|
|
Whenever Josette's thoughts in after
years reverted to her memorable journey to England, she never
felt that it had been real. It was all so like a dream: her start
from Paris in the early morning; the diligence; the first halt
at the barrier; the examination of the passports; and then the
incessant rumble of wheels, the rain beating against the windows,
the gusts of wind, the atmosphere reeking of stale provisions,
of damp cloth and of leather; the murmur of voices; the halts
outside village hostelries; the nights in the auberge at
Meulan and Les Andelys, at Rouen and Tréport; and her fellow-travellers.
They were nothing but dream figures, and it was only when she
closed her eyes very tight that Josette could vaguely recall their
faces: the prosperous shopman's wife with her rings and her gold
brooch and her wicker basket; the crowd in the diligence between
Rouen and Tréport who chattered incessantly about the English
spy and the horrors of Nantes; her neighbour, who squeezed her
into a corner until she could hardly breathe; and then the small,
thin man - he, surely, was nothing but a figure in a dream!
Dreams, dreams! they must all have been dreams! All those events,
those happenings which memory had never properly recorded, they
were surely only dreams; and all the way across the Channel she
sat as in a dream: she saw other travellers being very seasick,
and there was, indeed, a nasty gale blowing from the south-west,
but it was a favourable wind for the packet-boat to Dover and
she made excellent going, whilst to Josette the fresh sea air,
the excitement of seeing the white cliffs of England looming out
of the mist, the sense of contentment that she was nearing the
end of her journey and that her efforts on behalf of Maurice would
surely be crowned with success were all most welcome after the
stuffiness and dreariness of those days passed in the diligence.
And how bright and lovely England seemed to her! It was indeed
a dream world into which she had drifted. People looked happy
and free! Yes, free! There was no look of furtiveness or terror
on their faces; even children had shoes and stockings on their
feet, and not one of them had that look of disease and hunger
so prevalent - alas! - in revolutionary France. Peace and contentment
reigned everywhere; ay! in spite of the war-clouds that hung over
the land. And Josette's heart ached when she thought of her own
beautiful country, her beloved France, which was all the more
dear to all her children for the terrible time she was going through.
Poor little Josette! She felt very forlorn and very much alone
when she stood on the quay at Dover with her modest little bundle
and her wicker basket which contained all her worldly possessions.
For the first time she realised the magnitude of the task which
she had imposed on herself when all around her people talked and
talked and she could not understand one word that was said. Never
before had she been outside France, never before had she heard
a language other than her native one. She felt as if she had been
dropped down from somewhere into another world and knew not yet
what would become of her, a stranger among its denizens. Frightened?
Only a little, perhaps, was she frightened, but firm, nevertheless,
in her resolve to succeed. But what had seemed like such a simple
proposition in Paris looked distinctly complicated now.
She was forlorn and alone - and all round her people bustled
and jostled; not that anyone was unkind - far from it - they but
were all of them busy coming and going, collecting luggage, meeting
friends, asking for information. She, Josette, was the only one
who, perforce, was tongue-tied - a pathetic little figure in short
kirtle, shawl and frayed-out black cap, with lanky hair and a
red nose and a smear across one cheek, for much against her will
tears would insist on coming to her eyes and they made the smear
when they would roll down her face.
The crowd presently thinned out a bit: Josette could see these
or those fellow-passengers hurrying hither or thither, either
followed by a porter carrying luggage or shouldering their own
valise. They all seemed to know where they were going; she alone
was doubtful and ignorant. Indeed, she had never thought it would
be as bad as this.
* * * *
And suddenly a kind voice reached her ear:
"Can I be of service now, Mademoiselle? We all have to report
at the constable's office, you know."
Just for the moment it seemed to Josette as if le bon Dieu
had just taken pity on her and sent one of His angels to look
after her. And yet it was only the thin little man in seedy black
who had spoken, and there was nothing angelic about him. He had
his papers in his hand and quite instinctively she took hers out
from inside her bodice and gave them to him.
"Will you come with me, Mademoiselle," he went on to
say, "in case there is a little difficulty about your safe-conduct
being entirely made out by the French Government, with which the
English are at war! They welcome the émigrés
as a matter of course; still, there might be a little trouble.
But if you will come with me I feel sure I can see you through."
Josette gave him a look of trust and of gratitude out of her
blue eyes. How could she help fancying that here was one of those
English heroes of whom she had always dreamed and who were known
in the remotest corners of France as angels of rescue to those
unfortunates who were forced to flee from their own country and
take refuge in hospitable England? Dreams! dreams! Could Josette
Gravier be blamed for thinking that here were her dreams coming
true? When she felt miserable, helpless and forlorn, a hand was
suddenly stretched out to help her over her difficulties. Of course
she did not think that this pale-faced little man was the hero
of her dreams - she had always thought of the Scarlet Pimpernel
as magnificently tall and superbly handsome; but then she had
also thought of him as mysterious and endowed with mystic powers
that enabled him to assume any kind of personality at will. There
was enough talk about him among the girls in the government workshops:
how he had driven through the barriers of Paris disguised as an
old hag in charge of a refuse-cart in which the Marquise de Tournay
and his family lay hidden: and there were other tales more wonderful
still. Then why could he not diminish his stature and become a
pale-faced little man who spoke both English and French and conducted
her, Josette, to an office where he exhibited an English passport
which evidently satisfied the official in charge not only as to
his own identity, but also as to that of the girl with him?
Who but a hero of romance would have the power so to protect
the weak as to smooth out every difficulty that beset Josette
Gravier's path after her landing in England, from the finding
her a respectably hostelry where she could spend the night to
guiding her the next morning to the Bureau des émigrés
Français in Dover, where he obtained for her all the
information she wanted about her beloved Louise? Louise, indeed,
lived and worked not very far from Dover, in a town called Maidstone,
to which a public coach plied that very day. And into this coach
did Josette Gravier step presently in the company of her new guardian
angel, the thin-faced, pale-eyed little man with the soft voice,
whose mysterious hints and utterances, now that she fell into
more intimate conversation with him, clearly indicated that if
he was not actually the Scarlet Pimpernel himself, he was, at
any rate, very closely connected with him.
Return to Table of Contents
To Previous
Chapter
