Part 21 (1/2)
”Would I had your body to fill with wine, Antoine,” said Francois, longingly; and then, casting an unhappy look at the inn, he added, ”and the wine to fill it with.”
”What are you shaking for, Jacques?” asked fat Antoine of his slim comrade at his side. ”One would think you were afraid. Haven't you told us that love of fighting was the one pa.s.sion of your life?”
”Death of the devil, so it is!” replied Jacques in a soft voice, and with a lisp worthy of one of the King's painted minions. ”That is what annoys me, for if this insignificant matter should come to a fight, and I should accidentally be killed in so obscure an affair, how could I ever again indulge my pa.s.sion for fighting?”
Meanwhile, Barbemouche had gone to the door and cautiously opened it, no one having barred it after my departure from the kitchen. I could hear the sound of Blaise's superb snoring, mingled with the less resonant efforts of the old couple. Barbemouche surveyed as much of the kitchen as the moonlight disclosed to him. Then he quietly shut the door and turned to his fellows.
”It is well,” he said. ”The gentleman himself is snoring his lungs away just inside the door. There is another room, and it is there that the women must be. The others are probably in the shed. Let us go quietly, as it would not be polite to disturb their sleep.”
Whereupon Barbemouche led the way back to the woods, followed by fat Antoine, who toiled puffingly, Jacques, who stepped daintily and seemed fearful of treading on stones and briars, and last of all Francois, who moved at a measured pace, with long strides, retaining his air of profound meditation. The sound of the crus.h.i.+ng of leaves beneath their feet became more distant, and finally died out entirely.
In vain I asked myself the meaning of this strange investigation.
Manifestly the present object of De Berquin was nothing more than to keep himself informed of our whereabouts. But why had he sent all four of his henchmen to find out whether we were at this inn, when one would have sufficed? I abandoned the attempt to deduce what his exact intentions were. Drowsiness now coming over me, and the night air having grown colder, I repaired to the shed for the purpose of obtaining there the repose that had been denied me in the kitchen. I was satisfied in mind that whatever blow De Berquin intended to strike for the possession of mademoiselle, or for revenge upon myself, would be attempted at a time and place more convenient to him. Knowing that my slumbers invariably yielded to any unusual noise, I allowed myself to fall asleep on a pile of straw in the shed.
I know not how long I had slept, when I suddenly awoke with a start and sat upright. What noise had invaded my sleep, I could not, at that moment, tell. The place was then perfectly quiet, save for the regular breathing of the two boys, and an occasional movement of one of the horses. The shed was still entirely dark, excepting where a thin slice of moonlight entered at a crack. I sat still, listening.
Presently a low sound struck my ear, something between a growl and a groan. I quickly arose, left the shed, and ran to a clump of bushes at the side of the inn, whence the sound proceeded. Separating the bushes I saw, lying p.r.o.ne on the ground among them, the stalwart body of Blaise.
”What is the matter?” I cried. ”Speak! Are you wounded?”
The only reply was a kind of m.u.f.fled roar. Looking closer, I saw that Blaise's mouth and head were tightly bound by the detached sleeve of a doublet, and this had deterred him from articulating. I saw, also, that his legs had been tied together, and his hands fastened behind him with a rope.
I rapidly released his legs, and he stood up. Then I undid his hands, and he stretched out his arms with relief. Finally I unbound his mouth and he spoke:
”Oh, the whelps of h.e.l.l! To fall on a man when he is sleeping off his wine, and tie him up like a trussed fowl! I will have the blood of every cursed knave of them! And the maid! Grandmother of the devil! They have taken the maid! Come, monsieur, let us cut them into pieces, and save the maid!”
But I held him back, and cried: ”And mademoiselle, what of her? Speak, you drunken dog! Have you let her be harmed?”
”She is perfectly safe,” he answered, in his turn holding me back from rus.h.i.+ng to the inn. ”I do not think that she was even awakened. What use to let her know what has happened? If we rescue the maid and the maid will hold her tongue, mademoiselle will never know what danger she has escaped.”
”Or what vigilant protectors she has had to guard her sleep,” I said, with bitter self-reproach, no longer daring to blame Blaise for a laxity of which I had been equally guilty. ”You are right,” I went on, ”she must know nothing. Now tell me at once exactly what has occurred.”
Blaise would rather have looked for his sword, and started off immediately to the rescue of the maid, but I made him stand with me in the shadow of the inn and relate.
”From the time when I fell asleep on the kitchen floor,” he said, ”I knew nothing until a little while ago, when I awoke, and found myself still where I had lain down, but tied up as you found me yonder. Four curs of h.e.l.l were lifting me to carry me out. I tried to strike, but the deep sleep, induced by that cursed wine, had allowed them to tie me up as neatly as if I had been a dead deer. Neither could I speak, though I tried hard enough to curse, you may be sure. So they brought me out, and laid me down there by the inn-door. 'Would it not be best to stick a sword into him?' said one of the rascals, a soft speaking, womanish pup.
A hungry-looking giant put the point of an old two-handed sword at my breast, as if to carry out the suggestion; but a heavy, black-bearded scoundrel, whose voice I think I have heard before, pushed the sword away and said: 'No, the captain has a quarrel to adjust with him in person. We are to concern ourselves entirely with the lady. Lay him yonder.' So they carried me over to the bushes. 'And now for the others,' said the giant.
'Why lose time over them?' said the burly fellow, who seemed to be the leader; 'they are sleeping like pigs in the shed. Come! We can do the business without waking them up.'
”So they left me lying on the ground and went into the inn again, very quietly. They must have gone, without waking the landlord or his wife, into the room of mademoiselle and her maid. Presently they came out again, carrying the maid. When they had gone about half way to the woods, they stopped and set her on her feet. So far, I suppose, it was the wine that kept her asleep; but now she awoke, and I could see her looking around, very scared, from one to the other of the four rascals. Then she gave a scream. At that instant, there came rus.h.i.+ng from the woods, with his sword drawn, your friend, the Vicomte de Berquin. 'Stand off, rascals!' he shouted, as he ran up to them. They drew their weapons, and made a weak pretense of resisting him; then, when each one had exchanged a thrust with him, they all turned tail, and made off into the woods.
”M. de Berquin now turned to the maid, who had fallen to her knees in fright. Taking her hand, he said, 'Mademoiselle, I thank Heaven I arrived in time to give you the aid your own escort failed to afford. Perhaps now you will be the less unwilling to accept my protection!'--the maid now looked up at him, and he got a good view of her face. He started back as if h.e.l.l had opened before him, threw her hand from his, turned towards the woods, and shouted to the four rascals, 'You whelps of the devil, you have made a mistake and brought the maid!' He was about to follow them, when it probably occurred to him that if left free the maid would disclose his little project; for he stood thinking a moment, then grasped the frightened maid by the wrist, and ran off into the woods, dragging her after him. All this I saw through an opening in the bushes while I lay helpless and speechless. By industriously working my jaw, I at last succeeded in making my mouth sufficiently free to produce the sounds which brought you to me. Now, monsieur, let us hasten after the maid, for mademoiselle will be vastly annoyed to lose her precious Jeannotte.”
I saw that Blaise knew with what argument I was quickest to be moved.
”Blaise,” I said, ”do not pretend that it is only for mademoiselle's sake that you are concerned. In your anxiety about the maid, you forget the danger in which mademoiselle still lies, and which requires me to remain here. When the ingenious De Berquin learns, from his four henchmen, that mademoiselle was not awakened, he will certainly repeat his attempt. He thinks to win her favor by appearing to be her rescuer from these four pretended a.s.sailants, and, at the same time, to make us seem unworthy to protect her. He does not know that she has seen the four rascals in his company. He wishes to work with his own hand his revenge upon us, and so he has let us live. I see the way to make him so ridiculous in the eyes of mademoiselle that he will never dare show his face to her again.”
”But the maid!” persisted Blaise.