D. Broster - A Fire of Driftwood - A Collection of Short Stories (D. K. Broster) (Literary Thoughts Edition)

Hervé raised his eyes from that shaking hand to the livid face of a young man about his own age, and shrugged his shoulders.

“Tell me, you – – ” began the soldier still more violently, when one of the others pushed him roughly aside.

“Shut up, Delorme! – Come along, Chouan!”

The firing-party was already assembled. But as for the Comte de Saint-Armel, he could find nothing better to do at that moment than to survey with a sardonic amusement the situation in which he found himself. He was like to die to save his own life. The position demanded a few moments’ reflection. He turned his head and spoke to the man Lenormant.

“What does he say?” asked the officer hopefully.

“He asks that you will allow him five minutes to say his prayers, if you are going to shoot him.”

“Oh, he has grasped that fact, has he?” retorted the officer. “Very well; and tell him to look sharp about it. As he is so soon going to join his bonne Vierge and the rest of them, he need not send off a long petition from a distance.”

So Hervé was marched over to the fir-tree and there, his arms still bound behind him, he knelt down on the hot earth and bent his head. But he was not saying his prayers. “If I persist,” he was thinking, “I am a dead man in five minutes. If I tell them who I am I get a reprieve of a day or two, most probably, till they can take me to Auray and the guillotine. But if they shoot me now, without knowing who I am, Yves and the rest will go on fighting for some time before they guess what has happened. . . . Shall I tell them?” He had a great distaste for the prospect – absurd enough, since he was only betraying himself. He lifted his head, fantastically undecided – and descried a horseman topping the mound not a hundred yards away. He wore Republican uniform and was followed by two more riders.

The arrival of this individual appeared to cause surprise. The men drew themselves up and saluted as, stout and well set-up, he came riding towards them through the gorse.

“What’s this?” he called out as he came within ear-shot. “Prisoner?”

“Yes, mon commandant,” replied the lieutenant respectfully. “I was about to shoot him. He cannot or will not give any information, and I thought – – ”

“Oh, I have no objection on principle,” retorted his superior officer, with a sort of truculent bonhomie. “Only are you sure that you know what you are doing? Stand up, Chouan!” he commanded, urging his horse nearer.

Hervé got to his feet, and, pinioned, defiant, faced the newcomer’s increasingly triumphant scrutiny.

“So he will not say where l’Invincible has gone to! Have you thought of asking him where he got the bullet-wound under that bandage? Have you thought of looking at his hands? I do not think that you will find them a peasant’s. . . .” The stout man swung off his horse with surprising alacrity.

“Untie him,” he said curtly, and, as the prisoner’s arms fell to his sides, he advanced upon him, holding out his hand.

“You carry your reticence a trifle far, Monsieur l’Invincible,” he said, smiling pleasantly. “Or perhaps I should say, Monsieur le Comte de Saint-Armel.”

Hervé looked at him for a moment without moving.

“Oh, we have met before,” said the commandant. “This is a genuine recognition, not a trap. I had the pleasure of making your acquaintance when I was the prisoner of M. de Silz last year.”

Saint-Armel put out his hand. “You come in a good hour, Monsieur le Commandant,” he observed gaily. “That is, unless you propose to uphold M. le Lieutenant’s summary measures.”

“No,” returned the other, with meaning, “I must take you to Auray instead. But as I am dealing with a gentleman I will ask for your parole. I have no wish to tie up a wounded man.”

But l’Invincible shook his head with a smile. “I prefer material bonds.”

“You mean that they are more easily broken?” asked the officer. “I do not think that you will find it so, Monsieur le Comte. I have a carriage and an armed escort waiting for you on the road – you know that we have been hunting for you all day? – and it is kindest to tell you that you are now looking your last on the geographical features which you have utilised with so much success against the Republic.”

Hervé bowed. He did not resent the elation which pierced through his captor’s speech, but he had no mind to stand longer in the sun than was necessary. “I have small doubt that you are right, Monsieur,” he said coolly, and put his hands behind him as a hint that he was ready.

“No, not with those belts, men,” interposed the commandant. “Lieutenant, your scarf! That will be less uncomfortable and quite as efficacious, besides possessing a certain symbolism. . . . I am afraid, Monsieur l’Invincible,” he went on, as the tricolour sash tightened about Hervé’s wrists, “that you must regret our chance interview at M. de Silz’s quarters.”

A tiny half-contemptuous smile twitched at his captive’s mouth.

“I remember regretting at the time that M. de Silz had seen fit to exchange you.”

“Why, what would you have done with me, Monsieur de Saint-Armel?”

“Precisely what you are going to do with me,” answered Hervé dispassionately.

VI

There still runs a tale in the Baud district concerning the exploit of Yves le Guerric of St. Nicholas and Jean-Marie, his nephew; how they posted themselves with fifteen picked men one night on the Auray road where it runs narrowing through the forest of Camors; how they set upon a body of dragoons which presently came along, the leading horses whereof fell incontinently into a trench which Yves had caused to be dug in the sand and covered over with pine-branches; and how Yves and his men thereupon plucked that famous leader l’Invincible from the closed carriage where he sat fettered in the middle of the escort, opposite a Republican officer with a drawn sword. . . .

It is legend now; it was a fact, and a somewhat bloody one, on that June night of 1795. Out on the narrow road, a quarter of an hour afterwards, a flying moon lit carelessly the scene of the struggle, showing for a moment or two the black bulk of the overturned carriage, with the dead officer lying beside it, in the midst of a huddle of slaughtered horses and men. In the wood it filtered through the pine stems to silver the stern and exultant faces of the Bretons, as they gazed silently at l’Invincible, where he stood and read, by the light of a torch, the letter which Yves had just delivered to him. There was blood on Hervé’s clothes, but it was not his own.

“How far is the château de Kermelven from here?” he asked suddenly, folding up the letter.

“About nine miles north-east of Locminé,” replied his foster-father, devouring him with his eyes. “Are we to go there now, Monsieur Hervé?”

“This is to warn me to be there the day after to-morrow to meet two ladies bearing an important communication from the Regent. I shall want sufficient men to prevent a surprise.”

“You shall have them, Monsieur Hervé,” said Yves. “There is plenty of time.” He hesitated a moment, fumbling in his pocket. “I hope you will pardon me, Monsieur le Comte,” he continued in an apologetic tone, “ – and do not stay to read it now – but here is another letter that I promised to give you. It is from my grand-daughter. The poor child is very unhappy. It seems that the little medal which she gave you at parting, when it was taken from you by the Blues, was passed round until it came into the hands of a young man of Pontivy in the battalion, Jean Delorme, who once courted my grand-daughter, and he recognised it as hers. The little one says he has told her that he intends to kill you – and she says it is her fault for giving you the medal. . . . You will pardon the poor child, will you not, for troubling you?”