Lord Tonys Wife | Page 7

yes... Labrunière,' murmured the duc, who seemed very much
overcome with terror now that his daughter's safety was in jeopardy,
'see to it at once. Quick! quick! I shall wax crazy with anxiety.'
While Labrunière ran to make the necessary arrangements for an
efficient escort for Mademoiselle de Kernogan and gave the sergeant in
charge of the posse the necessary directions, M. le duc remained
motionless, huddled up in the capacious armchair, his head buried in
his hand, shivering in front of the huge fire which burned in the
monumental hearth, himself the prey of nameless, overwhelming terror.
He knew--none better-- the appalling hatred wherewith he and all his
family and belongings were regarded by the local peasantry. Astride
upon his manifold rights -- feudal, territorial, seignorial rights-- he had
all his life ridden roughshod over the prejudices, the miseries, the
undoubted rights of the poor people, who were little better than serfs in
the possession of the high and mighty duc de Kernogan. He also knew
-- none better-- that gradually, very gradually it is true, but with
unerring certainty, those same down-trodden, ignorant, miserable and
half-starved peasants were turning against their oppressors, that riots
and outrages had occurred in many rural districts in the North and that

the insidious poison of social revolution was gradually creeping toward
the south and West, and had already infected the villages and small
townships which were situated quite unpleasantly close to Nantes and
to Kernogan.
For this reason he had kept a company of artillery at his own expense
inside the precincts of his château, and with the aristocrat's open
contempt for his peasantry which it had not yet learned to fear, he had
disdained to take further measures for the repression of local gatherings,
and would not pay the village rabble the compliment of being afraid of
them in any way.
But with his daughter Yvonne in the open roadway on the very night
when an assembly of that same rabble was obviously bent on mischief,
matters became very serious. Insult, outrage or worse might befall the
proud aristocrat's only child, and knowing that from these people,
whom she had been taught to look upon as little better than beasts, she
could expect neither mercy nor chivalry, the duc de Kernogan within
his unassailable castle felt for his daughter's safety the most abject, the
most deadly fear which hath ever unnerved any man.
Labrunière a few minutes later did his best to reassure his master.
'I have ordered the men to take the best horses out of the stables, M. le
duc,' he said, 'and to cut across the fields toward la Gramoire so as to
intercept Mademoiselle's coach ere it reach the cross-roads. I feel
confident that there is no cause for alarm,' he added emphatically.
'Pray God you are right, Labrunière,' murmured the duc feebly. 'Do you
know how strong the rabble crowd is?'
'No, Monseigneur, not exactly. Camille the under-bailiff, who brought
me the news, was riding homewards across the meadows about an hour
ago when he saw a huge conflagration which seemed to come from the
back of Adet's mill: the whole sky has been lit up by a lurid light for the
past hour, and I fancied myself that Adet's staw must be on fire. But
Camille pushed his horse up the rising ground which culminates at
Adet's farmery. It seems that he heard a great deal of shouting which

did not seem to be accompanied by any attempt at putting out the fire.
So he dismounted and led his horse round the hillock skirting Adet's
farm buildings so that he should not be seen. Under cover of darkness
he heard and saw the old miller with his son Pierre engaged in
distributing scythes, poles and axes to a crowd of youngsters and
haranguing them wildly all the time. He also heard Pierre Adet speak of
the conflagration as a perconcerted signal, and say that he and his mates
would meet the lads of the neighbouring villages at the cross-roads...
and that four hundred of them would then march on Kernogan and
pillage the castle.'
'Bah!' quoth M. le duc in a voice hoarse with execration and contempt,
'a lot of oafs who will give the hangman plenty of trouble to-morrow.
As for that Adet and his son, they shall suffer for this... I can promise
them that.. If only Mademoiselle were home!' he added with a
heartrending sigh.
V
Indeed, had M. le duc de Kernogan been gifted with second sight, the
agony of mind which he was enduring would have been aggravated an
hundredfold. At the very moment when the head-bailiff was doing his
best to reassure his liege-lord as to the safety of Mlle. de Kernogan, her
coach was speeding along from the château of