(1)
may had given place to june before valentine de trélan had quite got accustomed to the departure of the handsome boy whose presence had been such an anxiety and yet such a pleasure to her. the five thousand francs which she had in his place—not nearly so large a sum as it appeared owing to the enormous depreciation of paper money under the incapable rule of the five kings—she had at first thought of returning to his relatives by suzon tessier. but suzon, by pretending to wish for her own sake to avoid further intercourse with that house, had persuaded the duchesse to keep their bounty, at least for the present.
since the evening when she had wept under her husband’s portrait valentine had never again felt any disposition to tears. reaction had come after that outburst. if gaston were alive—and she could not rid herself of the conviction that he was—it was difficult not to draw the conclusion that he was indifferent to her fate. seven years, and no sign! then she told herself again, as she had so often done, that her letters had never reached him, that he had not the slightest reason for supposing her to be still in life, since everybody of her world who had survived the tempest believed her murdered, that she had no evidence of his not having made enquiries after her, or unsuccessful efforts to find her. only of a successful effort would she have heard. but none of these reasoned considerations could remove the sting of that long silence.
yet, if gaston were suddenly to appear before her, would she be able to greet him with that unconcern which she had almost persuaded herself that she felt—and that she ought to feel? she knew she would not. down in the depths of her soul all the time was the emotion which had pierced her in the picture-gallery—the intense longing to see him again. it was mirabel which had first made her conscious of this longing, and it was mirabel which had insensibly fed it. and there were times when she cursed the impulse which had brought her here, for under the crust of indifference which she had hoped was forming over her heart she could feel the stirring of that desire, growing daily not less strong, but stronger.
and then one day it occurred to her that if this chouan chief of roland de céligny’s spoke of writing to the duc de trélan about the treasure he must know, or think he knew, gaston’s whereabouts. more, if he were to send someone to mirabel after the hoard, as roland had appeared to think certain, she might communicate at least with this self-styled kinsman of her husband’s by his emissary, whoever he were. yes, even if he were the comte de brencourt; for although that mad passion of his must be many times dead after all these years—and, perhaps, just because of its death—he would surely bear a letter for her back to brittany . . . even as roland might have done, had she thought of it in time.
this idea grew in her to an impatience for the coming of the next treasure-seeker. but june went on, and he did not come. paris celebrated (with insufficient enthusiasm to please the government) the obsequies of the envoys murdered at rastadt; commerce continued to decline, discontent and lethargy to become more marked, and republican feelings suffered outrage at the first performances of the opera of adrien, wherein the stage emperor made his entry with undue pomp. on the eighteenth came a minor revolution, the coup d’état of the 30th prairial, with a consequent change of ministry. valentine heard of it with calm, and june slid presently into july.
(2)
among the few sightseers who passed the sentry on the 20th of messidor, a visiting day, was one who, though m. thibault was too much engrossed in conversation to observe it, never entered the chateau at all, but strolled round to the garden front. there was nothing to prevent this, though it was hardly ever done. the really remarkable fact about this enterprising visitor was that he did not reappear again at leaving time; but this also passed without remark. yet he had not vanished into space; he was seated, when twilight came, in that very grotto of latona whose spring had refreshed roland, waiting with some impatience for completer darkness. he had already seen as much of the garden front of mirabel as he wished—a window on the ground-floor with a badly-broken shutter.
problems connected with the recruiting and organisation of finistère had kept the comte de brencourt longer in brittany than the marquis de kersaint had bargained for, but he was here at last on his mission. since a detail of the ancient plan had proved susceptible of two interpretations, he hoped to-night to make a preliminary search; after which he would arrange his plan of campaign with the royalist agents in paris with whom he was in touch.
more than the question of his difficult enterprise, however, was occupying m. de brencourt’s mind as he sat in that fantastic relic of the dead and gone world of which he also was a survival. it was impossible to be at mirabel, even for the first time in his life, without thinking of mme de trélan, and, as his refuge darkened, he found himself thinking of little else, and of the extraordinary chance which had thrown her tragic and sacred shadow across his path again. on the windings of that chance artus de brencourt, while he waited, had time to meditate profoundly, and sitting there in the july twilight, his chin on his hand, staring at the arbutus which almost blocked the entrance to the grotto, he was asking himself two questions. why had the marquis de kersaint, that kinsman of the duc de trélan’s, ceased, after that night at hennebont, to wear his emerald signet ring; and why had that ring borne, as he then distinctly saw for the first time, the phoenix of the saint-chamans? for m. de kersaint had stated that he was a connection of that house by marriage only. that he was a connection seemed obvious from the minute instructions he had been able to give m. de brencourt on the topography of mirabel. this business of the ring intrigued the comte not a little. he was quite conversant with the device of the great house of trélan, and over the troop of strange surmises born of the presence of that device on m. de kersaint’s finger and its abrupt disappearance he was still frowning when the time came for him to make his stealthy entrance into mirabel.
for all that she had half looked for his arrival, it was chance, of a kind, that directed the duchesse de trélan’s steps that evening towards the invader; chance that caused her to have left the special key in the door of the portrait gallery; chance that made her set out, somewhat unnecessarily, to fetch it before she retired for the night—and chance that led her returning footsteps through the great dark spaces of the salle verte . . . to hear, as she passed along between the pillars and the wall, a slight muffled noise of tapping—coming whence?
valentine stopped dead, lamp in hand. the gentle and recurrent sound did not come from the banqueting hall itself, that was plain. from the “sallette,” then?
no more than when she had searched the garden for a possible malefactor and found roland did she dream of danger to herself, though had she paused to think of it she might have guessed that the intruder would be armed, and, if surprised, might use his weapon. she walked back and softly opened the door of the sallette; her surmise was right.
her own lamp cast in its beams, but there was light there already—a lantern standing on the floor, making a pool of radiance by the feet of a man who stood in front of the great hearth with his back to her. in this pool, pinned down by the lantern, was an outspread sheet of paper, a plan of some sort. her eyes were able to take in these details before the man, turning quickly, saw her standing there with her lamp. his one hand went to his breast, doubtless in search of a weapon, but he never produced it, and the tool which he held in the other fell clattering to the floor.
“god in heaven!” he exclaimed sharply, and recoiled a step or two.
“who is it?” asked valentine a little uncertainly. “is it—is it monsieur de brencourt?”
the intruder did not answer—did not even seem to hear her question. he remained literally as if turned to stone, his eyes burning cavernously in his pale face, on which the upcast light of the lantern at his feet, crossing with that of valentine’s lamp, cast odd shadows. after a moment, moving like a man half stunned from a fall, he came a little towards her. then he stopped again, and passed his hand over his eyes.
“that light dazzles me . . . you are not real!” he muttered. stooping, he picked up his own lantern, and held it high in a hand that shook.
“is it really madame de trélan?” he asked huskily. “was it untrue then . . . september . . . la force?—speak, duchesse, for god’s sake!”
in the matter of astonishment valentine had the advantage of him, since she had been led to think his coming possible. but she too was shaken by the encounter, the first with anyone of her own world who had known her, for seven long years. and she found herself unable to do more than give a sort of pale acquiescence to his agitated questions by bending her head and saying, “yes, it was untrue.”
“it is she!” said de brencourt to himself, his harsh features showing his profound emotion. suddenly he lowered his lantern. “give me your lamp, duchesse, and sit down and tell me—tell me, unless i am to take leave of my senses, how it comes about . . . where you have been all these years . . . what you are doing now? my god, to think—permit me!”
he deposited his own lantern on the floor and took the lamp from her unresisting grasp, looking round the plundered sallette in vain for something to put it on.
“give me back the lamp, monsieur le comte,” said valentine, finding speech. “we cannot talk here. let us go to my room. it is safer also.”
“you have a room here?” he exclaimed. “you are . . .” for the first time he seemed to become aware of her attire, so different from anything which he had ever seen her wear.
she held out her hand for the lamp. “come,” she said, “unless your business here——” she indicated the tool and the map.
“oh, that can wait now!” said the treasure-hunter with an accent of scorn. he picked up the chisel and the plan and followed her.
so, beneath the cavernous half-seen gilding of the great salle verte, down the basement stairs and along the bare prison-like corridor below, carrying the lamp, went the duchesse de trélan in her respectable black dress and fichu, and behind her walked, still half stupefied, the man who had once made such persistent and unavailing love to her. and it was in this guise, very exactly that of a thief in the night, that the comte de brencourt came for the first time to her house of mirabel.
the thought penetrated his stupor with some force during the transit. for, once arrived at valentine’s little parlour, as she put down the lamp on the table he said abruptly:
“i have never been in mirabel in my life. and i find you here to greet me!” he gave a sudden laugh.
valentine did not answer. she was much more moved than she wished to betray. she sat down in a chair near the table and motioned to him to do the same. but he put his hands on the table and remained leaning over it, staring at her with a half-wild eagerness.
“are you alive, duchesse? or am i dead, too?”
“the duchesse is not alive,” responded valentine with a faint smile. “you are speaking to madame vidal, the concierge of mirabel.”
“good god!” exclaimed the comte de brencourt, springing upright.
“how else do you suppose i could be here?”
“you are jesting!” cried he, still incredulous. “you . . . you . . . a concierge! does no one know you? then you are poor—in want! madame, madame! . . .”
valentine lifted a hand. “please, monsieur de brencourt, do not agitate yourself! i am not in want. there is no one left at mirabel to recognise me—my portrait had a pike put through it. i came of my own free will, and i am not unhappy here.”
at this, as if it were the most stunning news of all, he did, perhaps unconsciously, subside into a chair, and, leaning his elbows on the table, took his head between his hands.
“tell me what happened?” he said after a moment. and mme de trélan told him, shortly, the history of those seven years.
“everybody thinks that i was killed,” she finished.
“i thought so,” said he without moving. “i thought so. . . . god pity me, i have carried that picture of your death about with me all these years. oh, why did you not let me into the secret?”
she looked at him with a sort of maternal regret, a kinder look indeed, had he but met it, than he had ever won from her during all the period of his fruitless passion. “in the beginning i could tell no one, lest i should endanger the tessiers. i disappeared, comte, without exactly intending it. in the end i was glad to disappear. no one but mme tessier knows to this hour of my identity; i do not mean anyone to know. believe me, i have not been unhappy with these good friends of mine. after being twice so near death, to see the sky and the green leaves in the spring, to know affection, as i have known it, and faithfulness. . . . but i am sorry if i have caused you so long a pain. . . . i had no news of you—for all i knew you had gone the same road.”
“i nearly did—in another way,” said the comte briefly, raising his head. he drew a deep breath and gazed at her anew. “do you know, duchesse, that this is like—no, i cannot yet grasp that this is you, valentine de trélan, not only alive, but in this mean room, this bourgeois dress——”
she interrupted him with a warning. “comte, this mean room of mine is not too safe a shelter for you! and how did you get into mirabel?”
plainly this subject had ceased to interest him for the moment, yet he answered that it were better for her not to know, adding, “but you do not ask me why you found me where you did?”
“no,” said valentine composedly. “i know why you broke in. you are come, are you not, on behalf of the marquis de kersaint, to secure the treasure supposed to have been hidden in the chateau during the time of the fronde?”
again m. de brencourt stared at her. “are you a witch, madame, or has some royalist agent——”
“neither,” said she smiling. “it is no mystery how i know. you have been preceded in your quest here, monsieur de brencourt. let me tell you of the doings of a very rash young man.”
and astonished, annoyed, but half envious in the end (for had she not nursed the boy for four days) the comte de brencourt listened. but valentine had to hear some very trenchant comments on her protégé’s insane proceedings—so her hearer characterised them.
“and where is the treasure really supposed to be?” she asked.
“as far as can be made out,” said her guest, “behind the great hearth, under that curious sort of gallery, in the room where you found me.—duchesse, i should perhaps ask your permission for my work there; indeed, should i find anything, what right have i to take it?”
“the right of conquest,” answered valentine. “but, as for my permission, if i thought that withholding it would keep you from going on with your search, i believe i would withhold it. you risk your life, monsieur de brencourt—or at least your liberty. is it worth it?”
his look said as plainly as speech, “so you do care a little for my life—even for my liberty,” but what he replied was, “the king’s cause in finistère is in desperate need of money.”
“and your leader is determined to secure it,” finished valentine. she went on, “who is this marquis de kersaint who . . . who sent you?” it was not the way in which she had meant to end the sentence.
her question had rung in the comte de brencourt’s own head pretty often of late. if he could have answered it . . .
“m. de kersaint, madame, as his ardent admirer, young de céligny, will probably have told you, is the émigré who commanded that forlorn hope of an austrian column at rivoli. he had been in imperial service, i believe, for some years, but left it at campoformio. monseigneur le comte d’artois and his council offered him the post of organising finistère, where he will, if all goes well, be the general commanding for the king this summer. i was assigned to him as his second-in-command and came over to brittany with him in january. i know no more of his personal history than that—except that all his family, so i understand, perished in the massacres.”
there was a little pause, and valentine, with an effort, said, “i hear that in addition he calls himself a kinsman of . . . my husband’s.”
the comte made her a little bow. “he does claim that honour.”
the blood mounted to mme de trélan’s cheek, but she took no notice of his tone, somewhat at variance with the phrase he used.
“i do not remember ever having heard his name.”
m. de brencourt was silent.
“but,” she went on, “as his kinship is . . . quite possible . . . i shall ask you, monsieur de brencourt, to do me a favour.”
“a favour! you have only to ask, duchesse.” but he bit his lip; for he feared what the request might be.
“there is,” said valentine, looking down, “a certain family matter on which i should be glad of information. it is possible that m. de kersaint can supply this. i will, therefore, write him a letter, and ask you to be good enough to convey it to him when you return, comte. will you do this for me?”
“any least service that i can render you, madame——” said the comte, but rather formally this time. his brain was still dazed with shock, but it was beginning to wake to other activities, and he suddenly saw with immense distaste a picture of himself delivering a letter from this woman, loved and mourned and now given back to life, into the hand of the man who wore the crest of the house of trélan, who knew mirabel so well, who had been so agitated at the mention of her death. . . .
“but do not, duchesse,” he continued hastily, “do not give me the letter till i have finished or all but finished my quest, for, should i have the mischance to be taken with it on me, you will involve yourself—involve us all,” he added, guessing that any threat of danger to herself alone would probably go unregarded.
valentine bent her head. “yes, i understand. and i thank you, comte. how long will your investigations take you, do you think?”
“it is the getting the gold away that will be the difficulty,” replied the adventurer. “when i have satisfactorily located it i shall concert measures with an agent in paris. see, madame, here is a copy of the original plan. but i fear it will not mean much to you, for steps have been taken to render it unintelligible to anybody else.”
he spoke truth, for of the scrawl now under her eyes valentine could make nothing. yet she kept her gaze long on it, making up her mind to do a thing she shrank from, with this man of all others, and that was, to bring her husband’s name into the conversation once more. for the comte had been with this “kinsman”; he might even conceivably have heard something himself.
“did i understand,” she began, her head still bent over the plan, “that m. de kersaint communicated with my . . . with the duc de trélan before undertaking this search? m. de céligny said something about such a project.”
“no,” replied m. de brencourt sharply. “no, there is nothing of m. de trélan in this. m. de kersaint soon abandoned that idea. he had to dispense with his kinsman’s authorisation.”
“he could not, perhaps, get into touch with the duc?” suggested valentine faintly. oh, how she hated this! yet he might hold some clue.
“no,” said the comte again. “he judged it to be impracticable, after all.”
“the duc is no longer in england, perhaps?” pursued valentine, in torture at having to show him that she herself did not know.
“no, madame, not in england, nor——”
he stopped abruptly. as a man who is fording a river may come unexpectedly on a deep and eddying current that threatens his balance, so did artus de brencourt find himself losing foothold in the wholly unlooked for temptation which suddenly assailed him. could it be blamed, the lie which should rid this beloved lady of the ghost of that worthless husband who had left her to this, the husband who in effect had been dead to her for years—and who probably really was dead by this time? for those suspicions as to de kersaint’s identity were absurd. . . .
and though it was unpremeditated, nothing could have served him better than his hesitation. the duchesse’s eyes were on him.
“do not be afraid to speak, monsieur de brencourt,” she said, slowly turning ashy pale. “if you mean that the duc is dead—tell me so!”
how could he resist the statement, put into his very mouth like that? once again those arguments flashed past him: nothing had been heard of de trélan for years, the marquis had not communicated with him—and as for those surmises about de kersaint himself, which till this moment he had done nothing but encourage, he mentally stamped on them. then, taking a long breath, he let himself be sucked down, dizzy but open-eyed, into the torrent.
“madame . . . i regret to be so fatal a messenger,” was all he said, and bent his head.
at least he would not look at her to see how his arrow had sped. he heard her catch her breath, heard her rise from her place opposite him at the table and go away. glancing up, after a moment, he saw her on the edge of the circle of lamplight, leaning against the high shuttered window, her hands over her face.
now, after the stroke he had dealt her, it were the part of a gentleman to leave her. even though her husband were nothing to her now, there was shock in the news. de brencourt was very conscious of it, but the circumstances were exceptional, for he stood in peril of never seeing her again. and now, perhaps, after these wasted, unhappy years she would listen to him.
he got up and went towards her, but something in her attitude or in his own soul restrained him from speaking to her just then. he paused, stood looking desperately at her stricken figure for a moment, then, going back to his former place at the table, buried his face in his arms.
after a little he heard her voice say, falteringly, from where she was:
“do you know any details, monsieur le comte—any place . . . when it was?”
he raised his head but did not look at her. “no,” he said slowly, gripping his hands together before him on the table. “m. de kersaint said no more than this, that it was useless to write to the duc de trélan, because he had just heard that he was dead—had been dead . . . some time.”
when, at the repetition of that word “dead” he heard her catch her breath again, he felt as though he were bludgeoning her. but no—it was only a surgical operation . . . and better so for her. the man he was murdering was dead already. and it was too late to go back now.
“i do not know how m. de kersaint was aware of this,” he went on. “he keeps his own counsel always. but that is what he said, madame. i . . . i . . . .” he tried to add some formal words of sympathy, but that falsehood would not come, and he remained staring before him.
“but i must know more!” said the duchesse to herself in a quick, breathless voice. “he will know, this m. de kersaint, this kinsman. oh, i must write to him at once—before you go, even, comte!” she put her hand to her head. “where—how shall i address the letter?”
he saw that he must give a direction that would never find its destination. how unexpectedly dark and tortuous it was beginning to be, this path! suddenly realising that he was seated while she was standing he got up, and for the first time since the utterance of his lie, looked her in the face for a second. but he could not bear the sight, and it was with downcast gaze that he responded,
“it will be better for me to take the letter myself, madame.”
“but i cannot wait . . .” she answered faintly, so faintly that he saw she was on the point of swooning. he sprang round the table to her, and catching her in his arms held her a second or two. the scarf had fallen from her hair, and her head, grey and golden, rested against his shoulder. her eyes were shut, but he did not think she had quite lost consciousness, or the kiss, reverent as it was, which he put on that pathetic hair might have found another goal, for his heart was beating furiously. then he lowered her into a chair, looked round for water, and, seeing a pitcher and a cup, poured some out with shaking hands and held it to her lips.
he was right; the duchesse had not lost consciousness entirely. she drank some water, contrived to thank him, and put her head back against the chair.
“are you better? are you better?” he got out. (“brute, brute, brute!” he said to himself. but he was not repentant.)
“you were right to tell me . . . i asked you,” said she almost inaudibly. a little colour was creeping back to her face.
he waited a moment, gave her the cup again, gently took one hand when she had finished, and gently rubbed it. “and now that i have told you—valentine, my only love, i have been faithful to your memory all these years—now that i have told you, you will let me take you away from this dreadful place, this intolerable existence, for ever. valentine . . . valentine . . .”
he was at her feet now, clutching at the hand he had been chafing, breathless, almost sobbing in the extremity of his pleading:
“valentine, i implore you! it breaks my heart to see you here! come with me; be my wife! let us take what remains to us in this sorry world! and if i speak so soon, when my hand has just dealt you this blow, it is because the time is so short, as you know. indeed, i would not press you for an answer now, even after all these years, but that we are in the midst of perils. say you forgive my importunity—and say you will come with me!”
she gently withdrew her hand.
“comte,” she said with an effort, “i . . . i thank you, but it could not be. i am an old woman now . . . i thank you, i thank you indeed for your faithfulness, but i could not.”
“at least then, let me take you away as a brother might! you cannot remain here—it is impossible to leave you to this!”
“you will have enough to do,” said she, with a tremor of the lips, “to get your gold away without encumbering yourself . . . with a sister.”
“curse the gold!” answered the comte de brencourt. “no, after all, it brought me here.”
he had got to his feet and stood looking down at her, his eyes kindling. then he made a great effort over himself, and, stooping, took her hand and kissed it as he might have done amid the gaieties where first he met her.
“to-morrow night i will come again for an answer, duchesse. i will leave you now; i have given you, i know, a very great shock. and i regret . . .” again the words stuck. “you must forgive me . . . and, lest you should be anxious, i will not return to the sallette to-night. indeed, i think it must be getting near dawn.”
“i have given you my answer, monsieur de brencourt,” repeated valentine. there were black rings under her eyes. “believe me, i do appreciate your devotion. if i could accept, i would.”
“i cannot take that answer,” said artus de brencourt gravely. “but i will take an assurance that when you have duly mourned the man to whom you have been so nobly faithful . . . that then, even if i have to wait a year, two years——”
“i can give you no hope,” she said once more.
“you do not love me, madame, that i have always known. but all i ask is the right to be spent in your service.”
“i had rather, comte, that you were spent in a worthier.”
he made a gesture. “there exists no worthier,” he said with quiet conviction, and bowing, went towards the door.
but at the door he paused. “one thing more, duchesse. since i would sooner die a thousand deaths than implicate you in this attempt of m. de kersaint’s, i wish to say that should any mischance happen to me within these walls, you may be well assured that i shall give no sign of ever having seen you before. and you, duchesse—for your own sake, not for mine—will do the same by me, will you not? promise me that!”
half by gesture, for speech was getting beyond her, she promised.
“i have the honour to take leave of you,” said the comte de brencourt, and he went out.
there was night in mirabel—cold night and loneliness.
