Lord Tony’s Wife, Baroness Orczy [bill gates best books TXT] 📗

the miller’s son,” replied the other curtly. “She is now the affianced wife of Martin-Roget the millionaire banker of Brest. Tonight I shall persuade M. le duc to allow my marriage with his daughter to take place within the week. I shall plead pressing business in Holland and my desire that my wife shall accompany me thither. The duke will consent and Yvonne de Kernogan will not be consulted. The day after my wedding I shall be on board the Hollandia with my wife and father-in-law, and together we will be on our way to Nantes where Carrier will deal with them both.”

“You are quite satisfied that this plan of yours is known to no one, that no one at the present moment is aware of the fact that Pierre Adet, the miller’s son, and Martin-Roget, banker of Brest, are one and the same?”

“Quite satisfied,” replied Martin-Roget emphatically.

“Very well, then, let me tell you this, citizen,” rejoined Chauvelin slowly and deliberately, “that in spite of what you say I am as convinced as that I am here, alive, that your real identity will be known⁠—if it is not known already⁠—to a gentleman who is at this present moment in Bath, and who is known to you, to me, to the whole of France as the Scarlet Pimpernel.”

Martin-Roget laughed and shrugged his shoulders.

“Impossible!” he retorted. “Pierre Adet no longer exists⁠ ⁠… he never existed⁠ ⁠… much.⁠ ⁠… Anyhow, he ceased to be on that stormy day in September, 1789. Unless your pet enemy is a wizard he cannot know.”

“There is nothing that my pet enemy⁠—as you call him⁠—cannot ferret out if he has a mind to. Beware of him, citizen Martin-Roget. Beware, I tell you.”

“How can I,” laughed the other contemptuously, “if I don’t know who he is?”

“If you did,” retorted Chauvelin, “it wouldn’t help you⁠ ⁠… much. But beware of every man you don’t know; beware of every stranger you meet; trust no one; above all, follow no one. He is there where you least expect him under a disguise you would scarcely dream of.”

“Tell me who he is then⁠—since you know him⁠—so that I may duly beware of him.”

“No,” rejoined Chauvelin with the same slow deliberation, “I will not tell you who he is. Knowledge in this case would be a very dangerous thing.”

“Dangerous? To whom?”

“To yourself probably. To me and to the Republic most undoubtedly. No! I will not tell you who the Scarlet Pimpernel is. But take my advice, citizen Martin-Roget,” he added emphatically, “go back to Paris or to Nantes and strive there to serve your country rather than run your head into a noose by meddling with things here in England, and running after your own schemes of revenge.”

“My own schemes of revenge!” exclaimed Martin-Roget with a hoarse cry that was like a snarl.⁠ ⁠… It seemed as if he wanted to say something more, but that the words choked him even before they reached his lips. The hot flush died down from his forehead and his face was once more the colour of lead. He took up a log from the corner of the hearth and threw it with a savage, defiant gesture into the fire.

Somewhere in the house a clock struck nine.

V

Martin-Roget waited until the last echo of the gong had died away, then he said very slowly and very quietly:

“Forgo my own schemes of revenge? Can you even remotely guess, citizen Chauvelin, what it would mean to a man of my temperament and of my calibre to give up that for which I have toiled and striven for the past four years? Think of what I was on that day when a conglomeration of adverse circumstances turned our proposed expedition against the château de Kernogan into a disaster for our village lads, and a triumph for the duc. I was knocked down and crushed all but to death by the wheels of Mlle. de Kernogan’s coach. I managed to crawl in the mud and the cold and the rain, on my hands and knees, hurt, bleeding, half dead, as far as the presbytery of Vertou where the curé kept me hidden at risk of his own life for two days until I was able to crawl farther away out of sight. The curé did not know, I did not know then of the devilish revenge which the duc de Kernogan meant to wreak against my father. The news reached me when it was all over and I had worked my way to Paris with the few sous in my pocket which that good curé had given me, earning bed and bread as I went along. I was an ignorant lout when I arrived in Paris. I had been one of the ci-devant Kernogan’s labourers⁠—his chattel, what?⁠—little better or somewhat worse off than a slave. There I heard that my father had been foully murdered⁠—hung for a crime which I was supposed to have committed, for which I had not even been tried. Then the change in me began. For four years I starved in a garret, toiling like a galley-slave with my hands and muscles by day and at my books by night. And what am I now? I have worked at books, at philosophy, at science: I am a man of education. I can talk and discuss with the best of those d⁠⸺⁠d aristos who flaunt their caprices and their mincing manners in the face of the outraged democracy of two continents. I speak English⁠—almost like a native⁠—and Danish and German too. I can quote English poets and criticise M. de Voltaire. I am an aristo, what? For this I have worked, citizen Chauvelin⁠—day and night⁠—oh! those nights! how I have slaved to make myself what I now am! And all for the one object⁠—the sole object without which existence would have been absolutely unendurable. That object guided me, helped me to bear and to toil, it cheered and comforted me! To be even one day with the duc de Kernogan and