The House of the Combrays Part 10

Mme. de Combray had applied to the woman Delaitre for this "safe and intelligent man," and the latter had, at Licquet's instance, offered the services of her husband, an honest royalist, who in reality did not exist, but was to be personated by a man whom Licquet had ready to send in search of the horse as soon as its whereabouts should be determined.

Lefebre refused to answer this question for the same reason that he had refused to answer others, and the detective was obliged to confess his perplexity to Real. "There is no longer any trouble in intercepting the prisoner's letters; the difficulty of sending replies increases each day. You must give me absolution, Monsieur, for all the sins that this affair has caused me to commit; for the rest, all is fair in love and war, and surely we are at war with these people." To which Real replied: "I cannot believe that the horse only served for Mme. Acquet's flight; they would not advise the strange precaution of taking it twelve leagues away, killing, and skinning it on the spot. These anxieties show the existence of some grave offence, for which the horse was employed, and which its discovery will disclose. You must find out the history of this animal; how long Mme. de Combray has had it, and who owned it before."

In vain Licquet protested that he had exhausted his supply of inventions and ruses; the invariable reply was, "Find the yellow horse!"

He cursed his own zeal; but an unexpected event renewed his confidence and energy. Lefebre, who was arrested early in September, had just been thrown into the Conciergerie at Rouen. This new card, if well played, would set everything right. It was easy to induce Mme. de Combray to write another letter insisting once more on knowing "the exact address of the horse," and the lawyer at last answered unsuspectingly, "With Lanoe at Glatigny, near Bretteville-sur-Dives."

With Lanoe! Why had Licquet never guessed it! This name, indeed, so often mentioned in the declarations of the prisoners, had made no impression on him. Mme. Acquet was hidden there without doubt, and he triumphantly sent off an express to Real announcing the good news, and sent two sharp men to Glatigny at the same time. They left Rouen on September 15th, and time lagged for Licquet while awaiting their return.

Three days, five days, ten days pa.s.sed without any news of them. In his impatience he spent his time worrying Lefebre. A continuous correspondence was established between him and Mme. de Combray; but in his letters, as in his examination, he showed great mistrust, and Licquet even began to fear that the prudent lawyer would not have told where the yellow horse was, if he had not been sure that the hunt for it would be fruitless. And so the detective, who had played his last card, was in an agony during the two weeks' absence of his men. At last they returned, discomfited and weary, leading the foundered yellow horse, and accompanied by a sort of colossus, "somewhat resembling a grenadier,"

who was no other than Lanoe's wife.

The story told by Licquet's emissaries was as short as it was delusive.

On arriving at Bretteville-sur-Dives they had gone to the farm of Glatigny, but had not found Lanoe, whom Caffarelli had arrested a fortnight before. His wife had received them, and after their first enquiry had led them to the famous horse's stable, enchanted at being relieved of the famished beast who consumed all her fodder. The men had gone as far as Caen, and obtained the prefect's authorisation to speak to Lanoe. The latter remembered that Lefebre had left the horse with him at the end of July, on returning from Tournebut, but he denied all knowledge of Mme. Acquet's retreat. If he was to be believed, she was "a prisoner of her family," and would never be found, as the whole country round Falaise was "sold" to the mayor, M. de Saint-Leonard, who had declared himself his cousin's protector.

Lanoe's wife was sent back to Glatigny, but the horse was kept at Rouen--apparently in the hope that this dumb witness would bring some revelation. Licquet even cut off some of its hairs and sent them, carefully wrapped up, to Mme. de Combray, implying that they came from the faithful Delaitre, to whom the Marquise had confided the task of disposing of the compromising animal. The same evening the Marquise, completely rea.s.sured, wrote the following note to the lawyer:

"You see that my commissioner was speedy. I have had certain proof. He went to Lanoe's wife, found the horse, got on it, went five or six leagues, killed it, and brought away the skin. He brought me some of its coat, and I send you half, so that you may see the truth for yourself, and so have no fear. I am going to write to Soyer to say that he sold the horse at Guibray for 350 livres."

In her joy at being delivered from her nightmare, she wrote the same day to Colas, her groom, who was also in the Conciergerie: "Do not worry: do you need money? I will send you twelve francs. The cursed horse! They have sent me some of its skin, which I send for recognition. Burn this."

And to her chambermaid, Catherine Querey: "The horse is killed. My agent skinned and burnt it. If you are asked about the missing horse, say that it was sold. My miserable daughter gives me a great deal of pain."

Thus ends the story of the yellow horse. It finished its mysterious odyssey in the stables of Savoye-Rollin, where Licquet often visited it, as if he could thus learn its secret. For a doubt remained, and Real's suggestion haunted him: "If the horse had only served for Mme. Acquet's flight, they would not advise the strange precaution of taking it twelve leagues away, killing, and skinning it on the spot." Even now a great deal of mystery hangs about it. The horse had not been used by Mme.

Acquet, because we know that since the robbery of June 7th, she had not left the neighbourhood of Falaise. Lefebre had ridden it from Tournebut; but was that a fact to be so carefully concealed? Why did the Marquise in her confidential letters insist on this point? "Say that the lawyer returned to his house on foot," is a sentence that we find in each of her letters. Since no mystery was made of the journey, why was its means of accomplishment important?

There was something unexplained, and Licquet was not satisfied. His tricks had brought no result. D'Ache was not found; Mme. Acquet had disappeared; her description had in vain been sent to all the brigades.

Manginot, in despair of finding her, had renounced the search, and Savoye-Rollin himself was "determined to suspend all action." Such was the situation during the last days of September. It seemed most probable that the affair of Quesnay and the great plot of which it was an off-shoot, were going to join many others of the same kind, whose originators Fouche's police had despaired of finding, when an unexpected event reawakened Licquet's fervour and suggested to him a new machination.

CHAPTER VII

MADAME ACQUET

Seclusion, isolation and trouble had in no way softened the Marquise de Combray's harsh nature. From the very first day, this woman, accustomed to living in a chateau, had accommodated herself to the life of a prisoner without abating anything of her haughty and despotic character.

Her very illusions remained intact. She imagined that from her cell she still directed her confederates and agents, whom she considered one and all as servants, never suspecting that the permission to write letters, of which she made such bad use, was only a trap set for her ingenuous vanity. In less than a month she had written more than a hundred letters to her fellow-prisoners, which all pa.s.sed through Licquet's hands. To one she dictated the answers he was to give, to another she counselled silence,--setting herself up to be an absolute judge of what they ought to say or to hold back, being quite unable to imagine that any of these unhappy people might prefer life to the pleasure of obeying her. She would have treated as a liar any one, be he who he might, who affirmed that all her accomplices had deserted her, that Soyer had hastened to disclose the secret hiding-places at Tournebut, that Mlle. Querey had told all about what she had seen, that Lanoe pestered Caffarelli with his incessant revelations, and that Lefebre, whom nothing but prudence kept silent, was very near telling all he knew to save his own head.

The Marquise was ignorant of all these defections. Licquet had created such an artificial atmosphere around her that she lived under the delusion that she was as important as before. Convinced that n.o.body was her equal in finesse and authority, she considered the detective sufficiently clever to deal with a person of humble position, but believed that as soon as she cared to trouble herself to bring it about, he would become entirely devoted to her. And Licquet, with his almost genial skilfulness, so easily fathomed the Marquise's proud soul--was such a perfect actor in the way he stood before her, spoke to her, and looked at her with an air of submissive admiration,--that it was no wonder she thought he was ready to serve her; and as she was not the sort of woman to use any discretion with a man of his cla.s.s, she immediately despatched the turnkey to offer him the sum of 12,000 francs, half down, if he would consent to promote her interests. Licquet appeared very grateful, very much honoured, accepted the money, which he put in the coffers of the prefecture, and the very same day read a letter in which Mme. de Combray informed her accomplices of the great news: "We have the little secretary under our thumb."

Ah! what great talks Licquet and the prisoner had, now they had become friends. From the very first conversation he satisfied himself that she did not know Mme. Acquet's hiding-place; but the lawyer Lefebre, who had at last ceased to be dumb, had not concealed the fact that it might be learned through a laundress at Falaise named Mme. Chauvel, and Licquet immediately informed Mme. de Combray of this fact and represented to her, in a friendly manner, the danger in which her daughter's arrest would involve her, and insinuated that the only hope of security lay in the escape to England of Mme. Acquet, "on whose head the government had set a price."

The idea pleased the Marquise; but who would undertake to discover the fugitive and arrange for her embarcation? Whom dared she trust, in her desperate situation? Licquet seemed the very one; he, however, excused himself, saying that a faithful man, carrying a letter from Mme. de Combray, would do as well, and the Marquise never doubted that her daughter would blindly follow her advice--supported by a sufficient sum of money to live abroad while awaiting better days. It remained to find the faithful man. The Marquise only knew of one, who, quite recently, at her request, had consented to go and look for the yellow horse, which he had killed and skinned, and who, she said, had acquitted himself so cleverly of his mission. She was never tired of praising this worthy fellow, who only existed, as every one knew, in her own imagination; she admitted that she did not know him personally, but had corresponded with him through the medium of the woman Delaitre, who had been placed near her; but she knew that he was the woman's husband, captain of a boat at Saint Valery-en-Caux, and, in addition, a relation of poor Raoul Gaillard, whom the Marquise remembered even in her own troubles.

Licquet listened quite seriously while his victim detailed the history of this fict.i.tious person whom he himself had invented; he a.s.sured her that the choice was a wise one, for he had known Delaitre for a long time as a man whose loyalty was beyond all doubt. As there could be no question of introducing him into the prison, Licquet kindly undertook to acquaint him with the service expected of him, and to give him the three letters which Mme. de Combray was to write immediately. The first, which was very confidential, was addressed to the good Delaitre himself; the second was to be handed, at the moment of going on board, to Mauge, a lawyer at Valery, who was to provide the necessary money for the fugitive's existence in England; the third accredited Delaitre to Mme.

Acquet. The Marquise ordered her daughter to follow the honest Captain, whom she represented as a tried friend; she begged her, in her own interest and that of all their friends, to leave the country without losing a day; and she concluded by saying that in the event of her obeying immediately, she would provide generously for all her wants; then she signed and handed the three letters to Licquet, overwhelming him with protestations of grat.i.tude.

All the detective had to do was to procure a false Delaitre, since the real did not exist. They selected an intelligent man, of suitable bearing, and making out a detailed pa.s.sport, despatched him to Falaise, armed with the Marquise's letters, to have an interview with the laundress. Five days later he returned to Rouen. The Chauvels, on seeing Mme. de Combray's letters, quite unsuspectingly gave the messenger a warm welcome. The gendarme, however, did not approve of the idea of crossing to England. Mme. Acquet, he said, was very well hidden in Caen, and n.o.body suspected where she was. What was the use of exposing her to the risk of embarking at a well watched port. But as Delaitre insisted, saying that he had a commission from Mme. de Combray which he must carry out, Chauvel, whose duty kept him at Falaise, arranged to meet the Captain at Caen on the 2d of October. He wished to present him himself to Mme. Acquet, and to help his mistress in this matter on which her future depended. Thus it was that on the 1st of October, Licquet, now sure of success, put the false Captain Delaitre in the coach leaving for Caen, having given him as a.s.sistants, a nephew of the same name and a servant, both carefully chosen from amongst the wiliest of his a.s.sistants. The next day the three spies got out at the Hotel du Pare in the Faubourg de Vaucelles at Caen, which Chauvel had fixed as the meeting-place, and whither he had promised to bring Mme. Acquet.

Six weeks previously, when quitting Falaise on the 23d August, after the examination to which Caffarelli had subjected her, Mme. Acquet, still ignorant of her mother's arrest, had proposed going to Tournebut, in order to hide there for some time before starting for Paris, where she hoped to find Le Chevalier. She had with her her third daughter, Celine, a child of six years, whom she counted on getting rid of by placing her at the school kept at Rouen by the ladies Dusaussay, where the two elder girls already were. They were accompanied by Chauvel's sister, a woman named Normand.

She went first to Caen where she was to take the diligence, and lodged with Bessin at the Coupe d'Or in the Rue Saint-Pierre. Chauvel came there the following day to say good-bye to his friend and they dined together. While they were at table, a man, whom the gendarme did not know, entered the room and said a few words to Mme. Acquet, who went into the adjoining room with him. It was Lemarchand, the innkeeper at Louvigny, Allain's host and friend. Chauvel grew anxious at this private conversation, and seeing the time of the diligence was approaching, opened the door and warned Mme. Acquet that she must get ready to start.

To his great surprise, she replied that she was no longer going, as important interests detained her in Caen. She begged him to escort the woman Normand and the little girl to the coach, and gave him the address of a lawyer in Rouen with whom the child could be left. The gendarme obeyed, and when he went back to the Coupe d'Or an hour later, his mistress had left. He returned sadly to Falaise.

Lemarchand, who had been informed of Mme. Acquet's journey, came to tell her, from Allain, that "a lodging had been found for her where she would be secure, and that, if she did not wish to go, she had only to come to the Promenade Saint-Julien at nightfall, and some one would meet her and escort her to her new hiding-place." It may well be that a threat of denouncing her, if she left the country, was added to this obliging offer. At any rate she was made to defer her journey. Towards ten o'clock at night, according to Lemarchand's advice, she reached the Promenade Saint-Julien alone, walked up and down under the trees for some time, and seeing two men seated on a bench, she went and sat down beside them. At first they eyed each other without saying a word; at last, one of the strangers asked her if she were not waiting for some one. Upon her answering in the affirmative they conferred for a moment, and then gave their names. They were the lawyer Vannier and Bureau de Placene, two intimate friends of Le Chevalier's. Mme. Acquet, in her turn, mentioned her name, and Vannier offering her his arm, escorted her to his house in the Rue Saint-Martin.

They held a council next day at breakfast. Lemarchand, Vannier, and Bureau de Placene appeared very anxious to keep Mme. Acquet. She was, they said, sure of not being punished as long as she did not quit the department of Calvados. Neither the prefect nor the magistrates would trouble to enquire into the affair, and all the gentry of Lower Normandy had declared for the family of Combray, which was, moreover, connected with all the n.o.bility in the district. Such were the ostensible reasons which the three confederates put forth, their real reason was only a question of money. They imagined that Mme. Acquet had the free disposal of the treasure buried at the Buquets, which amounted to more than 40,000 francs. Finding her ready to rejoin Le Chevalier, and persuaded that she would carry the remainder of this stolen money to her lover, they thought it well to stop her and the money, to which they believed they had a right--Lemarchand as Allain's friend and creditor, Placene in his capacity of cas.h.i.+er to the Chouans. The lawyer Vannier, as liquidator of Le Chevalier's debts, had offered to keep Mme. Acquet prisoner until they had succeeded in extorting the whole sum from her.

The life led by the unhappy woman at Vannier's, where she was a prey to this trio of scoundrels, was a purgatory of humiliations and misery.

When the lawyer understood that not only did his prisoner not possess a single sou, but that she could not dispose of the Buquets' treasure, he flew into a violent pa.s.sion and plainly threatened to give her up to the police; he even reproached her "for what she eat," swearing that somehow or other "he would make her pay board, for he certainly was not going to feed her free of cost." The unhappy woman, who had spent her last louis in paying for the seat in the Rouen diligence, which she had not occupied, wrote to Lefebre early in September, begging him to send her a little money. He had received a large share of the plunder and might at least have shown himself generous; but he replied coolly that he could do nothing for her; and that she had better apply to Joseph Buquet.

This was exactly what they wished her to do. Vannier himself brutally advised her to try going to Donnay, even at the risk of being arrested, in order to bring back some money from there; and Lemarchand, rather than lose sight of her, resolved to accompany her.

Mme. Acquet, worn out and reduced to a state of subjection, consented to everything that was demanded of her. Dressed as a beggar, she took the road to Donnay where formerly she had ruled as sovereign mistress; she saw again the long avenues at the end of which the facade of the chateau, imposing still despite its decay, commanded a view of the three terraces of the park; she walked along by the walls to reach the Buquets' cottage where Joseph, who was hiding in the neighbouring woods, occasionally returned to watch over his treasure. She surprised him there on this particular day, and implored him to come to her a.s.sistance but the peasant was inflexible; she obtained, however, the sum of one hundred and fifty francs, which he counted out to her in twelve-sou pieces and copper money. On the evening of her return to Caen Mme.

Acquet faithfully made over the money to Vannier, reserving only fifteen francs for her trouble; moreover, she was obliged to submit to her host's obscene allusions as to the means she had employed to extort this ridiculous sum from Buquet. She bore everything unmoved; her indifference resembled stupefaction; she no longer appeared conscious of the horrors of her situation or the dangers to which she was exposed.

Her happiest days were spent in walks round the town with Chauvel with whom she arranged meetings and who used to come from Falaise to pa.s.s a few hours with her; they went to a neighbouring village, dined there, and returned to the town at dusk.

Allain, too, showed some interest in her. He was hiding in the neighbourhood of Caen, and sometimes came in the evening to confer with Vannier in company with Bureau de Placene and a lawyer named Robert Langelley with whom her host had business dealings. They were all equally needed, and spent their time in planning means to make Joseph Buquet disgorge. Allain proposed only one plan, and it was adopted. Mme.

Acquet was to go to Donnay again and try to soften the peasant; if he refused to show where the money was hidden, Allain was to spring on him and strangle him.

They set out from Caen one morning, about the 25th of September. Mme.

Acquet had arranged to meet Joseph at the house of a farmer named Halbout, which was situated at some distance from the village of Donnay.

He came at the appointed hour; but as he was approaching carefully, fearing an ambuscade, he caught sight of Allain hiding behind a hedge, and taking fright made off as fast as his legs could carry him.

They had to go back to Caen empty-handed and face the anger of Vannier, who accused his lodger of complicity with the Buquets to make their attempts miscarry. A fresh council was held, and this time Chauvel was admitted; he too, had a plan. This was that he and Mallet, one of his comrades, should go to Donnay in uniform; Langelley was to play the part of commissary of police. "They were to arrest Buquet on the part of the government; if he consented to say where the money was, he was to be given his liberty, and the address of a safe hiding-place; in case of his refusing, the police were to kill him, and they would then be free to draw up a report of contumacy."

The Marquise de Combray's daughter was present at these conferences, meek and resigned, her heart heavy at the thought that this wretched money would become the prey of these men who had had none of the trouble and who would have all the profit. Every day she sank deeper and deeper into this quagmire; the plots that were hatched there, the things she heard--for they showed no reserve before her--were horrible. As she represented 40,000 francs to these ruffians, she had to endure not only their brutal gallantries, but also their confidences. "Mme. Placene one day suggested the enforced disappearance of the baker Lerouge," says Bornet, as he was "very religious and a very good man," she was afraid that if he were arrested, "he would not consent to lie, and would ruin them all." Langelley specially feared the garrulity of Flierle and Lanoe, in prison at Caen, and he was trying to get them poisoned. He had already made an arrangement "with the chemist and the prison doctor, whom he had under his thumb," and he also knew a man who "for a small sum, would create a disturbance in the town, allow himself to be arrested and condemned to a few months' imprisonment, and would thus find a way of getting rid of these individuals." They also spoke of Acquet, who was still in jail at Caen. In everybody's opinion Mme.

Vannier was his mistress, and went to see him every day in his cell. He was supposed to be a government spy, and Placene pretended that Vannier received money from him to keep him informed of Mme. Acquet's doings.

Langelley, for his part, said that Placene was a rogue and that if "he had already got his share of the plunder, he received at least as much again from the police."

The poor woman who formed the pivot of these intrigues was not spared by her unworthy accomplices. Having in mind Joseph Buquet and Chauvel, they all suspected one another of having been her lovers. Vannier had thus made her pay for her hospitality; Langelley and the gendarme Mallet himself, had exacted the same price--accusations it was as impossible as it was useless to refute. She herself well knew her own abas.e.m.e.nt, and at times disgust seized her. On the evening of September 27th, she did not return to Vannier's; escaping from this h.e.l.l, she craved shelter from a lacemaker named Adelade Monderard, who lodged in the Rue du Han, and who was Langelley's mistress. The girl consented to take her in and gave her up one of the two rooms which formed her lodgings, and which were reached by a very dark staircase. It was a poor room under the roof, lighted by two small cas.e.m.e.nts, the furniture being of the shabbiest. Chauvel came to see her there the following day, and there it was that she learnt of the expected arrival of Captain Delaitre, sent by Mme. de Combray to save her, and secure her the means of going to England. Mme. Acquet manifested neither regret nor joy. She was astonished that her mother should think of her; but it seems that she did not attach great importance to this incident, which was to decide her fate. A single idea possessed her: how to find a retreat which would allow of her escaping from Vannier's hateful guardians.h.i.+p; and Langelley, who was very surprised at finding her at the lacemaker's, seeing her perplexity offered to escort her to a country house, about a league from the town, where his father lived. She set out with him that very evening; at the same hour the false Captain Delaitre left Rouen, and the ruse so cleverly planned by Licquet, put an end to Mme. Acquet's lamentable adventures.

Arriving at the Hotel du Pare on October 2d, "Captain" Delaitre went to the window of his room and saw a man hurrying down the street with a very small woman on his arm, very poorly dressed. From his walk he recognised Chauvel dressed as a bourgeois; the woman was Mme. Acquet.

The two men bowed, and Chauvel leaving his companion, went up to the Captain's room. "There were compliments, handshakes, the utmost confidence, as is usual between a soldier and a sailor." Chauvel explained that he had walked from Falaise that afternoon, and that in order to get off, he had pretended to his chiefs that private business took him to Bayonne. The false Delaitre immediately handed him Mme. de Combray's two letters which Chauvel read absently.

"Let us go down," he said; "the lady is near and awaits us."

They met her a few steps farther down the road in company with Langelley, whom Chauvel introduced to Delaitre. The latter immediately offered his arm to Mme. Acquet: Chauvel, Langelley and the "nephew Delaitre" followed at some distance. They pa.s.sed the bridge and walked along by the river under the trees of the great promenade, talking all the time. It was now quite dark.

Captain Delaitre "after having given Mme. Acquet her mother's compliments, informed her of the latter's intentions concerning her going to England or the isles." But the young woman flatly rejected the proposal; she was, she said, "quite safe with her friend's father, within reach of all her relations, and she would never consent to leave Caen, where she had numerous and devoted protectors." The Captain objected that this determination was all the more to be regretted since "the powerful personage who was interesting himself in the fate of his own people, demanded that she should have quitted France, before he began to seek Mme. de Combray's release." To which Mme. Acquet replied that she should never alter her decision.

The discussion lasted about half an hour. The Captain having mentioned a letter of Mme. de Combray's of which he was the bearer, Mme. Acquet turned to Langelley and asked him to escort her to an inn, where she might read it. They crossed the bridge following Langelley up the Rue de Vaucelles, and stopped at an inn situated about a hundred yards above the Hotel du Pare. Mme. Acquet and her companions entered the narrow pa.s.sage and went up-stairs to a room on the first floor, where they seated themselves at a table, and Langelley ordered wine and biscuits.

The young woman took the Marquise's letter from the Captain's hands; all those around her were silent and watched attentively. They noticed that "she changed colour at every line and sighed."

"When do you start?" she asked Delaitre, wiping her eyes.

"Very early to-morrow," he replied.

She heaved another great sigh and began to read again. She became very nervous, and seemed about to faint. When she had finished the letter, she questioned Delaitre anew.