CHAPTER XXIX
The first streak of tarnished silver in the east aroused the sleeping batteries beyond Ausone. Warner, already dressed and out of doors, felt the dim world around him begin to shake again, as one by one the distant guns awoke and spoke to the ruined fort of doom. There was not a soul astir in the Château or about the grounds. Over shrubbery and woods thin films of night mist drooped, sagging like dew-laden spiders' webs; in the demi-light the great house loomed spectral and huge amid its phantom trees, and the wet lawns spread away and vanished under the pallid pall that bathed them.
Warner had slept badly. What might be transpiring in the north had haunted his troubled slumber, had broken it continually, and finally had driven him from his hot and tumbled pillows to dress and go out into the dark obscurity.
To see for himself, to try to form some conclusion concerning the approaching situation of the people in the Château des Oiseaux, was his object.
The first grey tint in the east woke up the guns; from the northern terrace he could see the fog all rosy over Ausone; pale flashes leaped and sparkled far beyond as the deep waves of sound came rolling and tumbling toward him, breaking in thunderous waves across the misty darkness.
Now and then a heavier concussion set the ground shaking, and a redder glare lighted the north and played shakily over the clouds. Ausone was still replying.
On the other side of the Récollette there was a hill terraced to the summit with vineyards. From its western slope he knew that part of Ausone town was visible, and from there he believed that with his field glasses he could see for himself how much of the town was really on fire; how near to it and to the fort were those paler flashes reflected on the clouds which ringed the northern sky.
Nobody was astir in the house as he left it; nobody in the roadway.
At the lodge he rapped on the dark window until the old man peered out at him through the diamond panes, yawning and blinking under his Yvetot nightcap, a candle trembling in his hand.
Outside the wall he crossed the road, climbed the hedge stile and struck across a field of stubble.
Over the darker eastern hills a wet sky lowered; the Récollette ran black under its ghostly cerements of vapor; lapwings were calling somewhere from the foggy sky, and their mournful and faint complaint seemed to harmonize sadly with the vague grey world around him.
A trodden path twisted through the grass down to the reedy shore where the punt lay. Peering about for it, his foot struck the pole, where it lay partly buried in the weeds; he picked it up and went down among the rushes. But until he laid his hand on the boat he did not notice the man asleep there. And not until the man sat up with a frightful yawn, rubbing his sleep-swollen lids, did he recognize Asticot.
"What the devil – " he began, but Asticot stumbled to his large, flat feet with a suppressed yelp of apprehension, as Warner's dreaded grasp fell on his collar.
"Mon Dieu," moaned the young ruffian, "may I not even sleep without offending M'sieu' – "
Warner shook him, not roughly.
"Now answer me once and for all! Why are you hanging around Saïs?"
The tiny, mousy eyes of Asticot became fixed; a grin of terror stiffened the pasty features.
"Why do I still find you in Saïs?" repeated Warner. "Tell me the truth!"
"I – I am too f-frightened to tell you – "
"Get over your fright. Listen, Asticot, I'm not going to hurt you. But you've got to answer me. Come, compose yourself – " He relaxed his grasp on the coat collar and stepped aside. "Come, Asticot; tell me why I find you here in Saïs?"
"M'sieu' – "
"Yes, go on. Just tell me the truth. I'm not going to beat you."
"M'sieu' will not believe me – God knows I do not know how to explain it to myself – but since that frightful beating bestowed upon me I do not know how to get along without the protection of M'sieu' – "
"What do you mean?"
"I am afraid! I do not know why. I desire to be taken under the patronage of him I fear. C'est plus fort que moi. Tenez, M'sieu', like a dog owned by nobody I once ran about at random, and not afraid, until caught and nearly killed by M'sieu'. And now I desire to be his. It is natural for me to follow him – even though I remain afraid of him, even risking his anger and another beating – "
"Asticot!"
"M'sieu'?"
"Do you nourish any agreeable dreams that you may one day live to insert your knife in my back?"
The sheer astonishment in the young ruffian's visage was sufficient answer for Warner. He realized then that this yellow mongrel would never again try to bite – that he might collapse and succumb under violence, but never again would he twist and try to mangle the hand of punishment which once had broken him so mercilessly.
"Get into the punt, anyway," said Warner, much perplexed.
Asticot turned and crept into the stern.
"Sit down!"
The young man squatted obediently. Warner shoved off, sprang aboard, and sent the punt shooting out across the misty water.
"So you don't want to murder me any more?" he asked humorously.
"No," said Asticot, with sullen but profound conviction.
"What's become of your delightful friend, Squelette?"
Asticot looked up, bared every tooth.
"Figurez-vous, M'sieu', a dragoon patrol caught him yesterday stealing a goose from a farm. Me, I hid in a willow tree. It's the Battalion of Biribi for Squelette – his class having been called a year ago – and he over the Belgian line with his fingers to his nose! Hé – hé!" laughed Asticot, writhing in the enjoyment of the prospect before his recent comrade. "Me, I have done my time in Biribi! – And the scars of it – God! – hot irons on the brain! – And the heart a cinder! Biribi! Is there a priest's hell like it?" He spat fiercely into the river.
"And Squelette, who always mocked me for the time I did in Biribi! Tenez, M'sieu', now they've caught him and he'll do a tour for himself in that dear Biribi! Hè – hè! C'est bien fait! Chacun à son tour! As for me – " His voice suddenly relapsed into a whine. "I shall now be well protected by M'sieu' and I shall be diligent and grateful in his service, ready always with brush and black soap or with knife and noose – "
"Thanks," said Warner dryly. "You may stick to the bowl of black soap until your class is summoned."
Asticot looked at him earnestly.
"If I have to go with my class, will M'sieu' speak a word for me that it shall be the line and not Biribi again?"
"Yes, if you behave yourself."
"A – a certificate of honest employment? – A few kind words that I have diligently labored in the service of M'sieu'?"
"Yes, I'll do that."
Asticot squirmed with delight. And Warner, poling steadily up stream, saw him making his toilet in the grey light, dipping his fists into the water, scrubbing his battered features, carefully combing out favoris and rouflaquette and greasing both from the contents of a knotted bandana handkerchief which he drew from the capacious pocket of the coat which the charity of Warner had bestowed upon him.
He was as merry as a washer-raccoon over his ablutions; all care for the future had fled, and an animal-like confidence in this terrible young patron of his reigned undisturbed in the primitive brain of Asticot.
There was now only one impelling force in life for him – the instinctive necessity of running rather close to Warner's heels, wherever that might lead him. Anxiety for personal comfort and well-being he dismissed; he would eat when his master thought best; he would find shelter and warmth and clothing when and where it pleased the man after whom he tagged. He was safe, he was comfortable. That dominating physical strength which had nearly destroyed him, coupled with that awesome intellectual power which now held him in dumb subjection, would in future look out for him and his needs. Tant mieux! Let his master do the worrying.
Carefully combing out his favoris with a broken comb and greasing them with perfumed pomade flat over his sunken cheekbones, he fairly wriggled with his new sense of security and bodily comfort.
Now and then he scratched his large, outstanding ears, trying to realize his good fortune; now and then, combing his rouflaquette with tenderness and pride, he lifted his mean, nasal voice in song:
"Depuis que j'suis dans c'tte p – n d'Afrique
A faire l'chameau avec une bosse su' l'dos,
Mon vieux frangin, j'suis sec comme un coup d'trique,
J'ai b'entôt p'us que d'la peau su'les os!
Et v'là l'Bat. d'Af. qui passe,
Ohé! ceux d'la classe! – "
Combing away and plastering his lovelocks by the help of a fragment of mirror, Asticot whined out his dreadful ballads of Africa, throwing all the soul he possessed into the tragic recital and sniffling sentimentally through his nose:
A Biribi c'est là qu'on marche,
Faut pas flancher;
Quand l'chaouch crie: 'En avant! Marche!'
I'faut marcher,
Et quand on veut fair' des épates,
C'est peau d'zébi:
On vous fiche les fers au quat' pattes
A Biribi!
A Biribi c'est là qu'on crève
De soif et d' faim,
C'est là qu'i' faut marner sans trêve
Jusqu' à la fin! …
Le soir on pense à la famille
Sous le gourbi…
On pleure encor' quand on roupille
A Biribi!"
He was still chanting when the punt glided in among the rushes of the eastern bank. He followed Warner to the land, aided him to beach the punt, then trotted docilely at heel as the American struck out across the quarry road and mounted the retaining wall of the vineyard-clad hill.
Up they climbed among the vines; and Asticot with a leer, but keeping his mousy eyes on Warner, ventured to detach a ripe bunch here and there and breakfast as he trotted along.
The thunder of the cannon had become very distinct; daylight came slowly under the heavy blanket of grey clouds; the foggy sky was still stained with rose over Ausone; red flashes leaped from the fort; the paler glare of the German guns played constantly across the north.
And now, coming out on the hill's crest among the vines, Warner caught sight of Ausone town far below, beyond the Château forest. Here and there houses kindled red as coals in a grate; the sluice and wheel of a mill by the Récollette seemed to be on fire; beyond it haystacks were burning and smothering all the east in smoke.
"Mazette," remarked Asticot, with his mouth full of stolen grapes. "It appears to Bibi that their church of Sainte Cassilda is frying the stone saints inside!"
And then, adjusting his field glasses, Warner discovered what the mouse-eyes of Asticot had detected: Sainte Cassilda the beautiful was merely a hollow shell within which raged a sea of fire crimsoning the gaping doors and windows, glowing scarlet through cracks and fissures in the exquisitely carved façade, mounting through the ruined roof in a whirl of rosy vapors that curled and twisted and glittered with swarming golden sparks.
Another fire burned in the ruins of what had been the Chalons railway station; the Café and Cabaret de Biribi were level wastes of stones and steaming bricks, over which fire played and smoke whirled upward; the market was a long heap of live coals; even trees were afire by the river, and Warner could see flames here and there among the bushes and whole thickets burning fiercely along the river and beyond, where the Bois d'Ausone touches it with a fringe of splendid oaks.
As day broke, a watery light illuminated the still landscape. Smoke hung heavy over Ausone Fort; the great cupola guns flashed redly through it; a wide, high bank of vapor towered above Ausone, stretching away to the west and north. Whole rows of burning houses in Ausone glowed and glimmered, marking the courses of streets; the Hôtel de Ville seemed to be intact, but the Boulevard d'Athos was plainly on fire; and, over the rue d'Auros, an infernal light flickered as flame and smoke alternately lighted the street or blotted it from view.
"The town is done for," said Warner calmly. "The fort is still replying, but very slowly. It looks rather bad to me. It looks like the end."
Asticot scratched one large ear and furtively helped himself to another bunch of grapes. Warner seated himself on the ground and raised his field glasses. Asticot squatted on his haunches, his little, mousy eyes fixed wistfully on the burning town. Looting ought to be good in Ausone – dangerous, of course, but profitable. A heaven-sent opportunity for honest pillage was passing. Asticot sighed and licked his lips.
After a while, and imbued now with the impudent confidence of a tolerated mongrel, he ventured to rise and nose around a bit, keeping, however, his new master carefully in sight.
The sour little wine grapes had allayed his thirst and hunger; he prowled at random around the summit of the hill, surveying the river valley and the hills beyond. By chance he presently kicked up a big hare, which cleared out at full speed, doubling and twisting before the shower of stones hurled after it by Asticot. He ran after it a little way among the vines, hoping that a chance missile might have bowled over the toothsome game. Craning his neck, he peeped discreetly down the hillside, reconnoitering; then suddenly ducked; squatted for a moment as though frozen to a statue, and, dropping on his belly, he crawled back to Warner, who still sat there with his field glasses bracketed on Ausone.
"M'sieu'!"
Warner turned at the weird whisper, lowering his glasses.
"Las Bosches!" whispered Asticot.
"Where?" demanded Warner incredulously.
"Riding up this very hill where we are sitting! I saw them – six of them on their horses!"
"They must be French!"
"No, Bosches! Uhlans!"
"Did they see you?"
"No."
Along the upper retaining wall of the vineyard a line of low bushes grew in patches, left there, no doubt, so that the roots might make firmer the steep bank of earth and dry-laid stone.
Warner rose, and, stooping low, ran toward this thatch of cover, followed by Asticot.
Under the bushes they crept, stretched themselves flat, and lay listening.
They had not long to wait; straight through the rows of vines toward the crest of the hill rode an Uhlan, walking his big, hard-breathing horse to the very verge of the northern slope.
His lance, with pennon furled, slanted low from the arm loop; he sat his high saddle like a statue, and looked out across the valley toward the burning town beyond.
He was so near that Warner could see the grey uniform in detail – the ulanka piped with dark crimson, shoulder straps bearing the number 2, collar with the eagle-button insignia of the Guard. A grey helmet-slip covered the mortar board and leather body of the schapska; boots and belt were of russet leather.
Another Uhlan rode up, showing the star of an oberleutnant on the pattes-d'épaules.
Four others followed, picking their way among the vines, cautiously yet leisurely. At the stirrups of the oberleutnant strode a man on foot – a big, shambling, bald-headed man wearing a smock and carrying a felt hat in his huge hand. And when he turned to wipe his hairless face on his sleeve, Asticot clutched Warner's arm convulsively.
The man was Wildresse.
The officer of Uhlans sat very straight in his saddle, his field glasses sometimes focussed on the burning town, sometimes sweeping the landscape to the north and west, sometimes deliberately studying the valley below.
Presently he lowered his glasses and turned partly around to look down at Wildresse, who was standing among the vines by his stirrup.
"Wohin führt diese Weg?" he demanded with a nod toward the quarry road below.
"Nach Drieux, Excellenz!"
"Zeigen Sie mir die Richtung nach Dreslin mit der Hand!"
Wildresse raised his arm and pointed, tracing the quarry road north and west.
"Also! Wie tief ist dieser Fluss? Ist eine Brücke?"
The harsh, deep rumble of Wildresse's voice, the mincing, nasal tones of the Prussian, the snort of horses receded as the Uhlans rode slowly over toward the right – evidently a precaution to escape observation from the valley below.
For a while they sat their big horses there, looking out over the valley; then, at a signal from the ober-leutnant, they turned their mounts and rode slowly off down the eastern slope of the vineyard, taking with them the double traitor, Wildresse.
Asticot's eyes were like two minute black sparks; he was shivering now from head to foot as he lay there; and it became very evident to Warner that this young ruffian had had no knowledge of that sort of villainy on the part of Wildresse.
"Ah, le cochon!" hissed Asticot, grasping two fistfuls of earth in his astonishment and fury. "Is he selling France then to the Bosches?"
"Didn't you know it?" inquired Warner coldly.
"I? Nom de Dieu! For what do you take me then? Whatever I am, I am not that! Ah, le sale bougre de Wildresse! Ah! Les salauds de saligauds de Bosches! Ah, Wildresse! – Fumier, viande à corbeau, caserne à puces, gadou', morceau d'chausett's russes – que j'te dis que j't'engeule et que j't'abomine, vermine malade, canard boiteux – "
Ashy white, his mouth twisted with rage, Asticot lay shivering and cursing the treachery of his late employer, Wildresse. And Warner understood that, low as this creature was, ignorant, treacherous, fierce, ruthless, and cowardly, the treason of Wildresse had amazed and horrified and enraged him.
"It's the last depths of filth," stammered Asticot. "Ah, non, nom de Dieu! One does not do that! – Whatever else one does! I'll have his skin for this. It becomes necessary to me that I have his skin! Minc' de Marseillaise! Viv' la république! En avant l'armée! Gare au coup d'scion, eh, vache d'apache! Les coutcaur sont faits pour les chiens, mince de purée! C'est vrai qu' Squelette c'est un copain à moi – but if he is in this – he and the père Wildresse, et bon! – Faut leur-z-y casser la geule – "
"That's enough!" interrupted Warner, who for a moment had been struck dumb by the frightful fluency of an invective he never dreamed existed, even in the awful argot of voyous like Asticot.
He rose. Pale and still trembling, Asticot stumbled to his feet, his pasty face twisted with unuttered maledictions.
Moving cautiously to the eastern edge of the vineyard, they saw, far below them, six Uhlans riding slowly eastward toward the Bois de Saïs, and a gross figure on foot shuffling ahead and evidently acting as pilot toward the wilder uplands of the rolling country beyond.
Warner watched them through his glasses until they disappeared in the woods, then he turned, looked at the burning town in the north for a few moments, closed his field glasses and slung them, and, nodding to Asticot, descended the western slope toward the river.
There were no people visible anywhere, either on the quarry road or across the river. The fugitives from Ausone must have gone west toward Dreslin.
Asticot crawled into the punt; Warner shoved off and poled for midstream, where he let the current carry him down toward Saïs.
"Asticot?"
"M'sieu'?"
"That was only one small scouting party of Uhlans. Perhaps there are more of them along the river."
Asticot began to curse again, but Warner stopped him.
"Curb that charmingly fluent flow of classic eloquence," he said. "It may sound well on the outer boulevards, but I don't care for it."
The voyou gulped, swallowed a weird oath, and shivered.
"Asticot, that man Wildresse ought to be apprehended and shot. Have you any idea where his hiding place is?"
"In the Bois d'Ausone. It was there. Animals travel."
"Could you find the place?"
Asticot shrugged and rubbed his pock-marked nose. The forest of Ausone was too near the cannon to suit him, and he said so without hesitation.
"Very well," said Warner. "When we meet any of our soldiers or gendarmes you can explain where Wildresse has been hiding. He won't come out, I suppose, until the occupation of Ausone by the Germans reassures him. He ought to be caught and executed."
"If the cannon would only stop their ugly noises I'd go myself," muttered Asticot. "Tenez, M'sieu', it would be a pleasure for me to bleed that treacherous hog – "
"I don't doubt it," said Warner pleasantly, "but, odd as it may appear to you, Asticot, I have a personal prejudice against murder. It's weak-minded of me, I know. But if you have no objection, we'll let military law catch Wildresse and deal with him if it can."
Asticot looked at him curiously:
"Is it then distasteful to M'sieu' that I bleed this espèce de pig for him?"
"I'm afraid it is."
"You do not desire me to settle the business of this limace?"
"No."
"For what purpose is an enemy?" inquired the voyou. "For revenge. And of what use is revenge if you do not use it on your enemy?"
"You can't understand me, can you, Asticot?"
"No," said Asticot naïvely, "I can't."