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Lorraine: A romance, a novel by Robert W. Chambers |
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Chapter 13. Aide-De-Camp |
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_ CHAPTER XIII. AIDE-DE-CAMP Lorraine and Jack sprang to the road from opposite sides of the vehicle; Georges' drawn face was stretched into an attempt at a smile which was ghastly, for the stiff, black blood that had caked in a dripping ridge from his forehead to his chin cracked and grew moist and scarlet, and his hollow cheeks whitened under the coat of dust. But he drew himself up by an effort and saluted Lorraine with a punctilious deference that still had a touch of jauntiness to it--the jauntiness of a youthful cavalry officer in the presence of a pretty woman. Old Pierre, who had witnessed the episode from the butler's window, came limping down the path, holding a glass and a carafe of brandy. "You are right, Pierre," said Jack. "Georges, drink it up, old fellow. There, now you can stand on those pins of yours. What's that--a sabre cut?" "No, a scratch from an Uhlan's lance-tip. Cut like a razor, didn't it? I've just killed my horse, trying to get over a ditch. Can you give me a mount, Jack?" "There isn't a horse in the stable that can carry you to Metz," said Lorraine, quietly; "Diable is lame and Porthos is not shod. I can give you my pony." "Can't you get a train?" asked Jack, astonished. "No, the Uhlans are in our rear, everywhere. The railroad is torn up, the viaducts smashed, the wires cut, and general deuce to pay. I ran into an Uhlan or two--you notice it perhaps," he added, with a grim smile. "Could you drive me to Morteyn? Do you think the vicomte would lend me a horse?" "Of course he would," said Jack; "come, then--there is room for three," with an anxious glance at Lorraine. "Indeed, there is always room for a soldier of France!" cried Lorraine. At the same moment she instinctively laid one hand lightly on Jack's arm. Their eyes spoke for an instant--the generous appeal that shone in hers was met and answered by a response that brought the delicate colour into her cheeks. "Let me hang on behind," pleaded Georges--"I'm so dirty, you know." But they bundled him into the seat between them, and Jack touched his beribboned whip to the horse's ears, and away they went speeding over the soft forest road in the cool of the fading day; old Pierre, bottle and glass in hand, gaping after them and shaking his gray head. Jack began to fire volleys of questions at the young hussar as soon as they entered the forest, and poor Georges replied as best he could. "I don't know very much about it; I was detached yesterday and taken on General Douay's staff. We were at Wissembourg--you know that little town on the Lauter where the vineyards cover everything and the mountains are pretty steep to the north and west. All I know is this: about six o'clock this morning our outposts on the hills to the south began banging way in a great panic. They had been attacked, it seems, by the 4th Bavarian Division, Count Bothmer's, I believe. Our posts fell back to the town, where the 1st Turcos reinforced them at the railroad station. The artillery were at it on our left, too, and there was a most infernal racket. The next thing I saw was those crazy Bavarians, with their little flat drums beating, and their fur-crested helmets all bobbing, marching calmly up the Geisberg. Jack, those fellows went through the vineyards like fiends astride a tempest. That was at two o'clock. The Prussian Crown-Prince rode into the town an hour before; we couldn't hold it--Heaven knows why. That's all I saw--except the death of our general." "General Douay?" cried Lorraine, horrified. "Yes, he was killed about ten o'clock in the morning. The town was stormed through the Hagenauer Thor by the Bavarians. After that we still held the Geisberg and the Chateau. You should have seen it when we left it. I'll say it was a butcher's shambles. I'd say more if Mademoiselle de Nesville were not here." He was trying hard to bear up--to speak lightly of the frightful calamity that had overwhelmed General Abel Douay and his entire division. "The fight at the Chateau was worth seeing," said Georges, airily. "They went at it with drums beating and flags flying. Oh, but they fell like leaves in the gardens, there--the paths and shrubbery were littered with them, dead, dying, gasping, crawling about, like singed flies under a lamp. We had them beaten, too, if it hadn't been for their General von Kirchbach. He stood in the garden--he'd been hit, too--and bawled for the artillery. Then they came at us again in three divisions. Where they got all their regiments, I don't know, but their 7th Grenadier Guards were there, and their 47th, 58th, 59th, 80th, and 87th regiments of the line, not counting a Jaeger battalion and no end of artillery. They carried the Three Poplars--a hill--and they began devastating everything. We couldn't face their fire--I don't know why, Jack; it breaks my heart when I say it, but we couldn't hold them. Then they began howling for cannon, and, of course, that settled the Chateau. The town was in flames when I left." After a silence, Jack asked him whether it was a rout or a retreat. "We're falling back in very decent order," said Georges, eagerly--"really, we are. Of course, there were some troops that got into a sort of panic--the Uhlans are annoying us considerably. The Turcos fought well. We fairly riddled the 58th Prussians--their king's regiment, you know. It was the 2d Bavarian Corps that did for us. We will meet them later." "Where are you going--to Metz?" inquired Jack, soberly. "Yes; I've a packet for Bazaine--I don't know what. They're trying to reach him by wire, but those confounded Uhlans are destroying everything. My dear fellow, you need not worry; we have been checked, that's all. Our promenade to Berlin is postponed in deference to King Wilhelm's earnest wishes." They all tried to laugh a little, and Jack chirped to his horse, but even that sober animal seemed to feel the depression, for he responded in fits and starts and jerks that were unpleasant and jarring to Georges' aching head. The sky had become covered with bands of wet-looking clouds, the leaves of the forest stirred noiselessly on their stems. Along the river willows quivered and aspens turned their leaves white side to the sky. In the querulous notes of the birds there was a prophecy of storms, the river muttered among its hollows of floods and tempests. Suddenly a great sombre raven sailed to the road, alighted, sidled back, and sat fearlessly watching them. Lorraine shivered and nestled closer to Jack. "Oh," she murmured, "I never saw one before--except in pictures." "They belong in the snow--they have no business here," said Jack; "they always make me think of those pictures of Russia--the retreat of the Grand Army, you know." "Wolves and ravens," said Lorraine, in a low voice; "I know why they come to us here in France--Monsieur Marche, did I not tell you that day in the carrefour?" "Yes," he answered; "do you really think you are a prophetess?" "Did you see wolves here?" asked Georges. "Yes; before war was declared. I told Monsieur Marche--it is a legend of our country. He, of course, laughed at it. I also do not believe everything I am told--but--I don't know--I have alway believed that, ever since I was, oh, very, very small--like that." She held one small gloved hand about twelve inches from the floor of the cart. "At such a height and such an age it is natural to believe anything," said Jack. "I, too, accepted many strange doctrines then." "You are laughing again," said Lorraine. So they passed through the forest, trying to be cheerful, even succeeding at times. But Georges' face grew paler every minute, and his smile was so painful that Lorraine could not bear it and turned her head away, her hand tightening on the box-rail alongside. As they were about to turn out into the Morteyn road, where the forest ended, Jack suddenly checked the horse and rose to his feet. "What is it?" asked Lorraine. "Oh, I see! Oh, look!" The Morteyn road was filled with infantry, solid, plodding columns, pressing fast towards the west. The fields, too, were black with men, engineers, weighted down with their heavy equipments, resting in long double rows, eyes vacant, heads bent. Above the thickets of rifles sweeping past, mounted officers sat in their saddles, as though carried along on the surface of the serried tide. Standards fringed with gold slanted in the last rays of the sun, sabres glimmered, curving upward from the thronged rifles, and over all sounded the shuffle, shuffle of worn shoes in the dust, a mournful, monotonous cadence, a hopeless measure, whose burden was despair, whose beat was the rhythm of breaking hearts. Oh, but it cut Lorraine to see their boyish faces, dusty, gaunt, hollow-eyed, turn to her and turn away without a change, without a shade of expression. The mask of blank apathy stamped on every visage almost terrified her. On they came, on, on, and still on, under a forest of shining rifles. A convoy of munitions crowded in the rear of the column, surrounded by troopers of the train-des-equipages; then followed more infantry, then cavalry, dragoons, who sat listlessly in their high saddles, carbines bobbing on their broad backs, whalebone plumes matted with dust. Georges rose painfully from his seat, stepped to the side, and climbed down into the road. He felt in the breast of his dolman for the packet, adjusted his sabre, and turned to Lorraine. "There is a squadron of the Remount Cavalry over in that meadow--I can get a horse there," he said. "Thank you, Jack. Good-by, Mademoiselle de Nesville, you have been more than generous." "You can have a horse from the Morteyn stables," said Jack; "my dear fellow, I can't bear to see you go--to think of your riding to Metz to-night." "It's got to be done, you know," said Georges. He bowed; Lorraine stretched out her hand and he gravely touched it with his fingers. Then he exchanged a nervous gripe with Jack, and turned away hurriedly, crowding between the passing dragoons, traversing the meadows until they lost him in the throng. "We cannot get to the house by the road," said Jack; "we must take the stable path;" and he lifted the reins and turned the horse's head. The stable road was narrow, and crossed with sprays of tender leaves. The leaves touched Lorraine's eyes, they rubbed across her fair brow, robbing her of single threads of glittering hair, they brushed a single bright tear from her cheeks and held it, glimmering like a drop of dew. "Behold the end of the world," said Lorraine--"I am weeping." He turned and looked into her eyes. "Is that strange?" he asked, gently. "Yes; I have often wished to cry. I never could--except once before--and that was four days ago." The day of their quarrel! He thrilled from head to foot, but dared not speak. "Four days ago," said Lorraine again. She thought of herself gliding from her bed to seek the stable where Jack's horse stood, she thought of her hot face pressed to the wounded creature's neck. Then, suddenly aware of what she had confessed, she leaned back and covered her face with her hands. "Lorraine!" he whispered, brokenly. But they were already at the Chateau. "Lorraine, my child!" cried Madame de Morteyn, leaning from the terrace. Her voice was drowned in the crash of drums rolling, rolling, from the lawn below, and the trumpets broke out in harsh chorus, shrill, discordant, terrible. The Emperor had arrived at Morteyn. _ |
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