CHAPTER XV.
A RIDE FOR LIFE OR DEATH!
Cecil's troop, which had lost heavily in the encounter with the Turkish lancers, escorted some of the wounded and sick to the camp at Deligrad, passing through a beautiful valley, and skirting the slopes of Mount Urtanj, one of the greatest hills in Servia. The way was of the roughest and steepest kind; his progress was slow, with a convoy of blood-stained, tattered and dying creatures. It was a march he never forgot, and from one circumstance, perhaps, more than all. He met en route the old village pope (or priest) of Palenka, mounted on one of the shaggy, hardy little ponies, and from him—amid many an exclamation of lamentation, sorrow and anathema—he learned distinct tidings of the fate of Margarita, and that her remains had been found by some woodcutters at the base of the cliff below the Krall Lazar chapel, and a storm of terrible emotion swelled up in Cecil's heart, as he listened to the broken accents of the priest. Great was his horror and great his pity! He forgot all the vengeance he personally owed Guebhard in this new, unthought-of and more terrible debt, and sadly and touchingly the rare beauty of the dead girl and her devotion to himself came back to memory now!
Full of thought that could take no coherent form in words, he rode on as one in a dream, and almost oblivious now of all around him; of the sufferings of those who formed his miserable convoy; of the dark blood dripping through the straw, from half-dressed wounds, that burst out afresh; of the groans and cries elicited by every jolt of the clumsy ambulance waggons; of the monotonous rumbling of the wheels that shook and jarred against ruts and stones; even of the deaths that were occurring from time to time, leaving the dead and the living side by side, while the forest birds of prey hovered over his sorrowful line of march, and followed it, in anticipation of a banquet.
He thought of Margarita, who, he felt assured, had perished thus awfully through her love for himself, and through the assignation made at the way-side chapel—an assignation of which Guebhard must—by some unaccountable means—have become cognisant; and then he thought of Guebhard, the half Bulgarian, and sighed in fury through his clenched teeth—'Oh, to be near Guebhard, but for a minute!'
But the latter was nearer him then he could well have imagined.
For food and rest, and to have his wounded attended to, and the dead taken from amid the living to a place of interment, he halted at a village which was indicated in his 'route,' on the slope of Mount Mezlani, just as darkness was closing in, and through the net work of the forest branches the western sky glowed vivid with lurid light, though darkness had fallen on the valleys far below the mountain slopes, and a busy time he had of it, with a couple of surgeons, a staff of soldier-nurses and orderlies, going from waggon to waggon, and hearing but one reiterated story of suffering, one repeated chorus of cries, moans and often curses.
Seeking the only cafane in the place, he dismounted at the door, had a dish of hot poprikash and black coffee, dashed well with brandy—of which, as his duty was not yet over, he partook standing, and was in the act of lighting a cigarette, when a man, dressed like a Servian peasant, but marvellously well mounted for such, approached the door, and without quitting his saddle, asked in a low and timid, or somewhat uncertain voice, for some refreshment.
The voice of the stranger gave Cecil a species of electric shock, for 'there is no instinct so rapid and so unerring as the instinct of a foe;' and despite the voluminous dark beard and peasant garb, he recognised the clearly cut features, the hawk-like nose with delicate nostrils, and the black beady eyes of Guebhard!
The voice, the sight, the presence of this man after the awful narrative of the village pope so recently told, and now acting suspiciously as a spy in the interests of the enemy, roused Cecil's blood to fever heat. As a deserter, spy and assassin, this man's life was trebly forfeited, and Cecil left his seat, slowly and deliberately to avoid giving alarm, and feeling in his heart a grim sweetness in the idea that the destroyer of Margarita was to perish by his hand!
But, as he moved towards the door of the cafane, the light of a lamp fell upon him, and he was instantly recognised by the renegade, who remained in his saddle outside an open window.
Guebhard started violently; a ferocious vindictiveness sparkled in his eyes; his face grew paler with rage and alarm that were evidently mingled with a panther-like desire to rush at Cecil. He ground his teeth; he quivered in every limb; and then, suddenly seized by a panic of fear, fired three shots from a revolver at Cecil, wheeled round his horse and galloped away.
Every shot went wide of its mark, and another moment saw Cecil in his saddle, in hot pursuit, guided for a time only by the sound of the flying hoofs. Careless of whither he rode, even if right into the Turkish lines, he dashed on, goring his horse with sharp rowels at every bound.
'Halt, dog and scoundrel!—halt, or die!' he cried again and again.
Guebhard was now about a hundred yards ahead, but that distance lessened fast as Cecil tore after him, his pistol levelled twenty times ere he would risk a shot, as there was no time for reloading, and the night-clouds were deepening fast.
They were in full race—pursuer and pursued. Cecil fired two chambers; but both must have missed, as Guebhard neither winced nor fell, but fired at random in return.
'The fiend take him!' was the latter's thought; 'he baulked my night's work once, and slew my Montenegrin comrade, and I have already missed him, shot after shot!'
Without other thought than flight, Guebhard, aware that he was unable to defend himself now that his pistols were empty, and knowing that his personal strength and skill with the sword were inferior to those of Cecil's, spurred wildly on and on, with every respiration tasting all the bitterness of anticipated death in his coward heart, expecting every instant to feel a shot pierce his back like a red-hot bolt and stretch him there to feed the wolves and carrion crows.
Guebhard, perhaps, was not quite a coward by nature; but somehow the panic of an utter poltroon possessed him now. Was it the terrible deed he had done at the chapel of Krall Lazar that unnerved his heart and unstrung his sinews? It must have been so. The last glance he had seen in the eyes of Margarita haunted him; and he thought of that delicate and faultless form lying mangled at the foot of the cliff to become the prey of vultures and wild animals now, when his own end seemed so terribly close and nigh, at the hands of her avenger—the man he had so often wantonly wronged, and who, he knew, would be pitiless as a famished tiger.
If he had remorse, it was curiously mingled with an emotion of jealous triumph, that to this man Margarita was lost for ever—wrested from him by his hands, as we have said, and that Death alone was her possessor now!
'Coward, rein up!—your sword—your sword to mine!' cried Cecil, more than once; but neither taunt, sneer, nor threat availed him then.
At this time he felt in his heart much of that emotion which a writer calls 'the religion of revenge, which had been sacred to his forefathers, in the age when murderers were proven by bier-right, and for wrong, the Fiery Cross of war was borne alight over moor and mountain.'
Fiercely, high and tumultuously, coursed the blood through his veins. Every muscle was strained, like those of a race-horse in the field, for he had an awful penalty to exact, and Guebhard knew well that he had a terrible debt to pay—one for which not even his life and the last drop of his blood would atone.
Yet Guebhard, perhaps, could not have told whether he most loved or hated the memory of the girl he had destroyed.
He knew that too probably, if steel and lead failed, if once in the grasp of Cecil, the latter would trample him to death, choke him like a viper with a heel upon his throat; and, sooth to say, such was the terrible idea that occurred to the pursuer at times while, with fiery exultation, he found himself gaining upon his prey.
The sweat of a great mortal agony gathered on the temples of Guebhard; his mouth was parched; his breath came short and fast; and, half-turning in his saddle, he could see, in the starlight, the white set face of his pursuer almost within arm's length of him, and the outstretched head of his horse more than once actually in a line with his crupper.
The black beard had fallen off now.
'How,' thought Cecil; 'how came it to pass that this man, so full of the common vulgar terror of mere physical peril, ever turned soldier—even in name!’
He next thought it was fortunate that, owing to the slowness of the past day's march, and the short length of it, his horse was tolerably fresh; but that of Guebhard seemed to be in the same condition.
He recalled the assassin-like attempts on his own life; his being tracked in the forest; wellnigh done to death and buried alive; he recalled the forged document which brought, for a time, dishonour on him and destruction close indeed; but more than all did he think of Margarita, done to death so terribly; and Guebhard thought of all these things as he rode wildly on, and the other as wildly and madly pursued him.
He had wrested her from his enemy, and what he had done he would not have undone even had he the power. Since she would not, and could not, be his, she was lost to the other—dead!—taken by his hand, and yet he feared to die!
Whatever the wretch Guebhard felt when alone was given way to there, in the darkness, to the full. No spectator or chance visitor—none of those with whom he had mingled in the Turkish camp—ever saw a change in the pale, delicate, and immutable face of the destroyer, or could have detected the dread secret his calm, soft smile concealed.
He had always feared, however, that sooner or later retribution would come; that his desertion, if not his other crimes, would find him out, and strike him down in the hour of fancied security, and now—now it seemed that the time of fate had come!
Cecil's last shot had been expended; but as revolver-firing is always dubious, and in certainty every way inferior to the old single or double-barrelled pistol, that shot had only grazed the shoulder of Guebhard, who was next aware that Cecil had drawn his sword, the steel blade of which glittered blue and grim in the starry light!
Where were their horses taking them—towards the Morava, or the valley of the Timok?
Cecil gave no thought to this, nor cared; down steep pathways, jagged with rocks; through orchards, more than once; past fields of flax and Indian corn; past walls laden with vines; past houses and farmsteads, sunk in darkness and silence; past villages, where pariah dogs barked and howled at them; through woods, where the interwoven foliage was dense above, and the late violets grew thick and fragrant below, and the wild acanthus spread its beautiful leaves.
Anon, down narrow gorges where the arbutus and laurel overhung the way; then thundering along the worn pavement of some old Roman road; now so close that they could hear each other breathing; and anon, a horse's length asunder, as some obstruction—a laurel root or a vine tendril—gave momentary hopes to the fugitive.
Of the way he went in this night ride for death and life—for retribution and punishment—Cecil had no knowledge and took no heed; he seemed to follow it, as we follow paths in dreams; yet he did so unvaryingly, and unswervingly.
At last the darkness became so intense by the thickness of the foliage overhead, in a deep and narrow way, that Cecil failed to make out the figure of the fugitive for a time.
The sound of their own breathing and that of their horses, with the crash of the hoofs, alone broke the stillness of the night—of the world it almost seemed—where all things slept amid the utter tranquillity that had fallen everywhere.
They rushed down steeps, where the loose and perilous stones emitted showers of sparks when struck by the iron hoofs; the necks of their horses were outstretched like those of racers; their flanks heaved, and their bridles and breasts were covered with white foam flecks.
In the gloomy way, under the forest trees, Cecil—we have said—failed to see the figure of him he pursued—but he could hear his horse's hoofs crashing on before him, and he followed the sound. He neared the animal, a grey, closer and closer, as now its speed seemed to slacken; with a low fierce exclamation, he came abreast of it, only to find the saddle empty, and the rider—gone!
But whether the latter had taken his feet out of the stirrups, caught the branch of a tree and swung himself up into it, or threw himself off amid some thick underwood and crept quietly and safely away, Cecil could not determine. But one fact remained; he saw no more of Guebhard for that night!
His mortification and disappointment at being suddenly baffled thus, were extreme; and his disgust was enhanced in no small degree by the humiliating conviction, that the sooner he was clear of that identical wooded way the better for himself, as he knew not from what tree, or clump of underwood he might, at any moment, be covered by the pistol of Guebhard, lurking in security and unseen.
Where was he now, and how to find his way back to where he had left his convoy of ambulance waggons?
He had noted no land marks—taken no heed of the way he had come. He had seen before him Guebhard, and Guebhard only! He must have ridden many miles—how many he knew not, and now his horse was weary and blown.
Fortunately for him, his orders were to halt at the village he had left for the night, and to begin the next day's march at noon, or as soon after as the wants of the wounded and sick had been attended to; and steering his way chiefly by the stars, he rode slowly on his return, with an irritating sense of annoyance, humiliation, and disquietude, as, for all he knew, he might be close in the vicinity of the enemy and fall into their hands.
He rode slowly and warily, and fortune favoured him; about dawn he found himself near the little town of Kragojeratz, on the right bank of the river Lepenitza, a tributary of the Morava, and there his Servian uniform at once procured him a mounted guide to the village he had left, and from which he was then about twenty miles distant.