Part 42 (2/2)

Two millions of s.h.i.+ning money, gold, silver, and English notes! And he laughed again as he recalled M. Ferraud, caught in a trap. He was clever, but not clever enough. What a stroke! To make prisoners of the party on their return, to carry the girl away into the mountains!

Would any of them think of treasures, of conspiracies, with her as a hostage? He thought not. In the hue and cry for her, these elements in the game would fall to a minor place. Well he knew M. Ferraud: he would call to heaven for the safety of Laura. Love her? Yes! She was the one woman. But men did not make captives of women and obtain their love. He knew the futility of such coercion. He had committed two or three scoundrelly acts, but never would he or could he sink to such a level. No. He meant no harm at all. Frighten her, perhaps, and terrorize the others; and mayhap take a kiss as he left her to the coming of her friends. Nothing more serious than that.

Two millions in gold and silver and English notes! He would have his revenge, for all these years of struggle and failure; for the cold and callous policies of state which had driven him to this piece of roguery, on their heads be it. Two thousand in Ma.r.s.eilles, ready at his beck and call, a thousand more in Avignon, in Lyons, in Dijon, and so on up to Paris, the Paris he had cursed one night from under his mansard. In a week he would have them shaking in their boots. The unemployed, the idlers, thieves, his to a man. If he saw his own death at the end, little he cared. He would have one great moment, pay off the score, France as well as Germany. He would at least live to see them harrying each other's throats. To declare to France that he was only Germany's tool, put forward for the sole purpose of destroying peace in the midst of a great military crisis. He had other papers, and the prying little Frenchman had never seen those; clever forgeries, bearing the signature of certain great German personages. These should they find at the selected moment. Let them rip one another's throats, the dogs! Two million of francs, enough to purchase a hundred thousand men.

”Ah, my great-grandsire, if spirits have eyes, yours will see something presently. And that poor little devil of a secret agent thinks I want a crown on my head! There was a time . . . Curse these infernal headaches!”

On, on; hurry, hurry. The driver was faithful, a sometime brigand and later a harbor boatman; and of all his confederates this one was the only man he dared trust on an errand of this kind.

Evisa. They did not pause. They ate their supper on the way. With three Sardinian donkeys, strong and patient little brutes, with lanterns and shovels and sacks, the two fared into the pines. Atone was all familiar ground to the Corsican who, in younger days, had taken his illegal t.i.the from these hills. They found the range soon enough, but made a dozen mistakes in measurements; and it was long toward midnight, when the oil of the lanterns ran low, that their shovels bore down into the precious pocket. The earth flew. They worked like madmen, with nervous energy and power of will; and when the chest finally came into sight, rotten with age and the soak of earth, they fell back against a tree, on the verge of collapse. The hair was damp on their foreheads, their breath came harshly, almost in sobs.

Suddenly Breitmann fell upon his knees and laughed hysterically, plunged his blistered hands into the s.h.i.+ning heap. It played through his fingers in little musical cascades. He rose.

”Pietro, you have been faithful to me. Put your two hands in there.”

”I, _padrone_?” stupefied.

”Go on! Go on! As much as your two hands can hold is yours. Dig them in deep, man, dig them in deep!”

With a cry Pietro dropped and burrowed into the gold and silver. A dozen times he started to withdraw his hands, but they trembled so that some of the coins would slip and fall. At last, with one desperate plunge, the money running down toward his elbows, he turned aside and let fall his burden on the new earth outside the shallow pit. He rolled beside it, done for, in a fainting state. Breitmann laughed wildly.

”Come, come; we have no time. Put it into your pockets.”

”But, _padrone_, I have not counted it!” naively.

”To-morrow, when we make camp for breakfast. Let us hurry.”

Quickly Pietro stuffed his pockets. Jabbering in his patois, swearing so many candles to the Virgin for this night's work. Then began the loading of the sacks, and these were finally dumped into the donkey-panniers.

”Now, Pietro, the shortest cut to Ajaccio. First, your hand on your amulet, and oath never to reveal what has happened.”

Pietro swore solemnly. ”I am ready now, _padrone_!”

”Lead on, then,” replied Breitmann. Impulsively he raised his hands high above his head. ”Mine, all mine!”

He wiped his face and hands, pulled his cap down firmly, lighted a cigarette, struck the rear donkey, and the hazardous journey began.

Seven men, more or less young, with a genial air of dissipation about their eyes and a varied degree of recklessness lurking at the corners of their mouths; seven men sat round a table in a house in the Rue St.

Charles. They had been eating and drinking rather luxuriously for Ajaccio. The Rue St. Charles is neither s.p.a.cious nor elegant as a thoroughfare, but at that point where it turns into the _Place Let.i.tia_ it is quiet and unfrequented at night. A film of tobacco smoke wavered in and out among the guttering candles and streamed round the empty and part empty champagne bottles. At the head of the table sat Breitmann, still pale and weary from his Herculean labors. His face was immobile, but his eyes were lively.

”To-morrow,” said Breitmann, ”we leave for France. On board the moneys will be equally divided. Then, for the work.” His voice was cold, authoritative.

”Two millions!” mused Picard, from behind a fresh cloud of smoke. He picked up a bottle and gravely filled his gla.s.s, beckoning to the others to follow his example. At another sign all rose to their feet, Breitmann alone remaining seated, ”To the Day!”

Breitmann's lips grew thinner; that was the only sign.

Outside, glancing obliquely through the grilled window, stood M.

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