CHAPTER X. THE STIFLED QUARREL
It was noon of the next day before Colonel Grant came to the house atMonsanto from whose balcony floated the British flag, and before whoseportals stood a sentry in the tall bearskin of the grenadiers.
He found the adjutant alone in his room, and apologised for the delay inresponding to his invitation, pleading the urgency of other matters thathe had in hand.
"A wise enactment this of Lord Wellington's," was his next comment. "Imean this prohibition of duelling. It may be resented by some of ouryoung bloods as an unwarrantable interference with their privileges, butit will do a deal of good, and no one can deny that there is ample causefor the measure."
"It is on the subject of the cause that I'm wanting to consult you,"said Sir Terence, offering his visitor a chair. "Have you been informedof the details? No? Let me give you them." And he related how thedispatch bore signs of having been tampered with, and how the onlydocument of any real importance came to be missing from it.
Colonel Grant, sitting with his sabre across his knees, listened gravelyand thoughtfully. In the end he shrugged his shoulders, the keen hawkface unmoved.
"The harm is done, and cannot very well be repaired. The informationobtained, no doubt on behalf of Massena, will by now be on its way tohim. Let us be thankful that the matter is not more grave, and thankful,too, that you were able to supply a copy of Lord Liverpool's figures.What do you want me to do?"
"Take steps to discover the spy whose existence is disclosed by thisevent."
Colquhoun Grant smiled. "That is precisely the matter which has broughtme to Lisbon."
"How?" Sir Terence was amazed. "You knew?"
"Oh, not that this had happened. But that the spy--or rather a networkof espionage--existed. We move here in a web of intrigue wrought byill-will, self-interest, vindictiveness and every form of malice. Whilstthe great bulk of the Portuguese people and their leaders are loyallyco-operating with us, there is a strong party opposing us which wouldprefer even to see the French prevail. Of course you are aware of this.The heart and brain of all this is--as I gather the Principal Souza.Wellington has compelled his retirement from the Government. But if bydoing so he has restricted the man's power for evil, he has certainlyincreased his will for evil and his activities.
"You tell me that Garfield was cared for by the parish priest atPenalva. There you are. Half the priesthood of the country are onSouza's side, since the Patriarch of Lisbon himself is little more thana tool of Souza's. What happens? This priest discovers that the Britishofficer whom he has so charitably put to bed in his house is the bearerof dispatches. A loyal man would instantly have communicated withMarshal Beresford at Thomar. This fellow, instead, advises theintriguers in Lisbon. The captain's dispatches are examined and the onlydocument of real value is abstracted. Of course it would be difficultto establish a case against the priest, and it is always vexatious andtroublesome to have dealings with that class, as it generally meanstrouble with the peasantry. But the case is as clear as crystal."
"But the intriguers here? Can you not deal with them?"
"I have them under observation," replied the colonel. "I already knewthe leaders, Souza's lieutenants in Lisbon, and I can put my hand uponthem at any moment. If I have not already done so it is because I findit more profitable to leave them at large; it is possible, indeed, thatI may never proceed to extremes against them. Conceive that they haveenabled me to seize La Fleche, the most dangerous, insidious and skilfulof all Napoleon's agents. I found him at Redondo's ball last week in theuniform of a Portuguese major, and through him I was able to track downSouza's chief instrument--I discovered them closeted with him in one ofthe card-rooms."
"And you didn't arrest them?"
"Arrest them! I apologised for my intrusion, and withdrew. La Flechetook his leave of them. He was to have left Lisbon at dawn equipped witha passport countersigned by yourself, my dear adjutant."
"What's that?"
"A passport for Major Vieira of the Portuguese Cacadores. Do youremember it?"
"Major Vieira!" Sir Terence frowned thoughtfully. Suddenly herecollected. "But that was countersigned by me at the request of CountSamoval, who represented himself a personal friend of the major's."
"So indeed he is. But the major in question was La Fleche nevertheless."
"And Samoval knew this?"
Sir Terence was incredulous.
Colonel Grant did not immediately answer the question. He preferred tocontinue his narrative. "That night I had the false major arrested veryquietly. I have caused him to disappear for the present. His Lisbonfriends believe him to be on his way to Massena with the informationthey no doubt supplied him. Massena awaits his return at Salamanca, andwill continue to wait. Thus when he fails to be seen or heard of therewill be a good deal of mystification on all sides, which is the properstate of mind in which to place your opponents. Lord Liverpool'sfigures, let me add, were not among the interesting notes found uponhim--possibly because at that date they had not yet been obtained."
"And you say that Samoval was aware of the man's real identity?"insisted Sir Terence, still incredulous. "Aware of it?" Colonel Grantlaughed shortly. "Samoval is Souza's principal agent--the most dangerousman in Lisbon and the most subtle. His sympathies are French through andthrough."
Sir Terence stared at him in frank amazement, in utter unbelief. "Oh,impossible!" he ejaculated at last.
"I saw Samoval for the first time," said Colonel Grant by way of answer,"in Oporto at the time of Soult's occupation. He did not call himselfSamoval just then, any more than I called myself Colquhoun Grant. He wasvery active there in the French interest; I should indeed be more preciseand say in Bonaparte's interest, for he was the man instrumental indisclosing to Soult the Bourbon conspiracy which was undermining themarshal's army. You do not know, perhaps, that French sympathy runs inSamoval's family. You may not be aware that the Portuguese Marquis ofAlorna, who holds a command in the Emperor's army, and is at presentwith Massena at Salamanca, is Samoval's cousin."
"But," faltered Sir Terence, "Count Samoval has been a regular visitorhere for the past three months."
"So I understand," said Grant coolly. "If I had known of it before Ishould have warned you. But, as you are aware, I have been in Spain onother business. You realise the danger of having such a man about theplace. Scraps of information--"
"Oh, as to that," Sir Terence interrupted, "I can assure you that nonehave fallen from my official table."
"Never be too sure, Sir Terence. Matters here must ever be underdiscussion. There are your secretaries and the ladies--and Samoval has agreat way with the women. What they know you may wager that he knows."
"They know nothing."
"That is a great deal to say. Little odds and ends now; a hint at onetime; a word dropped at another; these things picked up naturally byfeminine curiosity and retailed thoughtlessly under Samoval's charmingsuasion and display of Britannic sympathies. And Samoval has the devil'sown talent for bringing together the pieces of a puzzle. Take the linesnow: you may have parted with no details. But mention of them willsurely have been made in this household. However," he broke offabruptly, "that is all past and done with. I am as sure as you are thatany real indiscretions in this household are unimaginable, and so we maybe confident that no harm has yet been done. But you will gather fromwhat I have now told you that Samoval's visits here are not a meresocial waste of time. That he comes, acquires familiarity and makeshimself the friend of the family with a very definite aim in view."
"He does not come again," said Sir Terence, rising.
"That is more than I should have ventured to suggest. But it is a verywise resolve. It will need tact to carry it out, for Samoval is a man tobe handled carefully."
"I'll handle him carefully, devil a fear," said Sir Terence. "You candepend upon my tact."
Colonel Grant rose. "In this matter of Penalva, I will consider further.But I do not think there is anything to be done now. The main thing isto stop up t
he outlets through which information reaches the French, andthat is my chief concern. How is the stripping of the country proceedingnow?"
"It was more active immediately after Souza left the Government. But thelast reports announce a slackening again."
"They are at work in that, too, you see. Souza will not slumber whilethere's vengeance and self-interest to keep him awake." And he held outhis hand to take his leave.
"You'll stay to luncheon?" said Sir Terence. "It is about to be served."
"You are very kind, Sir Terence."
They descended, to find luncheon served already in the open under thetrellis vine, and the party consisted of Lady O'Moy, Miss Armytage,Captain Tremayne, Major Carruthers, and Count Samoval, of whose presencethis was the adjutant's first intimation.
As a matter of fact the Count had been at Monsanto for the past hour,the first half of which he had spent most agreeably on the terracewith the ladies. He had spoken so eulogistically of the genius of LordWellington and the valour of the British soldier, and, particularly-ofthe Irish soldier, that even Sylvia's instinctive distrust and dislikeof him had been lulled a little for the moment.
"And they must prevail," he had exclaimed in a glow of enthusiasm, hisdark eyes flashing. "It is inconceivable that they should ever yieldto the French, although the odds of numbers may lie so heavily againstthem."
"Are the odds of numbers so heavy?" said Lady O'Moy in surprise, openingwide those almost childish eyes of hers.
"Alas! anything from three to five to one. Ah, but why should we despondon that account?" And his voice vibrated with renewed confidence. "Thecountry is a difficult one, easy to defend, and Lord Wellington'sgenius will have made the best of it. There are, for example, thefortifications at Torres Vedras."
"Ah yes! I have heard of them. Tell me about them, Count."
"Tell you about them, dear lady? Shall I carry perfumes to the rose?What can I tell you that you do not know so much better than myself?"
"Indeed, I know nothing. Sir Terence is ridiculously secretive," sheassured him, with a little frown of petulance. She realised that herhusband did not treat her as an intelligent being to be consulted uponthese matters. She was his wife, and he had no right to keep secretsfrom her. In fact she said so.
"Indeed no," Samoval agreed. "And I find it hard to credit that itshould be so."
"Then you forget," said Sylvia, "that these secrets are not SirTerence's own. They are the secrets of his office."
"Perhaps so," said the unabashed Samoval. "But if I were Sir TerenceI should desire above all to allay my wife's natural anxiety. For I amsure you must be anxious, dear Lady O'Moy."'
"Naturally," she agreed, whose anxieties never transcended the fit ofher gowns or the suitability of a coiffure. "But Terence is like that."
"Incredible!" the Count protested, and raised his dark eyes to heaven asif invoking its punishment upon so unnatural a husband. "Do you tell methat you have never so much as seen the plans of these fortifications?"
"The plans, Count!" She almost laughed.
"Ah!" he said. "I dare swear then that you do not even know of theirexistence." He was jocular now.
"I am sure that she does not," said Sylvia, who instinctively felt thatthe conversation was following an undesirable course.
"Then you are wrong," she was assured. "I saw them once, a week ago, inSir Terence's room."
"Why, how would you know them if you saw them?" quoth Sylvia, seeking tocover what might be an indiscretion.
"Because they bore the name: 'Lines of Torres Vedras.' I remember."
"And this unsympathetic Sir Terence did not explain them to you?"laughed Samoval.
"Indeed, he did not."
"In fact, I could swear that he locked them away from you at once?" theCount continued on a jocular note.
"Not at once. But he certainly locked them away soon after, and whilst Iwas still there."
"In your place, then," said Samoval, ever on the same note of banter, "Ishould have been tempted to steal the key."
"Not so easily done," she assured him. "It never leaves his person. Hewears it on a gold chain round his neck."
"What, always?"
"Always, I assure you."
"Too bad," protested Samoval. "Too bad, indeed. What, then, should youhave done, Miss Armytage?"
It was difficult to imagine that he was drawing information from them,so bantering and frivolous was his manner; more difficult still toconceive that he had obtained any. Yet you will observe that he had beenplaced in possession of two facts: that the plans of the lines of TorresVedras were kept locked up in Sir Terence's own room--in the strong-box,no doubt--and that Sir Terence always carried the key on a gold chainworn round his neck.
Miss Armytage laughed. "Whatever I might do, I should not be guilty ofprying into matters that my husband kept hidden."
"Then you admit a husband's right to keep matters hidden from his wife?"
"Why not?"
"Madam," Samoval bowed to her, "your future husband is to be envied onyet another count."
And thus the conversation drifted, Samoval conceiving that he hadobtained all the information of which Lady O'Moy was possessed, andsatisfied that he had obtained all that for the moment he required.How to proceed now was a more difficult matter, to be very seriouslyconsidered--how to obtain from Sir Terence the key in question, andreach the plans so essential to Marshal Massena.
He was at table with them, as you know, when Sir Terence and ColonelGrant arrived. He and the colonel were presented to each other, andbowed with a gravity quite cordial on the part of Samoval, who was byfar the more subtle dissembler of the two. Each knew the other perfectlyfor what he was; yet each was in complete ignorance of the extent of theother's knowledge of himself; and certainly neither betrayed anything byhis manner.
At table the conversation was led naturally enough by Tremayne toWellington's general order against duelling. This was inevitable whenyou consider that it was a topic of conversation that morning at everytable to which British officers sat down. Tremayne spoke of the measurein terms of warm commendation, thereby provoking a sharp disagreementfrom Samoval. The deep and almost instinctive hostility between thesetwo men, which had often been revealed in momentary flashes, was suchthat it must invariably lead them to take opposing sides in any matteradmitting of contention.
"In my opinion it is a most arbitrary and degrading enactment," saidSamoval. "I say so without hesitation, notwithstanding my profoundadmiration and respect for Lord Wellington and all his measures."
"Degrading?" echoed Grant, looking across at him. "In what can it bedegrading, Count?"
"In that it reduces a gentleman to the level of the clod," was theprompt answer. "A gentleman must have his quarrels, however sweet hisdisposition, and a means must be afforded him of settling them."
"Ye can always thrash an impudent fellow," opined the adjutant.
"Thrash?" echoed Samoval. His sensitive lip curled in disdain. "To useyour hands upon a man!" He shuddered in sheer disgust. "To one ofmy temperament it would be impossible, and men of my temperament areplentiful, I think."
"But if you were thrashed yourself?" Tremayne asked him, and the lightin his grey eyes almost hinted at a dark desire to be himself theexecutioner.
Samoval's dark, handsome eyes considered the captain steadily. "To bethrashed myself?" he questioned. "My dear Captain, the idea of havinghands laid upon me, soiling me, brutalising me, is so nauseating, sorepugnant, that I assure you I should not hesitate to shoot the man whodid it just as I should shoot any other wild beast that attacked me.Indeed the two instances are exactly parallel, and my country's courtswould uphold in such a case the justice of my conduct."
"Then you may thank God," said O'Moy, "that you are not under Britishjurisdiction."
"I do," snapped Samoval, to make an instant recovery: "at least so faras the matter is concerned." And he elaborated: "I assure you, sirs, itwill be an evil day for the nobility of any country when its Governmentenacts aga
inst the satisfaction that one gentleman has the right todemand from another who offends him."
"Isn't the conversation rather too bloodthirsty for a luncheon-table?"wondered Lady O'Moy. And tactlessly she added, thinking with flatteryto mollify Samoval and cool his obvious heat: "You are yourself such afamous swordsman, Count."
And then Tremayne's dislike of the man betrayed him into his deplorablephrase.
"At the present time Portugal is in urgent need of her famous swordsmento go against the French and not to increase the disorders at home."
A silence complete and ominous followed the rash words, and Samoval,white to the lips, pondered the imperturbable captain with a balefuleye.
"I think," he said at last, speaking slowly and softly, and pickinghis words with care, "I think that is innuendo. I should be relieved,Captain Tremayne, to hear you say that it is not."
Tremayne was prompt to give him the assurance. "No innuendo at all. Aplain statement of fact."
"The innuendo I suggested lay in the application of the phrase. Do youmake it personal to myself?"
"Of course not," said Sir Terence, cutting in and speaking sharply."What an assumption!"
"I am asking Captain Tremayne," the Count insisted, with grim firmness,notwithstanding his deferential smile to Sir Terence.
"I spoke quite generally, sir," Tremayne assured him, partly under thesuasion of Sir Terence's interposition, partly out of consideration forthe ladies, who were looking scared. "Of course, if you choose to takeit to yourself, sir, that is a matter for your own discretion. I think,"he added, also with a smile, "that the ladies find the topic tiresome."
"Perhaps we may have the pleasure of continuing it when they are nolonger present."
"Oh, as you please," was the indifferent answer. "Carruthers, may Itrouble you to pass the salt? Lady O'Callaghan was complaining the othernight of the abuse of salt in Portuguese cookery. It is an abuse I havenever yet detected."
"I can't conceive Lady O'Callaghan complaining of too much salt inanything, begad," quoth O'Moy, with a laugh. "If you had heard the storyshe told me about--"
"Terence, my dear!" his wife checked him, her fine brows raised, herstare frigid.
"Faith, we go from bad to worse," said Carruthers. "Will you try toimprove the tone of the conversation, Miss Armytage? It stands in urgentneed of it."
With a general laugh, breaking the ice of the restraint that was indanger of settling about the table, a semblance of ease was restored,and this was maintained until the end of the repast. At last the ladiesrose, and, leaving the men at table, they sauntered off towards theterrace. But under the archway Sylvia checked her cousin.
"Una," she said gravely, "you had better call Captain Tremayne and takehim away for the present."
Una's eyes opened wide. "Why?" she inquired.
Miss Armytage was almost impatient with her. "Didn't you see? Resentmentis only slumbering between those men. It will break out again now thatwe have left them unless you can get Captain Tremayne away."
Una continued to look at her cousin, and then, her mind fastening everupon the trivial to the exclusion of the important, her glance becamearch. "For whom is your concern? For Count Samoval or Ned?" sheinquired, and added with a laugh: "You needn't answer me. It is Ned youare afraid for."
"I am certainly not afraid for him," was the reply on a faint note ofindignation. She had reddened slightly. "But I should not like to seeCaptain Tremayne or any other British officer embroiled in a duel.You forget Lord Wellington's order which they were discussing, and theconsequences of infringing it."
Lady O'Moy became scared.
"You don't imagine--"
Sylvia spoke quickly: "I am certain that unless you take CaptainTremayne away, and at once, there will! be serious trouble."
And now behold Lady O'Moy thrown into a state of alarm that borderedupon terror. She had more reason than Sylvia could dream, more reasonshe conceived than Sylvia herself, to wish to keep Captain Tremayne outof trouble just at present. Instantly, agitatedly, she turned and calledto him.
"Ned!" floated her silvery voice across the enclosed garden. And again:"Ned! I want you at once, please."
Captain Tremayne rose. Grant was talking briskly at the time, hisintention being to cover Tremayne's retreat, which he himself desired.Count Samoval's smouldering eyes were upon the captain, and full ofmenace. But he could not be guilty of the rudeness of interrupting Grantor of detaining Captain Tremayne when a lady called him.