Book I Chapter 14 The Marquis of Carabas by Rafael Sabatini
BOISHARDI
Cauchart judged shrewdly that the present lull could not endure.
Very soon the Chouans were in mutiny against Grosjean, abusing him for having restrained them when they would have avenged their chief. To his reminder of the word pledged, one of them, in whom a lawyer was lost, raised a question.
"The pledge was that the petaud should be allowed to depart. That pledge is now fulfilled. But what if any of us should ever meet him again? What then?"
Grosjean delivered judgment. "That would be another matter."
"Very well, then. We'll contrive to meet him again. To-day. We've only to find out what road he took. Who is with me?"
Saving Grosjean, who had a clearer sense of the engagement made, and who perceived in this no more than a fraudulent evasion, all were on the side of that tricky casuist.
And so it came to pass that some three hours later, when Quentin had come down from the moorland heights of Ploermel and was ambling quietly along the flat road in the neighbourhood of Paillac, he found himself suddenly surrounded by a score of wild men on shaggy Breton ponies, in whom he thought that he recognized some of the followers of Boisgelin.
Presently the sight of Grosjean amongst them made a certainty of the assumption. He guessed then that using that intimate knowledge of the country which rendered them so mobile, they had cut straight across it to intercept him and correct the error of having allowed him to depart.
"Is this the faith you keep?" he asked them.
For answer they pulled him from his horse, deprived him of his sword, and tied his hands behind him. They went to work in comparative silence, ignoring alike the questions and the abuse which he permitted himself, Grosjean close beside him throughout.
He could not guess that Grosjean's presence was protective, and that Grosjean in yielding where he had lacked power entirely to oppose, had at least been able to enforce the condition that the slayer of Boisgelin should not be put to death until their chief commander, Monsieur de Boishardi, with all the facts before him, should pronounce judgment.
Having bound his wrists, they searched him and removed from him the effects they found, the chief of which were his safe-conduct from the Committee of Public Safety and a money-belt containing the best part of two hundred guineas in English gold.
Then, after an altercation which he was unable to follow, his wrists were again unbound so as to enable him to ride. He was ordered to mount, and was led swiftly away.
Almost at once they quitted the highroad, and by narrow byways, sometimes by mere bridle-paths through wild tracts of country, through woods and once through the ford of a river, but always moving at speed, they brought him towards the close of that autumn day into the gloom of a great forest.
On the edge of it, uttered by one of them, he heard for the first time the note of the screech-owl, the chat huant from which they derived their appellation. From a distance within the forest an answering cry floated back to them. They advanced more slowly now, but no less surely towards the heart of that labyrinth of mingling oak and elm and beech, and they emerged at last into a clearing vast as a cathedral square, on the farther side of which the outlines of a mean building were just visible in the dusk. In the middle of the clearing a fire flamed about a huge cooking-pot borne on an iron tripod, and bivouacked about it were some five or six score men, whose garb and accoutrements proclaimed them of the same brotherhood as Quentin's captors. Several rose, and came to meet the newcomers. At the news imparted, always in that Breton tongue unknown to Quentin, their cries brought others from the fire.
Quentin was now dismounted and again pinioned before being led forward by four of the Chouans, following in the wake of Grosjean.
They came to the hut across the clearing, and the leader, having rapped upon the door, then opened it and passed in, the others following.
Quentin found himself in a small chamber, brightly lighted by a lamp on a big trestle table that carried the remains of a meal at one end and a litter of papers and writing materials at the other. Over these sat a man of perhaps thirty, darkly aristocratic of face and of a certain richness of dress incongruous in these mean surroundings. His coat was of grey velvet with silver buttons, and on the breast of it he wore as a badge a flaming heart. His dark, glossy hair was carefully dressed, a diamond gleamed in the rich lace of his cravat, another on the fine hand that held the pen.
A Breton bed, presenting the appearance of a cupboard, was set against the wall on the right, and a couple of wooden stools completed the furniture of that chamber of blackened mud walls, earthen floor and shuttered windows.
The man at the table, who was Boishardi, one of the most famous and elusive of the Royalist leaders in the West, had paused in his writing to see who came. At sight of the prisoner he threw up his head with a quickening of interest in his dark eyes. "What's this, Grosjean?"
Grosjean's brisk account was interrupted by corrections and amplifications from the other Chouans, delivered in a French so slurred and imperfect that to follow it was a strain upon the prisoner's attention. At moments all of them talked at once, as when they came to the death of Boisgelin. The mention of it brought Boishardi suddenly to his feet, so terrible of aspect that their clamours were instantly extinguished in awe.
After a pause he spoke, in a dull concentrated voice. "Dead! Boisgelin dead!" He sank into his chair again, as if overcome, a hand to his brow.
Grosjean went forward, and placed upon the table those effects which had been taken from Quentin, the safe-conduct on top. It was some time before Boishardi paid any attention to these. His voice, tortured almost to a moan, kept repeating monotonously: "Boisgelin dead! Murdered!"
At last Quentin spoke. "Not murdered. I killed him in fair fight. He chose to challenge me."
Boishardi looked up. His wild glance questioned the Chouans, and Grosjean answered: "So much is true. The fight was fair enough. We all saw it."
"But it is not possible. Fair! How could it be?" He leaned heavily upon the table, glaring at Quentin. "You say he challenged you. Why?"
"Because he liked the unpleasant truth as little as another. Because I told him that he was a poltroon to bring a score of brigands at his heels to attack a single man."
"You do not tell me why he attacked you."
The others answered for him. He was a spy of the Blues. Let Monsieur de Boishardi look at the safe-conduct found on him. Monsieur de Boisgelin knew him of old. He had attempted to force his way into Chavaray when Monsieur de Boisgelin was there with a band of followers. He had been at Coëtlegon with Hoche, and with Hoche had travelled as far as Ploermel, where the Republican General had left him, so that he might pursue his filthy trade in the country-side.
"Then why do you bring him to me?" demanded Boishardi. "Why didn't you hang him from the first tree by the roadside?"
Grosjean told him of the pledge, and of how having obeyed the letter of it they subsequently recaptured the man. "Because I wasn't easy about it; because it seems to me a point of honour for a gentleman's deciding, I bring him before you, Monsieur."
"A waste of time." Boishardi's handsome face was white and wicked with grief and rage. "A waste of time. It is all beside the point. The dog is a spy, and that is all that matters. We do not keep faith with spies. They are outside the pale of honour." The diamond flashed in the lamplight, as peremptorily he waved his hand. "Take him out and finish it."
"Wait, sir," cried Quentin with the brigands' hands already upon him. "There is a monstrous error in all this. I am not a spy."
Boishardi looked at the safe-conduct. He took it up, and waved it, his mouth curved in scorn. "I take it that it was because you could not persuade Monsieur de Boisgelin of that, that you found it necessary to murder him."
"That, too, is false. I did not murder him. Even these men have told you that we fought fair and clean."
"I do not choose to believe it. There was no better blade in France."
In the face of death, Quentin actually laughed. "And that's as much a lie as the rest, as I've proved to-day."
He could have said nothing more incautiously exasperating. Boishardi's fist crashed upon the table. "Take him out, I say, and finish it."
Quentin, with a nausea of fear upon him, found himself struggling wildly in their grip. "Are you all murderers, then? Do you care nothing for the truth that you will not even listen to it? I was at Coëtlegon as the guest of the Marquise du Grégo before Hoche arrived there. Send word to her. She will answer for me. I had nothing to do with Hoche. I had a right to be at Chavaray, as you've been told. Because . . ."
Boishardi interrupted him. "Enough!" he thundered. "You should have urged your reasons to Boisgelin, who was in case to judge them. That you preferred to kill him is proof enough for me. That you have killed him is more than enough, whatever and whoever you may be. Away, Grosjean! Get it over."
"But in God's name, sir," cried Quentin, as they were dragging him away. "Do you not even care to know who I am? At least let me account for myself."
"I care not if you are a prince of the blood. I care only for what you have done," was the implacable answer. "And for that you shall pay."
They had dragged him to within a yard of the door, when it was thrust open from without, and two figures surging on the threshold blocked the way.
The Chouans pulled their prisoner aside so as to give passage to these arrivals, one of whom was tall and spare, with an aspect of command in every line of him, the other plump and stocky.
They came forward staring, the tall man slightly in advance of the other. "What is happening here?" he asked incuriously, and then caught his breath as his lively eyes came to rest upon Quentin. "You, here, sir? And a prisoner!" His excitement mounted. "What is this?"
Quentin raised his drooping head, and to his amazement and the revival of his fainting spirit, beheld the Comte de Puisaye, whom he had so cavalierly dismissed in London. Without cause to suppose that here was one who might be interested in his fate, yet undying hope leapt up in him.
He heard dimly Boishardi's answer: "It is a scoundrel upon whom justice is to be done."
"Justice? What manner of justice?" Puisaye's tone was sharp and curt.
"The only kind we keep for spies, and murderers. Away with him, Grosjean."
But if the command was peremptory, so peremptory was the gesture of the Count's uplifted hand that the Chouan did not move. Puisaye stepped forward past Quentin, moving with that confident swaggering peculiar to him. "I'll know more of this, if you please."
Boishardi looked up in a surprise that changed to angry impatience. "The matter is judged and finished. Take him away."
"Wait!" Puisaye's manner swelled in authority. "You did not hear me, I think. I said that I require to know more of this. Justice that is in haste is ever suspect. Untie his hands, Grosjean."
More than by the order was Quentin astonished by the promptitude with which that voice of quiet authority was obeyed.
Boishardi, on his feet again, was raging. "What does this mean, Puisaye? Do you interfere with me?"
"You make it necessary. It happens that I know something of this gentleman, something which you, who have sat in judgment on him, can have been at no pains to discover. That does not please me."
"I care nothing for any of that. What I know, and you do not, is that he has killed Boisgelin. And for that I'll have him hanged whatever you may know about him, and whatever you may say."
"I see." Puisaye's tone was sardonic. "You've a nice sense of justice. You make yourself the instrument of a private vengeance. I arrive no more than in time."
"In time for what, if you please?" Boishardi was now all truculence.
"To prevent a crime for which I must have called you terribly to account."
"Call me to account!"
"That is what I said. As a beginning, let me present you to the Marquis de Chavaray."
Boishardi stared, his white face distorted by passion. "What lie is that?"
"Let us be clear, Monsieur de Boishardi. Do I understand you to give me the lie?"
"Ah, bah!" There was a gesture of fierce impatience. "I mean, how do you come to credit such a thing?"
"I happen to know it. Of sure knowledge. Monsieur de Chavaray and I have met before. In London."
"But the creature is a spy."
"Somebody has told you that. It is merely foolish."
"But here's the evidence." And in a shaking hand Boishardi held out the safe-conduct. "And if you want more, question Grosjean there."
Puisaye would not even look at the paper. "There is no evidence at all. There cannot be evidence of what is not. You've fastened upon some contemptible nonsense not worth sifting. What's this of his killing Boisgelin? Or is that in the same class?"
"Tell him, Grosjean," cried the exasperated Boishardi.
When the tale was told, Puisaye turned quietly to Quentin. "Do you agree with all that?"
"I do, sir. These men set upon me. At Boisgelin's orders they were about to hang me. He would listen to no reason."
"Of course not." And now Puisaye laughed. "Of course not. A dear friend and kinsman of your cousins of Chesnières that Monsieur de Boisgelin. Quite possibly their agent. And then?"
"I remembered his fame as a duellist. I took advantage of it. I insulted him grossly in the hope that such a swordsman would make a personal matter of it. When that succeeded, I exacted a pledge of immunity from his men before I would meet him."
"And the pledge was violated. Perfect." He turned again to Boishardi. "And you would have made yourself a party to that dishonour by murdering Monsieur de Chavaray. Do you begin to see from what I save you?"
Boishardi was unmoved. "Monsieur de Puisaye, I will not tolerate your interference. It is well to be frank. For what that man has done he shall certainly hang, whatever you may say."
"You should pay attention. You cannot have heeded my allusion to Boisgelin as a dear friend and kinsman of St. Gilles and his brother."
"What shall that mean?"
"Boisgelin's repute was none so sweet as to place him above suspicion of serving his kinsmen and friends in his own fashion."
"By God, sir! Are there no limits to the lengths to which your interest in this person will carry you?"
"None. None. So now that you understand that, you may dismiss these lads. There will be no hanging to-night."
Tense and white, Boishardi leaned heavily upon the table.
"Is that a challenge, Monsieur le Comte?"
"No. It's an order. You'll submit or else. . . . But there! You'd never be fool enough to drive me to deal with you for insubordination. You'll still remember, I hope, that here I represent the Princes."
A flush of anger welled up to stain Boishardi's pallor. He came stalking round the table to confront Puisaye at close quarters. "I am your subordinate only for so long as I choose to be. My followers are my own, and their obedience is to me."
"That is brave, Monsieur de Boishardi."
And now, for the first time, Puisaye's plump companion spoke. "So brave as to be almost treason."
"You are new to Brittany, Monsieur le Baron," he was pointedly answered. "Breton loyalties are not perhaps as those of others."
"Faith!" the plump gentleman retorted. "You make it evident, if what you offer is a sample of it. The great cause we serve is by your lights to yield to petty personal differences."
"This difference is not a petty one, Monsieur de Cormatin. A dear friend and one of our most gallant leaders has been done to death by a rascal who travels under a safe-conduct from the Committee of Public Safety. Judge if that condemns him. But judge as you please, I will not be baulked of justice upon the slayer."
"If we are still to talk of justice, I'll use plainer terms," said Puisaye. "This gallant leader, this dear friend, has met at last the fate which he has long been inviting. And that, if you please, is the end of the matter."
It proved also the end of what little patience Boishardi still possessed. "Grosjean," he commanded, "you will take that man and deal with him as I ordered."
"Grosjean!" said Puisaye, and the sternness of his voice and aspect rooted the Chouan where he stood. Then Puisaye took Boishardi by the shoulders, and span him round, so that they faced each other again.
"Listen to me, madman. I should break you for this if I were not your friend. If you think to prevail against me because you have your lads at hand, dismiss the thought. I am not alone. I have a thousand men with me, for work that's to be done. They outnumber your band by five to one. So let me invite you to bow to force since you will not bow to reason."
Abruptly Puisaye cast off his sternness, laughed, and held out his hand.
"Come, my friend. Let this end peaceably. We've work to do together. It is not for us to quarrel among ourselves."
Boishardi ignored the hand. He continued stiff and hostile, breathing hard. "The quarrel is not of my making. You come hectoring it here to assert yourself against me in defence of a man who is of no account to you."
"It happens that he is. Honour, too, is of some account to me. Yours as well as mine. To-morrow you will thank me for this intervention." And again he held out his hand.
Still ignoring it Boishardi turned and paced away to put the table between them.
"There is no more to be said." His tone was bitter.
"I hoped there might be," Puisaye answered. "But I will not urge it. I regret to say that you do not impress me favourably, Monsieur de Boishardi."
"That desolates me, of course," was the insolent answer. "Must we continue this interview?"
"Not upon personal matters. But there is something else. The fact not only that I arrive, but that I come in force might suggest it. I have word of a convoy of arms, ammunition and equipment for the Army of Cherbourg, which should pass this way, on the road to Rennes, by noon to-morrow. It travels under the strong guard of a whole regiment of Blues, also on its way to reinforce that army. Therefore, we must be in strength if we are to deal with it. I require your cooperation, and I have to ask you to see that your men are under arms soon after daybreak and ready to be moved to the post I shall assign you."
He had employed a hardening tone of authority as if to beat down any opposition that might spring from Boishardi's resentful, mutinous state of mind. As Boishardi remained silent, his handsome face darkened by his angry thoughts, Puisaye added after a pause: "You have heard me, Monsieur de Boishardi?"
The other inclined his head. "I have heard," he coldly acknowledged.
"Then, if you please, you will report to me at daybreak." He turned without waiting for an answer. "You will come with me, Monsieur de Chavaray, and you, Baron."
He passed out, and none now dared to hinder Quentin as he followed the stately figure from the hut in which he had looked upon the awful face of death.