Jacob's ladder

“My God!” exclaimed Luis, handling Jacob’s ladder among his fingers. “Help me! Do something! I need you!”

“Follow me! We haven’t got much time.”

Luis turned, surprised at hearing a woman’s voice at his back. What he saw jolted him: exotically beautiful, clothed with immaculate white fitting trousers and blouse, of a material which did not seem to be made of any textile fiber he had ever seen, the woman and her attire were outside his experience. She did not seem from this world. His feeling was confirmed by her sudden appearance where nobody had been a moment before. He wondered whether God had sent an angel to help them, in answer to his desperate plea. He felt shy, fearful, and dropped his eyes, not daring to look at her directly.

“Don’t be afraid,” she said. “Come with me.”

Taking his hand, while the cannon shots made the castle tremble, she drew him toward the stairs of the tower, up to the third level and to Charles’s room. Having exhausted his capacity for surprise, Luis left everything to her. If she was really an angel, the best he could do was trust her blindly.

The woman went in the room without knocking. Charles was sitting on his bed with his head in his hands. Pierre, who had been walking like a lion in a cage, stopped suddenly when the door opened.

“Charles Houy, comte de Philippe,” exclaimed the woman with a dominant voice. “What are you doing there, sunk in hopelessness? Stand up and fight!”

“Whatever for?” replied the man, without raising his eyes or his voice. “One cannot fight who cannot die.”

“Will you let your son fall in the hands of his mortal enemy without fighting?”

Unwillingly, dumbfounded, Charles gazed at the woman. Luis felt the impulse to shout that she had made a mistake: Charles was only his tutor; his father had died when he was a child. But looking at her he felt incapable of speaking. If she was an angel, she could not be mistaken. Then he remembered that Charles had a secret, which Pierre and Lady Borland seemed to know, which all had refused to tell him in spite of his insistence. Was this the secret? He wanted to ask, but it was not the proper time.

Charles seemed galvanized by the woman’s pep-talk. He stood up, took the rifle which Pierre had brought with him to the room and went toward the door, but she did not turn aside to let him pass.

“We shan’t fight Blatsov yet. We must leave the castle.”

“But we are surrounded!”

“There is a secret way. Follow me.”

Going down the stairs, Luis conquered his shyness and plucked at her sleeve. She looked at him with an indefinable expression and asked:

“What do you want?”

“There are other men in the castle. Will they come with us?”

“They are ill,” protested Pierre. “If we take them, they’ll slow us and prevent our escaping.”

The woman meditated, wrinkling her brow, before answering:

“We’ll leave them here. They are not in danger. Blatsov only wants Luis and the villagers just want to plunder the castle.”

“How can she know?” wondered Luis.

The woman led them to the dungeons, whose doors had been left open when Luis and Pierre freed the prisoners. She walked unhesitatingly to the end of the deepest corridor, as though she knew the castle perfectly. After groping for some time on the opposite wall, she turned around and let them see a slab of stone moving by itself and opening the mouth of a dark passage. Pierre, who had provided himself with a torch, went first, followed by Luis and Charles, while the woman closed the secret door. While they were walking, the count of Philippe turned and asked:

“Who are you?”

“My name is Lydia.”

“Is that all?”

“It’s enough.”

“I’m at a disadvantage. I know nothing about you, but you seem to know everything about us.”

“You’ll have to accept it, Charles, and trust me. I’ve come to help you.”

“How do we know that you aren’t Blatsov’s accomplice and are taking us to a trap, to put us in his hands?”

“Use your intelligence. If I hadn’t taken you from the castle, in your situation, how long would you’ve been out of his power?”

“That’s true.”

Luis noticed that Charles spoke at Lydia more ceremoniously than she at him, but the situation did not seem discordant. The woman was obviously in a higher plane than any of them, although she did not speak as a superior, but with such love that he was irresistibly reminded of his childish fantasies about a mother he had never known. He wondered whether Lydia could be his mother, sent by God in his help, but rejected the idea, for in such case Charles would have recognized her.

The secret passage was changing. At the light of the torch, they saw that the ceiling was now supported by thick wooden beams, while the walls were perforated by holes sinking toward the depths of the Earth. Empty sacks and forgotten tools showed that the excavation had been used sometime to extract minerals, but the deep dust covering the floor, unaltered by footprints, proved that the mine had been abandoned for a long time, perhaps centuries.

Pierre stopped in doubt at the first branch of the way, but Lydia instructed him how to go on, and did the same whenever the disposition of the mine was confusing. While they walked, Luis observed that the general direction of their walk did not change much: they were clearly going down. Once out of the mine, they would find themselves much lower than the castle and the village of Montsegur.

After walking over an hour, at the entrance of a bigger space, Lydia told them to stop. At the other side they could see a little natural light, indicating that the exit was near. Many bats fluttered around them, their sleep interrupted by the invasion of their daylight refuge. The floor was covered by old and recent whitish excrement.

“We’d better rest here,” said Lydia, sitting on a reasonably clean place, with her back to the wall. “It’s almost six, we are near the sunset. At full night, it will be easier to escape without being seen. Try to sleep a little, you need it. Last night you didn’t close your eyes.”

“What if we are followed?” asked Pierre.

“Don’t worry, they won’t find the secret passage. And I’ll be watching.”

“I can’t let a woman watch while I sleep,” protested Charles.

“I don’t need to sleep,” answered Lydia. “I’m giving the orders here. Please obey.”

Her voice had such a ring of authority that none dared defy it. Luis, however, who had lain near Charles, had to dispel his doubts before sleeping. Putting his lips near his tutor’s ears, he whispered:

“What Lydia said: is it true?”

“What do you mean?”

“That you are my father. Is this the secret that you didn’t want me to know?”

Charles took his time before answering. When he did, his voice was tired and almost inaudible, as though it cost him a hard effort to speak.

“Pardon me; I was only trying to protect you. I knew that sooner or later I’d be in danger, and didn’t want to drag you into it. In 1791 I left France, flying from the Revolution. Years later, in Salamanca, I met María Teresa de Guzmán, countess of la Mata, and fell in love with her. We were married and had a son, but she died at your birth. Mad with woe, I went away and left you under the care of some people I trusted. I came back in 1802, when you were three years old. Then I decided to do my duty, but let everybody think that I was your tutor, because it seemed safer for you. Things haven’t gone as I expected, you’ve been involved anyway. One can’t fight fate.”

“Then my name is not Luis García.”

“No, I invented that name. You should be called Luis Houy, heir of the count of Philippe, but I don’t think that our title will endure. Winds of change are blowing in Europe since the revolution.”

“You should have told me. I have lived without a father.”

“You are right. I’m sorry. We have lost that special relation between father and son. If we could go back, I’d do things differently, but we can’t.”

His voice became blurred, either because he was speaking softer or because Luis was too tired and passing into the world of dreams. Soon later, the three men were sleeping fitfully, while Lydia, whose body in the first echelon was fictitious and need not rest, kept a careful watch.

At ten o’clock, after about four hours, Lydia awoke them.

“We should take advantage of the dark,” she said. “The moon is full and will light us, if the clouds don’t hide it. At least, we’ll be less visible than by daylight. We’ll go to Spain and put the longest possible distance between us and Blatsov.”

“Who is he?” asked Luis, who seemed to have conquered his shyness. “Pierre put a shot through him, but didn’t harm him. He is tireless; he has followed me all around Europe. Although he could never seize me, I couldn’t make him lose my trail. Is he a fiend, or one of those living dead that they are talking about? Will this chase never end?”

“I can’t answer that, Luis, for there are things I don’t know, and what I do know, you wouldn’t understand. I can only say that I’m trying to help you. This is what I came here for.”

“Do you come from the same place as Blatsov?”

“To some extent, yes, but there, even as here, we are enemies. It’s difficult to explain, but I’ll try. I’ve come, because Blatsov and Nikomakos are trying to destroy our work, and I want to prevent it, but don’t know if that’s possible.”

“I’m sure that you’ll win.”

“Thanks for your trust. If I had it, my work would be far easier.”

“You aren’t alone, are you? You have spoken in plural.”

“True. We are a team.”

“Blatsov and Nikomakos are together. Are they also a team?”

“I know very little about them, except that they are here. I’ll try to find more, to prevent them disturbing us in the future.”

“Are you in danger, or are you invulnerable like Blatsov?”

“I don’t know. I’d prefer not to put it to the test.”

“But you came. Thanks for wanting to help us.”

“I couldn’t do less. It wasn’t easy, some of my mates were against it, but I had to accept this responsibility. Don’t thank me; I’ve just done my duty. In fact, it is I who should thank you. You’ve helped me a lot. After speaking with you, I’m sure that I haven’t made a mistake coming here.”

While Lydia and Luis were talking, they had walked toward the entrance of the mine. Darkness was complete. It was night, and the full moon was veiled by cotton-like clouds which did not threaten rain. Before getting out, Lydia watched carefully, but did not discover any signs of danger. Raising her arm, she asked her companions to follow.

Just when they all came outside, the clouds opened and the landscape was suddenly lighted. They were in the French Pyrenees, on one side of the mountain of Montsegur. At their feet, the slope descended steeply, and rose again at the outskirts of the impressive peak of Saint Bartholomew, over two thousand meter high, which dominated the area. The silvery light of the moon gave the ground an almost magic appearance. Luis wouldn’t have been surprised if a goblin had started running among the bushes dotting the slope.

Suddenly and unexpectedly, an awful noise rumbled among the mountains. A rain of dust, earth and plant detritus fell over them.

“What’s happened?” cried Luis, not knowing where to look.

“A cannon shot,” answered Charles. “They’ve fired upon us. We have been seen.”

“Let’s get again in the mine,” advised Lydia, walking in that direction. ”There is another entrance. It may make them lose our trail.”

“I doubt it,” whispered Charles, but he obeyed, followed by Pierre.

Luis was about to get in, when a new cannon shot made him lose his balance. When he stood up, he saw that the shot had impacted fully on the top of the mine entrance, which had collapsed, blocking it completely and separating him from his companions.