Chapter XXXVII: “childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came”

“To the little red house by the river
I came when the short night fell.
I broke the web for ever,
I broke my heart as well.
Michael and the Saints deliver
My soul from the nethermost Hell!”
—M. E. COLERIDGE, _Wilderspin_.

The grey March afternoon was dwindling into dusk, a dusk of windless cloud. A little sunset afterglow stained the west, behind the leafless chestnuts, as Gilbert walked steadily along the rough and narrow lane, one of that network of intersecting pathways which only a Vendean born could comfortably traverse. He was making his way, by an unfrequented route, to the solitary little hostelry which, just over a week ago, he had appointed as a rendezvous for his cousin when the latter should return from Nantes. Since then he had changed his mind about sending him on a further errand; but the arrangement had not been cancelled, and he must at any rate meet Louis at the Etoile de Vendée. And perhaps the unfamiliar surroundings would help him in what he had to do.

Gilbert de Chantemerle, unlike his father, had never found any real consolation in philosophy. Over against the solace which it offered he could always discern, set as in battle array, the challenge of the Christian life—of the lives of Christians. He lived himself in close contact with such a life, which—as his father had done—he admired and loved, but it troubled him with its perpetual question. He could not, like his father, walk placidly by Sébastien des Graves with his eyes on a different goal. Even from the tenantry towards whom he was so wise and so upright, to whose welfare he had sacrificed his own young ambitions, he was separated by a gulf which he knew to be impassable. It had not needed M. des Graves to tell him that he could not lead them, when the time came, in the spirit with which they would follow. If only he could! All the winter, since his return from Brittany, a longing had been budding in his heart. But the fulfilment of that longing demanded a miracle; in other words, it was impossible. How could he ever change his point of view, how pass from doubt to the certainty of faith? Mere desire, however vehement, will not transport one’s body from one adjacent point to another; how should it change the country of that immeasurably more tenacious thing, the soul?

Then had come the priest’s attack on him, and that interview which, though only a week old, seemed to be separated from the present by a century of struggle and anguish. . . . And he had been so consumed with wrath at the preposterous suggestion then made to him just because M. des Graves was not really the first to make it. His own heart had once or twice faintly whispered the same thing to him. But now, since one who dwelt within the gates of his desire had said that this was the key to unlock them, what could he do but try it? He did not believe in its efficacy, and yet—must not a sacrifice so bitter, so crushingly repugnant, for it was the immolation of his own intensely stubborn will—must not this offering call down some spark from heaven? . . . To this had the depth of his desire brought him, to the oblation, almost as an experiment, of his inmost personality, and to this, the crisis of all his emotional and moral life, he walked under the cloudy sky, repeating to himself the formula in which he meant to accomplish it. Only in such a way, as an actor speaking a part well conned, could he ever get through it.

The Etoile de Vendée, nominally an inn, was in reality half a farmhouse, half a cottage, in front of which the solitary old man who owned it had hung out a signboard, perhaps merely to satisfy a whim, for the building stood by no high-road, and lay at least two miles away from the nearest hamlet. It was all the better as a rendezvous. When Gilbert turned at last into the wavering lane which crawled past it, it suddenly occurred to him how more than likely it was that Louis had not been able to get to the tryst at the time appointed. But the unconfessed hope was vain, for there, tethered in front, was his cousin’s bay horse, who turned his head enquiringly at the sound of steps, and pricked his ears as he recognised the Marquis.

The door of the long, low parlour was exactly opposite the hearth, so that the first thing which Château-Foix saw on entering was Louis, sitting in a somewhat dejected attitude by the fire, with his head on his hand. He looked round as the door opened, but did not move from his chair, and the Marquis divested himself of his own hat and cloak without saying anything, and came forward to the hearth.

Louis plunged his hand into the breast of his coat. “I met your man at Nantes,” he said. “He gave me this letter for you. But it seems to me that it matters little to us now how much of M. de la Rouërie’s plans for Brittany are discovered. The whole of Northern Vendée is alight.” His tone expressed no elation at the fact—nothing but weariness.

The Marquis took the letter. “Nevertheless, I am extremely glad to have this, and I am very much obliged to you for going.”

“It was a pleasure,” said Louis curtly.

There was a sting in that simple and conventional reply. Gilbert took no notice, and pulling forward a chair opened his letter and began to run through it. But in half a minute he was looking instead at his cousin, who, his elbows on his knees, was leaning forward staring into the fire. Was it fancy that there was something in the set of his jaw that had not been visible six months ago, a line about the mouth which spelt . . . what?

The Marquis’ scrutiny of the profile presented to him was cut short, however, by Louis suddenly becoming aware of it.

“What are you looking at me for?” he demanded. “Is not the paper all right?”

“I don’t know,” said Château-Foix. “I was looking at you because—well, I want to speak to you about something else.”

Whatever the Vicomte may have thought of this exordium he did not betray. He kicked the smouldering log on the hearth with his spurred heel and sank back in his chair. “Very well,” he replied indifferently; “I am ready.”

Gilbert deliberately folded up the letter, put it in his pocket, and rose. “I should like,” he said, in a steady voice of ice, “to take back most of the things that I said to you the other day at the ford. I was . . . mistaken. I believe now that you did your best, that you had no intention of acting treacherously. The fault was mine for putting you in such a position.” He paused for a second; Louis had not stirred. “You have assured me that Lucienne does not return your affection; I appreciate your motive in the assurance, but I know that it is not true. And if we come out of this alive I do not, therefore, intend to press my claim. . . . That is all I have to say.” He turned and went to the table.

The stupor which had held Louis enmeshed during this short speech relaxed its hold. He sprang up. “Gilbert . . . God in heaven! You don’t mean it—I can’t——”

“Oh yes, you can,” replied the Marquis coolly, taking up his cloak. “She is yours already in spirit; you know that.” And he went towards the door.

But Louis, springing after him, caught him by the arm. “Gilbert . . . for God’s sake, don’t go like that . . . You can’t mean it! You——”

Somehow, without actually shaking him off, Gilbert succeeded in disengaging himself. “Surely,” he said bitingly, “you are not usually so dull. I cannot stay here all evening to repeat the same thing. Lucienne is yours—if she will have you. Is not that plain enough?”

Their eyes met. Then something more like horror than any other emotion dawned in the Vicomte’s, and with a catch of the breath he recoiled a little. The Marquis went quickly out and shut the door behind him.

* * * * * *

He set his face towards the miles of rough upland behind the inn. He must walk—he must walk for ever to get away. A fine soaking rain was beginning to fall; he did not feel it. Past the few bitten oaks that fringed the garden he strode, and up the vacillating track that ceased at last, disheartened, on the shaggy hillside. Where was the balm which the priest had promised him? “Liar! liar!” he said between his teeth. He had done it; he had wrenched his heart out, and where was the difference? . . . He walked, equally oblivious of time and of distance; of the rain and of the broken hilly ground, stumbling over gorse bushes, catching his feet in rabbit holes. At last, almost at the top of a hill, he came to a stop, not knowing or caring where he had got to, and threw himself down on his face in the wet grass.

It was night indeed in his heart. All was gone; Lucienne’s love—though that, he knew, he had lost long ago—and that fierce and steadfast determination to keep her in spite of everything, which had sustained him for months. When he had lost his hold on that he was indeed beaten to his knees by that force stronger than himself, whatever it was, which had conquered his own stubborn will and smitten to the earth his pride. The sense of loss, of shock, was at once more and less than pain; it was numbing, grinding, annihilating. . . . Of Lucienne, as desirable, loved and beautiful, cast from him by his own act, he hardly thought at all. The act itself had cost him too much.

He lay there long motionless, careless of the rain, of the deepening darkness, of the passage of time. The smell and touch of the friendly little blades of grass against his face and mouth began first to recall him to external things. They were life, and he, too, had to live—with nothing left to live for. . . . Yes, one thing! If only the moment would come soon, soon!

He stirred and sat up. The rain was ceasing; one or two stars were visible, hanging over a dark mass which stood out against the sky a little above where he lay, and which must be the wood on the top of the hill of La Chapelle-Michel. It was a surprise to find how far he had come. Dully, mechanically, he thought that he must get back, and that he was very cold and almost wet through. Then, suddenly galvanised into life, he jumped to his feet and stood listening with the most concentrated attention.

Through the silence drifted a faint jangling sound, which seemed to come from the direction of Chantemerle. It was a bell ringing the tocsin.