CHAPTER XXXIII.

PURSUED BY THE FURIES.

It was morning, and the sunlight was playing on the little brass crucifix fastened to the wall over the mantelshelf. It was a quiet still morning too, and only the chirping and clucking of the fowls could be heard, and the sound of the water dripping from the leaves of the forest trees. The room was a cheerful little room too, with its bright white walls, and little bits of pictures nailed against them, with here and there a bunch of dried herbs, and a few curious stones strung on a piece of string for luck.

Harry Hedley had had a wretched night. He had been wounded. in the shoulder, but very slightly. He had got a man to bind it up, and then, by a little ruse of making it appear that he had been attended to by one of the surgeons, managed to get taken away from the field as one of the wounded.

He had slept uneasily, his shoulder had certainly hurt him a little; but it was not that which had kept him awake. He had thought and thought, and pondered and pondered, and had seen no way out of his difficulties at all.

The morning before, an anonymous letter had found its way to Genappe, and had been placed in the hands of the general of the division before his appearing on the field. There had been a sort of flutter upon the regiment as it halted, and took up its position in front of the Quatre Bras. Hedley

remembered with what uneasy foreboding he had seen a staff officer come up to them. He remembered the man bending down from his horse to say to him,

'Where were you, sir, on the 16th of May ?'

It was the day that he had gone with that letter of D'Epinelle, the French spy-the letter, however, which he had never delivered.

He had answered as promptly as he could,

'I went out for a ride eastwards.'

'O' the officer said before riding away. And that was all that had happened. But, perhaps, D'Epinelle had no longer got it in his power to injure him. Had he not shot at the Frenchman, and had not the man fallen off his horse? There was some satisfaction in thinking over this. Had not the villain tempted him, aud did he not deserve his fate? But still, he, Harry Hedley, dared not stay where he was. He felt faint and sick and weary, and had never yearned so for the daylight to come in his life before. He would be off before the sun was well up. But how he should disguise himself, how he should get clear of the high-road and of Brussels, as he did not know the country over- well, he did not trouble himself to think.

still, he,

The gray light came at last. But then he was so weary that physical weakness got the better of all prudence, and he sank into a pleasant doze. When he awoke he heard the woman of the cottage moving

about and talking to her children.

'It will be too late; the Colonel will be back soon,' he said almost aloud. Then he called for the woman, and she came in.

'I feel so stiff with my shoulder,' he said to her in French, and my clothes hurt me. These stiff uniforms are not pleasant to wear.' The woman smiled, and said with an elaborate curtsy,

'If monsieur would condescend to wear some clothes which belonged to her good husband who was away in the forest, monsieur was perfectly welcome, and only honoured them too much.'

The woman brought the clothes, and Harry Hedley clad himself in the rough costume of a Walloon peasant. He looked at himself in the scrap of looking-glass, and sighed.

To think that I should ever have fallen as low as this !' and in very pity of himself he wiped his eyes with the back of his sleeve.

There was a coarse blue handkerchief, such as the women wore on their shoulders, lying on the bed. He took it up and placed his uniform in it, and tied the corners, forming a great bundle. His sword he had left behind him on the field, and as he thought of it his lips moved into a bitter smile, and he sighed yet again.

He went into the outer room, where the woman was arranging the pot-au-feu for the morning's

meal.

not answer.

He only looked at her in reply, and started on to the path. The woman called to him; but he did He did not even look back, but went doggedly on beneath the branches of the trees, which here and there came down across the path, and brushed against him as he went on. There was a gloom on everything around him; the water fell from the leaves above, and splashed heavily on his He had been head and shoulders. feverishly hot in bed, but now Somefelt cold and miserable. Then, times he stood and pondered on his wretched condition. again, he moved onwards with swift irritable steps.

It was not until he had been walking for some time that he found that he had a bundle in his hand. Directly he noticed this he made his way from the path and threw it heavily on the ground. He turned away, but some idea gained a sudden possession of him. He took up the bundle, unfastened

it, and then looked at the gold and scarlet of his uniform.

'I shall not wear that again,' he said to himself, in a dazed sort of way; it has never brought me any good fortune; let it lie here and rot away.'

After this, and when he had gone but a few hundred yards, a feeling of weariness came over him. He left the path and went and sat down under one of the trees. He sat for some time, and then fell into a heavy sleep.

He was awakened by a flash of lightning, which lit up the forest. The trunks of the trees seemed to take all sorts of colours. The short grass and undergrowth looked alternately white and blue. The startled birds flew out of the branches overhead and uttered strange cries. Then the rain came pouring down as the thunder rolled overhead.

'A storm,' he said aloud; 'what a cursed place to be in!'

But the thunder seemed to continue; it broke up into different sounds; it was nearer to the earth.

That is firing,' he thought; 'they are at it again.'

So in the forest broke the noise of the war of men and of the elements at the same minute. The one seemed to be in the sky, the other from the very depths below the earth.

But the noises grew confused. Even the sound of the rain was enough to deaden that of the thunder and the firing. It beat on the branches of the trees, and seemed to be tearing the leaves to pieces. When the lightning flashed, a curtain seemed to be raised up all around the wanderer.

'A cursed place to be in,' he said, and a cursed time.'

Then, in a blind way, as if to shelter himself from the storm, he dashed in among the trees. He had left the path and was losing his way in the forest. And now

he stumbled against the trees, and tore his hands and face with the undergrowth. But at last he was once more on the path, and could pursue his way with some sort of ease. The rain still poured down; it still lightened and thundered, and the growl of the firing could. still be heard. He knew not how far he had gone, when at length he found himself on the borders of the forest. The path ran out of the trees and cut through a field of high wheat. Here the rain was not falling so heavily. He could see, in the hollow beneath him, a small hamlet, and a church with white walls and a little spire.

He walked towards the houses belted in with orchard-trees. Unconsciously he made his way to the church porch and sat down on the wooden bench. He was drenched to the skin, and his wound smarted and ached. Presently out of the door of the church stepped the old curé. He looked at Harry and wished him Goodmorning.'

'Or rather bad, my friend. The storm is bad, and evil men are at work with their wickedness.'

Still, the old gentleman enjoyed the pinch of snuff which he took from his pocket.

'You have travelled far,' continued the worthy cleric; 'your clothes are torn, and you must be tired and footsore. Come with me; we will hasten through the rain, and you shall be well attended to.'

Harry muttered out his thanks, and the good curé, fastening on his great cloak, stepped out into the rain. They only just crossed the road when Harry Hedley found himself in front of a largish white house. The curé rang the housebell; an old woman opened the door.

'Célanie, take this man to the kitchen and dry his clothes, and

give him something to eat and drink;' and the curé nodded pleasantly, and turned away into a side-room.

'You had best go to bed,' said the old woman. 'You may have Jehan's in the little room; and then all will be arranged, and your clothes will be dried for you.'

Mechanically he followed her. She showed him into a little narnow room, with a truckle - bed in it. He undressed and got into bed, and she came for his clothes and took them away. Then he closed his eyes and fell asleep.

The curé was standing over him when he awoke. In his trouble and sleepiness his control of himself entirely deserted him. looked up, and said in English,

He

'Thank you for your kindness.' 'You are English, then!' answered the curé, speaking gravely, and in the same language.

'Monsieur !' said Harry Hedley, starting up, and flushing with fear and annoyance.

'You are English,' continued the other quite calmly; it is not mon affaire. Why you are here it matters not to me. You are here, and that is sufficient.'

I am ill,' answered Harry.

That I can see,' said his host; 'but had you not better rise and dress-monsieur, who speaks like a gentleman, and who wears the shirt of a gentleman, and who dresses like a peasant? But, as I said before, it is no affair of mine. Dress, and come you down and dine, or Célanie will be angry if you keep the grand banquet waiting.'

Harry Hedley put on the peasant's clothes. When he saw the old woman standing in the hall, she looked at him curiously and smiled, and said that all was served, and would monsieur go into that room?

The curé was sitting in a long

room, with wainscoted walls, hardly lit up by the two narrow windows. He motioned Harry to a seat, and he sat down in a half-dazed way. The host only smiled pleasantly, and helped the soup.

Harry looked around him. The quiet comfortable dining-room; the clean-shaven cleric, with the bland smile; the old woman waiting on them it was all like a dream. There was a portrait of Ignatius Loyola on the walls; he noticed that. There was a mirror which reflected the trees from the garden in front.

'We are better off than those poor fellows who are fighting outside;' and the curé gravely shook his head.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

AT WATERLOO.

NIGHT had set in, and it was quite dark. There had been no orders about fires not being lighted, and the men of the -2d had busied themselves in collecting together straws and sticks from the nearest farmhouses to raise some sort of blaze to cook their very small supplies of food and to warm themselves as best they could. Napoleon had strolled round his opponent, and had satisfied himself that the British would not move off in the darkness. Those fires showed plainly enough that they did not mean to retreat on the morrow. Then, of course, they would fall into his hands. Why he had counted on a certain victory is, to some extent, even a mystery to the present day. The Napoleon of 1815 was no longer the man of Austerlitz and of Wagram. His genius had departed with his health; and any simpleminded sensible person, however ignorant of the wondrous art of war, must needs come to the same

conclusion. His inactivity on the 16th was by no means a masterly inactivity. The chain was broken by which he should have held Ney and Grouchy close to him, and the iron links were recklessly scattered about. It could only have been his folly which had given him his confidence. So he passed that night more calmly than has commonly been supposed. His army was imbued with none of the spirit which had fired the heroes of Republican Hoche and the men of the days before Moscow and Leipzig. Blücher was down. south towards Namur; Grouchy was in chase; but he had with him the flower of his grand army; all would be well; all must be well. No matter that his men were wearied out with the tramp through the heavy wet fields from Ligny and Quatre Bras.

Had

they not driven off the Prussians from Amand St. Hameau, from Ligny, from Sombef? What more could be needed than his presence to give them the stern confidence and wild courage which must beget success?

He had reckoned without his host; and the reckoning would be a sure and sharp and deadly one. In the darkness had filed in that army of heroes which was again to shake the foundations of Europe. The untrained conscripts at Valmy and at Jemappes had fought against a trained and superior enemy, and had defeated him. At Mont St. Jean here was he, with the finest army, the most skilful veterans, the world had ever known. 'The earth seemed to be proud to bear so many gallant men.' So he thought on the morrow of the coming day; so he wrote afterwards in the loneliness of the rocky island washed by the waves of the Atlantic. The army of shopkeeping English, of dastardly Belgians, of wretched Dutchmen, whom he

had ground to the dust, the Hanoverians, all that disjointed host commanded by the unskilled 'Sepoy general,' would, with its disunity, its ignorance, its want of the trained martial ardour of his own veterans, be swept before him.

On the side of the British, however, there was confidence too— the confidence of a calm stubborn resolution. The retreat from Quatre Bras had, of course, damped any feeling of reckless belief in the future which the success of the 16th might have given. But the men would stand to their ground. They had no idolatrous affection for their chief; they had no belief in his being a god of war raised above all other mortals; he had no magnetic influence over them; they did not obey him with the blind infatuation with which the acolyte obeyed the old man of the mountain-the High Priest of the Assassins when he ordered him to throw himself over the castle-wall, merely to show the boastful Frank the extent of his power. For the Iron Duke they had a cool common-sense confidence and respect. He would always look after their creature-comforts; he would see that Tommy Atkins should have the best of beef and beer; he would never recklessly throw away their lives for the sake of what the mounseers called a grand coup; he would husband their lives, as he would carefully husband every chance of no lives, no chance, should be thrown away. So, on the cold earth, swamped with rain, those who had nothing in their knapsacks to make a meal off made the best of their not overcomfortable position, and laid themselves down quietly to get what rest they could for the struggle of the morrow.

success

By a bivouac fire, somewhere to the rear and left of Hougoumont, was standing Mr. Jack Hedley.