Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (1761 page)

“Impossible ! “ said one of the women. “ What are
our
lives — - the
 
lives of two poor nuns — - in comparison with
yours
; in comparison with the life of a priest ? “
 
“ Here, father, “ said the old nun who had just returned ; “ here are the consecrated wafers of which you sent me in search. “ She handed him the box which she had received from the pastrycook.

“Hark ! “ cried the other nun ; “ I hear footsteps coming up stairs. “
 
They all listened intently. The noise of footsteps ceased.

“Do not alarm yourselves, “ said the priest. “ Whatever happens, I have already engaged a person on whose fidelity we can depend, to escort you in safety over the frontier ; to rescue you from the martyrdom which the ferocious will of Robespierre and his coadjutors of the Reign of Terror would decree against every servant of the church. “

“Do
you
not mean to accompany us ? “ asked the two nuns, affrightedly.

“
My
place, sisters, is with the martyrs — - not with the saved, “ said the old priest, calmly.

“Hark ! the steps on the staircase ! — - the heavy steps we heard before ! “ cried the women.

This time it was easy to distinguish, in the midst of the silence of night, the echoing sound of footsteps on the stone stairs. The nuns, as they heard it approach nearer and nearer, forced the priest into a recess at one end of the room, closed the door, and hurriedly heaped some old clothes against it. The moment after, they were startled by three dis- tinct knocks at the outer door.

The person who demanded admittance appeared to interpret the terrified silence which had seized the nuns on hearing his knock, into a signal to enter. He opened the door himself, and the affrighted women immediately recognised him as the man whom they had detected watch- ing the house — - the spy who had watched one of them through the streets that night.

The stranger was tall and robust, but there was nothing in his features or general appearance to denote that he was a dangerous man. Without attempting to break the silence, he slowly looked round the room. Two bundles of straw, strewn upon boards, served as a bed for the two nuns. In the centre of the room was a table, on which were placed a copper candlestick, some plates, three knives, and a loaf of bread. There was but a small fire in the grate, and the scanty supply of wood piled near it, plainly showed the poverty of the inmates. The old walls, which at some distant period had been painted, indicated the miserable state of the roof, by the patches of brown streaked across them by the rain, which had filtered drop by drop through the ceiling. A sacred relic, saved probably from the pillage of the convent to which the two nuns and the priest had been attached, was placed on the chimney-piece. Three chairs, two boxes, and an old chest-of-drawers completed the furniture of the apartment.

At one corner near the mantel-shelf, a door had been constructed which indicated that there was a second room in that direction.

An expression of pity appeared on the countenance of the stranger, as his eyes fell on the two nuns, after having surveyed their wretched apartment. He was the first to break the strange silence that had hitherto prevailed, by addressing the two poor creatures before him in such tones of kindness as were best adapted to the nervous terror under which they were evidently suffering.
 

“Citizens ! “ he began, “ I do not come to you as an enemy. “
 
He stopped for a moment, and then continued — - “ If any misfortune has befallen you, rest assured that I am not the cause of it. My only object here is to ask a great favour of you. “

The nuns still kept silence.

“If my presence causes you any anxiety, “ he went on, “ tell me so at once, and I will depart ; but believe me, I am really devoted to your interests ; and if there is anything in which I can befriend you, you may confide in me without fear. I am, perhaps, the only man in Paris whom the law cannot assail, now that the Kings of France are no more.

There was such a tone of sincerity in these words, as he spoke them, that Sister Agatha (the nun to whom the reader was introduced at the outset of this narrative, and whose manners exhibited all the court refinement of the old school) instinctively pointed to one of the chairs, as if to request the stranger to be seated. His expression showed a mixture of satisfaction and melancholy, as he acknowledged this little attention, of which he did not take advantage until the nuns had first seated themselves.

“You have given an asylum here, “ continued he, “ to a venerable priest, who has miraculously escaped from massacre at a Carmelite convent.

“Are you the person, “ asked Sister Agatha, eagerly, “ appointed to protect our flight from — - ? “

“I am not the person whom you expected to see, “ he replied calmly.

“I assure you, sir, “ interrupted the other nun, anxiously, “ that we have no priest here ; we have not, indeed. “

“You had better be a little more careful about appearances on a future occasion, “ he replied gently, taking from the table a Latin breviary. “ May I ask if you are both in the habit of reading the Latin language ? “ he inquired, with a slight inflexion of sarcasm in his voice.

No answer was returned. Observing the anguish depicted on the countenance of the nuns, the trembling of their limbs, the tears that filled their eyes, the stranger began to fear that he had gone too far.

“Compose yourselves, “ he continued, frankly. “ For three days I have been acquainted with the state of distress in which you are living. I know your names, and the name of the venerable priest whom you are concealing. It is — - “

“Hush ! do not speak it, “ cried Sister Agatha, placing her finger on her lips.

“I have now said enough, “ he went on, “ to show that if I had con- ceived the base design of betraying you, I could have accomplished my object before now. “

On the utterance of these words, the priest, who had heard all that had passed, left his hiding-place, and appeared in the room.

“I cannot believe, sir, “ said he, “ that you are leagued with my per- secutors ; and I therefore willingly confide in you. What do you require of me ? “

The noble confidence of the priest — - the saint-like purity expressed in his features — - must have struck even an assassin with respect. The mysterious personage who had intruded on the scene of misery and resignation which the garret presented, looked silently for a moment on the three beings before him, and then, in tones of secrecy, thus addressed the priest : — -

“Father, I am come to entreat you to celebrate a mortuary mass for the repose of the soul of — - of a — - of a person whose life the laws once held sacred, but whose corpse will never rest in holy ground. “

An involuntary shudder seized the priest, as he guessed the hidden meaning in these words. The nuns, unable to imagine what person was indicated by the stranger, looked on him with equal curiosity and alarm.

“Your wish shall be granted, “ said the priest, in low, awe-struck tones. “ Return to this place at midnight, and you will find me ready to cele- brate the only funeral service which the church can offer in expiation of the crime to which I understand you to allude. “

The stranger trembled violently for a moment, then composed him- self, respectfully saluted the priest and the two nuns, and departed without uttering a word.

About two hours afterwards, a soft knock at the outer door announced the mysterious visitor’s return. He was admitted by Sister Agatha, who conducted him into the second apartment of their modest retreat, where everything had been prepared for the midnight mass. Near the fire-place the nuns had placed their old chest of drawers, the clumsy workmanship of which was concealed under a rich altar-cloth of green velvet. A large crucifix, formed of ivory and ebony, was hung against the bare plaster wall. Four small tapers, fixed by sealing-wax on the temporary altar, threw a faint and mysterious gleam over the crucifix, but hardly penetrated to any other part of the walls of the room. Thus almost exclusively confined to the sacred objects immediately above and around it, the glow from the tapers looked like a light falling from heaven itself on that unadorned and unpretending altar. The floor of the room was damp. The miserable roof, sloping on either side, was pierced with rents, through which the cold night air penetrated into the rooms. Nothing could be less magnificent, and yet nothing could be more truly solemn than the manner in which the preliminaries of the funeral ceremony had been arranged. A deep, dread silence, through which the slightest noise in the street could be heard, added to the dreary grandeur of the midnight scene — - a grandeur majestically ex- pressed by the contrast between the homeliness of the temporary church, and the solemnity of the service to which it was now devoted. On each side of the altar, the two aged women kneeling on the tiled floor, unmindful of its deadly dampness, were praying in concert with the priest, who, clothed in his sacerdotal robes, raised on high a golden chalice, adorned with precious stones, the most sacred of the few relics saved from the pillage of the Carmelite Convent.

The stranger, approaching after an interval, knelt reverently between the two nuns. As he looked up towards the crucifix, he saw, for the first time, that a piece of black crape was attached to it. On beholding this simple sign of mourning, terrible recollections appeared to be awakened within him ; the big drops of agony started thick and fast on his massive brow.

Gradually,as the four actors in this solemn scene still fervently prayed together, their souls began to sympathize the one with the other, Mending in one common feeling of religious awe. Awful, in truth, was the service in which they were now secretly engaged ! Beneath that mouldering roof, those four Christians were then interceding with Heaven for the soul of a martyred King of France ; performing, at the peril of their lives, in those days of anarchy and terror, a funeral service for that hapless Louis the Sixteenth, who died on the scaffold, who was buried without a coffin or a shroud ! It was, in them, the purest of all acts of devotion, — - the purest, from its disinterestedness, from its courageous fidelity. The last relics of the loyalty of France were collected in that poor room, enshrined in the prayers of a priest and two aged women. Perhaps, too, the dark spirit of the Revolution was present there as well, impersonated by the stranger, whose face, while he knelt before the altar, betrayed an expression of the most poignant remorse.

The most gorgeous mass ever celebrated in the gorgeous Cathedral of St. Peter, at Rome, could not have expressed the sincere feeling of prayer so nobly as it was now expressed, by those four persons, under that lowly roof !

There was one moment, during the progress of the service, at which the nuns detected that tears were trickling fast over the stranger’s cheeks. It was when the Pater Noster was said.

On the termination of the midnight mass, the priest made a sign to the two nuns, who immediately left the room. As soon as they were alone, he thus addressed the stranger: — -

“My son, if you have imbrued your hands in the blood of the mar- tyred King, confide in me, and in my sacred office. Repentance so deep and sincere as yours appears to be, may efface even the crime of regicide, in the eyes of God. “

“Holy father, “ replied the other, in trembling accents, “ no man is less guilty than I am of shedding the King’s blood. “

“I would fain believe you, “ answered the priest. He paused for a moment as he said this, looked stedfastly on the penitent man before him, and then continued : — -

“But remember, my son, you cannot be absolved of the crime of regicide, because you have not co-operated in it. Those who had the power of defending their King, and who, having that power, still left the sword in the scabbard, will be called to render a heavy account at the day of judgment, before the King of kings ; yes, a heavy and an awful account indeed ! for, in remaining passive, they became the invo- luntary accomplices of the worst of murders. “ “

“Do you think then, father, “ murmured the stranger, deeply abashed, “ that all indirect participations are visited with punishment ? Is the soldier guilty of the death of Louis who obeyed the order to guard the scaffold ?

The priest hesitated.

“I should be ashamed, “ continued the other, betraying by his ex- pression some satisfaction at the dilemma in which he had placed the old man — - “ I should be ashamed of offering you any pecuniary recom- pense for such a funeral service as you have celebrated. It is only possible to repay an act so noble by an offering which is priceless. Honour me by accepting this sacred relic. The day perhaps will come when you will understand its value. “