Lord Tony's Wife Part 29

"What are these?" queried Carrier.

"A few papers," replied Chauvelin, "which one of your Marats, Paul Friche by name, picked up in the wake of the Englishmen. I caught sight of them in the far distance, and sent the Marats after them. For awhile Paul Friche kept on their track, but after that they disappeared in the darkness."

"Who were the senseless louts," growled Carrier, "who allowed a pack of foreign a.s.sa.s.sins to escape? I'll soon make them disappear ... in the Loire."

"You will do what you like about that, citizen Carrier," retorted Chauvelin drily; "in the meanwhile you would do well to examine these papers."

He sorted these out, examined them one by one, then pa.s.sed them across to Carrier. Lalouet, impudent and inquisitive, sat on the corner of the desk, dangling his legs. With scant ceremony he s.n.a.t.c.hed one paper after another out of Carrier's hands and examined them curiously.

"Can you understand all this gibberish?" he asked airily. "Jean Baptiste, my friend, how much English do you know?"

"Not much," replied the proconsul, "but enough to recognise that abominable doggrel rhyme which has gone the round of the Committees of Public Safety throughout the country."

"I know it by heart," rejoined young Lalouet. "I was in Paris once, when citizen Robespierre received a copy of it. Name of a dog!" added the youngster with a coa.r.s.e laugh, "how he cursed!"

It is doubtful however if citizen Robespierre did on that occasion curse quite so volubly as Carrier did now.

"If I only knew why that _satane_ Englishman throws so much calligraphy about," he said, "I would be easier in my mind. Now this senseless rhyme ... I don't see...."

"Its importance?" broke in Chauvelin quietly. "I dare say not. On the face of it, it appears foolish and childish: but it is intended as a taunt and is really a poor attempt at humour. They are a queer people these English. If you knew them as I do, you would not be surprised to see a man scribbling off a cheap joke before embarking on an enterprise which may cost him his head."

"And this inane rubbish is of that sort," concluded young Lalouet. And in his thin high treble he began reciting:

"We seek him here; We seek him there!

Those Frenchies seek him everywhere.

Is he in heaven?

Is he in h----ll?

That demmed elusive Pimpernel?"

"Pointless and offensive," he said as he tossed the paper back on the table.

"A cursed aristo that Englishman of yours," growled Carrier. "Oh! when I get him...."

He made an expressive gesture which made Lalouet laugh.

"What else have we got in the way of doc.u.ments, citizen Chauvelin?" he asked.

"There is a letter," replied the latter.

"Read it," commanded Carrier. "Or rather translate it as you read. I don't understand the whole of the gibberish."

And Chauvelin, taking up a sheet of paper which was covered with neat, minute writing, began to read aloud, translating the English into French as he went along:

"'Here we are at last, my dear Tony! Didn't I tell you that we can get in anywhere despite all precautions taken against us!'"

"The impudent devils!" broke in Carrier.

--"'Did you really think that they could keep us out of Nantes while Lady Anthony Dewhurst is a prisoner in their hands?'"

"Who is that?"

"The Kernogan woman. As I told you just now, she is married to an Englishman who is named Dewhurst and who is one of the members of that thrice cursed League."

Then he continued to read:

"'And did you really suppose that they would spot half a dozen English gentlemen in the guise of peat-gatherers, returning at dusk and covered with grime from their work? Not like, friend Tony! Not like! If you happen to meet mine engaging friend M. Chambertin before I have that privilege myself, tell him I pray you, with my regards, that I am looking forward to the pleasure of making a long nose at him once more. Calais, Boulogne, Paris--now Nantes--the scenes of his triumphs multiply exceedingly.'"

"What in the devil's name does all this mean?" queried Carrier with an oath.

"You don't understand it?" rejoined Chauvelin quietly.

"No. I do not."

"Yet I translated quite clearly."

"It is not the language that puzzles me. The contents seem to me such drivel. The man wants secrecy, what? He is supposed to be astute, resourceful, above all mysterious and enigmatic. Yet he writes to his friend--matter of no importance between them, recollections of the past, known to them both--and threats for the future, equally futile and senseless. I cannot reconcile it all. It puzzles me."

"And it would puzzle me," rejoined Chauvelin, while the ghost of a smile curled his thin lips, "did I not know the man. Futile? Senseless, you say? Well, he does futile and senseless things one moment and amazing deeds of personal bravery and of astuteness the next. He is three parts a braggart too. He wanted you, me--all of us to know how he and his followers succeeded in eluding our vigilance and entered our closely-guarded city in the guise of grimy peat-gatherers. Now I come to think of it, it was easy enough for them to do that. Those peat-gatherers who live inside the city boundaries return from their work as the night falls in. Those cursed English adventurers are pa.s.sing clever at disguise--they are born mountebanks the lot of them. Money and impudence they have in plenty. They could easily borrow or purchase some filthy rags from the cottages on the dunes, then mix with the crowd on its return to the city. I dare say it was cleverly done. That Scarlet Pimpernel is just a clever adventurer and nothing more. So far his marvellous good luck has carried him through. Now we shall see."

Carrier had listened in silence. Something of his colleague's calm had by this time communicated itself to him too. He was no longer raving like an infuriated bull--his terror no longer made a half-cringing, wholly savage brute of him. He was sprawling across the desk--his arms folded, his deep-set eyes studying closely the well-nigh inscrutable face of Chauvelin. Young Lalouet too had lost something of his impudence. That mysterious spell which seemed to emanate from the elusive personality of the bold English adventurer had been cast over these two callous, b.e.s.t.i.a.l natures, humbling their arrogance and making them feel that here was no ordinary situation to be dealt with by smashing, senseless. .h.i.tting and the spilling of innocent blood. Both felt instinctively too that this man Chauvelin, however wholly he may have failed in the past, was nevertheless still the only man who might grapple successfully with the elusive and adventurous foe.

"Are you a.s.suming, citizen Chauvelin," queried Carrier after awhile, "that this packet of papers was dropped purposely by the Englishman, so that it might get into our hands?"

"There is always such a possibility," replied Chauvelin drily. "With that type of man one must be prepared to meet the unexpected."

"Then go on, citizen Chauvelin. What else is there among those _satane_ papers?"

"Nothing further of importance. There is a map of Nantes, and one of the coast and of Le Croisic. There is a cutting from _Le Moniteur_ dated last September, and one from the _London Gazette_ dated three years ago.

The _Moniteur_ makes reference to the production of _Athalie_ at the Theatre Moliere, and the _London Gazette_ to the sale of fat cattle at an Agricultural Show. There is a receipted account from a London tailor for two hundred pounds worth of clothes supplied, and one from a Lyons mercer for an hundred francs worth of silk cravats. Then there is the one letter which alone amidst all this rubbish appears to be of any consequence...."

He took up the last paper; his hand was still quite steady.

"Read the letter," said Carrier.

"It is addressed in the English fashion to Lady Anthony Dewhurst,"

continued Chauvelin slowly, "the Kernogan woman, you know, citizen. It says:

"'Keep up your courage. Your friends are inside the city and on the watch. Try the door of your prison every evening at one hour before midnight. Once you will find it yield. Slip out and creep noiselessly down the stairs. At the bottom a friendly hand will be stretched out to you. Take it with confidence--it will lead you to safety and to freedom. Courage and secrecy.'"

Lalouet had been looking over his shoulder while he read: now he pointed to the bottom of the letter.

"And there is the device," he said, "we have heard so much about of late--a five-petalled flower drawn in red ink ... the Scarlet Pimpernel, I presume."

"Aye! the Scarlet Pimpernel," murmured Chauvelin, "as you say!

Braggadocio on his part or accident, his letters are certainly in our hands now and will prove--must prove, the tool whereby we can be even with him once and for all."

"And you, citizen Chauvelin," interposed Carrier with a sneer, "are mighty lucky to have me to help you this time. I am not going to be fooled, as Candeille and you were fooled last September, as you were fooled in Calais and Heron in Paris. I shall be seeing this time to the capture of those English adventurers."

"And that capture should not be difficult," added Lalouet with a complacent laugh. "Your famous adventurer's luck hath deserted him this time: an all-powerful proconsul is pitted against him and the loss of his papers hath destroyed the anonymity on which he reckons."