A Gentleman of France

S >> Stanley Weyman >> A Gentleman of France

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I had scarcely time to identify him before he walked down the
steps swinging his cane, brushed carelessly past me, and was
gone. The two men looked after him awhile, shading their lights
from the wind, and one saying something, the other laughed
coarsely. The next moment they threw the door to and went, as I
saw by the passage of their light, into the room on the left of
the hall.

Now was my time. I could have hoped for, prayed for, expected no
better fortune than this. The door had rebounded slightly from
the jamb, and stood open an inch or more. In a second I pushed
it from me gently, slid into the hall, and closed it behind me.

The door of the room on the left was wide open, and the light
which shone through the doorway--otherwise the hall was dark--as
well as the voices of the two men I had seen, warned me to be
careful. I stood, scarcely daring to breathe, and looked about
me. There was no matting on the floor, no fire on the hearth.
The hall felt cold, damp, and uninhabited. The state staircase
rose in front of me, and presently bifurcating, formed a gallery
round the place. I looked up, and up, and far above me, in the
dim heights of the second floor, I espied a faint light--perhaps,
the reflection of a light.

A movement in the room on my left warned me that I had no time to
lose, if I meant to act. At any minute one of the men might come
out and discover me. With the utmost care I started on my
journey. I stole across the stone floor of the hall easily and
quietly enough, but I found the real difficulty begin when I came
to the stairs. They were of wood, and creaked and groaned under
me to such an extent that, with each step I trod, I expected the
men to take the alarm. Fortunately all went well until I passed
the first corner--I chose, of course, the left-hand flight--then
a board jumped under my foot with a crack which sounded in the
empty hall, and to my excited ears, as loud as a pistol-shot. I
was in two minds whether I should not on the instant make a rush
for it, but happily I stood still. One of the men came out and
listened, and I heard the other ask, with an oath, what it was.
I leant against the wall, holding my breath.

'Only that wench in one of her tantrums!' the man who had come
out answered, applying an epithet to her which I will not set
down, but which I carried to his account in the event of our
coming face to face presently. 'She is quiet now. She may
hammer and hammer, but--'

The rest I lost, as he passed through the doorway and went back
to his place by the fire. But in one way his words were of
advantage to me. I concluded that I need not be so very cautious
now, seeing that they would set down anything they heard to the
same cause; and I sped on more quickly, I had just gained the
second floor landing when a loud noise below--the opening of the
street door and the heavy tread of feet in the hall--brought me
to a temporary standstill. I looked cautiously over the
balustrade, and saw two men go across to the room on the left.
One of them spoke as he entered, chiding the other knaves, I
fancied, for leaving the door unbarred; and the tone, though not
the words, echoing sullenly up the staircase, struck a familiar
chord in my memory. The voice was Fresnoy's!

CHAPTER X.

THE FIGHT ON THE STAIRS.

The certainty, which this sound gave me, that I was in the right
house, and that it held also the villain to whom I owed all my
misfortunes--for who but Fresnoy could have furnished the broken
coin which had deceived mademoiselle?--had a singularly
inspiriting effect upon me. I felt every muscle in my body grow
on the instant; hard as steel, my eyes more keen, my ears
sharper--all my senses more apt and vigorous. I stole off like a
cat from the balustrade, over which I had been looking, and
without a second's delay began the search for mademoiselle's
room; reflecting that though the garrison now amounted to four, I
had no need to despair. If I could release the prisoners without
noise--which would be easy were the key in the lock--we might
hope to pass through the hall by a tour de force of one kind or
another. And a church-clock at this moment striking Five, and
reminding me that we had only half an hour in which to do all and
reach the horses, I was the more inclined to risk something.

The light which I had seen from below hung in a flat-bottomed
lantern just beyond the head of the stairs, and outside the
entrance to one of two passages which appeared to lead to the
back part of the house. Suspecting that M. de Bruhl's business
had lain with mademoiselle, I guessed that the light had been
placed for his convenience. With this clue and the position of
the window to guide me, I fixed on a door on the right of this
passage, and scarcely four paces from the head of the stairs.
Before I made any sign, however, I knelt down and ascertained
that there was a light in the room, and also that the key was not
in the lock.

So far satisfied, I scratched on the door with my finger-nails,
at first softly, then with greater force, and presently I heard
someone in the room rise. I felt sure that the person whoever it
was had taken the alarm and was listening, and putting my lips to
the keyhole I whispered mademoiselle's name.

A footstep crossed the room sharply, and I heard muttering just
within the door. I thought I detected two voices. But I was
impatient, and, getting no answer, whispered in the same manner
as before, 'Mademoiselle de la Vire, are you there?'

Still no answer. The muttering, too, had stopped, and all was
still--in the room, and in the silent house. I tried again. 'It
is I, Gaston de Marsac,' I said. 'Do you hear? I am come to
release you.' I spoke as loudly as I dared, but most of the
sound seemed to come back on me and wander in suspicious
murmurings down the staircase.

This time, however, an exclamation of surprise rewarded me, and a
voice, which I recognised at once as mademoiselle's, answered
softly:

'What is it? Who is there?'

'Gaston de Marsac,' I answered. 'Do you need my help?'

The very brevity of her reply; the joyful sob which accompanied
it, and which I detected even through the door; the wild cry of
thankfulness--almost an oath--of her companion--all. these
assured me at once that I was welcome--welcome as I had never
been before--and, so assuring me, braced me to the height of any
occasion which might befall.

'Can you open the door? I muttered. All the time I was on my
knees, my attention divided between the inside of the room and
the stray sounds which now and then came up to me from the hall
below. 'Have you the key?'

'No; we are locked in,' mademoiselle answered.

I expected this. 'If the door is bolted inside,' I whispered,
'unfasten it, if you please!'

They answered that it was not, so bidding them stand back a
little from it, I rose and set my shoulder against it. I hoped
to be able to burst it in with only one crash, which by itself, a
single sound, might not alarm the men downstairs. But my weight
made no impression upon the lock, and the opposite wall being too
far distant to allow me to get any purchase for my feet, I
presently desisted. The closeness of the door to the jambs
warned me that an attempt to prise it open would be equally
futile; and for a moment I stood gazing in perplexity at the
solid planks, which bid fair to baffle me to the end.

The position was, indeed, one of great difficulty, nor can I now
think of any way out of it better or other than that which I
adopted. Against the wall near the head of the stairs I had
noticed, as I came up, a stout wooden stool. I stole out and
fetched this, and setting it against the opposite wall,
endeavoured in this way to get sufficient purchase for my feet.
The lock still held; but, as I threw my whole weight on the door,
the panel against which I leaned gave way and broke inwards with
a loud, crashing sound, which echoed through the empty house, and
might almost have been beard in the street outside.

It reached the ears, at any rate, of the men sitting below, and I
heard them troop noisily out and stand in the hall, now talking
loudly, and now listening. A minute of breathless suspense
followed--it seemed a long minute; and then, to my relief, they
tramped back again, and I was free to return to my task. Another
thrust, directed a little lower, would, I hoped, do the business;
but to make this the more certain I knelt down and secured the
stool firmly against the wall. As I rose after settling it,
something else, without sound or warning, rose also, taking me
completely by surprise--a man's head above the top stair, which,
as it happened, faced me. His eyes met mine, and I knew I was
discovered.

He turned and bundled downstairs again with a scared face, going
so quickly that I could not have caught him if I would, or had
had the wit to try. Of silence there was so longer need. In a
few seconds the alarm would be raised. I had small time for
thought. Laying myself bodily against the door, I heaved and
pressed with all my strength; but whether I was careless in my
haste, or the cause was other, the lock did not give. Instead
the stool slipped, and I fell with a crash on the floor at the
very moment the alarm reached the men below.

I remember that the crash of my unlucky fall seemed to release
all the prisoned noises of the house. A faint scream within the
room was but a prelude, lost the next moment in the roar of
dismay, the clatter of weapons, and volley of oaths and cries and
curses which, rolling up from below, echoed hollowly about me, as
the startled knaves rushed to their weapons, and charged across
the flags and up the staircase. I had space for one desperate
effort. Picking myself up, I seized the stool by two of its legs
and dashed it twice against the door, driving in the panel I had
before splintered. But that was all. The lock held, and I had
no time for a third blow. The men were already halfway up the
stairs. In a breath almost they would be upon me. I flung down
the useless stool and snatched up my sword, which lay unsheathed
beside me. So far the matter had gone against us, but it was
time for a change of weapons now, and the end was not yet. I
sprang to the head of the stairs and stood there, my arm by my
side and my point resting on the floor, in such an attitude of
preparedness as I could compass at the moment.

For I had not been in the house all this time, as may well be
supposed, without deciding what I would do in case of surprise,
and exactly where I could best stand on the defensive. The flat
bottom of the lamp which hung outside the passage threw a deep
shadow on the spot immediately below it, while the light fell
brightly on the steps beyond. Standing in the shadow I could
reach the edge of the stairs with my point, and swing the blade
freely, without fear of the balustrade; and here I posted myself
with a certain grim satisfaction as Fresnoy, with his three
comrades behind him, came bounding up the last flight.

They were four to one, but I laughed to see how, not abruptly,
but shamefacedly and by degrees, they came to a stand halfway up
the flight, and looked at me, measuring the steps and the
advantage which the light shining in their eyes gave me.
Fresnoy's ugly face was rendered uglier by a great strip of
plaister which marked the place where the hilt of my sword had
struck him in our last encounter at Chize; and this and the
hatred he bore to me gave a peculiar malevolence to his look.
The deaf man Matthew, whose savage stolidity had more than once
excited my anger on our journey, came next to him, the two
strangers whom I had seen in the hall bringing up the rear. Of
the four, these last seemed the most anxious to come to blows,
and had Fresnoy not barred the way with his hand we should have
crossed swords without parley.

'Halt, will you!' he cried, with an oath, thrusting one of them
back. And then to me he said, 'So, so, my friend! It is you, is
it?'

I looked at him in silence, with a scorn which knew no bounds,
and did not so much as honour him by raising my sword, though I
watched him heedfully.

'What are you doing here? he continued, with an attempt at
bluster.

Still I would not answer him, or move, but stood looking down at
him. After a moment of this, he grew restive, his temper being
churlish and impatient at the best. Besides, I think he retained
just so much of a gentleman's feelings as enabled him to
understand my contempt and smart under it. He moved a step
upward, his brow dark with passion.

'You beggarly son of a scarecrow!' he broke out on a sudden,
adding a string of foul imprecations, 'will you speak, or are you
going to wait to be spitted where you stand? If we once begin,
my bantam, we shall not stop until we have done your business!
If you have anything to say, say it, and--' But I omit the rest
of his speech, which was foul beyond the ordinary.

Still I did not move or speak, but looked at him unwavering,
though it pained me to think the women heard. He made a last
attempt.' Come, old friend,' he said, swallowing his anger
again, or pretending to do so, and speaking with a vile bonhomie
which I knew to be treacherous, 'if we come to blows we shall
give you no quarter. But one chance you shall have, for the sake
of old days when we followed Conde. Go! Take the chance, and
go. We will let you pass, and that broken door shall be the
worst of it. That is more,' he added with a curse, 'than I would
do for any other man in your place, M. de Marsac.'

A sudden movement and a low exclamation in the room behind me
showed that his words were heard there; and these sounds being
followed immediately by a noise as of riving wood, mingled with
the quick breathing of someone hard at work, I judged that the
women were striving with the door--enlarging the opening it might
be. I dared not look round, however, to see what progress they
made, nor did I answer Fresnoy, save by the same silent contempt,
but stood watching the men before me with the eye of a fencer
about to engage. And I know nothing more keen, more vigilant,
more steadfast than that.

It was well I did, for without signal or warning the group
wavered a moment, as though retreating, and the next instant
precipitated itself upon me. Fortunately, only two could engage
me at once, and Fresnoy, I noticed, was not of the two who dashed
forward up the steps. One of the strangers forced himself to the
front, and, taking the lead, pressed me briskly, Matthew
seconding him in appearance, while really watching for an
opportunity of running in and stabbing me at close quarters, a
manoeuvre I was not slow to detect.

That first bout lasted half a minute only. A fierce exultant joy
ran through me as the steel rang and grated, and I found that I
had not mistaken the strength of wrist or position. The men were
mine. They hampered one another on the stairs, and fought in
fetters, being unable to advance or retreat, to lunge with
freedom, or give back without fear. I apprehended greater danger
from Matthew than from my actual opponent, and presently,
watching my opportunity, disarmed the latter by a strong parade,
and sweeping Matthew's sword aside by the same movement, slashed
him across the forehead; then, drawing back a step, gave my first
opponent the point. He fell in a heap on the floor, as good as
dead, and Matthew, dropping his sword, staggered backwards and
downwards into Fresnoy's arms.

'Bonne Foi! France et Bonne Foi!' It seemed to me that I bad
not spoken, that I had plied steel in grimmest silence; and yet
the cry still rang and echoed in the roof as I lowered my point,
and stood looking grimly down at them. Fresnoy's face was
disfigured with rage and chagrin. They were now but two to one,
for Matthew, though his wound was slight, was disabled by the
blood which ran down into his eyes and blinded him. 'France et
Bonne Foi!'

'Bonne Foi and good sword!' cried a voice behind me. And
looking swiftly round, I saw mademoiselle's face thrust through
the hole in the door. Her eyes sparkled with a fierce light, her
lips were red beyond the ordinary, and her hair, loosened and
thrown into disorder by her exertions, fell in thick masses about
her white cheeks, and gave her the aspect of a war-witch, such as
they tell of in my country of Brittany. 'Good sword!' she cried
again, and clapped her hands.

'But better board, mademoiselle!' I answered gaily. Like most
of the men of my province, I am commonly melancholic, but I have
the habit of growing witty at such times as these. 'Now, M.
Fresnoy,' I continued, 'I am waiting your convenience. Must I
put on my cloak to keep myself warm?'

He answered by a curse, and stood looking at me irresolutely.
'If you will come down,' he said.

'Send your man away and I will come,' I answered briskly. 'There
is space on the landing, and a moderate light. But I must be
quick. Mademoiselle and I are due elsewhere, and we are late
already.'

Still he hesitated. Still he looked at the man lying at his feet
--who had stretched himself out and passed, quietly enough, a
minute before--and stood dubious, the most pitiable picture of
cowardice and malice--he being ordinarily a stout man--I ever
saw. I called him poltroon and white-feather, and was
considering whether I had not better go down to him, seeing that
our time must be up, and Simon would be quitting his post, when a
cry behind me caused me to turn, and I saw that mademoiselle was
no longer looking through the opening in the door.

Alarmed on her behalf, as I reflected that there might be other
doors to the room, and the men have other accomplices in the
house, I sprang to the door to see, but had basely time to send a
single glance round-the interior--which showed me only that the
room was still occupied--before Fresnoy, taking advantage of my
movement and of my back being turned, dashed up the stairs, with
his comrade at his heels, and succeeded in pinning me into the
narrow passage where I stood.

I had scarcely time, indeed, to turn and put myself on guard
before he thrust at me. Nor was that all. The superiority in
position no longer lay with me. I found myself fighting between
walls close to the opening in the door, through which the light
fell athwart my eyes, baffling and perplexing me. Fresnoy was
not slow to see the aid this gave him, and pressed me hard and
desperately; so that we played for a full minute at close
quarters, thrusting and parrying, neither of us having room to
use the edge, or time to utter word or prayer.

At this game we were so evenly matched that for a time the end
was hard to tell. Presently, however, there came a change. My
opponent's habit of wild living suited ill with a prolonged bout,
and as his strength and breath failed and he began to give ground
I discerned I had only to wear him out to have him at my mercy.
He felt this himself, and even by that light I saw the sweat
spring in great drops to his forehead, saw the terror grow in his
eyes. Already I was counting him a dead man and the victory
mine, when something hashed behind his blade, and his comrade's
poniard, whizzing past his shoulder, struck me fairly on the
chin, staggering me and hurling me back dizzy and half-stunned,
uncertain what had happened to me.

Sped an inch lower it, would have done its work and finished
mine. Even as it was, my hand going up as I reeled back gave
Fresnoy an opening, of which he was not slow to avail himself.
He sprang forward, lunging at me furiously, and would have run me
through there and then, and ended the matter, bad not his foot,
as he advanced, caught in the stool, which still lay against the
wall. He stumbled, his point missed my hip by a hair's breadth,
and he himself fell all his length on the floor, his rapier
breaking off short at the hilt.

His one remaining backer stayed to cast a look at him, and that
was all. The man fled, and I chased him as far as the head of
the stairs; where I left him, assured by the speed and agility he
displayed in clearing flight after flight that I had nothing to
fear from him. Fresnoy lay, apparently stunned, and completely
at my mercy. I stood an instant looking down at him, in two
minds whether I should not run him through. But the memory of
old days, when he had played his part in more honourable fashion
and shown a coarse good-fellowship in the field, held my hand;
and flinging a curse at him, I turned in anxious haste to the
door, the centre of all this bloodshed and commotion. The light
still shone through the breach in the panel, but for some
minutes--since Fresnoy's rush up the stairs, indeed--I had heard
no sound from this quarter. Now, looking in with apprehensions
which grew with the continuing silence, I learned the reason.
The room was empty!

Such a disappointment in the moment of triumph was hard to bear.
I saw myself, after all done and won, on the point of being again
outwitted, distanced, it might be fooled. In frantic haste and
excitement I snatched up the stool beside me, and, dashing it
twice against the lock, forced it at last to yield. The door
swung open, and I rushed into the room, which, abandoned by those
who had so lately occupied it, presented nothing to detain me. I
cast a single glance round, saw that it was squalid, low-roofed,
unfurnished, a mere prison; then swiftly crossing the floor, I
made for a door at the farther end, which my eye had marked from
the first. A candle stood flaring and guttering on a stool, and
as I passed I took it up.

Somewhat to my surprise the door yielded to my touch. In
trembling haste--for what might not befall the women while I
fumbled with doors or wandered in passages?--I flung it wide, and
passing through it, found myself at the head of a narrow, mean
staircase, leading, doubtless, to the servants' offices. At
this, and seeing no hindrance before me, I took heart of grace,
reflecting that mademoiselle might have escaped from the house
this way. Though it would now be too late to quit the city, I
might still overtake her, and all end well. Accordingly I
hurried down the stairs, shading my candle as I went from a cold
draught of air which met me, and grew stronger as I descended;
until reaching the bottom at last, I came abruptly upon an open
door, and an old, wrinkled, shrivelled woman.

The hag screamed at sight of me, and crouched down on the floor;
and doubtless, with my drawn sword, and the blood dripping from
my chin and staining all the front of my doublet, I looked fierce
and uncanny enough. But I felt it was no time for sensibility--I
was panting to be away--and I demanded of her sternly where they
were. She seemed to have lost her voice--through fear, perhaps
--and for answer only stared at me stupidly; but on my handling
my weapon with some readiness she so far recovered her senses as
to utter two loud screams, one after the other, and point to the
door beside her. I doubted her; and yet I thought in her terror
she must be telling the truth, the more as I saw no other door.
In any case I must risk it, so, setting the candle down on the
step beside her, I passed out.

For a moment the darkness was so intense that I felt my way with
my sword before me, in absolute ignorance where I was or on what
my foot might next rest. I was at the mercy of anyone who
chanced to be lying in wait for me; and I shivered as the cold
damp wind struck my cheek and stirred my hair. But by-and-by,
when I had taken two or three steps, my eyes grew accustomed to
the gloom, and I made, out the naked boughs of trees between
myself and the sky, and guessed that I was in a garden. My left
hand, touching a shrub, confirmed me in this belief, and in
another moment I distinguished something like the outline of a
path stretching away before me. Following it rapidly--as rapidly
as I dared--I came to a corner, as it seemed to me, turned it
blindly, and stopped short, peeping into a curtain of solid
blackness which barred my path, and overhead mingled confusedly
with the dark shapes of trees. But this, too, after a brief
hesitation, I made out to be a wall. Advancing to it with
outstretched hands, I felt the woodwork of a door, and, groping
about, lit presently on a loop of cord. I pulled at this, the
door yielded, and I went out.

I found myself in a narrow, dark lane, and looking up and down
discovered, what I might have guessed before, that it, was the
Ruelle d'Arcy. But mademoiselle? Fanchette? Simon? Where were
they? No one was to be seen, Tormented by doubts, I lifted up my
voice and called on them in turn; first on mademoiselle, then on
Simon Fleix. In vain; I got no answer. High up above me I saw,
as I stood back a little, lights moving in the house I had left;
and the suspicion that, after all, the enemy had foiled me grew
upon me. Somehow they had decoyed mademoiselle to another part
of the house, and then the old woman had misled me!

I turned fiercely to the door, which I had left ajar, resolved to
re-enter by the way I had come, and have an explanation whether
or no. To my surprise--for I had not moved six paces from the
door nor heard the slightest sound--I found it not; only closed
but bolted--bolted both at top and bottom, as I discovered on
trying it.

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