Kitabı oku: «The Wolf-Leader», sayfa 3

CHAPTER I
THE GRAND MASTER OF HIS HIGHNESS’ WOLF HOUNDS

THE Seigneur Jean, Baron of Vez, was a hardy and indefatigable sportsman.

If you follow the beautiful valley which runs between Berval and Longpré, you will see, on your left hand, an old tower, which by reason of its isolated position will appear doubly high and formidable to you.

At the present moment it belongs to an old friend of the writer of this tale, and everyone is now so accustomed to its forbidding aspect, that the peasant passing that way in summer has no more fear of seeking shelter from the heat beneath its walls than the martins with their long black wings and shrill cries, and the swallows with their soft chirrupings, have of building their nests under its eaves.

But at the time we are now speaking of, somewhere about 1780, this lordly dwelling of Vez was looked upon with different eyes, and, it must be confessed, it did not then offer so safe a place of retreat. It was a building of the twelfth or thirteenth century, rugged and gloomy, its terrifying exterior having assumed no kindlier aspect as the years rolled by. True, the sentinel with his measured tread and flashing steel-cap no longer paced its ramparts, the archer with his shrill-sounding horn no longer kept watch and ward on the battlements; true the postern was no longer guarded by true men at arms, ready at the least signal of danger to lower the portcullis and draw up the bridge; but the solitude alone which surrounded this grim giant of granite was sufficient to inspire the feeling of awe-inspiring majesty awakened by all mute and motionless things.

The lord of this old fortress, however, was by no means so much to be dreaded; those who were more intimately acquainted with him than were the peasants, and could do him more justice, asserted that his bark was worse than his bite, and that he caused more fear than harm – that is, among his fellow Christians. With the animals of the forest it was different, for he was avowedly their mortal and implacable enemy.

He was chief wolf-hunter to his Royal Highness Louis Philippe of Orleans, the fourth of that name, – a post which allowed him to gratify the inordinate passion he had for the chase. Although it was not easy, it was yet possible to bring the Baron to listen to reason in other matters; but as regards the chase, if once he had got a fixed idea in his head, nothing would satisfy him until he had carried it out and had achieved his purpose.

His wife, according to report, was the natural daughter of the Prince, which, in conjunction with his title of chief wolf-hunter, gave him almost absolute power throughout the domains of his illustrious father-in-law, a power which no one dared to contest with him, especially after the re-marriage of his Royal Highness with Madame de Montesson. This had taken place in 1773, since which date he had almost abandoned his castle at Villers-Cotterets for his delightful residence at Bagnolet, where he entertained all the first wits of the day and amused himself with play-acting.

And so, whether the sun was shining to rejoice the earth, or the rain was saddening it, whether the winter fields lay hidden beneath a shroud of snow, or the spring had spread her fresh green carpet over the meadows, it was rare, on any day of the year, not to see the great gates of the Castle thrown wide open between eight and nine o’clock in the morning, and first the Baron come forth, and immediately after him his chief pricker, Marcotte, followed by the other prickers. Then appeared the dogs, coupled and held in leash by the keepers of the hounds, under the superintendence of Engoulevent, who aspired to become a pricker. Even as the German executioner walks alone, behind the nobles and in front of the citizens, to show that he is the least of the former and the first of the latter, so he walked immediately after the prickers and ahead of the keepers of the hounds, as being the chief of the whippers-in and least of the prickers.

The whole procession filed out of the castle court in full hunting array, with the English horses and the French hounds; twelve horses, and forty dogs.

Before we go any farther, let me say that with these twelve horses and forty dogs the Baron hunted every sort of quarry, but more especially the wolf, in order no doubt to do honour to his title.

No further proof will be needed by the genuine sportsman of the fine faith he had in the general quality of his hounds, and in their keenness of scent, than the fact that next to the wolf he gave preference to the boar, then to the red deer, then to the fallow-deer, and lastly to the roebuck; finally, if the keepers of the pack failed to sight the animal they had tracked, he uncoupled at random, and went after the first hare that crossed his path. For, as we have already stated, the worthy Baron went out hunting every day, and he would sooner have gone for four-and-twenty hours without food or drink, although he was often thirsty, than have spent that time without seeing his hounds run.

But, as everybody knows, however swift the horses, and however keen the dogs, hunting has its bad times as well as its good.

One day, Marcotte came up to where the Baron was awaiting him, with a crestfallen expression of countenance.

“How now, Marcotte,” asked the Baron frowning, “what is the matter this time? I see by your face we are to expect bad sport to-day.”

Marcotte shook his head.

“Speak up, man,” continued the Baron with a gesture of impatience.

“The matter is, my Lord, that the black wolf is about.”

“Ah! ah!” exclaimed the Baron, his eyes sparkling; for you must know that this made the fifth or sixth time that the worthy Baron had started the animal in question, but never once had he been able to get within gun-shot of him or to run him down.

“Yes,” Marcotte went on, “but the damned beast has employed himself so well all night crossing his track and doubling, that after having traced him over half the forest, I found myself at the place from which I started.”

“You think then, Marcotte, that there is no chance of getting near him.”

“I am afraid not.”

“By all the devils in hell!” exclaimed the Lord of Vez, who had not had his equal in swearing since the mighty Nimrod, “however, I am not feeling well to-day, and I must have a burst of some kind, to get rid of these bad humours. What do you think we can hunt, Marcotte, in place of this damned black wolf?”

“Well, having been so taken up with the wolf,” answered Marcotte, “I have not traced any other animal. Will my Lord uncouple at random and hunt the first animal that we come across?”

The Baron was about to express his willingness to agree to this proposal when he caught sight of little Engoulevent coming towards them cap in hand.

“Wait a moment,” he said, “here comes Engoulevent, who, I fancy, has some advice to give us.”

“I have no advice to give to a noble Lord like yourself,” replied Engoulevent, assuming an expression of humility on his sly and crafty face; “it is, however, my duty to inform you that there is a splendid buck in the neighbourhood.”

“Let us see your buck, Engoulevent,” replied the chief wolf-hunter, “and if you are not mistaken about it, there will be a new crown for you.”

“Where is this buck of yours?” asked Marcotte, “but look to your skin, if you make us uncouple to no purpose.”

“Let me have Matador and Jupiter, and then we shall see.” Matador and Jupiter were the finest among the hounds belonging to the Lord of Vez. And indeed, Engoulevent had not gone a hundred paces with them through the thicket, before, by the lashing of their tails, and their repeated yelping, he knew that they were on the right scent. In another minute or two a magnificent ten-tined stag came into view. Marcotte cried Tally-ho, sounded his horn, and the hunt began, to the great satisfaction of the Lord of Vez, who, although regretting the black wolf, was willing to make the best of a fine buck in its stead. The hunt had lasted two hours, and the quarry still held on. It had first led its pursuers from the little wood of Haramont to the Chemin du Pendu, and thence straight to the back of Oigny, and it still showed no sign of fatigue; for it was not one of those poor animals of the flat country who get their tails pulled by every wretched terrier.

As it neared the low grounds of Bourg-fontaine, however, it evidently decided that it was being run rather hard, for it gave up the bolder measures which had hitherto enabled it to keep ahead, and began to double.

Its first manœuvre was to go down to the brook which joins the ponds of Baisemont and Bourg, then to walk against stream with the water up to its haunches, for nearly half a mile; it then sprang on to the right bank, back again into the bed of the stream, made another leap to the left, and with a succession of bounds, as vigorous as its failing strength allowed, continued to out-distance its pursuers. But the dogs of my lord Baron were not animals to be put out by such trifles as these. Being both sagacious and well-bred, they, of their own accord, divided the task between themselves, half going up stream, and half down, these hunting on the right those on the left, and so effectually that they ere long put the animal off its changes, for they soon recovered the scent, rallying at the first cry given by one of the pack, and starting afresh on the chase, as ready and eager as if the deer had been only twenty paces in front of them.

And so with galloping of horses, with cry of hounds and blare of horn, the Baron and his huntsmen reached the ponds of Saint Antoine, a hundred paces or so from the Confines of Oigny. Between these and the Osier-beds stood the hut of Thibault, the sabot-maker.

We must pause to give some description of this Thibault, the shoe-maker, the real hero of the tale.

You will ask why I, who have summoned kings to appear upon the stage, who have obliged princes, dukes, and barons to play secondary parts in my romances, should take a simple shoe-maker for the hero of this tale.

First, I will reply by saying that, in my dear home country of Villers-Cotterets, there are more sabot-makers than barons, dukes and princes, and that, as soon as I decided to make the forest the scene of the events I am about to record, I was obliged to choose one of the actual inhabitants of this forest as hero, unless I had wished to represent such fantastic persons as the Incas of Marmontel or the Abencerrages of M. de Florian.

More than that, it is not the author who decides on the subject, but the subject which takes possession of the author, and, good or bad, this particular subject has taken possession of me. I will therefore endeavour to draw Thibault’s portrait for you, plain shoe-maker as he was, as exactly as the artist paints the portrait which a prince desires to send to his lady-love.

Thibault was a man between twenty-five and twenty-seven years of age, tall, well made, physically robust, but by nature melancholy and sad of heart. This depression of spirits arose from a little grain of envy, which, in spite of himself, perhaps unconsciously to himself, he harboured towards all such of his neighbours as had been more favoured by fortune than himself.

His father had committed a fault, a serious one at all times, but more especially in those days of absolutism, when a man was not able to rise above his station as now-a-days, when with sufficient capacity he may attain to any rank. Thibault had been educated above his position; he had been at school under the Abbé Fortier, at Villers-Cotterets, and had learnt to read, write, and cypher; moreover he knew a little Latin, which made him inordinately proud of himself. Thibault had spent a great part of his time in reading, and his books had been chiefly those which were in vogue at the close of the preceding century. But he had not been a sufficiently clever analyst to know how to separate the good from the bad, or rather he had separated what was bad, and swallowed it in large doses, leaving the good to precipitate itself at the bottom of the glass.

At twenty years of age Thibault had certainly had dreams of being something other than a sabot-maker. He had, for instance, for a very little while, cast his eyes towards the army. But his comrades who had worn the double livery of king and country, had left the service as they entered it, mere soldiers of the ranks, having failed during five or six years of slavery to obtain promotion, even to the not very exalted grade of corporal.

Thibault had also thought of becoming a sailor. But a career in the navy was as much forbidden to the plebeian as one in the army. Possibly after enduring danger, and storm and battle for fifteen or twenty years, he might be made a boatswain’s mate, that was all, and then! besides, it was by no means Thibault’s ambition to wear a short vest and sail-cloth trousers, but the blue uniform of the king with red vest and gold epaulettes. He had moreover known of no single case in which the son of a mere shoe-maker had become Master of a Frigate, or even Lieutenant. So he was forced to give up all idea of joining the King’s Navy.

Thibault would not have minded being a Notary, and at one time thought of apprenticing himself to the Royal Scrivener, Maître Niquet, as a stepping-stone, and of making his way up on the strength of his own legs and with the help of his pen. But supposing him to have risen to the position of head clerk with a salary of a hundred crowns, where was he to find the thirty thousand francs which would be required for the purchase of the smallest village practice.

There was, therefore, no better chance of his becoming a scrivener than of becoming an officer on sea or land. Meanwhile, Thibault’s father died, leaving very little ready money. There was about enough to bury him, so he was buried, and this done, there remained some thirty or forty francs over for Thibault.

Thibault knew his trade well; indeed, he was a first-rate workman; but he had no inclination to handle either auger or parer. It ended, therefore, by his leaving all his father’s tools in the care of a friend, a remnant of prudence still remaining to him, and selling every vestige of furniture; having thus realised a sum of five hundred and forty livres, he determined to make what was then called the tour of France.

Thibault spent three years in travelling; he did not make his fortune during that time, but he learnt a great many things in the course of his journey of which he was previously ignorant, and acquired certain accomplishments which he had previously been without.

He learned amongst other things that, although it was as well to keep one’s word on matters of business with a man, it was no use whatever keeping love vows made to a woman.

So much for his character and habits of mind. As to his external accomplishments, he could dance a jig beautifully, could hold his own at quarter-staff against four men, and could handle the boar-spear as cleverly as the best huntsman going. All these things had not a little served to increase Thibault’s natural self-esteem, and, seeing himself handsomer, stronger, and cleverer than many of the nobles, he would exclaim against Providence, crying, “Why was I not nobly born? why was not that nobleman yonder born a peasant?”

But as Providence took care not to make any answer to these apostrophés, and as Thibault found that dancing, playing at quarter-staff, and throwing the boar-spear only fatigued the body, without procuring him any material advantage, he began to turn his thoughts towards his ancient trade, humble though it was, saying to himself, if it enabled the father to live, it would also enable the son. So Thibault went and fetched away his tools; and then, tools in hand, he went to ask permission of the Steward of his Royal Highness Louis Philippe of Orleans, to build a hut in the forest, in which to carry on his trade. He had no difficulty in obtaining this, for the steward knew by experience that his master was a very kind-hearted man, expending as much as two hundred and forty thousand francs a year on the poor; he felt sure, therefore, that one who gave away a sum like this, would be willing to let an honest workman who wished to ply his trade, have thirty or forty feet of ground.

As he had leave to establish himself in whatever part of the forest he liked best, Thibault chose the spot near the osier-beds, where the roads crossed, one of the most beautiful parts of the woods, less than a mile from Oigny and about three times that distance from Villers-Cotterets. The shoe-maker put up his work-shop, built partly of old planks given him by M. Panisis, who had been having a sale in the neighbourhood, and partly of the branches which the steward gave him leave to cut in the forest.

When the building of the hut, which consisted of a bedroom, cosily shut in, where he could work during the winter, and of a lean-to, open to the air, where he could work in the summer, was completed, Thibault began to think of making himself a bed. At first, a layer of fern had to serve for this purpose; but after he had made a hundred pairs of wooden shoes and had sold these to Bedeau, who kept a general shop at Villers-Cotterets, he was able to pay a sufficient deposit to get a mattress, to be paid for in full by the end of three months. The framework of the bed was not difficult to make; Thibault was not the shoe-maker he was without being a bit of a carpenter into the bargain, and when this was finished he plaited osiers to take the place of sacking, laid the mattress upon them, and found himself at last with a bed to lie upon.

Little by little came the sheets, and then in their turn the coverlids; the next purchase was a chafing-dish, and earthenware pots to cook in, and finally some plates and dishes. Before the year was out Thibault had also made additions to his furniture of a fine oak chest and a fine walnut-wood cupboard, both, like the bed, his own handiwork. All the while he was driving a brisk trade, for none could beat Thibault in turning a block of beech into a pair of shoes, and in converting the odd chips into spoons, salt-cellars and natty little bowls.

He had now been settled in his work-shop for three years, that is, ever since his return after the completion of his tour round France, and there was nothing for which anyone could have reproached him during this interval except the failing we have already mentioned – that he was rather more envious of the good fortune of his neighbour than was altogether conducive to the welfare of his soul. But this feeling was as yet so inoffensive, that his confessor had no need to do more than awaken in him a sense of shame for harbouring thoughts which had, so far, not resulted in any active crime.

CHAPTER II
THE SEIGNEUR JEAN AND THE SABOT-MAKER

AS already said, the buck began to dodge and double on reaching Oigny, turning and twisting round Thibault’s hut, and the weather being fine although the autumn was well advanced, the shoe-maker was sitting at his work in his open lean-to. Looking up, he suddenly espied the trembling animal, quivering in every limb, standing a few paces in front of him, gazing at him with intelligent and terrified eyes.

Thibault had been for a long time aware that the hunt was circling around Oigny, at one time drawing near to the village, and then receding, only to draw near again.

There was nothing therefore very surprising to him in the sight of the buck, yet he stayed his hand, although he was busy at work, and contemplated the animal.

“Saint Sabot!” he exclaimed – I should explain, that the festival of Saint Sabot is the wooden-shoe fête – “Saint Sabot! but that is a dainty morsel and would taste as fine, I warrant, as the chamois I ate at Vienne once at the grand banquet of the Jolly Shoe-makers of Dauphiné. Lucky folk who can dine on the like every day. I tasted such once, it is now nearly four years ago, and my mouth waters now when I think of it. Oh! these lords! these lords! with their fresh meats and their old wines at every meal, while I have to be satisfied with potatoes to eat and water to drink from one week’s end to the other; and it is a chance if even on Sunday, I can feast myself with a lump of rusty bacon and an old cabbage, and a glass of pignolet fit to make my old goat stand on her head.”

It need scarcely be said, that as soon as Thibault began this monologue, the buck had turned and disappeared. Thibault had finished rounding his periods, and had just declaimed his peroration, when he heard himself roughly accosted in forcible terms:

“Ho, there, you scoundrel! answer me.”

It was the Baron, who seeing his dogs wavering, was anxious to make sure that they were not on the wrong scent.

“Ho, there, you scoundrel!” repeated the wolf-hunter, “have you seen the beast?”

There was evidently something in the manner of the Baron’s questioning which did not please our philosophical shoe-maker, for although he was perfectly aware what was the matter, he answered: “what beast?”

“Curse you! why, the buck we are hunting! He must have passed close by here, and standing gaping as you do, you must have seen him. It was a fine stag of ten, was it not? Which way did he go? Speak up, you blackguard, or you shall have a taste of my stirrup-leather!”

“The black plague take him, cub of a wolf!” muttered the shoe-maker to himself.

Then, aloud, with a fine air of pretended simplicity, “Ah, yes!” he said, “I did see him.”

“A buck, was it not? a ten-tiner, eh? with great horns.”

“Ah, yes to be sure, a buck, with great horns, – or great corns, was it? yes, I saw him as plain as I see you, my Lord. But there, I can’t say if he had any corns, for I did not look at his feet, anyhow,” he added, with the air of a perfect simpleton, “if he had corns, they did not prevent him running.”

At any other time the Baron would have laughed at what he might have taken for genuine stupidity; but the doublings of the animal were beginning to put him into a regular huntsman’s fever.

“Now, then, you scoundrel, a truce to this jesting! If you are in a humour for jokes, it is more than I am!”

“I will be in whatever humour it may please your Lordship I should be.”

“Well, then, answer me.”

“Your Lordship has asked me nothing as yet.”

“Did the deer seem tired?”

“Not very.”

“Which way did he come?”

“He did not come, he was standing still.”

“Well, but he must have come from one side or the other.”

“Ah! very likely, but I did not see him come.”

“Which way did he go?”

“I would tell you directly; only I did not see him go.”

The Lord of Vez cast an angry look at Thibault.

“Is it some while ago the buck passed this way, Master Simpleton?”

“Not so very long, my Lord.”

“About how long ago?”

Thibault made as if trying to remember; at last he replied:

“It was, I think, the day before yesterday,” but in saying this, the shoe-maker, unfortunately, could not suppress a grin. This grin did not escape the Baron, who, spurring his horse, rode down on Thibault with lifted whip.

Thibault was agile, and with a single bound he reached the shelter of his lean-to, whither the wolf-hunter could not follow, as long as he remained mounted; Thibault was therefore in momentary safety.

“You are only bantering and lying!” cried the huntsman, “for there is Marcassino, my best hound, giving cry not twenty yards off, and if the deer passed by where Marcassino is, he must have come over the hedge, and it is impossible, therefore, that you did not see him.”

“Pardon, my Lord, but according to our good priest, no one but the Pope is infallible, and Monsieur Marcassino may be mistaken.”

“Marcassino is never mistaken, do you hear, you rascal! and in proof of it I can see from here the marks where the animal scratched up the ground.”

“Nevertheless, my Lord, I assure you, I swear…” said Thibault, who saw the Baron’s eyebrows contracting in a way that made him feel uneasy.

“Silence, and come here, blackguard!” cried my lord.

Thibault hesitated a moment, but the black look on the sportsman’s face became more and more threatening, and fearing to increase his exasperation by disobeying his command, he thought he had better go forward, hoping that the Baron merely wished to ask a service of him.

But it was an unlucky move on his part, for scarcely had he emerged from the protection of the shed, before the horse of the Lord of Vez, urged by bit and spur, gave a leap, which brought his rider swooping down upon Thibault, while at the same moment a furious blow from the butt end of the Baron’s whip fell upon his head.

The shoe-maker, stunned by the blow, tottered a moment, lost his balance and was about to fall face downwards, when the Baron, drawing his foot out of the stirrup, with a violent kick in the chest, not only straightened him again, but sent the poor wretch flying in an opposite direction, where he fell with his back against the door of his hut.

“Take that!” said the Baron, as he first felled Thibault with his whip, and then kicked him, “take that for your lie, and that for your banter!”

And then, without troubling himself any further about the man, whom he left lying on his back, the Lord of Vez, seeing that the hounds had rallied on hearing Marcassino’s cry, gave them a cheery note on his horn, and cantered away.

Thibault lifted himself up, feeling bruised all over, and began feeling himself from head to foot to make sure that no bones were broken.

Having carefully passed his hand over each limb in succession, “that’s all right,” he said, “there is nothing broken either above or below, I am glad to find. So, my Lord Baron, that is how you treat people, because you happen to have married a Prince’s bastard daughter! But let me tell you, my fine fellow, it is not you who will eat the buck you are hunting to-day; it will be this blackguard, this scoundrel, this simpleton of a Thibault who will eat it. Yes, it shall be I who eat it, that I vow!” cried Thibault, confirming himself more and more in his bold resolution, and it is no use being a man if having once made a vow, one fails to keep it.

So without further delay, Thibault thrust his bill-hook into his belt, seized his boar-spear, and after listening for a moment to the cry of the hounds to ascertain in which direction the hunt had gone, he ran off with all the speed of which a man’s legs are capable to get the start of them, guessing by the curve which the stag and its pursuers were following what would be the straight line to take so as to intercept them.

There were two ways of doing his deed open to Thibault; either to hide himself beside the path which the buck must take and kill him with his boar-spear, or else to surprise the animal just as he was being hunted down by the dogs, and collar him there and then.

And as he ran, the desire to revenge himself on the Baron for the latter’s brutality, was not so uppermost in Thibault’s mind as the thoughts of the sumptuous manner in which he would fare for the next month, on the shoulders, the back, and the haunches of the deer, either salted to a turn, roasted on the spit, or cut in slices and done in the pan. And these two ideas, moreover, of vengeance and gluttony, were so jumbled up in his brain, that while still running at the top of his speed he laughed in his sleeve, as he pictured the dejected mien of the Baron and his men returning to the castle after their fruitless day’s hunt, and at the same time saw himself seated at table, the door securely fastened, and a pint of wine beside him, tête-à-tête with a haunch of the deer, the rich and delicious gravy escaping as the knife returned for a third or fourth cut.

The deer, as far as Thibault could calculate, was making for the bridge which crosses the Ourcq, between Noroy and Troesne. At the time of which we are now speaking there was a bridge spanning the river, formed of two joists and a few planks. As the river was very high and very rapid, Thibault decided that the deer would not attempt to ford it; so he hid himself behind a rock, within reach of the bridge, and waited.

It was not long before he saw the graceful head of the deer appear above the rock at some ten paces’ distance; the animal was bending its ears to the wind, in the endeavour to catch the sound of the enemy’s approach as it was borne along the breeze. Thibault, excited by this sudden appearance, rose from behind the rock, poised his boar-spear and sent it flying towards the animal.

The buck, with a single bound, reached the middle of the bridge, a second carried him on to the opposite bank, and a third bore him out of sight.

The boar-spear had passed within a foot of the animal, and had buried itself in the grass fifteen paces from where Thibault was standing. Never before had he been known to make such an unskilful throw; he, Thibault, of all the company who made the tour of France, the one known to be surest of his aim! Enraged with himself, therefore, he picked up his weapon, and bounded across the bridge with an agility equal to that of the deer.

Thibault knew the country quite as well as the animal he was pursuing, and so got ahead of the deer and once more concealed himself, this time behind a beech-tree, half-way up, and not too far from a little footpath.

The deer now passed so close to him, that Thibault hesitated as to whether it would not be better to knock the animal down with his boar-spear than to throw the weapon at it; but his hesitation did not last longer than a flash of lightning, for no lightning could be quicker than the animal itself, which was already twenty paces off when Thibault threw his boar-spear, but without better luck than the time before.

And now the baying of the hounds was drawing nearer and nearer; another few minutes, and it would, he felt, be impossible for him to carry out his design. But in honour to his spirit of persistence, be it said, that in proportion as the difficulty increased, the greater became Thibault’s desire to get possession of the deer.

“I must have it, come what will,” he cried, “I must! and if there is a God who cares for the poor, I shall have satisfaction of this confounded Baron, who beat me as if I were a dog, but I am a man notwithstanding, and I am quite ready to prove the same to him.” And Thibault picked up his boar-spear and once more set off running. But it would appear that the good God whom he had just invoked, either had not heard him, or wished to drive him to extremities, for his third attempt had no greater success than the previous ones.