Storyteller.

Southern Cross, Volume 1, Issue 47, 17 February 1894, Page 13

Storyteller.

“ONE, TWO!”

£By Walter Brown, in tlie Ludgate

Monthly.]

“Tin denx ! Un, deux!”

It was the harsh, monotonous voice t>£ the jailer in the convict prison, chanting this doleful reiteration to "the rhythm of the convicts measured tramp. These were the long-term prisoners, whose misdemeanours had Been of a violent description, • men whose hands had been imbrued n the blood of their fellow-creatures. This dismal croak of “ one, two !” was almost the only sound of human -voice which fell upon their ears during their long term of punishment. They walked in a circle, surrounded By the hare, massive stone walls, that shut them in from the outer world.

Jules Pasquelard was one of these unfortunates, a man of medium height and stature, of dark complexion, with brilliant eyes shining from the pale, dull mask of his countenance.

Speech was prohibited ; but it was not possible t» prevent thought. It was habiiual to Jules Pasquelard that this monotonous and hated exeicise should call before his mental vision the scenes of earlier years. “ One, two ! ” He was a boy again, standing on the shore of his beloved Normandjq gazing* seaward v hex-e the blue, misty "sea faded imperceptibly into the clouded azure of the sky ; and brown and white-sailed vessels swept silently and majestically past, an ever-changing panorama. In his heart were the mysterious yearnings of childhood, throbbing to take part in the deeds of men, to go out upon the deep waters, to be face to face with the God of nature ! His youngeyes knew full well the familiar outlines of his father’s boat. What joy it is to welcome home the bronzed and weather-beaten fishers, to haul with tiny hands upon the rope, to pick the shining spoils of the sea from the dripping nets ! “ One , two ! One , two /” Oh for those rough, hard years of young life and their"struggles upon the sea, with bbc smell of the brine and the sounds of the whistling wind ! What glowings of ambition ! What pride in the young life swelling into manhood, even to the day when the face of a young girl with beaming eyes and smiling lips became the most beauteous object of all the lovely works of creation ! Oh, what a long* time to stretch before the hopes of youth, the three years of naval service that stands between him and the wedded life at home !

“ One, two ! One, tivn ! ” The knowledge of love, and the hour of parting, a meeting on the beach in the dushy hour of twilight beside the boat that will bear him away to_-mor-xow. They have known it, but it has been unspoken, the great love in their be arts. And the last words—are they forgotten P It is not possible ; the'words and the look belong to each other ; they are not to be separated. Even the tones of her voice come back from that day so long ago : Nanette’s voice, full of love, of simplicity, full of the earnestness of unalterable faith, saying : “ Oh, Jules, my well-beloved ; believe me, I will wait for thee always and ever. My heart will remain al■ways, always faithful until thy return.”

“ One , tivo ! One , tivo ! ” Those harsh, croaking’ ■words measure the seconds of time, as they have measured them for years, and Jules lias not returned. Isanette —is she still waiting P “ One , two ! One , tivo ! It is no longer the voice of the jailer; it is that of the drill-master. Was it not a great thing for the young fisherman to be serving his country on a proud and stately man-of-war P But there is always that beast, Antoine 3?lanchet, who hates him because he, too, loves Hanette. Planchet is a villain. He makes his ill-humoured Jokes always of the patient Jules ; one might despise these things ; but

there are lying stories told behind Jules’ back. There is an enemy that plays tricks upon him, and gets him blamed and punished by the officers. It is Antoine Planchet who tells these lying stories and causes punishment to fall upon the shoulders of the innocent Jules. There are quari’els constantly between these two men, in which, sometimes, there are blows exchanged. Planchet, who makes himself useful to the officers, is promoted. Jules remains only in the ranks, with bad marks written against his conduct. There is a day when Jules is driven by the hateful conduct of this Planchet to forget the rank of the aggressor. Antoine strikes the first blow, and Jules returns it. There is a fight more desperate than there has been before. Jules is aware that he will be punished for striking’ an under officer. He is desperate : before they can be separated, Planchet is thrown to the deck. He lies there motionless.

“ One, two ! One, two /” Planchet is dead : Jules Pasquelard has killed him.

“ One, two ! One two !” It was an accident: it was not meant. It was the bolt upon which his head fell that struck him behind the ear. It is no matter! There are the irons, the imprisonment. There is the trial for murder. Jules Pasquelard will be guillotined for murder. Farewell, blue sea, blue sky, white cliffs, the village home, the boats upon the beach ! Farewell, the parents, the relations, the boyhood’s friends, the manhood’s companions. Nanette ! Nanette ! ! Oh, Nanette !! ! Thou, too, alas, beyond the grave only, Nanette ! What despair ! what bitterness ! what stunning grief ! One, two. One, two.” Maledictions on that jailer’s croak ! There is the tiial. What is it these men are say-ing-—Pasquelard’s mates P Is it a dream ? Planchet was always ag-ainst him, J ales. Planchet picked quarrels. Planchet told Hie lying’ stories. Planchet caused him to be punished. The fatal quarrel was the fault only of Planchet. Planchet struck the first blow. The result was an accident. It was not murder with intent. True, it was an accident, but it was an accident against a superior officer. It is not the guillotine for you, Pasquelard ; it is twenty years. It was an accident ; it was Planchet who was wrong ; and yet it is twenty years ! You shall have life, but you shall have the prison, Jules Pasquelard. for twenty years, twenty years, twenty years ! All gone but one year, then one ..month, one week, one day, one hour; Jules Pasquelard, you have finished your imprisonment. The twenty years are gone. The door is open. You are free, There is no more “ One, two !” He does not know how to look the world in the face. The stamp of the prison is on him. That man w r ho looks at him as he passes is saying to himself—“ There is a criminal who has been in prison.” That gendarme is saying that is the “ one, two ” step of the prison. Yet the street is almost empty. The few miles to the village seemed as if they would never be passed. A summer sky was over his head ; the fields were ripening- to the harvest, there was a feeling of peace and contentment in the air. Jules paused often by the way to wipe the perspiration from his brow ; and, at times, sat by the wayside to gather strength. When he reached the first houses of the village, he had no strength to go farther.

Everything now was full of strangeness. The village was the same ;it might have been only yesterday that he had left it; but the faces of all the people had changed ; there was not one whom he could recognise. He felt like a stranger in a strange land, like a wanderer in a dream. At the first wine shop he entered, and seated himself in the most reserved corner, and called for a pint of wine, which he drank slowly, with a heart hungry to ask questions and a face forbidding any person to be friendly with him.

Was there a welcome for him at home, or would he be considered an unwelcome stranger ? How was it with those at home P How was it with Hanette ? These were the questions which followed each other with the persistency of the jailer’s “ one, two ! ” As the first shades of the evening dusk began to gather in the sky, Jules Pasqdelard rose from his seat and passed out of the house. For a short distance he walked firmly and steadily in the direction of his home with a look ©f determination on his face.

The people regarded him with stupid curiosity, wondering who the stranger might be. His heart failed him, however, before he had proceeded far. The beach lay in his way ; the blue of the quiet sea lay fringing the 3mllow sand at the lowest point of the tide ; the evening breeze was full of the welcome smell of the brine.

He stood b} r the capstan of his father’s boat, La Jolie Jeanne.. Beside it was the boat itself, the same boat in the same place, as it had been twenty 3’ears ag’one. Some hundred yards farther on there lay a balk of timber, high on the combing’of the beach, some few paces from one of the foremost cottages, which w r ere grouped irregularly around. In those far distant days, when he was young, the persons inhabiting the cottage near had been his father’s partners. Seating himself upon the timber, he wished that one of those people should come out and speak to him, that he might know how it was with those whom he sought. There came two children and played near him on the stones of the beach, one a bright-eyed, rosy-cheeked little girl, some five years old, with a brother older b}' - a } r ear or two. Something of the quick sympathy of children caused them to be fearless of the stranger who looked upon them with eyes unfathomable in their meaning. There came to the door of the cottage a stout, motherly-looking woman, with a pleasant face, albeit there was a look of care and anxiety on her features.

“Nanette, Henri, come, my children, to supper,” she called, looking askance at the stranger, whose back was turned to her. Jules Pasquelard starred as if the fatal blow of a knife had plunged his back and entered his heart. The soft, low, pleasant tones of that voice belonged only to one woman, and that woman the girl Nanette, who had said that she would wjait for him always and ever —and now, she called to her children! The pattering of the little feet upon the stones ceased. The door was shut. Jules Pasquelard rose to his feet, shivered, shook himself, and strode awa} 7 , with a dull pain at his heart, and the bitter thought repeating itself in his brain, “ Why should Nanette, the pride of the village, keep herself waiting for a criminal—a convict ?”

One would have supposed that, walking without thought whither he was going, Jules Pasquelard would have described a circle, such as he was accustomed to perform to the jailer’s “ One, two !” but this was not the case. Surrounded by the familiar scenes of his youth, with which his mind had been filled all day, his footsteps traced again the path which led from the beach to his father’s house. It was not till he stood with his hand upon the latch that he had any knowledge of his actions. A cloud seemed suddenly to roll itself away from his brain. Before the eye of his memory was depicted the memory of his home. For a few moments his hand wavered, then, with a firm hand, he lifted the latch, opened the door, and crossed the threshold. There he stood still, without speaking, with a pale, jaded face, holding his cap in his hand. To the three occupants of the room this man presented the ajDpearance of an utter stranger. The expectancy of the mother’s heart, her maternal divination, translated through her dim eyes the meaning of this spectacle. The aged woman rose from her seat

in the chimney nook, trembling. “It is my son, my poor Jules !” she exclaimed, in a voice of emotion, as she tottered forward to throw herself on his breast. “It is I, my mother,” was the response, as the grey-haired convict received her in his arms. “My poor Jales, my innocent ■child !” was the only welcome the mother’s trembling lips could give, seeing this grev-haired man returned to her in the place of the bright young Xian who had been taken awsiy fiom her so many years ago. Jules embraced in turn the fine young man and the handsome young woman, his younger brother and sister, whom he had last seen as little toddling children. It was a sacred re-union, baptised with the tears of all. It was not necessary for him to ask questions, They told him eagerly of the events which had occurred, and of the loss of their father at sea. One may be sure that the news of the return of Jules Pasquelard was not confined to the precincts of the home, and his family being wellknown and respected, there weie not a few relatives and friends who hastened to welcome the returned unfortunate, whose sufferings they truly commiserated. There was one man who came there ignoi ant of what had occurred, Henri Bartello, partner with the Pasquelards in their boat, and the man who had married Nanette. He came to say that a man vyas needed for the boat which was goingout the next day, one having been taken ill. He, too, welcomed Jules with all cordiality ; and Jules did not yet know that this was Nanette’s husband. _ It was this man who was ill that did the work for the share in the boat which was kept for the return of Jules, and it was decided that the latter should return to the position which he formerly occupied. In his father’s home, surrounded by these good neighbours and friends, the life of the ex-convict, the criminal, number Do, was banished into the dreams of the dead past, and there ■emerged instead a personage rehabilitated as Jules Pasquelard, fisherman. The degrading level of the convict life had caused him to review his return home with feelings of dread as to the manner of his reception ; and the hearty welcome which he had received at once awakened the free manhood within him, and he fronted the world with a new-born courage and pride in himself.

In the first glow of the rekindled energies of his character, he determined to face the trial of an interview with ISTanette. His mother had related to him over night the history of Nanette’s marriage—how she had yielded to Henri’s persistent attentions for the sake of her parents, who who had become incapable of earning their own living, and who possessed only the one daughter to support them. Henri and the others were preparing the boat for sea. Jules Pasquelard, with his lips closed firmly against his teeth, strode across to the cottage which contained his Nanette. The door was ajar. Jules knocked once and pushed the door open. He passed the threshold with a firm step. The woman sitting at the table with an infant in her lap rose to her feet. Some of the red colour of her rosy cheeks died out from her face, and a paleness spread even to her lips. Both stood there in silence for some moments. It was the woman who first spoke, and her voice trembled. “ It is thou, Jules P” “ Yes, it is I. Hast thou waited P” Jules spoke with a bitter tone.

“ Oli, J ales, what could I do ? It was for my old father and my old mother.” “It is well.” The expression was one almost of contempt. An angry spark flashed in Nanette's eyes, but she answered softly : “ Believe me that I have been very sorry for thee, Jules, but ” “Bah! Your sorrow!” interrupted Jules rudely.

Then the knowledge and power of the old love for this woman rebuked him in his conscience, and as he supported himself with one hand on the table, and looked into the glittering eyes, where the teais were slowly gathering, the words of his mother came into his mind, and feelings of humility stole into his soul. “ I am wrong to blame thee,” he said, with some softening of his angry tones. “ Why shouldst thou have waited P The Jules of the prison was not the Jules of La Belle Jeanne! What is it that I should trouble about P It is all gone —the past; and now —art thou happy ?” “ My husband has been good to me. The good God has given me these children.” “ It is well!” There was this time a quiet resignation in the utterance. There was a step heard outside, and Nanette’s husband appeared at the door. He understood at a glance that, whatever had been said, the former lover had placed himself under submission to the events which had been brought about by time. “We are ready to start, Jules,” said he, with a pleasant nod, and he went into an inner apartment for some article. Jules, with a brief good morning that waited for no reply, left the cottage, and, striding across the beach, took his place in the waiting boat amidst the welcomings of his mates. Thus began the return to his old life where it had been left off more than twenty years ago.

Early winter liovers over the green and murky waters of the North Sea. It is a cold day, wrapped in grey shadows, with leaden clouds overhead discharging themselves in gusts of driving sleet. La Belle Jeanne has landed a load of fish in Ramsgate Inn hour and the five men who form her crew, with faces homeward bent, talk bitterly and angrily amongt themselves against the surly Kentish boatmen, who have given them a inception so far from friendly that two or three cany visible marks of illtreatment upon their faces. It is only the old quarrel of jealousy. These stupid Englishmen are enraged that French fishermen shall land their cargoes in English ports, to the cheapening of the market prices, while they are not permitted in return to sell theirs in the ports of France. There has been something of a riot on a small scale ; blows have been given with English generosity, and showers of stones have driven the Frenchmen back to their boats. Therefore the crew of La Belle Jeanne vent their anger in curses, and their hearts are full of hatred, as, tacking against the wind, they pass between the Goodwin breakers and the lowlying - shore of the English “ Cochon.” Suddenly there is an eager cry from one of the men forward. Through the shattered banks of mist and sleet he has caught a momentary glimpse of a vessel with sloping masts and tattered sails, and a fringe of white breakers where the hull should be. The white cliffs of Dover are far away on their lee. It does not need much experience for the sailor to recognise the position of the vessel. It has struck on the southermost bank of the Goodwins, and the tide is low. There is a pointing out to seaward, rapid gesticulations and earnest speech, and the course of La Belle Jeanne is altered, to bear down upon the hapless barque. Meanwhile, they observe on all sides to see if there be any Kentish luggers to dispute the prize with them, but none are to be discerned. Flushed with eager anticipation of gaining the prize of the sea, the crew exchange short and hurried remarks of congratulation. It is the salvage money in view, not the saving of human lives, that is the engrossing thought of all; for the tide is low, and the sea, though rough, is not tempestuous, and it is apparent to their practised eyes that the vessel has but recently struck. It is to be seen also as they get nearer that the crew are still aboard. La Belle Jeanne is soon anchored alongside, and Jules and Henri and another scramble on to the deck and engage in consultation with the cap-

tain, who offers them a liberal sum if they will, run over to the English coast and obtain the services of a tug from the neighbouring ports of Dover or Folkestone. But the Frenchmen cannot so readily forget the insults and blows of perfidious Albion ; moreover, they do not wish others to obtain the larger part of the reward ; they will themselves have allomone. They set to work at some attempts to get the barque clear, trusting to the assistance of the tide, already near the turn; but wind and waves are against them, and the sand beneath the hull clings tenaciously to its prey. The barque is lifted in the treacherous bed and thumps back again, rising and falling with each motion of the restless waves. The vanguard of an Atlantic storm sweeps up the channel and spreads itself in sudden gusts over the green waste of waters, churning the crests of the waves into flakes, of flying foam, that mingle with the driving mists and sleet. Having failed to tow the barque off, and having laid out anchors, there is some attempt made to lighten the ship of her cargo ; but with the rising tide the insidious force of the waters only buries the hull deeper in the sand, and the anchors fail to stay the progress of the fatal shocks as the barque thumps with incmasing violence that causes the masts to quiver like reeds and the stout timbers of the hull to creak and groan. Almost imperceptibly dangers increase and thicken until there comes the sudden warning of the fatal end. The cable astern snaps like a piece of string; the stern of the vessel, suddenly released, swings upward and outward with the rising wave, and falls back with a great crash : the barque heels over on her beam ends, and a cascade of green water sweeps in a flood over her deck, churned into boiling foam amidst the wreckage of the fallen masts. A cry, a glimpse of a struggling form, and one of the crew' is swept to his death. Wave after wave breaks over the deck with a fury that is almost sensate, striving to wrest the battered sailors from their clinging hold. There comes a lull of a few moments, which the active Henri seizes as an opportunity to make fast a rope, which is their only means of getting back to their boat, tossing close at hand in the trough of the broken waters. Three men and a boy, the survivors of the barque’s crew, are first conveyed into safety, followed by one of the Frenchmen; Henri and Jules are left together on board. There came a towering -wave that burst over them. Jules recovered himself first. He was clinging to a portion of the shrouds with his left hand: the hold of Ills right hand upon a belaying-pin had given way, the pin slipping from its socket. Before him was the bent form of Henri, his rival, the husband of Nanette. Whence came the devilish thought that was acted upon in that one flash of half a moment ? It was a blind instinct of murder. There was no will or mental volition in the deed. Upon the bared head of the defenceless man the iron weapon descended with a crash, and Henri rolled, stunned and senseless, into the tangled wreckage that strewed the deck. No eye of those in tbe boat beheld the tragedy. They saw only the wave break over their two comrades, and when it passed the form only of one stood erect, like a man dazed by the sudden shock—a man with a pale face, who only stood and stared wildly across the water and mouthed and gesticulated like one who had lost his senses.

At his feet lay the senseless form of his unconscious rival, preserved by the tangled cordage of the wreck from being lost in the cruel green waves that hungrily lapped the" deck and sucked at the swaying limbs of the huddled heap of senseless humanity.

Jules cast one shivering glance of dread at the huddled body, whose hands seemed stretched out to appeal for help, to seize upon him for rescue, or, terrible thought! to drag him

also downward into the abyss of death. The wild beating of his heart-throbs, the loud pulsations of the blood to his ears, beating time to those dreadful words of the past—- “ One, two ! One, two /”

It is but a few seconds, and a cry from the boat bidding him haste; then, a blinding flash of lightningtears through the sullen clouds and drenching mist and spray. One dazzling picture appears before the murderer's eyes—a fisher-wife standing by the doorway of her home, looking seaward for her husband’s sail, and, clinging to her gown, the chubby rosy-faced children. There dwells no stronger or nobler emotion in the human breast than that great sacrificial brother-love-which animates to heroism the sturdy souls of those whose daily life is exposed to constant peril. Even as ■Jules had acted before, blindly and unthinkingly, by an instinct of murder, so unknowingly of his free will followed the instinct of salvation,. That stunned and senseless form lying at his feet is a husband and a father ! It is all the work of one brief second. Pasquelard slips the rope from the broken stump of the mast, knots it around his chest, stoops, and with the furious strength of one mad impulse, seizes the body of his rival in his arms, mounts with a bound upon the shattered bulwarks, and plunges with his burden through the coming wave. There are cries from the boat; each man seizes upon the rope with a vigour born of desperation; a few brief moments of superhuman struggles and Jules and Henri are dragged into the boat. The latter falls prone upon the bottom ; the former, casting off the rope, crawis blindly to his seat, and, seizing desperately upon his oar, swings it out with a broad sweep into the water, bringing the stern of the boat round but just in time to save them from a swamping wave. With pale face and gritted teeth, he bends with the rest of the crew to the arduous task of propelling- their frail vessel out of danger from the perilous neighbourhood of the shattered wreck and deadly surf. Then, when the sail is hoisted, and they sweep into the banks of fog and mist, plunging from wave to wave, he sinks forward, a huddled form, upon his knees, with his face buried in his hands, that he may not see the group at the stern, where Henri is beingroughly tended by rude but kiudly hands. All the length of the voyage home Henri lies there senseles to the rocking waves, the driving mists, and perils of the deep—senseless still to the bitter cry of his wife when she sees her husband carried up the beach, and laid, with pale face and inanimate form, upon the bed. Jules Pasquelard lives through the night with a dull stupor as of one under the influence of a noxious drug —dazed, seeing nothing-, hearing nothing, knowing nothing, living a life in a dream, only conscious of the existence in his brain of a mechanical, harsh utterance droned in a hated voice—“ One, two I One. two !”

Always silent and reserved, liis family did not perceive any difference from liis ordinary demeanor ; but when the dawn, bright and rosy, had gladdened the earth, and they are rising from the table of their morningmeal, there comes a timid knock at the door. It is opened. It is Nanette standing in the full glory of the rosy light, an infant in her ax-ms. Jules, with a moaning cry, shrinks back, extending his arms as if to push her away, his face pale and livid, with a ghastly look of terror in his eyes. But she ! she sees not anything but the ontliixes of his form through the the blinding mist of tears that suffuse her eyes. His mother, his bx-other axxd sister also, do not xxotice the terrible expression of his face. “ Jules, my husband is safe and well. He himself would have come to thank you, bxxt it is not good for him to rise yet. I have come to thank you for bringing my husband to me,” she stammers.

The two toddling children, who have timidly followed her into the cottage, gaze open-mouthed at their trembling mother. Jules is smitten with such weakness that he leans •swaying against the table, with his .pallid face sinking towards his breast. “ You have saved the father of my ■children, these dear little ones. May the good God bless you rnd keep you from harm, and give—and give you great happiness ” She seized one of his hands before he was aware —the hand that smote the murderous blow —and, raising it to her lips, pressed a kiss upon it, watered with a tear. Jules Avithdrew his trembling hand, regarding it Avith shrinking eyes. “ Say no more, say no more; oh, my God!” he cried, Avith a voice hoarse and strange. Then he staggered from the house and so on to the beach and to the boat, Avhile Janette sinks into a seat and relates the stoiy of the heroism of the brave .son to his AvidoAved mother. There is not much more to tell. Jules Pas'puelard could not face the praises of these people Avith the knowledge of that black crime of intention of Avhich God alone besides himself had cognisance; so the next ■day he shipped aboard a vessel for a long foreign voyage; and AA'hen time had blunted the sharp memory of that evil hour of his life, he returned ■once more to his native village to find the deed of rescue one of the unspoken things of the past. And for the rest, he married the widow Bernardine, avlio kept a small Avine shop ; and there are now some children Avho call Jules Pasquelard “ father,” and things are Avell with him, according to the prayer of JSTanette.