CHAPTER XXVI.
THE END OF THE JOURNEY.
“La journée sera dure, Mais elle se passera.”
At the sight of the horseman on the road in front of him, those instinctsof the chase which must inevitably be found in all manly hearts, weresuddenly aroused, and Lory surprised his willing horse by using thespurs, of which the animal had hitherto been happily ignorant.
At the same time he made a mistake. He gave an eager shout, quiteforgetting that the count had never seen him in uniform, and wouldinevitably perceive the glint of his accoutrements in the sunlight. Theinstinct of the macquis was doubtless strong upon the fugitive, There arecertain habits of thought acquired in a brief period of outlawry, whichyears of respectability can never efface. The count, who had lived insecrecy more than half his life, took fright at the sight of a sword, anddown the quiet valley of the Prunelli father and son galloped one afterthe other--a wild and uncanny chase.
With the cunning of the hunted, the count left the road by the firstopening he saw--a path leading into a pine-wood; but over this roughground the trained soldier was equal to the native-born. The track onlyled to the open road again at a higher level, and de Vasselot had gainedon his father when they emerged from the wood.
Lory had called to his father once or twice, reassuring him, but withouteffect. The old count sat low in his saddle and urged his horse with amechanical jerk of the heels. Thus they passed through the village ofBastelica--a place with an evil name. It was early still, and but fewwere astir, for the peasants of the South are idle. In Corsica, moreover,the sight of a flying man always sends others into hiding. No man wishesto see him, though all sympathies are with him, and the pursuer isavoided as if he bore the plague.
In Bastelica there were none but closed doors and windows. A few childrenplaying in the road instinctively ran to their homes, where their mothersdrew them hurriedly indoors. The Bastelicans would have nought to do withthe law or the law-breaker. It was the sullen indifference of thecrushed, but the unconquered.
Down into the valley, across another river--the southern branch of thePrunelli--and up again. Cauro was above them--a straggling village withone large square house and a little church--Cauro, the stepping-stonebetween civilization and those wild districts about Sartene where the lawhas never yet penetrated. Lory de Vasselot had gained a little on thedownward incline. He could now see that his father’s clothes weremud-stained and torn, that his long white hair was ill-kempt. But thepursuer’s horse was tired; for de Vasselot had been unable to relieve himof his burden all through the night. Lame and disabled, he could notmount or dismount without assistance. On the upward slope, where the roadclimbs through a rocky gorge, the fugitive gained ground. Out on the openroad again, within sight of Cauro, the count’s horse showed signs ofdistress, but gained visibly. The count was unsteady in the saddle,riding heedlessly. In an instant de Vasselot saw the danger. His fatherwas dropping with fatigue, and might at any moment fall from the saddle.
“Stop,” he cried, “or I will shoot your horse!”
The count took no notice. Perhaps he did not hear. The road now mountedin a zigzag. The fugitive was already at the angle. In a few moments hewould be back again at a higher level. Lory knew he could never overtakethe fresher horse. There was but one chance--the chance perhaps of twoshots as his father passed along the road above him. Should the gendarmesof Cauro, where there is a strong station, see this fugitive, soevidently from the macquis, with all the signs of outlawry upon him, theywould fire upon him without hesitation. Also he might at any moment fallfrom the saddle and be dragged by the stirrup.
De Vasselot drew across the road to the outer edge of it, from whence hecould command a better view of the upper slope. The count came on at asteady trot. He looked down with eyes that had no reason in them and yetno fear. He saw the barrel of the revolver, polished by long use in aninner pocket, and looked fearlessly into it. Lory fired and missed. Hisfather threw back his head and laughed. His white hair fluttered in thewind. There was time for another shot. Lory took a longer aim,remembering to fire low, and horse and rider suddenly dropped behind thelow wall of the upper road. De Vasselot rode on.
“It was the horse--it must have been the horse,” he said to himself, withmisgiving in his heart. He turned the corner at a gallop. On the road infront, the horse was struggling to rise, but the count lay quite still inthe dust. Lory dismounted as well as he could. Mechanically he tied thetwo horses together, then turned towards his father. With his uninjuredhand he took the old man by the shoulder and raised him. The dishevelledwhite head fell to one side with a jerk that was unmistakable. The countwas dead. And Lory de Vasselot found himself face to face with thatquestion which so many have with them all through life: the questionwhether at a certain point in the crooked road of life he took the wrongor right turning.
Death itself had no particular terror for de Vasselot. It was his trade,and it is easier to become familiar with death than with suffering. Hedragged his father to the side of the road where a great chestnut treecast a shadow still, though its leaves were falling. Then he looked roundhim. There was no one in sight. He knew, moreover, that he was in acountry where the report of firearms repels rather than attractsattention. It occurred to him at that moment that his father’s horse hadrisen to its feet--a fact which had suggested nothing to his mind when hehad tied the two bridles together. He examined the animal carefully.There was no blood upon it; no wound. The dust was rubbed away from theknees. The horse had crossed its legs and fallen as it started at thesecond report of his pistol.
Lory turned and stooped over his father. Here again, was no blood--onlythe evidence of a broken neck. Still, though indirectly, Lory de Vasselothad killed his father. It was well for him that he was a soldier--taughtby experience to give their true value to the strange chances of life anddeath. Moreover, he was a Frenchman--gay in life and reckless of itsend.
He sat down by the side of the road and remembered the Abbé Susini’swords: “Life or death, you must be at Bastia on Wednesday morning.”
Mechanically, he drew his watch from within his tunic, which was whitewith dust. The watch had run down. And when Jean arrived a few minuteslater, he found Lory de Vasselot sitting in the shade of the greatchestnut tree, by the side of his dead father, sleepily winding up hiswatch.
“I fired at the horse to lame it--it crossed its legs and fell, throwinghim against the wall,” he said, shortly.
Jean lifted his master, noted the swinging head, and laid him gently downagain.
“Heaven soon takes those who are useless,” he said.
Then he slipped his hand within the old man’s jacket. The inner pocketswere stuffed full of papers, which Jean carefully withdrew. Some weretied together with pink tape, long since faded to a dull grey. He madeone packet of them all and handed it to Lory.
“It was for those that they burnt the château,” he said; “but we haveoutwitted them.”
De Vasselot turned the clumsy parcel in his hand.
“What is it?” he asked.
“It is the papers of Vasselot and Perucca--your title-deeds.”
Lory laid the papers on the bank beside him.
“In your pocket,” corrected Jean, gruffly. “That is the place for them.”
And while Lory was securing the packet inside his tunic, the unusuallysilent man spoke again.
“It is Fate who has handed them to you,” he said.
“Then you think that Fate has time to think of the affairs of theVasselots?”
“I believe it, monsieur le comte.”
They fell to talking of the past, and of the count. Then de Vasselot toldhis companion that he must be in Bastia in less than twenty-four hours,and Jean, whose gloomy face was drawn and pinched by past hardships, anda present desire for sleep, was alert in a moment.
“When the abbé says it, it is important,” he said.
“But it is easily done,” protested de Vasselot, who like many men ofaction had a certain conte
mpt for those crises in life which are butmatters of words. Which is a mistake; for as the world progresses itgrows more verbose, and for one moment of action, there are in men’slives to-day a million words.
“It is to be done,” answered Jean, “but not easily. You must ride toPorto Vecchio and there find a man called Casabianda. You will find himon the quay or in the Café Amis. Tell him your name, and that you must beat Bastia by daybreak. He has a good boat.”
Lory rose to his feet. There was a light in his tired eyes, and he sighedas he passed his hand across them, for the thought of further action waslike wine to him.
“But I must sleep, Jean, I must sleep,” he said, lightly.
“You can do that in Cassabianda’s boat.” Answered Jean, who was alreadychanging de Vasselot’s good saddle to the back of his own fresher horse.
Jean had to lift his master into the saddle, which office the wiry Susinihad performed for him at St. Florent fourteen hours earlier. There is agood inn at Cauro where de Vasselot procured a cup of coffee and somebread without dismounting. Jean had given him a list of names, and theroute to Porto Vecchio was not a difficult one, though it led through adeserted country. By midday, de Vasselot caught sight of the Eastern sea;by three o’clock he saw the great gulf of Porto Vecchio, and beforesunset he rode, half-asleep, into the ancient town with its crumblingwalls and ill-paved streets. He had ridden in safety through one of thewaste places of this province of France--a canton wherein a few years agoa well-known bandit had forbidden the postal service, and that postalservice was not--and he knew enough to be aware that the mysteriousmessengers of the macquis had cleared the way before him. But de Vasselotonly fully realized the magic of his own name when he at length found theman, Casabianda--a scoundrel whose personal appearance must assuredlyhave condemned him without further evidence in any court of justiceexcept a Corsican court--who bowed before him as before a king, and laidviolent hands upon his wife and daughter a few minutes later because thedomestic linen chest failed to rise to the height of a clean table cloth.
The hospitality of Casabianda outlasted the sun. He had the virtues ofhis primitive race, and that appreciation of a guest which urges theentertainer to give not only the best that he has, but the best that hecan borrow or steal.
“There is no breeze,” said this Porto Vecchian, jovially; “it will comewith the night. In waiting, this is wine of Balagna.”
And he drank perdition to the Peruccas.
With nightfall they set sail; the great lateen swinging lazily under thepressure of those light airs that flit to and fro over the islands atevening and sunrise. All the arts of civilization have as yet failed toapproach the easiest of all modes of progression and conveyance--sailingon a light breeze. For here is speed without friction, passage throughthe air without opposition, for it is the air that urges. Afloat,Casabianda was a silent man. His seafaring was of a surreptitious nature,perhaps. For companion, he had one with no roof to his mouth, whosespeech was incomprehensible--an excellent thing in law-breakers.
De Vasselot was soon asleep, and slept all through that quiet night. Heawoke to find the dawn spreading its pearly light over the sea. The greatplain of Biguglia lay to the left under a soft blanket of mist, as deadlythey say, as any African miasma, above which the distant mountains raisedsummits already tinged with rose. Ahead and close at hand, the old townof Bastia jutted out into the sea, the bluff Genoese bastion concealingthe harbour from view. De Vasselot had never been to Bastia, whichCasabianda described as a great and bewildering city, where the unwarymight soon lose himself. The man of incomprehensible speech was,therefore, sent ashore to conduct Lory to the Hotel Clément. Casabianda,himself, would not land. The place reeked, he said, of the gendarmerie,and was offensive to his nostrils.
Clément had not opened his hospitable door. The street door, of course,always stood open, and the donkey that lived in the entrance-hall wasastir. Lory dismissed his guide, and after ringing a bell which tinkledrather disappointingly just within the door, sat down patiently on thestairs to wait. At length the ancient chambermaid (who is no servant, butjust a woman, in the strictly domestic sense of that fashionable word)reluctantly opened the door. French and Italian were alikeincomprehensible to this lady, and de Vasselot was still explaining withmuch volubility, and a wealth of gesture, that the man he sought wore atonsure, when Clément himself, affable and supremely indifferent to thescantiness of his own attire, appeared.
“Take the gentleman to number eleven,” he commanded; “the Abbé Susiniexpects him.”
The last statement appeared to be made with that breadth of veracitywhich is the special privilege of hotel-keepers all the world over; forthe abbé was asleep when Lory entered his apartment. He awoke, however,with a characteristic haste, and his first conscious movement wassuggestive of a readiness to defend himself against attack.
“Ah!” he cried, with a laugh, “it is you. You see me asleep.”
“Asleep, but ready,” answered de Vasselot, with a laugh. He liked a quickman.
Without speaking, he unbuttoned his tunic and threw his bundle of paperson the abbé’s counterpane.
“Voilà!” he said. “I suppose that is what you want for your salad.”
“It is what Jean and I have been trying to get these three months,” answered the priest.
He sat up in bed, and from that difficult position, did the honours ofhis apartment with an unassailable dignity.
“Sit down,” he said, “and I will tell you a very long story. Not thatchair--those are my clothes, my best soutane for this occasion--theother. That is well.”