Chapter 44

________________________________________________
_ CHAPTER XLIV

Philip lay on a bed in the unostentatious lodging in the Rue de Vaugirard where Damour had brought him. The surgeon had pronounced the wound mortal, giving him but a few hours to live. For long after he was gone Philip was silent, but at length he said "You heard what Grandjon-Larisse said--It is broken pride that kills, Damour." Then he asked for pen, ink, and paper. They were brought to him. He tried the pen upon the paper, but faintness suddenly seized him, and he fell back unconscious.

When he came to himself he was alone in the room. It was cold and cheerless--no fire on the hearth, no light save that flaring from a lamp in the street outside his window. He rang the bell at his hand. No one answered. He called aloud: "Damour! Damour!"

Damour was far beyond earshot. He had bethought him that now his place was in Bercy, where he might gather up what fragments of good fortune remained, what of Philip's valuables might be secured. Ere he had fallen back insensible, Philip, in trying the pen, had written his own name on a piece of paper. Above this Damour wrote for himself an order upon the chamberlain of Bercy to enter upon Philip's private apartments in the castle; and thither he was fleeing as Philip lay dying in the dark room of the house in the Rue de Vaugirard.

The woman of the house, to whose care Philip was passed over by Damour, had tired of watching, and had gone to spend one of his gold pieces for supper with her friends.

Meanwhile in the dark comfortless room, the light from without flickering upon his blanched face, Philip was alone with himself, with memory, and with death. As he lay gasping, a voice seemed to ring through the silent room, repeating the same words again and again--and the voice was his own voice. It was himself--some other outside self of him--saying, in tireless repetition: "May I die a black, dishonourable death, abandoned and alone, if ever I deceive you. I should deserve that if I deceived you, Guida!... " "A black, dishonourable death, abandoned and alone": it was like some horrible dirge chanting in his ear.

Pictures flashed before his eyes, strange imaginings. Now he was passing through dark corridors, and the stone floor beneath was cold--so cold! He was going to some gruesome death, and monks with voices like his own voice were intoning: "Abandoned and alone. Alone--alone--abandoned and alone."... And now he was fighting, fighting on board the Araminta. There was the roar of the great guns, the screaming of the carronade slides, the rattle of musketry, the groans of the dying, the shouts of his victorious sailors, the crash of the main-mast as it fell upon the bulwarks. Then the swift sissing ripple of water, the thud of the Araminta as she struck, and the cold chill of the seas as she went down. How cold was the sea--ah, how it chilled every nerve and tissue of his body!

He roused to consciousness again. Here was still the blank cheerless room, the empty house, the lamplight flaring through the window upon his stricken face, upon the dark walls, upon the white paper lying on the table beside him.

Paper--that was it--he must write, he must write while he had strength. With the last courageous effort of life, his strenuous will forcing the declining powers into obedience for a final combat, he drew the paper near, and began to write. The light flickered, wavered, he could just see the letters that he formed--no more.

Guida [he began], on the Ecrehos I said to you: "If I deceive you may I die a black, dishonourable death, abandoned and alone!" It has all come true. You were right, always right, and I was always wrong. I never started fair with myself or with the world. I was always in too great a hurry; I was too ambitious, Guida. Ambition has killed me, and it has killed her--the Comtesse. She is gone. What was it he said--if I could but remember what Grandjon-Larisse said--ah yes, yes!--after he had given me my death-wound, he said: "It is not the broken heart that kills, but broken pride." There is the truth. She is in her grave, and I am going out into the dark.

He lay back exhausted for a moment, in desperate estate. The body was fighting hard that the spirit might confess itself before the vital spark died down for ever. Seizing a glass of cordial near, he drank of it. The broken figure in its mortal defeat roused itself again, leaned over the paper, and a shaking hand traced on the brief piteous record of a life.

I climbed too fast. Things dazzled me. I thought too much of myself--myself, myself was everything always; and myself has killed me. In wanton haste I came to be admiral and sovereign duke, and it has all come to nothing--nothing. I wronged you, I denied you, there was the cause of all. There is no one to watch with me now to the one moment of life that counts. In this hour the clock of time fills all the space between earth and heaven. It will strike soon-- the awful clock. It will soon strike twelve: and then it will be twelve of the clock for me always--always.

I know you never wanted revenge on me, Guida, but still you have it here. My life is no more now than vraic upon a rock. I cling, I cling, but that is all, and the waves break over me. I am no longer an admiral, I am no more a duke--I am nothing. It is all done. Of no account with men I am going to my judgment with God. But you remain, and you are Princess Philip d'Avranche, and your son--your son--will be Prince Guilbert d'Avranche. But I can leave him naught, neither estates nor power. There is little honour in the title now. So it may be you will not use it. But you will have a new life: with my death happiness may begin again for you. That thought makes death easier. I was never worthy of you, never. I understand myself now, and I know that you have read me all these years, read me through and through. The letter you wrote me, never a day or night has passed but, one way or another, it has come home to me.

There was a footfall outside his window. A roysterer went by in the light of the flaring lamp. He was singing a ribald song. A dog ran barking at his heels. The reveller turned, drew his sword, and ran the dog through, then staggered on with his song. Philip shuddered, and with a supreme effort bent to the table again, and wrote on.

You were right: you were my star, and I was so blind with selfishness and vanity I could not see. I am speaking the truth to you now, Guida. I believe I might have been a great man if I had thought less of myself and more of others, more of you. Greatness, I was mad for that, and my madness has brought me to this desolate end--alone. Go tell Maitresse Aimable that she too was a good prophet. Tell her that, as she foresaw, I called your name in death, and you did not come. One thing before all: teach your boy never to try to be great, but always to live well and to be just. Teach him too that the world means better by him than he thinks, and that he must never treat it as his foe; he must not try to force its benefits and rewards. He must not approach it like the highwayman. Tell him never to flatter. That is the worst fault in a gentleman, for flattery makes false friends and the flatterer himself false. Tell him that good address is for ease and courtesy of life, but it must not be used to one's secret advantage as I have used mine to mortal undoing. If ever Guilbert be in great temptation, tell him his father's story, and read him these words to you, written, as you see, with the cramped fingers of death.

He could scarcely hold the pen now, and his eyes were growing dim.

... I am come to the end of my strength. I thought I loved you, Guida, but I know now that it was not love--not real love. Yet it was all a twisted manhood had to give. There are some things of mine that you will keep for your son, if you forgive me dead whom you despised living. Detricand Duke of Bercy will deal honourably by you. All that is mine at the Castle of Bercy he will secure to you. Tell him I have written it so; though he will do it of himself, I know. He is a great man. As I have gone downwards he has come upwards. There has been a star in his sky too. I know it, I know it, Guida, and he--he is not blind. The light is going, I cannot see. I can only--

He struggled fiercely for breath, but suddenly collapsed upon the table, and his head fell forward upon the paper; one cheek lying in the wet ink of his last written words, the other, cold and stark, turned to the window. The light from the lamp without flickered on it in gruesome sportiveness. The eyes stared and stared from the little dark room out into the world. But they did not see.

The night wore on. At last came a knocking, knocking at the door-tap! tap! tap! But he did not hear. A moment of silence, and again came a knocking--knocking--knocking...! _

Read next: Chapter 45

Read previous: Chapter 43

Table of content of Battle Of The Strong: A Romance of Two Kingdoms


GO TO TOP OF SCREEN

Post your review
Your review will be placed after the table of content of this book