Complete weird tales of.., p.196
Complete Weird Tales of Robert W Chambers, page 196
My chase after Buckhurst began as soon as Colonel Jarras could summon me; and as Buckhurst had last been heard of in Strasbourg, I went after him on a train loaded with red-legged, uproarious soldiers, who sang all day:
“Have you seen Bismarck
Drinking in the gay café,
With that other brother spark —
Monsieur Badinguet?”
and had drunk themselves into a shameful frenzy long before the train thundered into Avricourt.
I tracked Buckhurst to Morsbronn, where I lost all traces of him; and now here I was with my orders concerning the unfortunate people at La Trappe, staring out at the dismal weather and wondering where my wild-goose chase would end.
I went to the door and called for the military telegraph operator, whose instrument I had been permitted to monopolize. He came, a pleasant, jaunty young fellow, munching a crust of dry bread and brushing the crumbs from his scarlet trousers. 17
“In case I want to communicate with you I’ll signal the tower on the Col du Pigeonnier,” I said. “Come up to the loft overhead.”
The loft in the house which had now been turned into a cavalry barracks was just above my room, a large attic under the dripping gables, black with the stains of centuries, littered with broken furniture, discarded clothing, and the odds and ends cherished by the thrifty Alsatian peasant, who never throws away anything from the day of his birth to the day of his death. And, given a long line of forefathers equally thrifty, and an ancient high-gabled house where his ancestors first began collecting discarded refuse, the attic of necessity was a marvel of litter and decay, among which generations of pigeons had built nests and raised countless broods of squealing squabs.
Into this attic we climbed, edged our way toward a high window out of which the leaded panes had long since tumbled earthward, and finally stood together, looking out over the mountains of the Alsatian frontier.
The rain had ceased; behind the Col du Pigeonnier sunshine fell through a rift in the watery clouds. It touched the rushing river, shining on foaming fords where our cavalry pickets were riding in the valley mist.
Somewhere up in the vineyards behind us an infantry band was playing; away among the wet hills to the left the strumming vibrations of wet drums marked the arrival of a regiment from goodness knows where; and presently we saw them, their gray overcoats and red trousers soaked almost black with rain, rifles en bandoulière, trudging patiently up the muddy slope above the town. Something in the plodding steps of those wet little soldiers touched me. Bravely their soaked drums battered away, bravely they dragged their clumsy feet after them, brightly and gayly the breaking sun touched their crimson forage-caps and bayonets and the swords of mounted officers; but to me they were only a pathetic troop of perplexed peasants, dragged out of the bosom of France to be huddled and herded in a strange pasture, where death watched them from the forest yonder, marking them for slaughter with near-sighted Teutonic eyes.
A column of white cloud suddenly capped the rocks on the vineyard above. Bang! and something came whistling with a curious, bird-like cry over the village of Morsbronn, flying far out across the valley: and among the pines of the Prussian forest a point of flame flashed, a distant explosion echoed.
Down in the street below us an old man came tottering from his little shop, peering sideways up into the sky.
“Il pleut, berger,” called out the operator beside me, in a bantering voice.
“It will rain — bullets,” said the old man, simply, and returned to his shop to drag out a chair on the doorsill and sit and listen to the shots which our cavalry outposts were exchanging with the Prussian scouts.
“Poor old chap,” said the operator; “it will be hard for him. He was with the Grand Emperor at Jena.”
“You speak as though our army was already on the run,” I said.
“Yes,” he replied, indifferently, “we’ll soon be on the run.”
After a moment I said: “I’m going to ride to La Trappe. I wish you would send those messages to Paris.”
“All right,” he said.
Half an hour later I rode out of Morsbronn, clad in the uniform of the Third Hussars, a disguise supposed to convey the idea to those at La Trappe that the army and not the police were responsible for their expulsion.
The warm August sunshine slanted in my face as I galloped away up the vineyard road and out on to the long plateau where, on every hillock, a hussar picket sat his wiry horse, carbine poised, gazing steadily toward the east.
Over the sombre Prussian forests mist hung; away to the north the sun glittered on the steel helmets and armor of the heavy cavalry, just arriving. And on the Col du Pigeonnier I saw tiny specks move, flags signalling the arrival of the Vicomte de Bonnemain with the “grosse cavalerie,” the splendid cuirassier regiments destined in a few hours to join the cuirassiers of Waterloo, riding into that bright Valhalla where all good soldiers shall hear the last trumpet call, “Dismount!”
With a lingering glance at the rivers which separated us from German soil, I turned my horse and galloped away into the hills.
A moist, fern-bordered wood road attracted me; I reasoned that it must lead, by a short cut, across the hills to the military highway which passed between Trois-Feuilles and La Trappe. So I took it, and presently came into four cross-roads unknown to me.
This grassy carrefour was occupied by a flock of turkeys, busily engaged in catching grasshoppers; their keeper, a prettily shaped peasant girl, looked up at me as I drew bridle, then quietly resumed the book she had been reading.
“My child,” said I, “if you are as intelligent as you are beautiful, you will not be tending other people’s turkeys this time next year.”
“Merci, beau sabreur!” said the turkey-girl, raising her blue eyes. Then the lashes veiled them; she bent her head a little, turning it so that the curve of her cheeks gave to her profile that delicate contour which is so suggestive of innocence when the ears are small and the neck white.
“My child,” said I, “will you kindly direct me, with appropriate gestures, to the military highway which passes the Château de la Trappe?”
* * *
II
THE GOVERNMENT INTERFERES
“THERE IS A short cut across that meadow,” said the young girl, raising a rounded, sun-tinted arm, bare to the shoulder.
“You are very kind,” said I, looking at her steadily.
“And, after that, you will come to a thicket of white birches.”
“Thank you, mademoiselle.”
“And after that,” she said, idly following with her blue eyes the contour of her own lovely arm, “you must turn to the left, and there you will cross a hill. You can see it from where we stand—”
She glanced at me over her outstretched arm. “You are not listening,” she said.
I shifted a troubled gaze to the meadow which stretched out all glittering with moist grasses and tufts of rain-drenched wild flowers.
The girl’s arm slowly fell to her side, she looked up at me again, I felt her eyes on me for a moment, then she turned her head toward the meadow.
A deadened report shook the summer air — the sound of a cannon fired very far away, perhaps on the citadel of Strasbourg. It was so distant, so indistinct, that here in this peaceful country it lingered only as a vibration; the humming of the clover bees was louder.
Without turning my head I said: “It is difficult to believe that there is war anywhere in the world — is it not, mademoiselle?”
“Not if one knows the world,” she said, indifferently.
“Do you know it, my child?”
“Sufficiently,” she said.
She had opened again the book which she had been reading when I first noticed her. From my saddle I saw that it was Molière. I examined her, in detail, from the tips of her small wooden shoes to the scarlet velvet-banded skirt, then slowly upward, noting the laced bodice of velvet, the bright hair under the butterfly coiffe of Alsace, the delicate outline of nose and brow and throat. The ensemble was theatrical.
“Why do you tend turkeys?” I asked.
“Because it pleases me,” she replied, raising her eyebrows in faint displeasure.
“For that same reason you read Monsieur Molière?” I suggested.
“Doubtless, monsieur.”
“Who are you?”
“Is a passport required in France?” she replied, languidly.
“Are you what you pretend to be, an Alsatian turkey tender?”
“Parbleu! There are my turkeys, monsieur.”
“Of course, and there is your peasant dress and there are your wooden shoes, and there also, mademoiselle, are your soft hands and your accented speech and your plays of Molière.”
“You are very wise for a hussar,” she said.
“Perhaps,” said I, “but I have asked you a question which remains parried.”
She balanced the hazel rod across her shoulders with a faintly malicious smile.
“One might almost believe that you are not a hussar, but an officer of the Imperial Police,” she said.
“‘ACROSS THAT MEADOW,’ SAID THE YOUNG GIRL”
“If you think that,” said I, “you should answer my question the sooner — unless you come from La Trappe. Do you?”
“Sometimes.”
“Oh! And what do you do at the Château de la Trappe?”
“I tend poultry — sometimes,” she replied.
“And at other times?”
“I do other things, monsieur.”
“What things?”
“What things? Mon Dieu, I read a little, as you perceive, monsieur.”
“Who are you?” I demanded.
“Oh, a mere nobody in such learned company,” she said, shaking her head with a mock humility that annoyed me intensely.
“Very well,” said I, conscious every moment of her pleasure in my discomfiture; “under the circumstances I am going to ask you to accept my escort to La Trappe; for I think you are Mademoiselle Elven, recently of the Odéon theatre.”
At this her eyes widened and the smile on her face became less genuine. “Indeed, I shall not go with you,” she said.
“I’m afraid I’ll have to insist,” said I.
She still balanced her hazel rod across her shoulders, a smile curving her mouth.
“Monsieur,” she said, “do you ride through the world pressing every peasant girl you meet with such ardent entreaties? Truly, your fashion of wooing is not slow, but everybody knows that hussars are headlong gentlemen— ‘Nothing is sacred from a hussar,’” she hummed, deliberately, in a parody which made me writhe in my saddle.
“Mademoiselle,” said I, taking off my forage-cap, “your ridicule is not the most disagreeable incident that I expect to meet with to-day. I am attempting to do my duty, and I must ask you to do yours.”
“By taking a walk with you, beau monsieur?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“And if I refuse?”
“Then,” said I, amiably, “I shall be obliged to set you on my horse.” And I dismounted and went toward her.
“Set me on — on that horse?” she repeated, with a disturbed smile.
“Will you come on foot, then?”
“No, I will not!” she said, with a click of her teeth.
I looked at my watch — it lacked five minutes to one.
“In five minutes we are going to start,” said I, cheerfully, and stood waiting, twisting the gilt hilt-tassels of my sabre with nervous fingers.
After a silence she said, very seriously, “Monsieur, would you dare use violence toward me?”
“Oh, I shall not be very violent,” I replied, laughing. I held the opened watch in my hand so that she could see the dial if she chose.
“It is one o’clock,” I said, closing the hunting-case with a snap.
She looked me steadily in the eyes.
“Will you come with me to La Trappe?”
She did not stir.
I stepped toward her; she gave me a breathless, defiant stare; then in an instant I caught her up and swung her high into my saddle, before either she or I knew exactly what had happened.
Fury flashed up in her eyes and was gone, leaving them almost blank blue. As for me, amazed at what I had done, I stood at her stirrup, breathing very fast, with jaws set and chin squared.
She was clever enough not to try to dismount, woman enough not to make an awkward struggle or do anything ungraceful. In her face I read an immense astonishment; fascination seemed to rivet her eyes on me, following my every movement as I shortened one stirrup for her, tightened the girths, and laid the bridle in her half-opened hand.
Then, in silence, I led the horse forward through the open gate out into the wet meadow.
Wading knee-deep through soaking foliage, I piloted my horse with its mute burden across the fields; and, after a few minutes a violent desire to laugh seized me and persisted, but I bit my lip and called up a few remaining sentiments of decency.
As for my turkey-girl, she sat stiffly in the saddle, with a firmness and determination that proved her to be a stranger to horses. I scarcely dared look at her, so fearful was I of laughing.
As we emerged from the meadow I heard the cannon sounding again at a great distance, and this perhaps sobered me, for presently all desire of laughter left me, and I turned into the road which led through the birch thicket, anxious to accomplish my mission and have done with it as soon as might be.
“Are we near La Trappe?” I asked, respectfully.
Had she pouted, or sulked, or burst into reproaches, I should have cared little — in fact, an outburst might have relieved me.
But she answered me so sweetly, and, too, with such composure, that my heart smote me for what I had done to her and what I was still to do.
“Would you rather walk?” I asked, looking up at her.
“No, thank you,” she said, serenely.
So we went on. The spectacle of a cavalryman in full uniform leading a cavalry horse on which was seated an Alsatian girl in bright peasant costume appeared to astonish the few people we passed. One of these foot-farers, a priest who was travelling in our direction, raised his pallid visage to meet my eyes. Then he stole a glance at the girl in the saddle, and I saw a tint of faded color settle under his transparent skin.
The turkey-girl saluted the priest with a bright smile.
“Fortune of war, father,” she said, gayly. “Behold! Alsace in chains.”
“Is she a prisoner?” said the priest, turning directly on me. Of all the masks called faces, never had I set eyes on such a deathly one, nor on such pale eyes, all silvery surface without depth enough for a spark of light to make them seem alive.
“What do you mean by a prisoner, father?” I asked.
“I mean a prisoner,” he said, doggedly.
“When the church cross-examines the government, the towers of Notre Dame shake,” I said, pleasantly. “I mean no discourtesy, father; it is a proverb in Paris.”
“There is another proverb,” observed the turkey-girl, placidly. “Once a little inhabitant of hell stole the key to paradise. His punishment was dreadful. They locked him in.”
I looked up at her, perplexed and irritated, conscious that she was ridiculing me, but unable to comprehend just how. And my irritation increased when the priest said, calmly, “Can I aid you, my child?”
She shook her head with a cool smile.
“I am quite safe under the escort of an officer of the Imperial—”
“Wait!” I said, hastily, but she continued, “of the Imperial Military Police.”
Above all things I had not wanted it known that the Imperial Police were moving in this affair at La Trappe, and now this little fool had babbled to a strange priest — of all people in the world! 27
“What have the police to do with this harmless child?” demanded the priest, turning on me so suddenly that I involuntarily took a step backward.
“Is this the confessional, father?” I replied, sharply. “Go your way in peace, and leave to the police what alone concerns the police.”
“Render unto Cæsar,” said the girl, quietly. “Good-bye, father.”
Turning to look again at the priest, I was amazed to find him close to me, too close for a man with such eyes in his head, for a man who moved so swiftly and softly, and, in spite of me, a nervous movement of my hand left me with my fingers on the butt of my pistol.
“What the devil is all this?” I blurted out. “Stand aside, father. Do you think the Holy Inquisition is back in France? Stand aside then! I salute your cloth!”
And I passed on ahead, one hand on the horse’s neck, the other touching the visor of my scarlet forage-cap. Once I looked back. The priest was standing where I had passed him.
We met a dozen people in all, I think, some of them peasants, one or two of the better class — a country doctor and a notary among them. None appeared to know my turkey-girl, nor did she even glance at them; moreover, all answered my inquiries civilly enough, directing me to La Trappe, and professing ignorance as to its inhabitants.
“Why do all the people I meet carry bundles?” I demanded of the notary.
“Mon Dieu, monsieur, they are too near the frontier to take risks,” he replied, blinking through his silver-rimmed spectacles at my turkey-girl.
“You mean to say they are running away from their village of Trois-Feuilles?” I asked. 28
“Exactly,” he said. “War is a rude guest for poor folk.”
Disgusted with the cowardice of the hamlet of Trois-Feuilles, I passed on without noticing the man’s sneer. In a moment, however, he repassed me swiftly, going in the same direction as were we, toward La Trappe.
“Wait a bit!” I called out. “What is your business in that direction, monsieur the notary?”
He looked around, muttered indistinctly about having forgotten something, and started on ahead of us, but at a sharp “Stop!” from me he halted quickly enough.
