Into the Niger Bend: Barsac Mission, Part 1

  "Yes. Miss Mornay is really my aunt, as much as anybody can be anybody's," Agenor de Saint-Berain assured him, while the young girl's lips parted gaily in a smile.

  "M. de Saint-Berain," she explained with a slight English accent, "insists on his status as my nephew, and never loses any opportunity of announcing our true relationship. ..."

  "It makes me feel younger," put in her nephew.

  "But," Jane Mornay continued, "once he has produced his effect and established his legal right, he agrees to reverse the position and to become once again my Uncle Agenor, that's what, within the family, he's always been since I was born."

  "And it's more in accordance with my age," explained the uncle-nephew. "But let us get on. Having introduced ourselves, you will allow me, Monsieur le Depute, to tell you what brings us here. Miss Mornay and I, as you see, are explorers. My aunt-niece is a fearless traveller, and I, like a good uncle-nephew, let her drag me about the world. We don't intend to stop at Konakry, but to go on into the interior, looking for new experiences. We've made all our preparations, and we were just on the point of setting off, when we heard that a Mission under your command was about to follow a route similar to our own. I pointed out to Miss Mornay that, however peaceful the country may be, I thought it best to join your Mission if you will accept us. So we have come to ask you to authorize us to make the journey with you."

  "I can't see any objections in principle," replied Barsac, "but you will understand that I must consult my colleagues."

  "Of course," St. Berain agreed.

  "They might be afraid that the presence of a lady would delay our progress, and would interfere with our carrying out the programme we have planned. If so...."

  "They needn't worry about that!" Uncle Agenor protested. "Miss Mornay is as good as a man. She would expect you to treat her not as a woman but as one of yourselves."

  "Of course," Jane agreed. "I can assure you, too, that we needn't give you any trouble regarding equipment. We have got our own horses and porters. In fact we don't need anything. We've even got two Bambaras, formerly in the Senegal Tirailleurs, to be our guides and interpreters. You needn't be afraid of letting us join you."

  "Well, in that case . . ." Barsac conceded. "I'll talk about it with my colleagues, and if they agree, we'll take it as settled. When shall I let you know our decision?"

  "Tomorrow, when you set out, because that's when we were going anyhow."

  This having been agreed, the visitors took their leave.

  While dining with the Governor, Barsac passed on the request to his colleagues. They received it favourably. Baudrieres was the only one who had doubts about it. Not that he refused outright to have so charming a fellow traveller, whom Barsac advocated with perhaps unnecessary warmth, but none the less he showed a certain hesitation. He thought the episode somewhat ambiguous. Was it conceivable that a young lady could set out on such a journey? No indeed, this reason could not be serious, and they had to believe that she was concealing her real purpose. This point having been raised, mightn't it be feared that her request concealed some sort of trap! Who knew, indeed, if it had some connection with the rumours which had been flying about the Ministry and the Chamber?

  Grinning, the others reassured him.

  "I don't know M. de Saint-Berain nor Miss Mornay," said M. Valdonne, "but they've been in Konakry a fortnight and I've noticed them."

  "You would notice one of them at least!" Barsac spoke emphatically.

  "Yes, the young lady is very pretty," M. Valdonne agreed. "They came, I'm told, from St. Louis de Senegal, by the coastal steamer. Strange as it seems, they appear to be travelling simply for pleasure, just as they told M. Barsac. I can't see that it would cause the slightest inconvenience to satisfy them."

  There was no further opposition, and his opinion carried the day.

  This was how the Mission led by Barsac received two new recruits. It now consisted of ten members, including Amedee Florence, reporter to L'Expansion Francaise, but not including the porters and the escort. It was only chance which next morning favoured Pierre Marcenay, a captain in the colonial infantry and commander of the escort, in allowing him to forestall Barsac just as the latter was hurrying, as fast as a somewhat tubby man of forty could possibly hurry, to help Miss Mornay into her saddle.

  "Armis cedat insigne," said Barsac, who was versed in the classics, indicating the place taken on official occasions by his badge of office.

  But anyone could see that he was not greatly pleased.

  CHAPTER III

  LORD BLAZON OF GLENOR

  When this narrative began, many years had passed since Lord Blazon had gone out of his home, many years since the door of Glenor Castle, in which he dwelt near the little town of Uttoxeter in the heart of England, had been opened to admit any visitor, many years since the windows of his own rooms had been finally and firmly closed. His seclusion had been complete, absolute, since the events which had tarnished the honour of his family, smirched his name, and ruined his life.

  More than sixty years before, Lord Blazon, having recently passed out of the Royal Naval Academy, had entered adult life through the front door; he had inherited from his ancestors wealth, immaculate honour, and fame.

  The history of the Blazon family was indeed inseparable from that of England, for whose sake they had freely shed their blood. Before the words "my country" had gained the value which a long national existence has given them, that ideal was already deeply graven on the heart of the men of that family which, coming over with the Norman Conquest, had lived only by the sword, and by the sword wielded in their country's service. Throughout the centuries nothing had diminished the glory of their name, and never a stain had fallen on their crest.

  Edward Alan Blazon was the worthy descendant of that proud line. Following his ancestor's example, he could imagine no other purpose in life but the proud cultivation of his honour, the passionate love of his country.

  If atavism, heredity, whatever name be given to that strange process which makes the sons resemble their fathers, had not imparted these principles to him, his education would have inculcated them. The history of England, so full of the glories of his ancestors, must have inspired him with the wish to do as well as, if not better than, they.

  At twenty-two he had married a girl belonging to one of the first families of England; and a year after their marriage a daughter was born. This was a disappointment to Edward Blazon, who waited impatiently for the birth of his second child.

  He waited twenty years. It was only after that long period that Lady Blazon, whose health had been gravely impaired by her daughter's birth, gave him the son he longed for. This child was christened George; almost at the same time, the daughter, recently married to a Frenchman, M. de Saint-Berain, brought into the world a son who was called Agenor. It was this Agenor who, forty years later, appeared so surprisingly before the Depute Barsac.

  Five years later Lord Blazon had a second son, Lewis Robert, who, thirty-five years later, was unhappily involved in the affair of the Central Bank.

  This great good fortune, to have a second child to carry on his name, was accompanied by the most dreadful of blows. The child's birth cost the life of his mother, and Lord Blazon saw the last of the one who, for more than a quarter of a century, had been his companion.

  Struck by so cruel a blow, he staggered. Distressed and disheartened, he gave up his ambitions, and although still relatively young, he abandoned the Navy, in which he had served so long, and in which he might have attained the highest rank.

  For long, following on this great misfortune, he lived withdrawn within himself; then, time having lessened his grief, he tried, after nine years of solitude, to reconstitute his broken household. He married the widow of one of his comrades, Marguerite Ferney, who brought him as her sole dowry a son, William, then aged sixteen.

  But fate had decided that Lord Glenor should grow old alone, and that he should come alone to the end of his days. A few years later, a fourth child
was born to him, a daughter who was called Jane, and he was widowed for the second time.

  Lord Glenor was then over sixty years old, and at such an age he could no longer hope to rebuild his life. So cruelly, so inexorably struck down in his dearest affections, he devoted himself exclusively to his duty as a father. If his first daughter, now Madame de Saint-Be-rain, had long been beyond his control, he still had four children, of whom the oldest was barely twenty, left to him by the two deaths, for in his heart he did not distinguish between William Ferney and the two sons and the daughter of his own blood.

  But destiny had not yet relented, and the Lord of Glenor was still to know a sorrow compared with which those which had already smitten him seemed fight.

  The first blow which the future had in store for him came direct from William Ferney, his dead wife's son, whom he had cared for as one of his own. Sly, surly, indeed something of a hypocrite, the young man failed to respond to the kindness given him, and remained lonely in the midst of the family which had offered him its home and heart. He remained indifferent to the tokens of affection showered upon him. Indeed, the more interest shown him the more he withdrew fiercely; the more friendship was offered him, the greater seemed his hatred for those around him.

  Envy, exasperated envy, wrathful envy, devoured his heart. He had felt this contemptible emotion from the very day on which he and his mother had entered Glenor Castle. Brooding over the difference between his own status and that of his two brothers, he conceived a violent hatred for George and Lewis, Lord Blazon's heirs; they would be rich, whereas he, the son of Margaret Ferney, would always be disinherited.

  His hatred grew more intense at the birth of his half-sister, Jane, for she too would share one day in that fortune from which he was debarred, and of which he received, as though in charity, only a vestige. His hatred passed all bounds when his mother died and he lost the only one who might have found a way into his perverted heart.

  Nothing appeased him, neither the brotherly friendship of Lord Blazon's two sons, nor the fatherly solicitude of that nobleman. Every day he withdrew still further, leading a life whose secrets were revealed only by a series of scandals.

  He was known to associate with evil companions, and to choose his friends from the least desirable of London's inhabitants.

  The rumour of his excesses reached the ears of Lord Blazon, who wore himself out in vain in useless remonstrances. At last the debts which he had previously paid in tribute to his wife's memory became so great that he had to put an end to it.

  Placed on a suitable allowance, William Ferney made no change in his way of life. It was a mystery how he obtained the necessary funds until there was presented at Glenor a draft for a large sum of money on which Lord Blazon's signature was very cleverly forged.

  He paid it without saying a word. Then, refusing to tolerate a forger, he called the culprit to him and drove him from his presence, none the less promising him an adequate pension.

  William Ferney listened with his usual air of cunning to reproaches and advice. Then, without saying a word, without even touching the first instalment of his pension, he left Glenor Castle and was heard of no more.

  What happened to him afterwards, Lord Blazon never knew. Never again did he have a word from him, and little by little, as time passed, the painful memory died away.

  Fortunately, the true children of Lord Glenor gave him as much satisfaction as the outsider had brought him care. In the same time as this fellow had gone never to return, George, following the glorious tradition of his family, passed out with honours from the Royal Military Academy and took a commission in the army, seeking adventure in the colonies.

  To the great regret of Lord Blazon, the second son, Lewis had no military ambition, though otherwise he showed himself worthy of his affection. He was serious-minded and competent, and one could always rely on his integrity.

  During the years following William's exit, while the memory of his misdeeds died away, the life of the two young men followed a regular and logical course. Lewis obviously had a vocation for business. Entering the service of the Central Bank, he was greatly esteemed and climbed the hierarchical ladder of that immense House, of which it was generally thought that he would one day take control. George, transferred from one colony to another, was more of a man of action and won his promotion at the sword-point.

  Lord Blazon might well think that a hostile fate had finished with him, and he could foresee the happiest vistas for his old age. Then a misfortune, more terrible even than those which had already assailed him, suddenly struck him down. But now he was injured not merely in his heart but in his honour, in that pure honour of Glenor whose name would now be smirched forever by the most abominable of treasons.

  Even today, in spite of the lapse of time, there may still be memories of that terrible drama in which the oldest son of Lord Blazon was the leading actor.

  George Blazon, seconded from the Army, had been placed at the service of an important exploration company. For two years he worked for that company's benefit, at the head of a semiregular body which it had enlisted. He was in Ashanti when it was reported that he had suddenly turned his coat and was in open revolt against his own country.

  The news arrived with the brutality of a thunderbolt, the news not only of the revolt but of its inevitable punishment. It simultaneously described the treachery of Captain Blazon and of his men, now transformed into adventurers, their robberies, their tyranny, the cruelties they inflicted, and the repression which followed so closely on the crime.

  The newspapers described the drama as it proceeded. They noted its progress, they described the rebel band relentlessly pursued and retreating gradually before the forces sent against them. They related how Captain Blazon, driven with several of his companions into regions then included within the French zone of influence, had at last been caught up with near the village of Koubo, at the foot of the Hombori Mountains, and had been killed at the first volley.

  The officer responsible for his death had since died of fever; but though the punishment he had inflicted had cost him his life, it had been speedy and final.

  Though at last the episode was generally forgotten, there was at least one dwelling where its memory lingered. It was that of Lord Blazon.

  Struck at the same time in his passionate love for his son and in what was dearer to him still, his honour, the Lord of Glenor did not flinch beneath it, and even the paleness of his face hardly betrayed his grief. Without asking one question, without uttering one word on the intolerable subject, he withdrew into a haughty solitude and a disdainful silence.

  From that day he was never seen, as of old, taking his daily walk. From that day, in the house from which even his oldest friends were debarred, he remained continually, hardly moving, silent, alone.

  Alone? Not altogether. There were three who in turn stayed with him, finding in the respect they felt for him the courage to support that frightful existence with a living statue, with a ghost, who though still in bodily form had locked himself of his own free will in an eternal silence.

  First there was his second son, Lewis Robert Blazon, who did not let a week pass without spending his one free day at Glenor Castle.

  There was also his grandson, Agenor de Saint-Berain, who tried to lighten by his cheerful good humour the claustral sadness of the household.

  Though, when George Blazon committed his incredible treachery, Agenor corresponded in every detail with the somewhat unflattering description given by the orderly, he was none the less a splendid fellow, helpful and obliging, tenderhearted, and with an unshakable loyalty.

  In three details he differed from others: an incredible absent-mindedness; a passion beyond all bounds, and sometimes very unfortunate for angling; and above all, a fierce dislike for female company.

  A competence inherited from his parents having made him independent, he had left France at the first tidings of the disaster which had felled his grandfather, and had settled in a villa near Glenor Castle
, where he spent most of his time.

  Its garden was traversed by a stream, and into this Agenor plunged his fishing lines with an enthusiasm as compelling as it was inexplicable. Why was he so keen on that pastime when he was always thinking of something else, and when all the fishes in the world could "bite" without his noticing how his float was bobbing? And even if a barbel, a roach, or a pike, even more impetuous than his captor was absentminded, had deliberately hooked itself, how would that have helped the compassionate Agenor, who would no doubt have thrown it back into the water at once, perhaps even begging its pardon?

  A fine fellow, as we have explained.

  But what a woman hater! He would explain his dislike of the sex to anyone who would listen to him. He credited them with all the faults, all the vices. "Deceitful, perfidious, liars, spendthrifts," he proclaimed them to be, not to mention the other epithets for which he was never at a loss.

  When anyone advised him to get married; "Me!" he would exclaim, "me, to ally myself with one of those faithless robbers!"

  And, if he were pressed: "I shall never believe in a woman's love," he would say quite seriously, "until I see her die of grief upon my tomb."

  This result being difficult to achieve, the odds were that he would remain a bachelor.

  His dislike for the fair sex permitted only one exception. The privilege was extended to Jane Blazon, last of the children of the Lord of Glenor, and in consequence Agenor's aunt, but an aunt fifteen years younger than himself, an aunt whom he had known from infancy, whose first steps he had guided, and of whom he became the guardian from the time when the unfortunate nobleman shunned the world. He felt an almost fatherly tenderness for her, a deep affection which she reciprocated. In theory he was her teacher, but a teacher who did all he could to become her disciple. They hardly ever parted. They went about together, roaming the woods on foot or on horseback, boating, hunting, following different kinds of sport, until the elderly nephew felt able to say about his young aunt, whom he brought up as a tomboy, that he would end by making a man of her!