My Lady Rotha Part 38

'To-morrow?' she gasped.

'To-morrow,' he answered ruthlessly. 'Now I think we understand one another.'

She threw up her hand suddenly, as if she were about to vent on him all the pa.s.sions which consumed her--the terror, rage, and shame which swelled in her breast. But something in his gibing tone, something in the set lines of his figure--she could not see his face--checked her.

She let her hand fall in a gesture of despair, and shrank into herself, shuddering. She looked at him as at a serpent--that fascinated her. At last she murmured--

'You will not dare. What have they done to you?'

'Nothing,' he answered. 'It is not their affair; it is yours.'

For a moment after that they stood confronting one another while the sound of the women sobbing in a corner, and the occasional jingle of a bridle outside, alone broke the silence. Behind her the room was dark; behind him, through the open windows, lay the road, glimmering pale through the dusk. Suddenly the door at her back opened, and a bright light flashed on his face. It was Marie Wort bringing in a lamp. No one spoke, and she set the lamp on the table, and going by him began to close the shutters. Still the Countess stood as if turned to stone, and he stood watching her.

'Where are they?' she moaned at last, though he had already told her.

'In the camp,' he said.

'Can I--can I see them?' she panted.

'Afterwards,' he answered, with the smile of a fiend; 'when you are my wife.'

That added the last straw. She took two steps to the table, and sitting down blindly, covered her face with her hands. Her shoulders began to tremble, her head sank lower and lower on the table. Her pride was gone.

'Heaven help us!' she whispered in a pa.s.sion of grief. 'Heaven help us, for there is no help here!'

'That is better,' he said, eyeing her coldly. 'We shall soon come to terms now.'

In his exultation he went a step nearer to her. He was about to touch her--to lay his hand on her hair, believing his evil victory won, when suddenly two dark figures rose like shadows behind her chair. He recoiled, dropping his hand. In a moment a pistol barrel was thrust into his face. He fell back another step.

'One word and you are a dead man!' a stern voice hissed in his ear.

Then he saw another barrel gleam in the lamplight, and he stood still.

'What is this?' he said, looking from one to the other, his voice trembling with rage.

'Justice!' the same speaker answered harshly. 'But stand still and be silent, and you shall have your life. Give the alarm, and you die, general, though we die the next minute. Sit down in that chair.'

He hesitated. But the two shining barrels converging on his head, the two grim faces behind them, were convincing; in a moment he obeyed.

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE FLIGHT.

One of the men--it was I--muttered something to Marie, and she snuffed the wick, and blew up the light. In a moment it filled the room, disclosing a strange medley of levelled weapons, startled faces, and flashing eyes. In one corner Fraulein Max and the two women cowered behind one another, trembling and staring. At the table sat my lady, with dull, dazed eyes, looking on, yet scarcely understanding what was happening. On either side of her stood Steve and I, covering the general with our pistols, while the Waldgrave, who was still too weak for much exertion, kept guard at the door.

Tzerclas was the first to speak. 'What is this foolery?' he said, scowling unutterable curses at us. 'What does this mean?'

'This!' I said, producing a piece of hide rope. 'We are going to tie you up. If you struggle, general, you die. If you submit, you live.

That is all. Go to work, Steve.'

There was a gleam in Tzerclas' eye, which warned me to stand back and crook my finger. His face was black with fury, and for an instant I thought that he would spring upon us and dare all. But prudence and the pistols prevailed. With an evil look he sat still, and in a trice Steve had a loop round his arms and was binding him to the heavy chair.

I knew then that as far as he was concerned we were safe; and I turned to bid the women get cloaks and food, adjuring them to be quick, since every moment was precious.

'Bring nothing but cloaks and food and wine,' I said. 'We have to go a league on foot and can carry little.'

The Countess heard my words, and looked at me with growing comprehension. 'The Waldgrave?' she muttered. 'Is he here?'

He came forward from the door to speak to her; but when she saw him, and how pale and thin he was, with great hollows in his cheeks and his eyes grown too large for his face, she began to cry weakly, as any other woman might have cried, being overwrought. I bade Marie, who alone kept her wits, to bring her wine and make her take it; and in a minute she smiled at us, and would have thanked us.

'Wait!' I said bluntly, feeling a great horror upon me whenever I looked towards the general or caught his eye. 'You may have small cause to thank us. If we fail, Heaven and you forgive us, my lady, for this man will not. If we are retaken----'

'We will not be retaken!' she cried hardily. 'You have horses?'

'Five only,' I answered. 'They are all Steve could get, and they are a league away. We must go to them on foot. There are eight of us here, and young Jacob and Ernst are watching outside. Are all ready?'

My lady looked round; her eye fell on Fraulein Max, who with a little bundle in her arms had just re-entered and stood shivering by the door. The Dutch girl winced under her glance, and dropping her bundle, stooped hurriedly to pick it up.

'That woman does not go!' the Countess said suddenly.

I answered in a low tone that I thought she must.

'No!' my lady cried harshly--she could be cruel sometimes--'not with us. She does not belong to our party. Let her stay with her paymaster, and to-morrow he will doubtless reward her.'

What reward she was likely to get Fraulein Max knew well. She flung herself at my lady's feet in an agony of fear, and clutching her skirts, cried abjectly for mercy; she would carry, she would help, she would do anything, if she might go! Knowing that we dared not leave her since she would be certain to release the general as soon as our backs were turned, I was glad when Marie, whose heart was touched, joined her prayers to the culprit's and won a reluctant consent.

It has taken long to tell these things. They pa.s.sed very quickly. I suppose not more than a quarter of an hour elapsed between our first appearance and this juncture, which saw us all standing in the lamplight, laden and ready to be gone; while the general glowered at us in sullen rage, and my lady, with a new thought in her mind, looked round in dismay.

She drew me aside. 'Martin,' she said, 'his orderly is waiting in the road with his horse. The moment we are gone he will shout to him.'

'We have provided for that,' I answered, nodding. Then a.s.suring myself by a last look round that all were ready, I gave the word. 'Now, Steve!' I said sharply.

In a twinkling he flung over the general's head a small sack doubled inwards. We heard a stifled oath and a cry of rage. The bars of the strong chair creaked as our prisoner struggled, and for a moment it seemed as if the knots would barely hold. But the work had been well done, and in less than half a minute Steve had secured the sack to the chair-back. It was as good as a gag, and safer. Then we took up the chair between us, and lifting it into the back room, put it down and locked the door upon our captive.

As we turned from it Steve looked at me. 'If he catches us after this, Master Martin,' he said, 'it won't be an easy death we shall die!'

'Heaven forbid!' I muttered. 'Let us be off!'

He gave the word and we stole out into the darkness at the back of the house, Steve, who had surveyed the ground, going first. My lady followed him; then came the Waldgrave; after him the two women and Fraulein Max, with Jacob and Ernst; last of all, Marie and I. It was no time for love-making, but as we all stood a minute in the night, while Steve listened, I drew Marie's little figure to me and kissed her pale face again and again; and she clung to me, trembling, her eyes shining into mine. Then she put me away bravely; but I took her bundle, and with full hearts we followed the others across the field at the back and through the ditch.

That pa.s.sed, we found ourselves on the edge of the village, with the lights of the camp forming five-sixths of a circle round us. In one direction only, where the swamp and creek fringed the place, a dark gap broke the ring of twinkling fires. Towards this gap Steve led the way, and we, a silent line of gliding figures, followed him. The moon had not yet risen. The gloom was such that I could barely make out the third figure before me; and though all manner of noises--the chorus of a song, the voice of a scolding hag, even the rattle of dice on a drumhead--came clearly to my ears, and we seemed to be enclosed on all sides, the darkness proved an effectual shield. We met no one, and five minutes after leaving the house, reached the bank of the little creek I have mentioned.

Here we paused and waited, a group of huddled figures, while Steve groped about for a plank he had hidden. Before us lay the stream, behind us the camp. At any moment the alarm might be raised. I pictured the outcry, the sudden flickering of lights, the galloping this way and that, the discovery. And then, thank Heaven! Steve found his plank, and in the work of pa.s.sing the women over I forgot my fears. The darkness, the peril--for the water on the nearer side was deep--the nervous haste of some, and the terror of others, made the task no easy one. I was hot as fire and wet to the waist before it was over, and we all stood ankle-deep in the ooze which formed the farther bank.

Alas! our troubles were only beginning. Through this ooze we had to wade for a mile or more, sometimes in doubt, always in darkness; now plashing into pools, now stumbling over a submerged log, often up to our knees in mud and water. The frogs croaked round us, the bog moaned and gurgled; in the depth of the marsh the bitterns boomed mournfully.

If we stood a moment we sank. It was a horrible time; and the more horrible, as through it all we had only to turn to see the camp lights behind us, a poor half-mile or so away.