Page:Stanley Weyman--Count Hannibal.djvu/339

Rh Some looked and saw these things; more rode on sulky and unseeing, supporting impatiently the toils of a flight from they knew not what.

To do Tignonville justice, he was not of these. On the contrary, he seemed to be in a better temper on this day and, where so many took things unheroically, he showed to advantage. Avoiding the Countess and riding with Carlat, he talked and laughed with marked cheerfulness; nor did he ever fail, when the mist rose, to note this or that landmark, and confirm Badelon in the way he was going.

“We shall be at Lége by noon!” he cried more than once, “and if M. le Comte persists in his plan, may reach Vrillac by late sunset. By way of Challans!”

And always Carlat answered, “Ay, by Challans, Monsieur, so be it!”

He proved, too, so far right in his prediction that noon saw them drag, a weary train, into the hamlet of Lége, where the road from Nantes to Olonne runs southward over the level of Poitou. An hour later Count Hannibal rode in with six of his eight men, and, after a few minutes’ parley with Badelon, who was scanning the horses, he called Carlat to him. The old man came.

“Can we reach Vrillac to-night?” Count Hannibal asked curtly.

“By Challans, my lord,” the steward answered, “I think we can. We call it seven hours’ riding from here.”

“And that route is the shortest?”

“In time, M. le Comte, the road being better.”

Count Hannibal bent his brows. “And the other way?” he said.

“Is by Commequiers, my lord. It is shorter in distance.”

“By how much?”

“Two leagues. But there are fordings and a salt marsh; and with Madame and the women”

“It would be longer?”