The Companions of Jehu

The monk thus interpellated opened a closet and brought forth a bag somewhat smaller than the one Morgan had brought, but which, nevertheless, contained the good round sum of forty thousand francs.

“Here is the full amount,” said the monk.

“Now, my friend,” said the president, “get something to eat and some rest; to-morrow you will start.”

“They are waiting for me yonder,” said the Breton. “I will eat and sleep on horseback. Farewell, gentlemen. Heaven keep you!” And he went toward the door by which he had entered.

“Wait,” said Morgan.

The messenger paused.

“News for news,” said Morgan; “tell General Cadoudal that General Bonaparte has left the army in Egypt, that he landed at Fréjus, day before yesterday, and will be in Paris in three days. My news is fully worth yours, don’t you think so? What do you think of it?”

“Impossible!” exclaimed all the monks with one accord.

“Nevertheless nothing is more true, gentlemen. I have it from our friend the Priest (Leprêtre),[1 - The name Leprêtre is a contraction of the two words “le prêtre,” meaning the priest; hence the name under which this man died.] who saw him relay at Lyons one hour before me, and recognized him.”

“What has he come to France for?” demanded several voices.

“Faith,” said Morgan, “we shall know some day. It is probable that he has not returned to Paris to remain there incognito.”

“Don’t lose an instant in carrying this news to our brothers in the West,” said the president to the peasant. “A moment ago I wished to detain you; now I say to you: ‘Go!’”

The peasant bowed and withdrew. The president waited until the door was closed.

“Gentlemen,” said he, “the news which our brother Morgan has just imparted to us is so grave that I wish to propose a special measure.”

“What is it?” asked the Companions of Jehu with one voice.

“It is that one of us, chosen by lot, shall go to Paris and keep the rest informed, with the cipher agreed upon, of all that happens there.”

“Agreed!” they replied.

“In that case,” resumed the president, “let us write our thirteen names, each on a slip of paper. We put them in a hat. He whose name is first drawn shall start immediately.”

The young men, one and all, approached the table, and wrote their names on squares of paper which they rolled and dropped into a hat. The youngest was told to draw the lots. He drew one of the little rolls of paper and handed it to the president, who unfolded it.

“Morgan!” said he.

“What are my instructions?” asked the young man.

“Remember,” replied the president, with a solemnity to which the cloistral arches lent a supreme grandeur, “that you bear the name and title of Baron de Sainte-Hermine, that your father was guillotined on the Place de la Révolution and that your brother was killed in Condé’s army. Noblesse oblige! Those are your instructions.”

“And what else?” asked the young man.

“As to the rest,” said the president, “we rely on your royalist principles and your loyalty.”

“Then, my friends, permit me to bid you farewell at once. I would like to be on the road to Paris before dawn, and I must pay a visit before my departure.”

“Go!” said the president, opening his arms to Morgan. “I embrace you in the name of the Brotherhood. To another I should say, ‘Be brave, persevering and active’; to you I say, ‘Be prudent.’”

The young man received the fraternal embrace, smiled to his other friends, shook hands with two or three of them, wrapped himself in his mantle, pulled his hat over his eyes and departed.

CHAPTER IX. ROMEO AND JULIET

Under the possibility of immediate departure, Morgan’s horse, after being washed, rubbed down and dried, had been fed a double ration of oats and been resaddled and bridled. The young man had only to ask for it and spring upon its back. He was no sooner in the saddle than the gate opened as if by magic; the horse neighed and darted out swiftly, having forgotten its first trip, and ready for another.

At the gate of the Chartreuse, Morgan paused an instant, undecided whether to turn to the right or left. He finally turned to the right, followed the road which leads from Bourg to Seillon for a few moments, wheeled rapidly a second time to the right, cut across country, plunged into an angle of the forest which was on his way, reappeared before long on the other side, reached the main road to Pont-d’Ain, followed it for about a mile and a half, and halted near a group of houses now called the Maison des Gardes. One of these houses bore for sign a cluster of holly, which indicated one of those wayside halting places where the pedestrians quench their thirst, and rest for an instant to recover strength before continuing the long fatiguing voyage of life. Morgan stopped at the door, drew a pistol from its holster and rapped with the butt end as he had done at the Chartreuse. Only as, in all probability, the good folks at the humble tavern were far from being conspirators, the traveller was kept waiting longer than he had been at the monastery. At last he heard the echo of the stable boy’s clumsy sabots. The gate creaked, but the worthy man who opened it no sooner perceived the horseman with his drawn pistol than he instinctively tried to, close it again.

“It is I, Patout,” said the young man; “don’t be afraid.”

“Ah! sure enough,” said the peasant, “it is really you, Monsieur Charles. I’m not afraid now; but you know, as the curé used to tell us, in the days when there was a good God, ‘Caution is the mother of safety.’”

“Yes, Patout, yes,” said the young man, slipping a piece of silver into the stable boy’s hand, “but be easy; the good God will return, and M. le Curé also.”

“Oh, as for that,” said the good man, “it is easy to see that there is no one left on high by the way things go. Will this last much longer, M. Charles?”

“Patout, I promise, in my honor, to do my best to be rid of all that annoys you. I am no less impatient than you; so I’ll ask you not to go to bed, my good Patout.”

“Ah! You know well, monsieur, that when you come I don’t often go to bed. As for the horse – Goodness! You change them every day? The time before last it was a chestnut, the last time a dapple-gray, now a black one.”

“Yes, I’m somewhat capricious by nature. As to the horse, as you say, my dear Patout, he wants nothing. You need only remove his bridle; leave him saddled. Oh, wait; put this pistol back in the holsters and take care of these other two for me.” And the young man removed the two from his belt and handed them to the hostler.

“Well,” exclaimed the latter, laughing, “any more barkers?”

“You know, Patout, they say the roads are unsafe.”

“Ah! I should think they weren’t safe! We’re up to our necks in regular highway robberies, M. Charles. Why, no later than last week they stopped and robbed the diligence between Geneva and Bourg!”

“Indeed!” exclaimed Morgan; “and whom do they accuse of the robbery?”

“Oh, it’s such a farce! Just fancy; they say it was the Companions of Jesus. I don’t believe a word of it, of course. Who are the Companions of Jesus if not the twelve apostles?”

“Of course,” said Morgan, with his eternally joyous smile, “I don’t know of any others.”

“Well!” continued Patout, “to accuse the twelve apostles of robbing a diligence, that’s the limit. Oh! I tell you, M. Charles, we’re living in times when nobody respects anything.”

And shaking his head like a misanthrope, disgusted, if not with life, at least with men, Patout led the horse to the stable.

As for Morgan, he watched Patout till he saw him disappear down the courtyard and enter the dark stable; then, skirting the hedge which bordered the garden, he went toward a large clump of trees whose lofty tops were silhouetted against the darkness of the night, with the majesty of things immovable, the while their shadows fell upon a charming little country house known in the neighborhood as the Château des Noires-Fontaines. As Morgan reached the château wall, the hour chimed from the belfry of the village of Montagnac. The young man counted the strokes vibrating in the calm silent atmosphere of the autumn night. It was eleven o’clock. Many things, as we have seen, had happened during the last two hours.

Morgan advanced a few steps farther, examined the wall, apparently in search of a familiar spot, then, having found it, inserted the tip of his boot in a cleft between two stones. He sprang up like a man mounting a horse, seized the top of the wall with the left hand, and with a second spring seated himself astride the wall, from which, with the rapidity of lightning, he lowered himself on the other side. All this was done with such rapidity, such dexterity and agility, that any one chancing to pass at that instant would have thought himself the puppet of a vision. Morgan stopped, as on the other side of the wall, to listen, while his eyes tried to pierce the darkness made deeper by the foliage of poplars and aspens, and the heavy shadows of the little wood. All was silent and solitary. Morgan ventured on his path. We say ventured, because the young man, since nearing the Château des Noires-Fontaines, revealed in all his movement a timidity and hesitation so foreign to his character that it was evident that if he feared it was not for himself alone.

He gained the edge of the wood, still moving cautiously. Coming to a lawn, at the end of which was the little château, he paused. Then he examined the front of the house. Only one of the twelve windows which dotted the three floors was lighted. This was on the second floor at the corner of the house. A little balcony, covered with virgin vines which climbed the walls, twining themselves around the iron railing and falling thence in festoons from the window, overhung the garden. On both sides of the windows, close to the balcony, large-leafed trees met and formed above the cornice a bower of verdure. A Venetian blind, which was raised and lowered by cords, separated the balcony from the window, a separation which disappeared at will. It was through the interstices of this blind that Morgan had seen the light.

The young man’s first impulse was to cross the lawn in a straight line; but again, the fears of which we spoke restrained him. A path shaded by lindens skirted the wall and led to the house. He turned aside and entered its dark leafy covert. When he had reached the end of the path, he crossed, like a frightened doe, the open space which led to the house wall, and stood for a moment in the deep shadow of the house. Then, when he had reached the spot he had calculated upon, he clapped his hands three times.

At this call a shadow darted from the end of the apartment and clung, lithe, graceful, almost transparent, to the window.