Chapter 17

HOW ANGELOT PLAYED THE PART OF AN OWL IN AN IVY-BUSH

That night, while Hélène sat alone and in disgrace, her lover was dancing.

After dinner Riette persuaded her father to walk across with her to La Marinière, where they found Monsieur Urbain, his wife and son, spending the evening in their usual sober fashion; he, deep in vintage matters, still studying his friend De Serres, and arguing various points with Angelot whose day had been passed with Joubard in the vineyards; she, working at her frame, where a very rococo shepherd and shepherdess under a tree had almost reached perfection.

Madame de la Marinière had views of her own about little girls, and considered Riette by no means a model. She had tried to impress her ideas on Monsieur Joseph, but though he smiled and listened admiringly, he spoiled Riette all the more. So her Aunt Anne reluctantly gave her up. But still, in her rather severe way, she was kind to the child, and Riette, though a little shy and on her good behaviour, was not afraid of her. There was always a basket beside Aunt Anne, of clothes she was making for the poor, for her tapestry was only an evening amusement. In this basket there was a little white cap such as the peasant children wore, partly embroidered in white thread. This was Riette's special work, whenever she came to La Marinière. Sitting on a footstool beside her aunt, she stitched away at "le bonnet de la petite Lise." At her rate of progress, however, as her aunt pointed out with a melancholy smile, Lise would be a grown-up woman before the cap was finished.

And on this special evening the stitches were both few and crooked. Riette paid no attention to her work, but sat staring and smiling at Angelot across the room, and he, instead of talking to his father and uncle, watched her keenly under his eyelids. Presently he came and stood near his mother's chair while she asked Riette a few questions about her lessons that day. It appeared that all had been satisfactory.

"A good little woman, Mademoiselle Moineau," said Riette, softly, smiling at Angelot, who felt the colour mounting to his hair. "I like her very much. She pretends to scold, but there is no malice in it, you know. I don't think she is very clever. Quite clever enough for Sophie and Lucie, who are most amiable, poor dear children, but stupid--ah!"

"They are older than you, I believe, Henriette," said her aunt, reprovingly.

"Yes, dear aunt, in years, but not in experience. I have lived, I know life"--she nodded gently--"while those poor girls--Ah, how charming! May I have a little dance with Ange, Aunt Anne?"

"I suppose so. Lise will not have her cap yet, it seems," said Madame de la Marinière, smiling in spite of herself.

Monsieur Joseph had sat down to the piano and was playing a lively polka. Angelot started up, seized his little cousin, and whirled her off down the room. In a minute or two Urbain took off his spectacles, shut the _Théâtre d'Agriculture_ with a sharp clap, walked up to Anne and held out his hands with a smiling bow.

"I can't resist Joseph's music, if you can, my little lady!"

"It seems we must follow the children," she said. "Riette has just been pointing out that she, at least, is wiser than her elders."

Angelot and his father jumped their light partners up and down with all the merry energy of France and a new world. After a few turns, Angelot waltzed Riette out into the hall, and they stood still for a few moments under the porch, while she whispered Hélène's message into his ear.

"Mon Dieu! But how can she meet me? It must be at night, or they will see us. And if she is locked into her room?"

"She can get out of her room, mon petit! She knows there is a way, though I have not shown it to her. Then there is the secret staircase in the chapel wall."

"You are right, glorious child that you are. She will find me in the moat, close to the little door. Nothing can be safer, provided that no one misses her."

"At what time?"

"Nine o'clock, when they are all playing cards."

"I will tell her," said Riette. "Oh, my Ange! she looked so sweet when she talked of you. I think I love her as much as you do. Why don't you bring her to Les Chouettes, that we may take care of her? There is an idea. Take her to Monsieur le Curé to-morrow night. He will be gone to bed, but no matter. Make him get up and marry you. Then come and live at Les Chouettes, both of you. We have plenty of room, and little papa would not be angry."

"Hush, child, what things you say!"

The very thoughts were maddening, there in the dim darkness under the stairs, with glimmering points of distant earthly light from Lancilly on the opposite hill. One of them might be Hélène's window, where she sat and watched La Marinière.

The music in the old room behind went swinging on. Monsieur Joseph played with immense spirit; Monsieur and Madame Urbain danced merrily up and down.

"Allons! we must go back," Angelot whispered to his little cousin, whose arms were round his neck. "And then you must dance with your uncle, because my mother likes a turn with me."

One cold touch of reflection came to dim his happiness. He had promised Uncle Joseph not to make Henriette a go-between. And it seemed no real excuse that it was Hélène's doing, not his. Well, this once it could not be helped. All the promises in the world would not make him disobey Hélène or disappoint her.

For the present, it seemed as if the attraction between himself and Hélène, a rapture to both of them, still meant very real misery to her. She was in deep disgrace with Madame de Sainfoy. Although she was allowed to come down to the meals, at which she sat statue-like and silent, she was sent back at once to her room, and either her mother or Mademoiselle Moineau locked her in.

Her father noticed these proceedings and shrugged his shoulders. He was sorry for Hélène, but had learnt by experience not to interfere, except on great and necessary occasions. No doubt girls were sometimes troublesome, and he did not pretend to know how to manage them. Adélaïde must bring up her children in her own way.

Another day of almost entire solitude, with a terrible doubt of Angelot added to the longing for his presence, so that peace was no longer to be found in the distant sight of La Marinière; another day had dragged its length through the hot hours of the afternoon, when, as Hélène walked restlessly up and down in her room, the blue-green depths of a grove on her tapestried wall began to move, and out from the wall itself, as if to join the dancing peasants beyond the grove, came the slender little figure of Henriette. In an instant the panel of tapestry had closed behind her and she had sprung into Hélène's arms. The girl clutched her convulsively.

"What does he say?"

"To-night, at nine o'clock, he will be near the little door in the moat. Meet him there."

"The little door in the moat!"

"You see this. Let me show you the spring"--she dragged her to the wall, and opened the panel with a touch. Inside it there was a dark and narrow passage, but opposite another panel stood slightly ajar.

"That is the way into the chapel," Riette whispered. "I came that way. But you must turn to the right, and almost directly you will find the stairs. The door is at the foot of them. He will be there."

"It is unlocked?"

"There is no key. I believe there has been none for centuries. Adieu, my pretty angel. They will miss me; I must go. I told them I wanted to say a little prayer to Our Lady in the chapel. She often helped me when I used to play here."

"I hope she will help me, too!" murmured Hélène.

In another moment she was terrified at finding herself alone in the dark; for the child was gone, softly closing the secret door into the chapel. Hélène felt about for a minute or two before she could find the spring behind the tapestry, and stepped back into her room, shivering from the damp chill of the passage.

It seemed like an extraordinary fate that that night her mother kept her downstairs at needlework later than usual. It was in truth a slight mark of returning favour. Madame de Sainfoy was in a better temper, and realised that it might be unwise to treat a tall girl of nineteen quite like a disobedient child. So Hélène sat there stitching beside Mademoiselle Moineau, who was sometimes called upon to take a hand at cards. To-night this did not seem likely, for Urbain de la Marinière came in after dinner, and the snuffy, sharp-faced little Curé of Lancilly was there too. Madame de Sainfoy had asked him to dine that day, partly to show herself superior to family prejudices; for this little man, unlike the venerable Curé of La Marinière, was one of the Constitutional priests of the Republic.

Flushing crimson, and feeling, as she well might, like a heroine of romance, Hélène heard the new Paris clock strike nine. Its measured, silvery tones had not died away, when she was by her mother's side at the card-table, timidly asking leave to go to her room.

Madame de Sainfoy had just glanced at her hand and found it an excellent one.

"Yes, my child, certainly," she said absently, and gave Hélène her free hand.

The girl touched it with her lips, and then her mother's fingers lightly patted her cheek.

"How feverish you are!" Adélaïde murmured, but took no further notice, absorbed in her game.

"Like a little flame! but it is a hot night," said Hervé as his daughter kissed him.

Mademoiselle Moineau was following Hélène from the room, when she was called back.

"No, mademoiselle, you must stay; we cannot do without you. Monsieur le Curé has to be home before ten o'clock."

The governess went back obediently to her corner. Hélène glanced back from the door at the group round the table, deep in their calculations, careless of what might be going on outside their circle of shaded candle-light. Only her father lifted his head and looked after her for an instant; her presence or absence was totally indifferent to the other men, though the square-headed cousin Urbain was Angelot's father; and her mother had forgotten her already.

Carrying her light, Hélène went with quick and trembling steps through the house to the north wing. As she entered the last passage, she met the maid who had been waiting on Sophie and Lucie, and who slept in the room next her own.

"Mademoiselle wants me?" said Jeanne, a little disappointed; she had hoped for half-an-hour's freedom.

"No, no, I do not want you," Hélène answered quickly. "I have things to do--you can stay till Mademoiselle Moineau comes up."

Jeanne went on her way rejoicing.

Hélène, once in her own room, locked the door inside, took a large black lace scarf and threw it over her head, hiding her white dress with it as much as possible; then, still carrying her candle, touched the mysterious tapestry door, that door which seemed to lead into old-time woods, into happy, romantic worlds far away, and stepped through into the passage in the thickness of the wall.

Almost instantly she came to the topmost step of the staircase. Black with dust and cobwebs, damp, with slimy snail-tracks on the stones, it went winding down to the lowest story of the old house. The steps were worn and irregular. Long ago they had been built, for this was the most ancient part of the château. In their first days the stairs had not ended with the moat, then full of water, but had gone lower still, leading to a passage under the moat that communicated with the open country. There were many such underground ways in the war-worn old province. But when Lancilly was restored and the moat drained, in the seventeenth century, the lower stairs and passage were blocked up, and the present door was made, opening on the green grass and bushes that grew at the bottom of the old moat.

Hélène went down the steep and narrow stairs as quickly as her trembling limbs would carry her. They seemed endless; but at last the light fell on a low, heavy door, deep set in the immense foundation wall. She seized the large rusty latch and lifted it without difficulty. Then she pulled gently; no result; she pushed hard, thinking the door must open outwards; it did not move. She set down her light on the stairs, and tried again with both hands; but the door was immovable. As her brain became a little steadier, and her eyes more accustomed to the dimness, she saw that a heavy iron bar was fastened across the upper panels of the door, and run into two enormous staples on the wall at each side. She touched the bar, tried to move it, but found her hands absolutely useless; it would have been a heavy task for a strong man. She stood and looked at the door, shivering with terror and distress. After all, it seemed, she was a real prisoner. She could not keep her appointment with Angelot. She gave a stifled cry and threw herself against the door, beating it with her fists and bruising them. Then a voice spoke outside, low and quickly.

"Hélène!"

"Ah! you are there!" she said, and leaned her head against the door.

"Open then, dearest--don't be afraid. Lift the latch, and pull it towards you. There is only a keyhole on this side--but it can't be locked, for there is no key."

"I cannot," she said. "It is barred with a great iron bar. I cannot move it. Oh, how unhappy I am! Why should I be so unfortunate, so miserable?" she cried, and beat upon the door again.

"Ah, mon Dieu! My father's precautions! He went round the château six weeks ago, to examine all the doors. I was not with him, or I should have known it. Hélène! Will you do as I ask you?"

"Ah! there is nothing to be done. I had to speak to you--I cannot, with this dreadful door between us, and--Ah, heavens, something has put out my candle. I am in the dark! What shall I do!"

"Courage, courage!" he said, speaking close to the keyhole. "Go back up the stairs; go to the chapel window!"

"But I cannot speak to you from the window!"

"Yes, you can--you shall."

"But I am in the dark!"

"You cannot miss your way. Go--go quickly--we have not much time--it is late already."

"I could not help it," sighed Hélène.

She was almost angry with him, and for a moment she was sorry she had sent him any message.

"What is the use? How can I speak to him from the window? it is too high," she said to herself as she stumbled up the stairs, shuddering as her fingers touched the damp wall. "It is my fate--I am never to be happy. My mother knows she can do as she likes with me."

A sob rose in her throat, and burning tears blinded her. But she dashed them away when she reached the level, and saw the thin line of light which showed the entrance into her own room, where she had left a candle burning. The opposite panel flew open as she touched it; she stooped and crept into the chapel.

It was dark, cold, and lonely; no friendly red light in the seldom-used little sanctuary; but the window in the north wall was unshuttered, and let in the pale glimmer of a sky lit by stars. Hélène had no difficulty in opening the window, though its rusty hinges groaned. There was a quick, loud rustling in the ivy beneath. Hélène stepped back with a slight scream as a hand shot suddenly up and caught the sill; in another instant Angelot had climbed to the level of the window and dropped on the brick floor. Hélène was almost in his arms, but she drew back and motioned him away, remembering just in time that she was angry.

"What is it?" he said quickly. "Why--"

"How--how did you get here?" she stammered. "I thought you were down in the moat."

"It is not the first time I have climbed the ivy, as the owls might tell you," he said. "It is easy; the old trunk is as thick as my body, and twists like a ladder. Hélène! You are angry with me! What have I done?"

He tried to take her hand, but she drew it from him. He fell on his knees and kissed the hem of her gown.

"Hélène!"

She stood motionless, unable to speak. But Angelot was not long to be treated in this chilling fashion. It seemed that he had a good conscience, and was not afraid to account for any of his actions. He rose to his feet; no words passed between them; but Hélène resisted him no longer. Her head was leaning on his breast; a long, happy sigh escaped her; and it was between kisses that he asked her again, "Why are you angry with me?"

"I am not--not now--I know it is not true," she murmured.

"What, my beloved?"

"You do care for me?"

Angelot laughed. Indeed it did not seem necessary to reassure her on such a point.

"Because, if you give me up, I shall die," she said. "I should have died, I think, if I had not seen you to-night. Now they may say and do what they please."

"What have they been saying and doing? Ah, my sweet, how have they been tormenting you? You are no happier than when I saw you first, though I love you so. How you tremble! Sit down here--there, softly--you are quite safe. What in God's name are we to do? Must I leave you again with these people?"

For a few minutes they sat in a corner of an old carved bench under the window, one of the family seats in those more religious days when grandfathers and grandmothers came to the chapel to pray. Hélène leaned against Angelot, clinging to him, and past his dark profile, dimly visible in the twilight of stars, she could see the roughly carved and painted figure of Our Lady, brought from a Spanish convent and much venerated by that Mademoiselle de Sainfoy who became a Carmelite in the early days of the order. Hélène had fancied, before now, that there was something motherly in the smile of the statue, neglected so long. She thought, even as her lover kissed her, that neither the Blessed Virgin, nor St. Theresa, nor the ancestor who was her disciple, would have been angry with her and Angelot. Only her own mother, and she for worldly reasons alone, would find any sin in this sweet human love which wrapped her round, which, if allowed to have its way, would shield her from all the miseries of life and keep her in the rapturous peace she enjoyed in this moment, this fleeting moment, which she could not spoil even by telling her Angelot why she sent for him.

"Ah, how I wanted you!" she breathed in his ear.

"My love! But what--what are we to do!" he murmured passionately; her feelings of rest and peace and safety were not for him.

"Your father is very good, and loves you," he said. "At least we know that he will not have you sacrificed. I will ask him. If he refuses--then, mille tonnerres, I will carry you off into the woods, Hélène."

"It is no use asking him, dearest, none," she said. "Besides, you told them all that you did not care for me."

She lifted her head, and tried to look into his face.

"Ah, did they tell you that? Was that why you were angry?" Angelot cried.

"Yes," she said; "and now you had better ask to be forgiven."

Indeed, as they both knew too well, there were more serious things than kisses and loving words to occupy that stolen half-hour. They had to tell each other all--all they knew--and each became a little wiser. Hélène knew that General Ratoneau had actually asked for her, and that her father had refused to listen; thus realising that her mother was deceiving her, and also that for some hidden reason the plan seemed to Madame de Sainfoy still possible. Angelot, even as they sat there together, realised vividly that he was living in a fool's paradise; that his love's confession to her mother had made things incalculably worse, justifying all the stern treatment, the violent means, which such a mother might think necessary.

"She means to marry her to Ratoneau," he thought, "and she will do it, unless Heaven interferes by a miracle. Uncle Joseph is my only friend, and he cannot help me--at least--if I do not act at once, we are lost."

He lifted Hélène's fair head a little, and its pale beauty, in the dim gleam from the open window, seemed to fill his whole being as he gazed. He drew her towards him and kissed her again and again; it might have been a last embrace, a last good-bye, but he did not mean it for that.

"Will you come with me now?" he said.

"Yes!" Hélène said faintly.

"Are you afraid?"

"No"--she hesitated--"not with you. I can be brave when I am with you--but when you are not here--"

"They shall not part us again," Angelot said.

"But how are we to get out?"

Though her lover was there, still holding her, the girl trembled as she asked the question.

"I can unbar the door," he said. "Come to the top of the stairs and wait there till I whistle; then come down to me."

This seemed enough for the moment, and the wild fellow had no further plan at all. To have her outside these prison walls, in the free air he loved, under the trees in the starlight, to make a right to her, as he vaguely thought, by running off with her in this fashion--that was all that concerned him at the moment. Where was he to take her? Would Uncle Joseph receive them? Such thoughts just flashed through the tumult of his brain, but seemed of no present importance. Angelot was mad that night, mad with love of his cousin, with the desperate necessity which needed to be met by desperate daring.

Hélène followed him, trembling very much, to the top of the stairs.

"You have a candle there? Fetch it for me," he said.

She obeyed him, slipping through the tapestry into her own room. Once there, she looked round with a wild wonder. Could this be herself--Hélène de Sainfoy--about to escape into the wide world with her lover--and empty-handed? She looked down vaguely at her white evening gown and thin shoes, snatched up her watch and chain and a diamond ring, which were lying on the table, and slipped them into her pocket. It was the work of a moment, yet when she carried the candle to Angelot, he was white as death, and stamping with impatience; the flame in his eyes frightened her.

He took the candle without a word and disappeared down the first steep winding of the stairs. His moving shadow danced gigantic on the wall, then was gone. Hélène waited in the darkness. Even love and faith, with hope added, were not strong enough to keep her brave and happy during the terrible minutes of lonely waiting there. Her limbs trembled, her heart thumped so that she had to lean for support against the cold damp wall. She bent her head forward, eagerly listening. Why had she not gone down with him? Somebody might hear him whistle. However, no whistle came; only a dull sound of banging, which echoed strangely, alarmingly, up the narrow staircase in the thickness of the wall.

It seemed to Hélène that she had waited long and was becoming stupefied with anxiety, when a light flashed suddenly upon her eyes, and she opened them wide; she had never lost the childish fear which made her shut them in the dark. Angelot had leaped up the stairs again and was standing beside her, white and frowning.

"It is impossible," he said, in a hurried whisper. "I cannot move the bar without tools. Come back into the chapel."

He set down the candlestick on the altar step, walked distractedly to the end of the low vaulted room, then back to where she stood gazing at him with a pitiful terror in her eyes.

"What is to be done! Is there no other way!" he said, half to himself. "Mon Dieu, Hélène, how beautiful you are! Ah, what is that? Listen!"

His ears, quicker than hers, had caught steps and a rustling sound in the passage that ended at the chapel door.

"Dear--go back to your room," he said. "They must not find you here. We shall meet again--Good-night, my own!"

He was gone. The bewildered girl looked after him silently, and he was across the floor, on the window-sill, disappearing hand over head down his ladder of old twisted ivy stems, before she realised anything. Then, not the least aware that some one was knocking at her bedroom door in the passage, shaking the latch, calling her name, she flew after him to the window and leaned out, crying to him low and wildly, "Angelot, come back, come back! Why did you go? Ah, don't leave me! Help me to climb down, too,--please, please, darling!"

Angelot was out of sight, though not out of hearing. Forty feet of thick ivy and knotted stems, shelter of generations of owls, stretched between the chapel window and the moat's green floor; ivy two centuries old, the happy hunting-ground of many a lad of Lancilly and La Marinière. But that night, perhaps, the hospitable old tree reached the most romantic point of its history.

Hélène stretched down eager hands among the thick leaves.

"Angelot! Angelot!"

She heard nothing but the rustling down below, saw nothing but the thick leaves under the stars, though somebody had opened the chapel door, and though her treacherous candle, throwing a square of light upon the dark trees opposite, showed not only her own imploring shadow, but that of a tall figure stepping up behind her. In another moment her arm was seized in a grasp by no means gentle, and she turned round with a scream to face Madame de Sainfoy.

Her cry might have stopped Angelot in his swift descent and brought him to the window again, but as he neared the ground he saw that some one was waiting for him, some one standing on the flat grass, under the light of such stars as shone down into the moat, gazing with fixed gravity at the window from which Hélène was leaning.

Angelot's light spring to the ground brought him within a couple of yards of the motionless figure, and his white face flushed red when he saw that it was Hélène's father. The few moments during which he faced Comte Hervé silently were the worst his happy young life had ever known. The elder man did not speak till Hélène, with that last little cry, had disappeared from the window. Then he looked at Angelot.

"I am sorry, Ange," he said, "for I owe a good deal to your father. But I will ask you to wait here while I fetch my pistols. It is best to settle such a matter on the spot--though you hardly deserve to be so well treated."

"Monsieur--" Angelot almost choked.

"Ah! Do not trouble yourself to hunt for excuses--there are none," said the Comte.

He was moving off, but Angelot threw himself in his way.

"Bring one pistol," he said. "One will be enough, for I cannot fight you--you know it. But you may kill me if it pleases you."

Hervé shrugged his shoulders.

"How long has this been going on? How many times have you met my daughter clandestinely? Does it seem to you the behaviour of a gentleman? On my soul, you deserve to be shot down like a dog, as you say!"

"No, monsieur," Angelot said quickly, "I give you leave to do it, for I see now that life must be misery. But I have done no such harm as to deserve to be shot! No! I love and adore my cousin, and you must have known it--every one knows it, I should think. Can I sit quietly at home while her family gives her the choice between General Ratoneau and a convent? No, I confess it is more than I can bear."

"And if her family had given her such a choice--which is false, by the bye--what could you do? Is it likely that they would change their minds and give her to you, as your uncle Joseph suggested? And would you expect to gain their favour by this sort of thing?" He pointed to the window. "No, young man; if you were not your father's son, my grooms might whip you out of Lancilly, and I should feel justified in giving the order."

Angelot broke into a short laugh. "A pistol-shot is not an insult," he said. "But you are angry."

"And you are Urbain's son," the Comte said.

There was a world of reproach in the words, but little violent anger. The two men stood and looked at each other; and it was not the least strange part of the position that they were still, as they had been all along, mutually attracted. Both natures were open, sweet-tempered, and generous. A certain grace and charm about Hervé de Sainfoy drew Angelot, as it had drawn his father. The touch of romance in Angelot, his beauty, his bold, defiant air, took Hervé's fancy.

"You climb like a monkey or a sailor," he said. "But you tried another exit, did you not? Was it you who was hammering at the door down there?"

"Yes, monsieur."

"Tell me all."

The questions were severe, but Angelot answered them frankly and truly, as far as he could do so and take the whole blame upon himself.

"It was I," he said; "I did the whole wrong, if it was wrong. Do not let madame her mother be angry with her. But for God's sake do not make her marry Ratoneau. She is timid, she is delicate--ah, monsieur--and we are cousins, after all--"

There was a break in his voice, and the Comte almost smiled.

"You are a pair of very absurd and troublesome children," he said, much more kindly. "But you are old enough to know better; it is ignorance of the world to think that lives can be arranged to suit private inclinations. I could not give you my daughter, even if I wished it; you ought to see, as your father would, that you are not in a position to expect such a wife. You are not even on my side in politics, though you very well might be. If you were in the army, with even the prospect of distinguishing yourself like General Ratoneau--and why not even now--"

It was a tremendous temptation, but only for a moment. Angelot thought of his mother and of his uncle Joseph.

"I cannot go into the army," he said quickly.

"No--you are a Chouan at heart, I know," said Hervé.

He added presently, as the young man stood silent and doubtful before him--"You will give me your word of honour, Angelot, that there is no more of this--that you do not attempt to see my daughter again."

Angelot answered him, after a moment's pause, "I warn you that I shall break my word, if I hear more of Ratoneau."

"The devil take Ratoneau!" replied his cousin. "You will give me your word, and I will give you mine. I will never consent to such a marriage as that for Hélène. Are you satisfied now?"

"You give me life and hope," said Angelot.

"Not at all. It is not for your sake, I assure you."

Angelot's poor love went to bed that night in a passion of tears. The time came for her to know and confess that Angelot's father, when he barred the postern door, might have had more than one guardian angel behind him; but that time was not yet.