And the child, with the memory of the night pressing upon her, jumped at that. "Then I shall go to-morrow night," she said. "I shall go to-morrow night."

Bonne was clear that she was not fit to go again. But she let that be for the moment. "That shall be as you wish," she answered comfortably.

"We will talk about that to-morrow. For to-night it is settled. And now you must try if you cannot go to sleep. If you do not sleep you will be ill."

CHAPTER XVI.

TO DO OR NOT TO DO?

To do or not to do? How many a one has turned the question in his mind; this one in the solitude of his locked room, seated with frowning face and eyes fixed on nothingness; that one amid the babble of voices and laughter, masking anxious thought under set smiles. How many a one has viewed the act she meditated this way and that, askance and across, in the hope of making the worse appear the better, and so of doing her pleasure with a light heart. Others again, trampling the scruple under foot, have none the less hesitated, counting the cost and striving to view dispa.s.sionately--with eyes that, the thing done, will never see it in that light again--how it will be with them afterwards, how much better outwardly, how much worse inwardly, and so to strike a balance for or against--to do or not to do. And some with burning eyes, and minds unswervingly bent on the thing they desire have yet felt hands pluck at them, and something--be it G.o.d or the last instinct of good--whispering them to pause--to pause, and not to do!

The Abbess pondered, while the Duke, reclining in the opening of his hut, from which the screen had been drawn back that he might enjoy the air, had no more accurate notion of her thoughts than had the Lieutenant's dog sleeping a few paces away. The missal had fallen from her hands and lay in her lap. Her eyes fixed on the green slope before her betrayed naught that was not dove-like; while the profound stillness of her form which permitted the Duke to gaze at will breathed only the peace of the cloister and the altar, the peace that no change of outward things can long disturb. Or so the Duke fancied; and eyeing her with secret rapture, felt himself uplifted in her presence. He felt that here was a being congenial with his better self, and a beauty as far above the beauty to which he had been a slave all his life as his higher moods rose above his worst excesses.

He had gained strength in the three days which had elapsed since his arrival in the camp. He could now sit up for a short time and even stand, though giddily and with precaution. Nor were these the only changes which the short interval had produced. The Countess's spears, to the number of thirty, were here, and their presence augmented the safety of the Vicomte's party. But indirectly, in so far as it fed the peasants' suspicions, it had a contrary effect. The Crocans submitted indeed to be drilled, sometimes by the Bat, sometimes by his master; and reasonable orders were not openly disobeyed. But the fear of treachery which a life-time of ill-usage had instilled was deepened by the presence of the Countess's men. The slightest movements on des Ageaux' part were scanned with jealousy. If he conferred too long with the Villeneuves or the Countess men exchanged black looks, or muttered in their beards. If he strayed a hundred paces down the valley a score were at his heels. Nor were there wanting those who, moving secretly between the camp and the savage horde upon the hill--the Old Crocans, as they were called--kept these apprised of their doubts and fears.

To eyes that could see, the position was critical, even dangerous. Nor was it rendered more easy by a feat of M. de Vlaye's men, who, reconnoitring up to the gates one evening, cut off a dozen peasants.

The morning light discovered the bodies of six of these hanged on a tree below the Old Crocans' station, and well within view from the ridge about the camp. That the disaster might not have occurred had des Ageaux been in his quarters, instead of being a virtual prisoner, went for nothing. He bore the blame, some even thought him privy to the matter. From that hour the gloom grew deeper. Everywhere, and at all times, the more fanatical or the more suspicious drew together in corners, and while simpler clowns cursed low or muttered of treachery, darker spirits whispered devilish plans. Those who had their eyes open noted the more frequent presence of the Old Crocans, who wandered by twos and threes through the camp; and though these, when des Ageaux'

eye fell on them, fawned and cringed, or hastened to withdraw themselves, they spat when his back was turned, and with stealthy gestures they gave him to hideous deaths.

In a word, fear like a dark presence lay upon the camp; and to add to the prevailing irritation, the heat was great. The giant earth-wall which permitted the Lieutenant to mature his plans and await his reinforcements shut out the evening breezes. Noon grilled his men as in a frying-pan; all night the air was hot and heavy. The peasants sighed for the cool streams of Brantome and the voices of the frogs.

The troopers, accustomed to lord it and impatient of discomfort, were quick with word and hand, and p.r.o.ne to strike, when a blow was as dangerous as a light behind a powder screen. Without was Vlaye, within was fear; while, like ravens waiting for the carnage, the horde of Old Crocans on the hill looked down from their filthy eyrie.

No one knew better than the Abbess that the least thing might serve for a spark. And she pondered. Not for an hour since its birth had the plan she had imagined been out of her mind; and still--there was so much good in her, so much truth--she recoiled. The two whom she doomed, if she acted, were her enemies; and yet she hesitated. Her own safety, her father's, her sister's, the safety of all, those two excepted, was secured by the Rochechouart reinforcement. Only her enemies would perish, and perhaps the poor fool whose presence she must disclose. And yet she could not make up her mind. To do or not to do?

It might suffice to detach Joyeuse. But the time was short, and the Duke's opinion of her high; and she shrank from risking it by a premature move. He had placed her on a pinnacle and worshipped her: if she descended from the pinnacle he might worship no longer. Meantime, if she waited until his troopers rode in, and on their heels a second levy from Rochechouart, it might be too late to act, too late to detach him, too late to save Vlaye. To do or not to do?

A dozen paces from her, old Solomon was pouring garrulous inventions into the ear of the Countess's steward; who, dull, faithful man, took all for granted, and gaped more widely at every lie. Insensibly her mind began to follow and take in the sense of their words.

"Six on one tree!" Solomon was saying, in the contemptuous tone of one to whom Montfaucon was an every-day affair. "'Tis nothing. You never saw the like at Rochechouart, say you? Perhaps not. Your lady is merciful."

"Three I have!"

"And who were they?" Solomon asked, with a sniff of contempt.

"Cattle-stealers. At least so it was said. But the wife of one came down next day and put it on another, and it was complained that they had suffered wrongfully. But three they were."

"Three?" Solomon's nose rose in scorn. "If you had seen the elm at Villeneuve in my lord's father's time! They were as acorns on an oak.

Ay, they were! Fifteen in one forenoon."

"G.o.d ha' mercy on us!"

"And ten more when he had dined!"

"G.o.d ha' mercy on us!" Fulbert replied, staring in stricken surprise.

"And what had they done?"

"Done?" Solomon answered, shrugging his shoulders after a careless fashion. "Just displeased him. And why should he not?" he continued, bristling up. "What worse could they do? Was he not lord of Villeneuve?"

And she was making a scruple of two lives. Of two lives that stood in her path! Still--life was life. But what was that they were saying now? Hang Vlaye? Hang--the Captain of Vlaye?

It was Solomon had the word; and this time the astonishment was on his side. "What is that you say?" he repeated. "Hang M. de Vlaye?"

"And why for not?" the steward replied doggedly, his face red with pa.s.sion, his dull intelligence sharpened by his lady's wrongs. "And why for not?"

Solomon was scandalised by the mere mention of it. Hang like any clod or clown a man who had been a constant visitor at his master's house!

"Oh, but he--you don't hang such as he!" he retorted. "The Captain of Vlaye? Tut, tut! You are a fool!"

"A fool? Not I! They will hang him!"

"Tut, tut!"

"Wait until _he_ speaks!" Fulbert replied, nodding mysteriously in the direction of the Lieutenant, who, at no great distance from the group, was watching a band of peasants at their drill. "When he speaks 'tis the King speaks. And when the King speaks, it is hang a man must, whoever he be!"

"Tut, tut!"

"Whoever he be!" Fulbert repeated with stolid obstinacy. And then, "It is not for nothing," he added with a menacing gesture, "that a man stops the Countess of Rochechouart on the King's road! No, no!"

Not for nothing? No, and it is not for nothing, the Abbess cried in her heart, that you threaten the man I love with the death of a dog!

Dogs yourselves! Dogs!

It was well that the Duke was not looking at her at that moment, for her heaving bosom, her glowing eyes, the rush of colour to her face all betrayed the force of her pa.s.sion. Hang him? Hang her lover? So that was what they were saying, thinking, planning behind her back, was it! That was the camp talk! That!

She could have borne it better had the Lieutenant proclaimed his aim aloud. It was the sedateness of his preparations, the slow stealth of his sap, the unswerving calmness of his approaches at which her soul revolted. The ceaseless drilling, the arming, the watch by day and night, all the life about her, every act, every thought had her lover's ruin for their aim, his death for their end! A loathing, a horror seized her. She felt a net closing about her, a net that enmeshed her and fettered her, and threatened to hold her motionless and powerless, while they worked their will on him before her eyes!

But she could still break the net. She could still act. Two lives?

What were two lives, lives of his enemies, in comparison of his life?

At the thought a spring of savage pa.s.sion welled up in her heart, and clouded her eyes. The die was cast. It remained only to do. To do!

But softly--softly. As she rose, having as yet no formed plan, a last doubt stayed her. It was not a doubt of his enemies' intentions, but of their power. He whose words had opened her eyes to their grim purpose was a dullard, almost an imbecile. He could be no judge of the means they possessed, or of their chances of success. The swarm of unkempt, ill-armed peasants, who disgusted her eyes, the troop of spears, who even now barely sufficed to secure the safety of her party, what chance had they against M. de Vlaye and the four or five hundred men-at-arms who for years had lorded it over the marches of the province, and made themselves the terror of a country-side? Surely a small chance if it deserved the name. Surely she was permitting a shadow to frighten her.

"Something," the Duke murmured near her ear, "has interrupted the even current of your thoughts, mademoiselle. What is it, I pray?"

"I feel the heat," she answered, holding her hand to her brow, that behind its shelter she might recover her composure. "Do not you?"

"It is like an oven," he answered, "within these earth-walls."

"How I hate them!" she cried, unable to repress the spirit of irritation.

"Do you? Well, so do I," he replied. "But within them--it is nowhere cooler than here."

"I will put that to the proof, my lord," she returned with a smile.

And, gliding from him, in spite of the effort he made to detain her, she crossed the gra.s.s to her father. Sinking on the sward beside his stool, she began to fan herself.

The Vicomte was in an ill-humour of some days' standing; nor without reason. Dragged, will he nill he, from the house in which his whim had been law, he found himself not only without his comforts, but a cipher in the camp. Not once, but three or four times he had let his judgment be known, and he had looked to see it followed. He might have spoken to the winds. No one, not even his sons, though they listened respectfully, took heed of it. It followed that he saw himself exposed to dangers against which he was not allowed to guard himself, and to a catastrophe which he must await in inaction; while all he possessed stood risked on a venture that for him had neither interest nor motive.