“No,” she answered.
“He came because he had learnt that the patron was dead. It was known in Königsberg a week ago. It is known all over Germany; that quiet old gentleman who scraped a fiddle here in the Frauengasse. And it is only I, in all the world, who know that he was a greater man in Paris than ever he was in Germany—with his Tugendbund—and I cannot remember his name.”
Barlasch broke off and thumped his brow with his fists, as if to awaken that dead memory. And all the while he was searching Désirée’s face, with eyes made brighter and sharper than ever by starvation.
“And do you know what he came for—the Captain—for he never does anything in idleness? He will run a great risk—but it is for a great purpose. Do you know what he came for?”
“No.”
Barlasch jerked his head back and laughed.
“For you.”
He turned and looked at her; but she had raised her clasped hands to her forehead, as if to shield her eyes from the light of the candle, and he could not see her face.
“Do you remember,” said Barlasch, “that night when the patron was so angry—on the mat—when Mademoiselle Mathilde had to make her choice. It is your turn tonight. You have to make your choice. Will you go?”
“Yes,” answered Désirée, behind her fingers.
“ ‘If Mademoiselle will come,’ he said to me, ‘bring her to this place!’ ‘Yes, mon capitaine,’ answered I. ‘At any cost, Barlasch?’ ‘At any cost, mon capitaine.’ And we are not men to break our words. I will take you there—at any cost, mademoiselle. And he will meet you there—at any cost.”
And Barlasch expectorated emphatically into the fire, after the manner of lowborn men.
“What a pity,” he added reflectively, “that he is only an Englishman.”
“When are we to go?” asked Désirée, still behind her barrier of clasped fingers.
“Tomorrow night, after midnight. We have arranged it all—the Captain and I—at the outpost nearest to the river. He has influence. He has rendered services to the Russians, and the Russian commander will make a night attack on the outpost. In the confusion we get through. We arranged it together. He pays me well. It is a bargain, and I am to have my money. We shook hands on it, and those who saw us must have thought that I was buying fish. I, who have no money—and he, who had no fish.”
XXX
The Fulfilment
And I have laboured somewhat in my time
And not been paid profusely.
When Désirée came down the next morning, she found Barlasch talking to himself and laughing as he prepared his breakfast.
He met her with a gay salutation, and seemed unable to control his hilarity.
“It is,” he explained, “because tonight we shall be under fire. We shall be in danger. It makes me afraid, and I laugh. I cannot help it. When I am afraid, I laugh.”
He bustled about the room, and Désirée saw that he had already opened his secret store beneath the floor, to take from it such delicacies as remained.
“You slept?” he asked sharply. “Yes, I can see you did. That is good, for tonight we shall be awake. And now you must eat.”
For Barlasch was a materialist. He had fought death in one form or another all his life, and he knew that those who eat and sleep are better equipped for the battle than those who cherish high ideals or think great thoughts.
“It is a good thing,” he said, looking at her, “that you are so slim. In a military coat—if you put on that short dress in which you skate, and your high boots—you will look like a soldier. It is a good thing that it is winter, for you can wear the hood of your military coat over your head, as they all do out in the trenches to keep their ears from falling. So you need not cut off your hair—all that golden hair. Name of thunder, that would be a pity, would it not?”
He turned to the fire and stirred his coffee reflectively.
“In my own country,” he said, “a long time ago, there was a girl who had hair like yours. That is why we are friends, perhaps.”
He gave a queer, short laugh, and took up his sheepskin coat preparatory to going out.
“I have my preparations to make,” he said, with an air of importance. “There is much to be thought of. We had not long together, for the others were watching us. But we understand each other. I go now to give him the signal that it is for tonight. I have borrowed one of Lisa’s dusters—a blue one that will show against the snow—with which to give him the signal. And he is watching from Zoppot with his telescope. That fat Lisa—if I had held up my finger, she would have fallen in love with me. It has always been so. These women—”
And he went away muttering.
If he had preparations to make, Désirée had no less. She could take but little with her, and she was quitting the house which had always been her home so long as she could remember. Those trunks which Barlasch had so unhesitatingly recognized as coming from France were, it seemed, destined never to be used again. Mathilde had gone, taking with her her few simple possessions; for they had always been poor in the Frauengasse. Sebastian had departed on that journey which the traveller must face alone, taking naught with him. And it was characteristic of the man that he had left nothing behind him—no papers, no testament, no clue to that other life so different from his life in the Frauengasse that it must have lapsed into a fleeting, intangible memory, such as the brain is sometimes allowed to retain of a dream dreamt in this existence, or
