Book I Chapter 8 The Marquis of Carabas by Rafael Sabatini
THE CLAIM
At any time the crossing of the narrow sea between England and France must have seemed to the traveller as the passage from one world to another, so different were the aspect, manners, language, customs, garments, architecture, food, and almost every other detail of the life of the country entered from that of the country left. But in the year '94--Year II of the Republic One and Indivisible--the difference was deepened by the traces of the violent political whirlwind that had swept over France.
Quentin had crossed by the ordinary packet from Southampton to Jersey, and thence in a French fishing-boat had been conveyed to Saint Malo, or Port Malo as it was termed in the new vocabulary of Freedom, which excluded heavenly hierarchies as rigorously as earthly ones.
Once Port Malo was left behind desolation spread an aspect of rugged misery upon the land. As he travelled in his chaise from posting-house to posting-house, along the high road to Rennes, neglected parklands and weed-choked gardens about more than one untenanted château, were grim reminders of how it had fared with the lordly class from which he had so lately discovered that he sprang. Grimmer still were here and there the blackened ruins of a mansion once stately; for by a curious irony this Brittany, now to be regarded as amongst the last strongholds of loyalty to Throne and Altar, had been amongst the first and most violent of the provinces to rise against the old order. It was here, where the distinction was most marked between noble and simple, where feudal practices weighed most harshly upon the common people, that the earliest outbreaks of revolt had taken place. And just as violent had been the reaction when the new order interfered with the Breton's freedom of worship, driving forth their priests and attempting to replace them by renegade constitutional strangers, and when conscription was introduced and a levy of men decreed.
To the peasants of the West, shedding in hunger the illusions of ease and abundance so glibly promised them in the name of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, this was the last intolerable affront. They would levy the men demanded of them by the Republic, but they would levy them, not to be sent to slaughter on distant battlefields, but to defend the only liberty left them by the new Age of Reason, the liberty to keep their lives and save their souls.
In that hour of their need they turned again to their natural overlords, from whose rule they had earlier revolted and of whom so few remained.
The great Royalist rising of the West against the Republic was not, at least in its beginnings, promoted by the nobles so as to re-establish the order in which they throve; it was a rising of peasants who marched in bands of thousands to implore, and in some cases--as in that of the famous Monsieur de Charette in Vendée--even to compel with menaces the nobles to take command of them.
These were the bands of which the Marquis de la Rouërie had been the organizer in chief, holding themselves now at the orders of the Comte de Puisaye, who had carried on and perfected La Rouërie's organization.
At the moment of Quentin's arrival in Brittany many of them, temporarily dispersed, were back at the cultivation of their fields pending the summons to action. Others, however, continued under arms, lurking in the dense forests of the West, where no Republican troops dared to hunt them, and sallying forth upon occasion to fall upon Republican convoys, in order to victual themselves and improve their equipment. The cry of the owl--the chat huant--was their rallying signal, whence was derived their designation of Chouans.
Quentin's acquaintance with them, however, was not to come until later. He saw nothing of them as he drove his hundred miles or so from Port Malo to Angers, by roads which, thanks to the forced labour of the old corvées, were better far than any in England. That, however, was the only comparison he could make to the advantage of France. Everywhere in that province he beheld stark misery, uncultivated or half-cultivated acres, with squalid villages in which the houses were hovels built of mud, their windows unglazed, inhabited by ragged starvelings who stood to stare with animal dullness at the chaise that swayed and rattled over their broken pavements.
Midway between Port Malo and Rennes he drove through miles of empty desert moorland, where gorse was the only thing that blossomed, with an occasional menhir or cromlech standing gaunt against the sky. After that, as he approached Rennes, there was some improvement, with signs of intermittent cultivation. The toilers in the fields were mainly women, and even those who were still young in years presented the weathered, wrinkled aspect of age, in which all feminine softness was extinct.
He lay in Rennes at a fine inn, where the food was execrable, for scarcity and want were the only visible fruits so far borne by the tree of liberty. There, too, he had his first glimpse of a guillotine, standing red and menacing, but idle, in the great square that once had been styled of Louis XV. There, too, he was pestered by cockaded and sash-girt officials, in a state of nervousness resulting from their bewilderment at the changed state of things which the fall of Robespierre had produced. They seemed relieved when Quentin presented papers which disposed of any possible doubts concerning him.
At last, and without accident, he came to Angers, a substantial town of stone houses with slate roofs, some open spaces and a fine promenade flanked by Lombardy poplars along the River Sarthe.
He put up at the Inn of the Three Pigeons, which was also the posting-house, and acting upon the advice received from Mr. Edgar Sharpe he began by seeking that Pierre Lesdiguières who was his mother's brother.
On the threshold of one of the more modest houses in the square, to which he had been directed, he was checked by a slatternly housekeeper, and informed that the Citizen Lesdiguières had gone two days ago to Nantes. The housekeeper did not know when he would return. These were days in which no one could venture a guess as to what might happen on the morrow. The Citizen Lesdiguières had much business to transact in Nantes. He had gone there with two commissioners who had arrived from Paris to look into the conduct of public affairs. It was known that in Nantes there had been many abuses by a Representative named Carrier, a creature of that monster Robespierre. All was in confusion, and the Citizen Lesdiguières was to assist the commissioners in restoring order. That might take some time.
The garrulous flood fell at last to a trickle, which Quentin was able to stem by handing her a leaf torn from his tablets, on which he had scribbled his name and the name of his inn, requesting her to deliver it to the Citizen Lesdiguières on his return.
With more time at his disposal he would have been content to await that return before taking any action. As it was, though disconcerted by the absence of one upon whose assistance he had counted, he boldly decided to seek at once the prefecture.
Past the portals, guarded by a couple of slouching National Guards, in striped trousers and blue coats, he was ushered into a dingy room and there received with cold civility by the under-prefect. That august functionary, young and not over clean, remained seated at his writing-table and covered by a conical hat on the front of which a tricolour cockade was plastered. He assumed judicial airs as he listened to Quentin's statement, and waved away the papers Quentin offered in support of it.
If he was peremptory, he was considerably less so than Quentin would have found him a month earlier. Then he would have overwhelmed any ci-devant Marquis with minatory official thunders. Less sure of himself in these days of sudden moderation, which he deplored, and with no other aim but that of avoiding responsibility as far as possible, he coldly informed the Citizen Morlaix that his case was one for the Revolutionary Committee of Angers, which would be sitting to-morrow at the town-hall from ten to twelve.
Thither on the morrow Quentin repaired. He found a Committee similarly shorn of the truculence with which for many months it had terrorized the public, and similarly anxious to practise inactivity, since in these days of transition it knew not what activities might ultimately be accounted incriminating.
After examining his papers, and after long deliberation, the President concluded that the decision of such matters really fell within the duties of the Public Accuser of Angers, to whom Quentin was now referred.
The Public Accuser being also lodged in the town hall, and as Quentin could think of no other official to whom he might be passed on, he imagined that satisfaction would now be prompt. But never was he more mistaken. The Public Accuser, he was informed by a clerk, was too deeply engaged to receive him that day or the next.
Nor was that the end of the delay. Day followed day, and still that high functionary continued to deny himself on the same plea. Quentin curbed his impatience only by the reflection that, after all, the date of his entering France made him safe from any chicanery that should classify him as an émigré, and so imperil his possessions. He was to realize his error when, at last, the Public Accuser consented to receive him. He afterwards blamed himself for his dullness in not perceiving a coincidence in the fact that the date of this was the 12th September, the day after the expiry of the six months' grace accorded to a justifiable expatriate.
He found the Public Accuser, the Citizen Besné, installed in a lofty chamber, furnished with the plunder of some nobleman's mansion. Cabinets richly inlaid and adorned by exquisitely painted panels contained his archives; arm-chairs of gilded wood with brocade coverings were set for the great man's visitors, and the great man himself, very correct in black with a formally clubbed wig and the airs of a petit maître sat at a bow-legged writing-table of mahogany and gilt bronze that might have come from the Palace of Versailles.
The Citizen Besné was of those, as Quentin was soon to discover, to whom Puisaye had alluded as having grown rich out of the national misfortune. Not only had he assembled for himself a great estate out of confiscated émigré property sold at vile prices, but he had driven a great trade as the nominee of others who could afford, or whom he could constrain, to pay his extortionate fees for purchasing on their behalf. He was a wizened, pock-marked little man, with a thin tip-tilted nose, an almost lipless slit of a mouth, and a pair of gimlet eyes that twinkled craftily.
His reception of Quentin was smoothly genial. He heard his statement, and glanced at his papers cursorily, whilst admitting that he had knowledge of his case.
"It is unfortunate, however," he said, "that you arrive just a day too late. The law is as precise and clear as it is generous to persons in your position; but it can tolerate no abuse of the benign consideration for which it provides."
Quentin protested that he had been in France two weeks and in Angers ten days, as he could prove. The Citizen Besné's mouth was stretched in a smile.
"Two weeks! You have been in France two weeks, and it is six months since the death of the ci-devant Marquis de Chavaray. Such tardiness, permit me to say, hardly argues a patriotic zeal or a love for the country of your birth and that eagerness to return to it at the first opportunity, such as should inflame the breast of every true Frenchman. The Republic, my friend, is patient with her erring children, and clement in these fortunate days of equality in justice as in all else. But there are limits beyond which clemency becomes mere weakness, and of weakness the Republic never can be guilty."
Quentin dissembled his nausea at this turgid rhetoric sonorously delivered; for the Citizen Besné possessed a voice that was startlingly big in so small a man.
"With submission, citizen, may I indicate that we are to be governed by the letter of the law, and not by sentimental assumptions. The letter of the law has been fulfilled by me. I was in France within the time prescribed."
"That," he was smoothly answered, "has a specious sound. But let me tell you that he is a bad man of law who concerns himself only with the letter of it and ignores the spirit. However, I will waive the fact that but for the excessive leniency of the Republic the estates of Chavaray would have been sequestered long ago, and that the death of the ci-devant Marquis before conviction was merely an accident by which the nation was cheated of her dues. I will keep to the letter of the law which you invoke. By that the estates, for lack of a claimant, became yesterday the property of the nation. You make your claim a day too late."
"Only because I was denied admittance to you earlier. The Revolutionary Committee will confirm my statement that I first applied ten days ago."
"And the Committee informed you that application must be made to me. Do me the justice," rejoined the booming voice, "to believe that mine is an exacting office. I am overburdened with work and with petitions of every kind. I must receive them in the order in which they are preferred, and the only date of which I can have cognizance is the date on which they come before me. You should have taken this into account instead of remaining out of France until the eleventh hour. Let me add, citizen, that you are fortunate in not being impeached as an émigré."
Inwardly burning with anger, yet perceiving that nothing could be gained by exploding it against this sleek rascal whom the Revolution had clothed in local omnipotence, Quentin set himself calmly to plead against the assumption of lukewarmness which he insisted was being permitted to weigh against him. It was to be remembered that a state of war existed between England and France, which created enormous difficulties in passing from one country to the other. The time lost had been lost in seeking to overcome them, and even when he had overcome them the events of Thermidor, and the changes resulting from the fall of the party of the mountain had created fresh delays.
The Public Accuser heard him out with patience; even, if that crafty face was to be read at all, with satisfaction. "The events of Thermidor certainly favour you," he admitted. "They ensure for you a leniency which a few weeks ago would have been denied you. Yet the facts--the legal facts--are as I have stated them. The sequestration of Chavaray became due yesterday. In that matter I can do nothing. It is beyond my power to put back the clock. But the explanation you supply is one that certainly deserves my sympathy. To cancel the sequestration is not possible. The estates are now national property, and for sale. Strictly, they should be put up to auction. But that, after all, is a matter within my discretion, and I am prepared to stretch a point in your favour so as to right a wrong which you make me understand has happened automatically." He cleared his throat, and leaned forward across his writing-table. "I will offer no opposition to--in fact, I will facilitate in every way--your private purchase of the estates."
"Purchase them!" Quentin was aghast at the rascally impudence of a proposal that he should purchase that which belonged to him. He began to understand fully the delay in giving him audience and the trick of extortion of which he was being made the victim. The times, after all, had not changed to the extent that he had so confidently supposed.
Besné smiled amiably into his staring eyes. "After all, and between ourselves, my dear citizen, the price need not be a high one. Indeed, prices of confiscated lands have been ruling ridiculously low, largely as a result of the depreciation of the paper currency of the Republic. Then, again, patriots are not rich. So that the levels established are little more than nominal." The boom of the voice was muted to a confidential key. "In strict confidence I may tell you that I have acted as nominee in one or two cases similar to your own, for ci-devants whose offences, of course, were merely technical. I am, I hope, too good a Republican to act for any others. In those cases I have naturally been allowed a commission for my pains: a commission of one-third of the purchase price."
He paused there a moment, his crafty eyes seeking to read the impassive countenance of the young man before him. Then he moistened his lips with a pale tongue, and softly expressed an opinion that drew a gasp from Quentin.
"Five million livres would be a reasonable price for Chavaray." He paused again to smile upon the other's manifest dismay. "Since that would be the value of it in normal times, it cannot be complained that we keep to it now, whilst disregarding a depreciation of the assignat of which we are under no obligation to take cognizance. You take my point. When that depreciation is reckoned, the gold equivalent of five million livres is little more than a paltry three thousand louis; a bagatelle; far less than the yearly yield of the estates in ordinary times."
Quentin passed from dismay to amazement at a guile that could so dissemble an outrageous transaction, and name a price that in itself was speciously reasonable if one ignored, as Besné claimed to be entitled to ignore, the shrinkage in the value of the Republican currency.
"Even so," he said at last. "Where shall I find three thousand louis?" Either he did not choose to remember that he could procure it in England, or else he assumed that the matter could not lie in suspense whilst he crossed the sea again to seek it.
"It offers difficulties, eh?" Besné stroked his chin reflectively. "Ah! That, now, is unfortunate." He considered further, quietly humming through pursed lips. "I wonder. I wonder." He became effusive. "Account me anxious to serve you, recognizing the unfortunate situation in which you are placed. I stand not only for law, but also for justice. Yet it would not be just--would it?--that I should forgo a commission to which I think I am entitled. Look, now, citizen, here is a friendly proposal for you; entirely between ourselves, you understand. Pay me the thousand louis which would come to me as my commission on the extraordinarily low price I have fixed, and I will offer no opposition to your claim to the heritage; I will even recommend that it be admitted. Considering how that will simplify matters for you, you will hardly grudge me that fee for such a service, eh?"
Dissembling his contempt, Quentin made answer smoothly: "I should not. But, faith, it's no easier for me to find a thousand than three thousand."
The Citizen Besné screwed up his eyes. "Are you so sure?"
"I am sure."
"It is possible that you are mistaken. I was lately informed that the family of Chesnières, the cousins of the late ci-devant and yours, are in London, living in luxury and wanting for nothing. I was about to order an investigation of this mystery of the source of their supplies, when the events of Thermidor, whilst nowise altering the laws relating to the property of émigrés, yet seem to palliate, at least for the present, their evasion. I have every reason to suppose that the revenues of Chavaray, whilst diminished, are by no means extinct. Out of these revenues the steward of Chavaray has been supplying what was necessary for the maintenance in Paris of the late ci-devant, and at the same time remitting moneys to the family in England. It's an abuse that could not have continued but for the sudden wave of moderation by which the country is flooded.
"I advise you, then, to pay a visit to your steward at Chavaray. He should be able to supply what you require from the funds in his possession. Go and see him, my friend. In the meantime I will stay my hand."
Quentin passed from amazement to amazement as he heard this rascally official instructing him in the very course which it was his intention to pursue.
Besné stood up, intimating that the interview was at an end.
"Of course you understand that all this is in strictest confidence between us. To a man of sense I need not add that an indiscretion on your part must compel me to repudiate the entire transaction. I could not expose myself to a misunderstanding of the motives out of which I act." He smiled. "I shall hope to see you soon again."
With a formal echo of the hope, Quentin bowed himself out of that scoundrel's presence, not without a sense of shame at being the conscious victim of so impudent a robber.