Wounded Name — Chapter 3: In the Dust, part 2

(4) That night always seemed to Laurent like a bad dream, in which, however, he was only a spectator, not an actor.

There was nothing he could do, beyond attending to the fire; indeed, M. Perrelet told him that he might as well go to sleep.

But, though he lay down on the bed which had been brought in for him and placed at the other side of the room, he scarcely closed his eyes.

About dawn, seeing the surgeon, who had never left his patient's side, get up rather quickly and bend over him, he slipped off his bed and tiptoed across the room.

But after a moment M. Perrelet lifted his head from L'Oiseleur's heart, and Laurent, prepared for the worst, could see that he looked relieved.

"Distinctly stronger," he murmured.

"We shall do it yet.

Give me that saucepan off the fire.

I want some more hot bouillon and brandy."

His own face looked tired and haggard in the growing light, but there was no fatigue in his manner.

And after the brandy, his head still lying in the crook of the doctor's arm, L'Oiseleur sighed, shut his lips tight, and moved that head a little with a faint suggestion of restlessness.

"Go round and turn the pillow over," commanded M. Perrelet in a low voice.

Secretly terrified, Laurent obeyed.

He was persuaded that La Rocheterie would open his eyes just at that moment.

But the dark lashes were down now as if they meant to stay there for ever.

"That will do," said M. Perrelet.

"Go back to bed and try to get a little sleep.

You will be wanted in the day--for there will be a day for him now, I think."

About eight o'clock, indeed, M. Perrelet was so well satisfied with his patient's condition that he left the room for a little.

To Laurent's surprise he returned with Colonel Guitton.

The latter, taking no notice of Laurent, went straight over to La Rocheterie's bed with the doctor, and stood there in silence.

"You said that he was better," he remarked after a moment.

"He looks no better at all!"

The disappointment in his tone almost amounted to annoyance.

"I told you it would be slow," replied M. Perrelet rather shortly.

The Colonel stooped.

"I suppose he's not shamming by any chance?"

Laurent gave a movement.

So did M. Perrelet.

"Shamming!"

he exclaimed.

"Do you think I am a .

.

.

a greengrocer, Colonel?

And I wish you would feel his pulse, and tell me how a man can simulate one like that!"

Colonel Guitton gave a sort of laugh.

"You need not be so peppery, my dear Perrelet.

I did not mean to cast any slur on your professional acumen.

And, as to your patient, the charge of malingering would be a trifling one to bring against a man who has done what he has done.

--Let me have a report of his progress, please, twice a day without fail," he finished curtly, and, turning on his heel, came in Laurent's direction.

"So you have elected to stay here, Monsieur le Comte, and play the Good Samaritan?

Please remember that it is not my wish, and that when you change your mind you have only to ask to be moved."

Laurent had got the better of the strangling sensation which had afflicted him while the Bonapartist stood over Aymar de la Rocheterie (unhearing and unseeing though the latter was) and spoke of him like that.

He was on fire, but coherently so, and having decided in the night exactly what he meant to say, he said it.

The Colonel heard him out.

Then he shrugged his shoulders, remarked calmly, "Ah, a champion!

Well, Monsieur de Courtomer, I am sorry for you!"

and departed, M. Perrelet with him, leaving Laurent angry, dumbfounded, and thoroughly bewildered, not by his incredulity but by his inconsistency.

How, if he was so concerned for La Rocheterie's life, so anxious to hear of his progress, could he speak of him with such utter contempt?

If he had such an opinion of him why did he trouble to have him kept alive at all?

In M. Perrelet's case he could see that he really cared, and he was, besides, a doctor, but the Colonel .

.

.

Then M. Perrelet returned, looking rather grim, and Laurent was immediately called upon to assist at the dressing of the patient's wounds--his first experience of the kind.

Of this proceeding, indeed, L'Oiseleur himself betrayed little consciousness beyond moaning once or twice; but there was one matter of which Laurent, for his part, was even more acutely aware than of the injuries themselves.

Each of M. de la Rocheterie's wrists, now seen for the first time, was encircled by a neat little bandage.

After what the surgeon had said about ropes, it was not difficult to guess the reason for their presence, and it turned Laurent sick and cold.

What ignominy had he suffered in that horrible wood, he, a gentleman and a hero?

The rest of the slow day was not free from anxiety, but as it wore on La Rocheterie's condition certainly improved and he became conscious for increasingly longer intervals, till at last, by the end of the afternoon, he was lying most of the time with his eyes open, though he seemed quite unaware of Laurent's presence, possibly even of the doctor's. And when the night came which Laurent had been so dreading, he found that the responsibility for L'Oiseleur's life was not to rest entirely on his untried shoulders, since M. Perrelet was going to sleep in the château, not in his house in the village, and could be summoned at need by means of the sentry.

That was an immense relief.

And Laurent did not have to summon him.

The little flame of life, so anxiously tended, showed no flicker.

La Rocheterie was very quiet, much as he had been during the day.

Occasionally he would stir feebly or sigh; part of the time he seemed to be asleep.

But even when his eyes were open they rested on his candle-lit surroundings, on the screen which had now been placed at the side of the bed, or on the watcher, with the same absence of interest, and he took what was given him with a similar indifference.

Perhaps, drained of blood as he was, he had lost for the time his hold on realities.

And possibly, in the circumstances, this was as well.

But the human body seemed to the newly initiated student a terrifyingly frail machine.

What would Maman say if she could see M. de la Rocheterie now .

.

.

if she could have seen both of them, brought together like this!

Darling Maman!

.

.

.

and Laurent pondered at intervals, during that long night, whether his gaolers would let him send a letter to tell her that he was at least safe.

Too safe, he would have said, but for that helpless and calumniated head on the pillow there!

(5) At the conclusion of his vigil in the morning Laurent, heavy-eyed but relieved, was rewarded with praise.

A little later another milestone was passed: Aymar de la Rocheterie spoke for the first time.

Laurent had already pricked up his ears when he heard M. Perrelet, on the inner side of the screen, saying to him encouragingly, "Ah, now I am beginning to be pleased with you!"

And to this a voice--more a breath than a voice, and broken at that--said, slowly and with effort, "You are the doctor, Monsieur?

.

.

.

Where am I?"

"In the château of Arbelles," responded M. Perrelet, "where we are going to make you quite well again."

"How long .

.

."

"Since Monday evening.

This is Thursday morning."

"Arbelles," murmured the voice.

There was a pause; then it said, "But that Royalist officer .

.

.

here sometimes .

.

.

?"

"He is a prisoner like you, Monsieur," responded M. Perrelet.

There was a moment's silence, and then the wounded man said, "And it was the .

.

.

Bonapartists then who .

.

.

brought me here?"

To some sudden strand of anguish in the voice M. Perrelet replied soothingly, "Well, it does not much matter who brought you.

Yes, they found you unconscious.

Now you had better not talk any more.

I am going to do your dressings."

He was obeyed.

Indeed it was obviously as much as La Rocheterie could do to retain his hold on consciousness at all during the next half-hour.

But he made no shadow of protest or complaint, and when at last the business was over, he lay motionless again, with his eyes shut, just a little more nearly the hue of the sheets than before.

He seemed in fact to be in a drowse when M. Perrelet came back to the bedside with a towel and the bandage scissors in his hand.

"I meant to have cut off this long hair before," he remarked to Laurent, still on the farther side of the bed.

"He will be much more comfortable with it gone.

Curious colour!"

He touched a bronze ripple.

"You are going to cut it off!"

exclaimed Laurent in a low tone.

The intention seemed almost sacrilege.

The surgeon nodded.

"At least, you shall do it, while I hold his head up."

"Oh, but .

.

."

said Laurent, hesitatingly accepting the scissors, "perhaps he would not wish it.

.

.

.

Unless of course it is necessary.

.

.

."

"I don't know that it is necessary," returned M. Perrelet, "but----" Here, immensely to the surprise of both of them, he over whose body they were holding this debate opened his eyes and faintly said something.

The old doctor bent down to catch it, but Laurent, whose hearing was sharper, had no need to stoop.

L'Oiseleur had whispered, "Cut it off.

.

.

.

I shall not want it so .

.

.

any more.

.

.

."

After that there was nothing to say.

But Laurent had his teeth in his underlip as he played the executioner, nervously clipping away at the "tiresome stuff," as its owner had once so insouciantly called it, till the shoulder-long locks, curling a little at the ends, lay like autumn beech-leaves on the linen.

"Nous n'irons plus aux bois, Les lauriers sont coupés," --that most haunting couplet came into his head meanwhile, to stay there all the rest of the morning.

"That will be much better, thank you, Monsieur de Courtomer," said M. Perrelet, settling the shorn head back again.

Was it only Laurent's fancy that a slight change passed over Aymar de la Rocheterie's half-conscious face at the name?

And, waking that afternoon from a short doze himself, Laurent found his charge's conscious gaze fixed full on him.

As Laurent's glance met his the very faintest tinge of colour mounted to his face--he was too bloodless to show more.

But he looked away, saying nothing.

Laurent felt certain, however, that he had recognized him.

In his present great prostration this was probably a shock; he must give him time to get over it.

He would obviously have to wait a little for the story of the doings in the wood; La Rocheterie would not have the strength to tell him yet.

Nor, perhaps, the inclination, it occurred to him later, when, having asked the wounded man whether there was anything he could do to make him more comfortable, he replied in the negative in a voice that seemed to the enquirer, for all its weakness, to be so extremely glacial that he felt a chill at the heart.

Had La Rocheterie not recognized him, after all?

Should he recall himself to his memory?

Better not: M. Perrelet would probably disapprove.

But during the night he was faced with a new idea.

Was it possible that L'Oiseleur, even though he had recognized him (for the more Laurent thought about that the more he felt sure that he had), did not want to admit the fact?

And if so, in Heaven's name why not?

Was it possible that--after all, he _did_ know something of the terrible imputation under which he lay?

But even then--Laurent was at a loss, and no amount of studying his face, at moments during the vigil when La Rocheterie was asleep, helped him to a solution.

All he gained was a completer impression of the extraordinary effect of candour, innocence, and helplessness given to it in repose by the motionless lashes, as long and curving as those of a boy.

Another morning brought a repetition of the morning before.

M.

Perrelet seemed pleased, and, presumably of set purpose, he talked a little as he did the dressings.

But his patient did not respond to his encouragement, and Laurent could not disguise from himself that he himself was beginning to be a trifle .

.

.

yes, disappointed in him.

La Rocheterie was very likely in pain from the wound in his chest with every breath he drew, and, worse, was so drained of vitality that he could not move or lift a hand to help himself, but somehow one would have thought that, by this time, a man of his fibre would have rallied a little in spirit, if not in body.

On the contrary, in these last two days Laurent had once or twice surprised on his increasingly haggard face such an expression of utter hopelessness as to be shocked by it.

Yet it was puzzling how, despite his silence and inertia, La Rocheterie would now and then turn on M. Perrelet a gaze that seemed pregnant with some unspoken question.

Possibly the doctor himself had noticed this, or it was for some other reason that he gave Laurent a warning before he left.

"In spite of the improvement, he must be kept absolutely quiet," he said.

"Whatever you do, don't go talking to him about Pont-aux-Rochers or the wood.

I would not answer for the consequences if he is agitated in any way."

"To talk is the last thing he seems to want to do," observed his nurse.

"I am not so sure of that," returned M. Perrelet.

(6) There seemed to be a great deal of movement going on at Arbelles that afternoon, and Laurent, sitting sleepily by the open window, remembered how M. Perrelet had said that a considerable part of the troops there had been ordered off against the small Royalist bodies in the Plesguen district who, under the leadership of a certain M. du Tremblay, were understood to be meditating a coup, but in what direction was uncertain.

Colonel Guitton was going in command of the force from the château, a piece of news which delighted M. de Courtomer.

The name of du Tremblay seemed familiar to him, but he was too lazy, or too tired, to recover the connection.

La Rocheterie was asleep.

Though the screen hid his body from Laurent, it had not been drawn completely up to the head of the bed, and through the gap the young man could see his face turned sideways on the pillow, still and colourless as alabaster, and all the more colourless for the lock of ruddy hair lying on the brow.

He was tranquil enough now.

But when he was awake .

.

.

Oh, that cursèd, cursèd wood!

Quick spurred steps were audible at this juncture outside, and in a moment more, to Laurent's surprise, and by no means pleasure, there entered Colonel Guitton, with the Major.

The former was evidently ready for the field, booted, sword-girt and polished, his tall brass helmet with the horse-hair plume and the strip of leopard-skin giving him additional height and truculence.

Into the yellow plastron of his uniform was stuck a folded paper.

He took no notice of Laurent beyond returning his salute, and, followed by the other officer, clanked across the room to L'Oiseleur's bed and disappeared behind the screen.

This irruption had of course roused the sleeper, for Laurent saw him stir and open his eyes.

"Ah, I am glad to see--as well as to hear--that you are better, Monsieur," came Colonel Guitton's voice, quick and incisive, "because I want a little conversation with you."

Laurent promptly walked to the farther edge of the screen.

"If you will excuse me, sir, M. Perrelet left particular orders that M. de la Rocheterie was to be kept absolutely quiet."

The helmeted head turned.

"I can't help that," said its owner, none too agreeably.

"This business is far too urgent to wait on M. Perrelet's permission.

Moreover, we shall not keep M. de la Rocheterie long."

He drew the chair by the bed still nearer and sat down, the Major standing behind him, while Laurent, after a second or two's hesitation, returned to his former place by the window.

He was perturbed, but he felt that if Colonel Guitton had the sense of a fly he would see that L'Oiseleur was in no fit state for conversation.

"I want to ask you a question or two," he heard the Colonel reiterate, in a much lower voice--but one which, whether he knew it or no, was perfectly audible.

"To go straight to the point, the district of St. Pierre de Plesguen is moving."

He waited a moment, and then added, "I expect I am right in concluding that M. du Tremblay's real plans are known to you?"

L'Oiseleur also waited a moment before replying.

"If it interests you .

.

they are."

His voice was slow and weak, but the reply had all the effect of curtness.

"It does interest me, Monsieur de la Rocheterie," said the dragoon.

"I am going out now in the hope of countering those plans .

.

.

when I know a little more definitely what they are."

And there was another pause, which Laurent dimly felt to be charged with something uncomfortable and threatening, though he could not as yet divine the goal of this conversation.

But it had suddenly come to him where he had heard the name of du Tremblay before, where he had seen the man who bore it--that officer at the Duc de Saint-Séverin's reception who knew so much about La Rocheterie and had spoken of him so warmly.

They had probably concerted measures.

"Do you expect me to wish you success?"

asked the faint voice at last.

"No, I expect something a little more concrete than good wishes," retorted Colonel Guitton.

He gave a half-laugh and lowered his voice still more, but not sufficiently.

"Come, La Rocheterie, let us get this business over as quickly as possible.

I am sure that you understand me!"

The faint, fugitive colour dyed L'Oiseleur's pallor to the roots of his hair.

"God!

For what do you take me!"

"Well," sniggered the Imperialist, "I had really no intention of pronouncing the word to your face, but if you want it .

.

.

No, I take you for a man who, like M. de Labédoyère, has seen the error of his ways, a man who is aware, now that the Emperor is back, how things are likely to go, and has acted accordingly .

.

.

and wisely, in my view.

Only you cannot stop halfway, you know.

So----" Little shoots of incredulity and horror had been running up and down the witness as he stood there rigid by the window, unseen and perhaps already forgotten.

Was it conceivable that they were expecting L'Oiseleur, _L'Oiseleur_, to reveal the plans which he and du Tremblay had no doubt made together, now that du Tremblay was on the verge of carrying them out?

It was so infamous that it could not be true; he must be wronging the two officers.

He restrained himself and listened.

As for L'Oiseleur himself, pinned there under their gaze, he had turned his head away, his teeth set in his lip.

"Come, La Rocheterie, don't prolong this!"

went on the Imperialist, and his tone held a certain repellent bonhomie.

"I am in a great hurry, and you are ill.

And, hang it all, you made Colonel Richard a present of your own plans; all I'm asking for is a little light on du Tremblay's!"

Yes, they did expect it!

And it was repeated to his very face, that vile and terrible lie!

Laurent took an instinctive step forward--and then checked himself.

La Rocheterie had turned his head back again on the pillow; he was going at least to have the satisfaction of denying the charge.

But was it any wonder that he looked ghastly?

"You can .

.

.

insult me .

.

."

he got out, struggling a little for breath, "but you can never .

.

.

make me do that!"

"_Make_ you, you fool!"

snarled Colonel Guitton, all the false geniality gone, "there's no question of 'making,' if you have any regard for your own skin!

Don't you realize that you stand to find a Royalist triumph a cursed bad lookout for yourself after what you've done, if they get hold of you!"

L'Oiseleur's lip curled.

"I had rather their justice .

.

.

than your mercy."

The charge was beneath his contempt then; he had not even troubled to deny it.

But how long was this to go on?

Was it of any use making another appeal to them?

No; a fellow-captive had no power to stop them, and if he intervened again, La Rocheterie would inevitably realize his presence, and he was beginning most devoutly to hope that he had forgotten it.

The Colonel cleared his throat.

From his now quite unmodulated voice it was plain that he, at all events, had forgotten him.

"Now, look here, La Rocheterie, you are behaving insanely.

I can't think what has come to you!

Your own side knows, or will soon know, what you have done, while on the other hand ours is already in your debt--though I don't doubt you got your _quid pro quo_ from Richard.

Now here is a still greater opportunity of putting us--I might almost say the Emperor--under an obligation to you, and yet, after having so thoroughly burned your boats, you hesitate to take it!"

"Hesitate!"

The Colonel swore softly.

Then he smote himself on the leg.

"Parbleu, I am stupid!

I .

.

.

I apologize, La Rocheterie.

But you were unlucky, and you need have no fear of consequences this time, for, most fortunately, I have a document here which will make the business quite safe for you.

I brought it to ask you about it."

Something rustled.

"I assume that this paper which was found on you contains notes or what not of du Tremblay's plans, since it is headed with his name.

So if ever you were accused of having communicated them you could safely say--and I would support you--that the cipher notes were taken from you and read."

His voice was eager, explanatory, almost coaxing.