AN ALLIANCE DECLINED

As the Emperor left the room, followed by the officers and men, a little silence fell over the three people remaining therein.

“Monsieur lé Comte d’Aumenier!” exclaimed the Countess Laure, wonder, derision and disdain in her voice.  “Your chateau, your domain!”

She looked about the great hall and laughed scornfully.  Young Marteau turned crimson.  He threw up his head proudly.

“Mademoiselle -” he began sternly, his voice full of indignant protest and resentment.

“Don’t be too hard on the lad, Countess,” interposed the Englishman, his interest aroused.  “By gad, he saved your honor, your life, and -”

“And, if I mistake not, I repaid the obligation by saving his life also, sir.”

“And I recognize it, and am grateful, mademoiselle.”

“I am ordered to report to you, sir,” said a young man, coming into the room followed by a file of dismounted soldiers, and relieving a situation growing most tense.

“Very good,” said Marteau, devoutly thankful for the interruption.  “You will dispose your men so as to guard the approaches of the chateau at every hand.  You will keep a strict lookout, and you will awaken me at dawn.  I think there is nothing to be apprehended from the enemy.  The advance of the Emperor will have cleared all this section of even wandering troops of Cossacks by this time, but there are masterless men abroad.”

“I shall know how to deal with them,” said the young officer, saluting.

“You will also send men to remove these dead bodies and clear up this room.  Take this poor lad”-pointing to Pierre-“and see that he is cared for.  You will find a place for him upstairs.  Your regimental surgeon -”

“Is attending to the wounded.  I will see that the boy gets every care, sir.”

“And Bal-Arrêt?”

“His arm is dressed, and he is the admiration of the camp-fire.”

“I suppose so.”

“Any other orders, Major?”

“None; you may go.”

“Mademoiselle,” said Marteau, facing the Countess as the officer turned away, his men taking the dead bodies and the wounded peasant with them, “you wrong me terribly.”

“By saving your life, pray?” she asked contemptuously.

“By-by-your -” he faltered and stopped.

“In what way, Monsieur lé Comte?” interrupted the young woman, who knew very well what the young man meant.

In her irritating use of his new-found title, and in the way in which it fell from her lips, she cut him like a whip-lash, and she did it deliberately, too-he, the Count, forsooth!

“Call me Marteau,” he protested, stepping toward her, at which she fell back a little.  “Or, better still, as when I was a boy, your faithful follower, Jean.”

“If the Emperor has the power, he has made you a Count; if he has not, you are not.”

“What the Emperor makes me is of little consequence between us, mademoiselle.  It is what I am that counts.”

“And you remain, then, just Jean Marteau, of the loyal Marteaux?”

“One does not wipe out the devotion of years in a moment.  My father served yours, your grandfather, your uncle, your father.  I am still”-he threw up his head proudly as he made the confession-“your man.”

“But the title -”

“What is a title?  Your uncle is in England.  He does not purpose to come back to France unless he whom he calls his rightful king again rules the land.  Should that come to be, my poor patent of nobility would not be worth the parchment upon which it was engrossed.”

“And the lands?”

“In any case I would but hold them in trust for the Marquis -”

“My uncle is old, childless.  I am the last of the long line.”

“Then I will hold them for you, mademoiselle.  They are yours.  When this war is over, and France is at peace once more, I will take my father’s place and keep them for you.”

“I could not accept such a sacrifice.”

“It would be no sacrifice.”

“I repeat, I cannot consent to be under such obligation, even to you.”

“There is a way -” began the young Frenchman softly, shooting a meaning glance at the young woman.

“I do not understand,” she faltered.

“I am peasant born,” admitted Marteau, “but, though no gentle blood flows through my veins, my family, I think, is as old as your own.”

“It is so,” agreed the Countess, trembling as she began to catch the meaning.  “Oh, monsieur, stop.”

“As there has never a d’Aumenier failed to hold the chateau so there has never failed a Marteau to follow him,” went on the young man, unheeding her protest.

“I care as little for distinctions of rank as any demoiselle of old France, perhaps, but -”

“Mademoiselle is right.  As for myself, I am a republican at heart, although I follow the Emperor.  I, too, care little for the distinctions of rank, for titles, yet I have earned a title in the service of the Emperor.  Through him, even humble men rise high and go far.  Will you -”

“Monsieur, you must not go on!” cried the girl, “thrusting out her hand, as if to check him.

“Pardon,” said the young Frenchman resolutely.  “Having gone thus far I must go further.  Humble as I am, obscure though I be, I have dared to raise my eyes to heaven-to you, mademoiselle.  In my boyhood days you honored me with your friendship, your companionship.  I have made something of myself.  If mademoiselle would only deign to - It is impossible that she should love me-it would be an ineffable condescension-but is there not some merit in the thought that the last survivors of the two lines should unite to -”

“Impossible!” cried the Countess, her face flushing.  “My uncle would never consent.  In my veins is the oldest, the noblest blood of France.  Even I could not -”

“Be it so,” said Marteau, paling, but standing very erect.  “It is, of course, impossible.  There is not honor enough or merit enough in the world,” he went on bitterly, “to obliterate the difference in station between us.  The revolution, after all, changed little.  Keep the title, keep the estates, mademoiselle, I want them not,” continued the young soldier bitterly.  “Having aspired to you, do you think these are compensations?”

“You saved my life,” said the girl falteringly.

“It was nothing.  You did as much for me.”

“And my honor,” she added.

“I ask no reward.”

“By gad!” said Yeovil at this juncture, “I’m damned if I see how you can withstand him.  He is a gallant lad.  He has fought bravely and he has pleaded nobly.  You may not win the Countess-as a matter of fact she is pledged to my son-but you deserve her.  I’ve never been able to understand any kind of women, much less Frenchwomen, saving your presence, mademoiselle.  Base-born you may be, Major Marteau, but I know a gentleman when I see him, I flatter myself, and, damme, young man, here’s my hand.  I can understand your Emperor better since he can inspire the devotion of men like you.”

The two men clasped hands.  The Countess looked on.  She stepped softly nearer to them.  She laid her hand on Marteau’s shoulder.

“Monsieur-Jean,” she said, and there was a long pause between the two words, “I would that I could grant your request, but it is-you see-you know I cannot.  I am betrothed to Captain Yeovil, with my uncle’s consent, of course.  I am a very unhappy woman,” she ended, although just what she meant by that last sentence she hardly knew.

“And this Captain Yeovil, he is a soldier?” asked Marteau.

“Under Wellington,” answered the father.

“Now may God grant that I may meet him!”

“You’ll find him a gallant officer,” answered the sturdy old Englishman proudly.

“When I think of his father I know that to be true,” was the polite rejoinder.

The little Countess sank down on the chair, buried her face in her hands and burst into tears.

“Well, of all the -” began the Englishman, but the Frenchman checked him.

“Mademoiselle,” he said softly, “were every tear a diamond they could not make for me so precious a diadem as they do when I think that you weep for me.  I wish you joy with your English captain.  I am your humble servant ever.”

And Laure d’Aumenier felt very much comforted by those words.  It was absurd, inconceivable, impossible, of course, and yet no handsomer, braver, truer, more considerate gentleman had ever crossed her horizon than this descendant of an ancient line of self-respecting, honorable yeomen.  She contrasted him with Captain Yeovil, and the contrast was not to Marteau’s disadvantage!  No, decidedly not!