"You tire me with reiterations, monsieur," he replied, calmly. "Since you will maintain that I have lied, do so. It is you who will suffer for your blindness, not I. I told you the truth, not really because I wished to do you a kindness, but because there was a chance of its serving my own purpose. The woman came here to find your hiding-place, and betray you to the governor. La Chatre engaged her to do so. His secretary, Montignac, took it into his head that he would like to become sole possessor of mademoiselle's time and attractions. But he could not undo the governor's plans, nor could he hope for the woman's cooperation, as she seems to have taken a dislike to him. It had been agreed that, when she had turned you over to the governor's soldiers, she should go to Fleurier to receive her reward. She had made this condition so that she might keep out of the way of Montignac. Now he dared not interfere to prevent her from doing the governor's errand, but he hoped to see more of her after that should be completed. Such, as it was necessary for him to tell me, was the state of his mind when I came along—I, ordered from court, hounded from Paris by creditors, ragged and ready for what might turn up. Near Fleurier Montignac turned up, in La Chatre's cavalcade. He wanted me to become the woman's escort to Clochonne, keep my eyes on her, know when she had settled your business, and, when she was about to start for Fleurier, keep her as his guest in a house that I was to hire in Clochonne. But why do I grow chilly telling you all this, when you do not intend to believe me? Shall we not begin, monsieur?"
"Doubtless you are vain of your skill at fabrication, monsieur," I said, wishing to deprive him of the satisfaction of thinking me deceived by his story, "but you have no reason to be. That a woman should be sent to betray an outlaw, and then a man sent to keep her in view and finally hold her,—it is complicated, to say the least. Why should you not have been sent to take me?" I thought that I had touched him here.
"That is what I asked Montignac," he replied. "But he told me that she had already been commissioned to hunt you down, before he had made up his mind to possess her by force. Moreover, it would not do to disturb the governor's plan, on which the governor was mightily set, though Montignac himself had suggested it. 'And,' said Montignac, 'you have not a woman's wit to find his hiding-place, or a woman's means of luring him from his men.' And yet, you will remember that when I thought you were a lackey, and you offered to deliver La Tournoire to me, I grasped at the chance, for I knew that, however set the governor might be on having the lady take you, he would be glad enough to have you taken by any one, and if I took you and got the reward I could afford to bear Montignac's displeasure. I think Montignac's desire to have the lady take you was due to his having suggested the plan. He wanted both the credit of having devised your capture and the pleasure of mademoiselle's society. Yes, when you held out to me the possibility, I was willing to risk Montignac's resentment and take La Tournoire myself. Before that, I had confined myself to the task of following mademoiselle. At first you and your supposed master were in my way. I had hoped to get her from you, and to obtain her esteem by the mock rescue, but this was spoiled first by my men and then by you. After that failure, I could merely follow and hope that chance would enable me to do Montignac's will."
"You cleverly mix truth and fiction, monsieur," I said. "You interest me. Go on."
It is true that he did interest me, so ingenious did I think his recital.
"I have no wish to prolong the life of one of us by this talk," he replied, "but a tale once begun should be finished. You know how you promised to deliver up La Tournoire to me. I grant that you kept the promise to the letter. During the rest of that night I lay quiet with my men. We heard your departure the next morning, and when the way was clear we followed in your track. We could do so quietly, for we were afoot; we had left our horses in another part of this wilderness the day before. We heard you greeted by your sentinel, and guessed that you were near your burrow. We came no further, but looked around and found a projecting rock, under which to lie hidden, and a tree from whose top this place could be seen. So we have lodged under the rock, one of us keeping watch night and day from the tree. I hoped thus to be able to know when you should be taken, so that I might then look to the lady. But no soldiers came for you, neither you nor the lady departed from the place, no sign came to indicate an attack or a flight. You can imagine, monsieur, how a gentleman accustomed to court pleasures and Parisian fare enjoyed the kind of life that we have been leading for these several days. Now and then one of us would crawl forth to a stream for water, or forage for nuts and berries, and we snared a few birds, which we had to eat raw, not daring to make a fire. This existence became tiresome. This afternoon three of my knaves deserted. What was I to do? It was useless to go back to Montignac without having done his work. To stay there awaiting your capture or the lady's departure was perhaps to starve. To go any distance from this place was to lose sight of the woman, who might leave at any time, and we could not know what direction she might take. The enterprise had been at best a scurvy one, fit only for a man at the end of his resources. In fine, monsieur, when the last of my men threatened to follow his comrades, I crawled out of my hole, stretched my aching bones, and resolved to let Montignac's business go to the devil. There was no chance for me in the service of the French King, therefore I came to offer myself as a member of your company. In the Huguenot cause I might earn back some of the good things of life. It no longer matters on which side I fight. 'Twas the same with Barbemouche. And, inasmuch as I had decided to cast in my fortunes with yours, I naturally wished you well. Thus it was my own interest I sought to serve, as well as yours, when I told you that this woman came here to betray you to La Chatre."
"You told me that," said I, calmly, "for one or both of two purposes,—the first, to make me withdraw my protection from the lady, in order that she might be at your disposal; the second, to get my confidence, in order that you yourself might betray me to La Chatre."
De Berquin laughed. "Am I, then, such a fool as to think that the wary
Tournoire could be put off his guard by a man? No, no. The governor or
Montignac was wise in choosing a woman for that delicate task. It is only
by a Delilah that a Samson can be caught!"
"Monsieur," I said, with ironical admiration, "you are indeed as artful in your lies as you are bold. You have constructed a story that every circumstance seems to bear out. Yet one circumstance you have forgotten, or you are not aware of it. It destroys your whole edifice. The father of Mlle. de Varion is now a prisoner, held by the governor's order, on a charge of treason for having harbored Huguenots. Would his daughter undertake to do the work of a spy and a traitor for that governor against a Huguenot? Now for your ingenuity, monsieur!"
"Such things have been known," he answered, not at all discomfited. "His daughter may not have her father's weakness for Huguenots, and if she bears resentment against the governor on her father's account, her desire of the reward may outweigh that resentment. Covetousness is strong in women. You would not expect great filial devotion in a hired spy and traitress. Moreover, for all I know, this woman may not be Mlle. de Varion, although Montignac so named her to me. She may have assumed that character at his suggestion, in order to get your confidence and sympathy, not daring to pretend to be a Huguenot, lest some habitual act might betray the deception."