The Bronze Eagle Part 27

Crystal's cold challenge recalled him to himself, and now he felt ashamed of what he had just contemplated, ashamed, too, of what he had done. He hated the Comte . . . he hated all royalists and all enemies of the Emperor . . . but he hated the Comte doubly because of the insults which he (de Marmont) had had to endure that evening at Brestalou. He had looked upon this expedition as a means of vengeance for those insults, a means, too, of showing his power and his worth before Crystal and of winning her through that power which the Emperor had given him, and through that worth which the Emperor had recognised.

But, though he hated the Comte he knew him to be absolutely incapable of telling a deliberate lie, and absolutely incapable of bartering his word of honour for the sake of his own safety.

Crystal's words brought this knowledge back to his mind; and now the desire seized him to prove himself as chivalrous as he was powerful. He was one of those men who are so absolutely ignorant of a woman's nature that they believe that a woman's love can be won by deeds as apart from personality, and that a woman's dislike and contempt can be changed into love. He loved Crystal more absolutely now than he had ever done in the days when he was practically her accepted suitor: his unbridled and capricious nature clung desperately to that which he could not hold, and since he had felt--that evening at Brestalou--that his political convictions had placed an insuperable barrier between himself and Crystal de Cambray, he felt that no woman on earth could ever be quite so desirable.

His mistake lay in this: that he believed that it was his political convictions alone which had turned Crystal away from him: he felt that he could have won her love through her submission once she was his wife, now he found that he would have to win her love first and her wifely submission would only follow afterwards.

Just now--though in the gloom he could only see the vague outline of her graceful form, and only heard her voice as through a veil of darkness--he had the longing to prove himself at once worthy of her regard and deserving of her grat.i.tude.

Without replying to her direct challenge, he made a vigorous effort to curb his rage, and to master his disappointment. Then he gave a few brief commands to his sergeant, ordering him to repair the disorder inside the coach, and to stop all further searching both of the vehicle and of the men.

Finally he said with calm dignity: "M. le Comte, I must offer you my humble apologies for the inconvenience to which you have been subjected.

I humbly beg Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse and Mademoiselle Crystal to accept these expressions of my profound regret. A soldier's life and a soldier's duty must be my excuse for the part I was forced to take in this untoward happening. Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse, I pray you deign to re-enter your carriage.

M. le Comte, if there is aught I can do for you, I pray you command me.

Neither the d.u.c.h.esse nor the Comte, however, deigned to take the slightest notice of the abominable traitor and of his long tirade.

Madame was s.h.i.+vering with cold and yawning with fatigue, and in her heart consigned the young brute to everlasting torments.

The Comte would have thought it beneath his dignity to accept any explanation from a follower of the Corsican usurper. Without a word he was now helping his sister into the carriage.

Jeanne, of course, hardly counted--she was dazed into semi-imbecility by the renewed terrors she had just gone through: so for the moment Victor felt that Crystal was isolated from the others. She stood a little to one side--he could only just see her, as the sergeant was holding up the lanthorn for Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse to see her way into the coach. M. le Comte went on to give a few directions to the coachman.

"Mademoiselle Crystal!" murmured Victor softly.

And he made a step forward so that now she could not move toward the carriage without brus.h.i.+ng against him. But she made no reply.

"Mademoiselle Crystal," he said again, "have you not one single kind word for me?"

"A kind word?" she retorted almost involuntarily, "after such an outrage?"

"I am a soldier," he urged, "and had to do my duty."

"You were a soldier once, M. de Marmont--a soldier of the King. Now you are only a deserter."

"A soldier of the Emperor, Mademoiselle, of the man who led France to victory and to glory, and will do so again, now that he has come back into his own once more."

"You and I, M. de Marmont," she said coldly, "look at France from different points of view. This is neither the hour nor the place to discuss our respective sentiments. I pray you, allow me to join my aunt in the carriage. I am cold and tired, and she will be anxious for me."

"Will you at least give me one word of encouragement, Mademoiselle?" he urged. "As you say, our points of view are very different. But I am on the high road to fortune. The Emperor is back in France, the army flocks to his eagles as one man. He trusts me and I shall rise to greatness under his wing. Mademoiselle Crystal, you promised me your hand, I have not released you from that promise yet. I will come and claim it soon."

"Excitement seems to have turned your brain, M. de Marmont," was all that Crystal said, and she walked straight past him to the carriage door.

Victor smothered a curse. These aristos were as arrogant as ever. What lesson had the revolution and the guillotine taught them? None. This girl who had spent her whole life in poverty and exile, and was like--after a brief interregnum--to return to exile and poverty again, was not a whit less proud than her kindred had been when they walked in their hundreds up the steps of the guillotine with a smile of lofty disdain upon their lips.

Victor de Marmont was a son of the people--of those who had made the revolution and had fought the whole of Europe in order to establish their right to govern themselves as they thought best, and he hated all these aristos--the men who had fled from their country and abandoned it when she needed her sons' help more than she had ever done before.

The aristocrat was for him synonymous with the emigre--with the man who had raised a foreign army to fight against France, who had brought the foreigner marching triumphantly into Paris. He hated the aristocrat, but he loved Crystal, the one desirable product of that old regime system which he abhorred.

But with him a woman's love meant a woman's submission. He was more determined than ever now to win her, but he wanted to win her through her humiliation and his triumph--excitement had turned his brain? Well!

so be it, fear and oppression would turn her heart and crush her pride.

He made no further attempt to detain her: he had asked for a kind word and she had given him withering scorn. Excitement had turned his brain . . . he was not even worthy of parley--not even worthy of a formal refusal!

To his credit be it said that the thought of immediate revenge did not enter his mind then. He might have subjected her then and there to deadly outrage--he might have had her personal effects searched, her person touched by the rough hands of his soldiers. But though his estimate of a woman's love was a low one, it was not so base as to imagine that Crystal de Cambray would ever forgive so dastardly an insult.

As she walked past him to the door, however, he said under his breath:

"Remember, Mademoiselle, that you and your family at this moment are absolutely in my power, and that it is only because of my regard for you that I let you all now depart from here in peace."

Whether she heard or not, he could not say; certain it is that she made no reply, nor did she turn toward him at all. The light of the lanthorn lit up her delicate profile, pale and drawn, her tightly pressed lips, the look of utter contempt in her eyes, which even the fitful shadow cast by her hair over her brows could not altogether conceal.

The Comte had given what instructions he wished to Pierre. He stood by the carriage door waiting for his daughter: no doubt he had heard what went on between her and de Marmont, and was content to leave her to deal what scorn was necessary for the humiliation of the traitor.

He helped Crystal into the carriage, and also the unfortunate Jeanne; finally he too followed, and pulled the door to behind him.

Victor did not wait to see the coach make a start. He gave the order to remount.

"How far are we from St. Priest?" he asked.

"Not eight kilometres, mon Colonel," was the reply.

"En avant then, ventre-a-terre!" he commanded, as he swung himself into the saddle.

The great high road between Gren.o.ble and Lyons is very wide, and Pierre had no need to draw his horses to one side, as de Marmont and his troop, after much scrambling, champing of bits and clanking of metal, rode at a sharp trot past the coach and him.

For some few moments the sound of the horses' hoofs on the hard road kept the echoes of the night busy with their resonance, but soon that sound grew fainter and fainter still--after five minutes it died away altogether.

M. de Comte put his head out of the window.

"Eh bien, Pierre," he called, "why don't we start?"

The postillion cracked his whip; Pierre shouted to his horses; the heavy coach groaned and creaked and was once more on its way.

In the interior no one spoke. Jeanne's terror had melted in a silent flow of tears.

Lyons was reached shortly before midnight. M. le Comte's carriage had some difficulty in entering the town, as by orders of M. le Comte d'Artois it had already been placed in a state of defence against the possible advance of the "band of pirates from Corsica." The bridge of La Guillotiere had been strongly barricaded and it took M. le Comte de Cambray some little time to establish his ident.i.ty before the officer in command of the post allowed him to proceed on his way.

The town was fairly full owing to the presence of M. le Comte d'Artois, who had taken up his quarters at the archiepiscopal palace, and of his staff, who were scattered in various houses about the town. Nevertheless M. le Comte and his family were fortunate enough in obtaining comfortable accommodation at the Hotel Bourbon.

The party was very tired, and after a light supper retired to bed.

But not before M. le Comte de Cambray had sent a special autographed message to Monseigneur le Comte d'Artois explaining to him under what tragic circ.u.mstances the sum of twenty-five million francs destined to reach His Majesty the King had fallen into a common highwayman's hands and begging that a posse of cavalry be sent out on the road after the marauders and be placed under the orders of M. le Marquis de St. Genis, who would be on the look-out for their arrival. He begged that the posse should consist of not less than thirty men, seeing that some armed followers of the Corsican brigand were also somewhere on the way.

CHAPTER V