be more just than to undervalue your own courage by exalting mine.Your courage must be very great--very great; for, after a battle, the spectacle of the carnage must be truly terrible to a generous and feeling heart.We, at least, though we may be killed, do not kill."
At these words of the missionary, the soldier drew himself up erect, looked upon Gabriel with astonishment, and said, "This is most surprising!"
"What is?" inquired Agricola.
"What Gabriel has just told us," replied Dagobert, "brings to my mind what I experienced in warfare on the battlefield in proportion as I advanced in years.Listen, my children: more than once, on the night after a general engagement, I have been mounted as a vidette,--alone, -by night,--amid the moonlight, on the field of battle which remained in our possession, and upon which lay the bodies of seven or eight thousand of the slain, amongst whom were mingled the slaughtered remains of some of my old comrades: and then this sad scene, when the profound silence has restored me to my senses from the thirst for bloodshed and the delirious whirling of my sword (intoxicated like the rest), I have said to myself, 'for what have these men been killed?--FOR WHAT--FOR WHAT?' But this feeling, well understood as it was, hindered me not, on the following morning, when the trumpets again sounded the charge, from rushing once more to the slaughter.But the same thought always recurred when my arm became weary with carnage; and after wiping my sabre upon the mane of my horse, I have said to myself, 'I have killed!--killed!!--killed !!! and, FOR WHAT!!!'"
The missionary and the blacksmith exchanged looks on hearing the old soldier give utterance to this singular retrospection of the past.
"Alas!" said Gabriel to him, "all generous hearts feel as you did during the solemn moments, when the intoxication of glory has subsided, and man is left alone to the influence of the good instincts planted in his bosom."
"And that should prove, my brave boy," rejoined Dagobert, "that you are greatly better than I; for those noble instincts, as you call them, have never abandoned you.* * * * But how the deuce did you escape from the claws of the infuriated savages who had already crucified you?"
At this question of Dagobert, Gabriel started and reddened so visibly, that the soldier said to him: "If you ought not or cannot answer my request, let us say no more about it."
"I have nothing to conceal, either from you or from my brother," replied the missionary with altered voice."Only; it will be difficult for me to make you comprehend what I cannot comprehend myself."
"How is that?" asked Agricola with surprise.
"Surely," said Gabriel, reddening more deeply, "I must have been deceived by a fallacy of my senses, during that abstracted moment in which I awaited death with resignation.My enfeebled mind, in spite of me, must have been cheated by an illusion; or that, which to the present hour has remained inexplicable, would have been more slowly developed; and I should have known with greater certainty that it was the strange woman--"
Dagobert, while listening to the missionary, was perfectly amazed; for he also had vainly tried to account for the unexpected succor which had freed him and the two orphans from the prison at Leipsic.
"Of what woman do you speak?" asked Agricola.
"Of her who saved me," was the reply.
"A woman saved you from the hands of the savages?" said Dagobert.
"Yes," replied Gabriel, though absorbed in his reflections, "a woman, young and beautiful!"
"And who was this woman?" asked Agricola.
"I know not.When I asked her, she replied, 'I am the sister of the distressed!'"
"And whence came she? Whither went she?" asked Dagobert, singularly interested.
"`I go wheresoever there is suffering,' she replied," answered the missionary;" and she departed, going towards the north of America--
towards those desolate regions in which there is eternal snow, where the nights are without end."
"As in Siberia," said Dagobert, who had become very thoughtful.
"But," resumed Agricola, addressing himself to Gabriel, who seemed also to have become more and more absorbed, "in what manner or by what means did this woman come to your assistance?"
The missionary was about to reply to the last question, when there was heard a gentle tap at the door of the garret apartment, which renewed the fears that Agricola had forgotten since the arrival of his adopted brother."Agricola," said a sweet voice outside the door, "I wish to speak with you as soon as possible."
The blacksmith recognized Mother Bunch's voice, and opened the door.But the young sempstress, instead of entering, drew back into the dark passage, and said, with a voice of anxiety: "Agricola, it is an hour since broad day, and you have not yet departed! How imprudent! I have been watching below, in the street, until now, and have seen nothing alarming; but they may come any instant to arrest you.Hasten, I conjure you, your departure for the abode of Miss de Cardoville.Not a minute should be lost."
"Had it not been for the arrival of Gabriel, I should have been gone.
But I could not resist the happiness of remaining some little time with him."
"Gabriel here!" said Mother Bunch, with sweet surprise; for, as has been stated, she had been brought up with him and Agricola.
"Yes," answered Agricola, "for half an hour he has been with my father and me."
"What happiness I shall have in seeing him again," said the sewing-girl.
"He doubtless came upstairs while I had gone for a brief space to your mother, to ask if I could be useful in any way on account of the young ladies; but they have been so fatigued that they still sleep.Your mother has requested me to give you this letter for your father.She has just received it."
"Thanks."
"Well," resumed Mother Bunch, "now that you have seen Gabriel, do not delay long.Think what a blow it would he for your father, if they came to arrest you in his very presence mon Dieu!"