CHAPTER XII.
THE KING'S LAST SERVICE.
"Is he up there?" asked a voice in the darkness.
"Not likely. A cat couldn't scramble up that woodwork," answered asecond.
"Send a shot, and try," suggested a third.
There he lay, stretched motionless on the flat roof of the veranda. Heheard the words as the thronging mob surged, and trampled, and swore,and quarreled, beneath him, in the blackness of the gloom; balked oftheir prey, and savage for some amends. There was a moment's pause--ahurried, eager consultation; then he heard the well-known sound of acharge being rammed down, and the sharp drawing out of a ramrod; therewas a flash, a report, a line of light flamed a second in his sight; aball hissed past him with a loud, singing rush, and bedded itself in thetimber, a few inches above his uncovered hair. A dead silence followed;then the muttering of many voices broke out afresh.
"He's not there, at any rate," said one, who seemed the chief; "hecouldn't have kept as still as that with a shot so near him. He's madefor the open country and the forest, I'll take my oath."
Then the trending of many feet trampled their way out from beneath theloggia; their voices and their rapid steps grew fainter and fainter asthey hurried away through the night. For a while, at least, he was safe.
For some moments he lay prostrated there; the rushing of the blood onhis brain, the beating of his heart, the panting of his breath, thequivering of his limbs after the intense muscular effort he had gonethrough, mastered him and flung him down there, beaten and powerless.He felt the foam on his lips and he thought with every instant that thesurcharged veins would burst; hands of steel seemed to crush in upon hischest, knotted cords to tighten in excruciating pain about his loins; hebreathed in short, convulsive gasps; his eyes were blind, and his headswam. A dreaming fancy that this was death vaguely came on him, and hewas glad it should be so.
His eyelids closed unconsciously, weighed down as by the weight of lead;he saw the starry skies above him no more, and the distant noise of thepursuit waxed duller and duller on his ear; then he lost all sense andmemory--he ceased even to feel the night air on his face. How long helay there he never knew; when consciousness returned to him all wasstill; the moon was shining down clear as the day, the west wind wasblowing softly among his hair. He staggered to his feet and leanedagainst the timber of the upper wall; the shelving, impenetrabledarkness sloped below; above were the glories of a summer sky atmidnight, around him the hills and woods were bathed in the silverlight; he looked, and he remembered all.
He had escaped his captors; but for how long? While yet there were somehours of the night left, he must find some surer refuge, or fall intotheir hands again. Yet it was strange that in this moment his ownmisery and his own peril were less upon him than a longing to see oncemore--and for the last time--the woman for whose sake he suffered this.Their love had had the lightness and the languor of their world, and hadhad but little depth in it; yet, in that hour of his supreme sacrificeto her, he loved her as he had not loved in his life.
Recklessness had always been latent in him, with all his serenity andimpassiveness; a reckless resolve entered him now--reckless to madness.Lightly and cautiously, though his sinews still ached, and his nervesstill throbbed with the past strain, he let himself fall, hand overhand, as men go down a rope, along the woodwork to the ground. Oncetouching earth, off he glided, swiftly and noiselessly, keeping in theshadow of the walls all the length of the streets he took, and shunningevery place where any sort of tumult could suggest the neighborhood ofthose who were out and hunting him down. As it chanced, they had takento the open country; he passed on unquestioned, and wound his way to theKursaal. He remembered that to-night there was a masked ball, at whichall the princely and titled world of Baden were present; to which hewould himself have gone after the Russian dinner; by the look of thestars he saw that it must be midnight or past; the ball would be now atits height.
The dare-devil wildness and the cool quietude that were so intimatelyand intricately mingled in his nature could alone have prompted andprojected such a thought and such an action as suggested themselvesto him now; in the moment of his direst extremity, of his utterhopelessness, of his most imminent peril, he went--to take a last lookat his mistress! Baden, for aught he knew, might be but one vast networkto mesh in and to capture him; yet he ran the risk with the dauntlesstemerity that had ever lain underneath the indifferentism and theindolence of his habits.
Keeping always in the shadow, and moving slowly, so as to attract nonotice from those he passed, he made his way deliberately, straighttoward the blaze of light where all the gayety of the town was centered;he reckoned, and rightly, as it proved, that the rumor of his story,the noise of his pursuit, would not have penetrated here as yet; hisown world would be still in ignorance. A moment, that was all hewanted, just to look upon a woman's beauty; he went forward daringly andtranquilly to the venture. If any had told him that a vein of romancewas in him, he would have stared and thought them madmen; yet somethingalmost as wild was in his instinct now. He had lost so much to keep herhonor from attainder; he wished to meet the gaze of her fair eyes oncemore before he went out to exile.
In one of the string of waiting carriages he saw a loose domino lyingon the seat; he knew the liveries and the footmen, and he signed them toopen the door. "Tell Count Carl I have borrowed these," he said to theservant, as he sprang into the vehicle, slipped the scarlet-and-blackdomino on, took the mask, and left the carriage. The man touched his hatand said nothing; he knew Cecil well, as an intimate friend of hisyoung Austrian master. In that masquerade guise he was safe; for the fewminutes, at least, which were all he dared take.
He went on, mingled among the glittering throng, and pierced his wayto the ballroom, the Venetian mask covering his features; many spoke tohim, by the scarlet-and-black colors they took him for the Austrian; heanswered none, and treaded his way among the blaze of hues, the joyousechoes of the music, the flutter of the silk and satin dominoes, themischievous challenge of whispers. His eyes sought only one; he soon sawher, in the white and silver mask-dress, with the spray of carmine-huedeastern flowers, by which he had been told, days ago, to recognize her.A crowd of dominoes were about her, some masked, some not. Her eyesglanced through the envious disguise, and her lips were laughing. Heapproached her with all his old tact in the art d'arborer le cotillon;not hurriedly, so as to attract notice, but carefully, so as to glideinto a place near her.
"You promised me this waltz," he said very gently in her ear. "I havecome in time for it."
She recognized him by his voice, and turned from a French prince torebuke him for his truancy, with gay raillery and much anger.
"Forgive me, and let me have this one waltz--please do!" She glanced athim a moment, and let him lead her out.
"No one has my step as you have it, Bertie," she murmured, as theyglided into the measure of the dance.
She thought his glance fell sadly on her as he smiled.
"No?--but others will soon learn it."
Yet he had never treaded more deftly the maze of the waltzers, nevertrodden more softly, more swiftly, or with more science, the polishedfloor. The waltz was perfect; she did not know it was also a farewell.The delicate perfume of her floating dress, the gleam of the scarletflower-spray, the flash of the diamonds studding her domino, thefragrance of her lips as they breathed so near his own; they haunted himmany a long year afterward.
His voice was very calm, his smile was very gentle, his step, as heswung easily through the intricacies of the circle, was none the lesssmooth and sure for the race that had so late strained his sinews tobursting; the woman he loved saw no change in him; but as the waltz drewto its end, she felt his heart beat louder and quicker on her own; shefelt his hand hold her own more closely, she felt his head drooped overher till his lips almost touched her brow;--it was his last embrace;no other could be given here, in the multitude of these courtlycrowds. Then, with a few low-murmured words that thrilled her in theirutterance,
and echoed in her memory for years to come, he resignedher to the Austrian Grand Duke who was her next claimant, and left hersilently--forever.
Less heroism has often proclaimed itself, with blatant trumpet to theworld--a martyrdom.
He looked back once as he passed from the ballroom--back to the seaof colors, to the glitter of light, to the moving hues, amid whichthe sound of the laughing, intoxicating music seemed to float; to theglisten of the jewels and the gold and the silver--to the scene, in aword, of the life that would be his no more. He looked back in a long,lingering look, such as a man may give the gladness of the earth beforethe gates of a prison close on him; then he went out once more into thenight, threw the domino and the mask back again into the carriage, andtook his way, alone.
He passed along till he had gained the shadow of a by-street, by a sheerunconscious instinct; then he paused, and looked round him--what couldhe do? He wondered vaguely if he were not dreaming; the air seemed toreel about him, and the earth to rock; the very force of control hehad sustained made the reaction stronger; he began to feel blind andstupefied. How could he escape? The railway station would be guardedby those on the watch for him; he had but a few pounds in his pocket,hastily slipped in as he had won them, "money-down," at ecarte that day;all avenues of escape were closed to him, and he knew that his limbswould refuse to carry him with any kind of speed farther. He had onlythe short, precious hours remaining of the night in which to makegood his flight--and flight he must take to save those for whom he hadelected to sacrifice his life. Yet how? and where?
A hurried, noiseless footfall came after him; Rake's voice camebreathless on his ear, while the man's hand went up in the unforgottensoldier's salute--
"Sir! no words. Follow me, and I'll save you."
The one well-known voice was to him like water in a desert land; hewould have trusted the speaker's fidelity with his life. He askednothing, said nothing, but followed rapidly and in silence; turning anddoubling down a score of crooked passages, and burrowing at the lastlike a mole in a still, deserted place on the outskirts of thetown, where some close-set trees grew at the back of stables andout-buildings.
In a streak of the white moonlight stood two hunters, saddled; one wasForest King. With a cry, Cecil threw his arms round the animal's neck;he had no thought then except that he and the horse must part.
"Into saddle, sir! quick as your life!" whispered Rake. "We'll be faraway from this d----d den by morning."
Cecil looked at him like a man in stupor--his arm still over the gray'sneck.
"He can have no stay in him! He was dead-beat on the course."
"I know he was, sir; but he ain't now; he was pisined; but I've a trickwith a 'oss that'll set that sort o' thing--if it ain't gone too far,that is to say--right in a brace of shakes. I doctored him; he's hisselfagen; he'll take you till he drops."
The King thrust his noble head closer in his master's bosom, and made alittle murmuring noise, as though he said, "Try me!"
"God bless you, Rake!" Cecil said huskily. "But I cannot take him, hewill starve with me. And--how did you know of this?"
"Begging your pardon, your honor, he'll eat chopped furze with youbetter than he'll eat oats and hay along of a new master," retorted Rakerapidly, tightening the girths. "I don't know nothing, sir, save that Iheard you was in a strait; I don't want to know nothing; but I sees themcursed cads a-runnin' of you to earth, and thinks I to myself, 'Comewhat will, the King will be the ticket for him.' So I ran to your roomunbeknown, packed a little valise, and got out the passports; thenback again to the stables, and saddled him like lightning, and got 'emoff--nobody knowing but Bill there. I seed you go by into the Kursaal,and laid in wait for you, sir. I made bold to bring Mother o' Pearl formyself."
And Rake stopped, breathless and hoarse with passion and grief that hewould not utter. He had heard more than he said.
"For yourself?" echoed Cecil. "What do you mean? My good fellow, I amruined. I shall be beggared from to-night--utterly. I cannot even helpyou or keep you; but Lord Rockingham will do both for my sake."
The ci-devant soldier struck his heel into the earth with a fiery oath.
"Sir, there ain't time for no words. Where you goes I go. I'll followyou while there's a drop o' blood in me. You was good to me when I wasa poor devil that everyone scouted; you shall have me with you to thelast, if I die for it. There!"
Cecil's voice shook as he answered. The fidelity touched him asadversity could not do.
"Rake, you are a noble fellow. I would take you, were it possible;but--in an hour I may be in a felon's prison. If I escape that, I shalllead a life of such wretchedness as--"
"That's not nothing to me, sir."
"But it is much to me," answered Cecil. "As things have turned--lifeis over with me, Rake. What my own fate may be I have not the faintestnotion--but let it be what it will, it must be a bitter one. I will notdrag another into it."
"If you send me away, I'll shoot myself through the head, sir; that'sall."
"You will do nothing of the kind. Go to Lord Rockingham, and ask himfrom me to take you into his service. You cannot have a kinder master."
"I don't say nothing agen the Marquis, sir," said Rake doggedly; "he'sa right-on generous gentleman, but he aren't you. Let me go with you, ifit's just to rub the King down. Lord, sir! you don't know what straitsI've lived in--what a lot of things I can turn my hand to--what a oneI am to fit myself into any rat-hole, and make it spicy. Why, sir, I'mthat born scamp, I am--I'm a deal happier on the cross and getting mybread just anyhow, than I am when I'm in clover like you've kept me."
Rake's eyes looked up wistfully and eager as a dog's when he prays tobe let out of kennel to follow the gun; his voice was husky and agitatedwith a strong excitement. Cecil stood a moment, irresolute, touched andpained at the man's spaniel-like affection--yet not yielding to it.
"I thank you from my heart, Rake," he said at length, "but it must notbe. I tell you my future life will be beggary--"
"You'll want me anyways, sir," retorted Rake, ashamed of the choking inhis throat. "I ask your pardon for interrupting, but every second's thatprecious like. Besides, sir, I've got to cut and run for my own sake.I've laid Willon's head open, down there in the loose box; and when he'scome to himself a pretty hue and cry he'll raise after me. He paintedthe King, that's what he did; and I told him so, and I give it tohim--one--two--amazing! Get into saddle, sir, for the Lord's sake! Andhere, Bill--you run back, shut the door, and don't let nobody know the'osses are out till the morning. Then look like a muff as you are, andsay nothing!"
The stable-boy stared, nodded assent, and sloped off. Rake threw himselfacross the brown mare.
"Now, sir! a steeple-chase for our lives! We'll be leagues away by theday-dawn, and I've got their feed in the saddle-bags, so that they'llbait in the forests. Off, sir, for God's sake, or the blackguards willbe down on you again!"
As he spoke the clamor and tread of men of the town racing to the chasewere wafted to them on the night wind, drawing nearer and nearer; Rakedrew the reins tight in his hand in fury.
"There they come--the d----d beaks! For the love of mercy, sir, don'tcheck now. Ten seconds more and they'll be on you; off, off!--or by theLord Harry, sir, you'll make a murderer of me, and I'll kill the firstman that lays his hand on you!"
The blaze of bitter blood was in the ex-Dragoon's fiery face as the moonshone on it, and he drew out one of his holster pistols, and swung roundin his saddle, facing the narrow entrance of the lane; ready to shootdown the first of the pursuit whose shadow should darken the broadstream of white light that fell through the archway.
Cecil looked at him, and paused no more; but vaulted into the oldfamiliar seat, and Forest King bore him away through the starry night,with the brown mare racing her best by his side. Away--through thesleeping shadows, through the broad beams of the moon, through theodorous scent of the crowded pines, through the soft breaking grayof the dawn; away--to mountain solitudes and forest silence, and theshelter of lonel
y untracked ravines, and the woodland lairs they mustshare with wolf and boar; away--to flee with the flight of the huntedfox, to race with the wakeful dread of the deer; away--to what fate, whocould tell?
Far and fast they rode through the night, never drawing rein. The horseslaid well to their work; their youth and their mettle were roused, andthey needed no touch of spur, but neck-and-neck dashed down through thesullen gray of the dawn and the breaking flush of the first sunrise.On the hard, parched earth, on the dew-laden moss, on the stretches ofwayside sward, on the dry white dust of the ducal roads, their hoofsthundered, unfollowed, unechoed; the challenge of no pursuit stayedthem, and they obeyed the call that was made on their strength with goodand gallant willingness. Far and fast they rode, happily knowingthe country well; now through the darkness of night, now through theglimmering daybreak. Tall walls of fir-crowned rocks passed by theireyes, all fused and dim; gray piles of monastic buildings, with the dullchimes tolling the hour, flashed on their sight to be lost in a moment;corn-lands yellowing for the sickle, fields with the sheaves set-up,orchards ruddy with fruit, and black barn-roofs lost in leafy nests;villages lying among their hills like German toys caught in the hollowof a guarding hand; masses of forests stretching wide, somber and silentand dark as a tomb; the shine of water's silvery line where it flowedin a rocky channel--they passed them all in the soft gray of the waningnight, in the white veil of the fragrant mists, in the stillness ofsleep and of peace. Passed them, racing for more than life, flying withthe speed of the wind.
"I failed him to-day through my foes and his," Forest King thought, ashe laid his length out in his mighty stride. "But I love him well; Iwill save him to-night." And save him the brave brute did. The grasswas so sweet and so short, he longed to stop for a mouthful; the brookslooked so clear, he longed to pause for a drink; renewed force andreviving youth filled his loyal veins with their fire; he could havethrown himself down on that mossy turf, and had a roll in its thyme andits lichens for sheer joy that his strength had come back. But he wouldyield to none of these longings; he held on for his master's sake, andtried to think, as he ran, that this was only a piece of play--only asteeple-chase, for a silver vase and a lady's smile, such as he and hisrider had so often run for, and so often won, in those glad hours of thecrisp winter noons of English Shires far away. He turned his eyes on thebrown mare's, and she turned hers on his; they were good friends in thestables at home, and they understood one another now. "If I were whatI was yesterday, she wouldn't run even with me," thought the King; butthey were doing good work together, and he was too true a knight andtoo true a gentleman to be jealous of Mother o' Pearl, so they racedneck-and-neck through the dawn; with the noisy clatter of water-millwheels, or the distant sound of a woodman's ax, or the tolling bell ofa convent clock, the only sound on the air save the beat of the flyinghoofs.
Away they went, mile on mile, league on league, till the stars fadedout in the blaze of the sun, and the tall pines rose out of the gloom.Either his pursuers were baffled and distanced, or no hue and cry wasyet after him; nothing arrested them as they swept on, and the silentland lay in the stillness of morning ere toil and activity awakened. Itwas strangely still, strangely lonely, and the echo of the gallop seemedto beat on the stirless, breathless solitude. As the light broke andgrew clearer and clearer, Cecil's face in it was white as death as hegalloped through the mists, a hunted man, on whose head a price was set;but it was quite calm still, and very resolute--there was no "harkingback" in it.
They had raced nigh twenty English miles by the time the chimes of avillage were striking six o'clock; it was the only group of dwellingsthey had ventured near in their flight; the leaded lattices were thrustopen with a hasty clang, and women's heads looked out as the iron trampof the hunters' feet struck fire from the stones. A few cries wereraised; one burgher called them to know their errand; they answerednothing, but traversed the street with lightning speed, gone from sightalmost ere they were seen. A league farther on was a wooded bottom, alldark and silent, with a brook murmuring through it under the leafy shadeof lilies and the tangle of water-plants; there Cecil checked the Kingand threw himself out of saddle.
"He is not quite himself yet," he murmured, as he loosened the girthsand held back the delicate head from the perilous cold of the water towhich the horse stretched so eagerly; he thought more of Forest Kingthan he thought, even in that hour, of himself. He did all that wasneeded with his own hands; fed him with the corn from the saddle-bags,cooled him gently, led him to drink a cautious draught from the bubblinglittle stream, then let him graze and rest under the shade of thearomatic pines and the deep bronze leaves of the copper beeches; itwas almost dark, so heavy and thickly laced were the branches, andexquisitely tranquil in the heart of the hilly country, in the peace ofthe early day, with the rushing of the forest brook the sole sound thatwas heard, and the everlasting sighing of the pine-boughs overhead.
Cecil leaned a while silently against one of the great gnarled trunks,and Rake affected to busy himself with the mare; in his heart was atumult of rage, a volcano of curiosity, a pent-up storm of anxiousamaze, but he would have let Mother o' Pearl brain him with a kick ofher iron plates rather than press a single look that should seem likedoubt, or seem like insult in adversity to his fallen master.
Cecil's eyes, drooped and brooding, gazed a long half-hour down insilence into the brook bubbling at his feet; then he lifted his head andspoke--with a certain formality and command in his voice, as though hegave an order on parade.
"Rake, listen, and do precisely what I bid you; neither more nor less.The horses cannot accompany me, nor you either; I must go henceforthwhere they would starve, and you would do worse. I do not take the Kinginto suffering, nor you into temptation."
Rake, who at the tone had fallen unconsciously in to the attitude of"attention," giving the salute with his old military instinct, openedhis lips to speak in eager protestation; Cecil put up his hand.
"I have decided; nothing you can say will alter me. We are near aby-station now; if I find none there to prevent me, I shall get away bythe first train; to hide in these woods is out of the question. Youwill return by easy stages to Baden, and take the horses at once to LordRockingham. They are his now. Tell him my last wish was that he shouldtake you into his service; and he will be a better master to you than Ihave ever been. As for the King"--his lips quivered, and his voice shooka little, despite himself--"he will be safe with him. I shall go intosome foreign service--Austrian, Russian, Mexican, whichever be opento me. I would not risk such a horse as mine to be sold, ill-treated,tossed from owner to owner, sent in his old age to a knacker's yard, orkilled in a skirmish by a cannon-shot. Take both him and the mare back,and go back yourself. Believe me, I thank you from my heart for yournoble offer of fidelity, but accept it I never shall."
A dead pause came after his words; Rake stood mute; a curiouslook--half-dogged, half-wounded, but very resolute--had come on hisface. Cecil thought him pained, and spoke with an infinite gentleness:
"My good fellow, do not regret it, or fancy I have no gratitude to you.I feel your loyalty deeply, and I know all you would willingly sufferfor me; but it must not be. The mere offer of what you would do had beenquite testimony enough of your truth and your worth. It is impossiblefor me to tell you what has so suddenly changed my fortunes; it issufficient that for the future I shall be, if I live, what you were--aprivate soldier in an army that needs a sword. But let my fate be whatit will, I go to it alone. Spare me more speech, and simply obey my lastcommand."
Quiet as the words were, there was a resolve in them not to be disputed;an authority not to be rebelled against. Rake stared, and looked athim blankly; in this man who spoke to him with so subdued but soirresistible a power of command, he could scarcely recognize the gay,indolent, indulgent, pococurante Guardsman, whose most serious anxietyhad been the set of a lace tie, the fashion of his hunting dress, or thechoice of the gold arabesques for his smoking-slippers.
Rake was silent a moment; then hi
s hand touched his cap again.
"Very well, sir," and without opposition or entreaty, he turned toresaddle the mare.
Our natures are oddly inconsistent. Cecil would not have taken the manin to exile, and danger, and temptation, and away from comfort and anhonest life, for any consideration; yet it gave him something of apang that Rake was so soon dissuaded from following him, and so easilyconvinced of the folly of his fidelity. But he had dealt himself a fardeadlier one when he had resolved to part forever from the King. Heloved the horse better than he loved anything--fed from his hand infoalhood, reared, broken, and trained under his own eye and his owncare, he had had a truer welcome from those loving, lustrous eyes thanall his mistresses ever gave him. He had had so many victories, so manyhunting-runs, so many pleasant days of winter and of autumn, with ForestKing for his comrade and companion! He could better bear to sever fromall other things than from the stable-monarch, whose brave heart neverfailed him, and whose honest love was always his.
He stretched his hand out with his accustomed signal; the King liftedhis head where he grazed, and came to him with the murmuring noise ofpleasure he always gave at his master's caress, and pressed hisforehead against Cecil's breast, and took such tender heed, such earnestsolicitude, not to harm him with a touch of the mighty fore hoofs, asthose only who care for and know horses well will understand in itsrelation.
Cecil threw his arm over his neck, and leaned his own head down on it,so that his face was hidden. He stood motionless so many moments, andthe King never stirred, but only pressed closer and closer againsthis bosom as though he knew that this was his eternal farewell to hismaster. But little light came there, the boughs grew so thickly; and itwas still and solitary as a desert in the gloom of the meeting trees.
There have been many idols--idols of gold, idols of clay--less pure,less true than the brave and loyal-hearted beast from whom he partednow.
He stood motionless a while longer, and where his face was hidden, thegray silken mane of the horse was wet with great, slow tears that forcedthemselves through his closed eyes; then he laid his lips on the King'sforehead, as he might have touched the brow of the woman he loved; andwith a backward gesture of his hand to his servant, plunged down intothe deep slope of netted boughs and scarce penetrable leafage, thatswung back into their places, and shrouded him from sight with theirthick, unbroken screen.
"He's forgot me right and away in the King," murmured Rake, as he ledForest King away slowly and sorrowfully, while the hunter pulled andfretted to force his way to his master. "Well, it's only natural like.I've cause to care for him, and plenty on it; but he ain't no sort ofreason to think about me."
That was the way the philosopher took his wound.
Alone, Cecil flung himself full-length down on the turf beneath thebeech woods; his arms thrown forward, his face buried in the grass, allgay with late summer forest blossoms; for the first time the whole mightof the rain that had fallen on him was understood by him; for the firsttime it beat him down beneath it, as the overstrained tension of nerveand of self-restraint had their inevitable reaction. He knew what thisthing was which he had done--he had given up his whole future.
Though he had spoken lightly to his servant of his intention to entera foreign army, he knew himself how few the chances were that he couldever do so. It was possible that Rockingham might so exert his influencethat he would be left unpursued, but unless this chanced so (and Baronihad seemed resolute to forego no part of his demands), the search forhim would be in the hands of the law, and the wiles of secret police andof detectives' resources spread too far and finely over the world forhim to have a hope of ultimate escape.
If he sought France, the Extradition Treaty would deliver him up;Russia--Austria--Prussia were of equal danger; he would be identified,and given up to trial. Into the Italian service he knew many a scoundrelwas received unquestioned; and he might try the Western world; though hehad no means to pay the passage, he might work it; he was a good sailor.Yachts had been twice sunk under him, by steamers, in the Solent and theSpezzia, and his own schooner had once been fired at by mistake for ablockade runner, when he had brought to, and given them a broadside fromhis two shotted guns before he would signal them their error.
As these things swept, disordered and aimless, through his mind, hewondered if a nightmare were upon him; he, the darling of Belgravia, theGuards' champion, the lover of Lady Guenevere, to be here outlawedand friendless; wearily racking his brains to solve whether he hadseamanship enough to be taken before the mast, or could stand beforethe tambour-major of a French regiment, with a chance to serve the sameflag!
For a while he lay like a drunken man, heavy and motionless, his browresting on his arm, his face buried in the grass; he had parted moreeasily with the woman he loved than he had parted with Forest King. Thechimes of some far-off monastery, or castle-campanile, swung lazily inthe morning stillness; the sound revived him, and recalled to him howlittle time there was if he would seek the flight that had begun onimpulse and was continued in a firm, unshrinking resolve; he must go on,and on, and on; he must burrow like a fox, hide like a beaten cur; hemust put leagues between him and all who had ever known him; he mustsink his very name, and identity, and existence, under some impenetrableobscurity, or the burden he had taken up for others' sake would beuselessly borne. There must be action of some sort or other, instant andunerring.
"It don't matter," he thought, with the old idle indifference, oddlybecoming in that extreme moment the very height of stoic philosophy,without any thought or effort to be such; "I was going to the bad of myown accord; I must have cut and run for the debts, if not for this; itwould have been the same thing, anyway, so it's just as well to do itfor them. Life's over, and I'm a fool that I don't shoot myself."
But there was too imperious a spirit in the Royallieu blood to let himgive in to disaster and do this. He rose slowly, staggering a little,and feeling blinded and dazzled with the blaze of the morning sun ashe went out of the beech wood. There were the marks of the hoofs on thedamp, dewy turf; his lips trembled a little as he saw them--he wouldnever rid the horse again!
Some two miles, more or less, lay between him and the railway. He wasnot certain of his way, and he felt a sickening exhaustion on him;he had been without food since his breakfast before the race. Agamekeeper's hut stood near the entrance of the wood; he had muchrecklessness in him, and no caution. He entered through the half-opendoor, and asked the keeper, who was eating his sausage and drinking hislager, for a meal.
"I'll give you one if you'll bring me down that hen-harrier," growledthe man in south German; pointing to the bird that was sailing far off,a mere speck in the sunny sky.
Cecil took the rifle held out to him, and without seeming even to pauseto take aim, fired. The bird dropped like a stone through the air intothe distant woods. There was no tremor in his wrist, no uncertainty inhis measure. The keeper stared; the shot was one he had thought beyondany man's range, and he set food and drink before his guest with acrestfallen surprise, oddly mingled with veneration.
"You might have let me buy my breakfast, without making me do murder,"said Bertie quietly, as he tried to eat. The meal was coarse--he couldscarcely touch it; but he drank the beer down thirstily, and took acrust of bread. He slipped his ring, a great sapphire graven with hiscrest, off his finger, and held it out to the man.
"That is worth fifty double-Fredericks. Will you take it in exchange foryour rifle and some powder and ball?"
The German stared again, open-mouthed, and clinched the bargain eagerly.He did not know anything about gems, but the splendor of this dazzledhis eye, while he had guns more than enough, and could get many othersat his lord's cost. Cecil fastened a shot-belt round him, took apowder-flask and cartridge-case, and with a few words of thanks, went onhis way.
Now that he held the rifle in his hand, he felt ready for the workthat was before him; if hunted to bay, at any rate he could now have astruggle for his liberty. The keeper stood bewildered, gazing blanklyafte
r him down the vista of pines.
"Hein! Hein!" he growled, as he looked at the sapphiresparkling in his broad, brown palm; "I never saw such awith-lavishness-wasteful-and-with-courteous-speech-laconic gentleman! Iwish I had not let him have the gun; he will take his own life, belikes;ach, Gott! He will take his own life!"
But Cecil had not bought it for that end--though he had called himselfa fool for not sending a bullet through his brain, to quench in eternaldarkness this ruined and wretched life that alone remained to him. Hewalked on through the still summer dawn, with the width of the countrystretching sun-steeped around him. The sleeplessness, the excitement,the misery, the wild running of the past night had left him strengthlessand racked with pain, but he knew that he must press onward or becaught, sooner or later, like netted game in the poacher's silkenmesh. Where to go, what to do, he knew no more than if he were a child;everything had always been ready to his hand; the only thought requiredof him had been how to amuse himself and avoid being bored; now thrownalone on a mighty calamity, and brought face to face with the severityand emergency of exertion, he was like a pleasure-boat beaten underhigh billows, and driven far out to sea by the madness of a ragingnor'wester. He had no conception what to do; he had but one resolve--tokeep his secret; if, to do it, he killed himself with the rifle hissapphire ring had bought.
Carelessly daring always, he sauntered now into the station for which hehad made, without a sign on him that could attract observation; hewore still the violet velvet Spanish-like dress, the hessians, and thebroad-leafed felt hat with an eagle's feather fastened in it, that hehad worn at the races; and with the gun in his hand there was nothingto distinguish him from any tourist "milor," except that in one hand hecarried his own valise. He cast a rapid glance around; no warrantfor his apprehension, no announcement of his personal appearance hadpreceded him here; he was safe--safe in that; safer still in the factthat the train rushed in so immediately on his arrival there, that thefew people about had no time to notice or speculate upon him. The coupewas empty, by a happy chance; he took it, throwing his money down withno heed that when the little he had left was once expended he would bepenniless, and the train whirled on with him, plunging into the heart offorest and mountain, and the black gloom of tunnels, and the golden seasof corn-harvest. He was alone; and he leaned his head on his hands, andthought, and thought, and thought, till the rocking, and the rushing,and the whirl, and the noise of the steam on his ear and the giddygyrations of his brain in the exhaustion of overstrung exertion,conquered thought. With the beating of the engine seeming to throb likethe great swinging of a pendulum through his mind, and the whirlingof the country passing by him like a confused phantasmagoria, his eyesclosed, his aching limbs stretched themselves out to rest, a heavydreamless sleep fell on him, the sleep of intense bodily fatigue, and heknew no more.
Gendarmes awoke him to see his visa. He showed it them by sheermechanical instinct, and slept again in that dead weight of slumber themoment he was alone. When he had taken his ticket, and they had askedhim to where it should be, he had answered to their amaze, "to thefarthest place it goes," and he was borne on now unwitting where itwent; through the rich champaign and the barren plains; through thereddening vintage and over the dreary plateaux; through antique cities,and across broad, flowing rivers; through the cave of riven rocks,and above nestling, leafy valleys; on and on, on and on, while he knewnothing, as the opium-like sleep of intense weariness held him in itstupor.
He awoke at last with a start; it was evening; the stilly twilight wassettling over all the land, and the train was still rushing onward,fleet as the wind. His eyes, as they opened dreamily, fell on a facehalf obscured in the gleaming; he leaned forward, bewildered anddoubting his senses.
"Rake!"
Rake gave the salute hurriedly and in embarrassment.
"It's I, sir!--yes, sir."
Cecil thought himself dreaming still.
"You! You had my orders?"
"Yes, sir, I had your orders," murmured the ex-soldier, more confusedthan he had ever been in the whole course of his audacious life, "andthey was the first I ever disobeyed--they was. You see, sir, they wasjust what I couldn't swallow nohow--that's the real, right-down fact!Send me to the devil, Mr. Cecil, for you, and I'll go at the firstbidding, but leave you just when things are on the cross for you, damnme if I will!--beggin' your pardon, sir!"
And Rake, growing fiery and eloquent, dashed his cap down on the floorof the coupe with an emphatic declaration of resistance. Cecil lookedat him in silence; he was not certain still whether this were not afantastic folly he was dreaming.
"Damn me if I will, Mr. Cecil! You won't keep me--very well; but youcan't prevent me follerin' of you, and foller you I will; and so there'sno more to be said about it, sir; but just to let me have my own lark,as one may say. You said you'd go to the station, I went there; youtook your ticket, I took my ticket. I've been travelling behind you tillabout two hours ago, then I looked at you; you was asleep sir. 'I don'tthink my master's quite well,' says I to Guard; 'I'd like to get inthere along of him.' 'Get in with you, then,' says he (only we wasjabbering that willainous tongue o' theirs), for he sees the name on mytraps is the same as that on your traps--and in I get. Now, Mr.Cecil, let me say one word for all, and don't think I'm a insolent,ne'er-do-well for having been and gone and disobeyed you; but youwas good to me when I was sore in want of it; you was even good to mydog--rest his soul, the poor beast! There never were a braver!--andstick to you I will till you kick me away like a cur. The truth is, it'sonly being near of you, sir, that keeps me straight; if I was to leaveyou I should become a bad 'un again, right and away. Don't send me fromyou, sir, as you took mercy on me once!"
Rake's voice shook a little toward the close of his harangue, and inthe shadows of evening light, as the train plunged through the gatheringgloom, his ruddy, bright, bronzed face looked very pale and wistful.
Cecil stretched out his hand to him in silence that spoke better thanwords.
Rank hung his head.
"No, sir; you're a gentleman, and I've been an awful scamp! It's enoughhonor for me that you would do it. When I'm more worth it, perhaps--butthat won't never be."
"You are worth it now, my gallant fellow." His voice was very low; theman's loyalty touched him keenly. "It was only for yourself, Rake, thatI ever wished you to leave me."
"God bless you, sir!" said Rake passionately; "them words are betternor ten tosses of brandy! You see, sir, I'm so spry and happy in a wildlife, I am, and if so be as you go to them American parts as you spokeon, why I know 'em just as well as I know Newmarket Heath, every bit!They're terrible rips in them parts; kill you as soon as look at you; itmakes things uncommon larky out there, uncommon spicy. You aren't neversure but what there's a bowie knife a-waiting for you."
With which view of the delights of Western life, Rake, "feeling likea fool," as he thought himself, for which reason he had diverged intoArgentine memories, applied himself to the touching and examining of therifle with that tenderness which only gunnery love and lore produce.
Cecil sat silent a while, his head drooped down on his hands, while theevening deepened to night. At last he looked up.
"The King? Where is he?"
Rake flushed shamefacedly under his tanned skin.
"Beggin' your pardon, sir; behind you."
"Behind me?"
"Yes, sir; him and the brown mare. I couldn't do nothing else with 'emyou see, sir, so I shipped him along with us; they don't care for thetrain a bit, bless their hearts! And I've got a sharp boy a-mindingof 'em. You can easily send 'em on to England from Paris if you'redetermined to part with 'em; but you know the King always was fond ofdrums and trumpets and that like. You remember, sir, when he as a coltwe broke him into it and taught him a bit of maneuvering; 'cause, tillyou find what pace he had in him, you'd thought of making a charger ofhim. He loves the noise of soldiering--he do; and if he thought you wasgoing away without him, he'd break his heart, Mr. Cecil, sir. It was allI could do to
keep him from follerin' of you this morning; he sawed myarms off almost."
With which, Rake, conscious that he had been guilty of unpardonabledisobedience and outrageous interference, hung his head over the gun; alittle anxious and a good deal ashamed.
Cecil smiled a little, despite himself.
"Rake, you will do for no service, I am afraid; you are terriblyinsubordinate!"
He had not the heart to say more; the man's fidelity was too true to bereturned with rebuke; and stronger than all surprise and annoyance was astrange mingling of pain and pleasure in him to think that the horse heloved so well was still so near him, the comrade of his adversity as hehad been the companion of his happiest hours.
"These things will keep him a few days," he thought, as he looked at hishunting-watch, and the priceless pearl in each of his wristband-studs.He would have pawned every atom he had about him to have had the Kingwith him a week longer.
The night fell, the stars came out, the storm-rack of a coming tempestdrifted over the sky, the train rushed onward through the thickeningdarkness, through the spectral country--it was like his life, rushingheadlong down into impenetrable gloom. The best, the uttermost, that hecould look for was a soldier's grave, far away under some foreign soil.