Chapter XXII
RAPTURE
Down the screw-stair I went in utter darkness; and having reached thestone floor I discerned the door and groped out the key-hole. With morecaution, and less noise than upon the night before, I opened the doorand stepped out into the thick brushwood. It was almost as dark in thisjungle.
Having secured the door I slowly pushed my way through the bushes, whichsoon became less dense. Then, with more case, but still under thickcover, I pursued in the track of the wood, keeping near its edge.
At length, in the darkened air, about fifty yards away, the shafts ofthe marble temple rose like phantoms before me, seen through the trunksof the old trees. Everything favored my enterprise. I had effectuallymystified my servant and the people of the Dragon Volant, and so darkwas the night, that even had I alarmed the suspicions of all the tenantsof the inn, I might safely defy their united curiosity, though posted atevery window of the house.
Through the trunks, over the roots of the old trees, I reached theappointed place of observation. I laid my treasure in its leathern casein the embrasure, and leaning my arms upon it, looked steadily in thedirection of the chateau. The outline of the building was scarcelydiscernible, blending dimly, as it did, with the sky. No light in anywindow was visible. I was plainly to wait; but for how long?
Leaning on my box of treasure, gazing toward the massive shadow thatrepresented the chateau, in the midst of my ardent and elated longings,there came upon me an odd thought, which you will think might well havestruck me long before. It seemed on a sudden, as it came, that thedarkness deepened, and a chill stole into the air around me.
Suppose I were to disappear finally, like those other men whose storiesI had listened to! Had I not been at all the pains that mortal could toobliterate every trace of my real proceedings, and to mislead everyoneto whom I spoke as to the direction in which I had gone?
This icy, snake-like thought stole through my mind, and was gone.
It was with me the full-blooded season of youth, conscious strength,rashness, passion, pursuit, the adventure! Here were a pair ofdouble-barreled pistols, four lives in my hands? What could possiblyhappen? The Count--except for the sake of my dulcinea, what was it to mewhether the old coward whom I had seen, in an ague of terror before thebrawling Colonel, interposed or not? I was assuming the worst that couldhappen. But with an ally so clever and courageous as my beautifulCountess, could any such misadventure befall? Bah! I laughed at all suchfancies.
As I thus communed with myself, the signal light sprang up. Therose-colored light, _couleur de rose_, emblem of sanguine hope andthe dawn of a happy day.
Clear, soft, and steady, glowed the light from the window. The stoneshafts showed black against it. Murmuring words of passionate love as Igazed upon the signal, I grasped my strong box under my arm, and withrapid strides approached the Chateau de la Carque. No sign of light orlife, no human voice, no tread of foot, no bark of dog indicated achance of interruption. A blind was down; and as I came close to thetall window, I found that half-a-dozen steps led up to it, and that alarge lattice, answering for a door, lay open.
A shadow from within fell upon the blind; it was drawn aside, and as Iascended the steps, a soft voice murmured--"Richard, dearest Richard,come, oh! come! how I have longed for this moment!"
Never did she look so beautiful. My love rose to passionate enthusiasm.I only wished there were some real danger in the adventure worthy ofsuch a creature. When the first tumultuous greeting was over, she mademe sit beside her on a sofa. There we talked for a minute or two. Shetold me that the Count had gone, and was by that time more than a mileon his way, with the funeral, to Pere la Chaise. Here were her diamonds.She exhibited, hastily, an open casket containing a profusion of thelargest brilliants.
"What is this?" she asked.
"A box containing money to the amount of thirty thousand pounds," Ianswered.
"What! all that money?" she exclaimed.
"Every _sou_."
"Was it not unnecessary to bring so much, seeing all these?" she said,touching her diamonds. "It would have been kind of you to allow me toprovide for both, for a time at least. It would have made me happiereven than I am."
"Dearest, generous angel!" Such was my extravagant declamation. "Youforget that it may be necessary, for a long time, to observe silence asto where we are, and impossible to communicate safely with anyone."
"You have then here this great sum--are you certain; have you countedit?"
"Yes, certainly; I received it today," I answered, perhaps showing alittle surprise in my face. "I counted it, of course, on drawing it frommy bankers."
"It makes me feel a little nervous, traveling with so much money; butthese jewels make as great a danger; that can add but little to it.Place them side by side; you shall take off your greatcoat when we areready to go, and with it manage to conceal these boxes. I should notlike the drivers to suspect that we were conveying such a treasure. Imust ask you now to close the curtains of that window, and bar theshutters."
I had hardly done this when a knock was heard at the room door.
"I know who this is," she said, in a whisper to me.
I saw that she was not alarmed. She went softly to the door, and awhispered conversation for a minute followed.
"My trusty maid, who is coming with us. She says we cannot safely gosooner than ten minutes. She is bringing some coffee to the next room."
She opened the door and looked in.
"I must tell her not to take too much luggage. She is so odd! Don'tfollow--stay where you are--it is better that she should not see you."
She left the room with a gesture of caution.
A change had come over the manner of this beautiful woman. For the lastfew minutes a shadow had been stealing over her, an air of abstraction,a look bordering on suspicion. Why was she pale? Why had there come thatdark look in her eyes? Why had her very voice become changed? Hadanything gone suddenly wrong? Did some danger threaten?
This doubt, however, speedily quieted itself. If there had been anythingof the kind, she would, of course, have told me. It was only naturalthat, as the crisis approached, she should become more and more nervous.She did not return quite so soon as I had expected. To a man in mysituation absolute quietude is next to impossible. I moved restlesslyabout the room. It was a small one. There was a door at the other end. Iopened it, rashly enough. I listened, it was perfectly silent. I was inan excited, eager state, and every faculty engrossed about what wascoming, and in so far detached from the immediate present. I can'taccount, in any other way, for my having done so many foolish thingsthat night, for I was, naturally, by no means deficient in cunning.About the most stupid of those was, that instead of immediately closingthat door, which I never ought to have opened, I actually took a candleand walked into the room.
There I made, quite unexpectedly, a rather startling discovery.