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

a traitor but as an unit of an undesirable herd of criminals sent up to Paris for trial, by an anxious and harried proconsul. There! there!” he added benignly, “we will not worry our fair Yvonne any longer, will we, citizen? I think she has grasped the alternative and will soon realise that marriage with an honourable patriot is not such an untoward fate after all.”

“And now, citizen Martin-Roget,” he concluded, “I pray you allow me to take my leave of the fair lady and to give you the wise recommendation to do likewise. She will be far better alone for awhile. Night brings good counsel, so they say.”

He watched the girl keenly while he spoke. Her impassivity had not deserted her for a single moment: but whether her calmness was of hope or of despair he was unable to decide. On the whole he thought it must be the latter: hope would have kindled a spark in those dark, purple-rimmed eyes, it would have brought moisture to the lips, a tremor to the hand.

The Scarlet Pimpernel was in Nantes⁠—that fact was established beyond a doubt⁠—but Chauvelin had come to the conclusion that so far as Yvonne Dewhurst herself was concerned, she knew nothing of the mysterious agencies that were working on her behalf.

Chauvelin’s hand closed with a nervous contraction over the packet of papers in his pocket. Something of the secret of that enigmatic English adventurer lay revealed within its folds. Chauvelin had not yet had the opportunity of examining them: the interview with Yvonne had been the most important business for the moment.

From somewhere in the distance a city clock struck six. The afternoon was wearing on. The keenest brain in Europe was on the watch to drag one woman and one man from the deadly trap which had been so successfully set for them. A few hours more and Chauvelin in his turn would be pitting his wits against the resources of that intricate brain, and he felt like a warhorse scenting blood and battle. He was aching to get to work⁠—aching to form his plans⁠—to lay his snares⁠—to dispose his trap so that the noble English quarry should not fail to be caught within its meshes.

He gave a last look to Yvonne, who was still sitting quite impassive, gazing through the squalid walls into some beautiful distance, the reflection of which gave to her pale, wan face an added beauty.

“Let us go, citizen Martin-Roget,” he said peremptorily. “There is nothing else that we can do here.”

And Martin-Roget, the weaker morally of the two, yielded to the stronger personality of his colleague. He would have liked to stay on for awhile, to gloat for a few moments longer over the helplessness of the woman who to him represented the root of every evil which had ever befallen him and his family. But Chauvelin commanded and he felt impelled to obey. He gave one long, last look on Yvonne⁠—a look that was as full of triumph as of mockery⁠—he looked round the four dank walls, the unglazed window, the broken pitcher, the mouldy bread. Revenge was of a truth the sweetest emotion of the human heart. Pierre Adet⁠—son of the miller who had been hanged by orders of the Duc de Kernogan for a crime which he had never committed⁠—would not at this moment have changed places with Fortune’s Benjamin.

IV

Downstairs in Louise Adet’s kitchen, Martin-Roget seized his colleague by the arm.

“Sit down a moment, citizen,” he said persuasively, “and tell me what you think of it all.”

Chauvelin sat down at the other’s invitation. All his movements were slow, deliberate, perfectly calm.

“I think,” he said drily, “as far as your marriage with the wench is concerned, that you are beaten, my friend.”

“Tshaw!” The exclamation, raucous and surcharged with hate came from Louise Adet. She, too, like Pierre⁠—more so than Pierre mayhap⁠—had cause to hate the Kernogans. She, too, like Pierre had lived the last three days in the full enjoyment of the thought that Fate and Chance were about to level things at last between herself and those detested aristos. Silent and sullen she was shuffling about in the room, among her pots and pans, but she kept an eye upon her brother’s movements and an ear on what he said. Men were apt to lose grit where a pretty wench was concerned. It takes a woman’s rancour and a woman’s determination to carry a scheme of vengeance against another to a successful end.

Martin-Roget rejoined more calmly:

“I knew that she would still be obstinate,” he said. “If I forced her into a marriage, which I have the right to do, she might take her own life and make me look a fool. So I don’t want to do that. I believe in the persuasiveness of the Rat Mort tonight,” he added with a cynical laugh, “and if that fails.⁠ ⁠… Well! I was never really in love with the fair Yvonne, and now she has even ceased to be desirable.⁠ ⁠… If the Rat Mort fails to act on her sensibilities as I would wish, I can easily console myself by following Carrier’s herd to Paris. Louise shall come with me⁠—eh, little sister?⁠—and we’ll give ourselves the satisfaction of seeing M. le duc de Kernogan and his exquisite daughter stand in the felon’s dock⁠—tried for malpractices and for evil living. We’ll see them branded as convicts and packed off like so much cattle to Cayenne. That will be a sight,” he concluded with a deep sigh of satisfaction, “which will bring rest to my soul.”

He paused: his face looked sullen and evil under the domination of that passion which tortured him.

Louise Adet had shuffled up close to her brother. In one hand she held the wooden spoon wherewith she had been stirring the soup: with the other she brushed away the dark, lank hair which hung in strands over her high, pale forehead. In appearance she was a woman immeasurably older than her years. Her face had