The Wounded Name

by D. K. Broster

(3)

The bronze hair was scattered on the pillow. Except for brows and lashes the only trace of colour in the upturned face that it surrounded was the blue stain beneath the shut eyes, for the shut lips had none. But the blood and dust which had disfigured that visage yesterday were gone; it was now so utterly bloodless that it had become mere sculpture, too fine-drawn for life—a little severe, almost disdainful. Lying there so straight and motionless and low, Aymar de la Rocheterie, in the hands of his enemies, had the aspect of a dead Crusader.

And it was of him that vile thing had just been said, the other side of the door!

Laurent stood petrified. He felt himself guilty, polluted, a party to that terrible lie. His instant impulse was to cry to the still figure, "Forgive me for having even heard it—for not having had time to deny it for you . . . this idea of a madman! You betray your men!" Then the knowledge swamped him like a flood to what deaf ears he would cry. L'Oiseleur was . . . surely . . . dying.

Oh, why had he not tried sooner to go with him yesterday? Now it was too late. There was no visible lift of breathing under the bedclothes, smoothly disposed as they were up to the very chin. And, pierced with an even keener pain than yesterday's, Laurent went nearer to the bed, drawn as by a magnet to something he was half afraid to approach, remembering Devonshire and the bright salmon river, the stranger who had so lightly risked his life for him, who had shown him the amulet—the useless amulet—the brilliant friend he had reëncountered in Paris, the lover he had guessed at in the Tuileries garden. Was this to be the end of all that charm and vigour and young renown?

And at that moment, as if to answer him . . . but in what sense? . . . Aymar de la Rocheterie opened his eyes and looked at him.

Laurent suffered a double shock, since, apart from their unmistakable warm red-brown colour, they did not seem to be L'Oiseleur's eyes at all. They were immensely large and even lustrous, but they had no life in them, nor, as Laurent almost instantly realized, any power of recognition worth the name. They might have seen something, but it certainly was not he. For the space of ten heart-beats or so they remained open; then the lashes fell again on to the blue circles and so stayed. There was no other movement.

Thank God, he was still alive then. But why, in this extremity, had he been left alone? The Colonel had said that they were doing their best to save him. There seemed a quantity of objects to that end on the table by the bed; the grey-panelled, well-furnished room with its two windows—a sitting-room, evidently—was very pleasant; there was a little fire burning; the bed itself, even if narrow, had fine linen sheets and an embroidered counterpane. But for all that it was patent that he who lay in it lay very near the brink of a swifter river than the Dart. That indeed Laurent had guessed and feared yesterday; but the other dark flood lapping at him—the atrocious calumny—how was that to be stayed? Yet, if Aymar de la Rocheterie were dying, so long as he had a tongue in his head he should not die sullied by so horrible a charge.

And, with a rapidly beating heart, he found himself away from the bedside staring through the window. How dared they say such a thing? As he asked himself the question the key turned in the lock. A sharp voice outside said rapidly, "Sentry? nonsense! I won't have one here, tell the Colonel!—Another prisoner waiting for me? Yes, I know." And the speaker entered, a short, stout, more than middle-aged man in civilian attire, with a pair of rather fierce eyes under shaggy grizzled brows. He threw a quick glance at Laurent, said, "In a moment!" and, crossing to the bed, bent over its occupant and slipped his hand under the bedclothes.

He was there a full minute; then he came away compressing his lips and frowning. "Now, Monsieur, I am at your service. It is your head, I see. Sit down, please. A cut? Anything else?"

Laurent did not sit down. "For God's sake, Monsieur le Docteur, tell me what is the meaning of that?" And he made a gesture towards the bed.

"Heart failure and collapse from excessive loss of blood is the meaning of that, Monsieur," replied the doctor rather curtly. "If you will kindly sit down and let me examine your head—"

"There's nothing there but a scratch," returned the young man, still uncomplying. "And that is not exactly what I meant. It's this dreadful story—they must all be lunatics in this place to think such a thing of him!"

The surgeon looked at him keenly. "You know who he is, then?"

"I do; but surely the Bonapartists do not—that is their only excuse. L'Oiseleur, the Vicomte de la Rocheterie, betray his own men! It's . . . it's grotesque!"

"You speak very confidently, Monsieur. But they do know quite well who he is, and I am afraid the story is only too true."

At that Monsieur de Courtomer, with almost a gesture of desperation, took the handkerchief off his head and sat down in the chair. "That is rank lunacy," he observed. "It was bad enough to come across him being brought here in this state—as I did yesterday—but to hear this slander in addition is like being in a nightmare. Even if I did not know him personally——"

The surgeon's hands, which were pushing the hair away from the scratch, stopped. "Ah, you know him personally," he said quickly. "You are a friend of his, then?"

Laurent's eyes turned towards the effigy in the bed. "I should be proud indeed if I could claim that distinction. An acquaintance would, I am afraid, be nearer the mark."

"And a champion," supplied the doctor.

"L'Oiseleur needs no champion," retorted the young man.

The hand fell somewhat weightily on his shoulder. "Indeed he does, Monsieur," returned its owner, and his voice was no longer sharp. "I assure you he stands in need of one rather badly just now. . . . And, for the moment, in need still more of something else."

Then he took his hand away, dropping all pretence of examining the hurt. His round face was very grave, and the fierceness had quite gone out of his little eyes. He looked at Laurent.

And Laurent stared back at him. "Something else," he repeated stupidly after an instant; and then, abruptly, "Tell me, is he going to live?"

"I don't know," answered M. Perrelet. The three words were eloquent. After a second or two he added, "He cannot hear; you need not be afraid," and went on, "I have only kept him alive so far by unremitting care and the constant use of stimulants. I have hardly left him for five minutes since he came. I shall sit up with him again to-night, but even if I succeed in pulling him through till to-morrow, I cannot go on doing that, for I'm an old man, with my work to do in the day . . ." He broke off and looked at Laurent again.

A certain dismayed realization of whither this was tending came over M. de Courtomer. "But, good Heavens, I could not take your place! No one in the world knows less of medicine, less of nursing, than I do. I could not undertake the responsibility!"

"Then you are undertaking a heavier," responded the surgeon meaningly. "Without the most incessant care these next few days, that young man will just flicker out. It's a question whether he doesn't do it in any case."

"But surely you could get someone——"

"Yes, some stupid orderly into whose head I could perhaps drum something which he would do unwillingly and with contempt in his heart, because it is not only for an enemy—that he could stomach—but for a renegade. For this story, true or no, is known to every soul in the garrison." And, as Laurent gave an exclamation, he went on, "The result of such 'nursing' would inevitably be that he would slip through my fingers. And I cannot bring in a woman from the village; the Colonel would not hear of it, and indeed it would not be much better. I'm no sentimentalist, Monsieur, but, guilty or innocent, what that unfortunate young man needs now as he never needed it, probably, in his life before, is just what Providence seems to have sent him—a friend! If it is a friend who still believes in him, so much the better. The only friend he does not want is one who, having seen his necessity, will pass him by on the other side."

How could he hesitate! He had wanted to meet L'Oiseleur, owed his capture very likely to the indulgence of that desire, and was needing to be urged to tend him now that he had thus tragically encountered him! Laurent put out his hand, his eyes smarting rather uncomfortably.

"I'll do it. I'll do anything you want. But I shall probably kill him," he added miserably.

He who claimed to be no sentimentalist patted him on the shoulder.

"No, you will not. And I shall be here myself until to-morrow. Now I will just wash that scratch of yours and put some more plaster on it, and then I will make them bring a bed for you in here." He worked quickly and deftly till Laurent's forehead was adorned with an impressive star. "There, that will do for the present. I must get something down his throat now—not very easy, but imperatively necessary every hour or so. You had better watch me."

And Laurent watched, nervously realizing what he, so totally inexperienced, was about to undertake.

"He is unconscious, you say," he whispered, looking at the paper-white face on the surgeon's arm. "But he opened his eyes and looked at me a little before you came in."

M. Perrelet laid the inert head with its dulled and tangled locks very gently back on the pillow. "He is quite unconscious at this moment. From time to time he comes to the surface, as it were. If he is going to live he will do that oftener, until he stays there altogether." He slipped his hand under the bedclothes again. "Yes, the pulse, fast as it is, seems a trifle stronger. With your help, Monsieur, I have hopes . . . I have great hopes. There is evidently much natural vitality." And he left the bedside, adding briskly, "I will just run down and tell Colonel Guitton that you have volunteered your services."

"I should like to see the Colonel myself as soon as possible," observed Laurent. "I must disabuse his mind at once of this preposterous idea about M. de la Rocheterie."

"I am afraid that you will not find it very easy to do that, Monsieur," said the doctor, shaking his head. "Facts stand in the way."

"Facts!" ejaculated Laurent with illimitable scorn.

"There was undoubtedly treachery at Pont-aux-Rochers. Colonel Richard, commanding at Saint-Goazec, had definite information sent him that L'Oiseleur's men would pass the bridge at a certain hour last Friday; he acted on the information, which purported to come from L'Oiseleur himself, ambushed the unprepared Chouans, and smashed them up."

"Well," said Laurent with a little grimace, "information may have been sent to this Colonel Richard, but that it should have been sent by La Rocheterie himself, by their own commander, by L'Oiseleur, who for more than a year before the Restoration kept the Imperialists at bay single-handed is, as I said before, grotesque!"

M. Perrelet shrugged his shoulders. "I assure you I should prefer to think so, too. But, in that case, why did his men shoot him?"

"That idea is equally grotesque, Monsieur le Docteur. They would be incapable of such a thing. They did not shoot him, that's all.—What are his wounds, by the way? Very serious, I suppose?"

"No, not in themselves, except that he has a bullet lodged in his left shoulder which I rather dislike because I do not know how, in this state of exhaustion, he is ever going to stand the extraction. He has also had a ball through the right side, a little above the hipbone, which, by some miracle, has touched nothing vital. And there is a painful but superficial glancing wound across the chest.—But what did the mischief was the haemorrhage; tied as he was in an upright position to that tree, and abandoned there for goodness knows how long . . . and he evidently struggled hard to get free . . . you can imagine——"

Laurent's face had slowly blanched as he stared at him.

"It is really true—about that tree!"

"I do not see what object the contingent who found him could have in making up such a story. And when he was brought in he had a cut end of rope dangling from either wrist. I saw them with my own eyes—and the state of his wrists, too!"

Laurent could feel now that he had turned pale. Could so unspeakable a thing have been the prelude to that forlorn journey in the cart!

"Yes, you see, Monsieur," said the doctor rather sadly, "it's pretty conclusive."

"Ah, not a bit!" retorted Laurent, recovering himself. "All it proves is that an attempt was made to murder him. To put the attempt down to his own men is the insanest of conjectures. He may have been captured by some band of marauders, or by Fédérés from the nearest town—or even by the Imperialists themselves . . . not these of Arbelles, but some other force. Yes, how can you disprove that it was the Imperialists?"

"Well, for one thing," replied M. Perrelet drily, "because I imagine that regulars would have made a more thorough job of it. But I am quite open to conviction, for I don't mind telling you that—unsentimental old curmudgeon though I am—I took a sort of fancy to the unhappy young man from the moment I saw him yesterday. . . And now I will go and see the Colonel. You are sure that you do not repent?"

"I am alarmed," replied Laurent with much truth, "but certainly I do not repent.—By the way," he added, as the doctor was at the door, "does M. de la Rocheterie himself know of the existence of this slander?"

M. Perrelet raised his eyebrows. "It all depends on what happened in the wood—the Bois des Fauvettes, I believe it is called. If his men shot him, it was presumably on account of the imputation that they did so; therefore he must know of it."

"Well, I am confident that that did not happen in the wood," proclaimed Laurent. "But has he learnt of the calumny since? Does he even know where he is?"

"Almost certainly not," replied the doctor. "He has never been sufficiently conscious. So he cannot have learnt of the charge since, and if he is really quite ignorant of it—well, there's no need to tell him yet awhile . . . if ever," he added under his breath. Then he turned the useless handle of the door. "Peste! I forgot I was locked in on your account!"

When Laurent was once more alone he ventured over to the bed again, and stood looking down at it in a tempest of pity and horror and indignation. That was L'Oiseleur . . . in need of a friend! And Fate had chosen him for the part. Fate had been bringing them together all the time! Ah, now he could repay that leap into the river—repay it doubly, perhaps, not only by caring for La Rocheterie's hurt body, but also for his honour, which seemed to have suffered so desperate and inexplicable a wound. . . .

Yet how could he, a prisoner, discover of what disastrous occurrence in the Bois des Fauvettes L'Oiseleur had been a victim, till L'Oiseleur himself could tell him? And perhaps those pale lips would never speak again. His own mouth twitched. "You shall live!" he said. "You shall . . . you will!"