‘Now, Lenet,’ Claire exclaimed, ‘you really are frightening me.’
‘I do not intend to. Or would you like me to advise you not to see him? No, surely not! And you would no doubt scold me even more if I came to tell you the opposite of what I just have.’
‘Yes, I admit that. But you are talking of seeing him: that was my one single desire, that is what I was praying to God when you arrived. But can it be done?’
‘Is anything impossible for the woman who captured Saint-Georges?’ Lenet said, with a smile.
‘Alas, I have been struggling for two hours to devise a way to get into the fortress, but so far in vain.’
‘And if I were to offer you such a way, what would you give me?’
‘What would I give you? Oh, I know, I would give you my hand on the day I go to the altar with him.’
‘Thank you, child,’ said Lenet. ‘You are right: I do indeed love you like a father. Thank you.’
‘So how?’ said Claire. ‘How?’
‘Here’s how. I asked the princess for a pass, so that I could talk to the prisoners, because if there was any way to save Captain Cauvignac, I should have liked to bring him over to our side. But now the pass is useless, since you have just condemned him to death through your entreaties on behalf of Monsieur de Canolles.’
Claire gave an involuntary shudder.
‘So take this paper,’ Lenet went on. ‘As you see, there is no name.’
Claire took the pass and read: ‘The jailer of the fortress will let the bearer of this present converse with whichever of the two prisoners of war he wishes to speak to, for half an hour. Claire-Clémence de Maillé.’
‘You have a man’s clothes,’ said Lenet. ‘Put them on. You have the pass. Use it.’
‘That poor officer!’ Claire murmured, unable to rid her mind of the idea of Cauvignac being executed in place of Canolles.
‘He is subject to the general law,’ said Lenet. ‘Being weak, he is devoured by the strong; having no protector, he is paying for those who have. I shall be sorry: he is a clever lad.’
Meanwhile, Claire was turning the paper round in her hands.
‘Do you know,’ she said, ‘that you are tempting me most cruelly with this piece of paper? Do you know that once I have my poor friend in my arms, I shall be liable to take him to the ends of the earth?’
‘I would advise you to do so, Madame, if that were possible. But this pass is not a letter of attestation, and you can use it only for the purpose it has.’
‘That’s true,’ said Claire. ‘And yet I have been granted Monsieur de Canolles: he is mine! No one can take him away from me!’
‘And no one wants to. Come now, Madame, waste no time; put on your disguise and leave. This pass gives you half an hour. I know that half an hour is not much, but a lifetime will follow it. You are young, and your life will be long. I pray God it will also be happy!’
Claire grasped Lenet’s hand, pulled him to her and kissed his forehead as she would have kissed the dearest of fathers.
‘Go, now,’ Lenet said, gently pushing her away. ‘Lose no time. ‘The man who truly loves is never resigned.’
Then, watching her as she went into another room, where Pompée came to her call and was waiting to dress her in men’s clothes, he muttered: ‘Alas! Who knows?’
XXII
The shouts, screams, threats and turmoil of the crowd had certainly not gone unnoticed by Canolles. Through the bars of his cell window, he was able to enjoy the lively, bustling spectacle unfolding before his eyes; it was the same, in fact, from one end of the angry town to the other.
‘By God!’ he told himself. ‘This is a pretty pickle. Richon’s death… Poor Richon, he was a fine fellow. His death will mean a much harder captivity for us: I won’t be allowed to run around the town as I used to; there’ll be no more meetings and no marriage, unless Claire is happy with a prison chapel. She will be. One is just as properly married in one chapel as in another. But it’s not a good omen. Why on earth did we not get the news tomorrow instead of today?’ Then, going over to the window and leaning over to look, he went on: ‘What a close watch! Two sentries! And to think that I’ll be shut up here for a week, perhaps a fortnight, until something happens to make them forget about this. Fortunately, the way things are, events are coming thick and fast, and the people of Bordeaux are not serious-minded. But in the meantime, it won’t stop me having some very unpleasant moments. Poor Claire! She must be desperate. Fortunately, she knows that I have been arrested. Ah, yes! She knows, so she knows that it was not my fault. Goodness! Where the devil are all those people off to? It seems as though they are heading towards the Esplanade – but there’s no parade or execution there at this time. They’re all going in the same direction. You really would think that they knew I was here, like a bear in a cage…’
Canolles took a few steps around the cell, with his arms folded. The walls of a real prison had momentarily brought him round to philosophical ideas that he usually worried very little about.
‘Stupid business, war!’ he muttered. ‘There’s poor Richon, with whom I was having dinner hardly a month ago, dead. He would have died at his guns, brave man that he was, as I ought to have done myself – as I should have done, had anyone but the viscountess besieged me. This women’s war is certainly the most to be feared of all wars. At least, I didn’t contribute at all to the death of my friend. Thank God, I didn’t draw my sword against my brother, and that’s a consolation. Why, I owe that to my good female angel, as well! When it comes down to it, I owe her a lot.’
At that moment, an officer came in, interrupting Canolles’s soliloquy.
‘Do you need some supper, Monsieur?’ he said. ‘If so, give me your order. The jailer has instructed me to let you have whatever dishes you like.’
‘Well now,’ Canolles thought. ‘It seems that they intend at least to treat me decently for as long as I am here. For a moment, I feared the contrary, seeing the princess’s tight lips and the unpleasant faces on all those judges of hers.’
‘I am waiting,’ said the officer, with a bow.
‘So you are – forgive me. The extreme politeness of your enquiry gave me pause… Back to business: yes, Monsieur, I should like supper, since I am very hungry, but I am a man of simple tastes, and a soldier’s meal will suit me.’
‘Now,’ the officer said, approaching him with interest. ‘Do you have any commission to be carried out, in town? You’re not expecting anything? You say that you are a soldier; so am I, and you can treat me as a comrade.’
Canolles looked at the officer with astonishment.
‘No, Monsieur,’ he said. ‘No, I don’t have any commission in town. I’m not expecting anyone, except one person whom I cannot name. As for treating you as a comrade, thank you for the offer. Here’s my hand on it, and if later I need anything, I shall remember it.’
This time, it was the officer’s turn to look surprised.
‘Very well,’ he said. ‘Dinner will be served at once.’ And he left.
A short time afterwards, two soldiers came in carrying a ready prepared supper. It was of better quality than Canolles had requested. He sat down at the table and ate heartily.
The soldiers, in their turn, looked at him with astonishment. Canolles mistook this for envy, and, as the wine was an excellent one from Guyenne, he said: ‘Friends, ask for two glasses.’
One of the soldiers went out and came back with the two glasses. Canolles filled them, then poured a few drops of wine into his own.
‘Your health, friends!’ he said.
The two soldiers took the glasses and clinked them mechanically against his, before drinking without returning the toast.
‘They are not very polite,’ Canolles thought. ‘But they drink well. You can’t have everything.’ And he went on with his meal, finishing it triumphantly.
When he was done, he got up, and the soldiers removed the table. The officer returned.
‘Well, I must say, Monsieur,’ C
anolles told him. ‘You should have dined with me: it was an excellent supper.’
‘I could not have the honour, Monsieur, because I have just had dinner myself, a moment ago… And I have come back…’
‘To keep me company?’ said Canolles. ‘If that’s the case, I’m most grateful, because it’s extremely kind of you.’
‘No, Monsieur, I have a less pleasant task. I’ve come to tell you that there is no minister in the prison and that the chaplain is Catholic. Knowing that you are Protestant, I thought this difference in faith might perhaps upset you.’
‘Upset me? Why?’ Canolles asked naively.
‘But… in your devotions,’ said the officer, embarrassed.
‘My devotions! Fine!’ said Canolles. ‘I’ll think about that tomorrow. I only make my devotions in the morning, you know.’
The officer looked at Canolles with an amazement that gradually changed to profound commiseration. He saluted and went out.
‘Well I never!’ said Canolles. ‘Everyone’s going mad. Since poor Richon died, everyone I meet seems to be half-witted or raging. God’s teeth! Am I never to see a slightly reasonable face?’
He had hardly finished saying this, when the cell door opened, and, before he could take in who it was, someone had rushed into his embrace, and, placing his arms around her, was drenching his face with tears.
‘Come now!’ the prisoner said, struggling free of the embrace. ‘Another madman! I really must be in Bedlam!’
However, the movement that he made in starting back knocked the stranger’s hat off, and the lovely blonde hair of Madame de Cambes fell around her shoulders.
‘You!’ said Canolles, running over to take her in his arms. ‘Here! Oh, forgive me for not having recognized you or, rather, for not having sensed your presence…’
‘Quiet!’ she said, quickly picking up her hat and replacing it on her head. ‘Quiet! If anyone knew that it was me, my happiness might be taken from me. At least, I can see you once more. Oh, God! How happy I am!’
Claire, feeling her chest crushed, burst into violent sobs.
‘Once more!’ said Canolles. ‘You say you are allowed to see me once more? And you say it with tears. What! Were you not supposed to see me again?’ he asked, laughing.
‘Please don’t laugh, my dearest,’ said Claire. ‘It hurts me when you laugh. I beg you, don’t laugh. It was so hard for me to get to see you… If only you knew… And I nearly didn’t come. Were it not for that fine man, Lenet… But let’s talk about you, my poor love. Good heavens! You are here! Is it really you? Can I really hold you against my heart?’
‘Yes, yes, it’s me, it’s really me,’ said Canolles, smiling.
‘Oh, please,’ said Claire, ‘there’s no point in putting on that happy look. I know everything. They did not know that I was in love with you, so they hid nothing from me.’
‘And what do you know?’ asked Canolles.
‘Weren’t you expecting me?’ asked the viscountess. ‘Weren’t you worried by my silence? Aren’t you already blaming me?’
‘Why? I was worried and unhappy, of course, but I didn’t blame you. I realized that some circumstances beyond your control were keeping us apart, and my greatest unhappiness, in all this, is that our wedding had to be put off for a week, or perhaps a fortnight…’
It was Claire’s turn to look at Canolles with the same amazement as the officer had shown a short time earlier.
‘What!’ she said. ‘Are you serious? Are you really not more alarmed than that?’
‘Alarmed?’ said Canolles. ‘Alarmed at what? Can it be,’ he said, laughing, ‘that I am in some danger that I am not aware of?’
‘Oh, the poor man!’ she cried. ‘He knew nothing!’
Then, doubtless afraid that she might accidentally reveal the whole truth to the person who was so cruelly threatened by it, she made a tremendous effort and halted the words that were rising from her heart to her lips.
‘No, I’m not aware of anything,’ Canolles said gravely. ‘But you will tell me everything, won’t you? I am a man. Speak to me, Claire, speak…’
‘You know that Richon is dead?’ she asked.
‘Yes, I know.’
‘And do you know how he died?’
‘No, but I can guess… He was killed at his post, surely, on the breach at Vayres?’
Claire was silent for a moment, then, as solemn as the bronze bell tolling for the dead, she said: ‘He was hanged in the market at Libourne.’
Canolles started back.
‘Hanged!’ he cried. ‘Richon! A soldier!’ Then, suddenly going pale and passing a trembling hand across his forehead, he went on: ‘Ah, now I understand everything. I understand my arrest, my interrogation, the words of the officer, the silence of the soldiers… I understand what you have done and why you wept at seeing me so unconcerned… And finally I understand the crowd, the shouts, the threats… Richon, assassinated! And he is to be avenged on me.’
‘No, no, my love! My dear heart!’ Claire said, bursting with joy, grasping both of Canolles’s hands and looking deep into his eyes. ‘No, you are not the one to be sacrificed, my dear prisoner! You were right: you had indeed been chosen, yes, and condemned. You were going to die, yes, you came very close to death, my lovely fiancé! But don’t worry, you can talk of happiness and the future. The woman who is going to devote her whole life to you has saved yours. So be happy, but be quiet, because you might wake up your unfortunate companion, the one on whom the storm will fall, the one who is to die in your place.’
‘Oh, don’t say that, don’t say that, my dearest! You chill me with horror,’ Canolles said, barely recovered from the terrible blow he had just received, despite Claire’s warm caresses. ‘I who was so calm and so confident, so naively happy, I was in mortal danger! And when? At what time? Heavens above! At the moment when I was to become your husband. I swear, it would have been a double killing.’
‘They are calling it reprisals,’ said Claire.
‘Yes, that’s true, they are right.’
‘Come, come, now you’re gloomy and thoughtful again.’
‘Oh, I’m not afraid of death,’ Canolles said. ‘But of death separated from you.’
‘If you had died, my beloved, I should have died too. But instead of feeling sad like this, rejoice with me. Come, now: tonight, perhaps within the hour, you will leave prison. I shall come to fetch you myself or wait for you at the gate. Then, without losing a moment, a second, we shall flee… oh! at once. I don’t want to wait. I’m afraid of this accursed town. Today, I managed to reach you again, but who knows what unexpected misfortune might take you away from me again tomorrow?’
‘My dear, beloved Claire,’ Canolles said, ‘do you know that you are giving me too much happiness all at once… Oh, yes, truly, too much happiness… I shall die from it.’
‘Very well, then, recover your merry, carefree mood.’
‘Then you must recover yours.’
‘Look, I’m laughing.’
‘And that sigh?’
‘That sigh, my friend, is for the unfortunate man who is giving his life for our happiness.’
‘Yes, yes… you’re right! Why couldn’t you take me away at once? Come, my good angel, open your wings and carry me off!’
‘Patience, my dear husband, patience! Tomorrow, I shall take you away. Where? I don’t know. To the paradise of our love. Meanwhile, I am here.’
Canolles took her in his arms and pressed her to him. She threw her arms around the young man’s neck and abandoned herself, trembling, against a heart that, stifled by so many various emotions, could hardly beat.
Suddenly, and for the second time, a painful sob rose from her breast to her lips, and, happy as she was, Claire bathed Canolles’s face in tears.
‘Now, now!’ he said. ‘Is this your merriment, poor angel?’
‘It is the remains of my sorrow.’
At that moment, the door opened, and the officer who had come earlier announced that the h
alf hour allowed on the pass had expired.
‘Farewell!’ Canolles murmured. ‘Or hide me in a fold of your cloak and carry me off!’
‘Hush, my poor friend,’ she said. ‘You are breaking my heart. Can’t you see that I am dying to do that? Be patient for yourself and still more for me. In a few hours we shall be together, never to separate again.’
‘I shall be patient,’ Canolles said joyfully, completely reassured by this promise. ‘But we must part. Come, be brave. We must say the word: farewell. Farewell, Claire, farewell!’
‘Farewell,’ she said, trying to smile. ‘Fare–’
But she could not finish the cruel word. For the third time, her voice was drowned in sobs.
‘Farewell, farewell!’ said Canolles, clasping the viscountess once more and covering her brow with ardent kisses. ‘Farewell!’
‘Diable!’ the officer thought. ‘I’m glad that I know the poor boy no longer has much to fear, because otherwise this scene would break my heart.’
He led Claire to the door and returned.
‘Now, Monsieur,’ he said to Canolles, who had slumped down on a chair, still overcome with emotion. ‘Now, it’s not enough to be happy, one must also show compassion. Your neighbour, your unfortunate companion, the one who is to die, is alone with no one to protect or console him. He is asking to see you. I took it upon myself to grant this request, but it still needs your consent.’
‘I do consent, indeed I do,’ said Canolles. ‘Certainly. The poor wretch. I am waiting for him with open arms. I don’t know him, but what does that matter?’
‘Nonetheless, he seems to know you.’
‘Does he know the fate that awaits him?’
‘No, I think not. So you will understand that we must keep him in ignorance.’
‘Oh, don’t worry.’
‘So, listen. Eleven is going to strike, and I’ll go back to the guardroom. After eleven, the warders reign alone inside the prison. Yours has been warned, and he knows that your neighbour will be in your cell. He will come to fetch him, when he has to take him back to his own. If the prisoner knows nothing, tell him nothing: but if he does realize something, let him know that we soldiers, for our part, all pity him from the depth of our hearts, because after all, dying is nothing, but to be hanged is to die twice.’