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"Let me see," said Chicot, "must I tell Henri what I have seen? Why should I? two men and a woman, who hide themselves; it would be cowardly. I will not tell; that I know it myself is the important point, for is it not I who reign? His love was very pretty, but he loves too often, this dear Henri of Navarre. A year ago it was Madame de Sauve, and I suppose this was La Fosseuse.
"Sauve qui peut" was now the cry; and Sneezer, quite in his element, began to cruise all about, threatening the tapers with instant extinction. "Ladies, get through the holes," shouted Don Ricardo. "Captain, get you out first." "Can't desert my ship," said the gallant fellow; "the last to quit where danger is, my dear sir. It is my charter; but, Mr Cringle, go you, and hand the ladies out."
The Jacobins, on the other hand, accused the anti-revolutionists of having occasioned the flight by the cry of sauve qui peut! Their joy, which they did not conceal, the declared hope of soon seeing the confederates in Paris, the emigrants returned, and the ancient regime restored, confirmed these suspicions.
Aft, more figures were appearing. In spite of the iron discipline of the Legion, signs of disorder were becoming evident. "We're hard hit, sir," Manderson reported. "Every man for himself, now? Orders, sir?" "My orders are, every man back to his post!" cried the Master, his voice a trumpet-call of resolution. "There'll be no sauve qui peut, here!" He laid a hand on the butt of his pistol.
Instead of returning to the rescue of their unfortunate comrades, their dread of the Indians had caused them to yield ready obedience to the Napoleonic motto, sauve qui peut: and they had hurried onward without making stop, till night overtook them in the Robideau Pass. This version enabled me to explain what had appeared very strange conduct on the part of the escort.
On they went carrying their muskets on their shoulders a cloud of tirailleurs in front of them, right into the cross-fire of the British guns: their loud cry of "Vive l'Empereur" drowning that other awesome, terrible cry which someone had raised a while ago and which now went from mouth to mouth: "We are betrayed! Sauve qui peut!"
Then came the lady-in-waiting, Madame de Sauve, the wife of the state secretary in attendance on Charles, and a triumphant, coquettish beauty, than a fat, good-humoured Austrian dame, always called Madame la Comtesse, because her German name was unpronounceable, and without whom the Queen never stirred, and lastly a little figure, rounded yet slight, slender yet soft and plump, with a kitten-like alertness and grace of motion, as she sprang out, collected the Queen's properties of fan, kerchief, pouncet-box, mantle, &c., and disappeared in to the chateau, without Berenger's being sure of anything but that her little black hat had a rose-coloured feather in it.
Reille and his infantry pause and listen: the cuirassiers halt in their upward movement, whilst up on the ridge of the plateau where Donzelot's grenadiers have attacked the brigade of Kempt and Lambert and Pack, the whisper goes from mouth to mouth: "We are betrayed! Sauve qui peut!" Panic seizes the younger men: they turn their horses' heads back toward the slopes.
They pray, not God to sauve you, or send you to the porte, but to send you to them by ship-wrack, that they may gette the spoile of her. It was told to him by the Governor of the island. But, then, this Governor, Robin Rugg by name, was "a notable good fellow, as his great read nose, full of pimples, did give testimony." Perhaps he exaggerated, or it was but one of his "merry discourses."
M. de Sauve, Charles's secretary, had disclosed his proceedings to his wife; she, flattered by the attentions of the Duke of Anjou, betrayed them to him; and the Queen-mother, terrified at the change of policy, and the loss of the power she had enjoyed for so many years, had hurried to the spot.
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