CHAPTER VI. So that was their plan. Two or three hours to the southward,the long, white, glittering wall stretched east and west above thebrown woods. Beyond that lay Spain. Once across the border, I might bedetained, if no worse happened to me, as a prisoner of war; for we werethen at war with Spain on the Italian side. Or I might be handed overto one of the savage bands, half smugglers, half brigands, that held thepasses; or be delivered, worse fate of all, into the power of the Frenchexiles, of whom some would be likely to recognise me and cut my throat.
'It is a long way into Spain,' I muttered, watching in a kind offascination Clon handling his pistols.
'I think you will find the other road longer still,' the landlordanswered grimly. 'But choose, and be quick about it.'
They were three to one, and they had firearms. In effect I had nochoice.
'Well, if I must I must?' I cried, making up my mind with seemingrecklessness. 'VOGUE LA GALERE! Spain be it. It will not be the firsttime I have heard the dons talk.'
The men nodded, as much as to say that they had known what the end wouldbe; the landlord released my rein; and in a trice we were riding downthe narrow track, with our faces set towards the mountains.
On one point my mind was now more easy. The men meant fairly by me, andI had no longer to fear, as I had feared, a pistol-shot in the back atthe first convenient ravine. As far as that went, I might ride in peace.On the other hand, if I let them carry me across the border my fatewas sealed. A man set down without credentials or guards among thewild desperadoes who swarmed in war-time in the Asturian passes mightconsider himself fortunate if an easy death fell to his lot. In my caseI could make a shrewd guess what would happen. A single nod of meaning,one muttered word, dropped among the savage men with whom I shouldbe left, and the diamonds hidden in my boot would go neither to theCardinal nor back to Mademoiselle--nor would it matter to me whitherthey went.
So while the others talked in their taciturn fashion, or sometimesgrinned at my gloomy face, I looked out over the brown woods with eyesthat saw yet did not see. The red squirrel swarming up the trunk, thestartled pigs that rushed away grunting from their feast of mast, thesolitary rider who met us, armed to the teeth, and passed northwardsafter whispering with the landlord--all these I saw. But my mind was notwith them. It was groping and feeling about like a hunted mole forsome way of escape. For time pressed. The slope we were on was growingsteeper. By-and-by we fell into a southward valley, and began to followit steadily upwards, crossing and recrossing a swiftly rushing stream.The snow peaks began to be hidden behind the rising bulk of hills thatoverhung us, and sometimes we could see nothing before or behind but thewooded walls of our valley rising sheer and green a thousand paces highon either hand; with grey rocks half masked by fern and ivy jutting hereand there through the firs and alders.
It was a wild and sombre scene even at that hour, with the mid-day sunshining on the rushing water and drawing the scent out of the pines;but I knew that there was worse to come, and sought desperately for someruse by which I might at least separate the men. Three were too many;with one I might deal. At last, when I had cudgelled my brain foran hour, and almost resigned myself to a sudden charge on the mensingle-handed--a last desperate resort--I thought of a plan: dangerous,too, and almost desperate, but which still seemed to promise something.It came of my fingers resting, as they lay in my pocket, on thefragments of the orange sachet; which, without having any particulardesign in my mind, I had taken care to bring with me. I had torn thesachet into four pieces--four corners. As I played mechanically withthem, one of my fingers fitted into one, as into a glove; a secondfinger into another. And the plan came.
Before I could move in it, however, I had to wait until we stopped tobait the flagging horses, which we did about noon at the head of thevalley. Then, pretending to drink from the stream, I managed to secureunseen a handful of pebbles, slipping them into the same pocket withthe morsels of stuff. On getting to horse again, I carefully fitted apebble, not too tightly, into the largest scrap, and made ready for theattempt.
The landlord rode on my left, abreast of me; the other two knavesbehind. The road at this stage favoured me, for the valley, whichdrained the bare uplands that lay between the lower hills and the baseof the real mountains, had become wide and shallow. Here were no trees,and the path was a mere sheep-track covered with short, crisp grass, andrunning sometimes on this bank of the stream and sometimes on that.
I waited until the ruffian beside me turned to speak to the men behind.The moment he did so, and his eyes were averted, I slipped out the scrapof satin in which I had placed the pebble, and balancing it carefully onmy right thigh as I rode, I flipped it forward with all the strengthof my thumb and finger. I meant it to fall a few paces before us in thepath, where it could be seen. But alas for my hopes! At the criticalmoment my horse started, my finger struck the scrap aslant, the pebbleflew out, and the bit of stuff fluttered into a whin-bush close to mystirrup--and was lost!
I was bitterly disappointed, for the same thing might happen again, andI had now only three scraps left. But fortune favoured me, by puttingit into my neighbour's head to plunge into a hot debate with theshock-headed man on the nature of some animals seen on a distant brow;which he said were izards, while the other maintained that they werecommon goats. He continued, on this account, to ride with his faceturned from me, and I had time to fit another pebble into the secondpiece of stuff. Sliding it on to my thigh, I poised it, and flipped it.
This time my finger struck the tiny missile fairly in the middle, andshot it so far and so truly that it dropped exactly in the path tenpaces in front of us. The moment I saw it fall I kicked my neighbour'snag in the ribs; it started, and he, turning in a rage, hit it. The nextinstant he pulled it almost on to its haunches.
'SAINT GRIS!' he cried; and sat glaring at the bit of yellow satin, withhis face turned purple and his jaw fallen.
'What is it!' I said, staring at him in turn, 'What is the matter,fool?'
'Matter?' he blurted out. 'MON DIEU!'
But Clon's excitement surpassed even his. The dumb man no soonersaw what had attracted his comrade's attention, than he uttered aninarticulate and horrible noise, and tumbling off his horse, more like abeast than a man threw himself bodily on the precious morsel.
The innkeeper was not far behind him. An instant and he was down, too,peering at the thing; and for an instant I thought that they would fightover it. However, though their jealousy was evident, their excitementcooled a little when they discovered that the scrap of stuff was empty;for, fortunately, the pebble had fallen out of it. Still, it threw theminto such a fever of eagerness as it was wonderful to witness. Theynosed the ground where it had lain, they plucked up the grass and turf,and passed it through their fingers, they ran to and fro like dogs on atrail; and, glancing askance at one another, came back always togetherto the point of departure. Neither in his jealousy would suffer theother to be there alone.
The shock-headed man and I sat our horses and looked on; he marvelling,and I pretending to marvel. As the two searched up and down the path,we moved a little out of it to give them space; and presently, whenall their heads were turned from me, I let a second morsel drop under agorse-bush. The shock-headed man, by-and-by, found this, and gave it toClon; and as from the circumstances of the first discovery no suspicionattached to me, I ventured to find the third and last scrap myself. Idid not pick it up, but I called the innkeeper, and he pounced upon itas I have seen a hawk pounce on a chicken.
They hunted for the fourth morsel, but, of course, in vain, and in theend they desisted, and fitted the three they had together; but neitherwould let his own portion out of his hands, and each looked at the otheracross the spoil with eyes of suspicion. It was strange to see them inthat wide-stretching valley, whence grey boar-backs of hills swelledup into the silence of the snow--it was strange, I say, in that vastsolitude, to see these two, mere dots on its bosom, circling roundone another in fierce forgetfulness of the outside world, glaringand sh
ifting their ground like cocks about to engage, and whollyengrossed--by three scraps of orange-colour, invisible at fifty paces!
At last the innkeeper cried with an oath, 'I am going back. This mustbe known down yonder. Give me your pieces, man, and do you go on withAntoine. It will be all right.'
But Clon, waving a scrap of the stuff in either hand, and thrusting hisghastly mask into the other's face, shook his head in passionate denial.He could not speak, but he made it as clear as daylight that if anyonewent back with the news, he was the man to go.
'Nonsense!' the landlord rejoined fiercely, 'We cannot leave Antoine togo on alone with him. Give me the stuff.'
But Clon would not. He had no thought of resigning the credit of thediscovery; and I began to think that the two would really come to blows.But there was an alternative--an alternative in which I was concerned;and first one and then the other looked at me. It was a moment of peril,and I knew it. My stratagem might react on myself, and the two, to putan end to their difficulty, agree to put an end to me. But I faced themso coolly, and showed so bold a front, and the ground where we stood wasso open, that the idea took no root. They fell to wrangling again moreviciously than before. One tapped his gun and the other his pistols. Thelandlord scolded, the dumb man gurgled. At last their difference endedas I had hoped it would.
'Very well then, we will both go back!' the innkeeper cried in a rage.'And Antoine must see him on. But the blame be on your head. Do you givethe lad your pistols.'
Clon took one pistol, and gave it to the shock-headed man.
'The other!' the innkeeper said impatiently.
But Clon shook his head with a grim smile, and pointed to the arquebuss.
By a sudden movement, the landlord snatched the pistol, and avertedClon's vengeance by placing both it and the gun in the shock-headedman's hands.
'There!' he said, addressing the latter, 'now can you do? If Monsieurtries to escape or turn back, shoot him! But four hours' riding shouldbring you to the Roca Blanca. You will find the men there, and will haveno more to do with it.'
Antoine did not see things quite in that light, however. He looked atme, and then at the wild track in front of us; and he muttered an oathand said he would die if he would.
But the landlord, who was in a frenzy of impatience, drew him asideand talked to him, and in the end seemed to persuade him; for in a fewminutes the matter was settled.
Antoine came back, and said sullenly, 'Forward, Monsieur,' the twoothers stood on one side, I shrugged my shoulders and kicked up myhorse, and in a twinkling we two were riding on together--man to man.I turned once or twice to see what those we had left behind were doing,and always found them standing in apparent debate; but my guard showedso much jealousy of these movements that I presently shrugged myshoulders again and desisted.
I had racked my brains to bring about this state of things. Strange tosay, now I had succeeded, I found it less satisfactory than I had hoped.I had reduced the odds and got rid of my most dangerous antagonists; butAntoine, left to himself, proved to be as full of suspicion as an egg ofmeat. He rode a little behind me, with his gun across his saddlebow, anda pistol near his hand; and at the slightest pause on my part, or if Iturned to look at him, he muttered his constant 'Forward, Monsieur!'in a tone which warned me that his finger was on the trigger. At such adistance he could not miss; and I saw nothing for it but to go on meeklybefore him to the Roca Blanca--and my fate.
What was to be done? The road presently reached the end of the valleyand entered a narrow pine-clad defile, strewn with rocks and boulders,over which the torrent plunged and eddied with a deafening roar. Infront the white gleam of waterfalls broke the sombre ranks of climbingtrunks. The snow line lay less than half a mile away on either hand; andcrowning all--at the end of the pass, as it seemed to the eye--rose thepure white pillar of the Pic du Midi shooting up six thousand feet intothe blue of heaven. Such a scene so suddenly disclosed, was enough todrive the sense of danger from my mind; and for a moment I reined in myhorse. But 'Forward, Monsieur!' came the grating order. I fell to earthagain, and went on. What was to be done?
I was at my wits' end to know. The man refused to talk, refused to rideabreast of me, would have no dismounting, no halting, no communicationat all. He would have nothing but this silent, lonely procession oftwo, with the muzzle of his gun at my back. And meanwhile we were fastclimbing the pass. We had left the others an hour--nearly two. The sunwas declining; the time, I supposed, about half-past three.
If he would only let me come within reach of him! Or if anything wouldfall out to take his attention! When the pass presently widened into abare and dreary valley, strewn with huge boulders and with snow lyinghere and there in the hollows, I looked desperately before me, andscanned even the vast snow-fields that overhung us and stretched awayto the base of the ice-peak. But I saw nothing. No bear swung across thepath, no izard showed itself on the cliffs. The keen, sharp air cut ourcheeks and warned me that we were approaching the summit of the ridge.On all sides were silence and desolation.
MON DIEU! And the ruffians on whose tender mercies I was to be thrownmight come to meet us! They might appear at any moment. In my despairI loosened my hat on my head, and let the first gust carry it to theground, and then with an oath of annoyance tossed my feet from thestirrups to go after it. But the rascal roared to me to keep my seat.
'Forward, Monsieur!' he shouted brutally. 'Go on!'
'But my hat!' I cried. 'MILLE TONNERRES, man! I must--'
'Forward, Monsieur, or I shoot!' he replied inexorably raising his gun.'One--two--'
And I went on. But, ah, I was wrathful! That I, Gil de Berault, shouldbe outwitted, and led by the nose like a ringed bull, by this Gasconlout! That I, whom all Paris knew and feared--if it did not love--theterror of Zaton's, should come to my end in this dismal waste of snowand rock, done to death by some pitiful smuggler or thief! It must notbe. Surely in the last resort I could give an account of one man, thoughhis belt were stuffed with pistols.
But how? Only, it seemed, by open force. My heart began to flutter asI planned it; and then grew steady again. A hundred paces before us agully or ravine on the left ran up into the snow-field. Opposite itsmouth a jumble of stones and broken rocks covered the path, I markedthis for the place. The knave would need both his hands to hold up hisnag over the stones, and, if I turned on him suddenly enough, he mighteither drop his gun or fire it harmlessly.
But, in the meantime, something happened; as, at the last moment, thingsdo happen. While we were still fifty yards short of the place, I foundhis horse's nose creeping forward on a level with my crupper; and, stilladvancing, still advancing, until I could see it out of the tail of myeye, and my heart gave a great bound. He was coming abreast of me: hewas going to deliver himself into my hands! To cover my excitement, Ibegan to whistle.
'Hush!' he muttered fiercely, his voice sounding so strange andunnatural, that my first thought was that he was ill; and I turned tohim. But he only said again,--
'Hush! Pass by here quietly, Monsieur.'
'Why?' I asked mutinously, curiosity getting the better of me. For hadI been wise I had taken no notice; every second his horse was coming upwith mine. Its nose was level with my stirrup already.
'Hush, man!' he said again. This time there was no mistake about thepanic in his voice. 'They call this the Devil's Chapel, God send us safeby it! It is late to be here. Look at those!' he continued, pointingwith a finger which visibly shook.
I looked. At the mouth of the gully, in a small space partly cleared ofstones, stood three broken shafts, raised on rude pedestals.
'Well?' I said in a low voice. The sun, which was near setting, flushedthe great peak above to the colour of blood; but the valley was growinggrey and each moment more dreary. 'Well, what of those?' I said.
In spite of my peril and the excitement of the coming struggle Ifelt the chill of his fear. Never had I seen so grim, so desolate, soGod-forsaken a place! Involuntarily I shivered.
'They w
ere crosses,' he muttered in a voice little above a whisper,while his eyes roved this way and that in terror. 'The Cure of Gabasblessed the place, and set them up. But next morning they were as yousee them now. Come on, Monsieur; come on!' he continued, plucking at myarm. 'It is not safe here after sunset. Pray God, Satan be not at home!'
He had completely forgotten in his panic that he had anything to fearfrom me. His gun dropped loosely across his saddle, his leg rubbed mine.I saw this, and I changed my plan of action. As our horses reached thestones I stooped, as if to encourage mine, and, with a sudden clutch,snatched the gun bodily from his hand, at the same time that I backed myhorse with all my strength. It was done in a moment! A second and I hadhim at the end of the gun, and my finger was on the trigger. Never wasvictory more easily gained.
He looked at me between rage and terror, his jaw fallen.
'Are you mad?' he cried, his teeth chattering as he spoke. Even in thisstrait his eyes left me and wandered round in alarm.
'No, sane!' I retorted fiercely. 'But I do not like this place anybetter than you do.' Which was true enough, if not quite true. 'So, byyour right, quick march!' I continued imperatively. 'Turn your horse, myfriend, or take the consequences.'
He turned like a lamb, and headed down the valley again, without givinga thought to his pistols. I kept close to him, and in less than a minutewe had left the Devil's Chapel well behind us, and were moving downagain as we had come up. Only now I held the gun.
When we had gone have a mile or so--until then I did not feelcomfortable myself, and though I thanked heaven that the place existed,I thanked heaven also that I was out of it--I bade him halt.
'Take off your belt,' I said curtly, 'and throw it down. But, mark me,if you turn I fire.'
The spirit was quite gone out of him, and he obeyed mechanically. Ijumped down, still covering him with the gun, and picked up the belt,pistols and all. Then I remounted, and we went on. By-and-by he asked mesullenly what I was going to do.
'Go back,' I said, 'and take the road to Auch when I come to it.'
'It will be dark in an hour,' he answered sulkily.
'I know that,' I retorted. 'We must camp and do the best we can.'
And as I said, we did. The daylight held until we gained the skirts ofthe pine-wood at the head of the pass. Here I chose a corner a littleoff the track, and well sheltered from the wind, and bade him light afire. I tethered the horses near this and within sight. Then it remainedonly to sup. I had a piece of bread: he had another and an onion. We atein silence, sitting on opposite sides of the fire.
But after supper I found myself in a dilemma; I did not see how I wasto sleep. The ruddy light which gleamed on the knave's swart face andsinewy hands showed also his eyes, black, sullen, and watchful. I knewthat the man was plotting revenge; that he would not hesitate to planthis knife between my ribs should I give him the chance; and I could findonly one alternative to remaining awake. Had I been bloody-minded, Ishould have chosen it and solved the question at once and in my favourby shooting him as he sat.
But I have never been a cruel man, and I could not find it in my heartto do this. The silence of the mountain and the sky-which seemed a thingapart from the roar of the torrent and not to be broken by it--awedme. The vastness of the solitude in which we sat, the dark void above,through which the stars kept shooting, the black gulf below in which theunseen waters boiled and surged, the absence of other human company orother signs of human existence, put such a face upon the deed that Igave up the thought of it with a shudder, and resigned myself, instead,to watch through the night--the long, cold, Pyrenean night. Presentlyhe curled himself up like a dog and slept in the blaze, and then for acouple of hours I sat opposite him, thinking. It seemed years sinceI had seen Zaton's or thrown the dice. The old life, the oldemployments--should I ever go back to them?--seemed dim and distant.Would Cocheforet, the forest and the mountain, the grey Chateau and itsmistresses, seem one day as dim? And if one bit of life could fadeso quickly at the unrolling of another, and seem in a moment pale andcolourless, would all life some day and somewhere, and all the thingswe--But enough! I was growing foolish. I sprang up and kicked the woodtogether, and, taking up the gun, began to pace to and fro underthe cliff. Strange that a little moonlight, a few stars, a breath ofsolitude should carry a man back to childhood and childish things.
. . . . . .
It was three in the afternoon of the next day, and the sun lay hot onthe oak groves, and the air was full of warmth as we began to climb theslope, midway up which the road to Auch shoots out of the track. Theyellow bracken and the fallen leaves underfoot seemed to throw up lightof themselves; and here and there a patch of ruddy beech lay like abloodstain on the hillside. In front a herd of pigs routed among themast, and grunted lazily; and high above us a boy lay watching them. 'Wepart here,' I said to my companion.
It was my plan to ride a little way along the road to Auch so as toblind his eyes; then, leaving my horse in the forest, I would go on footto the Chateau. 'The sooner the better!' he answered with a snarl. 'AndI hope I may never see your face again, Monsieur.'
But when we came to the wooden cross at the fork of the roads, and wereabout to part, the boy we had seen leapt out of the fern and came tomeet us.
'Hollo!' he cried in a sing-song tone.
'Well,' my companion answered, drawing rein impatiently. 'What is it?'
'There are soldiers in the village.'
'Soldiers,' Antoine cried incredulously.
'Ay, devils on horseback,' the lad answered, spitting on the ground.'Three score of them. From Auch.'
Antoine turned to me, his face transformed with fury.
'Curse you!' he cried. 'This is some of your work. Now we are allundone. And my mistresses? SACRE! if I had that gun I would shoot youlike a rat.'
'Steady, fool,' I answered roughly. 'I know no more of this than youdo.'
Which was so true that my surprise was at least as great as his, andbetter grounded. The Cardinal, who rarely made a change of front, hadsent me hither that he might not be forced to send soldiers, and runthe risk of all that might arise from such a movement. What of thisinvasion, then, than which nothing could be less consistent with hisplans? I wondered. It was possible that the travelling merchants, beforewhom I had played at treason, had reported the facts; and that on thisthe Commandant at Auch had acted. But it seemed unlikely since he hadhad his orders too, and under the Cardinal's rule there was small placefor individual enterprise. Frankly I could not understand it, and foundonly one thing clear; I might now enter the village as I pleased.
'I am going on to look into this,' I said to Antoine. 'Come, my man.' Heshrugged his shoulders, and stood still.
'Not I!' he answered, with an oath. 'No soldiers for me I have lain outone night, and I can lie out another.'
I nodded indifferently, for I no longer wanted him; and we parted. Afterthis, twenty minutes' riding brought me to the entrance of the village,and here the change was great indeed. Not one of the ordinary dwellersin the place was to be seen: either they had shut themselves up in theirhovels, or, like Antoine, they had fled to the woods. Their doors wereclosed, their windows shuttered. But lounging about the street werea score of dragoons, in boots and breastplates, whose short-barrelledmuskets, with pouches and bandoliers attached, were piled near the inndoor. In an open space, where there was a gap in the street, a long rowof horses, linked head to head, stood bending their muzzles over bundlesof rough forage; and on all sides the cheerful jingle of chains andbridles and the sound of coarse jokes and laughter filled the air.
As I rode up to the inn door an old sergeant, with squinting eyes andhis tongue in his cheek, scanned me inquisitively, and started to crossthe street to challenge me. Fortunately, at that moment the two knaveswhom I had brought from Paris with me, and whom I had left at Auch toawait my orders, came up. I made them a sign not to speak to me, andthey passed on; but I suppose that they told the sergeant that I was notthe man he wanted, for I saw no more of him.
> After picketing my horse behind the inn--I could find no better stable,every place being full--I pushed my way through the group at the door,and entered. The old room, with the low, grimy roof and the reekingfloor, was half full of strange figures, and for a few minutes I stoodunseen in the smoke and confusion. Then the landlord came my way, andas he passed me I caught his eye. He uttered a low curse, dropped thepitcher he was carrying, and stood glaring at me like a man possessed.
The soldier whose wine he was carrying flung a crust in his face,with,--
'Now, greasy fingers! What are you staring at?'
'The devil!' the landlord muttered, beginning to tremble.
'Then let me look at him!' the man retorted, and he turned on his stool.
He started, finding me standing over him.
'At your service!' I said grimly. 'A little time and it will be theother way, my friend.