King of Camargue Part 29

Renaud believed that he had a victim in his grasp, but he was himself the victim, and he rode away with the witch clinging fast to him--as the kite sometimes flies away with the serpent, thinking that he has mastered it, only to be strangled in its folds at last.

XXI

HERODIAS

They galloped across the plain. At every step, Renaud felt the gentle pressure of the woman's arm. Zinzara and Renaud galloped away upon Livette's horse!

Of what was the drover thinking? Was she girl or woman? His pride made him persist, in spite of himself, in wishing that she might be the former, although it seemed hardly probable, heathen females mature so early!

A breath of air blew in their faces. It brought to their nostrils the pungent smell of tamarisk blossoms. He slackened his horse's pace.

"Go on, go on!" said she, "press on! We will talk later--by ourselves, romi, where n.o.body can see us."

The horse darted forward afresh.

Renaud was conscious of a vague yet overmastering feeling of pride in being there, in trampling the gra.s.s of the plain with four feet, in knowing no obstacles, in having that woman close beside him--and, over yonder, another!

One would run risks and be false to the traditions of her race for his sake. The other, if she should know, might die of the knowledge.

And, although he loved her, the thought caused a thrill of savage joy, but he promptly repressed it. Luckily, however, she would know nothing of it. And he became intoxicated with the rapid movement and with pride, man and beast combined, fairly launched upon his mad career.

Magnificent was the sky, studded with more stars than the dunes have grains of sand and the desert waving flowers clinging to the twigs of the _saladelles_. The Milky-Way was as white as the pyramids of salt seen through the morning mist. One would have said that a vast bridal veil, torn in strips, was floating above the whole plain, alive with murmurs of love.

Innumerable little snails were perched, like blossoms, upon the stalks of the reeds, and swung to and fro.

A very gentle breeze was blowing and raising a slight, uncertain ripple along the edges of the marsh, with the sound of a furtive kiss among the flowering rushes. At times, a lark or a flamingo, asleep among the reeds or in the shallow water, would awaken ever so little and chirp to let his mate know that he was there, not far away.

June is no hotter. Sometimes the smell of roses filled their nostrils, coming in long puffs from far-off gardens. Yonder, in the park of the Chateau d'Avignon, the Syrian tree was sending forth its pollen.

Renaud, after skirting the sea for some distance, rode due northeast, beyond the pond of La Dame.

He was bound for Grand-Patis. The people at Sambuc had some boats that he knew of.

For a moment, they rode beside a drove. Bulls, standing in water up to their thighs, hardly noticed, were feeding on the flowering reeds.

White mares fled at their approach, followed faithfully by stallions anxious not to lose sight of them. The sap of May was flowing in the reeds and rushes, in the sambucus and tamarisk. The very water exhaled a saline odor, stronger than usual, and more heavily laden with desires. The wild vine called to its mate, that came borne upon the heavy breath of the blooming desert.

Again Renaud stopped, seized with a mild, pleasurable vertigo.

The fresh, love-compelling breeze in which they were bathed laid an imperious command upon him.

"Get down," said he, "get down at once! This is a good place to rest."

But she remembered the order she had given.

"We must go where we were going," said she. "I will not get down until we are there. We must cross the Rhone, you say? Press on, press on!--Gallop! The gipsy loves the horse."

She would have none of his caresses except at the place appointed. She would not submit to him until they should be where he was, by her agency, in danger of death or suffering. A kiss under other circ.u.mstances would be a triumph for him, and she gave herself to him for her own pleasure alone. She desired to feel, in the interchange of caresses, that the moisture of her lips was poison, that her bite would cause death or madness.

Firmly seated _en croupe_, still clinging fast to the drover--her victim--with her arm wound about him, her bare legs hanging in the folds of her skirt which the wind raised as they sped along, with her head thrown proudly back, she swayed gracefully with the rocking motion of the gallop; and her face, which had a sallow look in the moonlight against the neck of the man whom she was leading astray, albeit she seemed to be carried away by him--her face was wreathed in smiles.

When Herodias had obtained the head of John the Baptist, she lifted it by the hair from the gold charger, whereon it lay with a circle of blood around the neck, raised it to the level of her face, and after gazing upon it with deep interest, examining the closed eyelids and long lashes and the transparent pallor of the cheeks, she suddenly placed her mouth upon that lifeless mouth and sought to force her tongue between the lips to the cold teeth too tightly closed in death, esteeming that kiss, inflicted on her dead foe, more delicious than the incestuous caresses for which he had reproved her.

What was left of Renaud's suspicions of Zinzara, while she was smiling in the darkness, and the warm breath from her lips was playing upon his neck? He had ceased to reflect; he rode on. He willingly postponed the longed-for hour, now that he was forced to go on. He thought no more of violence. His happiness was secure. He could wait. In the midst of the deserted plains, still warm from the sunlight though refreshed by the night air, love came without calling, but he enjoyed the antic.i.p.ation more than anything he had known.--And then she might escape him even now. He must be careful not to startle her. When they reached the nest yonder, he would keep her there some time. And so he rode on, inhaling the saline air of the desert, which was his--with his stallion's four shoeless feet trampling through the sand and water, which were his also--bound for the horizon, which would soon be his.

Once, however, in the midst of a swamp, where the water was above his horse's knees, he stopped again.

"What is it?" said she.

Renaud turned his head, and throwing himself back, called her with a smacking of his lips.

"When I am ready!" said Zinzara in a mocking tone.

As she spoke, Blanchet leaped forward, with all four feet in the air, and made a tremendous splashing in the water, which fell about their heads in a heavy shower.

And, unseen by Renaud, the gipsy smiled against his neck, as she replaced in her hair the long gold pin she had plunged into the beast's flank.

Suddenly there was a shout of _Qui vive?_ directly in front of them, so unexpected in the solitude, that Blanchet jumped again.

"_Qui vive?_" the voice repeated.

"The king!" Renaud replied gaily.

"Ah! is it you, Renaud?"

It was the revenue officers; but Renaud hurried by, at a safe distance, so that they might not recognize the gitana.

They were near the salt spring of Badon. The rectangular heaps of salt seemed like so many long, low houses, with sharp roofs. In its shroud-like whiteness the spot resembled a little town, geometrically laid out, asleep under dead snow.

They reached the sh.o.r.e of the main stream of the Rhone.

Zinzara was on the ground before Renaud had stopped his horse.

He alighted in his turn, and handed the rein to the gipsy. She held Blanchet while he was drinking in the river.

"Now for some oats!" said Renaud.

He took a small sack that was fastened across his saddle-bow, from holster to holster, and at Zinzara's suggestion emptied it into her dress which she held up with both hands.

Poor, poor Blanchet! there was only a handful of grain.

"Wait for me; I'll go to find the boat."

Renaud disappeared in the darkness behind the reeds and willows that grew along the bank, drowned in the mist, floating like pallid spectres in the darkness.

Zinzara heard nothing save the plashing of the water, and the crunching of the oats between Blanchet's teeth, as he swept them up with his long lip from the hollow of the dress.--Oh! if Livette could have seen that!