Sir Percy Hits Back · Chapter 17 (2/2)

“On the bridle-path off the main road,” Chauvelin responded with a sneer; “half a league north of Laragne. The wagon and horses presumably belonging to the State left in a tumbledown cottage by the roadside. A thrilling situation forsooth. An ordinary situation you would have us believe. Pray continue. What happened after that?”

“We marched and we marched and we marched,” the lieutenant resumed sullenly. “We marched until we were ready to drop. We had had three days of marching, and had started in the morning without a bite, hungry! Nom d’un nom! how hungry we were! and weak and faint! The hours sped on; we could see the sun mounting the heavens and then start on its descent. The heat was intense, the dust terrible. It filled our eyes, our nostrils, our mouths. The soles of our feet were bleeding, sweat poured down our faces and obscured our vision. We marched and we marched, through two villages, the names of which I do not know; then over mountain passes, across rocky gorges, stepping over streams, climbing the sides of hills, the banks of rivers. I am a stranger in these parts. And I was tired. Tired! I knew not where we were, whither we were going. March! March! March! Ceaselessly. Even had I dared, I would no longer have had the strength to ask questions or to beg for mercy.”

And at the recollection of those hours of agony, Lieutenant Godet wiped the perspiration from his streaming brow.

“Well?” Chauvelin queried dryly, “and the others, the Englishmen?”

“They marched along at a swinging pace,” Godet replied, smothering a savage oath. “Without turning a hair. They kicked up no dust. They did not sweat. They just marched. No doubt their bellies were well filled.”

“And the prisoners?”

“They set to with a will. And I make no doubt but they had fed and drunk while they sat in the wagon. At any rate they showed no fatigue.”

“How long did you continue on the march?”

“Till one by one we⁠—my comrades and I⁠—fell out by the roadside.”

“And those who fell out were left, while the others went on?”

“Yes! We had gone through the second village, and were marching along the edge of a stream, when the first lot of us dropped out. Three of my men. They just rolled down the bank of the stream; and there lay on their stomachs trying to drink. The captain⁠—or whatever he was, curse him!⁠—called ‘Halt!’ and one of his men ran down the bank and had a look at those three poor fellows who lay there striving to slake their hunger as well as their thirst in the cool mountain stream. But, nom de nom! They⁠—the miscreants!⁠—had no bowels of compassion. I believe⁠—for in truth I was too tired to see anything clearly⁠—that one of them did leave a hunk of bread by the side of the stream: perhaps he was afraid that those poor fellows would die of inanition and then their death would be upon his conscience.”

“Well! And did all the men fall out that way?”

“Yes! We were marching three abreast: and three by three we all fell out. Always beside the stream, for we suffered from thirst as much as from hunger. The stream seemed to draw us, and three of us, as if by common understanding, would just roll down the bank and lie on our stomachs and try to drink. The captain no longer called a halt when that happened. One of his own men would just throw pieces of bread down to the edge of the stream, just as they would to a dog.”

“And you were the last to fall out?”

“The very last. I verily believe, when I rolled down the bank and felt the cool stream against my face, that I had died and reached the Elysian fields. A piece of bread was thrown to me, and I fell on it like a starved beast.”

“And then what happened?”

“Nothing.”

“What do you mean? Nothing?”

“Nothing as far as we were concerned. The bank of the stream, for a length of two kilometres or more, was strewn with our dead⁠—that is not dead, you understand, but fatigued, and only half-conscious with hunger: while those miscreants, those limbs of Satan, marched off without as much as a last look at us! Gaily they marched away singing. Yes, singing, some awful gibberish, in a tongue I did not understand. That is,” poor Godet went on ruefully, “when first I had an inkling of the awful truth. That strange tongue gave it away. You understand?”

The others nodded.

“And then, by chance, I put my hand in the back pocket of my tunic, and felt that piece of paper.”

With finger that quivered slightly, he pointed to Chauvelin’s hand; between the clenched claw-like fingers there protruded the corner of a scrap of paper. Chauvelin failed to suppress the exclamation of rage which rose to his lips.

“Nom de nom!” he muttered savagely through his teeth, and with his handkerchief he wiped the beads of moisture that had risen to the roots of his hair.

“And so they marched away,” one of the others remarked dryly. “In which direction?”

“Straight on,” the soldier replied laconically.

“On the way to Nyons, I suppose, and Walreas?”

“I suppose so. I don’t know the neighbourhood.”

“You do not seem to have known much, Lieutenant Godet,” Chauvelin put in with a sneer.

“I come from the other side of the Drac,” Godet retorted. “I could not⁠—”

But Chauvelin broke in with an oath:

“Wherever you come from, citizen,” he said sternly, “it was your duty to become acquainted with the country through which you were ordered to march your men.”

“I had no orders to take them through mountain passes,” Godet remarked sullenly. “We came through here a month ago and have kept to the high road. At Sisteron I had my orders to arrest the ci-devant Frontenacs. You, Citizen Chauvelin, must know how conscientiously I did my duty. All the orders you gave me I fulfilled. After Sisteron you ordered me to go to Laragne, and thence to Serres. It was you ordered me to halt at Laragne for the night.”

“All this is beside the point,” one of the others broke in roughly. “All we can gather from this confused tale is that all traces of the English spies have completely vanished.”

“For the moment,” Chauvelin assented dryly. “It is for Lieutenant Godet to find those traces again.”

He spoke now with extreme bitterness, and the glances which he levelled at Godet were both hostile and threatening. It would be curious to try and follow the mental processes which had given rise to this hostility. Godet, after all said and done, had only failed in the same manner as he himself, Chauvelin, had so often done. He had been hoodwinked by a particularly astute and daring adventurer who was an avowed enemy of France: and if being thus hoodwinked was a crime against the State, then the powerful member of the Committee of Public Safety and the humble lieutenant of infantry were fellow-criminals. This, of course, Godet did not know. Not yet: or he would not have been in such dread of this man with the pale eyes and the talon-like hands. The others he did not fear nearly so much. No doubt they too were cruel and vengeful these days. Strike or the blow will fall on you, was the rule of every man’s conduct. Pochart and Danou took their cue from Chauvelin; his was the mastermind, his the more ruthless nature, all they did was to try and show their zeal by saying Amen to every suggestion, every sarcasm, every accusation put forth by their colleague.

In fact the proceedings by now had developed into a kind of duel between the accused and the principal judge; it was a duel made up of acrimonious accusations on the one hand, and of defence that weakened perceptibly as the accused became more and more confused through ever increasing terror. The other two only put in a word here and there. They wished to know how the adventure had finally come to an end.

“In a long, weary tramp to Orange,” Godet replied; “weary beyond what words can describe, footsore, hungry and thirsty we tramped.”

They had to cover three leagues. How they lived through it, they none of them knew. At one or two villages which they encountered, they obtained a little food, and some drink. For the space of a league and a half, he, Godet, and two others got a lift in a farmer’s wagon. On the way they asked news of the English spies. They had been seen marching merrily; but soon all traces of them had vanished.

“Had I been the traitor you say I am, Citizen Chauvelin,” Godet said in the end, “would I have come into Orange with my tale? I would have tried to run away and to hide. Made my way to Toulons, what? and joined the army there. You would not have found me then; months would have gone by before you heard of my adventure.”

“You underestimate the power which is in my hands, citizen lieutenant,” was Chauvelin’s curt comment. “Only one thing could save you from the consequences of your treachery, and that was to speak the truth and to redeem your crime.”

He paused a moment, and then addressing his two colleagues he said with slow deliberation:

“We all agree, I think, that Citizen Lieutenant Godet has been guilty of gross negligence, which today, when France is threatened by traitors within as well as by her enemies on her frontier, amounts to treason against the State. Silence!” he went on, throwing a stern glance on Godet who had uttered a violent word of protest. “Listen to what hope of indulgence it is in my power to give you. The State against whom you have sinned will grant you the chance of retrieving your crime. We will grant you full powers under the new Law of the Suspect. You shall go into the highways and the byways with full power to seize any man, woman or child, whom you as much as vaguely suspect of complicity in this affair. Do you understand?”

“I think I do,” Godet replied dully.

“The State,” Pochart put in sagely, “would rather have the English spies’ than your head, citizen lieutenant.”

“The State will have Citizen Godet’s head,” Chauvelin rejoined dryly, “or the English spies. The choice rests with Citizen Godet himself.”

There was a moment’s pause. The eyes of the soldier were fixed upon the pale, determined face of his ruthless judge. He knew that his life hung upon the decision uttered by those thin, bloodless lips. He was in the grip of a white terror; his teeth were clenched and his tongue clove, hard and dry, against the roof of his mouth. He was terrified, and in his wildly beating heart there was an immense hatred for the man who thus terrorized him. He longed to get at him, to grip him by the throat, to scream out insults into that pale, stern, colourless face. He longed to see that same fear of death which was paralysing him, dim the light of those pale eyes. His own impotence made that hatred more intense. It shone out of his eyes, and Chauvelin meeting them caught the glance like that of an enraged cur, ready to spring. Indifferent, he shrugged his shoulders and the ghost of a sneer curled round his thin lips. He was accustomed to hatred and desire for revenge.

“Citizen lieutenant,” he said at last, “you have heard the decision of the committee. It has been found expedient to withhold punishment from you, because it is in your power to serve the State in a way that no other man could do at this moment. You have seen the English spies face to face; you know something of their appearance, something of their mode of speech. Go then into the highways and byways, the men who with you were guilty of negligence shall go with you. It is for you to use the full powers which the Law of the Suspect has placed in your hands. Go scour the country. Yours is the power to seize any man, woman or child whom you suspect of treason to the State, make use of that power in order to track down to their lair the English foxes who have outwitted you. Only let me add a word of warning in your ear. Do not be led by the nose a second time. If you are, no power on earth will save you. The State may forgive incompetence once: the second time it will bear the ugly name of treason.”

He had risen to his feet, and just for a moment the muscles of his hand relaxed, and the scrap of paper which he had crushed into a ball rolled upon the table.

His colleague Pochart picked it up and idly opened and smoothed it out: he studied for a moment or two the close writing upon it, then looked inquiringly up at Chauvelin.

“Can you tell us what is written on this paper, citizen?” he asked.

And while he spoke he tossed the paper across to his colleague Danou.

“Is it English?” Danou asked puzzled.

“Yes,” Chauvelin replied curtly.

“It looks like poetry,” Pochart remarked.

“Doggerel verses,” commented Chauvelin.

“And you can’t read it?”

“No!”

“I thought you knew English.”

“Not I.”

“Strange why a bit of doggerel verse should have been slipped into the pocket of Citizen Godet’s tunic,” Pochart remarked dryly. “And there’s your name, Citizen Chauvelin,” he added, pointing to the words “A mon ami Chauvelin,” which preceded the four lines of poetry written in English, a language which, apparently, no one here understood.

But Chauvelin was at the end of his patience. He seized the scrap of paper and tore it savagely into innumerable little pieces.

“Enough of this futility,” he said, and brought his clenched fist down with a crash on the table. “The English spies have been facetious, that is all. We do them too much honour by attaching importance to this senseless, childish verse. Lieutenant Godet,” he went on, once more addressing the accused, “you are dismissed, under the conditions I told you of just now. When next we meet face to face, you will either be the lucky man who has helped to lay these impudent English adventurers by the heel, or you will stand before me arraigned for treason and preparing for death. Now you can go.”

Without another word Godet turned on his heel and went out of the room. Past the guard at the door, he went with head erect, and with a firm step he walked the whole length of the corridor. But there was one moment when in the vestibule he found himself alone. Unwatched. At any rate he thought so. So he paused and looked over his shoulder in the direction of the room where he had just spent an uncomfortable two hours. He paused and raising his fist, he shook it at the unseen presence of the man who had so terrorized him, and whom he hated because of the terror which he inspired.

“With a bit of luck,” he muttered through his teeth, “we shall be even yet, you and I, mon ami Chauvelin.”

Then once more with a firm step he walked out of the Town Hall.