Certainly no such vehicle had ever troubled the streets of Romagnat. Of that Maitre Henri was sure. Nor did he entirely relish the half-tipsy air which the artist had managed to convey to the inn. His was a respectable place. Above all that shirt flapping from the window was a libel. The wash was always hung in the court! Bursting with indignation he hurried out to make sure, crossed the narrow street, and turned to survey the front of his establishment. The light in the captain's window was out, but certainly there was a shirt flapping there over the sill as if hung out to dry. "Morbleu! What was the place coming to?"
Chapter IV. THE ENCHANTED FOREST
THE captain was awakened next morning by his friend the innkeeper. Despite his chagrin at the shirt, which he noticed was still fluttering at the window, the good man was once more obviously in the role of conspirator. Nor did the fact that he came bearing a tray with a bowl of coffee and rolls prevent him from walking as though a burden of state still rested upon his shoulders. Between his half-closed eyelids Denis Moore surveyed him as he arranged the table, and permitted an inward smile to escape as an audible yawn. Finding his guest awake, the innkeeper turned and bade him good morning.
"The message was safely delivered, monsieur. The cook's sister has returned, two hours ago."
"Any reply?" yawned the captain stretching himself, but with a throb of pulses under the covers.
"No, monsieur, you said nothing about that. Did . . . ?"
"I did not expect one."
"Oh!" said the innkeeper.
"At least not till later, you know. And what do we hear from the mayor-postmaster ?"
"All has been arranged as I—as he said. There will be a room prepared for you at the farm we spoke of. You can go this morning if you like. Francois can drive you over in the cart with the cover. If monsieur will not mind sitting in the back, on a truss of straw, no one will see him there as he goes through the village."
"And the mare?" inquired the captain.
"She can be taken over this evening after it is dark,"
The captain was visibly pleased. "I am bound to say that you have both done very well, you and your brother, the mayor-postmaster. I shall see that your services are properly mentioned in my report," he added, sitting up officially, and drawing on his shirt. "All that is needed now is a closed mouth. You can leave the rest to me."
The innkeeper bowed and puffed out his cheeks. In his mind's eye he beheld a document heavy with seals and loaded with encomiums winging its official way to Paris. What an honour for the family Gervais to be mentioned to the Minister of War! "Monsieur is indeed very kind," he murmured. With some difficulty he returned to his role in actual life. "Is there anything ... is the breakfast satisfactory ?"
His guest surveyed it somewhat skeptically. "A flask of whisky, perhaps." The host stared blankly. "Eau de vie, then." With incredulity upon his face the man vanished to return a few minutes later with the desired liquid. "Bon Dieu!" said he as the captain emptied a considerable portion of it into his cup and tossed it off raw. "In the morning, monsieur!"
The captain laughed. "It is a family custom, my friend. Several generations in France have not changed it. We still drink to the King of France whenever we can in Irish whisky, as my grandfather, the great O'Moore, once drank to King James." He looked at the flask wistfully. "Lacking whisky, brandy is the next best thing."
"But in the morning, monsieur!"
"It is a fine loyal way to begin the day. Will you join me?"
Not daring to refuse, the innkeeper gulped down a fiery potion poured out by his host, and retired gasping. "Exit," thought the captain, "I shall now be left in peace at least for some time. But what a slander on the O'Moores. Brandy before breakfast! One would think us to be Russians." Labouring under great excitement as he was, he had craved the drink.
It might be hours before he heard from the chateau. Hours? Days! Perhaps not at all! But he dismissed that from his mind. Underneath he could hear the morning activities of the inn already well under way. Judging by the clatter in the stable, Francois was currying down the mare and being nipped at for his pains. He looked out into the littered courtyard. It was a beautiful, clear day and the smoke from Maitre Henri's two chimneys rose straight into the air. Then he crossed to the other window and standing back some little way so as to remain unobserved from the street, glanced toward the chateau. An exclamation of surprise escaped him. On the road leading to the village a cloud of dust could be seen coming his way rapidly. There was no time to lose.
He turned back into the room and from an inner flap of his saddlebag extracted a square object carefully packed in a fragment of blanket. Unwrapping this rapidly he took out a fair-sized mirror which it contained. Again hastening to the window he propped the glass on the window-sill almost at right angles to the street. Drawing up a chair some distance within the room, he seated himself, adjusted the mirror once or twice and waited.
Like many old buildings the inn did not front squarely on the road. Even the slight angle at which it was offset plus the overhang of the casement enabled the scene outside to be thrown upon the glass in a bright little miniature of that portion of the village street which the captain was most anxious to see without being seen. Despite his anxiety, the situation and his secret view amused him.
A few yards below him two women in white caps could be seen gossiping and gesturing violently. Their shrill voices came in through the window. He noticed the peculiar "well-what-could-one-do-about-it" gesture of one of the women as she seemed to let the bad luck she was relating pour back onto the spine of Providence. A black goat switching a long lily stalk in its teeth wandered across the street. "What kind of an omen is that?" thought the captain, who was now amused to imagine himself a crystal gazer. Undoubtedly a great deal of fate was concentrated in the mirror. He could not help feeling that way about it. Suddenly the women turned and both gazed in the same direction. There was the distant crack of a whip and a rumble. He could hear feet running to the door downstairs. A small blur appeared in the glass that grew rapidly, almost terrifyingly swiftly into a coach and four. He caught a glimpse of a squat, cat-faced postilion riding the right lead horse, and the two tall footmen behind. In the distortion of the glass there was something diabolical about them. Then horses, coach and footmen seemed to vanish uphill across the mirror into nothing. The next instant the cocked hats, white wigs and profiles of the two footmen appeared close to and on an exact level with the window. Their heads and a small part of the coach roof seemed to glide along the sill miraculously. He caught the flash of a yellow glove. There was a sharp crack, and the captain swore automatically. The mirror, shivered into a hundred jagged fragments, had tinkled musically to the floor.
He was on his knees now. He wondered if the missile had bounded back into the street. Inadvertently he had miscalculated the height of his room above the road. It had not been quite so easy to reach it as he had expected. Then he gave a relieved exclamation and rose with the desired object in his hands. In a few seconds the piece of paper was disengaged from the small stone about which it had been tightly wrapped, and opened out on the table before him. He bent over it, for the writing though clear was exceedingly minute.