Peter Simple; and, The Three Cutters, Vol. 1-2

by Frederick Marryat

"Then we understand each other," replied O'Brien; "this boy will give two hundred—one half shall be yours, if you will assist."

"I will think of it," replied the gendarme, who then talked about indifferent subjects, until we arrived at a small town, called Acarchot, where we proceeded to a cabaret. The usual curiosity passed over we were left alone, O'Brien telling the gendarme that he would expect his reply that night or to-morrow morning. The gendarme said, to-morrow morning. O'Brien requesting him to take charge of me, he called the woman of the cabaret to show him a room; she showed him one or two, which he refused, as not sufficiently safe for the prisoner. The woman laughed at the idea, observing, "What had he to fear from a pauvre enfant like me?"

"Yet this pauvre enfant escaped from Givet," replied O'Brien; "these Englishmen are devils from their birth." The last room showed to O'Brien suited him, and he chose it—the woman not presuming to contradict a gendarme. As soon as they came down again, O'Brien ordered me to bed, and went up-stairs with me. He bolted the door, and pulling me to the large chimney, we put our heads up, and whispered, that our conversation should not be heard. "This man is not to be trusted," said O'Brien, "and we must give him the slip. I know my way out of the inn, and we must return the way we came, and then strike off in another direction."

"But will he permit us?"

"Not if he can help it; but I shall soon find out his manoeuvres."

O'Brien then went and stopped the key-hole, by hanging his handkerchief across it, and stripping himself of his gendarme uniform, put on his own clothes; then he stuffed the blankets and pillow into the gendarme's dress, and laid it down on the outside of the bed, as if it were a man sleeping in his clothes—indeed, it was an admirable deception. He laid his musket by the side of the image, and then did the same to my bed, making it appear as if there was a person asleep in it, of my size, and putting my cap on the pillow. "Now, Peter, we'll see if he is watching us. He will wait till he thinks we are asleep." The light still remained in the room, and about an hour afterwards we heard a noise of one treading on the stairs, upon which, as agreed, we crept under the bed. The latch of our door was tried, and finding it open, which he did not expect, the gendarme entered, and looking at both beds, went away. "Now," said I, after the gendarme had gone down-stairs, "O'Brien, ought we not to escape?"

"I've been thinking of it, Peter, and I have come to a resolution that we can manage it better. He is certain to come again in an hour or two. It is only eleven. Now I'll play him a trick." O'Brien then took one of the blankets, make it fast to the window, which he left wide open, and at the same time disarranged the images he had made up, so as to let the gendarme perceive that they were counterfeit. We again crept under the bed, and as O'Brien foretold, in about an hour more the gendarme returned; our lamp was still burning, but he had a light of his own. He looked at the beds, perceived at once that he had been duped, went to the open window, and then exclaimed, "Sacre Dieu! ils m'ont echappés et je ne suis plus caporal. F——tre! à la chasse!" He rushed out of the room, and in a minute afterwards we heard him open the street door, and go away.

"That will do, Peter," said O'Brien, laughing; "now we'll be off also, although there's no great hurry." O'Brien then resumed his dress of a gendarme; and about an hour afterwards we went down, and wishing the hostess all happiness, quitted the cabaret, returning the same road by which we had come. "Now, Peter," said O'Brien, "we're in a bit of a puzzle. This dress won't do any more, still there's a respectability about it, which will not allow me to put it off till the last moment." We walked on till daylight, when we hid ourselves in a copse of trees. At night we again started for the forest of Ardennes, for O'Brien said our best chance was to return, until they supposed that we had had time to effect our escape; but we never reached the forest, for on the next day a violent snowstorm came on; it continued without intermission for four days, during which we suffered much. Our money was not exhausted, as I had drawn upon my father for £60, which, with the disadvantageous exchange, had given me fifty Napoleons. Occasionally O'Brien crept into a cabaret, and obtained provisions; but, as we dared not be seen together as before, we were always obliged to sleep in the open air, the ground being covered more than three feet with snow. On the fifth day, being then six days from the forest of Ardennes, we hid ourselves in a small wood, about a quarter of a mile from the road. I remained there while O'Brien, as a gendarme, went to obtain provisions. As usual, I looked out for the best shelter during his absence, and what was my horror at falling in with a man and woman who lay dead in the snow, having evidently perished from the weather. Just as I discovered them, O'Brien returned, and I told him; he went with me to view the bodies. They were dressed in a strange attire, ribands pinned upon their clothes, and two pairs of very high stilts lying by their sides. O'Brien surveyed them, and then said, "Peter, this is the very best thing that could have happened to us. We may now walk through France without soiling our feet with the cursed country."

"How do you mean?"

"I mean," said he, "that these are the people that we met near Montpelier, who come from the Landes, walking about on their stilts for the amusement of others, to obtain money. In their own country they are obliged to walk so. Now, Peter, it appears to me that the man's clothes will fit me, and the girl's (poor creature, how pretty she looks, cold in death!) will fit you. All we have to do is to practise a little, and then away we start."