CHAPTER XXVII

I FIND A KEY TO MY DILEMMA

"We are your prisoners!" I answered, instantly, for the slightest hesitation on such occasions may lead to the most serious results. Explanations can be made subsequently, but a bullet from an over-zealous musket can never be recalled.

In an instant they were beside us, a sergeant and six men, all Highlanders. I was about to speak again, but before I could do so Margaret stepped up to the sergeant, and taking him by the sleeve whispered a few words in his ear. He thereupon gave some instructions in Gaelic to his men, who closed round me and the priest, and, moving off a few paces with her, they spake earnestly together for a little. What she said I do not know, but in a moment he faced about, and picking up the lanthorn, examined me in turn.

"Your name and rank, sir?" he said to me.

"Hugh Maxwell, captain."

"God bless me, sir! But this is not the first time I have heard your name, nor seen you, if you'll excuse my saying it," he said, most earnestly.

"Like enough. What is your name?"

"Neil Murray, sir."

"And a very good name it is; but I cannot say I recall it."

"But you will remember the march to Derby, sir, and Lord George?" he asked, eagerly.

"I am never likely to forget it. Were you there?"

"Where else would I be when my grandfather was own cousin to his?"

"Then I suppose there's no treason now in shaking hands over so old a story, Neil?" I said, extending my hand, which he grasped heartily, and relations were established between us.

He then turned to the priest. "Your name, your reverence?"

"Le pere Jean, missionary."

"Well, gentlemen, it cannot be helped. You must both follow us into the town."

He gave his orders briefly, and blowing out the lanthorn, took Margaret by the arm, supporting her as one might a wounded man, and so we set off. It was evident the quick-witted sergeant possessed that invaluable qualification of the successful soldier, the readiness to carry out as well as to devise a plan; for in handling the lanthorn he had never once allowed the light to fall on Margaret, and by his happy pretence of her being wounded, he avoided the awkward necessity of handing over the command to her as his superior. That he would do his best to shelter her from any scrutiny or questioning was evident, and I was too thankful for the result to puzzle over the probable means by which it was attained. As like as not, by the very simple expedient of telling the truth--a wonderfully efficacious measure at times, when you know your man.

A quick, hard scramble brought us down to the level of the Palais; we passed the Intendance, black and deserted, and so on towards the foot of the Cote du Palais. When we reached the gate the sergeant halted us; the sign and countersign were given, whereupon the wicket was opened.

Passing his arm about Margaret, who leaned upon him heavily, the sergeant skilfully interposed himself between her and the officer in charge, and gave his report: "Neil Murray, sergeant, 78th, six men, two prisoners, and one of our own, wounded," and on we marched up the slippery hill without a moment's unnecessary delay.

As soon as we were beyond sight of the gate our pace was slackened, and, now that all immediate danger of discovery for Margaret was at an end, I fell to wondering at the extraordinary chance which again brought me face to face with her who had proved the turning-point in my life. Little by little I pieced out the puzzle, and the more I brought it together, the more I wondered, but in a vague, disjointed fashion, that led to no solution. My confused thoughts were interrupted by our party halting in front of the Convent of the Ursulines, where, to my relief, I saw the sergeant lead Margaret round towards the side entrance.

"May I ask where you are taking us?" I said, when we again began our march, putting the question more to set my mind working again than out of curiosity.

"Where else would we be going but to the General?"

"And where has he found quarters in this stone heap? You have made a fine mess of things with your battering," I said, for the evidence of their fire on the town was surprising.

"Have we not!" he exclaimed, with true soldierly pride. "But there will be a corner or two, here and there, that was out of our reach. It was a God's mercy for ourselves that we didn't have our will of the whole town, or there's many a poor fellow would have made a bad winter of it."

"I dare say you found it bad enough as it was, eh, Neil?"

"You may say that, sir! There's been a deal to put up with for both high and low. But here we will be at the General's."

As he spake we drew up before a house in the rue St. Louis, and were ushered into an anteroom, where we were left under guard, while our conductor departed to make his report.

I was not permitted to speak with my fellow-prisoner, and so went back to my wonderings. It was Margaret--that is, Mme. de St. Just--who had befriended Lucy on shipboard, and protected her since. What a marvellous happening, that these two women, of all others in the world, should have thus been thrown together! That she now knew of my relation towards Lucy I could not doubt; and though I had preferred it might have come about otherwise, I bitterly reflected that an estimate of my character was no longer of supreme importance to her, now she was a married woman. Though I had been doing my utmost all these years of exile to school myself to a frame of mind in which I might look upon her as unapproachable for me, now that I found an insurmountable barrier existed, not of my own raising, with the inconsistence of mankind, I straight rebelled against it. What a climax to every irony of fate! To find myself free, and she, whom I had so hopelessly loved, another's. Yet what did the priest mean when he said he had been trying to keep me from her? I looked across the room at his impassive face, and felt I would give much for five minutes alone with him. Then an explanation would be forthcoming in some shape.

From this coil I was aroused by the entrance of an officer to summon us into the presence of the General, and for the first time I considered my personal situation. Not that I had anything to fear, for, in those days, war was a profession, and an officer was treated as a gentleman by his opponent once active hostilities ceased, or were even suspended; but the consequence of my capture would certainly mean for me the loss of any advantage I might otherwise have gained from our success. Now my name would figure in no despatches, unless as "missing," a bitter disappointment, when I had so slowly and painfully gained something of a position. But I had no time to reason it out before we had crossed the threshold of the General's room.

He was a clear-featured, bright-eyed man of thirty-five or forty, visibly harassed with the hard fortune of the day, but he did not allow his preoccupation to affect his bearing towards us.

"Reverend sir," he said, addressing the priest, "I take it for granted you are a non-combatant, but as it has fallen to your lot to be brought within our lines, you must perforce remain a prisoner. If you will satisfy me as to your name and position, I shall judge if I can grant you the less galling restrictions of parole."

The priest smiled. "I appreciate the reasonableness of the condition, your Excellency. My full name is Jean Marie Gaston de Caldegues, Vicomte de Trincardel, but for years I have borne none other than 'le pere Jean, missionary to the Indians.'"

"That is perfectly satisfactory, sir. I shall be pleased to allow you parole within the walls, only restricting you from approaching those parts of the town where our defences are now placed. I shall give you an order for quarters at the Ursulines, though doubtless the good ladies would readily receive you even without my introduction." As he spake he accompanied the priest to the door, where he gave his instructions to an aide in waiting.

He then turned to me and extended his hand. "Chevalier, we have already had the pleasure of some slight correspondence."

"I have to thank your Excellency for as great a courtesy as one man can shew towards another. When I wrote, I ventured to mention my acquaintance with your Excellency's brother, Lord Elibank, not that I relied on anything else than your Excellency's natural sensibility for the acceptance of my request, but that I might in that manner help to establish my identity."

"Believe me, Chevalier," he returned, with emphasis, "that was totally unnecessary. I was quite aware that you were in Canada. A man does not easily slip out of sight so long as he remains among his own class."

"Your Excellency overwhelms me; such a recognition goes far to make up for the years of disappointment I have endured."

"Then let us speak plainly, without further compliments on either side," he said, smiling gravely.

"Nothing could please me better, your Excellency."

"It will not even be necessary to keep up the 'Excellency.' I shall call you Kirkconnel, after the good homely Scots' fashion, if you have not forgotten."

"Forgotten! That is one of the curses of my Scotch blood. I cannot forget!"

"Then there is hope for you yet, Kirkconnel! For you have something behind you worth remembering."

"I cannot say it oppresses me with any great sense of obligation, for I would find some difficulty in naming it at the moment."

"Tut, tut, man!" he exclaimed, heartily. "Don't tell me that a man who played his part as well as you in '45 need mourn over it."

"We're getting out towards the thin ice now, are we not, General?"

"Not for me; though I dare say some members of my house might have to guard their steps more carefully. But to go on: you followed what you and your forbears held to be The Cause, and to which you held your honour pledged, and you saw it through to the bitter end. Then, instead of mixing yourself up in a miserable farrago of pot-house plots and chamber-mysteries which have only served to turn some honest men into rogues, you have acted like a soldier, and done only a soldier's work. And, best of all, you have succeeded. You have much that is worth remembering, Kirkconnel!"

"Your Excellency is most kind."

"I prefer to be plain. Why not drop this whole business?"

"How can I? You would not urge me to come over because I happen to be a prisoner to-day? I may be exchanged to-morrow."

"That you shall not, I'll answer for it! I have no intention to give M. de Levis the assistance of even one more artillery officer, if I can help it. No, no! I shall keep you fast while I can, but 'tis only in the event of my holding the winning cards in this affair that I would urge you to send in your submission and take your place beside us, your natural comrades, where you belong. What chance of promotion, or even of recognition, will you run, if M. de Levis has to leave Canada in our hands?"

"None whatever. I have never deceived myself for a moment on that point."

"Then be sensible, and, like a sensible man, make a sensible move when the time comes!" he exclaimed, with the greatest good feeling.

"I am afraid I am too old a fool to be sensible at any time on such a subject. But I thank your Excellency from the bottom of my heart," I returned, as warmly.

"Nonsense, man! I would not have spoken had I not been taken with you. But there! I am not a recruiting officer," he said, with a laugh. "Think well over what I have said; I am not pressing for an answer." Thereupon he turned the subject, and we fell into a conversation over the events of the past summer and winter. I answered such questions as I could in regard to our present position, for there was no advantage to be gained by undue concealment, and his consideration spared me any embarrassment.

When our interview ended he thanked me very handsomely, and regretted he could not offer me the hospitality of his own roof, but provided for me in the Ursulines, granting me the same parole as the priest.

"You will find among your countrymen an odd rebel here and there, Kirkconnel; but I rely on you to stir up no fresh treason with 'White Cockades,' or 'Bonnie Charlies,' or any other of the old shibboleths."

"Have no anxieties on that score, your Excellency; I have had too rude an awakening ever to fall a-dreaming again. 'The burnt child.'" And I bowed, and left in company with the officer told off to see to my reception.

The General's unlooked-for sympathy had gone far to restore me to my natural bearing for the moment. It is flattering to any man to be received by his military superior as a social equal, and Heaven forbid that I should pretend to a susceptibility less than the ordinary. I was greatly pleased, therefore, by his recognition, and to my admiration of his soldierly qualities was now added a warm appreciation of his interest in me and my fortunes. But no personal gratification could long blind me to the misery of my real position. Chance, inclination, and, I think I may honestly add, principle, had kept my affections disengaged and, my heart whole, without any reasonable expectation of ever realising my life's desire, and now I had stumbled upon it, only to find it inexorably withheld from me, and every avenue to its attainment closed. Could I have gone on to the end without actually meeting with Margaret, I could have borne it with the silent endurance which had supported me so far, and had, in large measure, become a habit; but now every regret, every passionate longing, every haunting memory which time had lulled into seeming slumber, awoke to wring my heart at the very moment when I believed the bitterness to have passed forever.

The first to welcome me at the convent was my son Kit. Heavens! how tall and well-looking the boy had grown, and with what feeling did I take him in my arms. He returned my embrace with equal affection, and when we settled down, spake of his mother's death with much natural feeling.

Poor Lucy! She had had a narrow life of it with the exception of the year we had lived together. What a light-hearted, merry little soul she then was! She had no education in the general sense, but was possessed of so lively a sympathy that she entered into all that appealed to me with an enjoyment and an appreciation that no mere learning could have supplied. She may have lacked the bearing and carriage of a great lady, but what stateliness of manner can rival the pretty softnesses of a gentle girl wholly in love. She was not strictly beautiful, but she had the charm of constant liveliness, and her unfailing content and merriment more than made up for any irregularity in feature. This was the woman I had left, and I have already told what she was when I returned. It was not so much her nature that was at fault, poor thing! as the atrophy of soul resulting from an ungenerous form of religion.

I cannot but think it safer for both man and woman to continue in those religions which have received the sanction of authority, than take up with any new ventures, no matter what superior offers of salvation they may hold out. And the first step towards this dangerous ground I believe to be that pernicious habit of idle speculation on subjects too sacred for open discussion, which might well be left to their ordained guardians, and not to the curious guessings of simple and unsophisticated minds.

Kit had much information to give touching others in whom I was interested. Of Mme. de St. Just he spake, as I would have expected, with the warmest admiration and gratitude; but after he had informed me that she was an inmate of the same convent in which we were, I turned the conversation towards her brother, who, I learned, was wounded sufficiently to be under the surgeon's care, and was pleased to gather that Master Kit had made a respectable showing for himself in the rescue of his Captain. That Mademoiselle de Sarennes was much concerned in Nairn's condition I was glad to hear, as such an interest could not fail to be of service when she should learn of her brother's fate, of which I took care to make no mention, as I had no desire to figure as the bearer of what must, to her, prove painful tidings.

"Your Captain is fortunate to engage the sympathies of so fair an enemy," was my only remark.

"Why, father, we do not look on them as enemies at all!" he returned, with the ingenuousness of his years.

"Look you here, Master Kit, I cannot have you calling me 'father'; it has altogether too responsible a sound, and I do not wish to begin and bring you to book for matters which may, later on, call for a parent's judgment. Call me 'Chevalier,' if you like, it is more companionable, and it is as comrades you and I must live, unless you wish to have me interfering with you in a manner you might naturally enough resent later on. I love you heartily my boy, and it is love, not authority, I wish to be the bond between us. What do you say yourself?"

"It can never be anything less than that, sir; you know how I was drawn to you that very first morning, when I entered your room in Wych Street; you were the finest gentleman I had ever seen."

"Well, you have seen better since, Kit."

"None better to me, sir." And he added, hurriedly, as if to cover his emotion, "Will you come over to us, now that we are victorious?"

"Oh, Kit, Kit, you are a true Englishman! Victorious! Why, great Heavens! We beat you fifty times over, only to-day! Not that it will make any great matter in the long run, perhaps, for it is no question of a single battle for either Levis or Murray, it is the arrival of the first ships which will decide this affair. Wait until they come up, and then it will be time enough to talk of victory."

The lad's face fell. "I mean for ourselves," he said, wistfully; "this can't go on with us on different sides."

"That is a serious matter for the principals, no doubt, Kit; but we need not worry over it, for I am not likely to be exchanged, the way things now are."

"But when it is decided?"

"Your way, Kit?"

"I mean _if_ it is decided our way," he corrected. "You will come back?"

"Come back to what? You forget I am still a proscribed rebel with a price on my head."

"But that is long past."

"So Dr. Archie Cameron thought, but they hanged him like a dog not so many years ago, and I do not know that he was deeper in the affair than I. That I am not a very ardent rebel, I will confess; but I have grown too old in rebellion to shift my character readily. Besides, I fancy I am more of a Frenchman than an Englishman, or even a Scotchman; and the worst of such a transmogrification is, that one grows used to it, and change becomes wellnigh impossible. But you have chosen wisely, my boy. I wouldn't have you different for the world!"

"It is not for myself I speak. I am thinking of you, sir."

"God bless you, Kit! I would rather have those words from you than a free pardon. And now good-night, or rather, good-day. You have your duties before you, and I must get some sleep;" and I embraced the generous boy with a full heart.

The next afternoon I set out to look over the town and mark the effect of the English fire during the bombardment, and could not but admire how destructive it had been, nor withhold my approval of the efforts the garrison had put forth during the past winter to repair the results of their own handiwork.

As I wandered round the Cape I caught sight of le pere Jean leaning against the parapet of la batterie du Clerge, gloomily surveying the dismal prospect of a river full of drifting ice and a desolate and half-frozen country beyond.

He turned as I approached, and greeted me with a return of the manner that was once habitual with him. "I was glad to hear you found friends last night, Chevalier."

"Thank you, yes. I found friends both new and old," I answered, glancing at him curiously.

But he had turned towards the river again, and waved his hand outward. "This is all emblematic of our fortress, I fear --dissolution," he said, wearily.

"One might descant on the promise of spring and the renewal of hope, but in reality I gather as little from the prospect as you do," I returned. And side by side we leaned over the parapet, and continued to indulge our cheerless speculations in silence.

"Chevalier," said the priest, suddenly, but in his usual tone, and without changing his position, "perhaps I owe you a more formal apology than was possible last night; but when I found that Mademoiselle Nairn--"

"Mme. de St. Just," I corrected.

"It is scarce worth while to keep up that fiction between us," he said, as if waiving the most ordinary form in the world, and in some manner I checked the cry of astonishment that was on my lips, and remained silent while he continued. "When I found Mademoiselle Nairn in your company, I too hastily assumed that it was by design on your part."

I was so bewildered by this unconscious revelation that I could make no reply; but, fortunately, he did not mark my agitation, and went on as though speaking to himself: "Right or wrong, I have been the means of keeping her from you thus far; and if I have sinned in so doing, I must bear the consequence."

As he spake he turned and faced me, but by this I had recovered command of myself, and saw that his thin face was flushed and drawn with suffering. "Let me go on," he said, with decision. "I owe an explanation to myself as well as to you."

Just what he said I cannot clearly recall. The revelation he had made was so astounding, had so completely changed the whole complexion of my outlook, that my brain could scarce apprehend the import of his words. I only realised that Margaret was no longer beyond my reach. The rest mattered not one whit.

When he ceased speaking, I briefly exposed what had been my position throughout, without reserve or argument, leaving it to him to draw his own conclusion.

"Chevalier," cried the priest, heartily, as I ended, "I feel that any apology would be frivolous in the face of what you have told me, but I can assure you no man was ever more satisfied to find himself in the wrong than I."

"I take that as more than any apology," I returned, as sincerely. "But to return to Sarennes. What use did he make of my letter?"

"He attempted such a use that the outcome of your meeting with him is fully justified."

"It was justified as it was!" I objected. "I do not fight on trifles. Do you mean, he tried to persuade Margaret that it referred to her?"

"He did. And though I was enabled to save her from personal danger, I could do nothing to relieve the distress he had wrought by these means."

"The hound! It would have been a satisfaction to have known this when I met him."

"Remember, though, it is entirely owing to the loyalty of his mother and sister that her position here has been possible."

"That is true; but I see as clearly, that her reception by them was only possible through your answering for her. I owe you everything."

"You owe me much," he said, quietly, as if to himself. And at the simple words of self-abnegation my heart ached at the thought of the pain I had involuntarily caused.

"I am sorry for any family that holds so black a sheep as Sarennes," I said, to break the awkward pause that followed.

"His family need know nothing, beyond that he died on the field of battle, a much more desirable fate than he was likely to meet with in France, had he lived; for, believe me, information has gone forward that will insure the trial and, I trust, the punishment of every peculator who has helped to ruin this miserable colony, no matter which way the present crisis may turn."

"Now that we have confidence in each other, may I ask why you never let me know of your presence in Canada?"

"To be frank, I had no desire to awaken old associations. So far as I knew the past was a book that had been read and done with. Nothing was to be gained by reopening it under the same conditions, and I had no reason to suppose they could be altered. Remember it is only now my eyes have been opened, and I see the error of my warped and ignorant judgment. We have travelled a long road, Chevalier, to meet in friendship, and I am glad we can so meet at last. I always regret when my feeling towards an honourable man cannot go beyond mere liking."

"Gaston," I cried, "I never received so handsome a compliment in all my life!"