Under the Red Robe by Stanley John Weyman (positive books to read txt) 📕

to undertake was a dangerous one. He risked, he knew that he must risk, and the event proved him to be right, his life against the life of this unknown man. And one thing more; time was before him. The outlaw might be taken by another, might be killed, might die, might—But there, Mademoiselle, we know what answer this person made. He took the baser course, and on his honour, on his parole, with money supplied to him, he went free; free on the condition that he delivered up this other man.’

I paused again, but I did not dare to look at her; and after a moment of silence I resumed.

‘Some portion of the second half of the story you know, Mademoiselle; but not all. Suffice it that this man came down to a remote village, and there at risk, but, Heaven knows, basely enough, found his way into his victim’s home. Once there, however, his heart began to fail him. Had he found the house garrisoned by men, he might have pressed to his end with little remorse. But he found there only two helpless loyal women; and I say again that from the first hour of his entrance he sickened at the work which he had in hand, the work which ill-fortune had laid upon him. Still he pursued it. He had given his word; and if there was one tradition of his race which this man had never broken, it was that of fidelity to his side—to the man who paid him. But he pursued it with only half his mind, in great misery, if you will believe me; sometimes in agonies of shame. Gradually, however, almost against his will, the drama worked itself out before him, until he needed only one thing.

I looked at Mademoiselle, trembling. But her head was averted: I could gather nothing from the outlines of her form; and I went on.

‘Do not misunderstand me,’ I said in a lower voice. ‘Do not misunderstand what I am going to say next. This is no love-story; and can have no ending such as romancers love to set to their tales. But I am bound to mention, Mademoiselle, that this man who had lived almost all his life about inns and eating-houses and at the gaming-tables met here for the first time for years a good woman, and learned by the light of her loyalty and devotion to see what his life had been, and what was the real nature of the work he was doing. I think—nay, I know,’ I continued, ‘that it added a hundredfold to his misery that when he learned at last the secret he had come to surprise, he learned it from her lips, and in such a way that, had he felt no shame, Hell could have been no place for him. But in one thing I hope she misjudged him. She thought, and had reason to think, that the moment he knew her secret he went out, not even closing the door, and used it. But the truth was that while her words were still in his ears news came to him that others had the secret; and had he not gone out on the instant and done what he did, and forestalled them, M. de Cocheforet would have been taken, but by others.’

Mademoiselle broke her long silence so suddenly that her horse sprang forward.

‘Would to Heaven he had!’ she wailed.

‘Been taken by others?’ I exclaimed, startled out of my false composure.

‘Oh, yes, yes!’ she answered with a passionate gesture. ‘Why did you not tell me? Why did you not confess to me, sir, even at the last moment? But, no more! No more!’ she continued in a piteous voice; and she tried to urge her horse forward. ‘I have heard enough. You are racking my heart, M. de Berault. Some day I will ask God to give me strength to forgive you.’

‘But you have not heard me out,’ I said.

‘I will hear no more,’ she answered in a voice she vainly strove to render steady. ‘To what end? Can I say more than I have said? Or did you think that I could forgive you now—with him behind us going to his death? Oh, no, no!’ she continued. ‘Leave me! I implore you to leave me, sir. I am not well.’

She drooped over her horse’s neck as she spoke, and began to weep so passionately that the tears ran down her cheeks under her mask, and fell and sparkled like dew on the mane; while her sobs shook her so that I thought she must fall. I stretched out my hand instinctively to give her help, but she shrank from me. ‘No!’ she gasped, between her sobs. ‘Do not touch me. There is too much between us.’

‘Yet there must be one thing more between us,’ I answered firmly. ‘You must listen to me a little longer whether you will or no, Mademoiselle: for the love you bear to your brother. There is one course still open to me by which I may redeem my honour; and it has been in my mind for some time back to take that course. ‘To-day, I am thankful to say, I can take it cheerfully, if not without regret; with a steadfast heart, if no light one. Mademoiselle,’ I continued earnestly, feeling none of the triumph, none of the vanity, none of the elation I had foreseen, but only simple joy in the joy I could give her, ‘I thank God that it IS still in my power to undo what I have done: that it is still in my power to go back to him who sent me, and telling him that I have changed my mind, and will bear my own burdens, to pay the penalty.’

We were within a hundred paces of the top and the finger-post. She cried out wildly that she did not understand. ‘What is it you—you—have just said?’ she murmured. ‘I cannot hear.’ And she began to fumble with the ribbon of her mask.

‘Only this, Mademoiselle,’ I answered gently. ‘I give your brother back his word, his parole. From this moment he is free to go whither he pleases. Here, where we stand, four roads meet. That to the right goes to Montauban, where you have doubtless friends, and can lie hid for a time. Or that to the left leads to Bordeaux, where you can take ship if you please. And in a word, Mademoiselle,’ I continued, ending a little feebly, ‘I hope that your troubles are now over.’

She turned her face to me—we had both come to a standstill—and plucked at the fastenings of her mask. But her trembling fingers had knotted the string, and in a moment she dropped her hand with a cry of despair. ‘But you? You?’ she wailed in a voice so changed that I should not have known it for hers. ‘What will you do? I do not understand, Monsieur.’

‘There is a third road,’ I answered. ‘It leads to Paris. That is my road, Mademoiselle. We part here.’

‘But why?’ she cried wildly.

‘Because from to-day I would fain begin to be honourable,’ I answered in a low voice. ‘Because I dare not be generous at another’s cost. I must go back whence I came.’

‘To the Chatelet?’ she muttered.

‘Yes, Mademoiselle, to the Chatelet.’

She tried feverishly to raise her mask with her hand.

‘I am not well,’ she stammered. ‘I cannot breathe.’

And she began to sway so violently in her saddle that I sprang down, and, running round her horse’s head, was just