CHAPTER XV.
The balsam of the pine-trees, the quiet of the woods, failed to content for long the child who had so often found consolation and peace in his forest home. The burning fire in his heart parched his whole being. Back to the city he must go; the Indians could not cheer him, as they had so often done in times past. The priest, whose simple life he had shared so happily in other days, had no words of counsel now to help him. What did he know of love and its fierce pain, he whose life had been vowed to the worship of an immaculate goddess? Back to the city, where is no peace, no song of bird, no soft footstep of hidden wood-creature! His feet would fain tread the burning streets again because they led to her dwelling; while the odorous aisles strewn with pine-needles lose themselves in lonely thickets, fit only for happy lovers or for men wedded to their own thoughts!
After a short visit, the briefest he had ever made them, Robert left the village of his Indian friends and set his face towards the city. He took leave of the holy man just at nightfall, and made his way through the woods, guided by the familiar indications on the trees. It was a breath less night; the stars looked far away and dim beside one blazing planet that hung low in the horizon over the city. Never had he seen that queen of planets so bright. She shone forth with a mellow radiance, beside which the young moon looked pale and chilly in comparison. At a point where three paths converged, the wayfarer stopped, and falling on his knees, held up his hands adoring, beseeching the point of yellow flame which shone down upon New Orleans.
His lips moved. Could he be praying to the evening star, or was he apostrophizing the Love it typifies? Ere his journey was half accomplished, the star had set; but would it not rise on the morrow? Early in the morning he reached the city, having walked since sunset. The streets were quiet; and foot-weary as he was, he yielded to the temptation of looking upon his maiden's dwelling before he went to rest. The little house looked very friendly. The blinds of the lower rooms were open, and his eyes sought the corner where Margaret was wont to sit of an evening with her small tea-table beside her. All was as he had last seen it. With a light step he passed to the garden, and finding the studio-door unlocked, entered the familiar room. There lay her apron as she had left it, thrown over a chair. He had the little blue garment, which still showed the impress of a rounded shoulder, in his arms in an instant, and kissed it passionately.
Now that he was so near her, he could not go away without looking upon her face. The hunger in him for sight and sound and touch of her was stronger than aught beside. He would wait, and while waiting he would sleep a little; it was early yet, and he was passing weary. There was no couch in the room, and he stretched himself upon a tiger-skin on the floor, and was asleep ere he could have counted six of his own heartbeats.
As he slept, a strange dream came to him. He was aware of a creature bending over him, at once as beautiful and as deadly as the tiger on whose skin he lay. Through his heavily closed lids the malignant light of two strange red-brown eyes seemed to burn into his brain, a warm breath passed over his face. He stirred in his sleep and tried to open his eyes. In vain! A voice low and musical as the murmur of his forest pine-trees chanted words whose sound alone reached him in the distant sleep-world: "And the sins of the fathers shall be visited upon the children. Do you hear me? It is not I who do this thing, but the avenger. How beautiful you are, Robert! I could almost love you, were it not forbidden." The words ceased; a faint perfume was wafted over him; some one had kissed him as he slept,—a kiss burning, yet tender. He had dreamed of such kisses before; but those dream-embraces were given by a pale maiden with a small rose mouth like a half-unfolded flower, not by this tall woman with fiery dark eyes and lips as red as blood who was now kneeling beside him.
With an effort he awoke and started to his feet, confused and terrified, only to fall back faint and sick, a sharp pain in his side, a cry of agony on his lips. He had been stabbed; and on the floor beside him lay a jewelled crystal dagger, whose rubies looked pale beside the crimson dye that stained it. He had been stabbed, and he must die unless that red tide creeping across the tiger-skin could be stanched. Beside him was the little blue garment; he had slept with it in his embrace. With his last remaining strength he pressed the vesture of the woman he loved close to the gaping wound; and then his very soul seemed to be borne away on the stream of scarlet life-blood creeping across the tiger-skin toward the door.
Nearer and nearer to the sill stole the narrow thread of scarlet liquor, every drop of which lessened his chances of life. It stopped at the threshold and widened into a little pool, and lay there sparkling in the light of the sun that shone alike on flower and tree, on clear falling fountain, on singing-bird, and on the stricken, bleeding man.
•••••••
Philip Rondelet was a light sleeper, and the man who had come to rouse him had need to knock but once, though it was just the hour of sunrise, when he was wont to sleep most soundly. His visitor proved to be the dago, the half-brother of Theresa's mother. He shambled into the room through the door which Philip held half open, and stated his errand. Therese had been wilder than ever of late; her mother believed her mad, but he himself knew better. She had made a promise to the dead; and those who make promises to the dead are never easy till they have kept their word. The man nodded at Philip as if confident that he was understood, and then went on with his story. They had watched her till they were both weary, and the night before she had escaped them, "taking that which she always carries here with her," he added, significantly striking his breast and making a gesture as of stabbing. The mother had sought her everywhere. They had been to his house, and learned that she had passed that way, and talked with the servants of where she might find him. They knew not where else to seek her. Monsieur was his friend. Perhaps it would be well if he should warn him? Mad or not, the girl was a dangerous creature. It was an ill day when she had come back to them with her foreign ways and ideas of being a lady,—a lady, and too good to live and eat with her own flesh and blood!
As he ceased speaking, the man gave an ugly laugh and smote his red cap upon his knee with an angry gesture.
As he listened to the man's story, Philip hastily dressed himself, and by the time the dago had finished, he was ready. They went out together, a strangely contrasted pair, the tall and graceful figure of Rondelet, aristocratic in outline, exquisite in dress, towering above the short, heavily-built plebeian, strong and stupid as an ox. By that subtler sense of intuition he knew where to seek Robert; and while he was making all speed to reach and warn him, a suggestion floated through his mind whose baseness was only realized in the moment when it was indignantly dismissed,—"Why should he interfere? Why should he step out of his way to warn his rival of a possible danger, of a fate which he perhaps deserved?"
He shuddered as he understood the full meaning of that whispered temptation, and was thankful to see by the unabated pace of his companion that his feet had not faltered one instant on their errand of warning.
So it is that to the most noble, to the most white-souled of men, come thoughts of evil, promptings of the lower nature. It is not, as unwilling sinners would fain believe, that the good are so by nature and without effort; it is that they have strength to strangle the evil thought before it becomes a deed, to tear out the base desire and cast it from them before it is fulfilled.
All was quiet at Margaret's dwelling, no sign of life about the house or garden. His imagination, without doubt, had tricked him. The flowers bloomed serenely, the bird in the magnolia-tree twittered to her little ones, and the cat, sunning herself under the piazza rail, rubbed her nose against his legs in friendly greeting. The studio door stood ajar. He stepped quickly over the threshold; his foot slipped on something shiny and treacherous, and as he saved himself from falling, he saw lying before him the form of his friend Robert Feuardent, his face white and set with the look of death. The dago saw all this too, and one thing more,—a small dagger, which glistened in the light and broke the sunbeams into splinters of colors more splendid than the rarest gems. He hid the weapon in his breast, with a watchful glance at Philip to see whether the action was observed; but the physician either did not see or purposely ignored what the other had done, his attention being riveted on the man so grievously in need of his utmost skill. As with the aid of his rough companion Philip busied himself over the wounded man, his thoughts reverted to a scene not unlike this one. He half expected to see the face of Jean Thoron, of his young colleague, of Therese, beside him as he turned from the wounded man; but he was alone with the dago.
There was one more point of difference in the case,—Fernand Thoron had been doomed to die from the first, and the man who had killed him had one chance of life left.