The Queen Pedauque Part 24

"There is none."

"A saddler."

"There is no saddler."

We looked round. To the west the vineyards extended to the horizon their long peaceful lines. On the hill smoke came out of a chimney near a steeple. On the other side, the Saone, veiled by a light mist, lost itself slowly in the calm running of her flowing waters. The shadows of the poplars elongated themselves on the banks. The shrill cry of a bird pierced the deep silence.

"Where are we?" asked M. d'Anquetil.

"At two full leagues from Tournus," replied the postillion, spitting blood, "and at least four leagues from Macon."

And, extending his arm towards the smoking chimney:

"Up there, that village ought to be Vallars, but it's not up to much."

"Blast you!" roared M. d'Anquetil.

While the horses struggled we went near the carriage, which was lying sadly on its side.

The little postboy who had been taken out from the midst of the horses said:

"As to the spring, that could be mended by a strong piece of wood. It will only make the carriage shake you more. But there is the broken wheel! And, worst of all, my hat is under it, smashed to pieces."

"d.a.m.n your hat!" said M. d'Anquetil.

"Your lordship may not be aware that it was quite new," was the postboy's meek reply.

"And the window gla.s.ses are broken!" sighed Jahel, seated on a portmanteau, at the side of the road.

"If it were but the gla.s.ses," said M. Coignard, "a remedy could soon be found by lowering the blinds, but the bottles cannot be in the same state as the windows. I must look to it as soon as the coach can be raised. I am also in fear for my Boethius, which I had placed under the cushions with some other good books."

"It does not matter," said M. d'Anquetil. "I have the cards in my waistcoat pocket. But shall we not get any supper?"

"I had thought of it," said the abbe. "It is not in vain that G.o.d has given to the use of men the animals who crowd the earth, the sky and the water. I am an excellent angler; the care necessary to allure the fish particularly suits my meditative mind, and the River Orne has seen me managing my line while meditating on the eternal verities. Do not trouble over your supper. If Mademoiselle Jahel will be good enough to give me one of the pins which keep her garments together I'll soon make a hook of it, to enable me to fish in yonder river, and I flatter myself I shall return before nightfall laden with two or three carp, that we will grill over a brushwood fire."

"I am quite aware," said Jahel, "that we are reduced to somewhat of a savage state. But I could not give you a pin, abbe, without your giving me something in exchange for it; otherwise our friendship would be jeopardised. And that I do not want in any case."

"Then I will make an advantageous exchange, mademoiselle: I'll pay for your pin with a kiss."

And, taking the pin out of Jahel's hand, he kissed her on both cheeks with inconceivable courtesy, gracefulness and decency.

After having lost plenty of time, a reasonable step was at last taken.

The big postillion, who no longer spat blood, was sent to Tournus on one of the horses to bring back with him a blacksmith; the other boy was ordered to light a fire, as the air became fresh, and a sharp wind was rising.

We discovered on the road, a hundred paces from the place of our breakdown, a cliff of soft stone, the foot of which was quarried in several places. We resolved to wait in one of those caves, warming ourselves until the return of the boy sent to Tournus. The second boy tied the three remaining horses to the trunk of a tree, near our cavern.

The abbe, who had made a fishing rod with the branch of a willow-tree, some string, a cork and a pin, went a-fishing as much for his philosophical and meditative inclination as for the sake of bringing us back fish. M. d Anquetil, remaining with Jahel and me in the grotto, proposed a game of _l'ombre,_ which is played by three, and which he said, being a Spanish game, was the very one for persons as adventurous as ourselves. And true it is that, in that quarry, in a deserted road, our little company would not have been unworthy to figure in some of the adventures of Don Quixote in which menials take such a strong interest.

And so we played _l'ombre._ I committed a great many errors, and my impetuous partner got cross, when the n.o.ble and laughing face of my good tutor became visible at the light of our fire. He untied his handkerchief, and took out of it some four or five small fish, which he opened with his knife, decorated with the image of the late king, dressed as a Roman emperor, standing on a triumphal column; and cleaned them with dexterity, as if he had never lived anywhere else than in the midst of the fishwomen at the market. He excelled as much in trifles as in matters of the greatest importance. Arranging the fish on the embers, he said:

"I will tell you, in all confidence, that following the river in search of a favourable place for fishing, I perceived the apocalyptic coach which frightens Mademoiselle Jahel. It stopped somewhat behind our carriage. You ought to have seen it pa.s.s by while I was fishing, and mademoiselle's soul ought to have been comforted by it."

"We have not seen it," replied Jahel.

"Then it may have moved on only after the night had become dark. But at least you heard it rumbling?"

"We have not," said Jahel.

"It is then that this night is blind as well as deaf. It is not to be supposed that yonder coach, which had not a wheel broken, not a horse lamed, would have remained standing still on the road. What for?"

"Yes, what for?" said Jahel.

"Our supper," said my good tutor, "reminds me of the simplicity of the repasts described in the Bible, where the pious traveller divided with an angel, on the bank of the river, the fishes of the Tigris. But we are in want of bread, salt and wine. I'll try to take out of our coach the provisions put there, and look if by a fortunate chance some bottles have remained intact. There are occasions when gla.s.s remains whole but steel is broken. Tournebroche, my son, give me your steel; and you, mademoiselle, do not fail to turn the grilling fish. I'll be back in a moment."

He left. His somewhat heavy tread sounded in a de crescendo, and soon we could hear him no more.

"This very night," said M. d'Anquetil, "reminds me of the night before the battle of Parma. You may be aware that I have served under Villars and been in the War of Succession. I was with the scouts. We could not see anything. That's one of the best ruses of war. Men are sent out to reconnoitre the enemy who return without having reconnoitred anything.

But reports are drawn up, after the battle, and then it is that the tacticians are triumphant. Thus, at nine o'clock at night, I was sent out scouting with twelve men--"

And he gave us a narrative of the War of Succession and of his amours in Italy; his story had lasted for well-nigh a quarter of an hour when he exclaimed:

"That rascal of an abbe does not come back. I bet he drinks all the wine which remained in the coach."

Thinking that my dear tutor might possibly be embarra.s.sed, I rose and went to help him. It was a moonless night, and if the sky was resplendent in the light of thousands of stars, the earth was clad in a darkness which my eyes, dazzled by the light of the flames, could not pierce.

Having walked about fifty steps on the black road. I heard a terrible cry, which did not sound as if coming from a human breast, a cry altogether unlike all cries I had heard before, a horrible cry. I ran in the direction from whence came this clamour of fatal distress. But fear and darkness checked my steps. Arrived at last at the place where our coach lay on the road, shapeless and enlarged by the night, I found my dear tutor seated on the side of the ditch, bent double. Trembling I asked him:

"What's the matter? Why did you shout?"

"Yes; why did I shout?" he said, in a new and altered voice. "I did not know I had cried out. Tournebroche, did you not see a man? He struck me in the dark, very fiercely; he gave me a blow with his fist."

"Come," I said to him, "get up, my dear master."

Having risen he fell back heavily on the ground.

I tried to raise him, and my hands became moist when I touched his breast.

"You're bleeding!"

"Bleeding? I'm a dead man. He has killed me. I thought that it was but a blow with the fist. But it's a wound, and I feel that I shall never recover from it."

"Who struck you, my dear tutor?"

"It was the Jew. I did not see him, but I know it was he. How can I know that it was the Jew, when I did not see him? Yes; how is it? What strange things! It's not to be believed, is it, Tournebroche? I have the taste of death in my mouth, which cannot be defined. It was to be, my G.o.d! But why rather here than somewhere else? That's the mystery!

_'Adjutorium nostrum in nomine Domini--Domine exaudi orationem meam--'"_

For a short time he prayed in a low voice, then:

"Tournebroche, my son," he said to me, "take the two bottles I found in the coach and have placed here beside me. I can do no more.

Tournebroche, where do you think the wound is? It's in the back I suffer most, and it seems to me that life runs out by the legs. My spirits are going."