The Frontier Part 23

"Take something? A gla.s.s of wine, if you like ... a gla.s.s of good French wine.... That's it, uncork a bottle.... We'll have a gla.s.s all round....

Your health, Weisslicht!... Oh, what a joke!... When I think of the face of Weisslicht, the special commissary of the imperial government!... The prisoner's gone! The bird's flown!"

He laughed loudly and, after drinking two gla.s.ses of wine, one on top of the other, he kissed the three women once more, kissed Philippe, called in Victor, Catherine, the gardener, shook hands with them, sent them away again and began to walk up and down the room, saying:

"No time to be lost, children! I met the sergeant of gendarmes on the Saint-elophe road. The authorities have been informed.... They can be here within half an hour. I want to present a report. Take a pen, Philippe."

"What's much more important," protested his wife, "is that you should not excite yourself like this. Here, tell us all about it instead, quite calmly."

Old Morestal was never known to refuse to talk. He therefore began his story, in short, slow sentences, as she wished, describing all the details of attack and all the incidents of the journey to Borsweilen.

But, carried away once more, he raised his voice, grew indignant, worked himself into a rage, burst into sarcasm:

"Oh, they showed no lack of civility!... It was, 'Monsieur le commissaire special!... Monsieur le conseiller d'arrondiss.e.m.e.nt!'...

Weisslicht had his mouth crammed with our t.i.tles!... All the same, at one o'clock in the morning, we were safely locked up in two nice little rooms in the town-hall at Borsweilen.... In quod, what!... With a probable indictment for complicity, espionage, high treason and the devil knows what hanging over our heads!... Only, in that case, gentlemen, you should not carry politeness so far as to release your captives from their handcuffs; and the windows of your cells ought not to be closed with bars too slight to be of any use; and you ought not to let one of your prisoners keep his pocket-knife. If you do, as long as that prisoner has any grit in him--and a file to his knife, by Jove!--he will try what he can do. And I did try, by Jingo! At four o'clock in the morning, after cutting the window-pane and filing or loosening four of the bars, old Morestal let himself down by a waste-pipe and took to his heels. Kind friends, farewell!... It was now only a question of getting home.... The Col du Diable? The Albern Woods? The b.u.t.te-aux-Loups? No such fool! The vermin were bound to be swarming on that side.... And, in fact, I heard the drums beating and the trumpets sounding the alarm and the horses galloping. They were hunting for me, of course!... But how could they have thought of hunting for me six miles away, in the Val de Sainte-Marie, right in the middle of the Forest of Arzance? And I trotted ... I trotted until I was simply done.... I crossed the border at eight o'clock, unseen and unknown. Morestal's foot was on his native heath! At ten o'clock, I saw the steeple of Saint-elophe from the Cote-Blanche and I cut straight across, so as to get home quicker. And here I am! A bit tired, I admit, but quite presentable.... Well, what do you say to old Morestal now, eh?"

He had stood up and, forgetting all about the fatigue of the night, was enlivening his discourse with a savage display of gesture which alarmed his wife.

"And my poor father was not able to escape?" asked Suzanne.

"No, they had taken care to search him," replied Morestal. "Besides, they watched him more closely than they did me ... so he could not do as I did...." And he added. "And a good job too! For I should have been left to languish in their prisons until the end of an interminable trial; whereas he, in forty-eight hours ... But this is all talk. The authorities can't be far away. I want to have my report ready. There are certain things which I suspect ... the business was a plot from start to finish...."

He interrupted himself, as though startled by an unexpected thought, and sat for a long time motionless, with his head in his hands. Then, suddenly, he struck the table with his fist:

"That's it! I understand the whole thing now! Upon my word, it's taken me long enough!"

"What?" asked his wife.

"Dourlowski, of course!"

"Dourlowski?"

"Why, yes! From the first minute, I guessed that it was a trap, a trap contrived by inferior police-agents. But how was it laid? I see it now.

Dourlowski came here yesterday, on some pretext or other. He knew that Jorance and I would take the frontier-road in the evening; and the pa.s.sing of the deserter was contrived to take place at that moment, in connivance with the German detectives! One of them whistles as soon as we come up; and the soldier, who has been told, of course, that this whistle is a signal from the French accomplices, the soldier, whom Dourlowski or his confederates hold in a leash, like a dog, the soldier is let go. That's the whole mystery! It was not he, the poor wretch, whom they were after, but Jorance and Morestal. Morestal, right enough, flies to the rescue of the fugitive. They collar him, they lay hold of Jorance; and there we are, accomplices both. Bravo, gentlemen! Well played!"

Mme. Morestal murmured:

"But, I say, it might be a serious thing ..."

"For Jorance," he replied, "yes, because he is in custody; only--there is an 'only'--the pursuit of the deserter took place on French soil. We also were arrested on French soil. It was a flagrant violation of the frontier. So there's nothing to be afraid of."

"You think so?" asked Suzanne. "You think that my father ...?"

"Nothing to be afraid of," repeated Morestal. And he declared, positively, "I look upon Jorance as free."

"Tut, tut!" mumbled the old lady. "Things won't go so fast as that."

"Once more, I look upon Jorance as free and for this good reason, that the frontier has been violated."

"Who will prove the violation?"

"Who? Why, I, of course!... And Jorance!... Do you think they'll doubt the word of honest men like us? Besides, there are other proofs. They will find the traces of the pursuit, the traces of the attack, the traces of the stand which we made. And who can tell? There may have been witnesses...."

Marthe turned her eyes on Philippe. He was listening to his father, with a face so pale that she was astounded. She waited for a few seconds and then, seeing that he did not speak, she said:

"There was a witness."

Morestal started:

"What's that, Marthe?"

"Philippe was there."

"Nonsense! We left Philippe at the Carrefour du Grand-Chene, at the bottom of the hill, didn't we, Suzanne? You remained behind together."

Philippe intervened, quickly:

"Suzanne went off at once! and so did I ... but I had not gone two hundred yards when I turned back."

"So that was why you did not answer when I called to you, half-way up the hill?"

"I expect so. I went back to the Grand-Chene."

"What for?"

"To join you.... I was sorry I had left you."

"Then you were behind us at the time of the attack?"

"Yes."

"In that case, of course, you heard the shots fired!... Let me see, you must have been on the b.u.t.te-aux-Loups...."

"Somewhere near there...."

"And perhaps you saw us.... From above!... With the moonlight!..."

"Oh, no!" protested Philippe. "No, I saw nothing!"

"But, if you heard the firing, you must certainly have heard Jorance shouting.... They stuffed a gag into my mouth.... But Jorance kept on roaring, 'We are in France! We are on French territory!' You heard Jorance shouting, didn't you, now?"

Philippe hesitated before making a reply of which he vaguely felt the tremendous importance. But, opposite him, he saw Marthe watching him with increasing surprise and, near Marthe, he saw Suzanne's drawn features. He said:

"Yes, I heard him ... I heard him at a distance...."

Old Morestal could not contain himself for joy. And, when he learnt besides that Philippe had received the last words of Baufeld the deserter, he burst out:

"You saw him? He was alive? He told you that they had set a trap for us, didn't he?"

"He mentioned the name of Dourlowski."