The Light That Lures Part 23

It was not all the truth. Mercier said nothing of the amount of wine he had drunk, nothing of his boasting. He described the men at the Lion d'Or as truculent, easily ready to take offense, difficult to persuade.

"They began by rejoicing that a market woman was on her way to Paris to give evidence against an aristocrat," Mercier said, "and then the devil prompted some man to speculate whether she might not be an aristocrat in disguise. They were for making certain, and if she were an aristocrat they would have hanged her in the inn yard. I had to threaten to shoot the first man who attempted to mount the stairs."

"And even then they only waited to get the better of us," said Dubois.

"They left the inn sulkily at last," Mercier went on, "but all night we kept guard upon the stairs, wasting precious hours as it happened."

"Go on," said Latour, quietly.

"Soon after dawn we were startled by a groan from the end of a pa.s.sage, and we went to find a man lying there half dead. He had been badly handled, near where he lay was a door opening onto stairs which went down to the kitchens and the back entrance to the house. We went to mademoiselle's room and found that she had gone. How it had been accomplished neither Dubois nor I could tell, but we were both convinced that some of the men had stolen back after leaving the inn and had taken mademoiselle away, telling her some plausible tale to keep her silent.

We roused the sleeping inn and searched it from cellar to garret. From the man lying in the pa.s.sage we could get no coherent words, though we wasted good brandy on him. We went to the village, and were not satisfied until we had roused every man who had been at the Lion d'Or that night. More hours wasted. Then we went back to the inn and found the man revived somewhat. He declared that as he came to the top of the stairs a man and a woman met him. Before he could utter a cry the man seized him by the throat; he was choked and remembered nothing more. It was natural that our suspicions should turn to this fellow Barrington whom we had so easily outwitted at Beauvais. On this theory we asked ourselves which way he would be likely to take mademoiselle. It did not seem possible that they could enter Paris. We were at a loss what to do, and indeed wasted more time in searching the country in the neighborhood of the Lion d'Or for traces of the fugitives."

"You have certainly wasted much time," said Latour. "Tell me, what is this man Barrington like." He had already had a description from Jacques Sabatier, but a word-picture from another source might make the man clearer to him. Mercier's description was even better than Sabatier's.

"Did you tell this story of the Lion d'Or at the barrier?"

"No," Mercier answered. It was evidently the answer Latour wished to receive, and in a sense it was true. Mercier had not proclaimed at the barrier that he had been outwitted, and no one knew what business had taken him from Paris; but he had said that he believed an emigre in the disguise of a market woman had entered the city that morning. "What emigre?" he was asked. "Mademoiselle St. Clair," he had answered. The guard said nothing, no more inclined to confess to carelessness than Mercier was, and Mercier and Dubois had ridden on convinced that mademoiselle was not in Paris. At the barrier his remarks might have been taken for badinage, a sneer at the vigilance which was kept, had not the entrance of the quarreling market woman been remembered.

"If she is in Paris, we shall find her," said Latour.

"It is more likely she had ridden back to Beauvais," said Dubois. "If she is wise that is the way she has taken."

"Women in love are not always wise," said Latour.

"I am afraid, citizen, this unfortunate business has interfered with your plans. I am sorry. We had managed the whole affair so excellently." Mercier was so relieved to find Latour so calm that he was inclined to swagger.

"Most excellently," was the answer. "I am as far from having mademoiselle in my power as I was when you started."

"Citizen--"

"Is there need to say more?" Latour asked sharply. "I shall have other work for you presently; see that it is accomplished better. Did you meet Jacques Sabatier on the road this morning?"

"No, citizen. We have not seen him since he met us at the tavern yesterday and rode to Paris for your instructions. This morning we left the road several times to make sure the fugitives were not hidden in some shed or hollow. If he travelled to the Lion d'Or that is how we must have missed him."

"Come to me to-night at nine," he said, dismissing them. His anger was great, but it did not suit him to say more.

This was all Latour knew when he chanced upon Richard Barrington in the afternoon. He was thinking of mademoiselle when the noise of the approaching crowd reached him, and then he noticed the tall, strongly knit figure of the man just before him. A second glance convinced him that this was the American; therefore mademoiselle was in Paris. This was the man who had brought all his scheming to naught; his enemy, a daring and dangerous foe. He noted the expression on Barrington's face as the crowd went by, saw the intention in his eyes. In another moment his enemy might be destroyed, gashed with pikes, trampled under foot, yet Latour put out his hand and stopped him. Why? Latour could not see even his enemy throw his life away so uselessly. He hardly gave a thought to the wretched prisoner in the coach, but his interest was keen in the man who went with him to the wine shop. It was no mere phrase when he said he was a man after his own heart, he meant it. Their paths in life might be antagonistic, their ideals diametrically opposed, yet in both men there was purpose and determination, a struggle towards great achievement, a definite end to strive after. Circ.u.mstances might make them the deadliest of foes, but there was a strong and natural desire for friends.h.i.+p as they clasped hands.

"I could love that man," Latour mused as he went towards the Rue Valette afterwards. "Yet I must spy upon him and deceive him if I can.

Mademoiselle is in Paris and he knows where she is hidden. He is Bruslart's friend, and Bruslart I hate."

He climbed the stairs to his room to find Sabatier waiting for him on the landing.

"I have heard," said Latour, unlocking his door and entering the room with his visitor, "I have heard the whole story. The fools have been outwitted. I have just left this man Barrington."

"Citizen, I do not think you have heard the whole story."

Latour turned quickly. Something in the man's tone startled him.

"Mademoiselle was taken to the Abbaye prison this afternoon," said Sabatier.

A cry, a little cry almost like the whine of a small animal suddenly hurt, escaped from Latour's lips. His strength seemed to go out of him, and he sank into a chair by the table, his face pale, his hands trembling.

"Tell me," he said, his voice a whisper.

"I cannot say how suspicion first arose, but some one at the barrier must have started it. Whether it was a guess, or whether some one recalled her face some time after she had been allowed to pa.s.s, I do not know, nor does it matter much. It got wind that Mademoiselle St. Clair had entered Paris, and where in Paris would she be most likely to go?--to Citizen Bruslart's. A crowd was quickly on its way there.

Bruslart was away from home, but they would go in, and there they found her. Not an hour ago they were shouting round her as they took her to the Abbaye."

"There is wine in that cupboard, Sabatier--thanks. This news has taken the nerve out of me. Bruslart must have known she was in his house.

Barrington would leave her there."

"I am not so sure of that," said Sabatier. "I do not know how much this Barrington suspects, but I do not think he is a man to make so obvious a mistake. I give him credit for more cunning, and with reason, I think."

"And Bruslart must have known the danger," said Latour.

"He may not, if he supposed mademoiselle had managed to get into Paris unseen. I cannot understand Citizen Bruslart."

"Dieu! Did he betray her himself, Sabatier?"

"I do not know. If I could see any object in his doing so I might suspect him."

"The Abbaye," Latour muttered, getting up and pacing the room. "The Abbaye. We must get her out, Sabatier. She would never be acquitted. Had she remained in Paris, the good she has done to the poor might have been remembered in her favor, but an emigre, her great name and all that it stands for--. No, she is as surely doomed as any prisoner who has entered the Abbaye. I have business at the prison to-night, Sabatier. I may learn something of her."

"Wait, citizen. To-morrow will do. You will not be careful enough to-night."

Latour paused by the table, a little astonished perhaps at the concern in his companion's voice. Sabatier was to be trusted as a man who served well for payment, but his hands had been red often, and it was strange to hear anything like sentiment from his lips.

"One would think you had some real affection for me," said Latour.

Sabatier swaggered to hide such weakness. "I am a man, citizen, who fears nothing. I can recognize another man who fears G.o.d or man as little as I do."

"The wine has cured me," said Latour. "I shall do my business, nothing more. I am not a fool. There will be no need of carefulness. Sabatier, to-morrow you must find out what Citizen Bruslart does. His movements may be interesting."

"And this man Barrington?"

"Leave him to me," answered Latour.

No man knew better when to wait and when to act than Raymond Latour, and few men had a keener perception of possibilities, of chances which were worth taking, of risks it was unwise to run. He appreciated his own power and influence to the very turn of a hair in the balance, and although to his companions he might exaggerate or underrate that influence to suit the occasion, he never made the fatal mistake of deceiving himself in the matter. Under ordinary circ.u.mstances, had his interest been aroused in a prisoner, he would have gone openly to those in authority and put the case before them, with every confidence not only of being listened to, but of getting his request granted. He had a strong following and was too powerful to offend. But for such a prisoner as Mademoiselle St. Clair, he knew that he dare not plead. The strongest man in Paris would be howled down by the mob if he attempted to procure her acquittal. She was closely connected with the best hated families of France, she stood not for herself but for what she represented, and the mob had a.s.sisted at no capture that pleased it more. This knowledge had for a moment robbed Latour of his nerve and courage. Strong man and self-contained as he was, he had not been able to control himself and hide his fear from Jacques Sabatier; yet now, as he pa.s.sed quickly through the streets in the direction of the Abbaye prison, his step was firm, his face resolute, his course of action determined upon.

For an hour he talked with two friends of his who were in charge of this prison of the Abbaye, laughed and rejoiced with them at the arrest of such an important emigre that day; and then, at their prophecy that she would not be long in their keeping, that the tribunal would see to it that she went speedily upon her last journey to the Place de la Revolution, Latour ventured a protest--the first move in his scheme. It was so definite a protest that his companions were astonished.

"What! Does a woman appeal to you? Are you losing your hatred for aristocrats?"

"The woman appeals to me in a curious way," Latour answered. "After all, what is she? A little fish out of a great shoal. I would net in the shoal. It is not difficult with this little fish for bait. Do you not see how it is? This little fish is precious to the shoal, and lost, the shoal, or part of it, at any rate, will turn to find her. So long as it is known that she lives, there will be other emigres stealing into Paris to look for Mademoiselle St. Clair."

"You are right. Delay will be wise," was the answer.

"Urge it, then," said Latour, with gleaming, sinister eyes. "Urge it.

You are the keepers of prisoners and should know best when to spare and when to kill. It is not my business, and I have a name for gentleness in some matters, a reputation which it suits me to preserve, but I am bloodthirsty enough to give you good advice."