The Battle Of The Strong [A Romance of Two Kingdoms], Volume 4.
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Gilbert Parker >> The Battle Of The Strong [A Romance of Two Kingdoms], Volume 4.
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"Ah bah, she doesn't need rosemary wash for her hair!" said the
apprentice admiringly, looking down the street after Guida as she turned
into the Rue d'Egypte.
Perhaps it was a momentary sympathy for beauty in distress which made the
Master say, as he backed from the doorway with stealthy step:
"Gatd'en'ale, 'tis well she has enough to live on, and to provide for
what's to come!"
But if it was a note of humanity in the voice it passed quickly, for
presently, as he examined the bill for the funeral of the Sieur de
Mauprat, he said shrilly:
"Achocre, you've left out the extra satin for his pillow--you."
"There wasn't any extra satin," drawled the apprentice.
With a snarl the Master of Burials seized a pen and wrote in the account:
Item: To extra satin for pillow, three livres.
CHAPTER XXVIII
Guida's once blithe, rose-coloured face was pale as ivory, the mouth had
a look of deep sadness, and the step was slow; but the eye was clear and
steady, and her hair, brushed under the black crape of the bonnet as
smoothly as its nature would admit, gave to the broad brow a setting of
rare attraction and sombre nobility. It was not a face that knew inward
shame, but it carried a look that showed knowledge of life's cruelties
and a bitter sensitiveness to pain. Above all else it was fearless, and
it had no touch of the consciousness or the consequences of sin; it was
purity itself.
It alone should have proclaimed abroad her innocence, though she said no
word in testimony. To most people, however, her dauntless sincerity only
added to her crime and to the scandalous mystery. Yet her manner awed
some, while her silence held most back. The few who came to offer
sympathy, with curiousness in their eyes and as much inhumanity as pity
in their hearts, were turned back gently but firmly, more than once with
proud resentment.
So it chanced that soon only Maitresse Aimable came--she who asked no
questions, desired no secrets--and Dormy Jamais.
Dormy had of late haunted the precincts of the Place du Vier Prison,
and was the only person besides Maitresse Aimable whom Guida welcomed.
His tireless feet went clac-clac past her doorway, or halted by it,
or entered in when it pleased him. He was more a watch-dog than Biribi;
he fetched and carried; he was silent and sleepless--always sleepless.
It was as if some past misfortune had opened his eyes to the awful
bitterness of life, and they had never closed again.
The Chevalier had not been with her, for on the afternoon of the very day
her grandfather died, he had gone a secret voyage to St. Malo, to meet
the old solicitor of his family. He knew nothing of his friend's death
or of Guida's trouble. As for Carterette, Guida would not let her come
--for her own sake.
Nor did Maitre Ranulph visit her after the funeral of the Sieur de
Mauprat. The horror of the thing had struck him dumb, and his mind
was one confused mass of conflicting thoughts. There--there were the
terrifying facts before him; yet, with an obstinacy peculiar to him,
he still went on believing in her goodness and in her truth. Of the man
who had injured her he had no doubt, and his course was clear, in the
hour when he and Philip d'Avranche should meet. Meanwhile, from a spirit
of delicacy, avoiding the Place du Vier Prison, he visited Maitresse
Aimable, and from day to day learned all that happened to Guida. As of
old, without her knowledge, he did many things for her through the same
Maitresse Aimable. And it quickly came to be known in the island that
any one who spoke ill of Guida in his presence did so at no little risk.
At first there had been those who marked him as the wrongdoer, but
somehow that did not suit with the case, for it was clear he loved Guida
now as he had always done; and this the world knew, as it had known that
he would have married her all too gladly. Presently Detricand and Philip
were the only names mentioned, but at last, as by common consent, Philip
was settled upon, for such evidence as there was pointed that way. The
gossips set about to recall all that had happened when Philip was in
Jersey last. Here one came forward with a tittle of truth, and there
another with tattle of falsehood, and at last as wild a story was
fabricated as might be heard in a long day.
But in bitterness Guida kept her own counsel.
This day when she passed the undertaker's shop she had gone to visit the
grave of her grandfather. He had died without knowing the truth, and her
heart was hardened against him who had brought misery upon her. Reaching
the cottage in the Place du Vier Prison now, she took from a drawer the
letter Philip had written her on the day he first met the Comtesse
Chantavoine. She had received it a week ago. She read it through
slowly, shuddering a little once or twice. When she had finished,
she drew paper to her and began a reply.
The first crisis of her life was passed. She had met the shock of utter
disillusion; her own perfect honesty now fathomed the black dishonesty of
the man she had loved. Death had come with sorrow and unmerited shame.
But an innate greatness, a deep courage supported her. Out of her wrongs
and miseries now she made a path for her future, and in that path
Philip's foot should never be set. She had thought and thought, and had
come to her decision. In one month she had grown years older in mind.
Sorrow gave her knowledge, it threw her back on her native strength and
goodness. Rising above mere personal wrongs she grew to a larger sense
of womanhood, to a true understanding of her position and its needs. She
loved no longer, but Philip was her husband by the law, and even as she
had told him her whole mind and heart in the days of their courtship and
marriage, she would tell him her whole mind and heart now. Once more, to
satisfy the bond, to give full reasons for what she was about to do, she
would open her soul to her husband, and then no more! In all she wrote
she kept but two things back, her grandfather's death--and one other.
These matters belonged to herself alone.
No, Philip d'Avranche, [she wrote], your message came too late. All
that you might have said and done should have been said and done
long ago, in that past which I believe in no more. I will not ask
you why you acted as you did towards me. Words can alter nothing
now. Once I thought you true, and this letter you send would have
me still believe so. Do you then think so ill of my intelligence?
In the light of the past it may be you have reason, for you know
that I once believed in you! Think of it--believed in you!
How bad a man are you! In spite of all your promises; in spite of
the surrender of honest heart and life to you; in spite of truth and
every call of honour, you denied me--dared to deny me, at the very
time you wrote this letter.
For the hopes and honours of this world, you set aside, first by
secrecy, and then by falsehood, the helpless girl to whom you once
swore undying love. You, who knew the open book of her heart, you
threw it in the dust. "Of course there is no wife?" the Duc de
Bercy said to you before the States of Bercy. "Of course," you
answered. You told your lie without pity.
Were you blind that you did not see the consequences? Or did you
not feel the horror of your falsehood?--to play shuttlecock with a
woman's life, with the soul of your wife; for that is what your
conduct means. Did you not realise it, or were you so wicked that
you did not care? For I know that before you wrote me this letter,
and afterwards when you had been made prince, and heir to the duchy,
the Comtesse Chantavoine was openly named by the Duc de Bercy for
your wife.
Now read the truth. I understand all now. I am no longer the
thoughtless, believing girl whom you drew from her simple life to
give her so cruel a fate. Yesterday I was a child, to-day----Oh,
above all else, do you think I can ever forgive you for having
killed the faith, the joy of life that was in me! You have spoiled
for me for ever my rightful share of the joyous and the good. My
heart is sixty though my body is not twenty. How dared you rob me
of all that was my birthright, of all that was my life, and give me
nothing--nothing in return!
Do you remember how I begged you not to make me marry you; but you
urged me, and because I loved you and trusted you, I did? how I
entreated you not to make me marry you secretly, but you insisted,
and loving you, I did? how you promised you would leave me at the
altar and not see me till you came again to claim me openly for your
wife, and you broke that sacred promise? Do you remember--my
husband!
Do you remember that night in the garden when the wind came moaning
up from the sea? Do you remember how you took me in your arms, and
even while I listened to your tender and assuring words, in that
moment--ah, the hurt and the wrong and the shame of it! Afterwards
in the strange confusion, in my blind helplessness I tried to say,
"But he loved me," and I tried to forgive you. Perhaps in time I
might have made myself believe I did; for then I did not know you as
you are--and were; but understanding all now I feel that in that
hour I really ceased to love you; and when at last I knew you had
denied me, love was buried for ever.
Your worst torment is to come, mine has already been with me. When
my miseries first fell upon me, I thought that I must die. Why
should I live on--why should I not die? The sea was near, and it
buries deep. I thought of all the people that live on the great
earth, and I said to myself that the soul of one poor girl could not
count, that it could concern no one but myself. It was clear to me
--I must die and end all.
But there came to me a voice in the night which said: "Is thy life
thine own to give or to destroy?" It was clearer than my own
thinking. It told my heart that death by one's own hand meant
shame; and I saw then that to find rest I must drag unwilling feet
over the good name and memory of my dead loved ones. Then I
remembered my mother. If you had remembered her perhaps you would
have guarded the gift of my love and not have trampled it under your
feet--I remembered my mother, and so I live still.
I must go on alone, with naught of what makes life bearable; you
will keep climbing higher by your vanity, your strength, and your
deceit. But yet I know however high you climb you will never find
peace. You will remember me, and your spirit will seek in vain for
rest. You will not exist for me, you will not be even a memory; but
even against your will I shall always be part of you: of your brain,
of your heart, of your soul--the thought of me your torment in your
greatest hour. Your passion and your cowardice have lost me all;
and God will punish you, be sure of that.
There is little more to say. If it lies in my power I shall never
see you again while I live. And you will not wish it. Yes, in
spite of your eloquent letter lying here beside me, you do not wish
it, and it shall not be. I am not your wife save by the law; and
little have you cared for law! Little, too, would the law help you
in this now; for which you will rejoice. For the ease of your mind
I hasten to tell you why.
First let me inform you that none in this land knows me to be your
wife. Your letter to my grandfather never reached him, and to this
hour I have held my peace. The clergyman who married us is a
prisoner among the French, and the strong-box which held the
register of St. Michael's Church was stolen. The one other witness,
Mr. Shoreham, your lieutenant--as you tell me--went down with the
Araminta. So you are safe in your denial of me. For me, I would
endure all the tortures of the world rather than call you husband
ever again. I am firmly set to live my own life, in my own way,
with what strength God gives. At last I see beyond the Hedge.
Your course is clear. You cannot turn back now. You have gone too
far. Your new honours and titles were got at the last by a
falsehood. To acknowledge it would be ruin, for all the world knows
that Captain Philip d'Avranche of the King's navy is now the adopted
son of the Duc de Bercy. Surely the house of Bercy has cause for
joy, with an imbecile for the first in succession and a traitor for
the second!
I return the fifty pounds you sent me--you will not question why
....And so all ends. This is a last farewell between us.
Do you remember what you said to me on the Ecrehos? "If ever I
deceive you, may I die a black, dishonourable death, abandoned and
alone. I should deserve that if ever I deceived you, Guida."
Will you ever think of that, in your vain glory hereafter?
GUIDA LANDRESSE DE LANDRESSE.
IN JERSEY FIVE YEARS LATER
CHAPTER XXIX
On a map the Isle of Jersey has the shape and form of a tiger on the
prowl.
The fore-claws of this tiger are the lacerating pinnacles of the Corbiere
and the impaling rocks of Portelet Bay and Noirmont; the hind-claws are
the devastating diorite reefs of La Motte and the Banc des Violets. The
head and neck, terrible and beautiful, are stretched out towards the
west, as it were to scan the wild waste and jungle of the Atlantic seas.
The nose is L'Etacq, the forehead Grosnez, the ear Plemont, the mouth the
dark cavern by L'Etacq, and the teeth are the serried ledges of the Foret
de la Brequette. At a discreet distance from the head and the tail hover
the jackals of La Manche: the Paternosters, the Dirouilles, and the
Ecrehos, themselves destroying where they may, or filching the remains of
the tiger's feast of shipwreck and ruin. In truth, the sleek beast, with
its feet planted in fearsome rocks and tides, and its ravening head set
to defy the onslaught of the main, might, but for its ensnaring beauty,
seem some monstrous foot-pad of the deep.
To this day the tiger's head is the lonely part of Jersey; a hundred
years ago it was as distant from the Vier Marchi as is Penzance from
Covent Garden. It would almost seem as if the people of Jersey, like the
hangers-on of the king of the jungle, care not to approach too near the
devourer's head. Even now there is but a dwelling here and there upon
the lofty plateau, and none at all near the dark and menacing headland.
But as if the ancient Royal Court was determined to prove its sovereignty
even over the tiger's head, it stretched out its arms from the Vier
Marchi to the bare neck of the beast, putting upon it a belt of defensive
war; at the nape, a martello tower and barracks; underneath, two other
martello towers like the teeth of a buckle.
The rest of the island was bristling with armament. Tall platforms were
erected at almost speaking distance from each other, where sentinels kept
watch for French frigates or privateers. Redoubts and towers were within
musket-shot of each other, with watch-houses between, and at intervals
every able-bodied man in the country was obliged to leave his trade to
act as sentinel, or go into camp or barracks with the militia for months
at a time. British cruisers sailed the Channel: now a squadron under
Barrington, again under Bridport, hovered upon the coast, hoping that a
French fleet might venture near.
But little of this was to be seen in the western limits of the parish of
St. Ouen's. Plemont, Grosnez, L'Etacq, all that giant headland could
well take care of itself--the precipitous cliffs were their own defence.
A watch-house here and there sufficed. No one lived at L'Etacq, no one
at Grosnez; they were too bleak, too distant and solitary. There were no
houses, no huts.
If you had approached Plemont from Vinchelez-le-Haut, making for the sea,
you would have said that it also had no habitation. But when at last you
came to a hillock near Plemont point, looking to find nothing but sky and
sea and distant islands, suddenly at your very feet you saw a small stone
dwelling. Its door faced the west, looking towards the Isles of Guernsey
and Sark. Fronting the north was a window like an eye, ever watching the
tireless Paternosters. To the east was another tiny window like a deep
loop-hole or embrasure set towards the Dirouilles and the Ecrehos.
The hut had but one room, of moderate size, with a vast chimney. Between
the chimney and the western wall was a veille, which was both lounge and
bed. The eastern side was given over to a few well-polished kitchen
utensils, a churn, and a bread-trough. The floor was of mother earth
alone, but a strip of handmade carpet was laid down before the fireplace,
and there was another at the opposite end. There were also a table, a
spinning-wheel, and a shelf of books.
It was not the hut of a fisherman, though upon the wall opposite the
books there hung fishing-tackle, nets, and cords, while outside, on
staples driven in the jutting chimney, were some lobster-pots. Upon two
shelves were arranged a carpenter's and a cooper's tools, polished and in
good order. And yet you would have said that neither a cooper nor a
carpenter kept them in use. Everywhere there were signs of man's
handicraft as well as of woman's work, but upon all was the touch of a
woman. Moreover, apart from the tools there was no sign of a man's
presence in the hut. There was no coat hanging behind the door, no
sabots for the fields or oilskins for the sands, no pipe laid upon a
ledge, no fisherman's needle holding a calendar to the wall. Whatever
was the trade of the occupant, the tastes were above those of the
ordinary dweller in the land. That was to be seen in a print of
Raphael's "Madonna and Child" taking the place of the usual sampler upon
the walls of Jersey homes; in the old clock nicely bestowed between a
narrow cupboard and the tool shelves; in a few pieces of rare old china
and a gold-handled sword hanging above a huge, well-carved oak chair.
The chair relieved the room of anything like commonness, and somehow was
in sympathy with the simple surroundings, making for dignity and sweet
quiet. It was clear that only a woman could have arranged so perfectly
this room and all therein. It was also clear that no man lived here.
Looking in at the doorway of this hut on a certain autumn day of the year
1797, the first thing to strike your attention was a dog lying asleep on
the hearth. Then a suit of child's clothes on a chair before the fire of
vraic would have caught the eye. The only thing to distinguish this
particular child's dress from that of a thousand others in the island was
the fineness of the material. Every thread of it had been delicately and
firmly knitted, till it was like perfect soft blue cloth, relieved by a
little red silk ribbon at the collar.
The hut contained as well a child's chair, just so high that when placed
by the windows commanding the Paternosters its occupant might see the
waves, like panthers, beating white paws against the ragged granite
pinnacles; the currents writhing below at the foot of the cliffs, or at
half-tide rushing up to cover the sands of the Greve aux Langons, and
like animals in pain, howling through the caverns in the cliffs; the
great nor'wester of November come battering the rocks, shrieking to the
witches who boiled their caldrons by the ruins of Grosnez Castle that the
hunt of the seas was up.
Just high enough was the little chair that of a certain day in the year
its owner might look out and see mystic fires burning round the
Paternosters, and lighting up the sea with awful radiance. Scarce a rock
to be seen from the hut but had some legend like this: the burning
Russian ship at the Paternosters, the fleet of boats with tall prows and
long oars drifting upon the Dirouilles and going down to the cry of the
Crusaders' Dahindahin! the Roche des Femmes at the Ecrehos, where still
you may hear the cries of women in terror of the engulfing sea.
On this particular day, if you had entered the hut, no one would have
welcomed you; but had you tired of waiting, and followed the indentations
of the coast for a mile or more by a deep bay under tall cliffs, you
would have seen a woman and a child coming quickly up the sands. Slung
upon the woman's shoulders was a small fisherman's basket. The child ran
before, eager to climb the hill and take the homeward path.
A man above was watching them. He had ridden along the cliff, had seen
the woman in her boat making for the shore, had tethered his horse in the
quarries near by, and now awaited her. He chuckled as she came on, for
he had ready a surprise for her. To make it more complete he hid himself
behind some boulders, and as she reached the top sprang out with an ugly
grinning.
The woman looked at him calmly and waited for him to speak. There was no
fear on her face, not even surprise; nothing but steady inquiry and quiet
self-possession. With an air of bluster the man said:
"Aha, my lady, I'm nearer than you thought--me!" The child drew in to
its mother's side and clasped her hand. There was no fear in the little
fellow's look, however; he had something of the same self-possession as
the woman, and his eyes were like hers, clear, unwavering, and with a
frankness that consumed you. They were wells of sincerity; open-eyed,
you would have called the child, wanting a more subtle description.
"I'm not to be fooled-me! Come now, let's have the count," said the man,
as he whipped a greasy leather-covered book from his pocket. "Sapristi,
I'm waiting. Stay yourself!" he added roughly as she moved on, and his
greyish-yellow face had an evil joy at thought of the brutal work in
hand.
"Who are you?" she asked, but taking her time to speak.
"Dame! you know who I am."
"I know what you are," she answered quietly.
He did not quite grasp her meaning, but the tone sounded contemptuous,
and that sorted little with his self-importance.
"I'm the Seigneur's bailiff--that's who I am. Gad'rabotin, don't you put
on airs with me! I'm for the tribute, so off with the bag and let's see
your catch."
"I have never yet paid tribute to the seigneur of the manor."
"Well, you'll begin now. I'm the new bailiff, and if you don't pay your
tale, up you come to the court of the fief to-morrow."
She looked him clearly in the eyes. "If I were a man, I should not pay
the tribute, and I should go to the court of the fief to-morrow, but
being a woman--"
She clasped the hand of the child tightly to her for an instant, then
with a sigh she took the basket from her shoulders and, opening it,
added:
"But being a woman, the fish I caught in the sea that belongs to God and
to all men I must divide with the Seigneur whose bailiff spies on poor
fisher-folk."
The man growled an oath and made a motion as though he would catch her by
the shoulder in anger, but the look in her eyes stopped him. Counting
out the fish, and giving him three out of the eight she had caught, she
said:
"It matters not so much to me, but there are others poorer than I, they
suffer."
With a leer the fellow stooped, and, taking up the fish, put them in the
pockets of his queminzolle, all slimy from the sea as they were.
"Ba su, you haven't got much to take care of, have you? It don't take
much to feed two mouths--not so much as it does three, Ma'm'selle."
Before he had ended, the woman, without reply to the insult, took the
child by the hand and moved along her homeward path towards Plemont.
"A bi'tot, good-bye!" the bailiff laughed brutally. Standing with his
legs apart and his hands fastened on the fish in the pockets of his long
queminzolle, he called after her in sneering comment: "Ma fistre, your
pride didn't fall--ba su!" Then he turned on his heel.
"Eh ben, here's mackerel for supper," he added as he mounted his horse.
The woman was Guida Landresse, the child was her child, and they lived in
the little house upon the cliff at Plemont. They were hastening thither
now.
CHAPTER XXX
A visitor was awaiting Guida and the child: a man who, first knocking at
the door, then looking in and seeing the room empty, save for the dog
lying asleep by the fire, had turned slowly away, and going to the cliff
edge, looked out over the sea. His movements were deliberate, his body
moved slowly; the whole appearance was of great strength and nervous
power. The face was preoccupied, the eyes were watchful, dark,
penetrating. They seemed not only to watch but to weigh, to meditate,
even to listen--as it were, to do the duty of all the senses at once.
In them worked the whole forces of his nature; they were crucibles
wherein every thought and emotion were fused. The jaw was set and
strong, yet it was not hard. The face contradicted itself. While not
gloomy it had lines like scars telling of past wounds. It was not
despairing, it was not morbid, and it was not resentful; it had the look
of one both credulous and indomitable. Belief was stamped upon it; not
expectation or ambition, but faith and fidelity. You would have said he
was a man of one set idea, though the head had a breadth sorting little
with narrowness of purpose. The body was too healthy to belong to a
fanatic, too powerful to be that of a dreamer alone, too firm for other
than a man of action.
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