El Dorado: An Adventure of the Scarlet Pimpernel

Then without any transition from this schoolboy nonsense to the serious business of the moment, Sir Andrew Ffoulkes said abruptly:

“Tell us exactly, Blakeney, where you will want the cart to stand on Sunday.”

Blakeney rose and turned to the map against the wall, Ffoulkes and Tony following him. They stood close to his elbow whilst his slender, nervy hand wandered along the shiny surface of the varnished paper. At last he placed his finger on one spot.

“Here you see,” he said, “is the Villette gate. Just outside it a narrow street on the right leads down in the direction of the canal. It is just at the bottom of that narrow street at its junction with the tow-path there that I want you two and the cart to be. It had better be a coal-car by the way; they will be unloading coal close by there to-morrow,” he added with one of his sudden irrepressible outbursts of merriment. “You and Tony can exercise your muscles coal-heaving, and incidentally make yourselves known in the neighbourhood as good if somewhat grimy patriots.”

“We had better take up our parts at once then,” said Tony. “I’ll take a fond farewell of my clean shirt to-night.”

“Yes, you will not see one again for some time, my good Tony. After your hard day’s work to-morrow you will have to sleep either inside your cart, if you have already secured one, or under the arches of the canal bridge, if you have not.”

“I hope you have an equally pleasant prospect for Hastings,” was my Lord Tony’s grim comment.

It was easy to see that he was as happy as a schoolboy about to start for a holiday. Lord Tony was a true sportsman. Perhaps there was in him less sentiment for the heroic work which he did under the guidance of his chief than an inherent passion for dangerous adventures. Sir Andrew Ffoulkes, on the other hand, thought perhaps a little less of the adventure, but a great deal of the martyred child in the Temple. He was just as buoyant, just as keen as his friend, but the leaven of sentiment raised his sporting instincts to perhaps a higher plane of self-devotion.

“Well, now, to recapitulate,” he said, in turn following with his finger the indicated route on the map. “Tony and I and the coal-cart will await you on this spot, at the corner of the towpath on Sunday evening at nine o’clock.”

“And your signal, Blakeney?” asked Tony.

“The usual one,” replied Sir Percy, “the seamew’s cry thrice repeated at brief intervals. But now,” he continued, turning to Armand and Hastings, who had taken no part in the discussion hitherto, “I want your help a little further afield.”

“I thought so,” nodded Hastings.

“The coal-cart, with its usual miserable nag, will carry us a distance of fifteen or sixteen kilometres, but no more. My purpose is to cut along the north of the city, and to reach St. Germain, the nearest point where we can secure good mounts. There is a farmer just outside the commune; his name is Achard. He has excellent horses, which I have borrowed before now; we shall want five, of course, and he has one powerful beast that will do for me, as I shall have, in addition to my own weight, which is considerable, to take the child with me on the pillion. Now you, Hastings and Armand, will have to start early to-morrow morning, leave Paris by the Neuilly gate, and from there make your way to St. Germain by any conveyance you can contrive to obtain. At St. Germain you must at once find Achard’s farm; disguised as labourers you will not arouse suspicion by so doing. You will find the farmer quite amenable to money, and you must secure the best horses you can get for our own use, and, if possible, the powerful mount I spoke of just now. You are both excellent horse-men, therefore I selected you amongst the others for this special errand, for you two, with the five horses, will have to come and meet our coal-cart some seventeen kilometres out of St. Germain, to where the first sign-post indicates the road to Courbevoie. Some two hundred metres down this road on the right there is a small spinney, which will afford splendid shelter for yourselves and your horses. We hope to be there at about one o’clock after midnight of Monday morning. Now, is all that quite clear, and are you both satisfied?”

“It is quite clear,” exclaimed Hastings placidly; “but I, for one, am not at all satisfied.”

“And why not?”

“Because it is all too easy. We get none of the danger.”

“Oho! I thought that you would bring that argument forward, you incorrigible grumbler,” laughed Sir Percy good-humouredly. “Let me tell you that if you start to-morrow from Paris in that spirit you will run your head and Armand’s into a noose long before you reach the gate of Neuilly. I cannot allow either of you to cover your faces with too much grime; an honest farm labourer should not look over-dirty, and your chances of being discovered and detained are, at the outset, far greater than those which Ffoulkes and Tony will run—”

Armand had said nothing during this time. While Blakeney was unfolding his plan for him and for Lord Hastings—a plan which practically was a command—he had sat with his arms folded across his chest, his head sunk upon his breast. When Blakeney had asked if they were satisfied, he had taken no part in Hastings’ protest nor responded to his leader’s good-humoured banter.

Though he did not look up even now, yet he felt that Percy’s eyes were fixed upon him, and they seemed to scorch into his soul. He made a great effort to appear eager like the others, and yet from the first a chill had struck at his heart. He could not leave Paris before he had seen Jeanne.

He looked up suddenly, trying to seem unconcerned; he even looked his chief fully in the face.

“When ought we to leave Paris?” he asked calmly.

“You MUST leave at daybreak,” replied Blakeney with a slight, almost imperceptible emphasis on the word of command. “When the gates are first opened, and the work-people go to and fro at their work, that is the safest hour. And you must be at St. Germain as soon as may be, or the farmer may not have a sufficiency of horses available at a moment’s notice. I want you to be spokesman with Achard, so that Hastings’ British accent should not betray you both. Also you might not get a conveyance for St. Germain immediately. We must think of every eventuality, Armand. There is so much at stake.”

Armand made no further comment just then. But the others looked astonished. Armand had but asked a simple question, and Blakeney’s reply seemed almost like a rebuke—so circumstantial too, and so explanatory. He was so used to being obeyed at a word, so accustomed that the merest wish, the slightest hint from him was understood by his band of devoted followers, that the long explanation of his orders which he gave to Armand struck them all with a strange sense of unpleasant surprise.

Hastings was the first to break the spell that seemed to have fallen over the party.

“We leave at daybreak, of course,” he said, “as soon as the gates are open. We can, I know, get one of the carriers to give us a lift as far as St. Germain. There, how do we find Achard?”

“He is a well-known farmer,” replied Blakeney. “You have but to ask.”

“Good. Then we bespeak five horses for the next day, find lodgings in the village that night, and make a fresh start back towards Paris in the evening of Sunday. Is that right?”

“Yes. One of you will have two horses on the lead, the other one. Pack some fodder on the empty saddles and start at about ten o’clock. Ride straight along the main road, as if you were making back for Paris, until you come to four cross-roads with a sign-post pointing to Courbevoie. Turn down there and go along the road until you meet a close spinney of fir-trees on your right. Make for the interior of that. It gives splendid shelter, and you can dismount there and give the horses a feed. We’ll join you one hour after midnight. The night will be dark, I hope, and the moon anyhow will be on the wane.”

“I think I understand. Anyhow, it’s not difficult, and we’ll be as careful as may be.”

“You will have to keep your heads clear, both of you,” concluded Blakeney.

He was looking at Armand as he said this; but the young man had not made a movement during this brief colloquy between Hastings and the chief. He still sat with arms folded, his head falling on his breast.

Silence had fallen on them all. They all sat round the fire buried in thought. Through the open window there came from the quay beyond the hum of life in the open-air camp; the tramp of the sentinels around it, the words of command from the drill-sergeant, and through it all the moaning of the wind and the beating of the sleet against the window-panes.

A whole world of wretchedness was expressed by those sounds! Blakeney gave a quick, impatient sigh, and going to the window he pushed it further open, and just then there came from afar the muffled roll of drums, and from below the watchman’s cry that seemed such dire mockery:

“Sleep, citizens! Everything is safe and peaceful.”

“Sound advice,” said Blakeney lightly. “Shall we also go to sleep? What say you all—eh?”

He had with that sudden rapidity characteristic of his every action, already thrown off the serious air which he had worn a moment ago when giving instructions to Hastings. His usual debonnair manner was on him once again, his laziness, his careless insouciance. He was even at this moment deeply engaged in flicking off a grain of dust from the immaculate Mechlin ruff at his wrist. The heavy lids had fallen over the tell-tale eyes as if weighted with fatigue, the mouth appeared ready for the laugh which never was absent from it very long.

It was only Ffoulkes’s devoted eyes that were sharp enough to pierce the mask of light-hearted gaiety which enveloped the soul of his leader at the present moment. He saw—for the first time in all the years that he had known Blakeney—a frown across the habitually smooth brow, and though the lips were parted for a laugh, the lines round mouth and chin were hard and set.

With that intuition born of whole-hearted friendship Sir Andrew guessed what troubled Percy. He had caught the look which the latter had thrown on Armand, and knew that some explanation would have to pass between the two men before they parted to-night. Therefore he gave the signal for the breaking up of the meeting.

“There is nothing more to say, is there, Blakeney?” he asked.

“No, my good fellow, nothing,” replied Sir Percy. “I do not know how you all feel, but I am demmed fatigued.”

“What about the rags for to-morrow?” queried Hastings.

“You know where to find them. In the room below. Ffoulkes has the key. Wigs and all are there. But don’t use false hair if you can help it—it is apt to shift in a scrimmage.”

He spoke jerkily, more curtly than was his wont. Hastings and Tony thought that he was tired. They rose to say good night. Then the three men went away together, Armand remaining behind.

CHAPTER XII. WHAT LOVE IS

“Well, now, Armand, what is it?” asked Blakeney, the moment the footsteps of his friends had died away down the stone stairs, and their voices had ceased to echo in the distance.

“You guessed, then, that there was… something?” said the younger man, after a slight hesitation.

“Of course.”

Armand rose, pushing the chair away from him with an impatient nervy gesture. Burying his hands in the pockets of his breeches, he began striding up and down the room, a dark, troubled expression in his face, a deep frown between his eyes.

Blakeney had once more taken up his favourite position, sitting on the corner of the table, his broad shoulders interposed between the lamp and the rest of the room. He was apparently taking no notice of Armand, but only intent on the delicate operation of polishing his nails.

Suddenly the young man paused in his restless walk and stood in front of his friend—an earnest, solemn, determined figure.

“Blakeney,” he said, “I cannot leave Paris to-morrow.”

Sir Percy made no reply. He was contemplating the polish which he had just succeeded in producing on his thumbnail.

“I must stay here for a while longer,” continued Armand firmly. “I may not be able to return to England for some weeks. You have the three others here to help you in your enterprise outside Paris. I am entirely at your service within the compass of its walls.”

Still no comment from Blakeney, not a look from beneath the fallen lids. Armand continued, with a slight tone of impatience apparent in his voice:

“You must want some one to help you here on Sunday. I am entirely at your service… here or anywhere in Paris… but I cannot leave this city… at any rate, not just yet....”

Blakeney was apparently satisfied at last with the result of his polishing operations. He rose, gave a slight yawn, and turned toward the door.

“Good night, my dear fellow,” he said pleasantly; “it is time we were all abed. I am so demmed fatigued.”

“Percy!” exclaimed the young man hotly.

“Eh? What is it?” queried the other lazily.

“You are not going to leave me like this—without a word?”

“I have said a great many words, my good fellow. I have said ‘good night,’ and remarked that I was demmed fatigued.”

He was standing beside the door which led to his bedroom, and now he pushed it open with his hand.

“Percy, you cannot go and leave me like this!” reiterated Armand with rapidly growing irritation.

“Like what, my dear fellow?” queried Sir Percy with good-humoured impatience.

“Without a word—without a sign. What have I done that you should treat me like a child, unworthy even of attention?”

Blakeney had turned back and was now facing him, towering above the slight figure of the younger man. His face had lost none of its gracious air, and beneath their heavy lids his eyes looked down not unkindly on his friend.

“Would you have preferred it, Armand,” he said quietly, “if I had said the word that your ears have heard even though my lips have not uttered it?”

“I don’t understand,” murmured Armand defiantly.

“What sign would you have had me make?” continued Sir Percy, his pleasant voice falling calm and mellow on the younger man’s supersensitive consciousness: “That of branding you, Marguerite’s brother, as a liar and a cheat?”

“Blakeney!” retorted the other, as with flaming cheeks and wrathful eyes he took a menacing step toward his friend; “had any man but you dared to speak such words to me—”

“I pray to God, Armand, that no man but I has the right to speak them.”

“You have no right.”

“Every right, my friend. Do I not hold your oath?… Are you not prepared to break it?”

“I’ll not break my oath to you. I’ll serve and help you in every way you can command… my life I’ll give to the cause… give me the most dangerous—the most difficult task to perform.... I’ll do it—I’ll do it gladly.”

“I have given you an over-difficult and dangerous task.”

“Bah! To leave Paris in order to engage horses, while you and the others do all the work. That is neither difficult nor dangerous.”

“It will be difficult for you, Armand, because your head is not sufficiently cool to foresee serious eventualities and to prepare against them. It is dangerous, because you are a man in love, and a man in love is apt to run his head—and that of his friends—blindly into a noose.”

“Who told you that I was in love?”

“You yourself, my good fellow. Had you not told me so at the outset,” he continued, still speaking very quietly and deliberately and never raising his voice, “I would even now be standing over you, dog-whip in hand, to thrash you as a defaulting coward and a perjurer .... Bah!” he added with a return to his habitual bonhomie, “I would no doubt even have lost my temper with you. Which would have been purposeless and excessively bad form. Eh?”

A violent retort had sprung to Armand’s lips. But fortunately at that very moment his eyes, glowing with anger, caught those of Blakeney fixed with lazy good-nature upon his. Something of that irresistible dignity which pervaded the whole personality of the man checked Armand’s hotheaded words on his lips.

“I cannot leave Paris to-morrow,” he reiterated more calmly.

“Because you have arranged to see her again?”

“Because she saved my life to-day, and is herself in danger.”

“She is in no danger,” said Blakeney simply, “since she saved the life of my friend.”

“Percy!”

The cry was wrung from Armand St. Just’s very soul. Despite the tumult of passion which was raging in his heart, he was conscious again of the magnetic power which bound so many to this man’s service. The words he had said—simple though they were—had sent a thrill through Armand’s veins. He felt himself disarmed. His resistance fell before the subtle strength of an unbendable will; nothing remained in his heart but an overwhelming sense of shame and of impotence.

He sank into a chair and rested his elbows on the table, burying his face in his hands. Blakeney went up to him and placed a kindly hand upon his shoulder.

“The difficult task, Armand,” he said gently.

“Percy, cannot you release me? She saved my life. I have not thanked her yet.”

“There will be time for thanks later, Armand. Just now over yonder the son of kings is being done to death by savage brutes.”

“I would not hinder you if I stayed.”

“God knows you have hindered us enough already.”

“How?”

“You say she saved your life… then you were in danger… Heron and his spies have been on your track; your track leads to mine, and I have sworn to save the Dauphin from the hands of thieves.... A man in love, Armand, is a deadly danger among us.... Therefore at daybreak you must leave Paris with Hastings on your difficult and dangerous task.”

“And if I refuse?” retorted Armand.

“My good fellow,” said Blakeney earnestly, “in that admirable lexicon which the League of the Scarlet Pimpernel has compiled for itself there is no such word as refuse.”

“But if I do refuse?” persisted the other.

“You would be offering a tainted name and tarnished honour to the woman you pretend to love.”

“And you insist upon my obedience?”

“By the oath which I hold from you.”

“But this is cruel—inhuman!”

“Honour, my good Armand, is often cruel and seldom human. He is a godlike taskmaster, and we who call ourselves men are all of us his slaves.”

“The tyranny comes from you alone. You could release me an you would.”

“And to gratify the selfish desire of immature passion, you would wish to see me jeopardise the life of those who place infinite trust in me.”

“God knows how you have gained their allegiance, Blakeney. To me now you are selfish and callous.”

“There is the difficult task you craved for, Armand,” was all the answer that Blakeney made to the taunt—“to obey a leader whom you no longer trust.”

But this Armand could not brook. He had spoken hotly, impetuously, smarting under the discipline which thwarted his desire, but his heart was loyal to the chief whom he had reverenced for so long.

“Forgive me, Percy,” he said humbly; “I am distracted. I don’t think I quite realised what I was saying. I trust you, of course … implicitly… and you need not even fear… I shall not break my oath, though your orders now seem to me needlessly callous and selfish.... I will obey… you need not be afraid.”

“I was not afraid of that, my good fellow.”

“Of course, you do not understand… you cannot. To you, your honour, the task which you have set yourself, has been your only fetish.... Love in its true sense does not exist for you.... I see it now… you do not know what it is to love.”

Blakeney made no reply for the moment. He stood in the centre of the room, with the yellow light of the lamp falling full now upon his tall powerful frame, immaculately dressed in perfectly-tailored clothes, upon his long, slender hands half hidden by filmy lace, and upon his face, across which at this moment a heavy strand of curly hair threw a curious shadow. At Armand’s words his lips had imperceptibly tightened, his eyes had narrowed as if they tried to see something that was beyond the range of their focus.

Across the smooth brow the strange shadow made by the hair seemed to find a reflex from within. Perhaps the reckless adventurer, the careless gambler with life and liberty, saw through the walls of this squalid room, across the wide, ice-bound river, and beyond even the gloomy pile of buildings opposite, a cool, shady garden at Richmond, a velvety lawn sweeping down to the river’s edge, a bower of clematis and roses, with a carved stone seat half covered with moss. There sat an exquisitely beautiful woman with great sad eyes fixed on the far-distant horizon. The setting sun was throwing a halo of gold all round her hair, her white hands were clasped idly on her lap.

She gazed out beyond the river, beyond the sunset, toward an unseen bourne of peace and happiness, and her lovely face had in it a look of utter hopelessness and of sublime self-abnegation. The air was still. It was late autumn, and all around her the russet leaves of beech and chestnut fell with a melancholy hush-sh-sh about her feet.

She was alone, and from time to time heavy tears gathered in her eyes and rolled slowly down her cheeks.

Suddenly a sigh escaped the man’s tightly-pressed lips. With a strange gesture, wholly unusual to him, he passed his hand right across his eyes.

“Mayhap you are right, Armand,” he said quietly; “mayhap I do not know what it is to love.”

Armand turned to go. There was nothing more to be said. He knew Percy well enough by now to realise the finality of his pronouncements. His heart felt sore, but he was too proud to show his hurt again to a man who did not understand. All thoughts of disobedience he had put resolutely aside; he had never meant to break his oath. All that he had hoped to do was to persuade Percy to release him from it for awhile.

That by leaving Paris he risked to lose Jeanne he was quite convinced, but it is nevertheless a true fact that in spite of this he did not withdraw his love and trust from his chief. He was under the influence of that same magnetism which enchained all his comrades to the will of this man; and though his enthusiasm for the great cause had somewhat waned, his allegiance to its leader was no longer tottering.

But he would not trust himself to speak again on the subject.

“I will find the others downstairs,” was all he said, “and will arrange with Hastings for to-morrow. Good night, Percy.”

“Good night, my dear fellow. By the way, you have not told me yet who she is.”

“Her name is Jeanne Lange,” said St. Just half reluctantly. He had not meant to divulge his secret quite so fully as yet.

“The young actress at the Theatre National?”

“Yes. Do you know her?”

“Only by name.”

“She is beautiful, Percy, and she is an angel.... Think of my sister Marguerite… she, too, was an actress.... Good night, Percy.”

“Good night.”

The two men grasped one another by the hand. Armand’s eyes proffered a last desperate appeal. But Blakeney’s eyes were impassive and unrelenting, and Armand with a quick sigh finally took his leave.

For a long while after he had gone Blakeney stood silent and motionless in the middle of the room. Armand’s last words lingered in his ear:

“Think of Marguerite!”

The walls had fallen away from around him—the window, the river below, the Temple prison had all faded away, merged in the chaos of his thoughts.

Now he was no longer in Paris; he heard nothing of the horrors that even at this hour of the night were raging around him; he did not hear the call of murdered victims, of innocent women and children crying for help; he did not see the descendant of St. Louis, with a red cap on his baby head, stamping on the fleur-de-lys, and heaping insults on the memory of his mother. All that had faded into nothingness.

He was in the garden at Richmond, and Marguerite was sitting on the stone seat, with branches of the rambler roses twining themselves in her hair.

He was sitting on the ground at her feet, his head pillowed in her lap, lazily dreaming whilst at his feet the river wound its graceful curves beneath overhanging willows and tall stately elms.

A swan came sailing majestically down the stream, and Marguerite, with idle, delicate hands, threw some crumbs of bread into the water. Then she laughed, for she was quite happy, and anon she stooped, and he felt the fragrance of her lips as she bent over him and savoured the perfect sweetness of her caress. She was happy because her husband was by her side. He had done with adventures, with risking his life for others’ sake. He was living only for her.

The man, the dreamer, the idealist that lurked behind the adventurous soul, lived an exquisite dream as he gazed upon that vision. He closed his eyes so that it might last all the longer, so that through the open window opposite he should not see the great gloomy walls of the labyrinthine building packed to overflowing with innocent men, women, and children waiting patiently and with a smile on their lips for a cruel and unmerited death; so that he should not see even through the vista of houses and of streets that grim Temple prison far away, and the light in one of the tower windows, which illumined the final martyrdom of a boy-king.

Thus he stood for fully five minutes, with eyes deliberately closed and lips tightly set. Then the neighbouring tower-clock of St. Germain l’Auxerrois slowly tolled the hour of midnight. Blakeney woke from his dream. The walls of his lodging were once more around him, and through the window the ruddy light of some torch in the street below fought with that of the lamp.

He went deliberately up to the window and looked out into the night. On the quay, a little to the left, the outdoor camp was just breaking up for the night. The people of France in arms against tyranny were allowed to put away their work for the day and to go to their miserable homes to gather rest in sleep for the morrow. A band of soldiers, rough and brutal in their movements, were hustling the women and children. The little ones, weary, sleepy, and cold, seemed too dazed to move. One woman had two little children clinging to her skirts; a soldier suddenly seized one of them by the shoulders and pushed it along roughly in front of him to get it out of the way. The woman struck at the soldier in a stupid, senseless, useless way, and then gathered her trembling chicks under her wing, trying to look defiant.

In a moment she was surrounded. Two soldiers seized her, and two more dragged the children away from her. She screamed and the children cried, the soldiers swore and struck out right and left with their bayonets. There was a general melee, calls of agony rent the air, rough oaths drowned the shouts of the helpless. Some women, panic-stricken, started to run.

And Blakeney from his window looked down upon the scene. He no longer saw the garden at Richmond, the lazily-flowing river, the bowers of roses; even the sweet face of Marguerite, sad and lonely, appeared dim and far away.

He looked across the ice-bound river, past the quay where rough soldiers were brutalising a number of wretched defenceless women, to that grim Chatelet prison, where tiny lights shining here and there behind barred windows told the sad tale of weary vigils, of watches through the night, when dawn would bring martyrdom and death.

And it was not Marguerite’s blue eyes that beckoned to him now, it was not her lips that called, but the wan face of a child with matted curls hanging above a greasy forehead, and small hands covered in grime that had once been fondled by a Queen.

The adventurer in him had chased away the dream.

“While there is life in me I’ll cheat those brutes of prey,” he murmured.