The Launching of Roger Brook (68 page)

As the coach careered swiftly down the street, leaving M. de Rochambeau’s people behind, Roger strove to readjust his thoughts. He did not doubt that Athénaïs still loved him, yet he knew that she had been right beyond all question to accept the Vicomte’s proposal that they should elope.

‘’Twas a marvellous impulse,’ he said quickly. ‘Since for both of you it means all that offered a few months back, before any of us gave a thought to de Caylus. But what led you to conceive it?’

‘We are debtors there again,’ replied the Vicomte. ‘’Twas born of the converse I had with you when we were returning from the fight. You told me that Athénaïs would be happy to have me as a husband, while concealing nothing of your own relations with her. After you had left me I realised for the first time how she felt and how I stood. ‘Twas but a jump then to the thought of snatching her from her father’s vengeance.’

‘You owe me nothing,’ Roger demurred. ‘The swift and audacious decision was entirely yours. It needed courage, too, seeing that you can have had no time to make any preparations and M. de Rochambeau may yet pursue you.’

‘Nay, I doubt that,’ Athénaïs chimed in. ‘’Tis no small part of the genius of M. le Vicomte’s stroke that it will muddy the waters of the affair. By carrying me off he protects me from the scandal to which I would otherwise have been subject on your account. Since he accompanied you to the encounter before eloping with me, ‘twill now be said that you plotted the whole business together. People will believe that ’twas out of friendship for him that you killed de Caylus, and not from love of me. And my father is no fool. He’ll not let his anger against me deprive him of this chance to save the family honour.’

Roger felt that her reasoning was sound. For her father to catch her if he could, and drag her back to throw her into a convent, would be as good as an admission that any rumours de Caylus’s servants might spread about the cause of the duel were true; whereas a runaway match with a noble of de la Tour d’Auvergne’s quality would give the whole matter an acceptably romantic twist, and save her reputation.

‘I think you’re right,’ he said, after a moment, ‘but none the less, if M. le Vicomte is to be saddled with such full complicity in the slaying of de Caylus, ’tis more than ever important that you should use the utmost speed in reaching Brittany. Our good hackney coachman has served us well in carrying us clear of the Rue St. Honoré without trouble, but you must secure some far swifter vehicle with a minimum of delay.’

‘’Tis all arranged,’ the Vicomte announced. ‘As soon as I reached my lodging I gave instructions to Jacques about our journey. We are now on our way to a rendezvous with him at the Red Mill, up on Montmartre. While I took this hackney to the Hôtel de Rochambeau he was to pack for me, then engage a post-chaise with a team of six and be waiting for us there.’

‘Why at Montmartre?’ asked Roger. ’Tis to the north of Paris and the road to Brittany lies to the west.’

De la Tour d’Auvergne smiled in the darkness. ‘I promised our coachman a good reward to do as he was ordered without argument; but that will not stop his tongue wagging should he later be questioned by the police. If he thinks that we took the Amiens road it may fox them somewhat, for a few hours at least; and the detour to bring us round on to our true course is not considerable.’

‘’Twas well planned,’ Roger agreed. ‘But tell me now, how you succeeded in carrying Athénaïs off with so little fuss? I’d have thought that Madame Marie-Angé would have brought the whole Hôtel about your ears.’

Athénaïs laughed. ‘Poor Marie-Angé! We left her locked up in a toilette.’

‘’Twas amazingly simple,’ the Vicomte added. ‘By the time I reached the Hôtel ’twas near half-past eleven; but I sent up a message that I had urgent news for Athénaïs and by good fortune she had not yet retired. She received me with Madame Velot and, just as you had urged me to, I related all that had passed without reserve.’

‘’Tis cruel of me to laugh,’ Athénaïs took up the tale, ‘but ’twas vastly diverting, now that one can look back upon it. No sooner did Marie-Angé learn that for near a year past you and I had been carrying on a clandestine affair beneath her nose than she fainted dead away. Whether from shock to her sensibilities or from fear of what my father would say to her, I know not; but it gave M. le Vicomte the chance he was seeking to beg me to save myself and make him happy.’

‘And on Mademoiselle consenting to entrust herself to me, I carried her duenna to the closet and locked her in,’ de la Tour d’Auvergne went on. ‘’Twas an anxious ten minutes while my newly-betrothed collected her jewels and a night-bag, but all went well. I feared, too, that on seeing her about to leave the house alone with me at night the servants would run to acquaint M. le Marquis with so unusual an occurrence, and that he would order them to detain us before we could reach the coach. But not a soul did we see; the hall was empty and we made our exit without anyone being aware of it.’

‘’Twas my unconscious good fortune to have cleared the way for you,’ Roger smiled. ‘The servants had all congregated in my office, and were striving to break down the door between it and M. le Marquis’s sanctum.’

‘But what in the world possessed you to return to the Hôtel. I thought you well upon the road to Le Havre or Calais.’

Roger felt a horrid qualm about deceiving his friends; but they knew nothing of the intricacies of international affairs and he doubted if he could persuade them that his betrayal of M. de Rochambeau was justified by the chance
it offered of preventing war. So he said a little hurriedly:

‘I returned to collect my money and some other things. But, alas! I accomplished neither. Though, fortunately, I took the precaution of putting ten
louis
in my pocket against an emergency before I left for the Bois de Meudon. On my return I became involved in a conference that M. le Marquis was holding, and ’twould have provoked the most awkward questions had I attempted to leave before ’twas over. The affair was not concluded till midnight: then, just as I was hoping to get away, Count Lucien came on the scene. He told his father everything and ’twas that which precipitated the riot that you heard.’

The coach had now dropped into a walking pace and as it mounted the steep hill toward Montmartre, Roger related the outcome of Count Lucien’s denunciation. He had hardly done when it breasted the rise and turned towards Clichy. A quarter of a mile farther on it pulled up in an open space beneath the shadow of the big red windmill that dominated the height. A figure appeared at the window and threw the coach door open. It was Jacques, who announced that he had the post-chaise there in readiness.

They got out and while Roger escorted Athénaïs over to the chaise the Vicomte paid off the hackney coachman liberally. The two friends then moved aside out of earshot of the servants.

‘How do you now intend to proceed?’ asked de la Tour d’Auvergne.

‘I shall make for Dieppe, since ’tis the nearest port to Paris,’ replied Roger.

‘’Tis a hundred miles and you will have to ride all night, unless you are to be passed by the couriers that will be despatched to close the ports against you. Count Lucien’s wound not having proved serious enough to keep him at Meudon has deprived us of the long start we thought was ours. By now he and his father may be at the Ministry of Police, and if M. de Crosne proves readily available warrants will be issued for our arrest within an hour or so.’

‘I know it,’ Roger agreed glumly. ‘And I have yet to find a horse to carry me the first stage of my journey.’

‘Jacques has brought my two mounts as well as his own. The best of the pair I used to take me to Meudon and back so he is not fit for much else tonight, but you are welcome to the other.’

‘A thousand thanks. I’ll not refuse your offer.

‘Allowing for only brief halts to change horses on the road, ’tis a twelve-hour ride. Do you think that after what you have already been through tonight you can keep the saddle for so long?’

‘’Tis that which gives me most concern,’ Roger agreed. ‘Could I but rest for a few hours before making a start I’d do it easily enough; but that is impossible.’

De la Tour d’Auvergne considered for a moment, then he said: ‘Why not come with us to Brittany? Once there you could hide for a while. My people would never betray you, and within a week or so I would find a trustworthy Captain to take you across to England.’

Roger was tempted to accept, but the imperative necessity of reaching London by the 3rd, or at latest, the 4th of September, and the additional danger that he would bring upon his friends by remaining with them, made him feel that he ought to gamble everything on attempting to get through on his own, and at once.

‘’Tis mighty generous of you,’ he said. ‘But for all our sakes ’tis best that we should separate. The main hue and cry will be after me. If M. de Crosne’s people pick up traces of me in my dash into Normandy ’tis unlikely that they will bother themselves so much about you. But if they learn that I am with you in the chaise they’ll concentrate on that. Then, if they catch us, Athénaïs, as well as we two, would be hauled back to Paris.’

‘There’s sense in that,’ the Vicomte nodded. ‘Yet I fear you may fall off your horse from fatigue on the last stage to Dieppe. Wait, though! I have it! I’ll order the chaise to take us to Mantes. ’Tis midway between your route and ours. Thus we shall leave no tidings of our passing to our pursuers on either of the roads they would expect us to take. On reaching there we will separate; but ’tis a good thirty miles and while we cover them you can rest yourself in the chaise. ’Twould give you a far better chance of reaching Dieppe without collapsing.’

Roger barely hesitated. If he did collapse and was forced to halt on the road it was certain that M. de Crosne’s couriers would pass him while he slept. His chances of getting safely across the Channel would then be enormously reduced as, by the time he reached the port, every Captain would have been warned to be on the look-out for him.

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘’twould not only give me a few hours free from exertion, but also reduce the distance I have to ride to seventy-five miles. I will gladly come with you as far as Mantes.’

As they turned towards the post-chaise Roger took a last look at Paris. Despite the lateness of the hour lights were still shining from many dormer windows and there was no sense of repose about that city of violent contrasts. Underneath the myriad roofs down there in the valley many hundreds of nobles and several thousand wealthy
bourgeois
would-be-nobles, clad in their rich silks and satins, with powdered hair, patches and quizzing-glasses, were gambling at innumerable tables or supping off the fat of the land with their latest mistresses; while five times their number of servants aped their ways yet hated and envied them; and fifty times their number of fellow human beings, overworked, underpaid, half-starved, were taking such rest as they could get in conditions of the utmost misery and squalor.

The moon emerging from behind a bank of scudding cloud silvered the uneven, close-packed ranks of gables and threw the open spaces up as blanks of deep shadow. Following the bend of the river Roger picked out the Ile de la Cité, the vast quadrangle made by the Palace and, beyond it, the empty blackness of the Tuileries’ gardens. It was there, before the trees shed their leaves many times again, that
Madame la Guillotine
would be set up to do her deadly work, striking down the innocent as well as the guilty with blind impartiality.

Had Georgina been present her strange gift might have enabled her to see its sinister shadow; but Roger was simply wondering whether he would ever see Paris again as a free man, or be brought back there within the next few days, as a manacled prisoner, to meet an infamous death upon the scaffold.

‘Come! ’Tis no time to dally,’ called de la Tour d’Auvergne; and, running over to the post-chaise, Roger scrambled in. Jacques was already mounted, and holding the bridles of the two lead horses. As Roger slammed the door of the carriage the postilion cracked his whip and they were off.

For a little while, as they drove between the scattered farms and windmills on the heights of Clichy, they talked;

but by the time they reached the village of Asnières they had fallen silent. All three of them were now feeling the reaction from the hours of strain and excitement through which they had passed, the post-road was broad and even, and the chaise a well-sprung one; its rhythmic rocking had a soporific effect on their over-wrought minds, and before they passed south of the bend in the Seine to the east of St. Germain they were asleep.

Two hours later they shook themselves awake and descended in the yard of the
Auberge du Grand Cerf
at Mantes. Such post-houses were well used to travellers with urgent business arriving at all hours, and the night ostlers had already run out to change the horses. The door of the inn was unbolted after a few moments by a sleepy serving man who had just pulled on his jacket. Lantern in hand, he invited them to enter and take a cup of wine while the chaise was being furnished with its relay.

De la Tour d’Auvergne pulled out his watch, glanced at it, and said: ‘’Tis barely half-past three, so we have made good time, and I confess to being plaguey hungry. We can well afford twenty minutes for a scratch meal before we take the road again. What say you to it?’

Athénaïs smiled as she took the arm he offered. ‘’Tis said that a wife’s first duty is to see her husband lacks not for his creature comforts, so I pray you, Monsieur, order what you will and I’ll encourage you by partaking of a few tid-bits.’

‘Whatever they can give us will be welcome,’ Roger supported her. ‘For I, too, am now remembering the fact that tonight I missed my supper.’

The serving man led them into the inn parlour; then produced part of a cold ham, bread, butter, cheese and two bottles of Coron. Although the night was not cold they ate and drank standing round the smouldering ashes of the fire, conscious that they dared not linger, yet finding little to say to one another now that the time for Roger to leave the others had so nearly come.

After the Vicomte had swallowed a few mouthfuls of the food and a single glass of wine he said to Athénaïs: ‘I have some further arrangements to make for our journey, Mademoiselle, so I pray you excuse me. I shall be away for some ten minutes.’