A Monk of Cruta Part 32

"No, no! away! I cannot die in peace and think of you--in danger. I want to pray. Leave me, now, Paul. Dear Martin! Martin, my love--is it you?"

Her mind was wandering, and she saw her lover of old days in the man whose hand she clasped so frantically; and Paul, although out in the pa.s.sage he could hear the sound of hurrying feet, could not tear himself away from her dying embrace. A faint, curious smile was parting her pallid lips, and her dim eyes seemed suddenly to have caught a dim reflection of the light to come.

"Martin! Martin! there is a mist everywhere--but I see you, dear love!

Wait for me! Let us go hand in hand--hand in hand through the Valley of the Shadow of Death. Oh, my love! it has been a weary, weary while.

Hold me tighter, Martin! I cannot feel your hand! Ah! at last, at last! Farewell sorrow, and grief, and suffering! We are together once more--a new world--behind the clouds! I am happy."

CHAPTER x.x.xV

"FROM OUT LIFE'S THUNDERS TO A STRANGE, SWEET WORLD"

She was dead, and, after all, her end had been crowned with peace.

She did not hear the door thrown roughly open, the swelling of angry voices, or the fast-approaching tramp of many feet. Nor did Paul heed any of these signs of coming danger; he had folded his strong arms around her, and his lips, pressed close to her, seemed to draw the last quivering breath from her frail body. It was only when her head sunk back, and he knew that she was dead, that he laid her reverently down and turned around.

The room was full of strange flashes of light and grotesque shadows falling upon the white faces of half a dozen monks. Standing in front of them was Father Andrew, and by his side was an old man, tall and straight, with snow-white beard and hair. He stood in full glare of a torch held by one of the monks behind him, and his face seemed like the face of a corpse, save for the steady, malignant light in his jet-black eyes. As Paul turned round, with his features suddenly visible in a stream of lurid light, he raised his arm and pointed a long, skinny finger steadily towards him.

"The son of the devil!" he cried, his deep, tremulous voice awakening strange echoes in the high vaulted chamber. "Welcome! Welcome! Thrice welcome!"

Paul straightened himself, and reverently laid the little white hand which he had been clasping across the coverlet. "She is dead!" he said solemnly. "What I came here to learn from you, I have learnt from her.

Let me go!"

He moved a step forward, but the old man remained there in the way, motionless, and around the door were gathered a solid phalanx of monks. Paul halted, conscious at once of his danger. The white faces of the monks were all bent upon him, full of savage, animal ferocity, and a gleam of something still worse lit up the dark eyes of that old man. Their very silence was unnatural and oppressive. Paul bore it, looking round amongst them with questioning eyes, until he could bear it no longer.

"Am I a prisoner?" he cried. "What do you want with me? Speak! some of you! Count of Cruta, answer me!"

A dull, hollow laugh echoed through the chamber. Paul turned away, sick with horror. It was like being in the power of a h.o.a.rd of madmen.

The air of the place, too, seemed suddenly to have become stifling.

The perspiration was standing out upon his forehead in great beads. It was a relief when the Count spoke.

"You have done well, Paul de Vaux, to find your way here--here into the very presence of a dying woman, and force from her lips a confession that has made you glad. You think that you will go back now to your country, and cheat me of my well-planned vengeance. You will hold up your head once more; you will mock at the Church's rights. You will go your way through the world rich and honoured; you will call yourself by an old name. You will pluck all the roses of life. Worthy son of a worthy father! Look at me! Who was it who blasted my life, my happiness, my honour, my name? A name grander and older than his, as the oak is older and grander than the currant bush. When he took my daughter into his arms, he wrote the funeral of his race! I played with him, as a tiger plays with a miserable Hindoo! When life was sweetest to him, I struck. He came here for mercy; I laughed, and I was merciful. I stabbed him to the heart. The knife hangs side by side with the arms of the Crusaders of Cruta. You are his son! You are the next to die! You will not leave these walls alive! These monks know you! It is you who hold the lands of De Vaux, which by right belong to their Holy Church. You would go back to resist their just claims! The good of the Church demands that you should not go back! You shall not go back! The Count of Cruta demands that you shall not go back. You shall not go back! You shall be slain, even where your father was slain, but you shall not creep back to your hole to die! Your bones shall whiten and shrivel upon the rocks. Your blood shall be an honoured stain upon my floor. Monks of Cruta! there he stands! He who alone can resist your just possession of the broad lands and abbey of De Vaux. The despoiled Church cries to you to strike. The end is great! Haul him away!"

They were around him like a pack of wolves, their lean faces hungry and fierce, and their long, skinny fingers clutching at his throat and at his clothing. One silently drew a knife and brandished it over him.

Paul wrenched himself free with a tremendous effort, but they were upon him again. They forced him slowly backwards, backwards even across the bed where that dead woman lay with her eyes as yet unclosed. The great heat, as much as their numbers, was overpowering him. His eyes were bloodshot, and there was a choking in his throat.

Again the long knife was lifted; other hands held him motionless, ready for the blow. He was too weak to struggle now. He saw the blue steel quivering in the air. Then he closed his eyes.

What was that? There was a shrill cry from one of the monks, and Paul, finding their grasp relaxed, started up. They were cowering down like a flock of frightened animals. The room seemed full of red fire. The gla.s.s in the windows cracked; it flew into pieces, and a column of smoke curled in. The door was thrown open; Guiseppe stood for a moment on the threshold.

"Fly!" he cried. "Fly! The castle is on fire. The flames are near!"

They rushed for the door like panic-stricken cattle before a great prairie fire, biting and trampling upon one another in their haste.

Paul followed, but the old Count stood in his way, trembling, not with fear, but with anger.

"Cowards! beasts!" he cried after the flying monks. "But you shall not escape me!"

He wound his long arms around his enemy, but the strength of his manhood was gone, and without effort Paul threw him on one side. Then, through the smoke, he found himself face to face with Guiseppe.

"This way, Signor!" he said coolly. "Follow me closely!"

The old Count was up again, and seemed about to attack them. Suddenly he changed his mind, and with a hoa.r.s.e cry, ran down an empty corridor. Guiseppe and Paul turned in the opposite direction.

"We must fly, Signor!" the man cried. "He goes to the cellars! He is a devil! He will blow up the castle! Cover up your nose and your mouth!"

They hurried along wide, deserted corridors, down stone stairs, and finally reached what seemed to be a circular underground pa.s.sage.

Round and round they went, until Paul's head swam; but the air was cooler, and every moment brought relief. Suddenly there was a cold breeze. They turned one more corner, and Guiseppe stopped. They were in an open aperture facing the sea, barely twenty feet below. A small boat with a single man in it was there waiting.

"Dive!" cried Guiseppe. "We must not wait for the rope!"

Over they went almost simultaneously. The shock of the cold water sent the blood dancing once more through Paul's veins. He came to the surface just after his guide, cool and refreshed. They scrambled into the boat, and Paul gave a little cry of wonder. They were drifting on a sea of ruddy gold, and the s.p.a.ce all around them was brilliant with the reflection. High above, the flames were leaping up towards the sky, and the dull sing-song of their roar set the very air vibrating.

Guiseppe, still dripping, seized an oar.

"Pull, for your lives! pull!" he cried anxiously.

His companion shrugged his shoulders. "But why?"

"Ask no questions! You will see!"

They did see. They were barely half-way to the yacht, when there came the sound of a low rumbling from the castle. Suddenly it broke into a roar. Belching sheets of flame burst out on every side. Huge cracks in that brilliant light were suddenly visible in the walls, creeping in a jagged line from the foundation to the turret. Fragments of the stone work flew outwards and upwards. It seemed as though some mighty internal force were splitting the place up. The men in the boat sat breathless and transfixed. Only Guiseppe whispered: "It is the old Count! He is the devil! He has blown the place up!"

There was another, and then a series of explosions. Fragments of the rock and stone fell hissing into the water scarcely a hundred feet away. Great waves rolled towards them. It seemed as though the earth underneath were shaking. Then it all died away, and there was silence.

Only the blackened walls of the castle remained, with the dying flames still curling fitfully around them. The air grew darker, and the colour faded from the sea.

"It is the last of the Count of Cruta, and his castle of horrors!"

cried Guiseppe. "G.o.d be thanked!"

CHAPTER x.x.xVI

"LOVE THAN DEATH ITSELF MORE STRONG"

I had no thought of writing in you again, my silent friend. Only a little while ago I said to myself, the time has gone by when solitude and heart hunger could drive me to your pages for consolation. Only a little while ago, it is true; and yet between the past and future is fixed a mighty gulf. As I write these words I stand upon the threshold of death! What death may mean, I know not! I have no religion to throw bright gleams of hope upon its dark mysteries. I have no hope of any other life, save the one I am quitting! If I am resigned and calm, it is because the lamp of my life has burnt out, and I am in darkness. I wait for death as a maiden waits for the first gleams of dawn on her marriage day.

Who said that love was everlasting? They lied! Love is a dream, a floating shadow full of golden lights, quenched by the first breath of morning! Who should know, if I do not know? Who has done more for love than I--I whose hands are red with blood, I who this night must die?

It was for his sake, I struck--for his sake! and now that the hour of my punishment must come, I sit here alone and forsaken, waiting for the signal which must end my life! It was for his sake! A death-white face rises up before me, and a hoa.r.s.e, dying cry sobs ever in my ears!

I pa.s.s on my way through the Valley of the Shadow of Death with no hope to cheer me, forsaken, friendless, and shaken with dim fears!

Am I alone! He for whom I struck has turned from me. Oh, the bitter cruelty of it! It was he who taught me what love was, and yet of love he knows nothing, else I would not be here to meet my doom alone!

Oh! Paul, Paul! Oh, for one touch of your hand, for one kind look! My heart is sick and faint with longing! Am I indeed so low and vile a thing that you should turn away with never a single word of farewell?

O! my love, you are hard indeed! If my hands are stained with blood--for whose sake was it? It was only a word I craved for, Paul!

Only a word--a look, even! Was it too great a boon to grant?