CHAPTER XVII.
"KILL HIM DEAD, RAOUL!"
The duel was not, however, to take place in the road, since at that moment, and when both men were preparing to draw their swords, the inn door opened and two persons came forth – one evidently the landlord, the other a customer to whom he was saying "Good-night." Then, as he was about to re-enter his house, he saw under the rays of the moon the three others in the road – the two men close together and the woman still mounted – and came forward toward them, peering inquiringly in front of him.
"Do messieurs and madame require any refreshment?" he asked, noticing that two of the company were well and handsomely dressed, while the third looked like an officer. "My inn offers good accommodation for man and beast. Will monsieur and madame not enter?"
"Curse you, no!" De Roquemaure said; "may we not tarry a moment on the road without being pestered thus? Begone, fellow, and leave us!"
But St. Georges interposed, saying:
"On the contrary, if you have a good room where we can rest awhile and this noble lady," and he saw the woman's eyes sparkle – perhaps with hate! – as he spoke, "can be fittingly received, we will enter. My horse has cast a shoe; have you a farrier near the house who can reshoe it? It can be done while we drink a bottle."
"I am one myself," the innkeeper replied. "Monsieur may confide his horse to me. It is but a few moments' job, and the fire in the forge is still alive. As for the inn and the wine —hein! both are good; I have a large room, and a bottle of Brecquiny fit for a king."
"Lead us to it," said St. Georges, "then attend to the horse;" and as he spoke he threw the reins over the hook fixed in the tree by the mounting-block. "Come," he said, addressing De Roquemaure and the woman in a tone which would awaken no suspicion in the innkeeper's mind. "Shall I assist madame to alight or will you?"
Madame, however, slipped off the horse by herself lightly enough, brushing by St. Georges as she did so and whispering in his ear, "If I could help him to kill you, I would!" and so they entered the inn, St. Georges going last. He was a cautious man, this chevau-léger, and he had seen the little stiletto – or wedding-knife, as it was called then – in her girdle; he did not want the owner of those savage, glistening eyes to stab him in the back. She looked capable of doing it, he thought, judging by the sparkle they made behind the mask, and of stabbing the innkeeper afterward to hide her guilt.
The man led them into a long, low, white-washed room at the end of a corridor – all three noticing that it was some distance from the inhabited part of the house, so that interruption was unlikely – a room in which a fire burnt low.
"Bring the wine," St. Georges said to the man after he had lit the candles in their sconces, "and be quick about it. We have no time to tarry here."
Five minutes later the bottle of Brecquiny was on the table with three long tapering glasses by its side; the man had made up the fire so that it burnt brightly, and they were alone; and St. Georges, having bidden him not interrupt them until they called, walked to the door, locked it, and, coming back to the table, placed the key upon it.
"There will be two leave this room," he said quietly. "There is the key for those who will require it. – Madame is comfortable, I trust," glancing at the woman who was seated at the table, her elbows on it, and her face in her hands, while still the eyes glanced through the holes of the mask at him. – "Now, Monsieur de Roquemaure, we have sufficient space for our sword play here. I am at your service," and he unsheathed his weapon.
The table was close to the fire, a deep chair on either side of it; two smaller chairs, in one of which the woman sat, against the table; beyond it a space of twenty square feet of coarse tiled floor – enough for any pair of duellists to kill each other in!
"You force this on me," De Roquemaure said, rising and removing the cloak he wore, and speaking between thin, almost bloodless lips; "whether your blood or mine be shed, it is upon your own head," and he drew his sword too.
"Not so," St. Georges replied. "Deny that you led the attack on me, on my child and my comrade at Aignay-le-Duc; deny that it was your servant – that it was your livery he wore – accompanied by some woman, if not this one, who slew the Bishop of Lodève's servant" – once more the other started, as he had started when accused of having removed his beard – "deny this, I say, and I break my sword across my knee – I leave myself unarmed and defenceless, at your mercy to slay me here for the words I have spoken."
Again from the now absolutely livid lips there came the same words, or almost the same, he had previously uttered.
"I deny nothing – I assert nothing," and he advanced past the table to where St. Georges stood, weapon in hand.
"So be it! Yet, for the last time, ere it is too late, answer me one question and I will not force you to this encounter to-night. Tell me where my child is, let me regain possession of her, and a month hence, on my honour as a soldier, I meet you again, and, if you desire it, give you satisfaction."
"I do not know where your child is," De Roquemaure muttered hoarsely. "And for your honour as a soldier – you are a broken one. A man dismissed the army has no honour left."
"Enough!" said St. Georges; "you knew that – knew, not that I am broken, but that I was to be broken! Now I understand who two of my enemies are for sure. Thus I dispose of one. En garde!"
"Kill him!" he heard the woman hiss again as they commenced. "Kill him dead, Raoul!"
A moment later they were engaged, each seeking the other's life. And each knew that nothing but his death would satisfy his adversary.
Their weapons scarcely made any noise, so quietly the one stole upon the other, as point pressed point, and through the swords the power of their wrists made itself felt. Once De Roquemaure lunged savagely, but the thrust was parried and returned – dangerously so. The point of St. Georges's weapon slit his sleeve as, like an adder's tongue, it darted forth. Then the other drew back and fought more carefully, though the beads of sweat stood on his white forehead now. And St. Georges, observing them, knew that he held him safe. His nerve was gone already – the nearness of that thrust had shattered it!
The woman, looking on – her face also as white as a corpse's – was, perhaps, the strangest figure of the three. Her eyes shone like coals through the mask-holes now – her figure shook all over; one hand clutched the coarse cover on the table in a mass of folds; the other tremblingly played with the hilt of her little dagger. And the Brecquiny being near her, she more than once released the table cover to pour out a glass full, drain it a draught, throw down the glass, and glare at the combatants again.
Once, too, she shrieked aloud as a second time St. Georges's weapon, lunging full at the other's breast, was just caught by the hilt of De Roquemaure's sword and parried, though not without tearing from his breast a piece of the lace from his cravat. And she struck herself on the mouth with her clinched hand – so that her lips were bloody a moment after – as though in rage with herself for having done aught to alarm the house.
"You are doomed," St. Georges said to De Roquemaure in a low voice, driving him back toward the wall, so that now the latter faced up the room while the former's back was toward the table – "doomed! I have you fast. Acknowledge all, or by the God above us I slay you in the next pass!"
De Roquemaure made no answer; doggedly he fought – a horrible spectacle. Another thrust of St. Georges's was, however, also parried – the blade knocked nervously up by the affrighted man – bearing a piece of flesh from De Roquemaure's cheek, from which the blood ran down on to what was left of the cravat; the eyes glared like a hunted animal's; the mouth was half open.
It almost required St. Georges's memory of his lost Dorine, of the manner in which they had aimed under his arm at her – so appalled did his adversary appear – to prevent him from sparing the craven, from disarming him, and letting him go forth a whipped and beaten hound. But he remembered the wrong done him, the cruel, dastardly attempts on the child's life – and his blood was up. De Roquemaure should die. "The wolf was face to face with him" – at that moment he recalled the marquise's words – he would slay him.
Behind his back the other could see the woman – even as he endeavoured to shield himself from thrust after thrust, and thought: "God! when will it come? when shall I feel the steel through me?" – herself now a ghastly sight. Her upper lip was drawn back in her frenzy so that her teeth were bare as are a dog's that pauses ere it snaps; she was standing up trembling, as with a palsy, and her mask had fallen off. And, in what De Roquemaure felt were his last moments, he saw her suddenly rush at the sconces and knock the candles out of them on to the stone floor, where they lay guttering. He supposed that she had thought to disturb his dooms-man.
If she did so think she erred. St. Georges heard the crash of her arm against the metal, but never turned his head – to take his eye off the other's point would have been fatal! – instead, in the light given by the fire he crept one inch nearer the other.
"Now," he said, "now, De Roquemaure!" and as he spoke the other felt the iron muscles in the man's wrist forcing his blade down and down; the point was level to his adversary's thigh; an instant more, and St. Georges's sword would release his, would suddenly spring up and – a moment later – be through his breast.
In his agony he shrieked, "Au secours, au secours!" and in a last desperate effort leaped aside, the weapon that at that moment sought his heart with a tremendous lunge piercing his arm alone.
Another moment and St. Georges had disengaged it, drawn it forth, and was about to plunge it through the craven's heart – this time he would not fail! – when he heard the rustle of the woman's riding robe behind him, he felt a shock, and his arm instantly drop nerveless by his side; the weapon fell from his hand, and he sank back heavily on the stone floor, the room swimming before his eyes and all becoming rapidly dark.
Roused by her lover's cry and frenzied by the immediate death which she saw threatening him; driven almost mad also by the look of terror and mortal apprehension on his face, she had sprung up the room, reached St. Georges, and buried her dagger in his back. She had aimed under his left shoulder, where she knew the region of the heart was – it seemed her aim was true! As he fell to the ground she knew that she had saved De Roquemaure. Yet her frenzy was not calmed; in an instant she had seized the sword that still was grasped in her lover's nerveless right hand, placed it in his left, and muttered swiftly in a voice he did not recognise:
"Through his heart! – his heart, Raoul! That way. Otherwise it will seem murder and confound us."
"I – I dare not," the scared man muttered, shaking all over. "I cannot, I – "
"Lâche!" and as she hurled the epithet at him she seized the weapon herself in her own white jewelled hand and drew it back to plunge it through his breast so that it should meet the wound behind.
Yet that was not to be. Even as she raised the sword the door was burst violently open, and the innkeeper, with two other men and a waiting woman rushed into the room.
"Grand Dieu!" the landlord cried, shivering and shaking all over, as he saw the terrible spectacle which the place afforded – St. Georges stretched on the floor, the stones covered with blood, the other wounded man leaning against the wall, the maddened woman with the sword, which she had dropped at their entrance, lying at her feet, and the candles out – "Grand Dieu! what has been done in my house? Murder?"
At first neither De Roquemaure nor the panting creature by his side could answer; then the former found his tongue, while still the landlord and the other two men stared at them and the waiting woman hid her face in her apron, not to see the ghastly form on the floor, and said: "Not murder, but attempted murder. This man drew on me – with a lady present – would have assassinated me. You see my wound," and he held up his pierced arm.
"Attempted murder!" exclaimed one of the men, he looking of a very superior class to that of the landlord. "A strange attempt; you are young and strong as he; armed, too, your weapon drawn. Yet it seems it needed this also to aid you," and he stooped and picked up the woman's toy dagger. "This demands explanation – "
"And shall be given to those entitled to ask. I am the Marquis de Roquemaure, set upon and forced to defend myself by this fellow who entrapped us here. – You," turning to the landlord, "saw how he caused us to enter this house, though I told you we wanted nothing. He it was who gave all the orders. For the rest, he was a disgraced and ruined soldier, a common bravo and bully, who deemed me the cause of his punishment. I answer nothing further but to the king whom I serve, or his representative."
"He looks not like a bravo or bully," said the man who had spoken last, as he knelt down by St. Georges and took his wrist between his fingers. "He scarce seems that."
"Is he dead?" the woman asked hoarsely now, as she bent down over her victim.
"Not yet. There is still some pulse."
And even as he spoke, St. Georges opened his eyes, looked up at him, and muttered once, "Dorine!"
Then the eyes closed again and his head fell back on the other's arm.
THE SECOND PERIOD
CHAPTER XVIII.
LA GALÈRE GRANDE RÉALE
The July sun blazed down upon the sea which lay beneath it as unruffled as an artificial lake inland; there was no ripple on the water as far as the eye could see; above the water to the northwest there rose the chalky cliffs between Whitby and Scarborough – a white, hazy line over which a few fleecy clouds were massed together. Upon the water, three miles out from those cliffs, a dark blot, which grew larger and clearer moment by moment, and proved to be – when seen through the perspective glasses of the officers on board a French galley which was further out to sea and rapidly retreating from the English coast – one of King William's men-of-war.
A French galley rapidly retreating from the English coast, of the style known as La Grande Réale, and named L'Idole. On board of her six hundred and seventy souls, comprising a first and second captain, a lieutenant and sub-lieutenant, an ensign, also a major general, some standard bearers, a commissary general, one or two volunteer officers, over one hundred soldiers and seventy sailors, a number of subaltern officers and ship boys, and – three hundred and sixty galley slaves and sixty Turkish slaves.
A life of hell was this of the galley to all on board her when at sea – even to those in command! Neither first nor second captain, neither major nor commissary general, nor even volunteer officers – often members of the oldest and most aristocratic families of France – could ever lie down to sleep on board, for the sufficient reason that in the confined space there was no room for bed, cot, nor berth. Rest had to be taken by these superiors either when sitting on ordinary chairs placed on the poop cabin, or in armchairs if such were on board – their clothes on, their arms by their side. For not only was there no room for anything in the shape or nature of a bed, but also the galleys were rarely at sea except in time of open war, when at any moment they might be engaged in action. Truly, a life of hell!
Yet, if to the superiors such miseries came and had to be endured; such want of sleep, such constant necessity for watchfulness, such poor, coarse food as alone the galley could find room to carry – bacon, salt beef, salt cod, cheese, oil, and rice, with a small pot of wine daily, being their allowance – what of those wretches who propelled her when there was no wind, the galley slaves? What was their existence? Let us see!
Bound to the labouring oar – itself of enormous size and weight, being fifty feet long – seven condamnés to each oar, they sat at sixty benches, thirty on each side, four hundred and twenty men in all, including Turkish slaves. Naked they rowed for hours chained to these benches – sometimes for twenty-four hours at a stretch – while the comites, or overseers, men brutal beyond all thought and chosen for the post because of their natural ferocity, belaboured their backs with whips made of twisted and knotted cords. If they fainted under these continuous thrashings, their backs were rubbed with vinegar and salt water to revive them; if they were found to have died under their chastisement, the chains and rings round their legs were taken off and they were flung into the sea like carrion as they were. Then another man took their place, there being always a reserve of these unhappy creatures.
To see them would have wrung the hearts of all but those who dominated them. Their naked backs had upon them wheals, sores, old and new, scars and cicatrices; their faces were burnt black from the effects of the suns, the diverse winds, and the sprays under which and through which they rowed en perpétuité– since most were doomed for life; their hair was long and matted with their beards, when they were not old men who had grown bald in their lifelong toil and misery. Moreover, they were nearly starved, their daily food being twenty-six ounces of coarse and often weevily biscuit, and four ounces of beans a day – or rather "pigeon peas" – with water. And if any swooned from their long hours of rowing (hours only relieved by a favourable wind springing up, when the small sails could be set), in contradistinction to their fainting from the brutalities of the comites, then there was placed in their mouths a piece of bread moistened with salt water or vinegar, or sour and sharp wine, either of which was supposed to be an excellent reviver.
All were distinguished by numbers and none by name, though, in occasional moments that could be snatched from under the watchful eyes and ears of the comites, the doomed wretches could sometimes acquaint each other with their names, former positions in life, and supposed reasons for being condemned to their perpetual slavery. But not often, for a word spoken and overheard brought terrible retribution in its train, especially as in nine times out of ten religion was both the cause for which they suffered and by which they were punished. The galley slaves were in general Protestants who would not embrace the Roman Catholic faith, while the superior officers and the overseers were ardent papists. Yet there were others who, in ordinary eyes, though not in those of their taskmasters, would have been deemed to be sunk in crimes worse than that of being Huguenots. No. 512 was a murderer – of his own father; No. 497 had been caught giving information to England, he being a fisherman, of the whereabouts of Jean Bart's flotilla; No. 36 had cursed the king and his family – a truly awful crime; No. 98 had robbed a church, and so on. But in the eyes of the law, which was the king, or rather the reformed and married wanton, De Maintenon, none were so vile, none deserved such bitter punishment and bastinadoing, and rubbing in of vinegar and salt in their wounds, and starvation, as the pestilential heretics.
The black spot on the horizon grew larger to the view of the officers standing aft on the coursier, or raised fore-and-aft passage of the galley, which ran between the larboard and starboard gangs of rowers, and across which they were hourly stretched to be bastinadoed by their fellow-slaves, the Turks; and those officers by no means appreciated the increasing size of that spot. It showed that the English frigate was overhauling the French galley. The latter, low down in the water though it was, and with its two sails furled, had been seen by the former and the pursuit had begun. Fortunate for the galley, and unfortunate for the miserable slaves whose lives were a curse to them, if she escaped that frigate now following it so rapidly!
"Row! row!" howled the comites, as they rushed up and down the gangways of the benches, striking the bare backs of the vogueurs, or row-slaves, till they were all crimson with blood. "Row! In time! in time! Beware, all you," cried one, as bench 12 rowed wildly, while the lash fell on all their backs in consequence; "will you impede the galley's course? Carogne!" (a common oath), "you wish the accursed English to take us – foul Protestants like yourselves!"
"Ay," replied one slave on that bench, a man known as 211 – "ay. Pray God they take us or sink us! In the next world we shall not be chained, nor you free. The chances will be equal."
The lash fell on his back as he spoke, raised a new wheal to keep company with the others already there, and then the comite passed on, thrashing and belabouring all the others on his side of the ship, and howling and bawling and blaspheming at them.
Meanwhile the black spot became a large blur on the blue water; now her royals were visible, white and bright against the equally clear blue sky. She was sailing down the galley,
"Have a care, 211," muttered the galérien next to him – "have a care. If we escape the English ship with life, your existence will be a greater hell than before for those words!"
211 threw his matted hair back from his eyes with a jerk of his head – his hands he could not release from the oar – and looked at his neighbour. He was a man burnt black with the sun, thin, emaciated, and half starved. On his shoulders, where they caught hourly the cords of the comite's whip, great scars, and livid – as well as raw – wounds; yet still young and with handsome features.
"We shall not escape," he replied. "She gains on us each moment. See!" and as their faces were naturally directed aft of the galley, they could observe, through the great scuttle by the poops, the frigate rising larger each instant behind them.
"Better even this than death," said the other. "We know where we are now, at least – who knows where we shall be? Hist! he returns."
Again the comite ran along the gangway, dealing out more blows and curses, each of these men getting their share. Then, when the hoarse, foul voice of the overseer was heard at the other end of the hundred and eighty feet long galère Grand Réale, No. 211 answered him.
"No," he said, "death is better than this. It is peace at least."
"You seek it – hope for it?"
"Ay," No. 211 replied, "pray for it. Hourly!"
"What was your crime?" his companion asked. They had been chained together for two days only, the slave whose place the questioner now filled having been beaten to death, and this, in the excitement of the impending attack, was their first opportunity of conversing.
"Nothing."
The other grinned. Then he exclaimed, "We all say that."
"Most of us say true."
"It is put about," the other went on, "that you are English yourself, like our pursuers. Is that true?"
"Partly. Henceforth, if ever I escape, wholly so. That or death, somehow."
On the coursier there arose more noise and confusion now. The English frigate was nearing them; they could see with the perspective glasses her guns being run out on the lower tiers, so as better to sweep the galley; the course must be altered or their whole larboard side would be raked when once the frigate was on their beam. Therefore the chief captain gave his orders for the usual tactics of the galleys in an engagement to be pursued – they were to turn and "ram" the pursuers.
The first vessels of comparative modern warfare to utilize what is now known as the "ram" were the French galleys, they having at their prow or stern a long éperon, as it was termed, projecting from the deck above the water, and occupying the place of a bowsprit. Being far lower in the water than the ship, this spur was, consequently, in the exact position where it could inflict terrible damage; it struck a vessel of any size below the water line. And to add to the injury which a galley could do in thus advancing to meet an enemy "end on," there were behind this spur two huge gun forts in which were five bronze cannons of large calibre. As they rammed, therefore, propelled by hundreds of galley slaves, they fired also, and as the charge used was that known as à mitraille– viz., a metal case filled with balls of various sizes and pieces of iron, which exploded as it struck, the wounds inflicted in any ship were terribly effective. Moreover, the galley which advanced this presented but a small object for attack, the breadth or beam being never more than forty-eight feet at the broadest.
The order was given, the larboard side galériens backed water, the starboard side pulled lustily, assisted and urged on by both the whips and oaths of the comites and by the alteration of the helm, and slowly – for it was a long business to turn so lengthy a fabric as L'Idole – the galley wore round to meet her pursuer.
She would not have done so could she have escaped by flight, but that was impossible. Even four hundred and twenty galley slaves, Christian and Turk, could not propel her as fast as the lightest breeze could move the great frigate. Moreover, they were caught unawares since they happened to be alone instead of, as was almost always the case, in company with half a dozen other galleys. Their companions had that morning gone in chase of a Dutch merchantman whose mainmast had broken, so that she could only proceed slowly, and L'Idole was being sent back to Dunkirk when observed and chased by the English man-of-war. She had, therefore, to fight and beat the enemy or be sunk and every man on board of her be slain – certainly every man not a slave. For the British sailor of those days so hated the French galleys, in which he knew well enough men of his own faith were kept and tortured, that he spared none in authority in those vessels whenever the chance to slay them arose. Nor, indeed, did he always spare the Protestant slaves themselves in the heat of an engagement. They were fighting against England, and that was enough for him.
"Saperlote!" exclaimed the captain of the galley to the maître-canonnier, by whose side he now stood in the fore part of the galley, "the cochons will not be pierced! See how they change course with us! Grand Dieu! they have our beam. To your guns, at once! What will they do now?"
What they would do in the frigate was obvious. Their master gunner was also busy at his work; they could see his figure with the linstock in his hand, or could rather catch the gleam of the linstock itself, as he moved behind his gun ports. A moment later what he did was equally obvious. He ran along his tier, firing his cannon. Then there was a crash, followed by another, and another, and another, as cannon after cannon were discharged and the balls smashed into the galley. Some swept the coursier, cutting down the captain, two of the blaspheming and brutal comites, and the aumônier, or chaplain – who was encouraging the Protestant and Turkish slaves by reciting the Catholic service to them. Half a dozen more balls struck the benches of the galériens, wounding and killing one fifth of them, smashing even the chains by which some were bound to their seats, even smashing the benches themselves, and taking off legs and arms and heads. Then by a quick and masterly manœuvre the frigate altered course, came round on the other side, and repeated the broadside with her other tier.
As that was delivered, and a moment afterward her boats were lowered, filled with sailors to board L'Idole, the galley heeled over and began to sink.
And No. 211 muttered, as with a jerk from the lurching craft he was thrown into the sea, "Thank God, the end has come!"6