Gerald Fitzgerald, the Chevalier: A Novel

by Charles James Lever

‘The greater fool he! He ought to have known that the Pastore was not likely to requite a good office with cruelty,’ said Gerald.

‘As to that, it would depend on what humour he was in at the moment.’ Then, after a pause, he added, ‘If you like to risk the chance of finding him in a good temper, you have only to borrow a coat and cap from one of my boys, and take that letter. You will tell him that it was I sent you on with it, and he ‘ll ask no further question.’

‘And these hands of mine that you said would betray me,’ said Gerald, ‘what shall I do to disguise them?’

* Some fresh walnuts will soon colour them, and your face too; and now let me direct you as to the road you ‘ll take.’ And so the miller, drawing Gerald to the window, began to describe the route, pointing out various prominent objects as landmarks.

Having acquainted himself, so far as he could, with all the details of the way, Gerald proceeded to costume himself for the expedition, and so completely had the dye on his skin and the change of dress metamorphosed him, that for a second or two the miller did not recognise him.

With a touch of humour that he rarely gave way to, Gerald saluted him in rustic fashion, while in a strong peasant accent he asked if his honour had no further commands for him.

The miller laughed good-humouredly, and shook his hand in adieu. ‘I more than suspect the black mare will be mine,’ muttered he, as he looked after Gerald till he disappeared in the distance.

For miles and miles Gerald walked on without paying any attention to the scene around him; the spirit of adventure occupied his mind to the exclusion of all else, and he not only imagined every possible issue to the present adventure, but fancied what his sensations might have been were it his fortune to have been launched upon the great enterprise to which his hopes so long had tended. ‘Oh, if this were but Scotland or Ireland,’ thought he; ‘if my foot now only trod the soil that I could call my own; if I could but realise to myself once, even once, the glorious sense of being recognised as one of that race that once ruled there as sovereigns; if I could but taste the intoxication of that generous devotion that through all his calamities once cheered my father, I ‘d think the moment had repaid me for all the cares of life! And now it has all passed away like a dream. As Purcell said, “They want us no longer!” “We belong to the past, and have no significance in the present! Strange, sad, mysterious destiny!” There was a humiliation in that feeling that gave him intense pain; it was the sense of being cut off from all sympathy, estranged from the wishes, the hopes, the ambition of his fellow-men. Out of an isolation like that it was that Gabriel Riquetti had taught him to believe men achieve their greatest successes. You must first of all feel yourself alone, all alone in life, ere you can experience that liberty that ensures free action.

This was one of his axioms which he loved to repeat; and whether suggested by the scene where he had first met that wonderful man, or merely induced by the course of reflection, many of Mirabeau’s early teachings and precepts rose to his memory as he journeyed along.

For some time he had been unconsciously ascending a somewhat steep mountain-path, so deeply imbedded between two lines of thick brushwood as to intercept all view at either side, when suddenly the way emerged from the dense copse and took the mountain side, disappearing at a jutting promontory of rock around which it seemed to pass. As his eye followed the track thus far he saw the flutter of what seemed a scarlet banner; but on looking longer discovered it was the gay saddle-cloth of a mule, from which the rider had apparently dismounted. He had but just time to mark this much ere the object disappeared beyond the rock.