The path of honor: A tale of the war in the Bocage

by Burton Egbert Stevenson

I grew calmer after a time; that divine rage passed and left me weak and shaken. I sat limply down upon a nearby stone and gazed at those desecrated bodies, with hot tears starting from my eyes at thought of the gallant man and fair woman for whom this hideous fate had been reserved. In that moment of anguish there was but one comforting reflection—she had died with her husband’s arms about her, his voice in her ears, his kisses on her lips.

Yet, deserted, insentient as they were, I could not leave these bodies here to rot in the sun, food for carrion birds and unclean beasts of the night. Nor could I spare the time to bury them, for the sun was already sinking toward the horizon. I glanced despairingly about me—then I saw the way.

Twenty feet above the bed of the stream some tremendous freshet had eaten into the bank and so undermined it that it seemed to hang tottering in the air. In a moment I had carried the bodies, one by one, into the shadow of this bank and laid them tenderly side by side. Then I hesitated—but only for an instant. I went straight to the spot where Pasdeloup lay, and half dragging, half carrying, placed him at last beside his master, where he surely had the right to lie—where I was certain he would have wished to lie.

As I was about to turn away a sudden thought struck me. I had donned my gayest suit the night before,—the suit indeed I had not thought to wear until I approached the high altar at Poitiers,—and though it was already sadly soiled and torn, it must still attract attention to a man with no better means of conveyance than his legs. Here was a disguise ready to my hand; for under the rude garments which Pasdeloup had worn—stained as they were with blood and dirt—no one would suspect the Royalist. In a moment I had stripped off his stockings, blouse and breeches, cleaned the caked mud from them as well as I could, and throwing my own garments over him, donned his,—not without a shiver of repugnance,—taking care to transfer to my new attire my purse, my ammunition, and the one pistol which remained to me, and to secure the knife which had already done such execution, and which I found gripped in his right hand. I tied his coarse handkerchief about my head, and stopping only for a little prayer clambered to the top of the bank and with my sword began to loosen the overhanging earth. Great cracks showed here and there, and it must soon have fallen of its own weight. So very little remained for me to do, and at the end of a moment’s work I saw the cracks slowly widen.

Then, with a dull crash which echoed along the valley, the earth fell upon the bodies, burying them to a depth of many feet, safe from desecration by the fang of brute or the eye of man.

The tears were streaming down my face as I turned away; but I could not linger, for darkness was at hand and I had already been too long absent from my charge. I flung my sword far down the cliff, for I would have no further need of it, then with all the speed at my command I retraced my steps along the bed of the stream and upward toward the ledge of rock. As I approached it I fancied I saw a figure slip quickly out of sight behind the vines. Dreading I knew not what, I hastened my steps, swept aside the curtain and stooped to enter.

But even as I did so there came a burst of flame almost in my face, and I felt a sharp, vivid pain tear across my cheek.

CHAPTER XVIII.
CIRCE’S TOILET.

So blinded was I by the flash and by the swirl of acrid smoke which followed it that for an instant I thought there had been some terrible explosion—another mine perhaps, designed to wreck our cavern and entomb us beneath the rocks. Then, in an agony of fear, not for myself, but for the girl confided to my keeping, I sprang forward, determined to close with my assailant before he could fire again. Once my fingers were at his throat, I knew he would never fire....

But at the third step I stumbled over some obstruction and came headlong to the floor. I was up again in an instant, my back to the wall, my pistol in my hand, wondering at my escape. But there was no second attack, not a sound, save my own hurried breathing.