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"No, I shall not murder you. You 'll give them to me, I 'm sure."
"And if I refuse, dear M. Guillaume?"
"I shall invite you to accompany me to the village – or, more strictly, to precede me."
"What should we do together in the village?" cried Dieppe.
"I shall beg of you to walk a few paces in front of me, – just a few, – to go at just the pace I go, and to remember that I carry a revolver in my hand."
"My memory would be excellent on such a point," the Captain assured him. "But, again, why to the village?"
"We should go together to the office of the police. I am on good terms with the police."
"Doubtless. But what have they to do with me? Come, come, my matter is purely political, they would n't mix themselves up in it."
"I should charge you with the unlawful possession of my portfolio. You would admit it, or you would deny it. In either case your person would be searched, the papers would be found, and I, who am on such friendly terms with the police, should certainly enjoy an excellent opportunity of inspecting them. You perceive, my dear Captain, that I have thought it out."
"It's neat, certainly," agreed the Captain, who was not a little dismayed at this plan of Guillaume's. "But I should not submit to the search."
"Ah! Now how would you prevent it?"
"I should send for my friend the Count. He has influence; he would answer for me."
"What, when he hears my account of your interview with his wife?" Old Guillaume played this card with a smile of triumph. "I told you that the little affair might perhaps be turned to my purposes," he reminded Dieppe, maliciously.
The Captain reflected, taking as long as he decently could over the task. Indeed he was in trouble. Guillaume's scheme was sagacious, Guillaume's position very strong. And at last Guillaume grew impatient. But still the persistent candle burnt.
"I give you one minute to make up your mind," said Guillaume, dropping his tone of sarcastic pleasantry, and speaking in a hard, sharp voice. "After that, either you give me the papers, or you get up and march before me to the village."
"If I refuse to do either?"
"You can't refuse," said Guillaume.
"You mean – ?"
"I should order you to hold your hands behind your back while I took the papers. If you moved – "
"Thank you. I see," said the Captain, with a nod of understanding. "Awkward for you, though, if it came to that."
"Oh, I think not very, in view of your dealings with my portfolio."
"I 'm in a devil of a hole," admitted the Captain, candidly.
"Time's up," announced M. Guillaume, slowly raising the barrel of his revolver, and taking aim at the Captain. For the candle still burnt, although dimly and fitfully, and still there was light to guide the bullet on its way.
"It's all up!" said the Captain. "But, deuce take it, it's hardly the way to treat a gentleman!" Even as he spoke the light of the candle towered for a second in a last shoot of flame, and then went out.
At the same moment the Captain rolled down the incline of straw on which he had been resting, rose on his knees an instant, seized the truss and flung it at Guillaume, rolled under the next truss, seized that in like manner and propelled it against the enemy, and darted again to shelter. "Stop, or I fire," cried Guillaume; he was as good as his word the next minute, but the third truss caught him just as he aimed, and his bullet flew against and was buried in the planking of the roof. By now, the Captain was escaping from under the fourth truss, and making for the fifth. Guillaume, dimly seeing the fourth truss not thrown, but left in its place, discharged another shot at it. The fifth truss caught him in the side and drove him against the wooden block. He turned swiftly in the direction whence the missile came, and fired again. He was half dazed, his eyes and ears seemed full of the dust of the straw. He fired once again at random, swearing savagely; and before he could recover aim his arm was seized from behind, his neck was caught in a vigorous garotte, and he fell on the floor of the hut with Captain Dieppe on the top of him – Dieppe, dusty, dirty, panting, bleeding freely from a bullet graze on the top of the left ear, and with one leg of his trousers slit from ankle to knee by a rusty nail, that had also ploughed a nasty furrow up his leg. But now he seized Guillaume's revolver, and dragged the old fellow out of the hut. Then he sat down on his chest, pinning his arms together on the ground above his head.
"You enjoyed playing your mouse just a trifle too long, old cat," said he.
Guillaume lay very still, exhausted, beaten, and defenceless. Dieppe released his hands, and, rising, stood looking down at him. A smile came on his face.
"We are now in a better position to adjust our accounts fairly," he observed, as he took from his pocket M. Guillaume's portfolio. "Listen," he commanded; and Guillaume turned weary but spiteful eyes to him. "Here is your portfolio. Take it. Look at it."
Guillaume sat up and obeyed the command.
"Well?" asked Dieppe, when the examination was ended.
"You have robbed me of twenty-five thousand francs."
The Captain looked at him for a moment with a frown. But the next instant he smiled.
"I must make allowances for the state of your temper," he remarked. "But I wish you would carry all your money in notes. That draft, now, is no use to me. Hence" – he shrugged his shoulders regretfully – "I am obliged to leave your Government still no less than twenty-five thousand francs in debt to me."
"What!" cried Guillaume, with a savage stare.
"Oh, yes, you know that well. They have fifty thousand which certainly don't belong to them, and certainly do to me."
"That money 's forfeited," growled Guillaume.
"If you like, then, I forfeit twenty-five thousand of theirs. But I allow it in account with them. The debt now stands reduced by half."
"I 'll get it back from you somehow," threatened Guillaume, who was helpless, but not cowed.
"That will be difficult. I gave it to Paul de Roustache to discharge a claim he had on me."
"To Paul de Roustache?"
"Yes. It 's true he lent me five thousand again; but that 's purely between him and me. And I shall have spent it long before you can even begin to take steps to recover it." He paused a moment and then added, "If you still hanker after your notes, I should recommend you to find your friend and accomplice, M. Paul."
"Where is he?"
"Who can tell? I saw him last on the road across the river – it leads to Sasellano, I believe." Dieppe kept his eye on his vanquished opponent, but Guillaume threatened no movement. The Captain dropped the revolver into his pocket, stooped to pull up a tuft of grass with moist earth adhering to it, and, with the help of his handkerchief, made a primitive plaster to stanch the bleeding of his ear. As he was so engaged, the sound of wheels slowly climbing the hill became audible from the direction of the village.
"You see," he went on, "you can't return to the village – you are on too good terms with the police. Let me advise you to go to Sasellano; the flood will be falling by now, and I should n't wonder if we could find you a means of conveyance." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder towards the road behind him.
"I can't go back to the village?" demanded Guillaume, sullenly.
"In my turn I must beg you to remember that I now carry a revolver. Come, M. Guillaume, we 've played a close hand, but the odd trick 's mine. Go back and tell your employers not to waste their time on me. No, nor their money. They have won the big stake; let them be content. And again let me remind you that Paul de Roustache has your twenty thousand francs. I don't think you 'll get them from him, but you might. From me you 'll get nothing; and if you try the law – oh, think, my friend, how very silly you and your Government will look!"
As he spoke he went up to Guillaume and took him by the arm, exerting a friendly and persuasive pressure, under which Guillaume presently found himself mounting the eminence. The wheels sounded nearer now, and Dieppe's ears were awake to their movements. The pair began to walk down the other side of the slope towards the Cross, and the carriage came into their view. It was easy of identification: its broken-down, lopsided top marked it beyond mistake.
An instant later Dieppe recognised the burly figure of the driver, who was walking by his horses' heads.
"Wonderfully convenient!" he exclaimed. "This fellow will carry you to Sasellano without delay."
Guillaume did not – indeed could not – refuse to obey the prompting of the Captain's arm, but he grumbled as he went.
"I made sure of getting your papers," he said.
"Unlooked-for difficulties will arise, my dear M. Guillaume."
"I thought the reward was as good as in my pocket."
"The reward?" The Captain stopped and looked in his companion's face with some amusement and a decided air of gratification. "There was a reward? Oh, I am important, it seems!"
"Five thousand francs," said Guillaume, sullenly.
"They rate me rather cheap," exclaimed the Captain, his face falling. "I should have hoped for five-and-twenty."
"Would you? If it had been that, I should have brought three men with me."
"Hum!" said the Captain. "And you gave me a stiff job by yourself, eh?" He turned and signalled to the driver, who had now reached the Cross:
"Wait a moment there, my friend." Then he turned back again to Guillaume. "Get into the carriage – go to Sasellano; catch Paul if you can, but leave me in peace," he said, and, diving into his pocket, he produced the five notes of a thousand francs which Paul de Roustache, in some strange impulse of repentance, or gratitude, had handed to him. "What you tell your employers," he added, "I don't care. This is a gift from me to you. The deuce, I reward effort as well as success – I am more liberal than your Government." The gesture with which he held out the notes was magnificent.
Guillaume stared at him in amazement, but his hand went out towards the notes.
"I am free to do what I can at Sasellano?"
"Yes, free to do anything except bother me. But I think your bird will have flown."
Guillaume took the notes and hid them in his pocket; then he walked straight up to the driver, crying, "How much to take me with you to Sasellano?"
The driver looked at him, at Dieppe, and then down towards the river.
"Come, the flood will be less by now; the river will be falling," said Dieppe.
"Fifty francs," said the driver, and Guillaume got in.
"Good!" said the Captain to himself. "A pretty device! And that scoundrel's money did n't lie comfortably in the pocket of a gentleman." He waved his hand to Guillaume and was about to turn away, when the driver came up to him and spoke in a cautious whisper, first looking over his shoulder to see whether his new fare were listening; but Guillaume was sucking at a flask.
"I have a message for you," he said.
"From the lady you carried – ?"
"To the Count of Fieramondi's."
"Ah, you took her there?" The Captain frowned heavily.
"Yes, and left her there. But it's not from her; it's from another lady whom I had n't seen before. She met me just as I was returning from the Count's, and bade me look out for you by the Cross – "
"Yes, yes?" cried Dieppe, eagerly. "Give me the message." For his thoughts flew back to the Countess at the first summons.
The driver produced a scrap of paper, carelessly folded, and gave it to him.
Dieppe ran to the carriage and read the message by the light of its dim and smoky lamp:
"I think I am in time. Come; I wait for you. Whatever you see, keep Andrea in the dark. If you are discreet, all will be well, and I – I shall be very grateful."
The driver mounted the box, the carriage rolled off down the hill, Dieppe was left by the Cross, with the message in his hand. He did not understand the situation.
CHAPTER X
THE JOURNEY TO ROME
It was about ten o'clock – or, it may be, nearer half-past ten – the same night when two inhabitants of the village received very genuine, yet far from unpleasant, shocks of surprise.
The first was the parish priest. He was returning from a visit to the bedside of a sick peasant and making his way along the straggling street towards his own modest dwelling, which stood near the inn, when he met a tall stranger of most dilapidated appearance, whose clothes were creased and dirty, and whose head was encircled by a stained and grimy handkerchief. He wore no hat; his face was disfigured with blotches of an ugly colour and, maybe, an uglier significance; his trousers were most atrociously rent and tattered; he walked with a limp, and shivered in the cold night air. This unpromising-looking person approached the priest and addressed him with an elaborate courtesy oddly out of keeping with his scarecrow-like appearance, but with words appropriate enough to the figure that he cut.
"Reverend father," said he, "pardon the liberty I take, but may I beg of your Reverence's great kindness – "
"It 's no use begging of me," interrupted the priest hurriedly, for he was rather alarmed. "In the first place, I have nothing; in the second, mendicancy is forbidden by the regulations of the commune."
The wayfarer stared at the priest, looked down at his own apparel, and then burst into a laugh.
"Begging forbidden, eh?" he exclaimed. "Then the poor must need voluntary aid!" He thrust his hand into his pocket and brought out two French five-franc pieces. "For the poor, father," he said, pressing them into the priest's hand. "For myself, I was merely about to ask you the time of night." And before the astonished priest could make any movement the stranger passed on his way, humming a soft, and sentimental tune.
"He was certainly mad, but he undoubtedly gave me ten francs," said the priest to his friend the innkeeper, the next day.
"I wish," growled the innkeeper, "that somebody would give me some money to pay for what those two runaway rogues who lodged here had of me, their baggage is worth no more than half what they 've cost me, and I 'll lay odds I never clap eyes on them again."
And in this suspicion the innkeeper proved, in the issue, to be absolutely right, about the value of the luggage there is, however, more room for doubt.
The second person who suffered a surprise was no less a man than the Count of Fieramondi himself. But how this came about needs a little more explanation.
In that very room through whose doorway Captain Dieppe had first beheld the lady whom he now worshipped with a devotion as ardent as it was unhappy, there were now two ladies engaged in conversation. One sat in an arm-chair, nursing the yellow cat of which mention has been made earlier in this history; the other walked up and down with every appearance of weariness, trouble, and distress on her handsome face.
"Oh, the Bishop was just as bad as the banker," she cried fretfully, "and the banker was just as silly as the Bishop. The Bishop said that, although he might have considered the question of giving me absolution from a vow which I had been practically compelled to take, he could hold out no prospect of my getting it beforehand for taking a vow which I took with no other intention than that of breaking it."
"I told you he 'd say that before you went," observed the lady in the arm-chair, who seemed to be treating the situation with a coolness in strong contrast to her companion's agitation.
"And the banker said that although, if I had actually spent fifty thousand lire more than I possessed, he would have done his best to see how he could extricate me from the trouble, he certainly would not help me to get fifty thousand for the express purpose of throwing them away."
"I thought the banker would say that," remarked the other lady, caressing the cat.
"And they both advised me to take my husband's opinion on the matter. My husband's opinion!" Her tone was bitter and tragic indeed. "I suppose they 're right," she said, flinging herself dejectedly into a chair. "I must tell Andrea everything. Oh, and he 'll forgive me!"
"Well, I should think it's rather nice being forgiven."
"Oh, no, not by Andrea!" The faintest smile flitted for an instant across her face. "Oh, no, Andrea does n't forgive like that. His forgiveness is very – well, horribly biblical, you know. Oh, I 'd better not have gone to Rome at all!"
"I never saw any good in your going to Rome, you know."
"Yes, I must tell him everything. Because Paul de Roustache is sure to come and – "
"He 's come already," observed the second lady, calmly.
"What? Come?"
The other lady set down the cat, rose to her feet, took out of her pocket a gold ring and a gold locket, walked over to her companion, and held them out to her. "These are yours, are n't they?" she inquired, and broke into a merry laugh. The sight brought nothing but an astonished stare and a breathless ejaculation —
"Lucia!"
The two ladies drew their chairs close together, and a long conversation ensued, Lucia being the chief narrator, while her companion, whom she addressed from time to time as Emilia, did little more than listen and throw in exclamations of wonder, surprise, or delight.
"How splendidly you kept the secret!" she cried once. And again, "How lucky that he should be here!" And again, "I thought he looked quite charming." And once again, "But, goodness, what a state the poor man must be in! How could you help telling him, Lucia?"
"I had promised," said Lucia, solemnly, "and I keep my promises, Emilia."
"And that man has positively gone?" sighed Emilia, taking no notice of a rather challenging emphasis which Lucia had laid on her last remark.
"Yes, gone for good – I 'm sure of it. And you need n't tell Andrea anything. Just take all the vows he asks you to! But he won't now; you see he wants a reconciliation as much as you do."
"I shall insist on taking at least one vow," said Emilia, with a virtuous air. She stopped and started. "But what in the world am I to say about you, my dear?" she asked.
"Say I 've just come back from Rome, of course," responded Lucia.
"If he should find out – "
"It 's very unlikely, and at the worst you must take another vow, Emilia. But Andrea 'll never suspect the truth unless – "
"Unless what?"
"Unless Captain Dieppe lets it out, you know."
"It would be better if Captain Dieppe did n't come back, I think," observed Emilia, thoughtfully.
"Well, of all the ungrateful women!" cried Lucia, indignantly. But Emilia sprang up and kissed her, and began pressing her with all sorts of questions, or rather with all sorts of ways of putting one question, which made her blush very much, and to which she seemed unable, or unwilling, to give any definite reply. At last Emilia abandoned the attempt to extract an admission, and observed with a sigh of satisfaction:
"I think I 'd better see Andrea and forgive him."
"You 'll change your frock first, won't you, dear?" cried Lucia. It was certainly not desirable that Emilia should present herself to the Count in the garments she was then wearing.
"Yes, of course. Will you come with me to Andrea?"
"No. Send for me, presently – as soon as it occurs to you that I 've just come back from Rome, you know, and should be so happy to hear of your reconciliation."
Half an hour later, – for the change of costume had to be radical, since there is all the difference in the world between a travelling-dress and an easy, negligent, yet elegant, toilette suggestive of home and the fireside, and certainly not of wanderings, – the Count of Fieramondi got his shock of surprise in the shape of an inquiry whether he were at leisure to receive a visit from the Countess.
Yet his surprise, great as it was at a result at once so prosperous and so speedy, did not prevent him from drawing the obvious inference. His thoughts had already been occupied with Captain Dieppe. It was now half-past ten; he had waited an hour for dinner, and then eaten it alone in some disquietude; as time went on he became seriously uneasy, and had considered the despatch of a search expedition. If his friend did not return in half an hour, he had declared, he himself would go and look for him; and he had requested that he should be informed the moment the Captain put in an appearance. But, alas! what is friendship – even friendship reinforced by gratitude – beside love? As the poets have often remarked, in language not here to be attained, its power is insignificant, and its claims go to the wall. On fire with the emotions excited by the Countess's message, the Count forgot both Dieppe and all that he owed to Dieppe's intercession; the matter went clean out of his head for the moment. He leapt up, pushed away the poem on which he had been trying to concentrate his mind, and cried eagerly:
"I 'm at the Countess's disposal. I 'll wait on her at once."
"The Countess is already on her way here," was the servant's answer.
The first transports of joy are perhaps better left in a sacred privacy. Indeed the Count was not for much explanation, or for many words. What need was there? The Countess acquiesced in his view with remarkable alacrity; the fewer words there were, and especially, perhaps, the fewer explanations, the easier and more gracious was her part. She had thought the matter over, there in the solitude to which her Andrea's cruelty had condemned her: and, yes, she would take the oath – in fact any number of oaths – to hold no further communication whatever with Paul de Roustache.
"Ah, your very offer is a reproach to me," said the Count, softly. "I told you that now I ask no oath, that your promise was enough, that – "
"You told me?" exclaimed the Countess, with some appearance of surprise.
"Why, yes. At least I begged Dieppe to tell you in my name. Did n't he?"
For a moment the Countess paused, engaged in rapid calculations, then she said sweetly:
"Oh, yes, of course! But it's not the same as hearing it from your own lips, Andrea."
"Where did you see him?" asked the Count. "Did he pass the barricade? Ah, we 'll soon have that down, won't we?"
"Oh, yes, Andrea; do let 's have it down, because – "
"But where did you and Dieppe have your talk?"
"Oh – oh – down by the river, Andrea."
"He found you there?"
"Yes, he found me there, and – and talked to me."
"And gave you back the ring?" inquired the Count, tenderly.
The Countess took it from her pocket and handed it to her husband. "I 'd rather you 'd put it on yourself," she said.
The Count took her hand in his and placed the ring on her finger. It fitted very well, indeed. There could be no doubt that it was made for the hand on which it now rested. The Count kissed it as he set it there.
At last, however, he found time to remember the obligations he was under to his friend.
"But where can our dear Dieppe be?" he cried. "We owe so much to him."
"Yes, we do owe a lot to him," murmured the Countess. "But, Andrea – "
"Indeed, my darling, we must n't forget him. I must – "
"No, we must n't forget him. Oh, no, we won't. But, Andrea, I – I 've got another piece of news for you." The Countess spoke with a little timidity, as if she were trying delicate ground, and were not quite sure of her footing.
"More news? What an eventful night!"
He took his wife's hand. Away went all thoughts of poor Dieppe again.
"Yes, it's so lucky, happening just to-night. Lucia has come back! An hour ago!"
"Lucia come back!" exclaimed the Count, gladly. "That's good news, indeed."
"It 'll delight her so much to find us – to find us like this again, Andrea."
"Yes, yes, we must send for her. Is she in her room? And where has she come from?"
"Rome," answered the Countess, again in a rather nervous way.
"Rome!" cried the Count in surprise. "What took her to Rome?"
"She does n't like to be asked much about it," began the Countess, with a prudent air.
"I 'm sure I don't want to pry into her affairs, but – "
"No, I knew you would n't want to do that, Andrea."
"Still, my dear, it 's really a little odd. She left only four days ago. Now she 's back, and – "
The Count broke off, looking rather distressed. Such proceedings, accompanied by such mystery, were not, to his mind, quite the proper thing for a young and unmarried lady.