Henry Seton Merriman – The Complete Collection

Chapter 22

"Is it the snow--that you find slippery?" he asked, not requiring an answer. A moment later Louis came forward.

"There is nothing but bad news," he said laconically. "Barlasch will have told you; but there is no need to give up hope. The army has reached the Niemen; the rearguard has quitted Vilna. There is nothing for it but to go and look for him."

"Who will go?" she asked quietly.

"I."

He was looking at her with grave eyes trained to darkness. But she looked past him towards the sky, which was faintly lighted by the aurora. Her averted eyes and rigid attitude were not without some suggestion of guilt.

"My ship is ice-bound at Reval," said D'Arragon, in a matter-of-fact way. "They have no use for me until the winter is over, and they have given me three months' leave."

"To go to England?" she asked.

"To go anywhere I like," he said, with a short laugh. "So I am going to look for Charles, and Barlasch will come with me."

"At a price," put in that soldier, in a shrewd undertone. "At a price."

"A small one," corrected Louis, turning to look at him with the close attention of one exploring a new country.

"Bah! You give what you can. One does not go back across the Niemen for pleasure. We bargained, and we came to terms. I got as much as I could."

Louis laughed, as if this were the blunt truth.

"If I had more, I would give you more. It is the money I placed in a Dantzig bank for my cousin. I must take it out again, that is all."

The last words were addressed to Desiree, as if he had acted in assurance of her approval.

"But I have more," she said; "a little--not very much. We must not think of money. We must do everything to find him--to give him help, if he needs it."

"Yes," answered Louis, as if she had asked him a question. "We must do everything; but I have no more money."

"And I have none with me. I have nothing that I can sell."

She withdrew her fur mitten and held out her hand, as if to show that she had no rings, except the plain gold one on her third finger.

"You have the ikon I brought you from Moscow," said Barlasch gruffly. "Sell that."

"No," answered Desiree; "I will not sell that."

Barlasch laughed cynically.

"There you have a woman," he said, turning to Louis. "First she will not have a thing, then she will not part with it."

"Well," said Desiree, with some spirit, "a woman may know her own mind."

"Some do," admitted Barlasch carelessly; "the happy ones. And since you will not sell your ikon, I must go for what Monsieur le capitaine offers me.

"Five hundred francs," said Louis. "A thousand francs, if we succeed in bringing my cousin safely back to Dantzig."

"It is agreed," said Barlasch, and Desiree looked from one to the other with an odd smile of amusement. For women do not understand that spirit of adventure which makes the mercenary soldier, and urges the sailor to join an exploring expedition without hope of any reward beyond his daily pay, for which he is content to work and die loyally.

"And I," she asked, "what am I to do?"

"We must know where to find you," replied D'Arragon.

There was so much in the simple answer that Desiree fell into a train of thought. It did not seem much for her to do, and yet it was all. For it summed up in six words a woman's life: to wait till she is found.

"I shall wait in Dantzig," she said at length.

Barlasch held up his finger close to her face so that she could not fail to see it, and shook it slowly from side to side commanding her careful and entire attention.

"And buy salt," he said. "Fill a cupboard full of salt. It is cheap enough in Dantzig now. The patron will not think of it. He is a dreamer. But a dreamer awakes at length, and is hungry. It is I who tell you--Barlasch."

He emphasized himself with a touch of his curved fingers on either shoulder.

"Buy salt," he said, and walked away to a rising knoll to make sure that no one was approaching. The moon was just below the horizon, and a yellow glow was already in the sky.

Desiree and Louis were left alone. He was looking at her, but she was watching Barlasch with a still persistency.

"He said that it is the happy women who know their own minds," she said slowly.

"I suppose he meant--Duty," she added at length, when Louis made no sign of answering.

"Yes," he said.

Barlasch was beckoning to her. She moved away, but stopped a few yards off, and looked at Louis again.

"Do you think it is any good trying?" she asked, with a short laugh.

"It is no good trying unless you mean to succeed," he answered lightly. She laughed a second time and lingered, though Barlasch was calling her to come.

"Oh," she said, "I am not afraid of you when you say things like that. It is what you leave unsaid. I am afraid of you, I think, because you expect so much."

She tried to see his face.

"I am only an ordinary human being, you know," she said warningly.

Then she followed Barlasch.

CHAPTER XVIII.

MISSING.

I should fear those that dance before me now Would one day stamp upon me; it has been done: Men shut their doors against a setting sun.

During the first weeks of December the biting wind abated for a time, and immediately the snow came. It fell for days, until at length the grey sky seemed exhausted; for the flakes sailed downwards in twos and threes like the stragglers of an army bringing up the rear. Then the sun broke through again, and all the world was a dazzling white.

There had been a cessation in that stream of pitiable men who staggered across the bridge from the Konigsberg road. Some instinct had turned it southwards. Now it began again, and the rumour spread throughout the city that Rapp was coming. At length, in the middle of December, an officer brought word that Rapp with his staff would arrive next day.

Desiree heard the news without comment.

"You do not believe it?" asked Mathilde, who had come in with shining eyes and a pale face.

"Oh yes, I believe it."

"Then you forget," persisted Mathilde, "that Charles is on the staff. They may arrive to-night."

While they were speaking Sebastian came in. He looked quickly from one to the other.

"You have heard the news?" he asked.

"That the General is coming back?" said Mathilde.

"No; not that. Though it is true. Macdonald is in full retreat on Dantzig. The Prussians have abandoned him--at last."

He gave a queer laugh and stood looking towards the window with restless eyes that flitted from one object to another, as if he were endeavouring to follow in mind the quick course of events. Then he remembered Desiree and turned towards her.

"Rapp returns to-morrow," he said. "We may presume that Charles is with him."

"Yes," said Desiree, in a lifeless voice.

Sebastian wrinkled his eyes and gave an apologetic laugh.

"We cannot offer him a fitting welcome," he said, with a gesture of frustrated hospitality. "We must do what we can. You and he may, of course, consider this your home as long as it pleases you to remain with us. Mathilde, you will see that we have such delicacies in the house as Dantzig can now afford--and you, Desiree, will of course make such preparations as are necessary. It is well to remember, he may return . . . to-night."

Desiree went towards the door while Mathilde laid aside the delicate needlework which seemed to absorb her mind and employ her fingers from morning till night. She made a movement as if to accompany her sister, but Desiree shook her head sharply and Mathilde remained where she was, leaving Desiree to go upstairs alone.

The day was already drawing to its long twilight, and at four o'clock the night came. Sebastian went out as usual, though he had caught cold. But Mathilde stayed at home. Desiree sent Lisa to the shops in the Langenmarkt, which is the centre of business and gossip in Dantzig. Lisa always brought home the latest news. Mathilde came to the kitchen to seek something when the messenger returned. She heard Lisa tell Desiree that a few more stragglers had come in, but they brought no news of the General. The house seemed lonely now that Barlasch was gone.

Throughout the night the sound of sleigh-bells could be faintly heard through the double windows, though no sleigh passed through the Frauengasse. A hundred times the bells seemed to come closer, and always Desiree was ready behind the curtains to see the light flash past into the Pfaffengasse. With a shiver of suspense she crept back to bed to await the next alarm. In the early morning, long before it was light, the dull thud of steps on the trodden snow called her to the window again. She caught her breath as she drew back the curtain; for through the long watches of the night she had imagined every possible form of return.

This must be Barlasch. Louis and Barlasch must, of course, have met Rapp on his homeward journey. On finding Charles, they had sent Barlasch back in advance to announce the safety of Desiree's husband. Louis would, of course, not come to Dantzig. He would go north to Russia, to Reval, and perhaps home to England--never to return.

But it was not Barlasch. It was a woman who staggered past under a burden of firewood which she had collected in the woods of Schottland, and did not dare to carry through the streets by day.

At last the clocks struck six, and, soon after, Lisa's heavy footstep made the stairs creak and crack.

Desiree went downstairs before daylight. She could hear Mathilde astir in her room, and the light of candles was visible under her door. Desiree busied herself with household affairs.

"I have not slept," said Lisa bluntly, "for thinking that your husband might return, and fearing that we should make him wait in the street. But without doubt you would have heard him."

"Yes, I should have heard him."

"If it had been my husband, I should have been at the window all night," said Lisa, with a gay laugh--and Desiree laughed too.

Mathilde seemed a long time in coming, and when at length she appeared Desiree could scarcely repress a movement of surprise. Mathilde was dressed, all in her best, as for a fete.

At breakfast Lisa brought the news told to her at the door that the Governor would re-enter the city in state with his staff at midday. The citizens were invited to decorate their streets, and to gather there to welcome the returning garrison.

"And the citizens will accept the invitation," commented Sebastian, with a curt laugh. "All the world has sneered at Russia since the Empire existed--and yet it has to learn from Moscow what part a citizen may play in war. These good Dantzigers will accept the invitation."

And he was right. For one reason or another the city did honour to Rapp. Even the Poles must have known by now that France had made tools of them. But as yet they could not realize that Napoleon had fallen. There were doubtless many spies in the streets that cold December day--one who listened for Napoleon; and another, peeping to this side and that, for the King of Prussia. Sweden also would need to know what Dantzig thought, and Russia must not be ignorant of the gossip in a great Baltic port.