The Elusive Pimpernel
by
Baroness Emmuska Orczy [Full name]
Part 1 out of 6
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The Elusive Pimpernel
by Baroness Orczy
Contents
I. Paris: 1793
II. A Retrospect
III. Ex-Ambassador Chauvelin
IV. The Richmond Gala
V. Sir Percy and His Lady
VI. For the Poor of Paris
VII. Premonition
VIII. The Invitation
IX. Demoiselle Candeille
X. Lady Blakeney's Rout
XI. The Challenge
XII. Time – Place – Conditions
XIII. Reflections
XIV. The Ruling Passion
XV. Farewell
XVI. The Passport
XVII. Boulogne
XVIII. No. 6
XIX. The Strength of the Weak
XX. Triumph
XXI. Suspense
XXII. Not Death
XXIII. The Hostage
XXIV. Colleagues
XXV. The Unexpected
XXVI. The Terms of the Bargain
XXVII. The Decision
XXVIII. The Midnight Watch
XXIX. The National Fete
XXX. The Procession
XXXI. Final Dispositions
XXXII. The Letter
XXXIII. The English Spy
XXXIV. The Angelus
XXXV. Marguerite
Chapter I : Paris: 1793
There was not even a reaction.
On! ever on! in that wild, surging torrent; sowing the wind of
anarchy, of terrorism, of lust of blood and hate, and reaping a
hurricane of destruction and of horror.
On! ever on! France, with Paris and all her children still rushes
blindly, madly on; defies the powerful coalition,--Austria, England,
Spain, Prussia, all joined together to stem the flow of carnage, --
defies the Universe and defies God!
Paris this September 1793!--or shall we call it Vendemiaire, Year I.
of the Republic?--call it what we will! Paris! a city of bloodshed, of
humanity in its lowest, most degraded aspect. France herself a
gigantic self-devouring monster, her fairest cities destroyed, Lyons
razed to the ground, Toulon, Marseilles, masses of blackened ruins,
her bravest sons turned to lustful brutes or to abject cowards seeking
safety at the cost of any humiliation.
That is thy reward, oh mighty, holy Revolution! apotheosis of
equality and fraternity! grand rival of decadent Christianity.
Five weeks now since Marat, the bloodthirsty Friend of the People,
succumbed beneath the sheath-knife of a virgin patriot, a month since
his murderess walked proudly, even enthusiastically, to the guillotine!
There has been no reaction--only a great sigh! ... Not of content or
satisfied lust, but a sigh such as the man-eating tiger might heave
after his first taste of long-coveted blood.
A sigh for more!
A king on the scaffold; a queen degraded and abased, awaiting death,
which lingers on the threshold of her infamous prison; eight hundred
scions of ancient houses that have made the history of France; brave
generals, Custine, Blanchelande, Houchard, Beauharnais; worthy
patriots, noble-hearted women, misguided enthusiasts, all by the
score and by the hundred, up the few wooden steps which lead to the
guillotine.
An achievement of truth!
And still that sigh for more!
But for the moment,--a few seconds only,--Paris looked round her
mighty self, and thought things over!
The man-eating tiger for the space of a sigh licked his powerful jaws
and pondered!
Something new!--something wonderful!
We have had a new Constitution, a new Justice, new Laws, a new
Almanack!
What next?
Why, obviously!--How comes it that great, intellectual, aesthetic
Paris never thought of such a wonderful thing before?
A new religion!
Christianity is old and obsolete, priests are aristocrats, wealthy
oppressors of the People, the Church but another form of wanton
tyranny.
Let us by all means have a new religion.
Already something has been done to destroy the old! To destroy!
always to destroy! Churches have been ransacked, altars spoliated,
tombs desecrated, priests and curates murdered; but that is not
enough.
There must be a new religion; and to attain that there must be a new
God.
"Man is a born idol-worshipper."
Very well then! let the People have a new religion and a new God.
Stay!--Not a God this time!--for God means Majesty, Power,
Kingship! everything in fact which the mighty hand of the people of
France has struggled and fought to destroy.
Not a God, but a goddess.
A goddess! an idol! a toy! since even the man-eating tiger must play
sometimes.
Paris wanted a new religion, and a new toy, and grave men, ardent
patriots, mad enthusiasts, sat in the Assembly of the Convention and
seriously discussed the means of providing her with both these things
which she asked for.
Chaumette, I think it was, who first solved the difficulty:--Procureur
Chaumette, head of the Paris Municipality, he who had ordered that
the cart which bore the dethroned queen to the squalid prison of the
Conciergerie should be led slowly past her own late palace of the
Tuileries, and should be stopped there just long enough for her to see
and to feel in one grand mental vision all that she had been when she
dwelt there, and all that she now was by the will of the People.
Chaumette, as you see, was refined, artistic;--the torture of the fallen
Queen's heart meant more to him than a blow of the guillotine on her
neck.
No wonder, therefore, that it was Procureur Chaumette who first
discovered exactly what type of new religion Paris wanted just now.
"Let us have a Goddess of Reason," he said, "typified if you will by
the most beautiful woman in Paris. Let us have a feast of the Goddess
of Reason, let there be a pyre of all the gew-gaws which for centuries
have been flaunted by overbearing priests before the eyes of starving
multitudes, let the People rejoice and dance around that funeral pile,
and above it all let the new Goddess tower smiling and triumphant.
The Goddess of Reason! the only deity our new and regenerate
France shall acknowledge throughout the centuries which are to
come!"
Loud applause greeted the impassioned speech.
"A new goddess, by all means!" shouted the grave gentlemen of the
National Assembly, "the Goddess of Reason!"
They were all eager that the People should have this toy; something
to play with and to tease, round which to dance the mad Carmagnole
and sing the ever-recurring "Ca ira."
Something to distract the minds of the populace from the
consequences of its own deeds, and the helplessness of its legislators.
Procureur Chaumette enlarged upon his original idea; like a true artist
who sees the broad effect of a picture at a glance and then fills in the
minute details, he was already busy elaborating his scheme.
"The goddess must be beautiful ... not too young ... Reason can only
go hand in hand with the riper age of second youth ... she must be
decked out in classical draperies, severe yet suggestive ... she must be
rouged and painted ... for she is a mere idol ... easily to be appeased
with incense, music and laughter."
He was getting deeply interested in his subject, seeking minutiae of
detail, with which to render his theme more and more attractive.
But patience was never the characteristic of the Revolutionary
Government of France. The National Assembly soon tired of
Chaumette's dithyrambic utterances. Up aloft on the Mountain,
Danton was yawning like a gigantic leopard.
Soon Henriot was on his feet. He had a far finer scheme than that of
the Procureur to place before his colleagues. A grand National fete,
semi-religious in character, but of the new religion which destroyed
and desecrated and never knelt in worship.
Citizen Chaumette's Goddess of Reason by all means--Henriot
conceded that the idea was a good one--but the goddess merely as a
figure-head: around her a procession of unfrocked and apostate
priests, typifying the destruction of ancient hierarchy, mules carrying
loads of sacred vessels, the spoils of ten thousand churches of France,
and ballet girls in bacchanalian robes, dancing the Carmagnole around
the new deity.
Public Prosecutor Foucquier Tinville thought all these schemes very
tame. Why should the People of France be led to think that the era of
a new religion would mean an era of milk and water, of pageants and
of fireworks? Let every man, woman, and child know that this was an
era of blood and again of blood.
"Oh!" he exclaimed in passionate accents, "would that all the traitors
in France had but one head, that it might be cut off with one blow of
the guillotine!"
He approved of the National fete, but he desired an apotheosis of the
guillotine; he undertook to find ten thousand traitors to be beheaded
on one grand and glorious day: ten thousand heads to adorn the Place
de la Revolution on a great, never-to-be-forgotten evening, after the
guillotine had accomplished this record work.
But Collot d'Herbois would also have his say. Collot lately hailed
from the South, with a reputation for ferocity unparalleled
throughout the whole of this horrible decade. He would not be
outdone by Tinville's bloodthirsty schemes.
He was the inventor of the "Noyades," which had been so successful
at Lyons and Marseilles. "Why not give the inhabitants of Paris one of
these exhilarating spectacles?" he asked with a coarse, brutal laugh.
Then he explained his invention, of which he was inordinately proud.
Some two or three hundred traitors, men, women, and children, tied
securely together with ropes in great, human bundles and thrown
upon a barge in the middle of the river: the barge with a hole in her
bottom! not too large! only sufficient to cause her to sink slowly,
very slowly, in sight of the crowd of delighted spectators.
The cries of the women and children, and even of the men, as they
felt the waters rising and gradually enveloping them, as they felt
themselves powerless even for a fruitless struggle, had proved most
exhilarating, so Citizen Collot declared, to the hearts of the true
patriots of Lyons.
Thus the discussion continued.
This was the era when every man had but one desire, that of outdoing
others in ferocity and brutality, and but one care, that of saving his
own head by threatening that of his neighbour.
The great duel between the Titanic leaders of these turbulent parties,
the conflict between hot-headed Danton on the one side and cold-
blooded Robespierre on the other, had only just begun; the great, all-
devouring monsters had dug their claws into one another, but the
issue of the combat was still at stake.
Neither of these two giants had taken part in these deliberations anent
the new religion and the new goddess. Danton gave signs now and
then of the greatest impatience, and muttered something about a new
form of tyranny, a new kind of oppression.
On the left, Robespierre in immaculate sea-green coat and carefully
gauffered linen was quietly polishing the nails of his right hand
against the palm of his left.
But nothing escaped him of what was going on. His ferocious
egoism, his unbounded ambition was even now calculating what
advantages to himself might accrue from this idea of the new religion
and of the National fete, what personal aggrandisement he could
derive therefrom.
The matter outwardly seemed trivial enough, but already his keen and
calculating mind had seen various side issues which might tend to
place him--Robespierre--on a yet higher and more unassailable
pinnacle.
Surrounded by those who hated him, those who envied and those
who feared him, he ruled over them all by the strength of his own
cold-blooded savagery, by the resistless power of his merciless
cruelty.
He cared about nobody but himself, about nothing but his own
exaltation: every action of his career, since he gave up his small
practice in a quiet provincial town in order to throw himself into the
wild vortex of revolutionary politics, every word he ever uttered had
but one aim--Himself.
He saw his colleagues and comrades of the old Jacobin Clubs
ruthlessly destroyed around him: friends he had none, and all left him
indifferent; and now he had hundreds of enemies in every assembly
and club in Paris, and these too one by one were being swept up in
that wild whirlpool which they themselves had created.
Impassive, serene, always ready with a calm answer, when passion
raged most hotly around him, Robespierre, the most ambitious, most
self-seeking demagogue of his time, had acquired the reputation of
being incorruptible and self-less, an enthusiastic servant of the
Republic.
The sea-green Incorruptible!
And thus whilst others talked and argued, waxed hot over schemes
for processions and pageantry, or loudly denounced the whole matter
as the work of a traitor, he, of the sea-green coat, sat quietly
polishing his nails.
But he had already weighed all these discussions in the balance of his
mind, placed them in the crucible of his ambition, and turned them
into something that would benefit him and strengthen his position.
Aye! the feast should be brilliant enough! gay or horrible, mad or
fearful, but through it all the people of France must be made to feel
that there was a guiding hand which ruled the destinies of all, a head
which framed the new laws, which consolidated the new religion and
established its new goddess: the Goddess of Reason.
Robespierre, her prophet!
Chapter II : A Retrospect
The room was close and dark, filled with the smoke from a defective
chimney.
A tiny boudoir, once the dainty sanctum of imperious Marie
Antoinette; a faint and ghostly odour, like unto the perfume of
spectres, seemed still to cling to the stained walls, and to the torn
Gobelin tapestries.
Everywhere lay the impress of a heavy and destroying hand: that of
the great and glorious Revolution.
In the mud-soiled corners of the room a few chairs, with brocaded
cushions rudely torn, leant broken and desolate against the walls. A
small footstool, once gilt-legged and satin-covered, had been
overturned and roughly kicked to one side, and there it lay on its
back, like some little animal that had been hurt, stretching its broken
limbs upwards, pathetic to behold.
From the delicately wrought Buhl table the silver inlay had been
harshly stripped out of its bed of shell.
Across the Lunette, painted by Boucher and representing a chaste
Diana surrounded by a bevy of nymphs, an uncouth hand had
scribbled in charcoal the device of the Revolution: Liberte, Egalite,
Fraternite ou la Mort; whilst, as if to give a crowning point to the
work of destruction and to emphasise its motto, someone had
decorated the portrait of Marie Antoinette with a scarlet cap, and
drawn a red and ominous line across her neck.
And at the table two men were sitting in close and eager conclave.
Between them a solitary tallow candle, unsnuffed and weirdly
flickering, threw fantastic shadows upon the walls, and illumined with
fitful and uncertain light the faces of the two men.
How different were these in character!
One, high cheek-boned, with coarse, sensuous lips, and hair
elaborately and carefully powdered; the other pale and thin-lipped,
with the keen eyes of a ferret and a high intellectual forehead, from
which the sleek brown hair was smoothly brushed away.
The first of these men was Robespierre, the ruthless and incorruptible
demagogue; the other was Citizen Chauvelin, ex-ambassador of the
Revolutionary Government at the English Court.
The hour was late, and the noises from the great, seething city
preparing for sleep came to this remote little apartment in the now
deserted Palace of the Tuileries, merely as a faint and distant echo.
It was two days after the Fructidor Riots. Paul Deroulede and the
woman Juliette Marny, both condemned to death, had been literally
spirited away out of the cart which was conveying them from the Hall
of Justice to the Luxembourg Prison, and news had just been received
by the Committee of Public Safety that at Lyons, the Abbe du Mesnil,
with the ci-devant Chevalier d'Egremont and the latter's wife and
family, had effected a miraculous and wholly incomprehensible escape
from the Northern Prison.
But this was not all. When Arras fell into the hands of the
Revolutionary army, and a regular cordon was formed round the
town, so that not a single royalist traitor might escape, some three
score women and children, twelve priests, the old aristocrats
Chermeuil, Delleville and Galipaux and many others, managed to pass
the barriers and were never recaptured.
Raids were made on the suspected houses: in Paris chiefly where the
escaped prisoners might have found refuge, or better still where their
helpers and rescuers might still be lurking. Foucquier Tinville, Public
Prosecutor, led and conducted these raids, assisted by that
bloodthirsty vampire, Merlin. They heard of a house in the Rue de
l'Ancienne Comedie where an Englishmen was said to have lodged
for two days.
They demanded admittance, and were taken to the rooms where the
Englishman had stayed. These were bare and squalid, like hundreds of
other rooms in the poorer quarters of Paris. The landlady, toothless
and grimy, had not yet tidied up the one where the Englishman had
slept: in fact she did not know he had left for good.
He had paid for his room, a week in advance, and came and went as
he liked, she explained to Citizen Tinville. She never bothered about
him, as he never took a meal in the house, and he was only there two
days. She did not know her lodger was English until the day he left.
She thought he was a Frenchman from the South, as he certainly had
a peculiar accent when he spoke.
"It was the day of the riots," she continued; "he would go out, and I
told him I did not think that the streets would be safe for a foreigner
like him: for he always wore such very fine clothes, and I made sure
that the starving men and women of Paris would strip them off his
back when their tempers were roused. But he only laughed. He gave
me a bit of paper and told me that if he did not return I might
conclude that he had been killed, and if the Committee of Public
Safety asked me questions about me, I was just to show the bit of
paper and there would be no further trouble."
She had talked volubly, more than a little terrified at Merlin's scowls,
and the attitude of Citizen Tinville, who was known to be very severe
if anyone committed any blunders.
But the Citizeness--her name was Brogard and her husband's brother
kept an inn in the neighbourhood of Calais--the Citizeness Brogard
had a clear conscience. She held a license from the Committee of
Public Safety for letting apartments, and she had always given due
notice to the Committee of the arrival and departure of her lodgers.
The only thing was that if any lodger paid her more than ordinarily
well for the accommodation and he so desired it, she would send in
the notice conveniently late, and conveniently vaguely worded as to
the description, status and nationality of her more liberal patrons.
This had occurred in the case of her recent English visitor.
But she did not explain it quite like that to Citizen Foucquier Tinville
or to Citizen Merlin.
However, she was rather frightened, and produced the scrap of paper
which the Englishman had left with her, together with the assurance
that when she showed it there would be no further trouble.
Tinville took it roughly out of her hand, but would not glance at it.
He crushed it into a ball and then Merlin snatched it from him with a
coarse laugh, smoothed out the creases on his knee and studied it for
a moment.
There were two lines of what looked like poetry, written in a
language which Merlin did not understand. English, no doubt.
But what was perfectly clear, and easily comprehended by any one,
was the little drawing in the corner, done in red ink and representing
a small star-shaped flower.
Then Tinville and Merlin both cursed loudly and volubly, and bidding
their men follow them, turned away from the house in the Rue de
l'Ancienne Comedie and left its toothless landlady on her own
doorstep still volubly protesting her patriotism and her desire to serve
the government of the Republic.
Tinville and Merlin, however, took the scrap of paper to Citizen
Robespierre, who smiled grimly as he in his turn crushed the offensive
little document in the palm of his well-washed hands.
Robespierre did not swear. He never wasted either words or oaths,
but he slipped the bit of paper inside the double lid of his silver snuff
box and then he sent a special messenger to Citizen Chauvelin in the
Rue Corneille, bidding him come that same evening after ten o'clock
to room No. 16 in the ci-devant Palace of the Tuileries.
It was now half-past ten, and Chauvelin and Robespierre sat opposite
one another in the ex-boudoir of Queen Marie Antoinette, and
between them on the table, just below the tallow-candle, was a much
creased, exceedingly grimy bit of paper.
It had passed through several unclean hands before Citizen
Robespierre's immaculately white fingers had smoothed it out and
placed it before the eyes of ex-Ambassador Chauvelin.
The latter, however, was not looking at the paper, he was not even
looking at the pale, cruel face before him. He had closed his eyes and
for a moment had lost sight of the small dark room, of Robespierre's
ruthless gaze, of the mud-stained walls and greasy floor. He was
seeing, as in a bright and sudden vision, the brilliantly-lighted salons
of the Foreign Office in London, with beautiful Marguerite Blakeney
gliding queenlike on the arm of the Prince of Wales.
He heard the flutter of many fans, the frou-frou of silk dresses, and
above all the din and sound of dance music, he heard an inane laugh
and an affected voice repeating the doggerel rhyme that was even
now written on that dirty piece of paper which Robespierre had
placed before him:
"We seek him here, and we seek him there, Those Frenchies seek
him everywhere! Is he in heaven, is he in hell, That demmed elusive
Pimpernel?"
It was a mere flash! One of memory's swiftly effaced pictures, when
she shows us for the fraction of a second, indelible pictures from out
our past. Chauvelin, in that same second, while his own eyes were
closed and Robespierre's fixed upon him, also saw the lonely cliffs of
Calais, heard the same voice singing: "God save the King!" the volley
of musketry, the despairing cries of Marguerite Blakeney; and once
again he felt the keen and bitter pang of complete humiliation and
defeat.
Chapter III : Ex-Ambassador Chauvelin
Robespierre had quietly waited the while. He was in no hurry: being a
night-bird of very pronounced tastes, he was quite ready to sit here
until the small hours of the morning watching Citizen Chauvelin
mentally writhing in the throes of recollections of the past few
months.
There was nothing that delighted the sea-green Incorruptible quite so
much as the aspect of a man struggling with a hopeless situation and
feeling a net of intrigue drawing gradually tighter and tighter around
him.
Even now, when he saw Chauvelin's smooth forehead wrinkled into
an anxious frown, and his thin hand nervously clutched upon the
table, Robespierre heaved a pleasurable sigh, leaned back in his chair,
and said with an amiable smile:
"You do agree with me, then, Citizen, that the situation has become
intolerable?"
Then as Chauvelin did not reply, he continued, speaking more
sharply:
"And how terribly galling it all is, when we could have had that man
under the guillotine by now, if you had not blundered so terribly last
year."
His voice had become hard and trenchant like that knife to which he
was so ready to make constant allusion. But Chauvelin still remained
silent. There was really nothing that he could say.
"Citizen Chauvelin, how you must hate that man!" exclaimed
Robespierre at last.
Then only did Chauvelin break the silence which up to now he had
appeared to have forced himself to keep.
"I do!" he said with unmistakable fervour.
"Then why do you not make an effort to retrieve the blunders of last
year?" queried Robespierre blandly. "The Republic has been unusually
patient and long-suffering with you, Citizen Chauvelin. She has taken
your many services and well-known patriotism into consideration.
But you know," he added significantly, "that she has no use for
worthless tools."
Then as Chauvelin seemed to have relapsed into sullen silence, he
continued with his original ill-omened blandness:
"Ma foi! Citizen Chauvelin, were I standing in your buckled shoes, I
would not lose another hour in trying to avenge mine own
humiliation!"
"Have I ever had a chance?" burst out Chauvelin with ill-suppressed
vehemence. "What can I do single-handed? Since war has been
declared I cannot go to England unless the Government will find
some official reason for my doing so. There is much grumbling and
wrath over here, and when that damned Scarlet Pimpernel League has
been at work, when a score or so of valuable prizes have been
snatched from under the very knife of the guillotine, then, there is
much gnashing of teeth and useless cursings, but nothing serious or
definite is done to smother those accursed English flies which come
buzzing about our ears."
"Nay! you forget, Citizen Chauvelin," retorted Robespierre, "that we
of the Committee of Public Safety are far more helpless than you.
You know the language of these people, we don't. You know their
manners and customs, their ways of thought, the methods they are
likely to employ: we know none of these things. You have seen and
spoken to men in England who are members of that damned League.
You have seen the man who is its leader. We have not."
He leant forward on the table and looked more searchingly at the
thin, pallid face before him.
"If you named that leader to me now, if you described him, we could
go to work more easily. You could name him, and you would, Citizen
Chauvelin."
"I cannot," retorted Chauvelin doggedly.
"Ah! but I think you could. But there! I do not blame your silence.
You would wish to reap the reward of your own victory, to be the
instrument of your own revenge. Passions! I think it natural! But in
the name of your own safety, Citizen, do not be too greedy with your
secret. If the man is known to you, find him again, find him, lure him
to France! We want him--the people want him! And if the people do
not get what they want, they will turn on those who have withheld
their prey."
"I understand, Citizen, that your own safety and that of your
government is involved in this renewed attempt to capture the Scarlet
Pimpernel," retorted Chauvelin drily.
"And your head, Citizen Chauvelin," concluded Robespierre.
"Nay! I know that well enough, and you may believe me, and you
will, Citizen, when I say that I care but little about that. The question
is, if I am to lure that man to France what will you and your
government do to help me?"
"Everything," replied Robespierre, "provided you have a definite plan
and a definite purpose.
"I have both. But I must go to England in, at least, a semi-official
capacity. I can do nothing if I am to hide in disguise in out-of-the-
way corners."
"That is easily done. There has been some talk with the British
authorities anent the security and welfare of peaceful French subjects
settled in England. After a good deal of correspondence they have
suggested our sending a semi-official representative over there to
look after the interests of our own people commercially and
financially. We can easily send you over in that capacity if it would
suit your purpose."
"Admirably. I have only need of a cloak. That one will do as well as
another."
"Is that all?"
"Not quite. I have several plans in my head, and I must know that I
am fully trusted. Above all, I must have power--decisive, absolute,
illimitable power."
There was nothing of the weakling about this small, sable-clad man,
who looked the redoubtable Jacobin leader straight in the face and
brought a firm fist resolutely down upon the table before him.
Robespierre paused a while ere he replied; he was eying the other
man keenly, trying to read if behind that earnest, frowning brow there
did not lurk some selfish, ulterior motive along with that demand for
absolute power.
But Chauvelin did not flinch beneath that gaze which could make
every cheek in France blanch with unnamed terror, and after that
slight moment of hesitation Robespierre said quietly:
"You shall have the complete power of a military dictator in every
town or borough of France which you may visit. The Revolutionary
Government shall create you, before you start for England, Supreme
Head of all the Sub-Committees of Public Safety. This will mean that
in the name of the safety of the Republic every order given by you, of
whatsoever nature it might be, must be obeyed implicitly under pain
of an arraignment for treason."
Chauvelin sighed a quick, sharp sigh of intense satisfaction, which he
did not even attempt to disguise before Robespierre.
"I shall want agents," he said, "or shall we say spies? and, of course,
money."
"You shall have both. We keep a very efficient secret service in
England and they do a great deal of good over there. There is much
dissatisfaction in their Midland counties--you remember the
Birmingham riots? They were chiefly the work of our own spies.
Then you know Candeille, the actress? She had found her way among
some of those circles in London who have what they call liberal
tendencies. I believe they are called Whigs. Funny name, isn't it? It
means perruque, I think. Candeille has given charity performances in
aid of our Paris poor, in one or two of these Whig clubs, and
incidentally she has been very useful to us."
"A woman is always useful in such cases. I shall seek out the
Citizeness Candeille."
"And if she renders you useful assistance, I think I can offer her what
should prove a tempting prize. Women are so vain!" he added,
contemplating with rapt attention the enamel-like polish on his finger-
nails. "There is a vacancy in the Maison Moliere. Or--what might
prove more attractive still--in connection with the proposed National
fete, and the new religion for the people, we have not yet chosen a
Goddess of Reason. That should appeal to any feminine mind. The
impersonation of a goddess, with processions, pageants, and the rest.
... Great importance and prominence given to one personality. ...
What say you, Citizen? If you really have need of a woman for the
furtherance of your plans, you have that at your disposal which may
enhance her zeal."
"I thank you, Citizen," rejoined Chauvelin calmly. "I always
entertained a hope that some day the Revolutionary Government
would call again on my services. I admit that I failed last year. The
Englishman is resourceful. He has wits and he is very rich. He would
not have succeeded, I think, but for his money --and corruption and
bribery are rife in Paris and on our coasts. He slipped through my
fingers at the very moment when I thought that I held him most
securely. I do admit all that, but I am prepared to redeem my failure
of last year, and ... there is nothing more to discuss.--I am ready to
start."
He looked round for his cloak and hat, and quietly readjusted the set
of his neck-tie. But Robespierre detained him a while longer: that
born mountebank, born torturer of the souls of men, had not gloated
sufficiently yet on the agony of mind of this fellow-man.
Chauvelin had always been trusted and respected. His services in
connection with the foreign affairs of the Revolutionary Government
had been invaluable, both before and since the beginning of the
European War. At one time he formed part of that merciless
decemvirate which--with Robespierre at its head--meant to govern
France by laws of bloodshed and of unparalleled ferocity.
But the sea-green Incorruptible had since tired of him, then had
endeavoured to push him on one side, for Chauvelin was keen and
clever, and, moreover, he possessed all those qualities of selfless
patriotism which were so conspicuously lacking in Robespierre.
His failure in bringing that interfering Scarlet Pimpernel to justice and
the guillotine had completed Chauvelin's downfall. Though not
otherwise molested, he had been left to moulder in obscurity during
this past year. He would soon enough have been completely
forgotten.
Now he was not only to be given one more chance to regain public
favour, but he had demanded powers which in consideration of the
aim in view, Robespierre himself could not refuse to grant him. But
the Incorruptible, ever envious and jealous, would not allow him to
exult too soon.
With characteristic blandness he seemed to be entering into all
Chauvelin's schemes, to be helping in every way he could, for there
was something at the back of his mind which he meant to say to the
ex-ambassador, before the latter took his leave: something which
would show him that he was but on trial once again, and which would
demonstrate to him with perfect clearness that over him there
hovered the all-powerful hand of a master.
"You have but to name the sum you want, Citizen Chauvelin," said
the Incorruptible, with an encouraging smile, "the government will
not stint you, and you shall not fail for lack of authority or for lack of
funds."
"It is pleasant to hear that the government has such uncounted
wealth," remarked Chauvelin with dry sarcasm.
"Oh! the last few weeks have been very profitable," retorted
Robespierre; "we have confiscated money and jewels from emigrant
royalists to the tune of several million francs. You remember the
traitor Juliette Marny, who escape to England lately? Well! her
mother's jewels and quite a good deal of gold were discovered by one
of our most able spies to be under the care of a certain Abbe
Foucquet, a calotin from Boulogne--devoted to the family, so it
seems."
"Yes?" queried Chauvelin indifferently.
"Our men seized the jewels and gold, that is all. We don't know yet
what we mean to do with the priest. The fisherfolk of Boulogne like
him, and we can lay our hands on him at any time, if we want his old
head for the guillotine. But the jewels were worth having. There's a
historic necklace worth half a million at least."
"Could I have it?" asked Chauvelin.
Robespierre laughed and shrugged his shoulders.
"You said it belonged to the Marny family," continued the ex-
ambassador. "Juliette Marny is in England. I might meet her. I cannot
tell what may happen: but I feel that the historic necklace might prove
useful. Just as you please," he added with renewed indifference. "It
was a thought that flashed through my mind when you spoke--
nothing more."
"And to show you how thoroughly the government trusts you,
Citizen Chauvelin," replied Robespierre with perfect urbanity, "I will
myself direct that the Marny necklace be placed unreservedly in your
hands; and a sum of fifty thousand francs for your expenses in
England. You see," he added blandly, "we give you no excuse for a
second failure."
"I need none," retorted Chauvelin drily, as he finally rose from his
seat, with a sigh of satisfaction that this interview was ended at last.
But Robespierre too had risen, and pushing his chair aside he took a
step or two towards Chauvelin. He was a much taller man than the
ex-ambassador. Spare and gaunt, he had a very upright bearing, and
in the uncertain light of the candle he seemed to tower strangely and
weirdly above the other man: the pale hue of his coat, his light-
coloured hair, the whiteness of his linen, all helped to give to his
appearance at that moment a curious spectral effect.
Chauvelin somehow felt an unpleasant shiver running down his spine
as Robespierre, perfectly urbane and gentle in his manner, placed a
long, bony hand upon his shoulder.
"Citizen Chauvelin," said the Incorruptible, with some degree of
dignified solemnity, "meseems that we very quickly understood one
another this evening. Your own conscience, no doubt, gave you a
premonition of what the purport of my summons to you would be.
You say that you always hoped the Revolutionary Government would
give you one great chance to redeem your failure of last year. I, for
one, always intended that you should have that chance, for I saw,
perhaps, just a little deeper into your heart than my colleagues. I saw
not only enthusiasm for the cause of the People of France, not only
abhorrence for the enemy of your country, I saw a purely personal
and deadly hate of an individual man --the unknown and mysterious
Englishman who proved too clever for you last year. And because I
believe that hatred will prove sharper and more far-seeing than
selfless patriotism, therefore I urged the Committee of Public Safety
to allow you to work out your own revenge, and thereby to serve
your country more effectually than any other--perhaps more pure-
minded patriot would do. You go to England well-provided with all
that is necessary for the success of your plans, for the
accomplishment of your own personal vengeance. The Revolutionary
Government will help you with money, passports, safe conducts; it
places its spies and agents at your disposal. It gives you practically
unlimited power, wherever you may go. It will not enquire into your
motives, nor yet your means, so long as these lead to success. But
private vengeance or patriotism, whatever may actuate you, we here
in France demand you deliver into our hands the man who is known
in two countries as the Scarlet Pimpernel! We want him alive if
possible, or dead if it must be so, and we want as many of his
henchmen as will follow him to the guillotine. Get them to France,
and we'll know how to deal with them, and let the whole of Europe
be damned."
He paused for a while, his hand still resting on Chauvelin's shoulder,
his pale green eyes holding those of the other man as if in a trance.
But Chauvelin neither stirred nor spoke. His triumph left him quite
calm; his fertile brain was already busy with his plans. There was no
room for fear in his heart, and it was without the slightest tremor that
he waited for the conclusion of Robespierre's oration.
"Perhaps, Citizen Chauvelin," said the latter at last, "you have already
guessed what there is left for me to say. But lest there should remain
in your mind one faint glimmer of doubt or of hope, let me tell you
this. The Revolutionary Government gives you this chance of
redeeming your failure, but this one only; if you fail again, your
outraged country will know neither pardon nor mercy. Whether you
return to France or remain in England, whether you travel North,
South, East or West, cross the Oceans, or traverse the Alps, the hand
of an avenging People will be upon you. Your second failure will be
punished by death, wherever you may be, either by the guillotine, if
you are in France, or if you seek refuge elsewhere, then by the hand
of an assassin.
"Look to it, "Citizen Chauvelin! for there will be no escape this time,
not even if the mightiest tyrant on earth tried to protect you, not even
if you succeeded in building up an empire and placing yourself upon a
throne."
His thin, strident voice echoed weirdly in the small, close boudoir.
Chauvelin made no reply. There was nothing that he could say. All
that Robespierre had put so emphatically before him, he had fully
realised, even whilst he was forming his most daring plans.
It was an "either--or" this time, uttered to HIM now. He thought
again of Marguerite Blakeney, and the terrible alternative he had put
before HER less than a year ago.
Well! he was prepared to take the risk. He would not fail again. He
was going to England under more favourable conditions this time. He
knew who the man was, whom he was bidden to lure to France and
to death.
And he returned Robespierre's threatening gaze boldly and
unflinchingly; then he prepared to go. He took up his hat and cloak,
opened the door and peered for a moment into the dark corridor,
wherein, in the far distance, the steps of a solitary sentinel could be
faintly heard: he put on his hat, turned to look once more into the
room where Robespierre stood quietly watching him, and went his
way.
Chapter IV : The Richmond Gala
It was perhaps the most brilliant September ever known in England,
where the last days of dying summer are nearly always golden and
beautiful.
Strange that in this country, where that same season is so peculiarly
radiant with a glory all its own, there should be no special expression
in the language with which to accurately name it.
So we needs must call it "fin d'ete": the ending of the summer; not the
absolute end, nor yet the ultimate departure, but the tender lingering
of a friend obliged to leave us anon, yet who fain would steal a day
here and there, a week or so in which to stay with us: who would
make that last pathetic farewell of his endure a little while longer still,
and brings forth in gorgeous array for our final gaze all that he has
which is most luxuriant, most desirable, most worthy of regret.
And in this year of grace 1793, departing summer had lavished the
treasures of her palette upon woodland and river banks; had tinged
the once crude green of larch and elm with a tender hue of gold, had
brushed the oaks with tones of warm russet, and put patches of
sienna and crimson on the beech.
In the gardens the roses were still in bloom, not the delicate blush or
lemon ones of June, nor yet the pale Banksias and climbers, but the
full-blooded red roses of late summer, and deep-coloured apricot
ones, with crinkled outside leaves faintly kissed by the frosty dew. In
sheltered spots the purple clematis still lingered, whilst the dahlias,
brilliant of hue, seemed overbearing in their gorgeous insolence,
flaunting their crudely colored petals against sober backgrounds of
mellow leaves, or the dull, mossy tones of ancient, encircling walls.
The Gala had always been held about the end of September. The
weather, on the riverside, was most dependable then, and there was
always sufficient sunshine as an excuse for bringing out Madam's last
new muslin gown, or her pale-coloured quilted petticoat. Then the
ground was dry and hard, good alike for walking and for setting up
tents and booths. And of these there was of a truth a most goodly
array this year: mountebanks and jugglers from every corner of the
world, so it seemed, for there was a man with a face as black as my
lord's tricorne, and another with such flat yellow cheeks as made one
think of batter pudding, and spring aconite, of eggs and other very
yellow things.
There was a tent wherein dogs--all sorts of dogs, big, little, black,
white or tan--did things which no Christian with respect for his own
backbone would have dared to perform, and another where a weird-
faced old man made bean-stalks and walking sticks, coins of the
realm and lace kerchiefs vanish into thin air.
And as it was nice and hot one could sit out upon the green and listen
to the strains of the band, which discoursed sweet music, and watch
the young people tread a measure on the sward.
The quality had not yet arrived: for humbler folk had partaken of very
early dinner so as to get plenty of fun, and long hours of delight for
the sixpenny toll demanded at the gates.
There was so much to see and so much to do: games of bowls on the
green, and a beautiful Aunt Sally, there was a skittle alley, and two
merry-go-rounds: there were performing monkeys and dancing bears,
a woman so fat that three men with arms outstretched could not get
round her, and a man so thin that he could put a lady's bracelet round
his neck and her garter around his waist.
There were some funny little dwarfs with pinched faces and a
knowing manner, and a giant come all the way from Russia--so 'twas
said.
The mechanical toys too were a great attraction. You dropped a
penny into a little slit in a box and a doll would begin to dance and
play the fiddle: and there was the Magic Mill, where for another
modest copper a row of tiny figures, wrinkled and old and dressed in
the shabbiest of rags, marched in weary procession up a flight of
steps into the Mill, only to emerge again the next moment at a further
door of this wonderful building looking young and gay, dressed in
gorgeous finery and tripping a dance measure as they descended
some steps and were finally lost to view.
But what was most wonderful of all and collected the goodliest
crowd of gazers and the largest amount of coins, was a miniature
representation of what was going on in France even at this very
moment.
And you could not help but be convinced of the truth of it all, so
cleverly was it done. There was a background of houses and a very
red-looking sky. "Too red!" some people said, but were immediately
quashed by the dictum of the wise, that the sky represented a sunset,
as anyone who looked could see. Then there were a number of little
figures, no taller than your hand, but with little wooden faces and
arms and legs, just beautifully made little dolls, and these were
dressed in kirtles and breeches --all rags mostly--and little coats and
wooden shoes. They were massed together in groups with their arms
all turned upwards.
And in the center of this little stage on an elevated platform there
were miniature wooden posts close together, and with a long flat
board at right angles at the foot of the posts, and all painted a bright
red. At the further end of the boards was a miniature basket, and
between the two posts, at the top, was a miniature knife which ran up
and down in a groove and was drawn by a miniature pulley. Folk who
knew said that this was a model of a guillotine.
And lo and behold! when you dropped a penny into a slot just below
the wooden stage, the crowd of little figures started waving their
arms up and down, and another little doll would ascend the elevated
platform and lie down on the red board at the foot of the wooden
posts. Then a figure dressed in brilliant scarlet put out an arm
presumably to touch the pulley, and the tiny knife would rattle down
on to the poor little reclining doll's neck, and its head would roll off
into the basket beyond.
Then there was a loud whirr of wheels, a buzz of internal mechanism,
and all the little figures would stop dead with arms outstretched,
whilst the beheaded doll rolled off the board and was lost to view, no
doubt preparatory to going through the same gruesome pantomime
again.
It was very thrilling, and very terrible: a certain air of hushed awe
reigned in the booth where this mechanical wonder was displayed.
The booth itself stood in a secluded portion of the grounds, far from
the toll gates, and the band stand and the noise of the merry-go-
round, and there were great texts, written in red letters on a black
ground, pinned all along the walls.
"Please spare a copper for the starving poor of Paris."
A lady, dressed in grey quilted petticoat and pretty grey and black
striped paniers, could be seen walking in the booth from time to time,
then disappearing through a partition beyond. She would emerge
again presently carrying an embroidered reticule, and would wander
round among the crowd, holding out the bag by its chain, and
repeating in tones of somewhat monotonous appeal: "For the starving
poor of Paris, if you please!"
She had fine, dark eyes, rather narrow and tending upwards at the
outer corners, which gave her face a not altogether pleasant
expression. Still, they were fine eyes, and when she went round
soliciting alms, most of the men put a hand into their breeches pocket
and dropped a coin into her embroidered reticule.
She said the word "poor" in rather a funny way, rolling the "r" at the
end, and she also said "please" as if it were spelt with a long line of
"e's," and so it was concluded that she was French and was begging
for her poorer sisters. At stated intervals during the day, the
mechanical toy was rolled into a corner, and the lady in grey stood up
on a platform and sang queer little songs, the words of which nobody
could understand.
"Il etait une bergere et ron et petit pataplon. ... "
But it all left an impression of sadness and of suppressed awe upon
the minds and susceptibilities of the worthy Richmond yokels come
with their wives or sweethearts to enjoy the fun of the fair, and gladly
did everyone emerge out of that melancholy booth into the sunshine,
the brightness and the noise.
"Lud! but she do give me the creeps," said Mistress Polly, the pretty
barmaid from the Bell Inn, down by the river. "And I must say that I
don't see why we English folk should send our hard-earned pennies to
those murdering ruffians over the water. Bein' starving so to speak,
don't make a murderer a better man if he goes on murdering," she
added with undisputable if ungrammatical logic. "Come, let's look at
something more cheerful now."
And without waiting for anyone else's assent, she turned towards the
more lively portion of the grounds, closely followed by a ruddy-
faced, somewhat sheepish-looking youth, who very obviously was her
attendant swain.
It was getting on for three o-clock now, and the quality were
beginning to arrive. Lord Anthony Dewhurst was already there,
chucking every pretty girl under the chin, to the annoyance of her
beau. Ladies were arriving all the time, and the humbler feminine
hearts were constantly set a-flutter at sight of rich brocaded gowns,
and the new Charlottes, all crinkled velvet and soft marabout, which
were so becoming to the pretty faces beneath.
There was incessant and loud talking and chattering, with here and
there the shriller tones of a French voice being distinctly noticeable in
the din. There were a good many French ladies and gentlemen
present, easily recognisable, even in the distance, for their clothes
were of more sober hue and of lesser richness than those of their
English compeers.
But they were great lords and ladies, nevertheless, Dukes and
Duchesses and Countesses, come to England for fear of being
murdered by those devils in their own country. Richmond was full of
them just now, as they were made right welcome both at the Palace
and at the magnificent home of Sir Percy and Lady Blakeney.
Ah! here comes Sir Andrew Ffoulkes with his lady! so pretty and
dainty does she look, like a little china doll, in her new-fashioned
short-waisted gown: her brown hair in soft waves above her smooth
forehead, her great, hazel eyes fixed in unaffected admiration on the
gallant husband by her side.
"No wonder she dotes on him!" signed pretty Mistress Polly after she
had bobbed her curtsy to my lady. "The brave deeds he did for love
of her! Rescued her from those murderers over in France and brought
her to England safe and sound, having fought no end of them single-
handed, so I've beard it said. Have you not, Master Thomas Jezzard?"
And she looked defiantly at her meek-looking cavalier.
"Bah!" replied Master Thomas with quite unusual vehemence in
response to the disparaging look in her brown eyes, "'Tis not he who
did it all, as you well know, Mistress Polly. Sir Andrew Ffoulkes is a
gallant gentleman, you may take your Bible oath on that, but he that
fights the murdering frogeaters single-handed is he whom they call
The Scarlet Pimpernel: the bravest gentleman in all the world."
Then, as at mention of the national hero, he thought that he detected
in Mistress Polly's eyes an enthusiasm which he could not very well
ascribe to his own individuality, he added with some pique:
"But they do say that this same Scarlet Pimpernel is mightily ill-
favoured, and that's why no one ever sees him. They say he is fit to
scare the crows away and that no Frenchy can look twice at his face,
for it's so ugly, and so they let him get out of the country, rather than
look at him again."
"Then they do say a mighty lot of nonsense," retorted Mistress Polly,
with a shrug of her pretty shoulders, "and if that be so, then why
don't you go over to France and join hands with the Scarlet
Pimpernel? I'll warrant no Frenchman'll want to look twice at your
face."
A chorus of laughter greeted this sally, for the two young people had
in the meanwhile been joined by several of their friends, and now
formed part of a merry group near the band, some sitting, others
standing, but all bent on seeing as much as there was to see in
Richmond Gala this day. There was Johnny Cullen, the grocer's
apprentice from Twickenham, and Ursula Quekett, the baker's
daughter, and several "young 'uns" from the neighbourhood, as well
as some older folk.
And all of them enjoyed a joke when they heard one and thought
Mistress Polly's retort mightily smart. But then Mistress Polly was
possessed of two hundred pounds, all her own, left to her by her
grandmother, and on the strength of this extensive fortune had
acquired a reputation for beauty and wit not easily accorded to a
wench that had been penniless.
But Mistress Polly was also very kind-hearted. She loved to tease
Master Jezzard, who was an indefatigable hanger-on at her pretty
skirts, and whose easy conquest had rendered her somewhat
contemptuous, but at the look of perplexed annoyance and
bewildered distress in the lad's face, her better nature soon got the
upper hand. She realized that her remark had been unwarrantably
spiteful, and wishing to make atonement, she said with a touch of
coquetry which quickly spread balm over the honest yokel's injured
vanity:
"La! Master Jezzard, you do seem to make a body say some queer
things. But there! you must own 'tis mighty funny about that Scarlet
Pimpernel!" she added, appealing to the company in general, just as if
Master Jezzard had been disputing the fact. "Why won't he let anyone
see who he is? And those who know him won't tell. Now I have it for
a fact from my lady's own maid Lucy, that the young lady as is
stopping at Lady Blakeney's house has actually spoken to the man.
She came over from France, come a fortnight to-morrow; she and the
gentleman they call Mossoo Deroulede. They both saw the Scarlet
Pimpernel and spoke to him. He brought them over from France.
They why won't they say?"
"Say what?" commented Johnny Cullen, the apprentice.
"Who this mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel is."
"Perhaps he isn't," said old Clutterbuck, who was clerk of the vestry
at the church of St. John's the Evangelist.
"Yes!" he added sententiously, for he was fond of his own sayings
and usually liked to repeat them before he had quite done with them,
"that's it, you may be sure. Perhaps he isn't."
"What do you mean, Master Clutterbuck?" asked Ursula Quekett, for
she knew the old man liked to explain his wise saws, and as she
wanted to marry his son, she indulged him whenever she could.
"What do you mean? He isn't what?"
"He isn't. That's all," explained Clutterbuck with vague solemnity.
Then seeing that he had gained the attention of the little party round
him, he condescended to come to more logical phraseology.
"I mean, that perhaps we must not ask, 'who IS this mysterious
Scarlet Pimpernel?' but 'who WAS that poor and unfortunate
gentleman?'"
"Then you think ... " suggested Mistress Polly, who felt
unaccountably low-spirited at this oratorical pronouncement.
"I have it for a fact," said Mr. Clutterbuck solemnly, "that he whom
they call the Scarlet Pimpernel no longer exists now: that he was
collared by the Frenchies, as far back as last fall, and in the language
of the poets, has never been heard of no more."
Mr. Clutterbuck was very fond of quoting from the works of certain
writers whose names he never mentioned, but who went by the
poetical generality of "the poets." Whenever he made use of phrases
which he was supposed to derive from these great and unnamed
authors, he solemnly and mechanically raised his hat, as a tribute of
respect to these giant minds.
"You think that The Scarlet Pimpernel is dead, Mr. Clutterbuck? That
those horrible Frenchies murdered him? Surely you don't mean that?"
sighed Mistress Polly ruefully.
Mr. Clutterbuck put his hand up to his hat, preparatory no doubt to
making another appeal to the mysterious poets, but was interrupted in
the very act of uttering great thoughts by a loud and prolonged laugh
which came echoing from a distant corner of the grounds.
"Lud! but I'd know that laugh anywhere," said Mistress Quekett,
whilst all eyes were turned in the direction whence the merry noise
had come.
Half a head taller than any of his friends around him, his lazy blue
eyes scanning from beneath their drooping lids the motley throng
around him, stood Sir Percy Blakeney, the centre of a gaily-dressed
little group which seemingly had just crossed the toll-gate.
"A fine specimen of a man, for sure," remarked Johnnie Cullen, the
apprentice.
"Aye! you may take your Bible oath on that!" sighed Mistress Polly,
who was inclined to be sentimental.
"Speakin' as the poets," pronounced Mr. Clutterbuck sententiously,
"inches don't make a man."
"Nor fine clothes neither," added Master Jezzard, who did not
approve of Mistress Polly's sentimental sigh.
"There's my lady!" gasped Miss Barbara suddenly, clutching Master
Clutterbuck's arm vigorously. "Lud! but she is beautiful to-day!"
Beautiful indeed, and radiant with youth and happiness, Marguerite
Blakeney had just gone through the gates and was walking along the
sward towards the band stand. She was dressed in clinging robes of
shimmery green texture, the new-fashioned high-waisted effect
suiting her graceful figure to perfection. The large Charlotte, made of
velvet to match the gown, cast a deep shadow over the upper part of
her face, and gave a peculiar softness to the outline of her forehead
and cheeks.
Long lace mittens covered her arms and hands and a scarf of
diaphanous material edged with dull gold hung loosely around her
shoulders.
Yes! she was beautiful! No captious chronicler has ever denied that!
and no one who knew her before, and who saw her again on this late
summer's afternoon, could fail to mark the additional charm of her
magnetic personality. There was a tenderness in her face as she
turned her head to and fro, a joy of living in her eyes that was quite
irresistibly fascinating.
Just now she was talking animatedly with the young girl who was
walking beside her, and laughing merrily the while:
"Nay! we'll find your Paul, never fear! Lud! child, have you forgotten
he is in England now, and that there's no fear of his being kidnapped
here on the green in broad daylight."
The young girl gave a slight shudder and her child-like face became a
shade paler than before. Marguerite took her hand and gave it a
kindly pressure. Juliette Marny, but lately come to England, saved
from under the very knife of the guillotine, by a timely and daring
rescue, could scarcely believe as yet that she and the man she loved
were really out of danger.
"There is Monsieur Deroulede," said Marguerite after a slight pause,
giving the young girl time to recover herself and pointing to a group
of men close by. "He is among friends, as you see."
They made such a pretty picture, these two women, as they stood
together for a moment on the green with the brilliant September sun
throwing golden reflections and luminous shadows on their slender
forms. Marguerite, tall and queen-like in her rich gown, and costly
jewels, wearing with glorious pride the invisible crown of happy
wifehood: Juliette, slim and girlish, dressed all in white, with a soft,
straw hat on her fair curls, and bearing on an otherwise young and
child-like face, the hard imprint of the terrible sufferings she had
undergone, of the deathly moral battle her tender soul had had to
fight.
Soon a group of friends joined them. Paul Deroulede among these,
also Sir Andrew and Lady Ffoulkes, and strolling slowly towards
them, his hands buried in the pockets of his fine cloth breeches, his
broad shoulders set to advantage in a coat of immaculate cut,
priceless lace ruffles at neck and wrist, came the inimitable Sir Percy.
Chapter V : Sir Percy and His Lady
To all appearances he had not changed since those early days of
matrimony, when his young wife dazzled London society by her wit
and by her beauty, and he was one of the many satellites that helped
to bring into bold relief the brilliance of her presence, of her sallies
and of her smiles.
His friends alone, mayhap--and of these only an intimate few --had
understood that beneath that self-same lazy manner, those shy and
awkward ways, that half-inane, half-cynical laugh, there now lurked
an undercurrent of tender and passionate happiness.
That Lady Blakeney was in love with her own husband, nobody could
fail to see, and in the more frivolous cliques of fashionable London
this extraordinary phenomenon had oft been eagerly discussed.
"A monstrous thing, of a truth, for a woman of fashion to adore her
own husband!" was the universal pronouncement of the gaily-decked
little world that centred around Carlton House and Ranelagh.
Not that Sir Percy Blakeney was unpopular with the fair sex. Far be it
from the veracious chronicler's mind even to suggest such a thing.
The ladies would have voted any gathering dull if Sir Percy's witty
sallies did not ring from end to end of the dancing hall, if his new
satin coat and 'broidered waistcoat did not call for comment or
admiration.
But that was the frivolous set, to which Lady Blakeney had never
belonged.
It was well known that she had always viewed her good-natured
husband as the most willing and most natural butt for her caustic wit;
she still was fond of aiming a shaft or two at him, and he was still
equally ready to let the shaft glance harmlessly against the flawless
shield of his own imperturbable good humour, but now, contrary to
all precedent, to all usages and customs of London society,
Marguerite seldom was seen at routs or at the opera without her
husband; she accompanied him to all the races, and even one night--
oh horror!--had danced the gavotte with him.
Society shuddered and wondered! tried to put Lady Blakeney's
sudden infatuation down to foreign eccentricity, and finally consoled
itself with the thought that after all this nonsense could not last, and
that she was too clever a woman and he too perfect a gentleman to
keep up this abnormal state of things for any length of time.
In the meanwhile, the ladies averred that this matrimonial love was a
very one-sided affair. No one could assert that Sir Percy was anything
but politely indifferent to his wife's obvious attentions. His lazy eyes
never once lighted up when she entered a ball-room, and there were
those who knew for a fact that her ladyship spent many lonely days in
her beautiful home at Richmond whilst her lord and master absented
himself with persistent if unchivalrous regularity.
His presence at the Gala had been a surprise to everyone, for all
thought him still away, fishing in Scotland or shooting in Yorkshire,
anywhere save close to the apron strings of his doting wife. He
himself seemed conscious of the fact that he had not been expected at
this end-of-summer fete, for as he strolled forward to meet his wife
and Juliette Marny, and acknowledge with a bow here and a nod
there the many greetings from subordinates and friends, there was
quite an apologetic air about his good-looking face, and an obvious
shyness in his smile.
But Marguerite gave a happy little laugh when she saw him coming
towards her.
"Oh, Sir Percy!" she said gaily, "and pray have you seen the show? I
vow 'tis the maddest, merriest throng I've seen for many a day. Nay!
but for the sighs and shudders of my poor little Juliette, I should be
enjoying one of the liveliest days of my life."
She patted Juliette's arm affectionately.
"Do not shame me before Sir Percy," murmured the young girl,
casting shy glances at the elegant cavalier before her, vainly trying to
find in the indolent, foppish personality of this society butterfly, some
trace of the daring man of action, the bold adventurer who had
snatched her and her lover from out the very tumbril that bore them
both to death.
"I know I ought to be gay," she continued with an attempt at a smile,
"I ought to forget everything, save what I owe to ..."
Sir Percy's laugh broke in on her half-finished sentence.
"Lud! and to think of all that I ought not to forget!" he said loudly.
"Tony here has been clamouring for iced punch this last half-hour,
and I promised to find a booth wherein the noble liquid is properly
dispensed. Within half an hour from now His Royal Highness will be
here. I assure you, Mlle. Juliette, that from that time onwards I have
to endure the qualms of the damned, for the heir to Great Britain's
throne always contrives to be thirsty when I am satiated, which is
Tantalus' torture magnified a thousandfold, or to be satiated when my
parched palate most requires solace; in either case I am a most
pitiable man."
"In either case you contrive to talk a deal of nonsense, Sir Percy,"
said Marguerite gaily.
"What else would your ladyship have me do this lazy, hot afternoon?"
"Come and view the booths with me," she said. "I am dying for a
sight of the fat woman and the lean man, the pig-faced child, the
dwarfs and the giants. There! Monsieur Deroulede," she added,
turning to the young Frenchman who was standing close beside her,
"take Mlle. Juliette to hear the clavecin players. I vow she is tired of
my company."
The gaily-dressed group was breaking up. Juliette and Paul
Deroulede were only too ready to stroll off arm-in-arm together, and
Sir Andrew Ffoulkes was ever in attendance on his young wife.
For one moment Marguerite caught her husband's eye. No one was
within earshot.
"Percy," she said.
"Yes, m'dear."
"When did you return?"
"Early this morning."
"You crossed over from Calais?"
"From Boulogne."
"Why did you not let me know sooner?"
"I could not, dear. I arrived at my lodgings in town, looking a
disgusting object. ... I could not appear before you until I had washed
some of the French mud from off my person. Then His Royal
Highness demanded my presence. He wanted news of the Duchesse
de Verneuil, whom I had the honour of escorting over from France.
By the time I had told him all that he wished to hear, there was no
chance of finding you at home, and I thought I should see you here."
Marguerite said nothing for a moment, but her foot impatiently
tapped the ground, and her fingers were fidgeting with the gold fringe
of her scarf. The look of joy, of exquisite happiness, seemed to have
suddenly vanished from her face; there was a deep furrow between
her brows.
She sighed a short, sharp sigh, and cast a rapid upward glance at her
husband.
He was looking down at her, smiling good-naturedly, a trifle
sarcastically perhaps, and the frown on her face deepened.
"Percy," she said abruptly.
"Yes, m'dear."
"These anxieties are terrible to bear. You have been twice over to
France within the last month, dealing with your life as lightly as if it
did not now belong to me. When will you give up these mad
adventures, and leave others to fight their own battles and to save
their own lives as best they may?"
She had spoken with increased vehemence, although her voice was
scarce raised above a whisper. Even in her sudden, passionate anger
she was on her guard not to betray his secret. He did not reply
immediately, but seemed to be studying the beautiful face on which
heartbroken anxiety was now distinctly imprinted.
Then he turned and looked at the solitary booth in the distance,
across the frontal of which a large placard had been recently affixed,
bearing the words: "Come and see the true representation of the
guillotine!"
In front of the booth a man dressed in ragged breeches, with Phrygian
cap on his head, adorned with a tri-colour cockade, was vigorously
beating a drum, shouting volubly the while:
"Come in and see, come in and see! the only realistic presentation of
the original guillotine. Hundreds perish in Paris every day! Come and
see! Come and see! the perfectly vivid performance of what goes on
hourly in Paris at the present moment."
Marguerite had followed the direction of Sir Percy's eyes. She too
was looking at the booth, she heard the man's monotonous, raucous
cries. She gave a slight shudder and once more looked imploringly at
her husband. His face--though outwardly as lazy and calm as before--
had a strange set look about the mouth and firm jaw, and his slender
hand, the hand of a dandy accustomed to handle cards and dice and
to play lightly with the foils, was clutched tightly beneath the folds of
the priceless Mechlin frills.
It was but a momentary stiffening of the whole powerful frame, an
instant's flash of the ruling passion hidden within that very secretive
soul. Then he once more turned towards her, the rigid lines of his
face relaxed, he broke into a pleasant laugh, and with the most
elaborate and most courtly bow he took her hand in his and raising
her fingers to his lips, he gave the answer to her questions:
"When your ladyship has ceased to be the most admired woman in
Europe, namely, when I am in my grave."
Chapter VI : For the Poor of Paris
There was no time to say more then. For the laughing, chatting
groups of friends had once more closed up round Marguerite and her
husband, and she, ever on the alert, gave neither look nor sign that
any serious conversation had taken place between Sir Percy and
herself.
Whatever she might feel or dread with regard to the foolhardy
adventures in which he still persistently embarked, no member of the
League ever guarded the secret of his chief more loyally than did
Marguerite Blakeney.
Though her heart overflowed with a passionate pride in her husband,
she was clever enough to conceal every emotion save that which
Nature had insisted on imprinting in her face, her present radiant
happiness and her irresistible love. And thus before the world she
kept up that bantering way with him, which had characterized her
earlier matrimonial life, that good-natured, easy contempt which he
had so readily accepted in those days, and which their entourage
would have missed and would have enquired after, if she had changed
her manner towards him too suddenly.
In her heart she knew full well that within Percy Blakeney's soul she
had a great and powerful rival: his wild, mad, passionate love of
adventure. For it he would sacrifice everything, even his life; she
dared not ask herself if he would sacrifice his love.
Twice in a few weeks he had been over to France: every time he went
she could not know if she would ever see him again. She could not
imagine how the French Committee of Public Safety could so
clumsily allow the hated Scarlet Pimpernel to slip through its fingers.
But she never attempted either to warn him or to beg him not to go.
When he brought Paul Deroulede and Juliette Marny over from
France, her heart went out to the two young people in sheer gladness
and pride because of his precious life, which he had risked for them.
She loved Juliette for the dangers Percy had passed, for the anxieties
she herself had endured; only to-day, in the midst of this beautiful
sunshine, this joy of the earth, of summer and of the sky, she had
suddenly felt a mad, overpowering anxiety, a deadly hatred of the
wild adventurous life, which took him so often away from her side.
His pleasant, bantering reply precluded her following up the subject,
whilst the merry chatter of people round her warned her to keep her
words and looks under control.
But she seemed now to feel the want of being alone, and, somehow,
that distant booth with its flaring placard, and the crier in the
Phrygian cap, exercised a weird fascination over her.
Instinctively she bent her steps thither, and equally instinctively the
idle throng of her friends followed her. Sir Percy alone had halted in
order to converse with Lord Hastings, who had just arrived.
"Surely, Lady Blakeney, you have no though of patronising that
gruesome spectacle?" said Lord Anthony Dewhurst, as Marguerite
almost mechanically had paused within a few yards of the solitary
booth.
"I don't know," she said, with enforced gaiety, "the place seems to
attract me. And I need not look at the spectacle," she added
significantly, as she pointed to a roughly-scribbled notice at the
entrance of the tent: "In aid of the starving poor of Paris."
"There's a good-looking woman who sings, and a hideous mechanical
toy that moves," said one of the young men in the crowd. "It is very
dark and close inside the tent. I was lured in there for my sins, and
was in a mighty hurry to come out again."
"Then it must be my sins that are helping to lure me too at the present
moment," said Marguerite lightly. "I pray you all to let me go in
there. I want to hear the good-looking woman sing, even if I do not
see the hideous toy on the move."
"May I escort you then, Lady Blakeney?" said Lord Tony.
"Nay! I would rather go in alone," she replied a trifle impatiently. "I
beg of you not to heed my whim, and to await my return, there,
where the music is at its merriest."
It had been bad manners to insist. Marguerite, with a little
comprehensive nod to all her friends, left the young cavaliers still
protesting and quickly passed beneath the roughly constructed
doorway that gave access into the booth.
A man, dressed in theatrical rags and wearing the characteristic
scarlet cap, stood immediately within the entrance, and ostentatiously
rattled a money box at regular intervals.
"For the starving poor of Paris," he drawled out in nasal monotonous
tones the moment he caught sight of Marguerite and of her rich
gown. She dropped some gold into the box and then passed on.
The interior of the booth was dark and lonely-looking after the glare
of the hot September sun and the noisy crowd that thronged the
sward outside. Evidently a performance had just taken place on the
elevated platform beyond, for a few yokels seemed to be lingering in
a desultory manner as if preparatory to going out.
A few disjointed comments reached Marguerite's ears as she
approached, and the small groups parted to allow her to pass. One or
two women gaped in astonishment at her beautiful dress, whilst
others bobbed a respectful curtsey.
The mechanical toy arrester her attention immediately. She did not
find it as gruesome as she expected, only singularly grotesque, with
all those wooden little figures in their quaint, arrested action.
She drew nearer to have a better look, and the yokels who had
lingered behind, paused, wondering if she would make any remark.
"Her ladyship was born in France," murmured one of the men, close
to her, "she would know if the thing really looks like that."
"She do seem interested," quoth another in a whisper.
"Lud love us all!" said a buxom wench, who was clinging to the arm
of a nervous-looking youth, "I believe they're coming for more
money."
On the elevated platform at the further end of the tent, a slim figure
had just made its appearance, that of a young woman dressed in
peculiarly sombre colours, and with a black lace hood thrown lightly
over her head.
Marguerite thought that the face seemed familiar to her, and she also
noticed that the woman carried a large embroidered reticule in her
bemittened hand.
There was a general exodus the moment she appeared. The
Richmond yokels did not like the look of that reticule. They felt that
sufficient demand had already been made upon their scant purses,
considering the meagerness of the entertainment, and they dreaded
being lured to further extravagance.
When Marguerite turned away from the mechanical toy, the last of
the little crowd had disappeared, and she was alone in the booth with
the woman in the dark kirtle and black lace hood.
"For the poor of Paris, Madame," said the latter mechanically,
holding out her reticule.
Marguerite was looking at her intently. The face certainly seemed
familiar, recalling to her mind the far-off days in Paris, before she
married. Some young actress no doubt driven out of France by that
terrible turmoil which had caused so much sorrow and so much
suffering. The face was pretty, the figure slim and elegant, and the
look of obvious sadness in the dark, almond-shaped eyes was
calculated to inspire sympathy and pity.
Yet, strangely enough, Lady Blakeney felt repelled and chilled by this
sombrely-dressed young person: an instinct, which she could not have
explained and which she felt had no justification, warned her that
somehow or other, the sadness was not quite genuine, the appeal for
the poor not quite heartfelt.
Nevertheless, she took out her purse, and dropping some few
sovereigns into the capacious reticule, she said very kindly:
"I hope that you are satisfied with your day's work, Madame; I fear
me our British country folk hold the strings of their purses somewhat
tightly these times."
The woman sighed and shrugged her shoulders.
"Oh, Madame!" she said with a tone of great dejection, "one does
what one can for one's starving countrymen, but it is very hard to
elicit sympathy over here for them, poor dears!"
"You are a Frenchwoman, of course," rejoined Marguerite, who had
noted that though the woman spoke English with a very pronounced
foreign accent, she had nevertheless expressed herself with wonderful
fluency and correctness.
"Just like Lady Blakeney herself," replied the other.
"You know who I am?
"Who could come to Richmond and not know Lady Blakeney by
sight."
"But what made you come to Richmond on this philanthropic errand
of yours?"
"I go where I think there is a chance of earning a little money for the
cause which I have at heart," replied the Frenchwoman with the same
gentle simplicity, the same tone of mournful dejection.
What she said was undoubtedly noble and selfless. Lady Blakeney felt
in her heart that her keenest sympathy should have gone out to this
young woman--pretty, dainty, hardly more than a girl --who seemed
to be devoting her young life in a purely philanthropic and unselfish
cause. And yet in spite of herself, Marguerite seemed unable to shake
off that curious sense of mistrust which had assailed her from the
first, nor that feeling of unreality and staginess with which the
Frenchwoman's attitude had originally struck her.
Yet she tried to be kind and to be cordial, tried to hide that coldness
in her manner which she felt was unjustified.
"It is all very praiseworthy on your part, Madame," she said
somewhat lamely. "Madame ...?" she added interrogatively.
"My name is Candeille--Desiree Candeille," replied the
Frenchwoman.
"Candeille?" exclaimed Marguerite with sudden alacrity, "Candeille ...
surely ..."
"Yes ... of the Varietes."
"Ah! then I know why your face from the first seemed familiar to
me," said Marguerite, this time with unaffected cordiality. "I must
have applauded you many a time in the olden days. I am an ex-
colleague, you know. My name was St. Just before I married, and I
was of the Maison Moliere."
"I knew that," said Desiree Candeille, "and half hoped that you would
remember me."
"Nay! who could forget Demoiselle Candeille, the most popular star
in the theatrical firmament?"
"Oh! that was so long ago."
"Only four years."
"A fallen star is soon lost out of sight."
"Why fallen?"
"It was a choice for me between exile from France and the
guillotine," rejoined Candeille simply.
"Surely not?" queried Marguerite with a touch of genuine sympathy.
With characteristic impulsiveness, she had now cast aside her former
misgivings: she had conquered her mistrust, at any rate had relegated
it to the background of her mind. This woman was a colleague: she
had suffered and was in distress; she had every claim, therefore, on a
compatriot's help and friendship. She stretched out her hand and took
Desiree Candeille's in her own; she forced herself to feel nothing but
admiration for this young woman, whose whole attitude spoke of
sorrows nobly borne, of misfortunes proudly endured.
"I don't know why I should sadden you with my story," rejoined
Desiree Candeille after a slight pause, during which she seemed to be
waging war against her own emotion. "It is not a very interesting one.
Hundreds have suffered as I did. I had enemies in Paris. God knows
how that happened. I had never harmed anyone, but someone must
have hated me and must have wished me ill. Evil is so easily wrought
in France these days. A denunciation --a perquisition--an accusation--
then the flight from Paris ... the forged passports ... the disguise ... the
bribe ... the hardships ... the squalid hiding places. ... Oh! I have gone
through it all ... tasted every kind of humiliation ... endured every
kind of insult. ... Remember! that I was not a noble aristocrat ... a
Duchess or an impoverished Countess ..." she added with marked
bitterness, "or perhaps the English cavaliers whom the popular voice
has called the League of the Scarlet Pimpernel would have taken
some interest in me. I was only a poor actress and had to find my way
out of France alone, or else perish on the guillotine."
"I am so sorry!" said Marguerite simply.
"Tell me how you got on, once you were in England," she continued
after a while, seeing that Desiree Candeille seemed absorbed in
thought.
"I had a few engagements at first," replied the Frenchwoman. "I
played at Sadler's Wells and with Mrs. Jordan at Covent Garden, but
the Aliens' Bill put an end to my chances of livelihood. No manger
cared to give me a part, and so ..."
"And so?"
"Oh! I had a few jewels and I sold them. ... A little money and I live
on that. ... But when I played at Covent Garden I contrived to send
part of my salary over to some of the poorer clubs of Paris. My heart
aches for those that are starving. ... Poor wretches, they are
misguided and misled by self-seeking demagogues. ... It hurts me to
feel that I can do nothing more to help them ... and eases my self-
respect if, by singing at public fairs, I can still send a few francs to
those who are poorer than myself."
She had spoken with ever-increasing passion and vehemence.
Marguerite, with eyes fixed into vacancy, seeing neither the speaker
nor her surroundings, seeing only visions of those same poor
wreckages of humanity, who had been goaded into thirst for blood,
when their shrunken bodies should have been clamouring for healthy
food,--Marguerite thus absorbed, had totally forgotten her earlier
prejudices and now completely failed to note all that was unreal,
stagy, theatrical, in the oratorical declamations of the ex-actress from
the Varietes.
Pre-eminently true and loyal herself in spite of the many deceptions
and treacheries which she had witnessed in her life, she never looked
for falsehood or for cant in others. Even now she only saw before her
a woman who had been wrongfully persecuted, who had suffered and
had forgiven those who had caused her to suffer. She bitterly accused
herself for her original mistrust of this noble-hearted, unselfish
woman, who was content to tramp around in an alien country,
bartering her talents for a few coins, in order that some of those, who
were the originators of her sorrows, might have bread to eat and a
bed in which to sleep.
"Mademoiselle," she said warmly, "truly you shame me, who am also
French-born, with the many sacrifices you so nobly make for those
who should have first claim on my own sympathy. Believe me, if I
have not done as much as duty demanded of me in the cause of my
starving compatriots, it has not been for lack of good-will. Is there
any way now," she added eagerly, "in which I can help you? Putting
aside the question of money, wherein I pray you to command my
assistance, what can I do to be of useful service to you?"
"You are very kind, Lady Blakeney ..." said the other hesitatingly.
"Well? What is it? I see there is something in your mind ..."
"It is perhaps difficult to express ... but people say I have a good
voice ... I sing some French ditties ... they are a novelty in England, I
think. ... If I could sing them in fashionable salons ... I might perhaps
..."
"Nay! you shall sing in fashionable salons," exclaimed Marguerite
eagerly, "you shall become the fashion, and I'll swear the Prince of
Wales himself shall bid you sing at Carlton House ... and you shall
name your own fee, Mademoiselle ... and London society shall vie
with the elite of Bath, as to which shall lure you to its most
frequented routs. ... There! there! you shall make a fortune for the
Paris poor ... and to prove to you that I mean every word I say, you
shall begin your triumphant career in my own salon to-morrow night.
His Royal Highness will be present. You shall sing your most
engaging songs ... and for your fee you must accept a hundred
guineas, which you shall send to the poorest workman's club in Paris
in the name of Sir Percy and Lady Blakeney."
"I thank your ladyship, but ..."
"You'll not refuse?"
"I'll accept gladly ... but ... you will understand ... I am not very old,"
said Candeille quaintly, "I ... I am only an actress ... but if a young
actress is unprotected ... then ..."
"I understand," replied Marguerite gently, "that you are far too pretty
to frequent the world all alone, and that you have a mother, a sister
or a friend ... which? ... whom you would wish to escort you to-
morrow. Is that it?"
"Nay," rejoined the actress, with marked bitterness, "I have neither
mother, nor sister, but our Revolutionary Government, with tardy
compassion for those it has so relentlessly driven out of France, has
deputed a representative of theirs in England to look after the
interests of French subjects over here1"
"Yes?"
"They have realised over in Paris that my life here has been devoted
to the welfare of the poor people of France. The representative whom
the government has sent to England is specially interested in me and
in my work. He is a stand-by for me in case of trouble ... in case of
insults ... A woman alone is oft subject to those, even at the hands of
so-called gentlemen ... and the official representative of my own
country becomes in such cases my most natural protector."
"I understand."
"You will receive him?"
"Certainly."
"Then may I present him to your ladyship?"
"Whenever you like."
"Now, and it please you."
"Now?"
"Yes. Here he comes, at your ladyship's service."
Desiree Candeille's almond-shaped eyes were fixed upon a distant part of
the tent, behind Lady Blakeney in the direction of the main entrance to
the booth. There was a slight pause after she had spoken and then
Marguerite slowly turned in order to see who this official representative
of France was, whom at the young actress' request she had just agreed to
receive in her house. In the doorway of the tent, framed by its gaudy
draperies, and with the streaming sunshine as a brilliant background
behind him, stood the sable-clad figure of Chauvelin.
Chapter VII : Premonition
Marguerite neither moved nor spoke. She felt two pairs of eyes fixed
upon her, and with all the strength of will at her command she forced the
very blood in her veins not to quit her cheeks, forced her eyelids not to
betray by a single quiver the icy pang of a deadly premonition which at
sight of Chauvelin seemed to have chilled her entire soul.
There he stood before her, dressed in his usual somber garments, a look
almost of humility in those keen grey eyes of his, which a year ago on the
cliffs of Calais had peered down at her with such relentless hate.
Strange that at this moment she should have felt an instinct of fear. What
cause had she to throw more than a pitiful glance at the man who had
tried so cruelly to wrong her, and who had so signally failed?
Having bowed very low and very respectfully, Chauvelin advanced
towards her, with all the airs of a disgraced courtier craving audience
from his queen.
As he approached she instinctively drew back.
"Would you prefer not to speak to me, Lady Blakeney?" he said humbly.
She could scarcely believe her ears, or trust her eyes. It seemed
impossible that a man could have so changed in a few months. He even
looked shorter than last year, more shrunken within himself. His hair,
which he wore free from powder, was perceptibly tinged with grey.
"Shall I withdraw?" he added after a pause, seeing that Marguerite made
no movement to return his salutation.
"It would be best, perhaps," she replied coldly. "You and I, Monsieur
Chauvelin, have so little to say to one another."
"Very little indeed," he rejoined quietly; "the triumphant and happy have
ever very little to say to the humiliated and the defeated. But I had hoped
that Lady Blakeney in the midst of her victory would have spared one
thought of pity and one of pardon."
"I did not know that you had need of either from me, Monsieur."
"Pity perhaps not, but forgiveness certainly."
"You have that, if you so desire it."
"Since I failed, you might try to forget."
"That is beyond my power. But believe me, I have ceased to think of the
infinite wrong which you tried to do to me."
"But I failed," he insisted, "and I meant no harm to YOU."
"To those I care for, Monsieur Chauvelin."
"I had to serve my country as best I could. I meant no harm to your
brother. He is safe in England now. And the Scarlet Pimpernel was
nothing to you."
She tried to read his face, tried to discover in those inscrutable eyes of
his, some hidden meaning to his words. Instinct had warned her of
course that this man could be nothing but an enemy, always and at all
times. But he seemed so broken, so abject now, that contempt for his
dejected attitude, and for the defeat which had been inflicted on him,
chased the last remnant of fear from her heart.
"I did not even succeed in harming that enigmatical personage,"
continued Chauvelin with the same self-abasement. "Sir Percy Blakeney,
you remember, threw himself across my plans, quite innocently of course.
I failed where you succeeded. Luck has deserted me. Our government
offered me a humble post, away from France. I look after the interests of
French subjects settled in England. My days of power are over. My
failure is complete. I do not complain, for I failed in a combat of wits ...
but I failed ... I failed ... I failed ... I am almost a fugitive and I am quite
disgraced. That is my present history, Lady Blakeney," he concluded,
taking once more a step towards her, "and you will understand that it
would be a solace if you extended your hand to me just once more, and
let me feel that although you would never willingly look upon my face
again, you have enough womanly tenderness in you to force your heart to
forgiveness and mayhap to pity."
Marguerite hesitated. He held out his hand and her warm, impulsive
nature prompted her to be kind. But instinct would not be gainsaid: a
curious instinct to which she refused to respond. What had she to fear
from this miserable and cringing little worm who had not even in him the
pride of defeat? What harm could he do to her, or to those whom she
loved? Her brother was in England! Her husband! Bah! not the enmity
of the entire world could make her fear for him!
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