CHAPTER XXII

"TO NOROWAY, TO NOROWAY"

(1)

From the quarterdeck of His Britannic Majesty's frigate _Pomone_, which had recently come to anchor in the wide and placid bay of Quiberon, Mr. Francis Tollemache gazed with interest on that portion of the southern coast of Brittany which lay before him. The June evening was calm and foggy, but not sufficiently so as to obscure the nearer land. In front of the observer was the low, sandy shore of Carnac; to the right the deeply indented coast, scarcely seen, broke into inlets and islands till, passing the narrow mouth of that surprising inland sea, the Morbihan, which gave its name to the department, it swept round into the peninsula of Rhuis. But on Mr. Tollemache's left hand, much nearer, curved the long, thin, sickle-blade of the peninsula of Quiberon, with its tiny villages, its meagre stone-walled fields, and its abundant windmills. About two-thirds of the way up, at the narrowest part of the blade, the threatening mass of Fort Penthièvre looked out on the one side over the tranquil waters of the bay, on the other over the tormented open sea, the 'mer sauvage,' that broke against the very rocks on which the fortress was built. And to this long natural breakwater was due the shelter of that ample beach at Carnac, indeed the spacious harbourage of the bay itself, where now the present squadron and its transports rode in comfort this twenty-fifth of June.

For the long-talked-of Government expedition had really sailed, and the surmise made by Mr. Tollemache to the Marquis de Flavigny that afternoon in St. James's Park had proved entirely correct. Not only did his ship, the _Pomone_, form part of the convoying force, but she flew the flag of the commodore himself, that sterling sailor and gentleman, Sir John Borlase Warren. Under his command there had left Southampton on the sixteenth of the month a squadron comprising two seventy-fours, the _Thunderer_ and the _Robust_, and seven vessels of lesser armament, which flotilla had the task of convoying transports containing three thousand five hundred French Royalists, all kinds of stores and uniforms, muskets to the number of twenty-seven thousand, and ammunition to match. And it was in vain that the Brest fleet, under Villaret-Joyeuse, had tried to cut them off from the coast of France.

As Mr. Tollemache, his telescope under his arm, thus gazed at their destination--for he understood that the landing, which the British would cover, but in which they would not participate, was to take place on the easy sands of Carnac--it occurred to him, tolerably free though he was from the curse of imagination, that the unfortunate devils of Frenchies whom they were convoying must feel rather queerish at seeing their native shores again. They were in fact crowded now on the decks of the transports, gazing at the coast through the mist and the failing daylight. M. de Flavigny, for instance, that little boy's father, he was probably there, doing the same, poor beggar . . . just like the two leaders of the expedition here on the quarterdeck of the flagship. Out of the corner of his eye the young lieutenant could see them, talking to the commodore; the strutting, self-important, irascible little man in the uniform of the troops in English pay, the Comte d'Hervilly, and the would-be organiser of the Chouannerie, the Comte de Puisaye, tall, awkward, and enigmatic. From what Francis Tollemache had seen of these individuals during the voyage he had not formed a very high opinion of their capacity. There did not seem to be much harmony between them either, and their authority was strangely divided, for d'Hervilly, who held an English commission, was supposed to be in command when the troops were at sea, and Puisaye when they were landed. For this extraordinary arrangement Mr. Tollemache had heard that My Lords of the Admiralty were to blame, and he thought the plan very foolish.

He was to be confirmed in this opinion. That night it fell to him, as officer of the watch, to witness the arrival up the side of the _Pomone_, from a tiny boat, of two Chouan chiefs, the Chevalier de Tinténiac and the Comte du Boisberthelot, gentlemen of title arrayed in dirty Breton costumes. As a matter of fact the young man had seen them before, for they had boarded the frigate at Southampton before she sailed, but he hardly recognised them now. They brought, so he later understood, good accounts of the disposition of the countryside, where all the peasantry were ready to rise, undertook to 'sweep' the coast, and strongly pressed an immediate disembarkation. And immediately the fruits of the divided command were made manifest: the Comte de Puisaye and Sir John Warren were for following this advice, but, since d'Hervilly objected, they had to give way to the needless precaution of a reconnaissance, on which he insisted. So next morning, at daybreak, the young sailor saw him embark in a cutter and make a majestic tour of the bay--a proceeding which had no effect save that of delaying the landing for twenty-four hours.

"And," as Mr. Tollemache observed later in the wardroom to a friend, "why give the beggars on shore longer warning of our arrival than we need? They are not blind, I suppose; this little collection can hardly be invisible to the crew in the fort over there, for instance! Land 'em at once, say I!"

The friend drew at his pipe. "Wish we were landing a party too eh, Tollemache?"

"Well, _we_ aren't getting any fun for our money! I confess I would rather like to have a smack at the sans-culottes before we leave. Do you think the fellows we are landing have much of a chance, Carleton?"

"Devilish little, I should say," replied his laconic companion, and knocked out his pipe.

(2)

"Surely it must be a good omen!" thought René de Flavigny that night, where he sat, with the other officers of the regiment to which he was attached--du Dresnay's--in the flat-bottomed boat approaching Carnac beach. For everything to-night--or rather, this morning, since it was two o'clock--was made resplendent by the glorious moon which seemed to be riding the heavens on purpose to welcome these exiles in arms to the land of their birth. Behind the steadily advancing boats the hulls of the English squadron lay almost motionless on the breast of an unrippled sea of argent, in front the wide, pale sands of Carnac stretched like a magic band of silver. Yes, surely it was a good omen!

Oh, if only some day his little son too could come back to the land of his fathers, in no hostile or furtive fashion, but openly, as of right--and if he might be with him too! Or might his own death avail, if need were, to bring Anne there before he grew old! Such was René de Flavigny's prayer in that speaking radiance. And the sight of that shore and the beauty of the night itself made him think also. If only one were not coming with a sword against one's mother! There stole back to him too the remembrance of the day when he had pointed out the oncoming shores of France to Jeannette--a bride--and then of the day when they had left them behind in their flight--the last time she was ever to see them. Yes, when last he had looked on France she had been in his arms, and Anne in hers. . . .

De Flavigny's meditations were suddenly checked. Orders were being shouted; the boats came to a standstill on the silver tide. And, peering forward, René could make out the cause.

Drawn up on the beach in the moonlight was a small body of Republican troops. Their white breeches and facings and cross-belts were clearly visible. Between the shore and the now stationary craft with their load were slipping the flotilla's half-dozen gunboats.

"Oh, why are we not there!" sighed a young officer sitting by the Marquis, bringing his hand sharply down on his knee.

But before the English sailors could fire a shot the Blues began to draw off in haste, and from the mainland behind them came the rattle of musketry. The Chouans there were evidently driving out the small Republican garrisons before them--sweeping the coast, in short, as they had undertaken.

"First blood to the Bretons!" said the young officer, with envy in his tones. René felt some consolation in reflecting that La Vireville had probably had a share in that honour.

He began to talk to his companion as the boats resumed their shoreward course. There was time enough indeed for any amount of conversation before either of them set foot on the beach, for the régiment du Dresnay was in the second detachment, and the first had yet to be landed--the regiment of Loyal-Emigrant, mostly veterans from Flanders, and d'Hervilly's own regiment, once Royal-Louis, the numbers of which had been made up, most unwisely, by drafts from the French Republican prisoners in England.

But at last their turn came, and to cries of "Vive le Roi" and the roll of drums du Dresnay's colours were unfurled, and, when they were near enough, many an émigré jumped into the water and waded to land. In du Dresnay many were actually Bretons, and for them the shore in front of them was not only France, but their own sacred corner of France, and several of them, when they reached it, dropped on their knees and kissed the wet sand.

René de Flavigny did not do that, but it was not for want of emotion, for his heart was swelling painfully as he stood at last on the earth that had borne him. "It is France, France!" he said to himself, hardly believing it. And then he was swallowed up in the intense excitement reigning on the beach, where two or three bands of the victorious Chouans had suddenly streamed down upon the regiments of the first detachment, embracing their compatriots and declaring that the whole countryside was theirs--and filling some of the correctly uniformed newcomers with surprise at their strange appearance. Even their officers were little better clad. De Flavigny's eyes lit upon one of these--a French gentleman from Jersey--and beheld a figure attired in a little green vest, short breeches of the same, with bare legs covered with mud, burst shoes, a three months' beard, and a perfect armoury of weapons. But where was Fortuné? Had he been delayed, or met with some mishap?

And the scene became still more confused and further charged with emotions, for there were now arriving not Chouans, but the peaceful inhabitants of the districts round, bringing cattle, and carts loaded with provisions, and all eager to help disembark the ammunition and the cannon, and insisting on carrying through the water, on their shoulders, those émigrés who had not yet reached shore. The noise and tumult were indescribable, and at last, to complete the reception, there advanced on to the beach, singing as they came, a procession of priests preceded by crosses and the banners of their parishes.

It was at these last that the Marquis was gazing, wondering for the first time why the saintly old Bishop of Dol, Monseigneur de Hercé, whom they had brought with them, had not been landed with his ecclesiastics, when a hand fell on his shoulder, and he found himself looking into the face of La Vireville, bronzed and not overclean, his hair falling loose on his shoulders in the Breton manner--differentiated indeed from his men only by his high boots and the white scarf that crossed his breast.

De Flavigny seized him by the wrists. "At last, at last, I am able to thank you, Fortuné!"

But the Chouan wrenched a hand free and put it over the Marquis's mouth.

"Don't speak of that now, as you love me, René! It is past history, and we have more important matters to occupy us. And as for thanks, it is I who owe them to you, as responsible for the child's existence. . . . Is he well?"

If the young man was not allowed to speak his thanks, he could look them, there on the sandy beach amid the excited throng, the east on fire with the coming day, and his friend's hand in his. "I was to tell you, if I had the chance to meet you, that he had got a new goldfish in place of the one he left at Canterbury, and that he hopes to show it to you--some day."

La Vireville smiled. "He shall bring it to France."

"And show it to the little King at Versailles," interposed de Flavigny, "when we have put him into his own again!"

All the amusement died out of the Chouan's face. "You have not heard then?"

"What!" asked Rene in alarm.

La Vireville took off his shabby, wide-brimmed hat. "Louis XVII. is dead . . . he died before you sailed, on the eighth of June. I have not long known it--my men do not know it yet. The Comte de Provence will have to be proclaimed here. The Bretons, who know nothing of him, will probably murmur. That poor child was often spoken of amongst them, whereas the Regent--Bon Dieu, what is happening!"

They both turned. At a little distance, where the new muskets were being distributed to the Chouans, a sergeant of d'Hervilly's regiment was having an argument of more than words with two or three Bretons who had evidently precipitated themselves on to these new possessions more quickly than he liked. Into the disturbance there now entered a Chouan of Herculean proportions, presumably a leader, who, seconded in his efforts by a young man of twenty with the face of a girl, began driving off the excited gars with the butt-end of a musket.

"That is Georges Cadoudal and his friend Mercier la Vendée," observed La Vireville. "Those must be his own Morbihannais that he is disciplining!"

He looked on rather amused, but suddenly his face clouded. The Comte d'Hervilly had unfortunately hurried to the scene, and began to rate the two Chouan leaders in no measured terms. The gigantic Cadoudal--brutal, adored, and bravest of the brave--restrained himself with evident difficulty, and finally went off, the little figure of d'Hervilly following him with gesticulations. Meanwhile, amid shouts of laughter, the sergeant and the too impetuous Bretons were suddenly reconciled.

La Vireville shrugged his shoulders.

"I cannot congratulate you, René, on your leaders! That man d'Hervilly is incompetent and ridiculous; Heaven send he do not make a mess of everything! And as for Puisaye, who fancies himself the man to stand in La Rouërie's shoes and to head the Chouannerie--I know something of him and of his intrigues in Jersey. Well, I must be getting back to my men over there, lest Grain d'Orge is letting them also acquire firearms too quickly. Au revoir, my friend; I trust not to be away more than a few days."

"You are going then--but where?"

"I am going to help Tinténiac and du Boisberthelot drive the Blues out of Auray and Landévant. When I return I hope to see the fleur-de-lys on Fort Penthièvre over there. Au revoir!"

He wrung the Marquis's hand and departed, and René watched his tall figure making its way through the scarlet-clad ranks of émigrés (whose uniforms seemed to many of them to smack too much of English patronage) ere he himself turned away.