Count Hannibal Part 21

"And what of these?" she said. "What of these? You forget them, Monsieur. You do not think, you cannot have thought, that I would abandon them? That I would leave them to such mercy as he, defeated, might extend to them? No, you forgot them."

He did not know what to answer, for the jealous eyes of the frightened waiting-woman, fierce with the fierceness of a hunted animal, were on him. The Carlat and she had heard, could hear. At last--

"Better one than none!" he muttered, in a voice so low that if the servants caught his meaning it was but indistinctly. "I have to think of you."

"And I of them," she answered firmly. "Nor is that all. Were they not here, it could not be. My word is pa.s.sed--though a moment ago, Monsieur, in the joy of seeing you I forgot it. And how," she continued, "if I keep not my word, can I expect him to keep his? Or how, if I am ready to break the bond, on this happening which I never expected, can I hold him to conditions which he loves as little--as little as I love him?"

Her voice dropped piteously on the last words; her eyes, craving her lover's pardon, sought his. But rage, not pity or admiration, was the feeling roused in Tignonville's breast. He stood staring at her, struck dumb by folly so immense. At last--

"You cannot mean this," he blurted out. "You cannot mean, Mademoiselle, that you intend to stand on that! To keep a promise wrung from you by force, by treachery, in the midst of such horrors as he and his have brought upon us! It is inconceivable!"

She shook her head. "I promised," she said.

"You were forced to it."

"But the promise saved our lives."

"From murderers! From a.s.sa.s.sins!" he protested.

She shook her head. "I cannot go back," she said firmly; "I cannot."

"Then you are willing to marry him," he cried in ign.o.ble anger. "That is it! Nay, you must wish to marry him! For, as for his conditions, Mademoiselle," the young man continued, with an insulting laugh, "you cannot think seriously of them. _He_ keep conditions and you in his power! He, Count Hannibal! But for the matter of that, and were he in the mind to keep them, what are they? There are plenty of ministers. I left one only this morning. I could lay my hand on one in five minutes.

He has only to find one, therefore--and to find me!"

"Yes, Monsieur," she cried, trembling with wounded pride, "it is for that reason I implore you to go. The sooner you leave me, the sooner you place yourself in a position of security, the happier for me! Every moment that you spend here, you endanger both yourself and me!"

"If you will not be persuaded--"

"I shall not be persuaded," she answered firmly, "and you do but"--alas!

her pride began to break down, her voice to quiver, she looked piteously at him--"by staying here make it harder for me to--to--"

"Hus.h.!.+" cried Madame Carlat. "Hus.h.!.+" And as they started and turned towards her--she was at the end of the chamber by the door, almost out of earshot--she raised a warning hand. "Listen!" she muttered, "some one has entered the house."

"'Tis my messenger from Biron," Tignonville answered sullenly. And he drew his cowl over his face, and, hiding his hands in his sleeves, moved towards the door. But on the threshold he turned and held out his arms.

He could not go thus. "Mademoiselle! Clotilde!" he cried with pa.s.sion, "for the last time, listen to me, come with me. Be persuaded!"

"Hus.h.!.+" Madame Carlat interposed again, and turned a scared face on them.

"It is no messenger! It is Tavannes himself: I know his voice." And she wrung her hands. "_Oh, mon Dieu, mon Dieu_, what are we to do?" she continued, panic-stricken. And she looked all ways about the room.

CHAPTER XVI. AT CLOSE QUARTERS.

Fear leapt into Mademoiselle's eyes, but she commanded herself. She signed to Madame Carlat to be silent, and they listened, gazing at one another, hoping against hope that the woman was mistaken. A long moment they waited, and some were beginning to breathe again, when the strident tones of Count Hannibal's voice rolled up the staircase, and put an end to doubt. Mademoiselle grasped the table and stood supporting herself by it.

"What are we to do?" she muttered. "What are we to do?" and she turned distractedly towards the women. The courage which had supported her in her lover's absence had abandoned her now. "If he finds him here I am lost! I am lost!"

"He will not know me," Tignonville muttered. But he spoke uncertainly; and his gaze, s.h.i.+fting hither and thither, belied the boldness of his words.

Madame Carlat's eyes flew round the room; on her for once the burden seemed to rest. Alas! the room had no second door, and the windows looked on a courtyard guarded by Tavannes' people. And even now Count Hannibal's step rang on the stair! his hand was almost on the latch. The woman wrung her hands; then, a thought striking her, she darted to a corner where Mademoiselle's robes hung on pegs against the wall.

"Here!" she cried, raising them. "Behind these! He may not be seen here! Quick, Monsieur, quick! Hide yourself!"

It was a forlorn hope--the suggestion of one who had not thought out the position; and, whatever its promise, Mademoiselle's pride revolted against it.

"No," she cried. "Not there!" while Tignonville, who knew that the step was useless, since Count Hannibal must have learned that a monk had entered, held his ground.

"You could not deny yourself?" he muttered hurriedly.

"And a priest with me?" she answered; and she shook her head.

There was no time for more, and even as Mademoiselle spoke Count Hannibal's knuckles tapped the door. She cast a last look at her lover.

He had turned his back on the window; the light no longer fell on his face. It was possible that he might pa.s.s unrecognized, if Tavannes' stay was brief; at any rate, the risk must be run. In a half stifled voice she bade her woman, Javette, open the door. Count Hannibal bowed low as he entered; and he deceived the others. But he did not deceive her. He had not crossed the threshold before she repented that she had not acted on Tignonville's suggestion, and denied herself. For what could escape those hard keen eyes, which swept the room, saw all, and seemed to see nothing--those eyes in which there dwelt even now a glint of cruel humour? He might deceive others, but she who panted within his grasp, as the wild bird palpitates in the hand of the fowler, was not deceived! He saw, he knew! although, as he bowed, and smiling, stood upright, he looked only at her.

"I expected to be with you before this," he said courteously, "but I have been detained. First, Mademoiselle, by some of your friends, who were reluctant to part with me; then by some of your enemies, who, finding me in no handsome case, took me for a Huguenot escaped from the river, and drove me to s.h.i.+fts to get clear of them. However, now I am come, I have news."

"News?" she muttered with dry lips. It could hardly be good news.

"Yes, Mademoiselle, of M. de Tignonville," he answered. "I have little doubt that I shall be able to produce him this evening, and so to satisfy one of your scruples. And as I trust that this good father," he went on, turning to the ecclesiastic, and speaking with the sneer from which he seldom refrained, Catholic as he was, when he mentioned a priest, "has by this time succeeded in removing the other, and persuading you to accept his ministrations--"

"No!" she cried impulsively.

"No?" with a dubious smile, and a glance from one to the other. "Oh, I had hoped better things. But he still may? He still may. I am sure he may. In which case, Mademoiselle, your modesty must pardon me if I plead urgency, and fix the hour after supper this evening for the fulfilment of your promise."

She turned white to the lips. "After supper?" she gasped.

"Yes, Mademoiselle, this evening. Shall I say--at eight o'clock?"

In horror of the thing which menaced her, of the thing from which only two hours separated her, she could find no words but those which she had already used. The worst was upon her; worse than the worst could not befall her.

"But he has not persuaded me!" she cried, clenching her hands in pa.s.sion.

"He has not persuaded me!"

"Still he may, Mademoiselle."

"He will not!" she cried wildly. "He will not!"

The room was going round with her. The precipice yawned at her feet; its naked terrors turned her brain. She had been pushed nearer, and nearer, and nearer; struggle as she might, she was on the verge. A mist rose before her eyes, and though they thought she listened she understood nothing of what was pa.s.sing. When she came to herself, after the lapse of a minute, Count Hannibal was speaking.

"Permit him another trial," he was saying in a tone of bland irony. "A short time longer, Mademoiselle! One more a.s.sault, father! The weapons of the Church could not be better directed or to a more worthy object; and, successful, shall not fail of due recognition and an earthly reward."

And while she listened, half fainting, with a humming in her ears, he was gone. The door closed on him, and the three--Mademoiselle's woman had withdrawn when she opened to him--looked at one another. The girl parted her lips to speak, but she only smiled piteously; and it was M. de Tignonville who broke the silence, in a tone which betrayed rather relief than any other feeling.

"Come, all is not lost yet," he said briskly. "If I can escape from the house--"

"He knows you," she answered.