Scaramouche (43 page)

Saint-Just continued to regard him steadily. "You are possibly under the delusion that you will be given an opportunity to talk when you come to trial? That you will be able to tell the world of certain things you ferreted out at Blérancourt?"

"Is it a delusion?"

"Entirely. For there will be no trial. I have given my instructions. There will be a mistake. A mistake for reasons of State. You will be included, entirely by accident, in the next batch sent to execution. The mistake—the so regrettable mistake—will be discovered afterwards."

He ceased speaking and waited.

André-Louis shrugged indifferently. "Who cares?"

"You think that I am bluffing you?"

"I see no other object in your coming here to tell me this."

"Ah! It does not occur to you that I might wish to give you a chance."

"I thought that would follow. After the bluff, the bargain."

"A bargain, yes; if you choose. But bluff there is none. You stole certain papers from Thuillier at Blérancourt."

"Yes, and others from Bontemps. Hadn't you heard?"

"Where are they now?"

"Do you mean to say you haven't found them? Yet you'll have searched my lodgings, I suppose."

"Don't play the fool, Moreau." The gentle voice acquired a rasp. "Of course I have had your lodgings searched; searched under my own supervision."

"And you haven't found the letters? But how vexatious for you! I wonder where they can have got to."

"So do I," snapped Saint-Just. "My curiosity is so lively that I'll give you your life and a safe-conduct in exchange for the information."

"In exchange for the information?"

"In exchange for the letters, that is to say."

André-Louis took his time, regarding him. Under his admirable self-control, an anxiety was to be guessed in Saint-Just. "Ah! That's different. I am afraid it's beyond my power to give you the letters."

"Your head will fall if you don't, and that to-morrow."

"Then my head must fall. For I can't give you the letters."

"What do you hope to gain by obstinacy? The letters will buy your life. Where are they?"

"Where you'll never find them."

There followed a considerable pause, during which Saint-Just continued steadily to regard him. The representative's breathing had quickened a little. In the yellow light of the lantern his colour seemed to have darkened.

"I am offering you your only chance of life, Moreau."

"How you repeat yourself," said André-Louis.

"You are resolved not to tell me?"

"I have told you. I have nothing to add."

"Very well," said Saint-Just quietly, yet with obvious reluctance. "Very well!" He picked up the lantern, and walked to the door. There he turned. He held up the lantern, so that its light fell full upon the prisoner's face. "For the last time: will you buy your life with them?"

"You're tiresome. Go to the devil."

Saint-Just pressed his lips together, lowered the lantern, and went out.

André-Louis sat alone in darkness once more. He told himself that no doubt he was rightly punished for what he had done. Then he relapsed into his weary indifference of what might follow.

Early next morning a gaoler brought him a lump of horrible black bread and a jug of water. He drank the water, but made no attempt to touch the repulsive bread. After that he sat on, in a dull numbed state of body and of mind, and waited.

Sooner than he had expected, less than an hour after serving him that breakfast, the gaoler appeared again. He held the door open, and beckoned him.

"You are to come with me, citizen."

André-Louis looked at his watch. It was half-past nine. Singularly early for the tumbrils to be setting out. Was he, perhaps, to have a trial, after all? At the thought a tiny flame of hope was kindled, almost despite him, in his soul.

But it was extinguished when he found himself conducted to the hall where the toilet of the condemned was usually performed. Here, however, a great surprise awaited him. The vaulted place was tenanted by a single person: a short, trim, sturdy figure dressed in black. It was de Batz.

The Baron advanced to meet him. "I have an order tor your release," he said, quietly grave. "Come along."

André-Louis wondered if he was still asleep in his cell and dreaming. His sensations were curiously unreal, and the gloom of the hall on that January morning served to add to their unreality. In this vague condition he stepped beside de Batz to the porter's lodge, where they were detained. The Baron presented a paper, and the concierge scratched an entry in a book, then grinned up at them from under his fur bonnet.

"You're lucky, my lad, to be leaving us so soon. And on foot. It's more usual to ride from here in style. A good-day to you!"

They were outside on the quay, under the grey sky, beside the yellow swollen river. They walked along in silence towards the Pont Neuf. Midway across this a quacksalver was setting up his booth. A little way beyond him, André-Louis slackened his pace. The Baron slackened with him.

"It is time we talked, Jean. There will be some explanation of this morning walk."

The Baron looked at him, and the sternness of his face relaxed.

"I owed you what I have done. That is all. For one thing, I struck you yesterday. Because you might desire satisfaction of me one day for the blow, I could not meanly leave you to perish."

Despite himself André-Louis smiled at the Gasconnade. "Was that your only reason for doing whatever you have done?"

"Of course not. I owed it you on other grounds. As an amend, if you choose." He leaned upon the parapet of the bridge, looking down at the water swirling against the piers. André-Louis leaned beside him. They were practically alone there. Briefly, gloomily, tonelessly, de Batz informed him of what had happened.

"Tissot witnessed your arrest yesterday in the courtyard. He brought us word of it at once, of course, and as we did not know what might follow, but knew that we were not safe, ourselves, we made off at once, and went to earth at Roussel's in the Rue Helvétius. We were thankful to get away, and no more than in time. I left Tissot to observe. He reported to me last night that within a few minutes of our departure, Saint-Just, himself, arrived with a couple of municipals. They ransacked my lodgings so thoroughly that they have left them in a state of wreckage.

"Your action in not giving the documents to Desmoulins, so that with them we could now defy Saint-Just, placed us all in a position of great danger. It became necessary to meet it. I went to Saint-Just two hours ago. He was still in bed. But he was glad to see me, and received me with threats of instant arrest, with the guillotine to follow, unless I chose to purchase my life and liberty by surrendering to him the letters which you had stolen from Thuillier and Bontemps.

"I laughed at him. 'Do you suppose, Saint-Just, that I should walk into your house without being aware that this is how you would receive me, and, therefore, without taking my precautions? You are not really clever, Saint-Just. You succeed in imposing yourself upon those who are even more foolish than yourself; that is all. When you threaten to take off my head, you really threaten to take off your own. For the one follows upon the other as inevitably as effect upon cause.'

"That gave him something to think about.

"'You have come to bargain with me?' he said.

"'A moment's reflection must have shown you that I could come for no other purpose, and you might have spared the breath you wasted in threats.'

"He seemed relieved, poor fool. 'You have brought me the letters, then?'

"'Either you are ingenuous, Saint-Just, or you think that I am. No, my friend, I have not brought you the letters, and I never shall. I have brought you a warning, that is all. A warning that if you raise a finger against me, and unless you do what else I require, those letters will instantly be in the hands of Danton.'

"That put him in a panic. 'You would never dare,' he roared.

"'But why not?' I asked him. 'It is you who will not dare to refuse me, now that you know that your head will pay the price of your refusal. For you can be under no delusion as to what use Danton will make of the letters. Their publication will show that the ci-devant Chevalier de Saint-Just (that is how they will speak of you, how they are sneaking of you already) the ci-devant Chevalier de Saint-Just is true to the evil aristocratic stock from which he springs. That he enriches himself at the expense of the nation, and that he abuses his power to issue letters of cachet so as to put away the inconvenient persons he has wronged. And that he covers it all under a mantle of virtue, of asceticism, hypocritically preaching purity in private as in public life. A nice tale, Saint-Just. A nice tale to be told by a man with the proofs in his hand.'

"He sprang at me like a tiger, his hands reaching for my throat. I laid him low by a kick in the stomach, and invited him to leave violence, come to his senses, and consider his position and mine.

"He gathered himself up, in a rage. He sat down, half-naked as he was, on his tumbled bed and talked foolishly at first, then more wisely. I should have all I wanted in return for the letters.

"But I shook my head at him. 'I do not trust you, Saint-Just. I know your record. You are a low, dishonest scoundrel, and only a fool would take your word. It is for you to take mine. And take it you must because you cannot help yourself. I'll keep faith with you as long as you keep faith with me. Do as I require of you, and I give you my word of honour that no man shall ever see those letters. You may consider them as good as destroyed, and you may sleep in peace. But I do not surrender them, because if I did so I should have no guarantee that you would not play me false. In other words, I retain them so as to keep you honest."

"That, of course, was not the end of it. We talked for nearly half an hour. But at last he came to it, as it was clear that he must. What choice had he? Better take the risk of my keeping faith with him than face the certainty I had given him that the letters would go to Danton at once. He ended by surrendering. He would attempt nothing against me, and he would give me at once an order for your release and a safe-conduct for you, in case it should now be necessary, so as to enable you to depart the country."

There was silence. They continued to lean upon the parapet.

André-Louis fetched a ponderous sigh. "You have been generous, Jean. I did not deserve this at your hands."

"I am aware of it." De Batz was stern. "But I struck you yesterday, and I say again, it is in my code that I must preserve the life of any man who has grounds for demanding satisfaction of me."

André-Louis turned sideways against the stone parapet, so as to face the Gascon "But you also said that you have another reason?"

"It is true. I have preserved you also because I require of you in return a last service to the cause."

"Ah, that, no! Name of God, I will not raise a finger—"

"Wait, child! Hear first what the service is. It is one that you may actually desire to discharge. If you don't I'll not insist. I invite you to seek out the Comte de Provence. He should be at Turin by now, under the hospitality of his father-in-law, the King of Sardinia. Tell him of what has happened here and of how we had brought matters to the very threshold of success for him. Then tell him how the chance was destroyed and why."

It took André-Louis aback. "To what purpose this?"

"The story has a moral. It may serve as a warning to him. Considering it, he may come into some acquaintance with honour. Let him know that his wanton neglect of it on this occasion has cost him more than the loss of Toulon. Thus he may render himself more worthy of the position he holds at the head of the monarchical cause in France, and he may see to it in future that he holds that position by virtue of something more than his birth. You may say that I sent you. Tell him that if I remain it is because I trust that this bitter lesson will not be wasted." He paused, and the keen dark eyes flashed as he turned them upon his companion. "Will you go?"

A smile of infinite bitterness broke across the haggard face of André-Louis.

"I will go, Jean."

CHAPTER XLIV

ACCOUNT RENDERED

It may interest those who are concerned to analyse the sequel of events, the multiplication of circumstance, amoeba-like by fission, to speculate upon what might have been the end of this story of André-Louis Moreau. but for that mission upon which the Baron de Batz dispatched him, as a last service to the cause. Among his surviving papers there is no hint of what alternative he might have found.

Neither are there any details of the journey to Turin upon which he obediently set out. Remembering that the long line of French frontier from Belgium to the Mediterranean was an armed camp and that he would have to pass through it, the difficulties he encountered must have been considerable. We are also left to infer this from the fact that it was not until the early days of the following April that he rode into the capital of the Kingdom of Sardinia. He arrived there at just about the time that the triumphant Robespierrists, whose fate for a moment had lain in the hollow of his hand, were assuming the undisputed mastery of France. Danton's great head had rolled into the executioner's basket, and Robespierre, ably supported by his terrible acolytes, Saint-Just and Couthon, was establishing with these two an evil triumvirate whose power was absolute. The restoration of the monarchy had never seemed so distant.

Turin, which André-Louis had deemed his goal, was to prove but a halting-place upon the way. He learned there that the Comte de Provence, unable to find an abiding refuge at the court of his timid father-in-law, had, after many humiliating appeals, been accorded in Verona the hospitality of the Republic of Venice. This as a result of representations made on his behalf by Russia and Spain, who undertook presently to provide for him more permanently.

His highness had been received by the Most Serene Republic subject to certain rigorous conditions. He was to do nothing that should compromise the Republic's strict neutrality. The title of Regent which he had assumed would not there be recognized, nor must he look for any of the courtesies normally commanded by a person of royal blood.

To comply he had assumed the title of Comte de Lisle, and he was quietly installed in the summer residence of the patrician family of Gazzola, near the Capuchin Convent in the suburbs of Verona. It was a simple, unpretentious villa, clad in jessamine and clematis.

His little court was much the same as it had been at Hamm. It was composed by the Counts d'Avaray and d'Entragues; two secretaries, one of whom was the Comte de Plougastel; a surgeon, Monsieur Colon; and four servants. The remainder of those who followed him or sought him in his exile were lodged in the inns of the town. For the rest, his existence was as impecunious as it had been in Westphalia, and he was constrained to continue the practice of a frugality unwelcome to one who loved good cheer as much as he did.

To seek him in these surroundings André-Louis rode out from Turin again, and took the road through Piedmont and across the fertile plain of Lombardy where spring had spread already her luxuriant carpets. It was on an April day that he rode at last dusty and travel-worn into the lovely, ancient, brick-and-marble city of the Scaligers, and drew rein in the courtyard of the Due Toni in the Piazza dei Signori.

Here, scarcely had he set foot to the ground, whilst an ostler led away his horse, and the landlord stood to receive his commands, a lady dressed for walking, in a long claret cloak and a wide black hat, who issued from the inn, was brought to a staggering halt on the very threshold by the sight of him.

André-Louis found himself looking into the face of Madame de Plougastel, a white face in which the lips were parted, the eyes wide and the eyebrows raised, its whole expression blending astonishment and fear.

To him, too, there was, of course, surprise in the meeting. But it was slight and transient. Her presence here was very natural, and she was of those he must have sought before again departing.

He bared his head, and bowed low with a murmured: "Madame!"

Thereupon, after another instant's gaping pause, she brushed past the landlord and came to clutch the traveller by his two shoulders.

"André-Louis!" she cried, her note almost interrogative "André-Louis! It is you. It is you."

There was a queer tenderness in her voice that moved him. He feared that she was about to weep. He schooled himself to reply in quiet, level tones.

"It is I, Madame. I take you by surprise, no doubt."

"No doubt? You take me by surprise. By surprise?" And now it seemed as if she wanted to laugh, or as if she balanced between laughter and tears. "Whence are you? Whence do, you spring?" she asked him.

"Why, from France, of course."

"Of course? You say of course? You spring from the grave, and you say I come from France, of course."

But as now it was his turn to stare, she took him by the arm.

"Come you in," she said, and almost dragged him with her across the threshold, leaving the landlord to shrug his shoulders and to inform the waiting ostler in confidence that they were all mad these French.

André-Louis was conducted along a gloomy, unevenly-paved passage, and ushered into an austere but fairly spacious sitting-room on the left of it. A rug was spread on the stone floor. The ceiling was rudely frescoed in a pattern of fruit and flowers. The sparse furniture was of dark walnut, roughly carved. The tall mullioned windows, about which green creepers rioted, looked out upon a garden splashed with sunshine.

He stood bemused in mid-apartment whilst for a moment again she surveyed him. Then, still bemused, she had taken him in her arms. She was kissing him fondly and fondly murmuring his name before he took alarm at her transports.

"Madame! Madame! In Heaven's name, collect yourself, madame."

"Can I help it, André-Louis? Can I help it? I have believed you dead, and mourned you these months, and now...and now..." She was weeping.

"You have believed me dead?" He stood suddenly stiff within the compass of those maternal arms. His quick mind, that ever moved by leaps, was racing over all that was implied in that assertion.

And then the door behind them opened. A harsh voice spoke.

"I have been waiting, madame, for..." The voice checked, and then exclaimed: "Name of God! What is this?"

They fell apart. André-Louis turned. On the threshold, the door wide behind him, stood Monsieur de Plougastel, his brows knit, his face darkening.

André-Louis stood confused, fearful for his mother. But she, helped perhaps by her excitement, by the singleness of her thought, displayed no awkwardness.

"But look who it is, Plougastel."

The Count craned his neck to stare. "Moreau!" he said. He too was faintly surprised. But in the main indifferent. This godson of Kercadiou's was nothing to him, and he had always thought his wife ridiculous in her attachment to this good-for-nothing, simply because she had known him as a child. "We thought you dead," he added, and closed the door.

"But he's alive! Alive!" exclaimed Madame in a quivering voice.

"So I perceive." Monsieur de Plougastel was dry. "God knows if he's to be envied."

André-Louis, now white and grim, desired to know how such a thing had been assumed, and heard, of course, that Langéac had borne the tale to Hamm of his having been killed in the attempt to rescue the Queen.

"But Langéac was followed by another messenger who carried the true story, and also a letter from me to Aline. I know that he arrived safely."

"The letter never did," Madame asserted.

"But that is impossible, madame. I know that the letter arrived. And it was not by any means the last. I sent several others, and some of the messengers I have since seen, and I have heard from them that those letters were delivered. What does it mean? Can Mine have wished to—"

Madame interrupted him. "Mine mourned you for dead. Aline never had any news of you directly or indirectly after the tale that Langéac brought of your death. Of that you can be sure. I can answer for what Mine believed as I can answer for what I believed, myself."

"But then? My letters?" he cried almost in exasperation.

"It is impossible that she should have received them. Impossible that she would not have told me. She knew my own..." she checked, remembering Plougastel's presence, choked down the word "anguish" and replaced it by "concern". Then she continued: "But apart from that, I know, André, I know that she remained in the conviction that you were dead."

He stood there clenching and unclenching his hands, his chin on his breast. There was something here he could not fathom. Links were missing from the chain he sought to complete.

Abruptly he asked of her and of the Comte de Plougastel, who remained coldly aloof, the question beating in his mind. "How was it possible that these letters were not delivered to her?" And swift on the heels of this came his next fierce question, addressed directly to the Count. "By whose contriving was it? Do you know, Monsieur de Plougastel?"

Plougastel raised his brows. "What do you mean? Do I know?"

"You were in attendance upon Monsieur. It may be within your knowledge. That these letters reached Hamm leaves no doubt. Langéac assured me of it so far as the one he carried for me was concerned. He told me that he left it with Monsieur d'Entragues, to be delivered. Monsieur d'Entragues?" Again it was Plougastel he questioned. "Ay, it lies between Monsieur d'Entragues and the Regent."

It was Madame de Plougastel who answered him.

"If those letters reached the hands of Monsieur d'Entragues, they must have been suppressed, André."

"It is the conclusion I had formed, madame," said André-Louis, whilst the Count stormed at his lady for an assertion which he described as monstrous.

"It is not the assertion that is monstrous, but the fact," she retorted. "For clearly it must be the fact."

Monsieur de Plougastel empurpled. "Madame, in all my life I have never known you practise discretion in your assumptions. But this transcends all bounds."

What further form his voluble protest took André-Louis did not wait to ascertain. He heard his storming voice, but did not heed his words. Abruptly he quitted the room, and went forth to demand his horse and directions touching the whereabouts of the Casa Gazzola.

He came to that modest villa in the outskirts, tethered his horse within the gateway and strode purposefully to the door within the creeper-clad porch. It stood open to the little hallway. He rapped with the butt of his riding-whip on the panel, and to the servant who came in answer to the summons announced himself a courier from Paris.

This made a stir. Only a moment was he kept waiting in the hall until d'Entragues, scrupulously dressed as ever, graceful and consequential as if they were at Versailles, came hurrying forth. At sight of André-Louis the Count checked, and the expression of the dark, handsome face with its deeply graven, rather sinister lines underwent a perceptible change.

"Moreau!" he exclaimed.

André-Louis bowed. He was very coldly self-possessed now, his face set and grim. "Your memory flatters me, Monsieur le Comte. You believed me dead, I think?"

D'Entragues missed the mockery in his tone. He stammered in the precipitance of his affirmative reply, in his expressions of satisfaction at this evidence that the rumours had been unfounded. Then dismissing all that in haste, he ended on the question: "Are you from Paris, do you say?"

"With extraordinary news."

To d'Entragues' excited demand for details André-Louis swore that he had not breath to tell his tale twice, and desired to be taken at once to the Regent.

He was ushered into the presence chamber, which, if of no better proportions, was at least more dignified than that of Hamm. The floor was marbled and the ceiling trivially frescoed with cupids and garlands, the work of some journeyman artist's hand. There was a carved press, a gilded coffer, some tall chairs in dark leather with faded gildings were ranged against the wall, and in the middle of the well-lighted room a table with corkscrew legs at which his highness sat at work. He appeared to have increased in bulk and weight, but his face had lost some of its high colour. He was neatly dressed, and his head was powdered. He wore the ribbon of the Holy Ghost and a small dress sword. At the table's farther end sat the Comte d'Avaray, pallid, fair and frail.

"Monsieur Moreau, with news from Paris, monseigneur," d'Entragues announced.

His highness laid down his pen, and looked up. Liquid eyes that seemed full of pathos pondered the newcomer, noted the dust upon him and the erect carriage of his slender, vigorous figure.

"Moreau?" he echoed. "Moreau?" The name was awakening memories in the royal mind. They came with a rush, and at their coming the colour rose in the great face and then receded again. The voice strove to maintain its level tone. "Ah, Moreau! And from Paris, with news, you say?"

"With great news, monseigneur," André-Louis replied. "I am sent by the Baron de Batz to give your highness the full details of the underground campaign we have been conducting against the revolutionaries, and of the stages by which we possessed ourselves of the keys to ultimate success."