I
The antechamber, wide and long, ran the whole length of Mother Théot’s apartment. Her witch’s lair and the room where she had just had her interview with Chauvelin gave directly on it on the one side, and two other living rooms on the other. At one end of the antechamber there were two windows, usually kept closely shuttered; and at the other was the main entrance door, which led to landing and staircase.
The antechamber was empty. It appeared to mock Chauvelin’s excitement, with its grey-washed walls streaked with grime, its worm-eaten benches and tarnished chandelier. Mother Théot, voluble and quaking with fear, was close at his heels. Curtly he ordered her to be gone; her mutterings irritated him, her obvious fear of something unknown grated unpleasantly on his nerves. He cursed himself for his cowardice, and cursed the one man who alone in this world had the power to unnerve him.
“I was dreaming, of course,” he muttered aloud to himself between his teeth. “I have that arch-devil, his laugh, his voice, his affectations, on the brain!”
He was on the point of going to the main door, in order to peer out on the landing or down the stairs, when he heard his name called immediately behind him. Theresia Cabarrus was standing under the lintel of the door which gave on the sybil’s sanctum, her delicate hand holding back the portière.
“Citizen Chauvelin,” she said, “I was waiting for you.”
“And I, citoyenne,” he retorted gruffly, “had in truth forgotten you.”
“Mother Théot left me alone for a while, to commune with the spirits,” she explained.
“Ah!” he riposted, slightly sarcastic. “With what result?”
“To help you further, citizen Chauvelin,” she replied; “if you have need of me.”
“Ah!” he exclaimed with a savage curse. “In truth, I have need of every willing hand that will raise itself against mine enemy. I have need of you, citizeness; of that old witch; of Rateau, the coalheaver; of every patriot who will sit and watch this house, to which we have brought the one bait that will lure the goldfish to our net.”
“Have I not proved my willingness, citizen?” she retorted, with a smile. “Think you ’tis pleasant to give up my life, my salon, my easy, contented existence, and become a mere drudge in your service?”
“A drudge,” he broke in with a chuckle, “who will soon be greater than a Queen.”
“Ah, if I thought that! …” she exclaimed.
“I am as sure of it as that I am alive,” he replied firmly. “You will never do anything with citizen Tallien, citoyenne. He is too mean, too cowardly. But bring the Scarlet Pimpernel to his knees at the chariot wheel of Robespierre, and even the crown of the Bourbons would be yours for the asking.”
“I know that, citizen,” she rejoined dryly; “else I were not here.”
“We hold all the winning cards,” he went on eagerly. “Lady Blakeney is in our hands. So long as we hold her, we have the certainty that sooner or later the English spy will establish communication with her. Catherine Théot is a good jailer, and Captain Boyer upstairs has a number of men under his command—veritable sleuthhounds, whose efficiency I can guarantee and whose eagerness is stimulated by the promise of a magnificent reward. But experience has taught me that that accursed Scarlet Pimpernel is never so dangerous as when we think we hold him. His extraordinary histrionic powers have been our undoing hitherto. No man’s eyes are keen enough to pierce his disguises. That is why, citoyenne, I dragged you to England; that is why I placed you face to face with him, and said to you, ‘That is the man.’ Since then, with your help, we hold the decoy. Now you are my coadjutor and my help. In your eyes I place my trust; in your wits, your instinct. In whatever guise the Scarlet Pimpernel presents himself before you—and he will present himself before you, or he is no longer the impudent and reckless adventurer I know him to be!—I feel that you at least will recognise him.”
“Yes; I think I should recognise him,” she mused.
“Think you that I do not appreciate the sacrifice you make—the anxiety, the watchfulness to which you so nobly subject yourself? But ’tis you above all who are the lure which must inevitably attract the Scarlet Pimpernel into my hands.”
“Soon, I hope,” she sighed wearily.
“Soon,” he asserted firmly. “I dare swear it! Until then, citizeness, in the name of your own future, and in the name of France, I adjure you to watch. Watch and listen! Oh, think of the stakes for which we are playing, you and I! Bring the Scarlet Pimpernel to his knees, citoyenne, and Robespierre will be as much your slave as he is now the prey to a strange dread of that one man. Robespierre fears the Scarlet Pimpernel. A superstitious conviction has seized hold of him that the English spy will bring about his downfall. We have all seen of late how aloof he holds himself. He no longer attends the Committees. He no longer goes to the Clubs; he shuns his friends; and his furtive glance is forever trying to pierce some imaginary disguise, under which he alternately fears and hopes to discover his arch-enemy. He dreads assassination, anonymous attacks. In every obscure member of the Convention who walks up the steps of the tribune, he fears to find the Scarlet Pimpernel under a new, impenetrable mask. Ah, citoyenne! what influence you would have over him if through your agency all those fears could be drowned in the blood of that abominable Englishman!”
“Now, who would have thought that?” a mocking voice broke in suddenly, with a quiet chuckle. “I vow, my dear M. Chambertin, you are waxing more eloquent than ever before!”
Like the laughter of a while ago, the voice seemed to come from nowhere. It was in the air, muffled by the clouds of Mother Théot’s perfumes, or by the thickness of doors and tapestries. Weird, yet human.
“By Satan, this is intolerable!” Chauvelin exclaimed; and paying no heed to Theresia’s faint cry of terror, he ran to the main door. It was on the latch. He tore it open and dashed out upon the landing.