A Sheaf of Bluebells

by Baroness Emmuska Orczy Orczy

II

Just then there came a knock at her bedroom door.

Madame thought it might be Fernande, or else Annette bringing her more food which she did not want, and impatiently she called: "Come in!"

The door was thrown open; she could see it from where she stood, and she turned, thinking that it must be Annette. The next moment she gave a cry:

"Laurent!"

She ran into the next room, her heart and mind suddenly assailed with a horrible foreboding. Laurent was standing on the threshold, pale, haggard, trembling visibly. His clothes were soiled, his boots muddy, his eyes looked dazed and feverish.

"Laurent, in the name of God, what has happened?" queried Denise de Mortain as calmly as she could, after she had dragged Laurent into the room and closed the door behind him.

He staggered to a chair and threw himself into it, in an obvious state of physical exhaustion.

"Where is Fernande?" were the first words which came to his lips.

"Fernande?" queried Madame with a frown. "I don't know. In her room, I think. But never mind about Fernande now. Tell me, in God's name, why you are here?"

"Fernande is not in her room," he retorted savagely, and, wearied though he so obviously was, he jumped up from his chair and stood facing his mother with hands clenched, eyes glowing and cheeks aflame. "Where is she?"

"I don't know," replied Madame as firmly and unconcernedly as she could. "She may be as impatient as I am and, unable to sit still, she may be wandering about somewhere in the house or round the gardens. I don't know, I tell you," she added fiercely. "Laurent, I insist upon knowing what your presence here means at this hour, when I thought you on the way to Domfront."

She tried to force him to look her squarely in the eyes. There was something so awful, so paralysing in the terror which was invading her whole being, that she dared not yet face the thoughts which at sight of Laurent had rushed wildly through her brain. She wanted to force an explanation from him, for she felt now that anything he said must be simpler, more intelligible than the horrible surmises which froze the very blood in her veins. But Laurent would not meet her searching gaze. Instead of this, he threw himself back into the chair, and, burying his head in his hands, he burst into a passionate flood of weeping.

He was weak, exhausted, footsore, his nerves were obviously strained to breaking point. Denise de Mortain's cold heart melted at the sight of his grief, but she made no movement to soothe him. The puzzled frown settled more deeply between her brows, and after a while, when Laurent's paroxysm had somewhat subsided, and he leaned his head in utter dejection and weariness against the back of the chair, she tapped her foot impatiently against the ground.

"Laurent," she said more quietly after a while, "you must tell me what all this means. You must try and collect yourself as quickly as you can and try to explain to me why you are here—and in this state—wildly calling for Fernande, when I, your mother, thought you at Domfront engaged in the execution of your duty."

"A man's first duty, Mother," he retorted fiercely, "is to watch over the treasure which God has placed in his hands. Something told me that a wolf was prowling round my fold, and I came to guard what was mine and to shoot the wolf ... if I could."

He spoke more coherently now. The violent paroxysm of weeping had eased the tension on his nerves. The look in his eyes was more full of anger, but less wild, and though heavy sobs still shook his frame from time to time, and a hot, feverish flush glowed on his cheeks and on his forehead, he was, on the whole, more master of himself.

"Will you explain more clearly what you mean?" queried Madame la Marquise coldly.

"I mean," he replied, "that ever since I parted from Fernande two days ago, torturing doubts have racked me till I thought my brain would burst. I have been on the threshold of frenzy, enduring torments of hell, the while de Puisaye and M. de Courson and all the others talked and manœuvred, and drilled and discussed plans, for the thousand thousandth time. Oh!" he continued vehemently, "I fought against my own thoughts, against my fears, against that lashing, flaying, maddening doubt. I fought against it till my head was in a whirl, and I began to marvel if, indeed, I was not insane."

"But why?" exclaimed Madame, in deeper perplexity than before. "In Heaven's name, why?"

"Will you deny, Mother," he riposted hotly, "that you, too, have felt doubts about Fernande?—that you, too, have watched the play of emotion on her face, the quiver of her mouth, the soft look in her eyes, the moment my brother Ronnay's name is mentioned?"

"Laurent!"

"Can you deny it?" he insisted.

Then, as she remained silent and merely shrugged her shoulders with well-affected indifference, he continued with the same vehemence: "Ah, you see, you cannot deny it! You cannot! You know that my doubts and fears are not the outcome of feverish hallucinations! Oh, my God!" he exclaimed, and put his hand up to his throat as if he were choking, "if only I could kill him with mine own hands...."

"I'll deny nothing, Laurent," interposed Madame calmly, and her harsh, stern voice acted like an icy douche on the young man's fierce passion. "I think that Fernande is foolish, childishly romantic. Something about de Maurel's personality has stirred her imagination. But there's nothing more in it than that, and...."

"Then why is she not here to-night?" he broke in savagely.

"You say that she is not here. But how do you know?"

"Because," he began, speaking slowly and measuredly, and Denise de Mortain had no cause to complain now that her son did not look her squarely in the face—"because two hours ago I saw Fernande stealing out of the château, wrapped in a dark cloak and alone, and making her way across the park. I did not want her to see me, so I stole to the gates and there watched for her coming. I wished to know whither she was going and I was determined to follow her. I watched and I waited, marvelling why she tarried. She did not come, and then I realized what a fool I had been. Whilst I had been standing on guard outside the great gates, she had slipped out by the side door in the wall, and I did not know whither she had gone. I was ready to dash my head against the iron gates; and there I stood, stupid, semi-imbecile, marvelling what I should do. Suddenly a passer-by came along and I hailed him. I asked him if he had seen a lady on the high road walking unattended and closely wrapped in a dark cloak. He answered me yes, and pointed the way she went. I thanked him, and as soon as his back was turned I started to run in the wake, as I thought, of Fernande. Then I came to a cross-road, where there was a sign-post, one arm of which bore the legend: 'La Frontenay,' and the other, 'La Vieuville.' La Vieuville, where my brother dwells! I spelt out every letter. I saw that it was distant five kilomètres. La Vieuville! Fernande had gone to La Vieuville to betray us all to Ronnay de Maurel!"

"That is false, I'll swear," exclaimed Madame, "and you, Laurent, are mad to imagine anything so monstrous against the girl whom you profess to love."

"Mad!" he riposted. "Of course I am mad! Did I not tell you that I had become mad?"

"What were you doing outside the gates of this château at nine o'clock to-night when...."

"When I should have been at Mortain," he broke in with a strident laugh, which seemed to go right through his mother's heart like a knife. "At Mortain, drilling a few oafs in the use of muskets which they haven't got. What was I doing here? Did I not say that I was watching over my property? I could not stay away, Mother," he cried wildly. "I could not! I suffered too much. I was going mad."

"So you—my son—Laurent Marquis de Mortain, preferred to turn deserter?" she asked coldly.

"Mother!"

"I have yet to learn how it comes that when my son is under orders from his chiefs, at the hour when the destinies of his King and his country are at stake, how it comes that he has deserted his post."

"I left my men in charge of young de Fleurot, my most able lieutenant. I only wanted to speak with Fernande—only to see her for five minutes. I was here—outside the gates at nine o'clock—I could have seen her and spoken with her and be back at my post long before now. Even so, there is no harm done. Our contingent was not due to start until midnight. I have arranged with de Fleurot—in case I was detained—that he shall start at the appointed hour, and I would pick up the company at the cross-roads less than a kilomètre from here and not more than three from Domfront. But I should have been back at Mortain long before now," he reiterated testily, "only when I saw Fernande stealing out of the park like a pert wench going to meet her gallant, I lost my head and I followed her."

"All the way to La Vieuville?"

"All the way."

"And you saw her?"

"No."

"Had she been to the château?"

"No one could tell me. The château was shut up and dark. I hammered on the door. No one replied. I would have broken in the door, but it resisted my every onslaught."

"Then what did you do?"

"I lay in wait for some time—my pistol in my hand. If I had seen him, I would have shot him ... him and Fernande too."

"How long did you wait?"

"I don't know ... half an hour perhaps—perhaps more. No one came. The château was deserted. Somewhere in it, no doubt, Gaston de Maurel, that old reprobate, lay dying. But I realized that Fernande was not there, so I came away."

"Well? And then?"

"I came back here," he replied savagely. "I am here now to ask you where is Fernande?"

"Yes, you are here, my son," rejoined Denise de Mortain harshly, "at the post of dishonour, while your father and kindred are fighting for France."

"Mother!"

But now at last she turned on him with all the fury of a tigress roused to wrath. She had interrogated him coolly, firmly, smothering the horror and the indignation which she felt. But the floodgates of her emotion would no longer be kept back; they broke into a torrent of unbridled vituperation.

"Traitor! deserter!" she cried. "How dare you remain here another minute? How dare you whine and fret before me, while every moment of the night is fraught with danger for your King and his cause? How dare you run on the high roads after a wench, like a jealous, love-sick swain, while your King hath need of every ounce of energy, of courage which you possess. Out of my sight, craven deserter! and pray to God that He may grant you grace to atone for your treachery with your blood!"

"Mother ..." he protested firmly, as, stung by her words as with a lash, he had jumped to his feet and made a desperate effort to pull himself together.

"Not another word," she commanded. "When you have redeemed your cowardice by prodigies of valour, when you have held Domfront for your King in the face of overwhelming odds, you may come to me again ... but not before."

She turned her back on him without another look and swept out of the room, leaving him standing there miserable, dejected, a hot flush of shame on each cheek as if she had struck him there. Once in the darkened boudoir, she tottered as far as the open window. Her knees were giving way under her. She leaned against the window-frame and with her hand clung desperately to the heavy curtain. Not a breath of air came from outside; the storm was at its height—vivid flashes of lightning tore the heavens asunder and the thunder crashed continuously overhead. A great sob broke from Denise de Mortain's throat. She had suffered this night the keenest torture, the deadliest ignominy, which heart of woman can endure; she had seen her beloved son—the one cherished idol of her loveless heart—sunk to a level of degradation from which nothing could ever raise him again.

She had seen him the prey of a base and futile passion, tortured by insensate jealousy which caused him to forget the most elementary dictates of honour. Desertion at the hour preceding the battle was infamy so heinous, that in her heart Denise de Mortain would have been vastly happier if they had brought Laurent to her on a stretcher—dead.