Read the book: «The Sword of Gideon», page 18

"And the rest is soon answered. I am no spy. Had I escaped from here with her whom I love, no word of your plans and dispositions should have ever passed, not even though Peterborough had bade me speak and divulge all; though he had told me that on my utterance all my future hopes rested. As for the passports, listen, messieurs, I beg. I loathed landing under an assumed name on the soil acquired by you; had it been possible, I would have come in plume and corselet, as once I came against you when an English cuirassier. But that was not possible, while as for the second papers-ah, well! there was no other way. That unhappy man now dead would have avenged my honourable defeat of him-one given face to face, by man to man-by himself denouncing me behind my back in his new shape of spy, of informer; he who had been our ally, the countryman of our King! In Antwerp, in St. Trond, he would have done so; also in Liége, had not this man whom you have heard slain him. Messieurs, there is no more. I have been what you are all. I have faced death before; it will not fright me now, much though I desire to live." And beneath his breath Bevill added, "For her."

He ceased, and, in ceasing, knew that in his few, quietly spoken words he had better pleaded his cause than if he had uttered one word for mercy. For though the eyes of all his judges had never left his face, they had been grave, but not hostile. He knew-he felt-that, had there existed no absolute code by which they were forced to condemn him for that which he had done, there would be no condemnation. But still there was the code, as he had known from the moment when Peterborough had first opened to him the matter of his quest for Sylvia; from the moment he set out upon his enterprise.

The heads of the members of the Court were close together now; the registrar was reading a paper to them he had written; a moment later the paper and a pen were handed to the Duc de Guise, who, although the highest in position, was the lowest in military rank, and was therefore to sign first.

For a moment this young man of superb lineage, though a lineage on which there rested, as it had rested for more than a century, so dark and awful a blot, sat gazing at the paper before him while biting the feather of the pen; then he said, or asked:

"The prisoner is a Protestant?"

"He is," De Violaine answered, gazing astonished at him.

"I will not sign," the Duke said, throwing down the pen.

"Monseigneur!"

"No, I will not sign. We," and the Duke's hand caught the lace at his breast in its grasp, as though its owner were stirred by some internal agitation, "we-ah! – we of our line have testified in the past all that we have felt towards those of his faith. I will not have it said that another Guise should sign the finding of this Court against a man whom he respects, no matter how much that man has erred, because he is a Protestant."

"I, too, respect him," De Violaine said, even as he laid his hand, unseen by the others, upon the young Duke's and pressed it. "But I myself am a Protestant, and also the President of this inquiry. Yet I shall sign. Neither will I have it said that, being of the prisoner's faith, I used that bond between us to shield him from the punishment he has brought on his own head."

CHAPTER XXXII

To die. That was the sentence, awaiting only confirmation from Tallard to be at once carried into effect. To die-though, because he had once been that which his judges were now, because the "one touch of nature" had made these French soldiers and that English soldier kin; because, too, his quiet, manly bearing, his restraint from all plea for mercy, had touched the hearts of those who sentenced him-not by the rope, but by the hands of soldiers. Not to be hanged, as Francbois and Stuven were to be, but to be shot as he stood upright before a platoon of soldiers; his eyes unbandaged, so that he might look them and the death they dealt him as straight in the face as he had often before looked the enemy and death.

Also, it may be, the hearts of those judges had been softened to this extent by the avowal of his love for the stately, beautiful woman whom some of them-De Guise, De Violaine, D'Aubignay-had seen; whom these, at least, had heard cry "I love him, I love him, I love him!" Remembering that cry of Sylvia's, remembering how in that moment, so fraught with evil to both their destinies, the girl had cast aside all sense of mock diffidence, and how nobly she had avowed her love while recognising that, in doing so, no reproach of want of reserve could come anigh her, De Violaine, as he signed the finding of the Court over which he had presided, muttered to himself:

"To have heard Radegonde thus proclaim her love for me would have caused this sentence to fall harmless. Harmless! Nay, rather, welcome."

While, as for De Guise, duke and peer of France though he might be, with, in his veins, the old illustrious blood of Lorraine and Burgundy-what would he not have given to hear one woman utter that cry on his behalf from the depths of her heart? He who might, doubtless, obtain such avowals from many a nobly born woman hovering round the garish, bizarre Court of the great King, yet would, in doing so, scarce be able to bring himself to believe in the truth of even one of them.

Some days had passed since Bevill had heard his doom pronounced by De Violaine in a voice full of emotion; days in which he had stood, sometimes for hours together, at the window of the great cell, which was in truth a room, gazing across the town. Across the town, since the citadel was built on the brow of a hill that overhung it, to where, perhaps, he dreamt that, even at the last moment, succour might be expected to come. For though he did not know that the Comtesse de Valorme and Sylvia had by now contrived to escape out of Liége, he knew that this was the direction in which Marlborough must be; that, if there was any hope to be looked for, it was thence it must arrive. Yet he knew, too, that, if it came, also must it come swiftly.

"De Violaine said," he had told himself a hundred times, "that the finding of the Court would be sent at once to the Marshal Tallard for his approval. Ah, well! the time will not be long. With Marlborough as near as he must be by now, Tallard cannot be far away. Whispers filter even through these prison walls; the soldiers amongst whom I am allowed to walk below, and to get the air, are gloomy and depressed. Also, I have caught ere now the name of Venloo on their lips. If Venloo has fallen, then Liége will be the next. It will be its turn. But mine!" Bevill would add, with almost the shadow of a smile upon his face, "will my turn come first?"

"And she, my sweet, my love," he would continue. "What of her? Where is she, what is she doing? Yet why ask, why ponder? She is dreaming, musing, thinking of me now, I know; pitying my fate-it may be endeavouring in some way to avert it. Ah! Sylvia, Sylvia, if ere I go from out this world we might stand face to face again; if I might look once more into those fond, pure eyes, and read therein the love that I must part with, leave behind, death would not seem so bitter and parting be lighter sorrow than I deem it now."

Yet even as he spoke he chided himself for his consideration of himself alone; for thinking only of the love that he, going out into the darkness, must leave behind, not of the one left behind in a deeper, because a living, darkness.

As thus he mused one morning by the spot at the window at which he always stood while these, or similar, reflections occupied his mind, he heard the great bunch of keys in the possession of one of the soldier-gaolers rattling outside, and a moment later heard his cell being unlocked. Knowing that this was not the time for the man to visit him, either to bring food or to take him forth to walk in the courtyard of the citadel, he wondered who might be coming, and, with a leap at his heart, a quick bound of hope, wondered also if it were she who might have obtained admission to him.

A moment later De Violaine entered the room, and again Bevill's heart leapt within him, since he could suppose that this visit must bode but one thing, the announcement of the hour fixed for his execution. Wherefore he murmured to himself:

"Be brave. Fear naught. Remember 'tis but a dozen bullets. What are they to one who has faced thousands?"

If, however, the Governor of the citadel had come with any such intention as that which Bevill supposed, he at least did not declare it at once. Instead, he asked his prisoner if, so far as might be, he had been well attended and treated well.

"I have no complaint to urge," Bevill replied, "even if one placed as I am might venture to do so." Then, bracing himself to that which was nearest to, was never out of, his heart, he said: "Yet, monsieur, I may, perhaps, ask of you a question I might scarce put to those who have me in their charge." Then, seeing that De Violaine showed no signs of dissent, he continued: "I would fain know how it is with her-the woman whose affianced husband I am, and shall be while life remains. Also, if all is well with that noble lady the Comtesse de Valorme."

"I have seen neither of them since your appearance before the Court of Inquiry."

"Yet you were the friend of one of them at least-of Madame la Comtesse."

"Yes, of Madame la Comtesse-once."

"If-if-" Bevill said, while observing the hesitation in the other's words, the pause before that last word "once" – "if my doom is not close at hand, if still there remains even one day, some few hours, to me of life in this world, I would fain crave a boon at your hands, make one request. Ah! if it might be granted it would make my parting with life easier; it may be she would better be able to bear our eternal separation."

"What is it you desire?" De Violaine asked in a low voice, his eyes fixed on the other.

"To see her once again. To bid her one last farewell, to hold her in my arms for the first and last time. You know, you must know, that our love grew from out this attempt for which I am now to suffer; that, even as the knowledge came to both our hearts that the love was there, so, too, the parting, the end was at hand. Ah! if to you the love for a woman has ever come, if it has ever so fortuned that you should love and lose-"

"It is impossible!" De Violaine interrupted, his voice at war with his features. For, though there seemed to be a harshness in the former, there were tears in the latter. And Bevill, hearing the harshness even as he saw the tears, was amazed-staggered, too, as he showed while repeating the word "Impossible."

"Ay. They are not here. Not in Liége. They have left-evaded-the city."

"Left! Gone!"

"Yes. Doubtless you of all others best know whither."

"I know nothing."

"You knew where they would go when you sought to accompany them. You can have little doubt where they are gone without you."

To say now that he did not know, that he could not conceive which way those two women had for certain directed their steps would, Bevill recognised, be but to add one more equivocation, one more evasion of the absolute truth, to those he had been obliged to perpetrate in his desire to escape with Sylvia from Liége. But now-and if he could welcome the perilous position in which he stood he was almost brought to do so by De Violaine's last utterance-equivocations, evasions, were no longer necessary. Henceforth, since he had failed and Sylvia had escaped from Liége, and also was undoubtedly either with the English or some portion of the Allies, he need never again utter one word that was not absolutely a true one. He had failed in that which he had undertaken, yet, he thanked God, that failure mattered not. Out of it had at least come the escape of her he loved.

He stood, therefore, before De Violaine neither asserting nor denying the last words of the other; while that other, observing the calm frankness of his manner, thought that, should there be any future before this man, should he and the woman he loved ever come by any chance together, how proud, how happy in her possession of him, should that woman be.

A moment later he said, perhaps as though desirous of answering his own suggestion, perhaps of showing his prisoner that he, too, was under no doubt of where Sylvia and her friend-the one a woman the prisoner loved, the other the woman he loved-were.

"Doubtless," he said, "they are not very far. Venloo has fallen," and De Violaine sighed as he told of one more defeat to his country.

"To Marlborough!"

"To the Allies at least. Marlborough draws near. Yet Liége may not fall so easy a prey to him as other of these towns and cities have done. If Tallard returns from the Rhine, if Boufflers but succours us-ah! England cannot win for ever!"

"The time is almost past," Bevill said now, and even as his words fell from him the noble heart of De Violaine, the heart of the man who held this other in his grasp, was full of pity and compassion; "the time is almost past when it matters for me whether Marlborough or Tallard reaches Liége first, whether England or France wins at last. My day is almost done. But to go leaving her behind, unmarried yet widowed, since no other man will ever win the love she gave to me; to leave her to a long life cheerless and blank! Ah! ah!" he murmured, breaking off, "I dare not, must not think of that," while, his manly stoicism giving way, he turned his back on the other so that he should not see his face, and moved towards the deep embrasure of the window.

As he did so De Violaine, observing Bevill's emotion, his poignant grief, stood for a moment looking at him. Then, some feeling stronger than a soldier's duty, a soldier's necessary harshness towards a prisoner, an enemy, one taken as Bevill had been taken, under a false name and bearing false papers, stirred him deeply. They were no longer, he felt, captor and captive, French soldier or English, but man and man. Advancing towards the embrasure, yet hesitating ere he did so, De Violaine placed his hand on Bevill's sleeve.

"Be cheered," he said, impelled to do that which his humanity, in contradistinction to his duty, prompted him towards. "Be cheered. Until either De Boufflers or Tallard comes, the warrant for your-your-for the end-cannot be made. The finding of the Court cannot be carried out. And there is another chance, a hope for you. At Nimeguen the English hold a prisoner of our side who is to suffer for doing that which you have done."

"Ah! if they should spare him."

"If Marlborough has not signed his warrant, and almost I doubt it, seeing that day by day he places a greater distance between him and that city, there is a possibility of an exchange; while until Tallard returns here he cannot sign. No messenger from us can reach him now, since, Heaven help us! an iron ring is round us. Also, it may be, Tallard cannot fight his way here. Even though the worst befalls you, your fate is not yet."

"But still prolonged, still in the balance! Ah! if she were here," Bevill said again.

"She is not. She and Ra-Madame de Valorme-have taken their own way-have placed leagues between them and this place. If she were here, she should see you."

After which, as though feeling that he had said more than became the Governor of this fortress, and of others in the city, who held in his hands a prisoner belonging to the enemy, De Violaine went towards the door. Arrived at it, however, he paused, and looked back while saying:

"Whatever faults you have committed against France, there was not one of those who judged you a week ago who did not sympathise with, nay pity, you. You heard the noble reason De Guise gave for not signing; the reason I gave for signing. And of the others-some of them worn veterans who have crossed swords with those of England scores of times-all acquitted you in their hearts, even while, in duty, condemning you. Tallard will be no harder than they, provided ever that Marlborough has himself been merciful to De Cabrieres, the prisoner whose fault is as yours."

"All sympathised with, all pitied me," Bevill said to himself when De Violaine was gone. "Even though they condemned me as they did so. Ah! well, I must bear my lot whate'er befall. I knew the chances and faced them ere I left England; they have gone against me-let me face that, too."

"Yet," he continued to muse, "'twas strange that the one from whom the Comtesse de Valorme feared the worst might come-De Guise-should have been the only one who refused to sign my condemnation."

But now, as ever, his thoughts wandered from any fate, good or bad, that hovered over him to what she, his love, was doing, to where she might be. And in those thoughts there was always one surety strong and triumphant over all the rest. The thought, the certainty, that his image was never absent from her heart, the confidence that, since she had escaped out of Liége, the escape had only been made with a view to endeavouring to obtain succour for him.

Though whether that endeavour, wild, almost hopeless as it must be, could meet with success was more than he dared dream of.

"I am in God's hand," he murmured. "In God alone I must put my trust."

CHAPTER XXXIII

October had come by now, Marlborough's camp was at Sutendal, and the army was but waiting to receive the latest information as to the disposal of the French round Liége to throw their pontoons across the river Jaar, and, after crossing, to march in two columns on that city. Venloo was taken, so, too, were Ruremond and Stevenswaert; the Earl, to use his own words, had now but one enemy between him and Liége-the weather.

Meanwhile, there had passed between Marlborough and Le Maréchal de Boufflers some of those courteous epistles which, at that time, it was customary for the principal commanders of hostile forces to indite to each other. Cartels, as they were then termed, in which the one would inform the other that he had so many prisoners in his hands whom he desired to exchange for some of his own men who might happen to be in the hands of his adversary, and that he would be obliged by the consent of the other being given. In one of the most recent of these, Marlborough had stated briefly the case of Bevill Bracton, while making comparisons between it and that of the Marquis de Cabrieres, and had informed the French commander that he was willing to exchange the latter gentleman against his own countryman, now a prisoner in Liége.

To this there had been returned an answer by De Boufflers in which he stated that, with regard to the ordinary prisoners in his and Marlborough's hands, the exchange should be willingly made, but that a regards the Englishman now a prisoner at Liége it was not in his power to do anything. The decision, he continued, rested with M. Tallard, who was at the moment near Bonn, although De Boufflers added that, if it were possible for him to communicate with Liége, he, as supreme commander of the French army of the Netherlands, would send orders that, presuming the English prisoner had not been already found guilty and executed, the execution should be delayed.

"This is, perhaps, no very satisfying news," the Earl of Marlborough said, when, after having received this letter from his adversary, he proceeded to a tent near his own pavilion in which the Comtesse de Valorme and Sylvia were installed. Nor were they the only women present in this camp, since, wherever an army definitely halted for any length of time, there always appeared on the scene the wives and daughters of the local peasantry intent on selling any provisions and drink they might chance to be possessed of. Also, they were always willing to hire out their services in washing and mending, attending to the sick and wounded, and, sometimes, if they were of the worst species, of robbing the latter. But in the case of Sylvia and the Comtesse, an honest, respectable creature had been found at Asch who acted as general maid to both, and, when the camp was removed to Sutendal some few miles off, was willing to accompany them in that capacity.

"Yet, my lord," Sylvia said, in answer to the Earl's remark, "at least it is something. Except for those last awful words, 'if the prisoner has not yet been found guilty and executed,' there is much hope in the letter. Le Maréchal de Boufflers says if he could communicate with Liége he would send orders for delay."

"That, however," the Earl replied, "it is impossible for him to do. We are between him and Liége, and another portion of our forces is between M. Tallard and Liége. In no way can that letter reach the Governor."

"Therefore," said the Comtesse, "neither can the warrant, which your Lordship says would undoubtedly have to be signed by one of these two generals, reach him either. If one of the enemy, bearing that which will save Bevill Bracton, cannot reach M. de Violaine, how is it possible for the warrant to reach M. Tallard, and how be returned?"

"That is indeed true," Marlborough said reflectively. "While, for our army, we cannot invest Liége yet. We must wait for our reinforcements. And even at the last moment, when the men of the garrison find themselves attacked by us, they might proceed to the extreme. Or-" but he paused. He would not repeat again that which must at least be as obvious to those women as to him, that which had been obvious to the Maréchal de Boufflers-the possibility of Bevill having been already found guilty and executed.

A moment later, however, the Earl added.

"'Tis pity-a thousand pities-we cannot yet advance on Liége or communicate with the Governor-reach his ear somehow. For this reply from De Boufflers to me would be sufficient. With that letter from the Generalissimo of the French army in his hand, not even the signed warrant of Tallard could have effect."

"You cannot reach him, you cannot communicate with him, my lord!" Sylvia exclaimed, her whole body quivering with excitement as she spoke, her eyes glistening like stars. "You cannot reach him!"

"It is impossible. If I send forward a regiment they will be fallen upon, annihilated by some out of the thirty thousand troops that are near here; even an English regiment cannot fight half the army of France and Spain. Though," he added, "it is our curse to be always too self-vaunting and to believe we can perform superhuman feats."

"They will not annihilate me," Sylvia said. "What an English regiment cannot do an English woman hastening to save her lover can."

"You, Mistress Thorne! You!" Marlborough exclaimed, taken almost aback, if one so calm as he could by any means be startled. "You!"

"Yes, I. I reached here in safety. I can return."

"But you will be stopped; your reasons will be demanded. And-you may not fall into the hands of French officers-of gentlemen. Their patrols, pickets, outposts, are commanded by sergeants and corporals. They are not always even French but, instead, Spanish, and mercenaries at that. Also they may not be able to read the Maréchal's letter, to understand-"

"They will understand what I tell them," Sylvia exclaimed, carried away by the excitement of her thoughts and desires. "That I, an Englishwoman, one who, after escaping out of Liége when her lover was to be tried for his life as a spy, was forced-by her love-to return to his side. And," she continued, "they, those French and Spanish who hate us English so dearly, will not thwart but rather assist me to re-enter the jaws of the trap. Only they will not know that in my possession will be that letter of their supreme commander; one that will o'erweigh even the orders of M. Tallard, should he have sent them. If," she added, almost hysterically, as her memory reverted to those written words of the French marshal, "it is not too late. If it is not-ah! Heaven grant it may not be."

And Sylvia threw herself weeping into the arms of the Comtesse.

For a moment-only a moment-Marlborough's eyes rested on her even as, it may be, he thought that here was a woman whose love and heroism, whose loyalty to the man who had gained her heart, might match with the love and loyalty of the woman who was his own wife-the woman who, hated by many for her imperious nature and haughty spirit, was the most fond, proud wife whom any husband's arms had ever enfolded. The woman who, even while she teased and vexed him with her overbearing temper and violent disposition, loved him as deeply and fondly as the day when first they became lovers.

A moment later and when now Sylvia stood once more upright before him, he, taking her hand and raising it to his lips, said:

"It may not be that he shall perish. Mr. Bracton must live even to claim you for his bride. Therefore, your desire to return to Liége with the letter-it is a shrewd one, worthy of a woman's wit! – shall not be gainsaid. While, for the rest, you shall be accompanied some part of the way, 'Tis but a day's ride. Also," and now his voice sank a little lower so that the shrillness that was so often apparent in it was no longer perceptible, "if they permit that you should see him, your affianced husband-"

"Ah!" Sylvia said. "If-if I should see him! If-no! no!" she almost moaned. "I cannot say the words." But recovering herself a moment later, forcing herself to be valiant, she continued, "If he-is-still-alive it may be we shall become fellow prisoners. Once M. de Violaine has me in his keeping again he will give me no further chance of escape."

"Nor me," the Comtesse said. "In his stern sense of honour he will deem me a traitor. Though I am none to France but only to the King and 'her'-to the woman he has made his wife." For it was as "her" and "she" that all France spoke of the "dark and fatal woman," De Maintenon-all France, no matter of what faith, while at the same time refusing to accord her the title of Queen or the right to bear that title. De Maintenon who, born a Protestant, had now been for years the most cruel and vindictive oppressor of all Protestants.

"If it may be so," Marlborough continued; "say to him, I beg, that from the moment we meet again he shall become once more a soldier of the Queen. Even though he has not accomplished that which he set out to do, the attempt was gallant, was well worthy of reward."

"Heaven above bless you," Sylvia said, and now she held out her hand to Marlborough, while, as he took it and as, for a moment, his eyes scanned all the troubled beauty of her face, she added: "Henceforth, no matter what befall, in the prayers of a humble subject of that Queen her greatest subject shall be remembered. Farewell, my lord. I thank you from my heart."

"Not farewell. We shall meet again at Liége. We and one other-your future husband. I pray it may be so. Such noble bravery as yours cannot surely go unrewarded."

And now, ere departing, he turned from Sylvia to the Comtesse de Valorme, his manner to her equally full of the chivalrous courtesy which never failed him.

"Madame," he said, "ere you, too, depart with your friend, believe that, as I have already said, England is preparing to make the cause of those in the South of France hers. Already there are thousands of French Protestants who have found succour and shelter in our land; the Queen's intentions towards all of the Protestant religion cannot be doubted. The matter is already broached. The Council is deliberating on sending a fleet to the Mediterranean to succour those of your faith and ours. Rest assured, madame, nothing will be forgotten that can aid them."

As the Earl of Marlborough spoke, doubtless through the information he was regularly supplied with from England, so things occurred. Sir Cloudesley Shovel, the English admiral, did send the Pembroke and the Tartar to the Gulf of Narbonne with a view not only to supply the Camisards with money and arms and ammunition, but also to land men to assist them. But, when they arrived off the coast and made signals all night, there were none on shore who could comprehend them, for the simple reason that the French Protestant who had been sent by the Earl of Nottingham from London with the key to these signals, had been arrested before he could reach Cette, and his body was at the very time lying broken to pieces and mutilated on the wheel at Aigues-Mortes. Later, but unhappily much later, the peace that was patched up between Louis and his Protestant subjects came about not by the force of arms but by the humanity of a French general, De Villars.

But neither the Comtesse de Valorme nor the Earl of Marlborough could look into the glass of Time or tell what seeds should grow and what should not, and, consequently, if the former did not set out with Sylvia with her heart thoroughly at ease, at least that heart was full of hope. Hope that those of her faith might at last be free from the miseries they had endured so long; from the burnings, the wheels and dungeons, the gallows formed by their own fruit trees, the deaths from starvation of their old parents and helpless children, the galleys and the forced exile to stranger lands.

And also, she set out with one other great, one supreme hope in her heart for the immediate future. The hope, coupled with a prayer that she and Sylvia might be in time to save Bevill from the fate that still must threaten him, if already the worst had not befallen-the prayer that, at last, he and Sylvia might be happy.

"For," she told herself again as she had done many times before, "they love each other. Let my happiness in this world be to see their happiness; my greatest hope never to lose hope that they may yet be united, since, for me, there can never be any other," and, as these thoughts passed through her mind, the tears fell from her eyes.