The Girl Philippa

"I think you said over the telephone that you have had no word from Mr. Halkett?"

"Not a word, Sister Eila."

"Thank you."

CHAPTER XXVII

The journey back along the Ausone road was a slow and stifling one. Warner, walking on the left, led the donkey by the head; Philippa moved beside the basket cart on the right. In the cart sat the wounded Englishman, his bandaged head lying on Sister Eila's shoulder.

Through the heavy, suffocating cloud of dust, group after group of fugitives loomed up ahead, coming toward them, parting right and left to let the basket cart and the little, plodding donkey pass through. Sheep were driven aside for them; cattle swung out into the roadside ditches on either hand, halting there with stupid heads turned toward them while the basket cart took right of way.

Once, from the toiling procession behind them, distant shouts arose, and the ground began to quiver and shake; and Warner called out a sharp warning to Philippa and drew the donkey cart out among the dusty weeds of the ditch, while everywhere ahead of them people, cattle, vehicles, were being hurriedly turned out and crowded aside along the grassy roadside gullies.

Louder grew the clamour behind; heavier the jarring of the ground; a mounted gendarme – a maréchal de logis– appeared, alternately cantering and galloping his superb horse, and sweeping the crowds aside with vigorous gestures of his white-gloved hand.

Behind him trotted six more gendarmes, sabers sheathed, their single rank stretching the entire width of the road from ditch to ditch. And behind these, in a writhing storm of dust and flying gravel, came the field artillery on a swift, swinging trot, drivers erect in their saddles, képis strapped tight, sun-scorched faces sweating under masks of dust.

Tan-colored limbers, guns, caissons drawn by powerful, dust-whitened teams, rushed past thudding and clanking, escorted by galloping pelotons of artillerymen armed with saber and carbine, flanked by smart officers flashing all over cherry red and gold.

Battery after battery, with forges and wagons, passed; a fanion with trumpeters sped by; a squadron of remount cavalry in clearer blue jackets followed, then came two squadrons of galloping dragoon lancers, their steel helmets covered with brown holland slips, and the pennons streaming wildly from their lance heads. A gendarme or two galloped in the rear, mere ghosts in the driving dust. And the flying column had passed.

Sister Eila, covering Gray's mouth and nose with her grey-blue sleeve, bowed her head and closed her eyes while the storm of dust and pebbles lasted; then Warner nodded to Philippa, and between them they led out the donkey cart once more and pushed slowly ahead into the oncoming torrent of vehicles – cattle, men, women, and children.

It was nearly noon when they arrived at the Château des Oiseaux. A footman aided him to carry Gray upstairs to the room prepared for him.

"Are you all right?" asked Warner doubtfully.

Gray opened his haggard eyes.

"All right, thanks… May I have a little water, if it's not too much trouble – "

Sister Eila entered the room with a carafe and some lemons; and Warner withdrew.

In the hallway below he encountered Madame de Moidrey and Peggy Brooks in earnest consultation with the village physician – an old man crippled from 1870, and wearing the Legion and an empty sleeve.

Warner shook hands with Dr. Senlis and told him what he knew of Gray's condition. Sister Eila came down presently and everybody greeted her with a warmth which unmistakably revealed her status in Saïs.

Presently she went upstairs again with Dr. Senlis. Later the Countess went up. Peggy and Philippa had gone out to the south terrace where the reverberation of the cannonade was now continually shaking the windows, and where, beyond, Ausone, a dark band of smoke stretched like a rampart across the northern sky.

As Warner stood thinking, listening to the dull shock of the concussions rolling in toward them on the wind from the north, the footman, Vilmar, approached him.

"Pardon, Monsieur Warner, but there is a frightful type hanging about whom it seems impossible to drive away – "

"What!" said Warner angrily.

"Monsieur, I have hustled him from the terrace several times; I have summoned aid from my fellow domestics; the chauffeur, Vignier, chases him with frequency into the shrubbery; Maurice and the lad, Henri, pursue him with horsewhips – "

"Is it that voyou who is all over bandages?" demanded Warner incredulously.

"It is, Monsieur – "

Out of sheer contempt for the creature and for all his species, Warner had ordered him to be fed and turned loose. And here he was, back again, hanging around!

"Where is he?"

"He dodged into the shrubbery across the lawn."

The effontery of Asticot amazed Warner. With an impatient gesture he turned on his heel to traverse the lawn. And at the same moment Asticot emerged from the bushes bordering it.

His bruised and ratty eyes blinked nervously; his battered casquette de marlou was in his hand; his knees, and his teeth also, seemed inclined to smite together. Plainly, he was terrified; and when Warner walked swiftly toward him across the lawn, the creature uttered a sort of stifled squeak.

"Asticot," said Warner, in pleasant, even tones, "I told the servants to feed you and turn you loose. Also, I left word that I'd kill you the next time I caught you hanging around here. Did they give you that message?"

"M-m'sieu' – "

"Did they?"

"Alas!"

"Then why are you still prowling in this vicinity? Do you want to be killed?"

A suppressed howl escaped the bandaged ruffian.

"I do not desire to go away from M'sieu'! No! I desire to remain under his powerful protection – "

"What!"

"I desire to serve M'sieu' – to dedicate my life to the service of M'sieu', my patron, powerful and terrible. I have need to render him homage – I, Asticot, grateful and affectionate – " He blubbered sentimentally, squirming like a kicked and abject dog.

Warner, astonished, stared at the writhing ruffian for a few moments, then he burst into a laugh.

"Why, you Parisian sewer rat," he said, "do you imagine that I could have any use for you?"

"M'sieu'! I ask as wages only a crust, a pallet of straw in some corner, and a few pennies which will enable me to 'fry a cigarette' when I am lonely – "

"I don't want you!" repeated Warner, disgusted, but much amused. "Why do you imagine that I have any employment to offer a cutthroat?"

"There is le Père Wildresse," replied Asticot, naïvely.

"Do you imagine I expect to hire somebody to murder him?"

"M'sieu' – it is but natural."

Warner's laughter died out and his expression altered.

"Come, Asticot, cut away," he said quietly, "or I shall become angry!"

"M'sieu'! Don't drive me away!" he whined. "I know how to wash brushes in black soap – "