and there was an accumulation of business to go through. In the evening he expected the promised courier, who did not arrive: but his was not the sort of disposition that would fret and fume because of a contretemps which might be attributable to the weather—it had rained heavily since afternoon—or to sundry trifling causes which he at Combwich, ten or a dozen miles from Bath, could not estimate. He had no suspicions even then. How could he have? How could he guess? Nevertheless when he ultimately went to bed, it was with the firm resolve that he would in any case go over to Bath in the[117] morning and remain there until Yvonne was able to come back with him.
Combwich without her was anyhow unendurable.
VI
He started for Bath at nine o'clock in the morning. It was still raining hard. It had rained all night and the roads were very muddy. He started out without a groom. A little after half-past ten, he drew rein outside his house in Chandos Buildings, and having changed his clothes he started to walk to Laura Place. The rain had momentarily left off, and a pale wintry sun peeped out through rolling banks of grey clouds. He went round by way of Saw Close and the Upper Borough Walls, as he wanted to avoid the fashionable throng that crowded the neighbourhood of the Pump Room and the Baths. His intention was to seek out the Blakeneys at their residence in the Circus after he had seen Yvonne and obtained news of M. le duc.
He had no suspicions. Why should he have?
The Abbey clock struck a quarter-past eleven when finally he knocked at the house in Laura Place. Long afterwards he remembered how just at that moment a dense grey mist descended into the valley. He had not noticed it before, now he saw that it had enveloped this part of the city so that he could not even see clearly across the Place.
A woman came to open the door. Lord Tony then thought this strange considering how particular M. le duc always was about everything pertaining to the management of his household: "The house of a poor exile," he was wont to say, "but nevertheless that of a gentleman."
"Can I go straight up?" he asked the woman, who he[118] thought was standing ostentatiously in the hall as if to bar his way. "I desire to see M. le duc."
"Ye can walk upstairs, zir," said the woman, speaking with a broad Somersetshire accent, "but I doubt me if ye'll see 'is Grace the Duke. 'Es been gone these two days."
Tony had paid no heed to her at first; he had walked across the narrow hall to the oak staircase, and was half-way up the first flight when her last words struck upon his ear ... quite without meaning for the moment ... but nevertheless he paused, one foot on one tread, and the other two treads below ... and he turned round to look at the woman, a swift frown across his smooth forehead.
"Gone these two days," he repeated mechanically; "what do you mean?"
"Well! 'Is Grace left the day afore yesterday—Thursday it was.... 'Is man went yesterday afternoon with luggage and sich ... 'e went by coach 'e did.... Leave off," she cried suddenly; "what are ye doin'? Ye're 'urtin' me."
For Lord Tony had rushed down the stairs again and was across the hall, gripping the unoffending woman by the wrist and glaring into her expressionless face until she screamed with fright.
"I beg your pardon," he said humbly as he released her wrist: all the instincts of the courteous gentleman arrayed against his loss of control. "I ... I forgot myself for the moment," he stammered; "would you mind telling me again ... what ... what you said just now?"
The woman was prepared to put on the airs of outraged dignity, she even glanced up at the malapert with scorn expressed in her small beady eyes. But at sight of his face her anger and her fears both fell away from her. Lord Tony was white to the lips, his cheeks were the colour[119] of dead ashes, his mouth trembled, his eyes alone glowed with ill-repressed anxiety.
"'Is Grace," she said with slow emphasis, for of a truth she thought that the young gentleman was either sick or daft, "'Is Grace left this 'ouse the day afore yesterday in a hired barouche. 'Is man—Frederick—went yesterday afternoon with the liggage. 'E caught the Bristol coach at two o'clock. I was 'Is Grace's 'ousekeeper and I am to look after the 'ouse and the zervants until I 'ear from 'Is Grace again. Them's my orders. I know no more than I'm tellin' ye."
"But His Grace returned here yesterday forenoon," argued Lord Tony calmly, mechanically, as one who would wish to convince an obstinate child. "And my lady ... Mademoiselle Yvonne, you know ... was with him."
"Noa! Noa!" said the woman placidly. "'Is Grace 'asn't been near this 'ouse come Thursday afternoon, and 'is man left yesterday wi' th' liggage. Why!" she added confidentially, "'e ain't gone far. It was all zettled that zuddint I didn't know nothing about it myzelf till I zeed Mr. Frederick start off wi' th' liggage. Not much liggage neither it wasn't. Sure but 'Is Grace'll be 'ome zoon. 'E can't 'ave gone far. Not wi' that bit o' liggage. Zure."
"But my lady ... Mademoiselle Yvonne...."
"Lor, zir, didn't ye know? Why 'twas all over th' town o' Tuesday as 'ow Mademozell 'ad eloped with my lord Anthony Dew'urst, and...."
"Yes! yes! But you have seen my lady since?"
"Not clapped eyes on 'er, zir, since she went to the ball come Monday evenin'. An' a picture she looked in 'er white gown...."
"And ... did His Grace leave no message ... for ... for anyone?... no letter?"[120]
"Ah, yes, now you come to mention it, zir. Mr. Frederick 'e give me a letter yesterday. ''Is Grace,' sez 'e, 'left this yere letter on 'is desk. I just found it,' sez 'e. 'If my lord Anthony Dew'urst calls,' sez 'e, 'give it to 'im.' I've got the letter zomewhere, zir. What may your name be?"
"I am Lord Anthony Dewhurst," replied the young man mechanically.
"Your pardon, my lord, I'll go fetch th' letter."
VII
Lord Tony never moved while the woman shuffled across the passage and down the back stairs. He was like a man who has received a knock-out blow and has not yet had time to recover his scattered senses. At first when the woman spoke, his mind had jumped to fears of some awful accident ... runaway horses ... a broken barouche ... or a sudden aggravation of the duc's ill-health. But soon he was forced to reject what now would have seemed a consoling thought: had there been an accident, he would have heard—a rumour would have reached him—Yvonne would have sent a courier. He did not know yet what to think, his mind was like a slate over which a clumsy hand had passed a wet sponge—impressions, recollections, above all a hideous, nameless fear, were all blurred and confused within his brain.
The woman came back carrying a letter which was crumpled and greasy from a prolonged sojourn in the pocket of her apron. Lord Tony took the
letter and broke its heavy seal. The woman watched him, curiously, pityingly now, for he was good to look on, and she scented the significance of the tragedy which she had been the means[121] of revealing to him. But he had become quite unconscious of her presence, of everything in fact save those few sentences, written in French, in a cramped hand, and which seemed to dance a wild saraband before his eyes:
"Milor,—
"You tried to steal my daughter from me, but I have taken her from you now. By the time this reaches you we shall be on the high seas on our way to Holland, thence to Coblentz, where Mademoiselle de Kernogan will in accordance with my wishes be united in lawful marriage to M. Martin-Roget whom I have chosen to be her husband. She is not and never was your wife. As far as one may look into the future, I can assure you that you will never in life see her again."
And to this monstrous document of appalling callousness and cold-blooded cruelty there was appended the signature of André Dieudonné Duc de Kernogan.
But unlike the writer thereof Lord Anthony Dewhurst neither stormed nor raged: he did not even tear the execrable letter into an hundred fragments. His firm hand closed over it with one convulsive clutch, and that was all. Then he slipped the crumpled paper into his pocket. Quite deliberately he took out some money and gave a piece of silver to the woman.
"I thank you very much," he said somewhat haltingly. "I quite understand everything now."
The woman curtseyed and thanked him; tears were in her eyes, for it seemed to her that never had she seen such grief depicted upon any human face. She preceded him to the hall door and held it open for him, while he passed out. After the brief gleam of sunshine it had started to rain again, but he didn't seem to care. The woman suggested fetching a hackney coach, but he refused quite po[122]litely, quite gently: he even lifted his hat as he went out. Obviously he did not know what he was doing. Then he went out into the rain and strode slowly across the Place.
* * *
[123]
CHAPTER VI
THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL
I
Instinct kept him away from the more frequented streets—and instinct after awhile drew him in the direction of his friend's house at the comer of The Circus. Sir Percy Blakeney had not gone out fortunately: the lacquey who opened the door to my lord Tony stared astonished and almost paralysed for the moment at the extraordinary appearance of his lordship. Rain dropped down from the brim of his hat on to his shoulders: his boots were muddy to the knees, his clothes wringing wet. His eyes were wild and hazy and there was a curious tremor round his mouth.
The lacquey declared with a knowing wink afterwards that his lordship must 'ave been drinkin'!
But at the moment his sense of duty urged him to show my lord—who was his master's friend—into the library, whatever condition he was in. He took his dripping coat and hat from him and marshalled him across the large, square hall.
Sir Percy Blakeney was sitting at his desk, writing, when Lord Tony was shown in. He looked up and at once rose and went to his friend.
"Sit down, Tony," he said quietly, "while I get you some brandy."
He forced the young man down gently into a chair in front of the fire and threw another log into the blaze. Then[124] from a cupboard he fetched a flask of brandy and a glass, poured some out and held it to Tony's lips. The latter drank—unresisting—like a child. Then as some warmth penetrated into his bones, he leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands. Blakeney waited quietly, sitting down opposite to him, until his friend should be able to speak.
"And after all that you told me on Monday night!" were the first words which came from Tony's quivering lips, "and the letter you sent me over on Tuesday! Oh! I was prepared to mistrust Martin-Roget. Why! I never allowed her out of my sight!... But her father!... How could I guess?"
"Can you tell me exactly what happened?"
Lord Tony drew himself up, and staring vacantly into the fire told his friend the events of the past four days. On Wednesday the courier with M. de Kernogan's letter, breathing kindness and forgiveness. On Thursday his arrival and seeming ill-health, on Friday his departure with Yvonne. Tony spoke quite calmly. He had never been anything but calm since first, in the house in Laura Place, he had received that awful blow.
"I ought to have known," he concluded dully, "I ought to have guessed. Especially since you warned me."
"I warned you that Martin-Roget was not the man he pretended to be," said Blakeney gently, "I warned you against him. But I too failed to suspect the duc de Kernogan. We are Britishers, you and I, my dear Tony," he added with a quaint little laugh, "our minds will never be quite equal to the tortuous ways of these Latin races. But we are not going to waste time now talking about the past. We have got to find your wife before those brutes have time to wreak their devilries against her."[125]
"On the high seas ... on the way to Holland ... thence to Coblentz ..." murmured Tony, "I have not yet shown you the duc's letter to me."
He drew from his pocket the crumpled, damp piece of paper on which the ink had run into patches and blotches, and which had become almost undecipherable now. Sir Percy took it from him and read it through:
"The duc de Kernogan and Lady Anthony Dewhurst are not on their way to Holland and to Coblentz," he said quietly as he handed the letter back to Lord Tony.
"Not on their way to Holland?" queried the young man with a puzzled frown. "What do you mean?"
Blakeney drew his chair closer to his friend: a marvellous and subtle change had suddenly taken place in his individuality. Only a few moments ago he was the polished, elegant man of the world, then the kindly and understanding friend—self-contained, reserved, with a perfect manner redolent of sympathy and dignity. Suddenly all that was changed. His manner was still perfect and outwardly calm, his gestures scarce, his speech deliberate, but the compelling power of the leader—which is the birth-right of such men—glowed and sparkled now in his deep-set eyes: the spirit of adventure and reckless daring was awake—insistent and rampant—and subtle effluvia of enthusiasm and audacity emanated from his entire personality.
Sir Percy Blakeney had sunk his individuality in that of the Scarlet Pimpernel.
"I mean," he said, returning his friend's anxious look with one that was inspiring in its unshakable confidence, "I mean that on Monday last, the night before your wedding—when I urged you to obtain Yvonne de Kernogan's consent to an immediate marriage—I had followed Martin-[126]Roget to a place called "The Bottom Inn" on Goblin Combe—a place well known to every smuggler in the county."
"You, Percy!" exclaimed Tony in amazement.
"Yes, I," laughed the other lightly. "Why not? I had had my suspicions of him for some time. As luck would have it he started off on the Monday afternoon by hired coach to Chelwood. I followed. From Chelwood he wanted to go on to Redhill: but the roads were axle deep in mud, and evening was gathering in very fast. Nobody would take him. He wanted a horse and a guide. I was on the spot—as disreputable a bar-loafer as you ever saw in your life. I offered to take him. He had no choice. He had to take me. No one else had offered. I took him to the Bottom Inn. There he met our esteemed friend M. Chauvelin...."
"Chauvelin!" cried Tony, suddenly roused from the dull apathy of his immeasurable grief, at sound of that name which recalled so many exciting adventures, such mad, wild, hair-breadth escapes. "Chauvelin! What in the world is he doing here in England?"
"Brewing mischief, of course," replied Blakeney dryly. "In disgrace, discredited, a marked man—what you will—my friend M. Chauvelin has still an infinite capacity for mischief. Through the interstices of a badly fastened shutter I heard two blackguards devising infinite devilry. That is why, Tony," he added, "I urged an immediate marriage as the only real protection for Yvonne de Kernogan against those blackguards."
"Would to God you had been more explicit!" exclaimed Tony with a bitter sigh.
"Would to God I had," rejoined the other, "but there was so little time, with
licences and what not all to arrange for, and less than an hour to do it in. And would you have[127] suspected the Duc himself of such execrable duplicity even if you had known, as I did then, that the so-called Martin-Roget hath name Adet, and that he matures thoughts of deadly revenge against the duc de Kernogan and his daughter?"
"Martin-Roget? the banker—the exiled royalist who...."
"He may be a banker now ... but he certainly is no royalist—he is the son of a peasant who was unjustly put to death four years ago by the duc de Kernogan."
"Ye gods!"
"He came over to England plentifully supplied with money—I could not gather if the money is his or if it has been entrusted to him by the revolutionary government for purposes of spying and corruption—but he came to England in order to ingratiate himself with the duc de Kernogan and his daughter, and then to lure them back to France, for what purpose you may well imagine."
"Good God, man ... you can't mean ...?"
"He has chartered a smuggler's craft—or rather Chauvelin has done it for him. Her name is the Hollandia, her master hath name Kuyper. She was to be in Portishead harbour on the last day of November: all her papers in order. Cargo of West India sugar, destination Amsterdam, consignee some Mynheer over there. But Martin-Roget, or whatever his name may be, and no doubt our friend Chauvelin too, were to be aboard her, and also M. le duc de Kernogan and his daughter. And the Hollandia is to put into Le Croisic for Nantes, whose revolutionary proconsul, that infamous Carrier, is of course Chauvelin's bosom friend."
Sir Percy Blakeney finished speaking. Lord Tony had listened to him quietly and in silence: now he rose and[128] turned resolutely to his friend. There was no longer any trace in him of that stunned apathy which had been the primary result of the terrible blow. His young face was still almost unrecognisable from the lines of grief and horror which marred its habitual fresh, boyish look. He looked twenty years older than he had done a few hours ago, but there was also in his whole attitude now the virility of more mature manhood, its determination and unswerving purpose.