The Last Vendée

"Oh!" he said, "if he is likely to trouble you, say so; we can settle him so that he shall know nothing, or if he does know anything he shall be made to hold his tongue. I have old scores against him which I've long wanted a pretext to-"

"No, no!" cried Michel, hastily, "Courtin is my farmer. I am under obligations to him which make me anxious that no harm shall happen to him; besides," he hastened to add, seeing the frown on Picaut's brow, "he is not what you think he is."

Joseph Picaut shook his head; but Michel did not notice the gesture.

"Don't trouble yourself," said the inn-keeper. "If he comes in I'll look after him."

"Very good. As for you, Joseph, take the horse on which I came. I want you to do an errand. By the bye, Courtin must not see that horse in the stable; he would certainly recognize it, inasmuch as it is his own beast."

"What next?"

"You know the river, don't you?"

"There's not a corner of the left bank I've not shot over. I know less of the right."

"That's all right; it is the left bank you'll have to follow."

"Follow where?"

"To Couéron. Opposite to the second island, between the two old wrecks, you will see a vessel called the 'Jeune Charles.' Though at anchor its foretopsail will be set; you'll know it by that."

"Trust me to know it."

"Take a boat and row out to her. They'll call to you, 'Who's there?' Answer, 'Belle-Isle en Mer.' Then they'll let you go aboard. You'll give the captain this handkerchief, just as it is, – that is to say, knotted at three corners, – and you will tell him to be all ready to weigh anchor at one o'clock to-night."

"Is that all?"

"Yes-or rather, no, it is not all. If I am satisfied with you, Picaut, you shall have five pieces of gold such as the one I gave you to-night."

"Well, well," said Joseph Picaut, "leaving out the chance of being hung, it is not such a bad business; and if I can only get a shot now and then at the Blues, or revenge myself on Courtin, I sha'n't regret Maître Jacques and his burrows. What next?"

"How do you mean?"

"Why, after I have done the errand?"

"Then you will hide somewhere on the bank of the river, and wait for us; whistle to let us know where you are. If all goes well imitate a cuckoo; if on the contrary you see anything that ought to make us uneasy, give the owl's cry."

"Ha! Monsieur de la Logerie," said Joseph, "I see you've been well trained. All you've ordered is clear, and seems to me well arranged. It is a pity, though, you haven't a better horse to put between my legs; otherwise the matter could be quickly done."

Joseph Picaut departed on his mission. The inn-keeper then took Michel to a poor-looking room on the first floor, which served as an annex to the dining-room, and had two windows opening on the main-road; then he put himself on the watch for Courtin.

Michel opened one of the windows as agreed upon with the gentleman in the dressing-gown; after which he sat down on a stool, placing himself so that his head could not be seen from the road he was watching.

XXVII.

MICHEL'S LOVE AFFAIRS SEEM TO BE TAKING A HAPPIER TURN

Michel, under his apparent composure, was really in a state of extreme anxiety. He was about to meet Mary; and, at the mere idea his breast tightened, his heart swelled, his blood coursed in leaps along his veins; he felt himself trembling with emotion. He formed no hopes as to what the result might be, but the firmness which, contrary to all his habits, he had shown in presence of his mother and also of Bertha had answered so well that he now resolved to be equally firm with Mary. He saw very plainly that he had come to a crisis in this singular situation, and that eternal happiness or irreparable misery would result from his present conduct.

He had been on the watch about an hour and a half, following anxiously with his eyes all the human forms which seemed to be approaching the little inn, looking to see if they came toward the door, feeling wretched when they passed it and his hopes vanished, thinking minutes eternities, and wondering whether his heart would not burst in his bosom when he was actually in Mary's presence.

All of a sudden he saw a shadow coming from the direction of the rue du Château, walking rapidly, skirting the house, and making no sound with its motions. By the clothing he recognized a woman; but it could not, of course, be Petit-Pierre, or Mary, for it was not to be supposed that either would venture there alone.

And yet, it seemed to the baron as if the woman were looking up at the house trying to recognize it; next he saw her stop before the inn, and then he heard the three little raps, the signal, struck on the door. With one bound he sprang from his post of observation to the staircase, rushed hastily down, opened the door, and in the woman, closely wrapped in a mantle, he recognized Mary.

Their two names were all the young pair dared to say when they found themselves face to face; then Michel seized the young girl by the arm, guided her through the darkness, and took her to the chamber on the first floor. But scarcely had they entered it, when, falling on his knees, he burst forth: -

"Oh, Mary, Mary! is it really you? Am I not dreaming? I have dreamt so often of this blessèd moment, so often have I tasted this infinite joy in imagination only, that I fancy I am still the plaything of a dream. Mary, my angel, my life, my love, oh! let me hold you to my heart!"

"Michel, my friend," said the young girl, sighing to feel she could not conquer the emotion that now seized upon her, "I, too, am happy that we meet again. But tell me, poor, dear friend, you have been wounded, have you not?"

"Yes, yes; but it was not my wound that made me suffer; it was the misery of being parted from all I love in this world. Oh, Mary! believe me, death was deaf and obstinate, or it would have come at my call."

"Michel, how can you say such things? How can you forget all that my poor Bertha has done for you? We have heard all; and I have only loved and admired my dear sister the more for the devotion she has proved to you at every instant."

But at Bertha's name Michel, who was resolved not to let Mary impose her will upon his any longer, rose abruptly and walked about the room with a step which betrayed his emotion. Mary saw what was passing in his soul and she made one last effort.

"Michel," she said, "I ask you, I conjure you, in the name of all the tears I have shed to your memory, speak to me only as though to a sister; remember that you are soon to become my brother."

"Your brother! I, Mary?" said the young man, shaking his head. "As for that, my decision is made, and firmly made. Never, never, will I be your brother, I swear it!"

"Michel, do you forget that you once swore otherwise?"

"I did not swear it; no! you wrung the promise from me, you wrung it cruelly; you took advantage of the love I bear you to compel me to renounce it. But all that is within me rises against that promise; there's not a fibre in my body that does not refuse to keep it. And I here say to you, Mary, that for two months, ever since we have been parted, I have thought of you only! Buried in the blazing ruins at La Pénissière and near to death, I thought of you only! Wounded with a ball through my shoulder, which just missed my heart, I thought of you only! Dying of hunger, weariness, and weakness, I thought of you only-of you alone! Bertha is my sister, Mary; you are my beloved, my precious treasure; and you, Mary, you shall be my wife!"

"Oh, my God! how can you say it, Michel; are you mad?"

"I was for a moment, Mary-when I thought I could obey you. But absence, grief, despair, have made another man of me. Count no longer on the poor, weak reed which bent at your breath; whatever you may say or do, you shall be mine, Mary! – because I love you, because you love me, because I will no longer lie to God or to my own heart."

"You forget, Michel," said Mary, "that my resolutions do not change as yours do. I swore to a course of conduct, and I shall keep my oath."

"So be it; then I will leave Bertha forever; Bertha shall never see me again!"

"My friend-"

"Seriously, Mary, for whose sake do you suppose I am here now?"

"You are here to save the princess, to whom we are all devoted, body and soul."

"I am here, Mary, to meet you. Don't think more of my devotion to the princess than it deserves. I am devoted to you, Mary, and to no other. What inspired in my mind the thought of saving Petit-Pierre? My love for you! Should I have thought of it, think you, if it had not been that in saving her I should see you? Don't make me either a hero or a demigod; I am a man, and a man who loves you ardently and is ready to risk his head for you! Why should I care, otherwise, for these quarrels of dynasty against dynasty? What have I to do with the Bourbons of the elder branch or the Bourbons of the younger branch, – I, whose past has nothing to do with either of them; I, who have not a single memory connecting me with theirs? My opinions are-you; my beliefs are-you. If you were for Louis Philippe, I should be for Louis Philippe. You are for Henri V. and I am for Henri V. Ask for my blood and I shall say, 'There it is, take it!' but don't ask me to lend myself any longer to an impossible state of things."

"What do you mean to do, then?"

"Tell Bertha the truth."

"The truth! impossible! you will never dare to?"

"Mary, I declare to you-"

"No, no!"

"Yes, I declare to you that I shall do it. Every day I am shaking off the swaddling-clothes of my weak youth. There's a vast distance already between me and that child you met in the sunken road, scratched and weeping with fear at the very name and thought of his mother. It is to my love that I owe this new strength. I have borne, without blenching, a look which formerly made me bow my head and bend my knees. I have told all to my mother, and my mother has replied to me, 'I see you are a man; do as you will!' My will is to consecrate my life to you; but I also will that you shall be mine. See, therefore, in what a senseless struggle you have plunged us. I, the husband of Bertha! let us suppose it for a moment; why, there could be no greater misery on earth than that poor creature would endure, not to speak of mine. They told me tales in my infancy of Carrier's 'republican marriages,' when living bodies were tied to dead ones and flung into the Loire. That, Mary, would be our marriage, Bertha's and mine; and you, you would stand by and see our agony! Mary, would you be glad of your work then? No, I am resolved; either I will never see Bertha again, or the first time that I do see her I will tell her how my stupid timidity misled Petit-Pierre, and how courage has always failed me until now to speak the truth; and then-then-no, I will not tell her that I do not love her, but I will tell her that I love you."

"Good God!" cried Mary, "but don't you know, Michel, that if you do that she will die of it?"

"No, Bertha will not die of it," said the voice of Petit-Pierre, who had entered the room behind them without their hearing her. The two young people turned round hurriedly with a cry. "Bertha," continued Petit-Pierre, "is a noble and courageous girl, who will understand the language you propose to address her, Monsieur de la Logerie, and who will also know how to sacrifice her happiness to that of the sister she loves. But you shall not have the pain of telling her. It is I who did the wrong, – or rather, who made the mistake, – and it is I who will repair it; begging Monsieur Michel," she added, smiling, "to be in future a little more explicit in his confidences."

At the first sound of Petit-Pierre's voice, which had startled them into a cry, the lovers hastily stepped apart from each other; but the princess caught them by the arm, drew them once more together, and joined their hands.

"Love each other without remorse!" she said. "You have both been more generous than any one has the right to expect of our poor human race. Love each other without stint! for blessed are they who have no other ambition in this world."

Mary lowered her eyes, but as she lowered them her hand pressed Michel's. The young man knelt at the feet of the little peasant lad.

"It needs all the happiness you order me to take, to console me for not dying for you," he said in a spasm of gratitude.

"Oh, don't talk of being killed or dying! Alas! I see how useless it is to be killed or to die. Look at my poor Bonneville! What good did all his great devotion do me? No, Monsieur de la Logerie, live for those you love; and you have given me the right to place myself among them! Live for Mary, and-I will take upon myself to declare that Mary will live for you!"

"Ah! madame," cried Michel, "if all Frenchmen had seen you as I have seen you, if they knew you as I know you-"

"I should have some chance of returning in triumph-especially if they were lovers! However, let us, if you please, talk of other things; before dreaming of future triumphs we must think of present retreat. See if our friends have arrived. I must blame you, my brave sentinel, for being so absorbed in Mademoiselle Mary that you failed to make me the concerted signal; and I might have waited in the street till morning if I had not heard your voice through the window; happily, you had left the door open and I was able to get in."

As Petit-Pierre uttered this reproach in a laughing tone two other persons who were to accompany her in her flight arrived; but after a short consultation it was decided that her safety might be endangered by the presence of too many persons, and they stayed behind. Petit-Pierre, Michel, and Mary started alone.

The quay was deserted; the pont Rousseau seemed absolutely solitary. Michel led the way. They crossed the bridge without incident. Michel took a path along the bank; Petit-Pierre and Mary followed him, walking side by side. The night was splendid, – so splendid that they feared to continue along this open way. Michel proposed to take the road to Pèlerin, which ran parallel with the river, but was less exposed than the path along the bank.

Thanks to the moonlight, they could see the river from time to time, like a broad and brilliant silver sheet, marked here and there with wooded islets, their tree-tops clearly defined against the sky. This clearness of the night, though it had its inconveniences, had on the other hand, some advantages. Michel, who served as guide, was sure of not losing his way; and, as they walked along, they could even see the schooner itself at intervals.

When they had passed, or rather gone round the village of Pèlerin, the young baron hid the duchess and Marie in a rocky hollow of the shore, and going to a little distance along the bank he gave the whistle which was to signal Joseph Picaut.

As Joseph did not reply with the owl's cry, – the cry of alarm, – Michel, who, up to that time had been very anxious, felt more easy. He felt sure that, as he received no answer, the Chouan would soon come to him.

He waited five minutes; nothing stirred. He whistled again, more sharply than before; still nothing answered, no one came. He thought he might have been mistaken as to the place of meeting, and he hurried along the bank. But no! a hundred steps farther took him past the isle of Couéron; and there was no other island within sight where a vessel could lie, – yet the vessel was not visible.

It certainly was the spot agreed upon, and he returned upon his steps. The vessel must be within sight where he had first stopped; but even so, he could not explain to himself Joseph Picaut's absence.

An idea came to him. Had the enormous sum promised to whoever would deliver up the person passing under the name of Petit-Pierre tempted the Chouan, whose cast of countenance had not impressed him favorably? He communicated his suspicions to Petit-Pierre and Mary, who now joined him.

But Petit-Pierre shook her head.

"It is not possible," she said. "If that man had betrayed us we should have been arrested before now; besides, that doesn't explain the absence of the vessel."

"You are right. The captain was to send a boat ashore, and I don't see it."

"Perhaps it is not yet time."

Just then the church clock at Pèlerin struck two, as though it was ordered to make answer to her words.

"There!" said Michel, "it is two o'clock!"

"Was there any fixed hour with the captain?"

"My mother could only act on probabilities, and she told him it might be as late as five o'clock."

"He had, then, no reason to be impatient, for we have got here three hours too soon."

"What shall we do?" asked Michel. "My responsibility is so great I dare not act by myself."

"We must take a boat and look for the ship. As the captain is aware we know his anchorage, very likely he expects us to go to him."

Michel went a few hundred feet toward Pèlerin and found a boat made fast to the shore. Evidently, it had been lately used, for the oars, which were lying in the bottom of it, were still wet. He came back with the news to his companions, asking them to go back into their hiding-place while he crossed the river.

"Do you know how to row?" asked Petit-Pierre.

"I own to you," replied Michel, blushing for his ignorance, "that I am not very good at it."

"Then," said Petit-Pierre, "we will go with you. I will steer the boat; many a time I have done that in the bay of Naples for amusement."

"And I'll help him to row," said Mary. "My sister and I often row over the lake of Grand-Lieu."

All three embarked. When they reached the middle of the river Petit-Pierre, looking forward in the direction of the current, cried out: -

"There she is! there she is!"

"Who? What?" exclaimed Mary and Michel together.

"The ship! the ship! There, don't you see?"

And Petit-Pierre pointed down the river in the direction of Paimb[oe]uf.

"No," said Michel, "that can't be the ship!"

"Why not?"

"Because it is sailing away from us!"

Just then they reached the extremity of the island. Michel jumped ashore, helped his two companions to land, and ran with all speed to the other side.

"It is our vessel!" he cried, returning. "To the boat! to the boat, and row as fast as we can!"

All three sprang again into the boat; Mary and Michel strained at the oars while Petit-Pierre took the helm. Helped by the current the little boat flew along rapidly; there was still a chance of overtaking the schooner if she kept on her present course.

But presently a black shadow came between their eyes and the lines of the masts and cordage standing out against the sky; she had hoisted her mainsail. Soon another bit of canvas, the foretopsail, rose into the air; the jib followed; and then the "Jeune Charles," profiting by the breeze which was steadily rising, hoisted her other sails, one by one.

Michel took the second oar from Mary's tired hands and bent to the thwarts like a convict on the galleys. Despair had seized him; for in that second of time he had seen all the consequences which would follow on the loss of the schooner. He began to shout and hail her; but Petit-Pierre stopped him, exhorting him to prudence.

"Ah!" she cried, her gayety surmounting all vicissitudes of fortune, "Providence evidently does not choose that I shall leave this glorious land of France!"

"God grant it may be Providence!" said Michel.

"What do you mean by that?" asked Petit-Pierre.

"I fear there is some horrible machination under all this."

"Nonsense, my poor friend; it is only a bit of ill-luck. They mistook the day or the hour, that's all. Besides, how do we know whether we could have slipped through the cruisers at the mouth of the Loire? All's for the best, perhaps."

But Michel was not convinced by Petit-Pierre's reasoning; he continued to lament; talked of throwing himself into the river and swimming to the schooner, which was now gently widening the distance and beginning to disappear in the mists on the horizon. It was, in fact, with much difficulty that Petit-Pierre succeeded in calming him; perhaps she might not have done so without Mary's help.

Three o'clock was now ringing from the steeples at Couéron; in another hour it would be daylight. There was no time to lose. Michel and Mary took up the oars; they regained the shore and left the boat about where they found it. It then became a question whether they should return to Nantes. This being decided upon, it was most important to get there before daybreak.

Suddenly Michel, as they walked along, stopped and struck his forehead.

"I'm afraid I have committed a great folly," he said.

"What folly?" asked the duchess.

"I ought to have returned to Nantes by the other bank."

"Pooh! all roads are safe if you follow them cautiously; besides, what should we have done with the boat?"

"Left it on the other shore."

"So that the poor fisherman to whom it belongs would have lost a whole day in looking for it! No, no! better take more trouble ourselves than snatch the bread out of the mouth of some poor fellow who has little enough as it is."

They reached the pont Rousseau. Here Petit-Pierre insisted that Michel should let her return to the house alone in company with Mary; but Michel would not consent. Perhaps he was too happy in the sense of Mary's presence; for she, under the influence of Petit-Pierre's promise, replied (with sighs, it is true, but still she replied) to the tender words her lover said to her. For this reason, perhaps, he positively refused to leave them, and all they could induce him to do was to walk behind them, at some distance.

They had just crossed the place du Bouffai when Michel, as he turned the corner of the rue Saint-Sauveur, felt certain that he heard a step behind him. He turned and saw a man, who, perceiving that he was noticed, darted hastily into a doorway. Michel's first idea was to follow him; but he reflected that if he did so he should lose sight of Petit-Pierre and Mary. He therefore hurried on and overtook them.

"We are followed!" he said to Petit-Pierre.

"Well, let them follow us!" said the duchess, with her usual serenity. "We have plenty of ways of evading them."

Petit-Pierre signed to Michel to follow her up a cross-street, where, after taking about a hundred steps, they reached the end of the little alley which Michel had once before taken, and where he had recognized a door by the branch of holly hung there by Père Eustache.

Petit-Pierre lifted the knocker and struck three blows at varying intervals. At this signal the door opened as though by magic. Petit-Pierre made Mary enter the courtyard and then she entered herself.

"Good!" said Michel. "Now I will see if that man is still watching us."

"No, no!" cried Petit-Pierre, "you are condemned to death. If you forget it, I don't; and as you and I are running the same danger, you will be good enough to take the same precautions. Come in-quick!"

During this time the man whom Michel had seen reading his paper the evening before, appeared on the portico, wearing the same dressing-gown and apparently half asleep. He raised his arms to heaven on seeing Petit-Pierre.

"Never mind! never mind!" said the latter, "don't lose time in lamentation. It is all a failure, and we are followed. Open the door, my dear Pascal!"

He turned to the half-open door behind him.

"No, not the house door," said Petit-Pierre, "the garden door. In ten minutes the house will be surrounded; we must make for the hiding-place at once!"

"Follow me, then."

"We will follow. So sorry to disturb you, my poor Pascal, at such an early hour; and all the more distressed because my visit will force you to come too, if you don't want to be arrested."

The garden door was now open. Before passing through, Michel stretched out his hand to take Mary's. Petit-Pierre saw the action and gently pushed the girl into the young man's arms.

"Come," she said, "kiss him, or, at any rate, let him kiss you! Before me, it is quite permissible; I stand to you as a mother, and I think the poor lad has fully earned it. There! Now go your way, Monsieur de la Logerie, and we will go ours; but remember that the care of my own interests will not prevent me from looking after yours."

"When may I see her again?" said Michel, timidly.

"It will be dangerous, I know that," replied Petit-Pierre; "but after all, they say there's a God who protects both lovers and drunkards, and if so, I'll rely on him. You shall pay one visit at least to the rue du Château, No. 3. I intend, if I can, to return your Mary to you."