The Bronze Eagle (21 page)

Whereupon Clyffurde made a violent effort to appear friendly and jovial
too.

"Why," he said with a pleasant laugh, "what madcap ideas are floating
through your head now?"

"Madcap schemes?" ejaculated de Marmont. "Nothing more or less, my dear
Clyffurde, than complete revenge for the humiliation those de Cambrays
put upon me last Sunday."

"Revenge? That sounds exciting," said Clyffurde with a smile, even while
his palm itched to slap the young braggart's face.

"Exciting,
par Dieu!
Of course it will be exciting. They have no idea
that I guessed their little machinations. Mme. la Duchesse d'Agen
travelling to Paris forsooth! Aye! but with five and twenty millions
sewn somewhere inside her petticoats. Well! the Emperor happens to want
his own five and twenty millions, if you please. So Mme. la Duchesse or
M. le Comte will have to disgorge. And I
[Pg 164]
shall have the pleasing task
of
making
them disgorge. What say you to that, friend Clyffurde?"

"That I am sorry for you," replied the other drily.

"Sorry for me? Why?"

"Because it is never a pleasing task to bully a defenceless woman—and
an old one at that."

De Marmont laughed aloud. "Bully Mme. la Duchesse d'Agen?" he exclaimed.
"
Sacré tonnerre!
what do you take me for. I shall not bully her. Fifty
soldiers don't bully a defenceless woman. We shall treat Mme. la
Duchesse with every consideration: we shall only remove five and twenty
millions of stolen money from her carriage, that is all."

"You may be mistaken about the money, de Marmont. It may be anywhere
except in the keeping of Mme. la Duchesse."

"It may be at the Château de Brestalou in the keeping of M. le Comte de
Cambray: and this I shall find out first of all. But I must not stand
gossiping any longer. I must see Colonel de la Bédoyère and get the men
I want. What are your plans, my dear Clyffurde?"

"The same as before," replied Bobby quietly. "I shall leave Grenoble as
soon as I can."

"Let the Emperor send you on a special mission to Lord Grenville, in
London, to urge England to remain neutral in the coming struggle."

"I think not," said Clyffurde enigmatically.

De Marmont did not wait to ask him to what this brief remark had
applied; he bade his friend a hasty farewell, then he turned on his
heel, and gaily whistling the refrain of the "Marseillaise," stalked out
of the hotel.

Clyffurde remained standing in the narrow panelled hall, which just then
reeked strongly of stewed onions and of hot coffee; he never moved a
muscle, but remained absolutely quiet for the space of exactly two
minutes; then he con
[Pg 165]
sulted his watch—it was then close on midday—and
finally went back to his room.

An hour after dawn that self-same morning the travelling coach of M. le
Comte de Cambray was at the perron of the Château de Brestalou.

At the last moment, when M. le Comte, hopelessly discouraged by the
surrender of Grenoble to the usurper, came home at a late hour of the
night, he decided that he too would journey to Paris with his sister and
daughter, taking the money with him to His Majesty, who indeed would
soon be in sore need of funds.

At that same late hour of the night M. le Comte discovered that with the
exception of faithful Hector and one or two scullions in the kitchen his
male servants both indoor and out had wandered in a body out to Grenoble
to witness "the Emperor's" entry into the city. They had marched out of
the château to the cry of "Vive l'Empereur!" and outside the gates had
joined a number of villagers of Brestalou who were bent on the same
errand.

Fortunately one of the coachmen and two of the older grooms from the
stables returned in the early dawn after the street demonstrations
outside the Emperor's windows had somewhat calmed down, and with the
routine of many years of domestic service had promptly and without
murmurings set to to obey the orders given to them the day before: to
have the travelling berline ready with four horses by seven o'clock.

It was very cold: the coachman and postillions shivered under their
threadbare liveries. The coachman had wrapped a woollen comforter round
his neck and pulled his white beaver broad-brimmed hat well over his
brows, as the northeast wind was keen and would blow into his face all
the way to Lyons, where the party would halt for the
[Pg 166]
night. He had
thick woollen gloves on and of his entire burly person only the tip of
his nose could be seen between his muffler and the brim of his hat. The
postillions, whip in hand, could not wrap themselves up quite so snugly:
they were trying to keep themselves warm by beating their arms against
their chest.

M. le Comte, aided by Hector, was arranging for the disposal of leather
wallets underneath the cushions of the carriage. The wallets contained
the money—twenty-five millions in notes and drafts—a godsend to the
King if the usurper did succeed in driving him out of the Tuileries.

Presently the ladies came down the perron steps with faithful Jeanne in
attendance, who carried small bags and dressing-cases. Both the ladies
were wrapped in long fur-lined cloaks and Mme. la Duchesse d'Agen had
drawn a hood closely round her face; but Crystal de Cambray stood
bareheaded in the cold frosty air, the hood of her cloak thrown back,
her own fair hair, dressed high, forming the only covering for her head.

Her face looked grave and even anxious, but wonderfully serene. This
should have been her wedding morning, the bells of old Brestalou church
should even now have been ringing out their first joyous peal to
announce the great event. Often and often in the past few weeks, ever
since her father had formally betrothed her to Victor de Marmont, she
had thought of this coming morning, and steeled herself to be brave
against the fateful day. She had been resigned to the decree of the
father and to the necessities of family and name—resigned but terribly
heartsore. She was obeying of her own free will but not blindly. She
knew that her marriage to a man whom she did not love was a sacrifice on
her part of every hope of future happiness. Her girlish love for St.
Genis had opened her eyes to the possibilities of happiness; she knew
that Life could hold
[Pg 167]
out a veritable cornucopia of delight and joy in a
union which was hallowed by Love, and her ready sacrifice was therefore
all the greater, all the more sublime, because it was not offered up in
ignorance.

But all that now was changed. She was once more free to indulge in those
dreams which had gladdened the days and nights of her lonely girlhood
out in far-off England: dreams which somehow had not even found their
culmination when St. Genis first told her of his love for her. They had
always been golden dreams which had haunted her in those distant days,
dreams of future happiness and of love which are seldom absent from a
young girl's mind, especially if she is a little lonely, has few
pleasures and is surrounded with an atmosphere of sadness.

Crystal de Cambray, standing on the perron of her stately home, felt but
little sorrow at leaving it to-day: she had hardly had the time in one
brief year to get very much attached to it: the sense of unreality which
had been born in her when her father led her through its vast halls and
stately parks had never entirely left her. The little home in England,
the tiny sitting-room with its bow window, and small front garden edged
with dusty evergreens, was far more real to her even now. She felt as if
the last year with its pomp and gloomy magnificence was all a dream and
that she was once more on the threshold of reality now, on the point of
waking, when she would find herself once more in her narrow iron bed and
see the patched and darned muslin curtains gently waving in the draught.

But for the moment she was glad enough to give herself to the delight of
this sudden consciousness of freedom. She sniffed the sharp, frosty air
with dilated nostrils like a young Arab filly that scents the
illimitable vastness of meadowland around her. The excitement of the
coming adventure thrilled her: she watched with glowing eyes the
preparations for the journey, the bestowal under the cushions of the
car
[Pg 168]
riage of the money which was to help King Louis to preserve his
throne.

In a sense she was sorry that her father and her aunt were coming too.
She would have loved to fly across country as a trusted servant of her
King; but when the time came to make a start she took her place in the
big travelling coach with a light heart and a merry face. She was so
sure of the justice of the King's cause, so convinced of God's wrath
against the usurper, that she had no room in her thoughts for
apprehension or sadness.

The Comte de Cambray on the other hand was grave and taciturn. He had
spent hours last evening on the ramparts of Grenoble. He had watched the
dissatisfaction of the troops grow into open rebellion and from that to
burning enthusiasm for the Corsican ogre. St. Genis had given him a
vivid account of the encounter at Laffray, and his ears were still
ringing with the cries of "Vive l'Empereur!" which had filled the
streets and ramparts of Grenoble until he himself fled back to his own
château, sickened at all that he had seen and heard.

He knew that the King's own brother, M. le Comte d'Artois, was at Lyons
even now with forty thousand men who were reputed to be loyal, but were
not the troops of Grenoble reputed to be loyal too? and was it likely
that the regiments at Lyons would behave so very differently to those at
Grenoble?

Thus the wearisome journey northwards in the lumbering carriage
proceeded mostly in silence. None of the occupants seemed to have much
to say. Mme. la Duchesse d'Agen and M. le Comte sat on the back seats
leaning against the cushions; Crystal de Cambray and ever-faithful
Jeanne sat in front, making themselves as comfortable as they could.

There was a halt for
déjeuner
and change of horses at Rives, and here
Maurice de St. Genis overtook the party.
[Pg 169]
He proposed to continue the
journey as far as Lyons on horseback, riding close by the off side of
the carriage. Here as well as at the next halt, at St. André-le-Gaz,
Maurice tried to get speech with Crystal, but she seemed cold in manner
and unresponsive to his whispered words. He tried to approach her, but
she pleaded fatigue and anxiety, and he was glad then that he had made
arrangements not to travel beside her in the lumbering coach. His
position on horseback beside the carriage would, he felt, be a more
romantic one, and he half-hoped that some enterprising footpad would
give him a chance of displaying his pluck and his devotion.

A start was made from St. André-le-Gaz at six o'clock in the afternoon.
Crystal was getting very cramped and tired, even the fine views over the
range of the Grande Chartreuse and the long white plateau of the Dent de
Crolles, with the wintry sunset behind it, failed to enchain her
attention. Her father and her aunt slept most of the time each in a
corner of the carriage, and after the start from St. André-le-Gaz,
comforted with hot coffee and fresh bread and the prospect of Lyons now
only some sixty kilomètres away, Crystal settled herself against the
cushions and tried to get some sleep.

The incessant shaking of the carriage, the rattle of harness and wheels,
the cracking of the postillions' whips, all contributed to making her
head ache, and to chase slumber away. But gradually her thoughts became
more confused, as the dim winter twilight gradually faded into night and
a veil of impenetrable blackness spread itself outside the windows of
the coach.

The northeasterly wind had not abated: it whistled mournfully through
the cracks in the woodwork of the carriage and made the windows rattle
in their framework. On the box the coachman had much ado to see well
ahead of him, as the vapour which rose from the flanks and
[Pg 170]
shoulders of
his steaming horses effectually blurred every outline on the road. The
carriage lanthorns threw a weird and feeble light upon the ever-growing
darkness. To right and left the bare and frozen common land stretched
its lonely vastness to some distant horizon unseen.

Suddenly the cumbrous vehicle gave a terrific lurch, which sent the
unsuspecting Jeanne flying into Mme. la Duchesse's lap and threw Crystal
with equal violence against her father's knees. There was much cracking
of whips, loud calls and louder oaths from coachman and postillions,
much creaking and groaning of wheels, another lurch—more feeble this
time—more groaning, more creaking, more oaths and finally the coach
with a final quivering as it were of all its parts settled down to an
ominous standstill.

Whereafter the oaths sounded more muffled, while there was a scampering
down from the high altitude of the coachman's box and a confused murmur
of voices.

It was then close on eight o'clock: Lyons was distant still some dozen
miles or so—and the night by now was darker than pitch.

M. le Comte, roused from fitful slumbers and trying to gather his
wandering wits, put his head out of the window: "What is it, Pierre?" he
called out loudly. "What has happened?"

"It's this confounded ditch, M. le Comte," came in a gruff voice from
out the darkness. "I didn't know the bridge had entirely broken down.
This sacré government will not look after the roads properly."

"Are you there, Maurice?" called the Comte.

But strangely enough there came no answer to his call. M. de St. Genis
must have fallen back some little distance in the rear, else he surely
would have heard something
[Pg 171]
of the clatter, the shouts and the swearing
which were attending the present unfortunate contretemps.