The Adventures of Gerard by Arthur Conan Doyle (i read books TXT) 📖

his side. He turned a haggard face upon me, and it was Duplessis, the man who had gone before me. It needed but one glance at his sunken cheeks and glazing eyes to tell me that he was dying.

“Gerard!” said he; “Gerard!”

I could but look my sympathy, but he, though the life was ebbing swiftly out of him, still kept his duty before him, like the gallant gentleman he was.

“The beacon, Gerard! You will light it?”

“Have you flint and steel?”

“It is here!”

“Then I will light it tonight.”

“I die happy to hear you say so. They shot me, Gerard.

But you will tell the Marshal that I did my best.”

“And Cortex?”

“He was less fortunate. He fell into their hands and died horribly. If you see that you cannot get away, Gerard, put a bullet into your own heart. Don’t die as Cortex did.”

I could see that his breath was failing, and I bent low to catch his words.

“Can you tell me anything which can help me in my task?” I asked.

“Yes, yes; de Pombal. He will help you. Trust de Pombal.” With the words his head fell back and he was dead.

“Trust de Pombal. It is good advice.” To my amazement a man was standing at the very side of me.

So absorbed had I been in my comrade’s words and intent on his advice that he had crept up without my observing him. Now I sprang to my feet and faced him. He was a tall, dark fellow, black-haired, black-eyed, black-bearded, with a long, sad face. In his hand he had a wine-bottle and over his shoulder was slung one of the trabucos or blunderbusses which these fellows bear. He made no effort to unsling it, and I understood that this was the man to whom my dead friend had commended me.

“Alas, he is gone!” said he, bending over Duplessis.

“He fled into the wood after he was shot, but I was fortunate enough to find where he had fallen and to make his last hours more easy. This couch was my making, and I had brought this wine to slake his thirst.”

“Sir,” said I, “in the name of France I thank you. I am but a colonel of light cavalry, but I am Etienne Gerard, and the name stands for something in the French army. May I ask–-”

“Yes, sir, I am Aloysius de Pombal, younger brother of the famous nobleman of that name. At present I am the first lieutenant in the band of the guerilla chief who is usually known as Manuelo, ‘The Smiler.’ “

My word, I clapped my hand to the place where my pistol should have been, but the man only smiled at the gesture.

“I am his first lieutenant, but I am also his deadly enemy,” said he. He slipped off his jacket and pulled up his shirt as he spoke. “Look at this!” he cried, and he turned upon me a back which was all scored and lacerated with red and purple weals. “This is what ‘The Smiler’ has done to me, a man with the noblest blood of Portugal in my veins. What I will do to ‘The Smiler’ you have still to see.”

There was such fury in his eyes and in the grin of his white teeth that I could no longer doubt his truth, with that clotted and oozing back to corroborate his words.

“I have ten men sworn to stand by me,” said he. “In a few days I hope to join your army, when I have done my work here. In the meanwhile—” A strange change came over his face, and he suddenly slung his musket to the front: “Hold up your hands, you French hound!” he yelled. “Up with them, or I blow your head of!”

You start, my friends! You stare! Think, then, how I stared and started at this sudden ending of our talk.

There was the black muzzle and there the dark, angry eyes behind it. What could I do? I was helpless. I raised my hands in the air. At the same moment voices sounded from all parts of the wood, there were crying and calling and rushing of many feet. A swarm of dreadful figures broke through the green bushes, a dozen hands seized me, and I, poor, luckless, frenzied I, was a prisoner once more. Thank God, there was no pistol which I could have plucked from my belt and snapped at my own head. Had I been armed at that moment I should not be sitting here in this cafe and telling you these old-world tales.

With grimy, hairy hands clutching me on every side I was led along the pathway through the wood, the villain de Pombal giving directions to my Captors. Four of the brigands carried up the dead body of Duplessis.

The shadows of evening were already falling when we cleared the forest and came out upon the mountain-side.

Up this I was driven until we reached the headquarters of the guerillas, which lay in a cleft close to the summit of the mountain. There was the beacon which had cost me so much, a square stack of wood, immediately above our heads. Below were two or three huts which had belonged, no doubt, to goatherds, and which were now used to shelter these rascals. Into one of these I was cast, bound and helpless, and the dead body of my poor comrade was laid beside me.

I was lying there with the one thought still consuming me, how to wait a few hours and to get at that pile of fagots above my head, when the door of my prison opened and a man entered. Had my hands been free I should have flown at his throat, for it was none other than de Pombal. A couple of brigands were at his heels, but he ordered them back and closed the door behind him.

“You villain!” said I.

“Hush!” he cried. “Speak low, for I do not know who may be listening, and my life is at stake. I have some words to say to you, Colonel Gerard; I wish well to you, as I did to your dead companion. As I spoke to you beside his body I saw that we were surrounded, and that your capture was unavoidable. I should have shared your fate had I hesitated. I instantly captured you myself, so as to preserve the confidence of the band.

Your own sense will tell you that there was nothing else for me to do. I do not know now whether I can save you, but at least I will try.”

This was a new light upon the situation. I told him that I could not tell how far he spoke the truth, but that I would judge him by his actions.

“I ask nothing better,” said he. “A word of advice to you! The chief will see you now. Speak him fair, or he will have you sawn between two planks. Contradict nothing he says. Give him such information as he wants. It is your only chance. If you can gain time something may come in our favour. Now, I have no more time. Come at once, or suspicion may be awakened.”

He helped me to rise, and then, opening the door, he dragged me out very roughly, and with the aid of the fellows outside he brutally pushed and thrust me to the place where the guerilla chief was seated, with his rude followers gathered round him.

A remarkable man was Manuelo, “The Smiler.” He was fat and florid and comfortable, with a big, clean-shaven face and a bald head, the very model of a kindly father of a family. As I looked at his honest smile I could scarcely believe that this was, indeed, the infamous ruffian whose name was a horror through the English Army as well as our own. It is well known that Trent, who was a British officer, afterward had the fellow hanged for his brutalities. He sat upon a boulder and he beamed upon me like one who meets an old acquaintance.

I observed, however, that one of his men leaned upon a long saw, and the sight was enough to cure me of all delusions.

“Good evening, Colonel Gerard,” said he. “We have been highly honoured by General Massena’s staff: Major Cortex one day, Colonel Duplessis the next, and now Colonel Gerard. Possibly the Marshal himself may be induced to honour us with a visit. You have seen Duplessis, I understand. Cortex you will find nailed to a tree down yonder. It only remains to be decided how we can best dispose of yourself.”

It was not a cheering speech; but all the time his fat face was wreathed in smiles, and he lisped out his words in the most mincing and amiable fashion. Now, however, he suddenly leaned forward, and I read a very real intensity in his eyes.

“Colonel Gerard,” said he, “I cannot promise you your life, for it is not our custom, but I can give you an easy death or I can give you a terrible one. Which shall it be?”

“What do you wish me to do in exchange?”

“If you would die easy I ask you to give me truthful answers to the questions which I ask.”

A sudden thought flashed through my mind.

“You wish to kill me,” said I; “it cannot matter to you how I die. If I answer your questions, will you let me choose the manner of my own death?”

“Yes, I will,” said he, “so long as it is before midnight tonight.”

“Swear it!” I cried.

“The word of a Portuguese gentleman is sufficient,” said he.

“Not a word will I say until you have sworn it.”

He flushed with anger and his eyes swept round toward the saw. But he understood from my tone that I meant what I said, and that I was not a man to be bullied into submission. He pulled a cross from under his zammara or jacket of black sheepskin.

“I swear it,” said he.

Oh, my joy as I heard the words! What an end— what an end for the first swordsman of France! I could have laughed with delight at the thought.

“Now, your questions!” said I.

“You swear in turn to answer them truly?”

“I do, upon the honour of a gentleman and a soldier.”

It was, as you perceive, a terrible thing that I promised, but what was it compared to what I might gain by compliance?

“This is a very fair and a very interesting bargain,” said he, taking a note-book from his pocket.

“Would you kindly turn your gaze toward the French camp?”

Following the direction of his gesture, I turned and looked down upon the camp in the plain beneath us. In spite of the fifteen miles, one could in that clear atmosphere see every detail with the utmost distinctness.

There were the long squares of our tents and our huts, with the cavalry lines and the dark patches which marked the ten batteries of artillery. How sad to think of my magnificent regiment waiting down yonder, and to know that they would never see their colonel again! With one squadron of them I could have swept all these cut-throats of the face of the earth. My eager eyes filled with tears as I looked at the corner of the camp where I knew that there were eight hundred men, any one of whom would have died for his colonel. But my sadness vanished when I saw beyond the tents the plumes of smoke which marked the headquarters at Torres Novas. There was Massena, and, please God, at the cost of my life his mission would that night be done. A spasm of pride and exultation filled my breast. I should