The Indiscretion of the Duchess Part 24

"Our business," said he, "will wait."

"It will be the better for waiting."

He hesitated a moment; then he a.s.sented gravely:

"You're right--much better."

He took a pistol out of the drawer, and shut and locked the drawer. Then he turned to Suzanne and said:

"You had better go back to bed."

"I daren't, I daren't!"

"Then stay here and keep quiet. Mind, not a sound!"

"Give me a pistol."

He unlocked the drawer again, and gave her what she asked. Then signing to me to follow him, he opened the door, and we stepped together into the dark hall, the duke laying his hand on my arm and whispering:

"They're after the necklace."

We groped slowly, with careful noiselessness, across the hall to the foot of the great staircase. There we paused and listened. There was nothing to be heard. We climbed the first flight of stairs, and the duke turned sharp to the right. We were now in a short corridor which ran north and south; three yards ahead of us was another turn, leading to the west wing of the house. There was a window by us; the duke gently opened it; and over against us, across the base of the triangle formed by the building, was another window, four or five yards away. The window was heavily curtained; no light could be seen through it. But as we stood listening, the sounds began--first the gentle m.u.f.fled hammering, then the sound of the file. The duke still held my arm, and we stood motionless. The sounds went on for a while. Then they ceased. There was a pause of complete stillness. Then a sharp, though not loud, click! And, upon this, the duke whispered to me:

"They've got the safe open. Now they'll find the small portable safe which holds the necklace."

And I could make out an amused smile on his pale face. Before I could speak, he turned and began to crawl away. I followed. We descended the stairs again to the hall. At the foot he turned sharply to the left, and came to a standstill in a recess under the staircase.

"We'll wait here. Is your pistol all right?"

"Yes, all right," said I.

And, as I spoke, the faintest sound spread from the top of the stairs, and a board creaked under the steps of a man. I was close against the duke, and I felt him quiver with a stifled laugh. Meanwhile the Cardinal's Necklace pressed hard against my ribs under my tightly b.u.t.toned coat.

CHAPTER XIV.

For an Empty Box.

When I look back on the series of events which I am narrating and try to recover the feelings with which I was affected in its pa.s.sage, I am almost amazed and in some measure ashamed to find how faint is my abhorrence of the Duke of Saint-Maclou. My indignation wants not the bridle but the whip, and I have to spur myself on to a becoming vehemence of disapproval.

I attribute my sneaking kindness for him--for to that and not much less I must plead guilty--partly indeed to the revelation of a pa.s.sion in him that seemed to leave him hardly responsible for the wrong he plotted, but far more to the incidents of this night, in which I was in a manner his comrade and the partner with him in an adventure. To have stood shoulder to shoulder with a man blinds his faults--and the duke bore himself, not merely with the coolness and courage which I made no doubt of his displaying, but with a readiness and zest remarkable at any time, but more striking when they followed on the paroxysm to which I had seen him helplessly subject. These indications of good in the man mollified my dislike and attached me to him by a bond which begot toleration and resists even the clearer and more piercing a.n.a.lysis of memory. Therefore, when those who speak to me of what he did and sought to do say what I cannot help admitting to be true, I hold my peace, thinking that the duke and I have played as partners as well as on hostile sides, and that I, being no saint, may well hold my tongue about the faults of a fellow-sinner. Moreover,--and this is the thing of all strongest to temper or to twist my judgment of him,--I feel often as though it were he who laid his finger on my blind eyes and bade me look up and see where lay my happiness. For it is strange how long a man can go without discovering his own undermost desire. Yet, when seen, how swift it grows!

Quiet and still we stood in the bay of the staircase, and the steps over our heads creaked under the feet of the men who came down. The duke's hand was on my arm, restraining me, and he held it there till the feet had pa.s.sed above us and the stealthy tread landed on the marble flagging of the hall. We thrust our heads out and peered through the darkness. I saw the figures of two men, one following the other toward the front door; this the first and taller unfastened and noiselessly opened; and he and his fellow, whom, by the added light which entered, I perceived to be carrying a box or case of moderate size, waited for a moment on the threshold. Then they pa.s.sed out, drawing the door close after them.

Still the duke held me back, and we rested where we were three or four minutes. Then he whispered, "Come," and we stole across the hall after them and found ourselves outside. It must have been about half-past two o'clock in the morning; there was no moon and it was rather dark. The duke turned sharp to the left and led me to the bypath, and there, a couple of hundred yards ahead of us, we saw a cube of light that came from a dark lantern.

The duke's face was dimly visible, and an amused smile played on his lips as he said softly:

"Lafleur and Pierre! They think they've got the necklace!"

Was this the meaning of Pierre's appearance in the role of my successor?

The idea suggested itself to me in a moment, and I strove to read my companion's face for a confirmation.

"We'll see where they go," he whispered, and then laid his finger on his lips. Amus.e.m.e.nt sounded in his voice; indeed it was impossible not to perceive the humor of the position, when I felt the Cardinal's Necklace against my own ribs.

We were walking now under cover of the trees which lined the sides of the path, so that no backward glance could discover us to the thieves; and I was wondering how long we were thus to dog their steps, when suddenly they turned to the left about fifty yards short of the spot where old Jean's cottage stood, and disappeared from our sight. We emerged into the path, the duke taking the lead. He was walking more briskly now, and I saw him examine his pistol. When we came where the fellows had turned, we followed in their track.

The first distant hint of approaching morning caught the tops of the trees above us, turning them from black to a deep chill gray, as we paused to listen. Our pursuit had brought us directly behind the cottage, which now stood about a hundred yards on the right; and then we came upon them--or rather suddenly stopped and crouched down to avoid coming upon them--where they were squatting on the ground with a black iron box between them, and the lantern's light thrown on the keyhole of the box. Lafleur held the lantern; Pierre's hand was near the lock, and I presumed--I could not see--that he held some instrument with which he meant to open it. A ring of trees framed the picture, and the men sat in a hollow, well hidden from the path even had it been high day.

The Duke of Saint-Maclou touched my arm, and I leaned forward to look in his face. He nodded, and, brus.h.i.+ng aside the trees, we sprang out upon the astonished fellows. Fora moment they did not move, struck motionless with surprise, while we stood over them, pistols in hand. We had caught them fair and square. Expecting no interruption, they had guarded against none.

Their weapons were in their pockets, their hands busy with their job. They sprang up the next moment; but the duke's muzzle covered Lafleur, and mine was leveled full at Pierre. A second later Lafleur fell on his knees with a cry for mercy; the little man stood quite still, his arms by his side and the iron box hard by his feet. Lafleur's protestations and lamentations began to flow fast. Pierre shrugged his shoulders. The duke advanced, and I kept pace with him.

"Keep your eye on that fellow, Mr. Aycon," said the duke; and then he put his left hand in his pocket, took out a key and flung it in Lafleur's face. It struck him sharply between the eyes, and he whined again.

"Open the box," said the duke. "Open it--do you hear? This instant!"

With shaking hands the fellow dragged the box from where it lay by Pierre's feet, and dropping on his knees began to fumble with the lock. At last he contrived to unlock it, and raised the lid. The duke sprang forward and, catching him by the nape of the neck, crammed his head down into the box, bidding him, "Look--look--look!" And while he said it he laughed, and took advantage of Lafleur's posture to give him four or five hearty kicks.

"It's empty!" cried Lafleur, surprise rescuing him for an instant from the other emotions to which his position gave occasion. And, as he spoke, for the first time Pierre started, turning an eager gaze toward the box.

"Yes, it's empty," said the duke. "The necklace isn't there, is it? Now, tell me all about it, or I'll put a bullet through your head!"

Then the story came: disentangled from the excuses and prayers, it was simply that Pierre was no footman but a noted thief--that he had long meditated an attack on the Cardinal's Necklace; had made Lafleur's acquaintance in Paris, corrupted his facile virtue, and, with the aid of forged testimonials, presented himself in the character in which I had first made his acquaintance. The rascals had counted on the duke's preoccupation with Marie Delha.s.se for their opportunity. The duke smiled to hear it. Pierre listened to the whole story without a word of protest or denial; his accomplice's cowardly attempt to present him as the only culprit gained no more notice than another shrug and a softly muttered oath. "Destiny," the little man seemed to say in the eloquent movement of his shoulders; while the growing light showed his beady eyes fixed, full and unfaltering, on me.

Lafleur's prayers died away. The duke, still smiling, set his pistol against the wretch's head.

"That's what you deserve," said he.

And Lafleur, groveling, caught him by the knees.

"Don't kill me! Don't kill me!" he implored.

"Why not?" asked the duke, in the tone of a man willing to hear the other side, but certain that he would not be convinced by it. "Why not? We find you stealing--and we shoot you as you try to escape. I see nothing unnatural or illegal in it, Lafleur. Nor do I see anything in favor of leaving you alive."

And the pistol pressed still on Lafleur's forehead. Whether his master meant to shoot, I know not--although I believe he did. But Lafleur had little doubt of his purpose; for he hastened to play his best card, and, clinging still to the duke's knees, cried desperately:

"If you'll spare me, I'll tell you where she is!"

The duke's arm fell to his side; and in a changed voice, from which the cruel bantering had fled, while eager excitement filled its place, he cried:

"What? Where who is?"

"The lady--Mlle. Delha.s.se. A girl I know--there in Avranches--saw her go.

She is there now."

"Where, man, where?" roared the duke, stamping his foot, and menacing the wretch again with his pistol.