Percy Brebner - Vayenne

"Leave him to me," said the priest to the other two men, and then as Herrick turned and went down the passage toward the stairs, Father Bertrand drew his companions closer to him, and talked eagerly to them for a few moments.

When Herrick descended the stairs a few minutes later the passage was empty, and only a waiter was in the long room. The conversation he had chanced to overhear had made little impression upon him. Was there ever a state yet in which every citizen was contented with his rulers? Here in Montvilliers there were contentions, and the coming demise of the Duke prompted men to talk. How dangerous such talk might be, Herrick had no means of judging. He had heard a few names which had little meaning for him – a count, a beautiful woman, and a scholar. Evidently they were of import in the Duchy, but of what interest could they be to him? Nor had he particularly noticed the priest's close scrutiny of his face. Father Bertrand had been astonished to see a stranger there, one who had certainly overheard something of what had been said, and, being a politician as well as a churchman, more loyal as the latter possibly than as the former, he had naturally sought to understand what manner of man this stranger might be. That was all.

So Herrick sought to dismiss the occurrence from his mind as he passed out of the inn, and, after standing on the narrow footway for a moment looking up and down the street, turned in the direction of the castle, bent on a short walk before bed.

There is ever a sense of mystery in an unknown city when it is traversed for the first time after nightfall. Seen over the intervening roofs, some tower or battlemented edifice, rising gray and ghost-like in the dim light of the moon as it did to-night, seems full of mystery; there is a secret in every street turning to right and left, leading we know not whither; in every narrow alley, looking dangerous betwixt frowning walls; in every dark window, from whence evil might peep out unseen. In Vayenne this sense of mystery was intensified since for long centuries history had been busy with it. Its interest lay in the folded mantle of the past rather than in the open lap of the present. Its foundations were in the days of Charlemagne, and in war and peace it had played a foremost part since then. Hate and ambition had fought out their deadly feuds around it and in its streets. Thrice it had closed its gates against the invader and stood a siege. Chivalry had held sway in it, and in cruel ages deeds unspeakable had been perpetrated within its walls. It had had its periods of great glory and of even greater neglect, of victory and defeat, yet it stood to-day as it ever had stood, the capital of the Duchy of Montvilliers, the centre of an independent state, the dukes of which could still link themselves with those Frankish pirates who had conquered and made their home here.

But to-day Vayenne had fallen behind in the march of modern civilization. For the most part its streets were old and ill-lighted. Men still inhabited houses which had stood for centuries, the castle still frowned over the city as it had done in the Middle Ages, and the ruling hand had still an iron grip in it. Perhaps nowhere in Europe had the ways of the foreigner made less progress. Travellers had not yet marked Vayenne as a place to visit. It was not easy of access, and no one had written eulogies concerning it. That it had fallen behind the times in this manner may have been a potent factor in keeping it inviolate and independent. What wonder then if its rulers, and its people, too, were satisfied with things as they were?

Well might a traveller feel strangely alone and out of the world in this city, whose monuments of chiselled stone and sturdy oak had defied the ravages of the conqueror and of time. Yet no such strangeness took possession of Roger Herrick. Vayenne had been to him a dream city. He had known of it from earliest childhood, why and how he hardly understood; as a boy he had vowed one day to see and know it in reality; and to-night the sudden rushes of bell and chime music, the very cadences of the carillon, which came from the belfry of the great church whose spire rose high toward heaven, seemed familiar. They were not new, he had only forgotten them for a while. He seemed to have known these dark streets with their overhanging houses in some other life, and in this present existence the death of the Duke to-night seemed to hold some meaning for him.

This sense of familiarity with his surroundings was particularly strong as he stopped at a corner with the intention of turning and retracing his steps to the inn. Some distance down, the street was spanned by a deep archway, in the upper part of which was a great clock. By the light of a lamp swinging at the corner, Herrick saw that it was called the Rue de la Grosse Horloge. Its upper end, at least, was better lighted than most of the streets he had passed through, and he walked toward the archway, which was old and weather-worn, and must have been a familiar object in Vayenne long before any clock was placed there. There were small shops, part of the structure on either side of the road, and in the deep arch itself, above and on the sides, were bold reliefs, some past history of the city carved into permanence in stone. Herrick paused to look up at them, his action marking him for a foreigner, for who amongst those who passed daily through that familiar archway would give them a thought? Two men walking a dozen yards behind him stopped to watch him, and when he went on, they went on, too, quickening their pace a little and drawing closer to him. The street beyond the arch was darker, most of the shops there being closed for the night, and the fact reminded Herrick that it was time to return to the Croix Verte. He turned so suddenly that he almost collided with the two men who followed him, and had walked so lightly that he was quite unconscious of their presence. One stepped aside and passed on, the other stepped back and began a voluble apology.

"Pardon, monsieur, I did not see. I was walking with my eyes on the ground. It is a bad habit."

Raising his hat and bowing even as the other did, Herrick was explaining that if there were any fault it was his, and that no apology was necessary, when an arm was thrown suddenly across his throat from behind, and he was dragged violently backward. Immediately the man in front closed with him, endeavoring to prevent his using his hands; and the attack was so unexpected that for some moments it was all Herrick could do to keep his feet. He was, however, a strong man, a wrestler and a fighter of no mean skill. With the hand that he had succeeded in keeping free he gripped the arm about his throat, and with one great heave of his body threw the man over his head on to the roadway, where he lay motionless, as though all life were beaten out of him. In another moment it would have gone hard with his other assailant had the man not slipped to the ground, keeping his arms tightly clasped round Herrick's legs, however.

"A spy! Help! A spy!" he shouted. The effect of that cry was wonderful. Before Herrick could kick himself free, a score of men were upon him. He attempted to shout an explanation, but to no purpose. This way and that was he thrown, his arms were seized and twisted behind him, and then a noose was slipped over his wrists, rendering him helpless.

Hatless and with torn clothes he was hustled down the street, the crowd about him becoming larger every moment, those on the outer fringe of it loudly questioning who he was and what he had done.

"A spy!" some one shouted.

"A quick death to all spies," came the ready answer.

Herrick had been severely handled, and for a few moments was hardly conscious of what was happening about him. The reiterated cry of "Spy" served to rouse him. For these people the word appeared to have a special interpretation. They expected and feared spies, and were inclined to be merciless. Revenge was in their minds rather than justice. That the two men who had attacked him took him for a spy, Herrick did not believe; the man clasping his legs had only raised the cry to save himself, knowing full well how promptly assistance would come to such a shout. A quick death seemed likely to follow capture, and, one man as he was against a multitude, Herrick nerved himself for a last struggle. The cord that bound his wrists was not fastened in too workman-like a fashion, he could work his hands free, and it should go hard with some before they succeeded in stringing him to some lamp at a corner, which he imagined was their intention.