The Companions of Jehu by Alexandre Dumas (red scrolls of magic .txt) 📕

of Berne received an income of fifty or even sixty thousand francs.”

The doctor burst out laughing.

“Decidedly, sir, you are trying to frighten us,” said he.

“Gentlemen,” said the watchmaker, “I give you my word of honor—”

“Take your places gentlemen,” shouted the conductor, opening the door. “Take your places! We are three-quarters of an hour late.”

“One moment, conductor, one moment,” Said the architect; “we are consulting.”

“About what?”

“Close the door, conductor, and come over here.”

“Drink a glass of wine with us, conductor.”

“With pleasure, gentlemen; a glass of wine is never to be refused.”

The conductor held out his glass, and the three travellers touched it; but just as he was lifting it to his lips the doctor stopped his arm.

“Come, conductor, frankly, is it true?”

“What?”

“What this gentleman says?” And he pointed to the Genevese.

“Monsieur Féraud?”

“I don’t know if that is his name.”

“Yes, sir, that is my name—Féraud & Company, No. 6 Rue du Rempart, Geneva, at your service,” replied the watchmaker, bowing.

“Gentlemen,” repeated the conductor, “take your places!”

“But you haven’t answered.”

“What the devil shall I answer? You haven’t asked me anything.”

“Yes, we asked you if it is true that you are carrying a large sum of money belonging to the French Government?”

“Blabber!” said the conductor to watchmaker, “did you tell that?”

“Confound it, my worthy fellow—”

“Come, gentlemen, your places.”

“But before getting in we want to know—”

“What? Whether I have government money? Yes I have. Now, if we are stopped, say nothing and all will be well.”

“Are you sure?”

“Leave me to arrange matters with these gentry.”

“What will you do if we are stopped?” the doctor asked the architect.

“Faith! I shall follow the conductor’s advice.”

“That’s the best thing to do,” observed the latter.

“Well, I shall keep quiet,” repeated the architect.

“And so shall I,” added the watchmaker.

“Come, gentlemen, take your seats, and let us make haste.”

The boy had listened to this conversation with frowning brow and clinched teeth.

“Well,” he said to his mother, “if we are stopped, I know what I’ll do.”

“What will you do?” she asked.

“You’ll see.”

“What does this little boy say?” asked the watchmaker.

“I say you are all cowards,” replied the child unhesitatingly.

“Edouard!” exclaimed his mother, “what do you mean?”

“I wish they’d stop the diligence, that I do!” cried the boy, his eye sparkling with determination.

“Come, come, gentlemen, in Heaven’s name, take your places,” called the conductor once more.

“Conductor,” said the doctor, “I presume you have no weapons!”

“Yes, I have my pistols.”

“Unfortunate!”

The conductor stooped to the doctor’s ear and whispered: “Don’t be alarmed, doctor; they’re only loaded with powder.”

“Good!”

“Forward, postilion, forward!” shouted the conductor, closing the door of the interior. Then, while the postilion snapped his whip and started the heavy vehicle, he also closed that of the coupé.

“Are you not coming with us, conductor?” asked the lady.

“Thank you, no, Madame de Montrevel,” replied the conductor; “I have something to do on the imperial.” Then, looking into the window, he added: “Take care the Monsieur Edouard does not touch the pistols in the pocket of the carriage; he might hurt himself.”

“Pooh!” retorted the boy, “as if I didn’t know how to handle a pistol. I have handsomer ones than yours, that my friend Sir John had sent me from England; haven’t I, mamma?”

“Never mind, Edouard,” replied Madame de Montrevel, “I entreat you not to touch them.”

“Don’t worry, little mother.” Then he added softly, “All the same, if the Companions of Jehu stop us, I know what I shall do.”

The diligence was again rolling heavily on its way to Paris.

It was one of those fine winter days which makes those who think that nature is dead at that season admit that nature never dies but only sleeps. The man who lives to be seventy or eighty years of age has his nights of ten or twelve hours, and often complains that the length of his nights adds to the shortness of his days. Nature, which has an everlasting existence; trees, which live a thousand years; have sleeping periods of four or five months, which are winters for us but only nights for them. The poets, in their envious verse, sing the immortality of nature, which dies each autumn and revives each spring. The poets are mistaken; nature does not die each autumn, she only falls asleep; she is not resuscitated, she awakens. The day when our globe really dies, it will be dead indeed. Then it will roll into space or fall into the abysses of chaos, inert, mute, solitary, without trees, without flowers, without verdure, without poets.

But on this beautiful day of the 23d of February, 1800, sleeping nature dreamed of spring; a brilliant, almost joyous sun made the grass in the ditches on either side of the road sparkle with those deceptive pearls of the hoarfrost which vanish at a touch, and rejoice the heart of a tiller of the earth when he sees them glittering at the points of his wheat as it pushes bravely up through the soil. All the windows of the diligence were lowered, to give entrance to this earliest smile of the Divine, as though all hearts were saying: “Welcome back, traveller long lost in the clouds of the West, or beneath the heaving billows of Ocean!”

Suddenly, about an hour after leaving Châtillon, the diligence stopped at a bend of the river without any apparent cause. Four horsemen quietly approached, walking their horses, and one of them, a little in advance of the others, made a sign with his hand to the postilion, ordering him to draw up. The postilion obeyed.

“Oh, mamma!” cried Edouard, standing up and leaning out of the window in