THE PATH of HONOR

PREVIOUS NOVELS IN “THE BASTILE
SERIES” OF FASCINATING
FRENCH ROMANCE....

BY BURTON E. STEVENSON

AT ODDS WITH
THE REGENT

A Story of the Cellamare Conspiracy

“Full of action from start to finish, and
the dialogue is bright all the way through.”

—Cincinnati Times-Star.

Illustrated. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50

CADETS of GASCONY

TWO STORIES of OLD FRANCE

“‘Romance pure and simple’ ... and the
romance is served up in a delightfully
thrilling manner.”

—Los Angeles Herald.

Illustrated by Anna Whelan Betts.
12mo. Cloth, $1.50

J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY

PUBLISHERS PHILADELPHIA

I WAS ASTONISHED TO SEE THAT HER FACE WAS SCARLET,
AND THAT SHE WAS STARING AT ME WITH STARTLED EYES

Page [42]

THE PATH of HONOR

A Tale of the War in the Bocage

BY
BURTON E. STEVENSON
AUTHOR OF
“AT ODDS WITH THE REGENT,” “CADETS OF GASCONY,”
“A SOLDIER OF VIRGINIA,” ETC.

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
OLIVE RUSH
AND
ETHEL PENNEWILL BROWN

PHILADELPHIA & LONDON
J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
1910

Copyright, 1909, by Burton E. Stevenson
Under the title of “Tavernay”
Copyright, 1910, by J. B. Lippincott Company
Published September, 1910
Printed by J. B. Lippincott Company
The Washington Square Press, Philadelphia, U.S.A.

“For honour travels in a strait so narrow,

Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path.”

Troilus and Cressida

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

THE PATH of HONOR

CHAPTER I.
THE TRAP OF SERGEANT DUBOSQ.

Dawn was just breaking as I bade my fat little host at the Beau Visage good-by and, leaving the white streets of Tours behind me, crossed the shallow river and turned my face southward on the pleasant road to Poitiers.

The morning was a perfect one, soft and warm, with the shimmer of sunshine and the stirring of green things over the earth; for spring had come again to our fair land of Touraine, and I sat erect in the saddle, drinking long draughts of the good air, riotously, gloriously happy. For I was young, heart-whole, care-free, and setting forth upon a pilgrimage which would have given my father joy had he been alive to know. Yes, and it was the last morning of my life that I could apply to myself those three adjectives—though I did not suspect it then.

The way was thronged with market-women hastening toward the town, pushing their little carts before them, their sabots clacking merrily upon the hard, clean road, and their tongues clacking more merrily still. They looked up, with smiling countenances under their white caps, to wish me good-morning and God-speed, and more than once I caught a flash of dark eyes in a fresh and rosy face which sent through me a pang of regret that I could not linger.

The broad valley of the river seemed one continued village, so closely were cottages and farmsteads set; but as I pushed forward into the flat country beyond, houses became less frequent, the road grew more and more deserted, and the fields stretched fallow and neglected to left and right as far as the eye could reach. Here and there, indeed, I caught a glimpse of a château veiled by a screen of trees, but the land itself seemed empty of humankind. There were no flocks in the pastures, no peasants in the fields, not a single plow driving a furrow through the waiting soil.

All of which, I told myself, was the bitter fruit of the Revolution. No one would sow when there was small likelihood of reaping; besides, the canaille found it more amusing to jostle about the streets of Paris, to shout for the Nation, and to watch the guillotine at work. Ever since that dusty battalion from Marseilles, with its red bonnets and furious faces, had marched up to Paris, singing its terrifying hymn, others, large and small, had followed, until it seemed that all France was crowding to the capital. When hunger gnawed there was always Citizen Santerre, offering refreshment to every one under certain easy conditions; there was work on the fortifications, or enlistment in the National Guard; and finally of course, food might be stolen, if too difficult to earn. Or as a last resort information against one’s neighbor might be laid before the Committee of Public Safety, and a reward secured.

I thanked God that we of Touraine had not yet been caught in the eddies of that maelstrom. Danton had been too busy at home to cast his eyes in our direction, and if our peasants ran away it was at least without leaving behind them blackened walls and outraged bodies. So we had lived our lives in peace, undisturbed by massacres, by the worship of Reason, or by that grim machine which toiled so ceaselessly upon the Place de la Révolution.

But as I topped a rise in the road, I saw that the instruments of war at least had at last invaded even this peaceful country. Under a tree by the roadside a group of soldiers were sitting, and it needed no second glance to tell me they were Republicans. They were lolling about, talking idly among themselves; only their officer was on his feet, but he was watching the road intently and the instant his eyes met mine he uttered a sharp command. In a breath his men had sprung to arms and deployed across the road.

I was a peaceful traveller, intent on my own business; so telling myself that I had nothing to fear from even the most rabid of Revolutionists, I continued on without hesitating. It could not be for such a small and inoffensive fish as I that a net so elaborate had been spread.

“Halt, citizen!” called the officer, as I came up. “I must ask you to dismount,” he added, looking at me with eyes of extraordinary brilliancy.

“Willingly,” I replied, “if one of your men will hold my horse;” but two of them had him by the bridle before the words were fully uttered.

“Now, citizen,” continued the officer, urbanely, as I sprang from the saddle and faced him, “there are a few questions which I shall have to ask you. But the sun is warm, and to stand is fatiguing, so let us sit down together in the shade of that tree yonder.”

“Very well,” I assented, and followed him to a spot where we were defended not only from the rays of sun but also from the curious ears of the soldiers of the detachment, which still held its position across the road.

My companion paused a moment to look at me before he began his questioning, and gave me in turn the opportunity to examine him. He was a tall, raw-boned man, evidently of enormous strength. His face was roughened by wind and rain and burned to a deep red by the sun. A ferocious mustache shaded mouth and chin, and his eyes gleamed behind their bushy brows like those of a beast in ambush. His hair was streaked with gray, but I judged not so much from age,—for his whole being was instinct with fire and vigor,—as from the appalling scenes in which he had played a part. He embodied for me at that moment the very spirit of the Revolution, irate, implacable, but with a certain rude sense of honor and of justice and a confused belief that its cause was in some way bound up with human rights and human progress.

“Come, citizen,” he began at last, “your name?”

“Jean Tavernay,” I answered, deeming it wise to omit the preposition.

“Your home?”

“Near Beaufort.”

“Your destination?”

“Poitiers.”

“Your business?”

I hesitated.

“A private matter,” I said finally.

He frowned fiercely.

“The Republic has the right to know!” he said, in a formidable voice.

“This is not a thing which in any way concerns the Republic. It concerns only myself.”

“That is for me to judge. Besides, the business of the Republic is that of each of its citizens. Will you answer?”

I have,—I may as well confess at once what the reader must soon discover,—concealed under an exterior the most ordinary, a vein of obstinacy which has often impelled me to deeds the most foolish. It was so now. A hesitancy which had its origin in boyish shyness crystallized suddenly into sullen determination.

“Come,” repeated my questioner even more fiercely, “will you answer?”

“No!” I said bluntly, and nerved myself for what might follow.

Then I began to suspect that this dragon, like that of Rouen, was ferocious only in appearance, for he contented himself with gnawing at his mustache and looking at me darkly.

“How am I to know you are not a ci-devant?” he rasped out at last. “A traitor, a conspirator against the Nation, a scoundrel upon whose head a price has been set?”

“Merely by looking at me, my friend,” I retorted, and smiled at the thought that I, whose whole life had passed peacefully at Beaufort, could be any of those things.

I cannot say that he actually smiled in answer, but his face certainly relaxed.

“When did you leave Beaufort?” he questioned, in a milder tone.

“Yesterday morning.”

“And last night?”

“I spent at Tours.”

“What inn?”

“The Beau Visage.”

“The landlord’s name?”

“Triboulet.”

“His appearance?”

“Short and fat, a red face, eyes like gimlets, and a head as bald as an egg.”

My captor nodded.

“That’s Triboulet,” he said. “A fine fellow.”

“Yes,” I agreed; “and his wife——”

My captor smacked his lips.

“She made you an omelet?”

“The best I ever ate.”

“She is famous for that,” he said, and looked at me again, pulling pensively at his mustache.

“Come, citizen,” he added, and this time he really smiled, “it is evident that you are not the game I am after.”

“I should hope so,” I agreed.

“I am looking for a wolf, not for a mouse.”

“At least I am not a wolf,” I conceded.

“Old Dubosq has seen too much of the world to be mistaken in a matter so clear as this,” he continued, throwing out his chest. “A conspirator? Bah! You don’t know its meaning. You’re too pink and white—too much of the nursery—its odor clings to you! Why, infant, you’ve never before been away from your mother!”

I flushed, and he burst into a roar of laughter as he saw my face.

“A hit!” he cried. “Ah, citizen, would I could blush like that! But for Dubosq that day is past and far away. Come, my friend, all you need is a little knowledge of the world to be a perfect devil with the ladies. Join my troop and let Dubosq finish you, polish you, give you the true air. Come; it shall be my revenge.”

“Your revenge?”

“Against the women. They have made me suffer and have laughed. A month ago I won my promotion, but a petticoat intervened, and the reward which should have been mine passed to another. Some day I will tell you——”

A shout from his men interrupted him.

We sprang to our feet and saw, just topping the rise in the road, another rider. He drew short up at the shout and at sight of the guard barring his passage. Then he wheeled sharp around as though to retreat, but again stopped.

Dubosq chuckled.

“Caught!” he cried.

“But why doesn’t he go back?” I asked.

“Because, my child, there’s another detachment across the road down yonder, as you would have seen had you looked around.” He drew a pistol from his belt and fired it in the air. “That will bring them on,” he added. “Now, citizen, you will see the trap close—the trap of Sergeant Dubosq. Advance, men! Bring him down if he attempts to escape.”

The Blues began to advance slowly, their guns presented.

“Hold your horse, citizen,” said Dubosq, “and wait here for me. I have something more to say to you;” and he set off after his men.

The fugitive looked about him again. He was fairly caught between two fires. In a moment he must surrender, covered by twenty muskets. But he did not wait for that moment. Instead he put his horse at the ditch, leaped it, and made off across the fields.

“Fire!” yelled Dubosq. “Fire!”

A volley of shots rang out, echoed by another from up the road, and my heart rejoiced as I saw the fugitive keep on unharmed. But only for an instant. His horse bounded twice, then staggered and fell headlong.

The Blues gave a yell of triumph, leaped the ditch and started after their quarry, spreading fan-wise so that he could not escape. But he sprang from the saddle even as his horse fell, and ran with surprising speed toward a cluster of trees just ahead. In a moment he had disappeared among them.

I watched until his pursuers reached the grove and plunged into it; then I tied my horse to the tree and resumed my seat beneath its branches, for I was curious to see the end of this encounter. My sympathies were wholly with the fugitive. Whatever his offense, so gallant a dash for liberty deserved to be successful. And yet he could scarcely hope to escape with twenty men at his heels.

Once a chorus of frantic yells came to me from the grove, and I thought for a time that the chase was ended. But the moments passed, and I saw no sign of either the fugitive or his pursuers. Perhaps he had eluded them after all; or perhaps they were pushing across the country after him. In either event it was useless for me to tarry longer; it was time for me to be getting forward if I wished to reach Châtellerault, as I had planned, by nightfall. Only I should have liked to say good-by to Sergeant Dubosq. There was about the man a fascination, an air of deviltry, that pleased me. Perhaps at another time I might even have found myself listening to his words, but now——

“Sit still, monsieur,” said a low voice just behind me; and I started round to find myself looking down the long barrel of a pistol above which gleamed two eyes, blue and cold as steel. “I was moved to shoot you,” he went on evenly, “as the shortest way out; but after all I am not a murderer. I will give you one chance. I must have your horse. Give me your word of honor to sit there quietly, and you are safe; refuse,”—and he made a menacing little motion with his pistol.

There could be no doubting his earnestness. One glance at that resolute countenance convinced me that its owner would not hesitate to carry out his threat. But to lose my horse——

“Come,” he said; “decide quickly. Faith, the choice ought not to be difficult;” and he laughed grimly.

“Take the horse, monsieur,” I said, in a voice trembling with rage and chagrin. “But my hour will come!”

He laughed again, put up his pistol, and came out upon the road.

As I watched him untie my horse, I realized suddenly all that this loss would mean to me, and a blind impulse seized me to rush upon him and run him through. I think I must have yielded to it, in spite of my passed word, had he not seemed to trust it so implicitly. For he even turned his back to me as he bent to adjust the stirrups.

He seemed in no haste—indeed, I was apparently far more excited than he—and I had time to admire the erect figure, the easy carriage, the grace of movement. Dubosq had spoken truly when he had pointed out that no one could mistake me for this finished cavalier. He sprang to the saddle with superb unconcern and paused for a look about him. He was even humming a song.

“Ah, there they come,” he said, and following his eye, I saw Dubosq and his men burst from the grove and come charging across the field. “At last they have discovered how I eluded them! Blockheads! Adieu, monsieur.”

“Till we meet again,” I corrected.

He laughed blithely.

“As you will,” he said, and gathered up the reins. “Whither are you bound?” he added, turning back to me.

“To Poitiers,” I answered.

“Then we may indeed meet again;” and waving his hand to his enemies, who by this time were very near, he set spur to flank and galloped away down the road.

A shower of bullets followed him, but he kept on apparently unhurt, and in a moment more was out of gunshot.

Dubosq came panting up, his men at his heels. He was fairly livid. He stopped for an instant to shake his fist at the cloud of dust far down the road. Then he turned to me.

“Traitor!” he cried, hoarsely. “Aristocrat!” And I saw how the great veins stood out across his forehead. “So you had the effrontery to wait for me!”

“Assuredly,” I replied, as calmly as I could, “since you requested it.”

He glared at me for a moment with bloodshot eyes. Then he turned to his men.

“Secure him!” he said. “We will let him espouse Madame Guillotine.”

And before I could open my lips to protest, my hands were lashed behind me.

CHAPTER II.
IN AN ENEMY I FIND A FRIEND.

For an instant I was too astonished to resist; then the indignity of it—the indignity of the strong and cruel hands which seized and held me—swept over me like flame, and I shook off my assailants and faced Dubosq.

“Loose me!” I cried, struggling furiously with my bonds. “Loose me! I demand that you loose me!”

Dubosq laughed sardonically.

“At your service,” he sneered. “Any other orders?”

I realized how impotent I was, and the knowledge struck chill to my heart. Dubosq could stand me up at the side of the road and order me shot, and no one would question or protest. He had only to give the word. I felt as the wild beast feels caught in a sudden trap.

“But this is an outrage!” I protested thickly, striving to still the trembling of my lips; for I was young—remember always, my reader, that I was young and new to the world.

Dubosq stood regarding me, gnawing his mustache savagely. I dare say the trembling lip did not escape him.

“Outrage or not,” he growled, “you are under arrest, citizen.”

“And for what?” I demanded.

“As an accomplice of the ci-devant Favras.”

My astonishment was so overwhelming that even he discerned it.

“Of course you are innocent,” he sneered.

“Citizen Dubosq,” I said slowly, “I give you my word of honor that I have never before even heard of the person you mention. As for being his accomplice, that is too absurd to discuss.”

“It is strange, then,” commented Dubosq, grimly, “that you should have been so complaisant as to permit him to ride away upon your horse. But no doubt you have an explanation. There is always an explanation.”

“Oh!” I cried, understanding suddenly and looking down the empty road. “So that was the ci-devant Favras! I am glad to know his name, for I have an account to settle with him. So far from permitting him to take the horse, I had an impulse to murder him.”

“And why did you not?” Dubosq demanded. “That would at least have saved your own neck.”

“I had given him my word,” I explained, and related the dilemma in which I had found myself. “But even then,” I concluded, “I would have killed him had he not turned his back.”

Dubosq listened, looking at me keenly. At the last words he nodded, almost imperceptibly, as though he understood. Then he glanced moodily away across the field.

I followed his eyes and saw approaching us from the grove two men bearing the body of a third.

“Is that his work?” I asked.

“Yes,” said Dubosq; and fell silent until the bearers reached the road and placed the body on the grass beneath the tree. I saw with a shudder that the man had been stabbed in the back.

“Yes,” repeated Dubosq fiercely, “that is his work. He crept upon him from behind and struck him down. He did not hesitate because his victim’s back was turned. Oh, these traitors, these aristocrats, with their talk of honor!” and he shook his clenched fists above his head.

“But how did he escape?” I queried, for even yet I did not understand.

“How did he escape?” yelled Dubosq, his face purple. “He escaped because his wits are better than ours. There is that to be said for the aristocrats—their wits are better than ours, clods that we are! He murdered this man——”

“Not murder, citizen,” I interrupted. “Not that—self-defense.”

“Self-defense!” roared Dubosq. “In the back? Murder, I say! Then shielding himself in that ditch yonder, he worked his way back to the road, mounted your horse and was off, while we were blundering around in that little grove. I should have thought of the ditch;” and he stood glowering at it. “I did—too late! I disgust myself!”

“And I suffer in consequence,” I added. “Come, my friend, confess that you believe my story. Look at me. I am no conspirator—in your heart you know it. If I had been the friend of that fellow, I would have ridden away behind him; certainly I should not have remained here waiting for your return. To revenge yourself on me because your trap has failed—that is unworthy of you. Besides I have suffered enough already—and for no fault.”

He looked at me for a moment, and his face softened. I saw that the storm was over.

“I believe you, citizen,” he said; “you are free,” and he whipped out his knife and cut my bonds.

For thanks I held out my hand and he gripped it warmly.

“Come,” he urged, “join my troop, pin on the tri-color, and I will make a man of you.”

But I shook my head.

“No, my friend,” I said, “an errand of honor calls me to Poitiers.”

He looked at me with renewed suspicion.

“Which reminds me,” he added, “that you have not yet told me the nature of that errand.”

“I will tell you,” I said, “as a friend;” and I whispered a swift sentence in his ear.

He burst out laughing, his good humor restored in an instant.

“Well, go your way,” he said, slapping me on the shoulder, “and good luck go with you. At the fête, citizen, drink a health to old Dubosq. As for me, I have the pleasant duty of burying my dead, and reporting to my superiors that I am a fool and that the trap is empty;” and he glowered angrily down the road, his mustache drooping dismally.

“Your turn will come,” I urged. “Or if not yours, mine—of that I am certain.”

“Yes,” he agreed, with a growl, “I will yet get my hands on him, and when I do, he will have reason to remember it. Adieu, citizen,” he added. “My compliments to the lady. Come, my children, march!” And he and his soldiers set off toward Tours, bearing their dead with them.

I watched them for a few moments with something like regret. After all, Dubosq had spoken truly. I had seen little of the world, and he had offered me a chance to see more in gallant company. I could not but admit that he would have made an admirable guide and companion. If his cockade were only white! But even then I could not have followed him. For I was not free—another duty lay before me. Would I ever be free, I wondered—free to march away whither I listed, to live a man’s life and grow to man’s stature? Or would I always be tied to some woman’s petticoat, imprisoned in a trivial round of daily duties, as were so many men? Was I on this journey simply exchanging one petticoat for another?

With such thoughts for companions,—surely less pleasant than Dubosq!—I turned my face again to the south, and strode along with such speed as my legs could compass. I am not fond of foot-exercise, and it was not at all in this ridiculous fashion that I had thought to make the journey to Poitiers. Besides there was need that my entry into that city should be made with a certain dignity, and I knew well that the whole contents of my purse would not purchase a new horse, to say nothing of a new equipment.

For the horse was not all that I had lost. In the holsters of the saddle was a pair of handsome pistols which had belonged to my father, and in the portmanteau strapped behind it an array of gallant clothing such as I had never possessed before, and would in all likelihood never again possess. As to replenishing my purse, I remembered only too acutely how my mother had pinched herself for months to provide me with this outfit. No, decidedly, to repair this misfortune I had only my own prowess to depend upon, and I am free to say that it was not of a quality greatly to enhearten me. Certainly my first adventure in the world had ended most disastrously.

So I trudged on, looking neither to the right nor to the left, turning my misfortune over in my mind, and recalling the good points of my horse,—a friend and companion almost since my boyhood,—the comfort of my saddle, and the beauties of my wardrobe, as a starving man will picture to himself the savory details of some banquet he has enjoyed in happier days. And I almost found it in my heart to regret that I had not struck the robber down in that moment when he had dared to turn his back upon me.

There were few people on the road, but such as I met stared at me curiously, evidently unable to understand how it was that a young fellow so gallantly arrayed should be footing it through the dust with sour countenance. This of course served only to increase my spleen, and ended in my pulling my hat over my eyes and trudging on without glancing up, even at the rustle of a petticoat. I know not how great a distance I covered in this fashion, but at last the sun, rising high in the heavens, beat down upon me with such ardor that my head began to swim dizzily. I looked about for shelter, and seeing just ahead of me a little cluster of mean houses, hastened my steps in the hope that there might be an inn among them.

So indeed there proved to be. But when I came to the threshold of the low, ill-smelling room, dark almost as a dungeon even in full day, I hesitated, for I was armed only with sword and dagger and it was impossible to see what lay within. Decidedly I had no wish to risk my purse, and perhaps my life as well, for the sake of a bottle of bad wine.

But a gay voice encouraged me.

“Enter, monsieur,” it called. “I was awaiting you.”

And as my eyes grew somewhat accustomed to the darkness, I descried, seated at a table in one corner, my enemy, my despoiler, smiling at me as though he were my dearest friend.

“Come,” he added, “join me;” and such was the wizardry of his voice and the gesture which accompanied it, that whatever my reluctance, I could not but obey.

“What is your name, monsieur?” he asked, as I took the seat opposite his; and he smiled again as he caught my glance.

“Jean de Tavernay,” I answered; “and, monsieur, I have to say to you——”

“One moment,” he broke in, holding up his hand. “My name perhaps you have already heard?”

“Yes, if you are who the Republicans said you were.”

“And that was?”

“One M. de Favras.”

“They are not at your heels?”

“No, they returned to Tours.”

“Disappointed?”

“Extremely so.”

He laughed, then grew suddenly sober and knitted his brows in thought, which I somehow dared not interrupt. After all, there was no cause for haste. He could not escape me.

“It looked like a trap,” he said, at last.

“It was a trap,” I assured him.

“And set for me?”

“I believe so.”

He pondered this a moment longer, then put it from him.

“No matter,” he said. “Why waste thought on a trap from which one has escaped? And now, M. de Tavernay, to your affair. I see the words which are trembling on your lips; I read the thought which is passing in your mind. You would say that I have not used you as one gentleman uses another. I admit it. You are thinking that now you will revenge yourself. I do not blame you. I owe you an apology for treating you in the fashion that I did. But it was with me a question of life or death. I had no alternative. And I assure you,” he added, smiling grimly, “I should not have hesitated to kill you had you chosen to resist. I gave you a chance for your life merely because I saw that you were not a Republican, but a traveller like myself. Had you worn the tri-color, nothing would have saved you.”

“All of which I saw in your eyes, monsieur,” I said. “It was for that reason I did not resist.”

“Well,” he asked, looking at me, “which is it, monsieur—an apology and this bottle of wine, or our swords back of the cabaret? For myself, I hope it is the former. But it is for you to choose.”

There was a kindness in his tone not to be resisted, an authority in his glance and in the expression of his face which bore in upon me anew my own youth and inexperience.

“The wine, monsieur,” I said. “The other would be folly.”

He nodded and filled our glasses, then raised his to his lips.

“To our better acquaintance,” he said, and we drank the toast. I was beginning to wonder how I had ever been so blind as to think this man an enemy.

“There was one moment,” I confessed, “when you were in some danger.”

“I saw it,” he said quietly. “It was for that reason I turned my back to you.”

I stared at him in amazement.

“To help you overcome temptation,” he explained. “One gentleman does not break his word by stabbing another in the back.”

A warm flush of pleasure sprang to my cheeks. Then a sudden vision rose before me of a limp body in Republican uniform——

“But you——” I stopped, confused, conscious that I was uttering my thought aloud, and that the thought was not a pleasant one.

“Ah,” he went on, smiling sadly, “you would say that I stabbed that poor fellow in the back. Believe me, monsieur, I should have preferred a thousand times to meet him face to face. But I had no choice. A moment’s delay, and I should have been taken. So I hardened my heart and struck.”

“Pardon me, monsieur,” I murmured.

He nodded, the shadow still on his face.

“Fortune of war,” he said, with affected lightness. “We must make the best of it. And now, M. de Tavernay,” he added, rising, “you will find your horse awaiting you outside yonder door, as fresh as when you started with him from Tours. I have secured another in a less peremptory way than I found necessary to adopt with you. It is foolhardy for me to linger here. I must push on at once. But you may be weary, you may wish to avoid the heat of the day; you may, in a word, prefer to continue your journey alone and at your leisure. If so, farewell; but if you are ready to go on, I assure you that I shall be very glad of your company.”

“Thank you, monsieur,” I said, my decision taken on the instant. “I am quite ready to go.”

“Good! come then,” and throwing a gold-piece on the table he started toward the door.

Not until that instant did I remember that the inn must have a keeper, and that the keeper would have ears, which he had no doubt kept wide open during all this talk. I looked around for him, and as though guessing my thought, he shambled slowly forward from a dark corner—as ill-favored a villain as I ever saw.

“Is there anything else monsieur wishes?” he asked, looking at me with a glance so venomous that I recoiled as though a snake had struck at me.

“No,” I stammered, “except to tell you that there is your money.”

He picked up the coin without a word and spun it in his hand, while I hastened after my companion, anxious to escape from that sinister place into the clear day. I found him awaiting me just outside the door.

“Our horses will be here in a moment,” he said. “I have sent for them.”

“I shall breathe more freely when I am in the saddle and well away from here,” I answered. “There is a fellow back yonder who is longing to assassinate both of us.”

“Our host?” and he laughed lightly. “I noticed him. He is like all the others—they would all jump to assassinate us, if they dared.”

“This one looked particularly wolfish.”

“They are all wolfish, and like the wolf arrant cowards, save when they hunt in pack.”

“But if he overheard?”

“Perhaps we were a little indiscreet,” he agreed, sober for an instant. “But one peril more or less—what does it matter?” he added, with a shrug. “Here are the horses. Permit me to return you yours, with apologies and thanks.”

“I am rejoiced to get him back,” I said, patting his nose.

“The pleasure seems to be mutual,” observed my companion; and indeed there was no mistaking the joy in the eyes of my old friend. “You would better look over your belongings,” he added. “There are thieves about.”

But I found that nothing had been disturbed. My pistols were in their holsters, and my portmanteau was still strapped behind the saddle.

“Then let us be off,” said M. de Favras.

Not until we were well out of the village and cantering briskly toward the south with a clear road behind us, did I feel at ease. Then I took my chin from my shoulder and directed an admiring gaze at my companion—would I ever acquire such an air? He caught my glance and smiled.

“Where had you intended spending the night, M. de Tavernay?” he inquired.

“At Châtellerault,” I said.

“But you cannot hope to reach Châtellerault to-day,” he protested, “after the delay which I have caused you. You must be my guest to-night. My château is just beyond Dange. I will see you on your way at daybreak to-morrow, and you can reach Poitiers with ease by sunset. I hope you will accept, my friend,” he went on, seeing that I hesitated, “if only that I may feel you have wholly forgiven me. Besides,” he added, with an air of finality, “it is folly to travel unattended in this country after nightfall. It is overrun with brigands who shout for liberty, equality, fraternity, only to conceal their crimes.”

Truth to tell, I needed no urging. I tried to stammer something of the pleasure the invitation gave me, but he stopped me with a kind little wave of the hand.

“For the past month I have been in the Bocage,” he went on, when that was settled. “Ah, if you would see true heroism, my friend, you must go there. A devoted people, fighting for their homes and for their faith, under leaders the most heroic that army ever had. It is against those peasants of La Vendée that this cursed carnival of slaughter will wreck itself.”

His face was alight with enthusiasm, his eyes shining with deep emotion.

“They are carrying all before them,” he went on, more calmly. “To-day, they are mere scattered peasants, working in their fields. To-morrow, they are an army of fifty thousand, springing from the very ground to smite the enemy. They shoot him down from behind their hedges, they put him to the sword, they send him staggering back to his barracks, all but annihilated. Then the next day, if there is no more fighting, they are back again with their flocks and herds. It recalls that golden age of Greece when every man was eager to give his life for his country.”

“But surely,” I objected, “trained troops should be able easily to stand against them.”

“They have not yet done so,” he retorted. “We have taken Les Herbiers, Montaigu, Chantonnay, Cholet and Vihiers, one after the other, like shaking ripe plums from a tree. After all, victory depends not so much upon organization or generalship, or even numbers, as upon the spirit of the men themselves. The army which goes into a battle with each individual unit of it bent on victory wins the victory. The army which fights half-heartedly loses. That is the history of every battle. The people of the Bocage are fighting for their homes and their religion—their souls are in the conflict, and they will never admit themselves defeated until the last man has been slain. Within a month the Blues will have been driven completely from Vendée, and the King will reign there;” and at the words he crossed himself. “‘God and the King’ is our watchword.”

He saw the question in the glance I turned upon him.

“You are wondering,” he said, “why at such a time I should have left the army. Two nights since I received a message that my wife was dangerously ill—dying even. The army will be victorious without me—but my wife——”

He stopped. I understood and nodded gently.

“Only that could have brought me away,” he added—“the certainty that she needed me. I started at once but found the Blues in force at Coulonges. I attempted to turn aside and at once lost my way amid the innumerable and abominable roads with which that country is cursed. I was forced finally to ride on to Chinon and then along the Loire, for it seemed as though every road was blocked by the enemy. I should have reached the château last night, and behold me only this far;” and he pricked his horse savagely and galloped forward.

I followed, and for a time we held the pace without exchanging a word, he busy with his own thoughts, and I wrapped in contemplation of the marvellous turn of fortune which had not only restored me all that I had lost, but which had also given me the friendship of a man like this. I looked at him from time to time, admiring more than ever the fine face and graceful figure. He was, I judged, not over thirty; but there was something in the glance of his eye, in the set of his lips, which told me that he had played his part in the world for many years. Perhaps the time was at hand when I should play my part, too.

At last we drew rein to give our horses breath, and my companion pointed out to me some of the features of the country. To our right was the gentle valley of the Vienne, and finally we dipped into it and crossed the river at a ford.

“Now I am at home,” he said, looking about with a smile of pleasure. “But in this case home is not without its dangers, for I may be recognized at any turn, and the adventure of this morning warns me to be careful. At the village, there may even be another detachment of Republicans. So I think it would be wise to turn aside and take that path yonder, by which we shall not only avoid the town but come directly to my estate.”

“Very well, monsieur,” I agreed; and in another moment we had plunged among the trees.

The soft earth of the wood, with its carpet of leaves, deadened the sound of our horses’ hoofs and we went on silently among the shadows for some time. Then we turned abruptly to the left, the wood opened, and again I saw the river gleaming before us.

“There is the château,” he said suddenly, and following his gesture I saw a lofty tower rising above the trees. “That tower,” he added, smiling, “is my heritage from an amorous ancestor, who built it some hundreds of years ago to shelter a fair lady, whom a rival coveted. The tower was designed to withstand attack—and did withstand it—so the lady remained in our family and helped perpetuate it. That brave Marquis de Favras, who died so gallantly on the Place de Grève two years ago, belonged to that branch; so you see we have no reason to be ashamed of it, however irregular its origin. There is the modern wing,” he added, as we came out suddenly upon the road, “built by my father.”

It was a handsome building of white stone, and as we approached it I saw two ladies strolling upon the terrace which ran across its front. At the gate, a man, swart and heavy-set, stood for a moment eyeing us.

“Ah, Pasdeloup!” cried my companion; and at the word the man sprang to the gate and threw it back with a clang, his face beaming. “Alert as ever!” added his master, waved his hand to him and galloped past, while the other gazed after him with something very like adoration transfiguring his rough countenance.

At the sound of our horses’ hoofs upon the gravelled road, the ladies turned and looked toward us. Then one of them flew down the steps, her hands outstretched, her face alight.

“Madame!” cried my companion. “Madame!” and he threw himself from his horse and caught her to his heart.

CHAPTER III.
I FALL INTO A PLEASANT BONDAGE.

“Then you are not ill?” my friend was saying, as I dismounted and drew near. “You are not dying? Thank God for that!”

“Ill?” echoed the lady. “Dying? Nonsense! Look at me!”

“You are adorable!” he cried, and kissed the hands he held in his.

“Sad I have been,” she went on, blushing but still gazing fondly up at him. “That was because you were away from me, in danger yonder. Yet I tried to be brave, for I knew that you were serving your country and that you would not forget me.”

“Forget you!” he repeated; and my own heart warmed in sympathy as he gazed down at her, his eyes alight. Ah, here was no match prearranged no marriage of convenience, but a true mating. So true that there could be about it no false pride, no dissimulation or pretense of indifference; so true that it was still the lover talking to his mistress, as well as the husband talking to his wife.

I know it is the custom in certain circles in the great cities to sneer at all this—to seek love anywhere but in the family circle; but we of the provinces are not like that. Do not think it. We live closer to the heart of things—closer to nature, closer to each other, closer to the good God—and I think we are sounder at core.

“But I had a message saying you were ill,” he continued. “You did not send it, then?”

“No; but I bless the sender since it has brought you back to me.”

“And not alone,” he added, remembering my presence. “Permit me to present to you, madame, M. de Tavernay. I began by stealing his horse and ended by gaining his friendship. Be kind to him. Monsieur, this is my wife, Madame la Comtesse de Favras.”

She held out her hand to me with a charming smile, but her eyes and thoughts were only for her husband, nor could I find it in my heart to blame her, for, beside him, I was so crude, so ordinary, worth scarcely a passing glance. Indeed, I was myself somewhat confused at the revelation of my friend’s distinguished title and bowed over her hand awkwardly enough.

“You are welcome, monsieur,” she said. “At dinner we must hear the story of these adventures. You have no doubt been all day in the saddle—you need rest, refreshment. Come—but first you must meet my guest;” and she led the way toward the terrace where her companion awaited us.

“What fortune!” cried M. le Comte, as he sprang up the steps, and in another moment he was kissing the cheek of a lady, young, divinely fair, as I saw in the single glance I dared take at her, who blushed most becomingly as she received his salute.

“My dear,” he added, “this is M. de Tavernay. I have already asked Madame la Comtesse to be kind to him. With you, I can only beg that you will not be cruel. M. de Tavernay, this is Mlle. de Chambray, who permits you to kiss her hand.”

As I bowed before her and touched her fingers with lips not wholly steady, I was suddenly conscious of the dust and travel-stains which covered me, head to foot. She would think me ridiculous, no doubt; but when I summoned courage to glance up at her, I was astonished to see that her face was scarlet, and that she was staring at me with startled eyes. Then she withdrew her hand and turned hastily away, her shoulders shaking convulsively, and I felt my own cheeks grow red.

Luckily our friends were too engrossed in each other to perceive this bit of comedy—or perhaps tragedy would, from my standpoint, be the better word. A moment later, my ears still burning, I stalked stiffly away after the man to whom I had been entrusted, through a vestibule, up a wide flight of stairs, and into a spacious room overlooking the gardens at the back of the house.

“Dinner is at eight,” said the man. “If there is anything monsieur requires he will ring the bell yonder;” and after unstrapping my portmanteau and glancing around to assure himself that everything was right, he left the room and closed the door behind him.

The instant I was alone, dignity and self-control fell from me like a mantle, and flinging myself into a chair, I stared blindly out through the open window. The garden was a formal one in the Italian style, not large, but elegantly planned, and sloping gently to the margin of the river, which seemed here both broad and deep. Beyond it was a tangle of trees and shrubbery, and farther away, upon the side of a little hill, were the white houses of a village, their windows bright with the rays of the setting sun.

But it was at none of these things I looked—though I see them now as plainly as if they were here before me—for my eyes were turned inward at the tumult in my own bosom, and my brain was wondering numbly why it was that my life, heretofore so bright, had turned suddenly so gray; that the green valleys of the future had changed to sandy, barren wastes; that the very savor of living was as dust in my throat. I had glanced for an instant into a pair of startled eyes, and that instant had struck the boyish carelessness from my heart as with a blow.

But at last I shook the feeling off—or perhaps it was only the warm blood of youth asserting itself—and when the man came with the candles I could proceed with my toilet with almost, if not quite, my old calmness. When it was finished I turned to the glass and contemplated the reflection there. Fresh the face undoubtedly was, and if not handsome, at least not grotesque; but with the memory of my host before me I thought it absurdly boyish. The figure, while erect enough, had not that easy poise I had marked in him, nor did the garments in which I had arrayed myself fall into those natural and graceful lines which somehow stamp the finished gentleman. As I stared gloomily at myself I recalled the careless words of Sergeant Dubosq. Yes, he was right; he had hit the mark—I was too young, too pink and white, too much of the country.

Comforting myself as well as I could with the thought that time would remedy these defects, I turned away, opened the door and went down the stair. Beyond the vestibule was the saloon, a circular marble room, extremely elegant and well-furnished, and still beyond this the drawing-room, with four large paintings of the French victories of 1744 upon the walls. There was no one in either room, and I was examining the paintings, which no doubt pictured events in which the father of my host had taken part, and which appeared to me of splendid execution, when I heard the rustling of skirts behind me. I turned to perceive Mlle. de Chambray upon the threshold, and the fear of her ridicule was swept away in the burst of happiness at seeing her again.

“Oh, is it you, M. de Tavernay?” she said, hesitating and coloring divinely.

“Yes, it is I, mademoiselle,” I answered, trembling at this first time that she had ever addressed me.

“And alone?” she added, with a quick glance about the room. “It is strange that madame is not down.”

“She and M. le Comte doubtless have much to say to each other,” I hastened to explain, for I too thought it strange—though the rack itself could not have wrung the admission from me.

“Yes—no doubt,” she agreed, but she was plainly not convinced, and still hesitated on the threshold.

“It would be cruel to interrupt them,” I added. “Besides, I assure you that I am quite harmless.”

This time she permitted her glance to dwell upon me for an instant, and I caught the perfect contour of her face.

“I am not so sure of that,” she retorted, “unless your appearance is most deceptive. I think I would better join madame;” and she made a motion toward the door.

“If there is any oath I can swear, mademoiselle,” I protested, “prescribe it—I will take it gladly. I will agree to sit here in this corner, if you wish it.”

“Oh, you will?” she said; and looked at me doubtfully, but with a glimmer of mischief in her eye.

“Yes, mademoiselle; I am capable even of that heroism.”

“I hear that you surrendered rather easily this morning,” she taunted.

“There was a pistol at my ear,” I explained, “and the face of M. le Comte behind it. I saw no reason to throw away my life for nothing more important than a horse. I am doubly glad now that I was so sensible.”

She looked at me, her brows uplifted.

“Life means more to me now than it did this morning,” I hastened to explain. “Oh, vastly more! So I rejoice that I am not lying back there on the road with a bullet through me. Even had M. le Comte missed me, I should not be here.”

“He would not have missed. A pistol in the hands of M. le Comte is a dangerous thing.”

“I have never encountered but one thing more dangerous, mademoiselle.”

“And that?”

“A pair of brown eyes, levelled at me by a person who knows their power,” I answered, and trembled at my temerity.