"Yes, kind sir," drawled out Tortillard, with a nasal twang and canting, hypocritical tone; "may God bless you for your charity to the poor blind! Here, father, take my arm; lean on my shoulder, father; take care, take care, gently;" and, with affected zeal and tenderness, the urchin guided the steps of the brigand till they reached the indicated spot. As the pair approached Lysander, he uttered a low, growling noise; but as the Schoolmaster brushed past him, and the sagacious animal had full scent of his garments, he broke out into one of those deep howls with which, it is asserted by the superstitious, dogs frequently announce an approaching death.
"What, in the devil's name, do all these cursed animals mean by their confounded noise?" said the Schoolmaster to himself. "Can they smell the blood on my clothes, I wonder? for I now recollect I wore the trousers I have on at present the night the cattle-dealer was murdered."
"Did you notice that?" inquired Jean René of Father Châtelain. "Why, I vow that, as often as old Lysander had caught scent of the wandering stranger, he actually set up a regular death-howl."
And this remark was followed up by a most singular confirmation of the fact; the cries of Lysander were so loud and mournful that the other dogs caught the sound (for the farmyard was only separated from the kitchen by a glazed window in the latter), and, according to the custom of the canine race, they each strove who should outdo the other in repeating and prolonging the funereal wail, which, according to vulgar belief, always foretells death. Though but little given to superstitious dread, the farm-people looked from one to another with a feeling of wonder not unmixed with awe. Even the Schoolmaster himself, diabolically hardened as he was, felt a cold shudder steal over him at the thought that all these fatal sounds burst forth upon the approach of him—the self-convicted murderer! while Tortillard, too audacious and hardened to enter into such alarms, with all the infidelity in which he had been trained, even from his mother's arms, looked on with delighted mockery at the universal panic, and was, perhaps, the only person present devoid of an uneasy feeling; but, once freed from his apprehensions of suffering from the violence of the animals, he listened even with pleasure to the horrible discord of their long-drawn-out wailings, and felt almost tempted to pardon them the fright they had originally occasioned him, in consideration of the perfect terror they had struck into the inhabitants of the farm, and for the gratification he derived from the convulsive horror of the Schoolmaster. But after the momentary stupor had passed away Jean René again quitted the kitchen, and the loud cracking of his whip soon put an end to the prophetic howlings of Médor, Turk, and Sultan, and quickly dispersed them to their separate kennels, and as the noise ceased, the gloomy cloud passed away from the kitchen, and the peasants looked up with the same honest cheerfulness they had worn upon the entrance of the two travellers. Ere long they had left off wondering at the repulsive ugliness of the Schoolmaster, and only thought with pity of his great affliction, in being blind; they commiserated the lameness of the poor boy, admired the interesting sharpness of his countenance, the deep, cute glance of his ever-moving eye, and, above all, loaded him with praises for the extreme care and watchfulness with which he attended to his afflicted parent. The appetite of the labourers, which had been momentarily forgotten, now returned with redoubled violence, and for a time nothing could be heard but the clattering of plates and rattling of knives and forks. Still, however busily employed with their suppers, the servants assembled round the table, both male and female, could not but remark, with infinite pleasure, the tender assiduity of the lad towards the blind creature who sat beside him. Nothing could exceed the devoted affection and filial care with which Tortillard prepared his meat for him, cutting both that and his bread with most accurate nicety, pouring out his drink, and never attempting even to taste a morsel himself, till his father expressed himself as having completed his supper. But, for all this dutiful attention, the young ruffian took ample and bitter revenge. Instigated as much by an innate spirit of cruelty as the desire of imitation natural to his age, Tortillard found an equal enjoyment with the Chouette in having something to torment (a bête de souffrance); and it was a matter of inexpressible exultation to his wretched mind that he, a poor, distorted, crippled, abject creature, should have it in his power to tyrannise over so powerful and ferocious a creature as the Schoolmaster,—it was like torturing a muzzled tiger. He even refined his gratification, by compelling his victim to endure all the agonies he inflicted, without wincing or exhibiting the slightest external sign of his suffering. Thus he accompanied each outward mark of devoted tenderness towards his supposed parent, by aiming a severe kick against the Schoolmaster's legs, on one of which there was (in common with many who had long worked in the galleys) a deep and severe wound, the effect of the heavy iron chain worn during the term of punishment around the right leg; and, by way of compelling the miserable sufferer to exercise a greater degree of stoical courage, the urchin always seized the moment when the object of his malice was either drinking or speaking.
"Here, dear father! here is a nice peeled nut," said Tortillard, placing on the plate of his supposed parent a nut carefully prepared.
"Good boy," said old Châtelain, smiling kindly at him. Then, addressing the bandit, he added: "However great may be your affliction, my friend, so good a son is almost sufficient to make up even for the loss of sight; but Providence is so gracious, he never takes away one blessing without sending another."
"You are quite right, kind sir! My lot is a very hard one, and, but for the noble conduct of my excellent child, I—"
A sharp cry of irrepressible anguish here broke from the quivering lips of the tortured man; the son of Bras Rouge had this time aimed his blow so effectually, that the point of his heavy-nailed shoe had reached the very centre of the wound, and produced unendurable agony.
"Father! dear father! what is the matter?" exclaimed Tortillard, in a whimpering voice; then, suddenly rising, he threw both his arms round the Schoolmaster's neck, whose first impulse of rage and pain was to stifle the limping varlet in his Herculean grasp; and so powerfully did he compress the boy's chest against his own, that his impeded respiration vented itself in a low moaning sound. A few minutes, and Tortillard's last prank would have been played; but, reflecting that the lad was for the present indispensable to the furtherance of the schemes he had on hand, the Schoolmaster, by a violent effort, controlled his desire to annihilate his tormentor, and contented himself with pushing him off his shoulders back into his own chair. The sympathising group around the table were far from seeing through all this, and merely considered these close embraces as an interchange of paternal and filial tenderness, while the half suffocation and deadly pallor of Tortillard they attributed to emotion caused by the sudden illness of his beloved father.
"What ailed you just now, my good man?" inquired Father Châtelain; "only see, you have quite frightened your poor boy. Why, he looks pale as death, and can scarcely breathe. Come, my little man; you must not take on so—your father is all right again."