The old gentleman bowed again with elaborate courtesy and, turning sharply on his heel, left the room.

Somewhat disturbed by the turn affairs had taken, Dan stood for a moment lost in thought. There was nothing for it, he supposed: Tom, who had been in command, had given orders, and they should be obeyed; besides there was no reason that he could see why the Marquis should be detained at the Inn if he chose to leave it. So he sat down at a table, made out the old gentleman's bill for the month, and then stepped to the door to call for Jesse.

"Take this," he said when the man appeared in response to his summons, "to the old Marquis. It is the bill for his board. If he pays you, well and good; if not--in any case, treat him courteously, and do not interfere with his movements. He is leaving the Inn for good. I want you to have the buggy ready within half-an-hour and drive him where he wishes to go. I fancy he will want his stuff put on the schooner in the Cove."

"All right, sir," replied Jesse. "Now that you and Miss Nance are back, sir, I guess the sooner we get rid of the Marquis the better."

Jesse carried the bill to the Marquis, then came down and went to the barn to harness the horse. A little later he drove round to the courtyard, hitched the horse to a ring in the Red Oak, and ran upstairs to fetch the Marquis's boxes.

Perhaps half-an-hour had pa.s.sed when he returned to Dan in the Bar. "The old gentleman's gone, sir," he said.

"Gone!--where?" cried Dan.

"Don't know, sir," Jesse replied. "To the schooner, I guess. He left this money on his dressing-bureau."

Dan took the gold which Jesse held out to him. "Well, well," he murmured, "quite on his dignity, eh? All right, Jess, take his stuff to the beach and hail the schooner. He will probably have given directions. I hope we've seen the last of him."

PART IV

THE ATTACK ON THE INN

CHAPTER XVIII

THE AVENUE OF MAPLES

The Marquis's belongings were sent after him to the schooner, where, however, it appeared that they had not been expected, for it was some time before Jesse could obtain an answer to his hail from the sh.o.r.e, and still longer before he could make the men on the ship understand what it was he wanted with them. Eventually Captain Bonhomme had rowed ash.o.r.e, and the Marquis's bags, boxes, writing-desk, and fiddle were loaded into the small boat and taken off to _The Southern Cross_.

It appeared from Jesse's report that the Captain had been sufficiently polite, and had attributed the misunderstanding of his men to their inability to speak English. They had not gotten their orders for the Marquis. He had asked no further questions about Monsieur de Boisdhyver or about his recent prisoners, but had feed Jesse liberally, and dismissed him, with his own and the Marquis's thanks.

"Well," said Tom, who had returned an hour before and had been exchanging experiences with Dan, "that seems to be the end of him for the present. I don't know that I did right in promising your French lady that I should release him, but there seemed no other way to make sure of getting you back."

"I am glad you promised," replied Dan. "It is a relief not to have him under our roof. For the last week I've felt as if the place were haunted by an evil spirit."

"So it has been, and so it still will be, I am afraid," was Tom's reply.

"If there is treasure here, you may be sure that gang won't sail away without making a desperate effort to get it. I move that we beat them out by hunting for it ourselves. Why not begin to-night?"

"Not to-night," protested Dan. "I am tired to death. You can imagine that I didn't get much sleep cooped up on that confounded ship."

"No more have I, old boy. But I believe in striking while the iron is hot. Every day's delay gives them a better chance for their plans, if they mean to attack the Inn."

"I doubt if they'll do that. I don't think force is precisely their line.

You know, I believe that the story Madame de la Fontaine told isn't altogether a fiction."

"Pshaw!" exclaimed Tom. "I don't believe a word of it. Naturally they wouldn't use force, if they could help it. But their plans have all been upset, and a gang like that won't stop at anything."

"But we live in a civilized community, my boy. This isn't the middle ages."

"We live in a civilized community, perhaps; but if you can find a more isolated spot, a place more remote from help, in any other part of the civilized world, I'd be glad to see it. We might as well be in the middle of the Sahara desert. Find the treasure and get it out of harm's way--that's my idea."

"All right, but to-morrow; I swear I'm not up to it to-night."

"To-morrow! Well, then to-morrow. Though for the life of me, I don't see why you want to delay things. Jesse and Ezra can keep watch tonight."

"But we must get some sleep, Tom."

"The devil with sleep! However, you're the boss now. It's your inn, your treasure, your sister, that are involved. I'll take a back seat."

"Come, come, Tom--don't let's quarrel. Give me to-night to--to get myself together, and tomorrow I'll pull the Inn down with you, if you wish."

Perhaps Dan was right, he did need rest and sleep and a few hours would restore him. They had their supper, then, apportioned the night into watches, and Dan went upstairs for his first period of sleep.

His brain was a-whirl. All through the afternoon, during his talk with the Marquis, and later during his talk with Tom, one idea had been dominating his thought, dictating his plan of action, colouring his judgment. The fascination which Madame de la Fontaine exerted over his senses was too strong for him even to contemplate resisting it. She was confessedly in league with a gang of adventurers upon a quest for treasure. She had lied to him at first about the Marquis, she had lied to him about Nancy, she had lied to him about his release; and when she had left him under the pretext of arranging his return to the Inn, she had in fact gone to Tom to bargain an exchange of him for the old Marquis. Her lies, her subterfuges, her flatteries, had been evidently designed but to get possession of the torn sc.r.a.p of paper which was so necessary to their finding the hidden treasure. All this Dan told himself a hundred times, and then, quickly dispelling the witness of these cold hard facts, there would flash before him the vision of her wonderful eyes, of her strange appealing beauty, of her stirring personality; he would feel once more the touch of her cheek and her lips pressing his, intoxicating as wine; and delicious fires flamed through his veins, and set his heart to beating, and made havoc of his honour and his conscience. Whatever were the consequences, he would meet her again that night as he had promised. It was his first experience of pa.s.sion and it was sweeping him off his feet.

Alone in his room Dan sat down at the table. He drew from his pocket the torn paper, and as an act of justice to the friends he felt that he was about to betray, he labourously made a copy of the difficult French handwriting. This done, he locked the copy in his strong box and put the original back in his pocket. Then, like the criminal he thought himself to be, he crept cautiously down the stairs. The door into the bar was open, and he stood for a moment, shoes in hand, peering into the dimly-lit room. Tom sat by the hearth, reading, a pipe in his mouth and a c.o.c.ked pistol on the table by his side. A pang went through Dan's breast, but he checked the impulse to speak, and stole softly across the hall and into his mother's parlour. Ever so cautiously he closed the door behind him, crossed the room, and raised the sash of one of the windows.

It was dark, but starlight; the moon had not yet risen. In a moment he had slipped over the sill and stood upon the porch. Lowering the sash, he crept across the band of light that shone from the windows of the bar, and into the shadow of the Red Oak. There he b.u.t.toned his great coat tightly about him, put on his shoes, and started softly down the avenue of maples. Scarcely a sound disturbed the silence of the night, save the lazy creaking of the windmill as it turned now and then to the puff of a gentle breeze.

At every few steps, he paused to listen, fearful lest his absence had been detected and he were followed by some one from the Inn. Then he would start on again, peering eagerly into the darkness ahead for any sign of her whom he sought. At last he reached the end of the avenue.

His heart was beating wildly, in a very terror that she might not come.

Nothing--no catastrophe, no danger, no disgrace,--could be so terrible to him as that the woman he loved so recklessly and madly should not come. She must not fail! He looked at his watch; it was already three minutes past ten. If in five--then minutes she did not come, he would go to seek her--to the House on the Dunes, aye, if must be to _The Southern Cross_ itself.

Suddenly a dark figure slipped out of the gloom, and Claire de la Fontaine was in his arms. For a moment she let him clasp her, let his lips again meet hers; then quickly she disengaged herself. "Are we safe?"

she asked in a whisper. "Is it that we can talk here."

"We are perfectly safe," he answered. "Nothing can be heard from the Inn.

No one is about."

"You escaped without notice? Are you certain that no one follows you?"

"Absolutely. I am sure. And you?"

"I?--Oh, no, no--. There is no one to question me. I have been at the House on the Dunes all the evening. Marie, my maid,--she thinks that I am gone to the schooner. _Mon Dieu! cher ami_, what terrors I have suffered for you. It had not seemed possible that Claire de la Fontaine would ride and walk two so long miles in a desolate country to meet a lover--It must be that we are gone mad."

"Madness then is the sweetest experience of life," said Dan, seizing her hand again and carrying it to his lips.

"Ah _peut-etre, mon ami_. But now there are many affairs to discuss. Tell me--the Marquis, he was released, as your friend has promised me he should be?"

"Of course, didn't you know it?"

"I know nothing. Why then is it he has not left the Inn?"

"But he did leave--in the middle of the afternoon, half an hour after I returned."