A Gentleman of France

S >> Stanley Weyman >> A Gentleman of France

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To such reflections he put an end in a way which made me blush
for my churlishness. For, suddenly awaking out, of his pleasant
dream, he asked me about myself and my fortunes, inquiring
eagerly how I came to be in St. Cloud, and listening to the story
of my adventures with a generous anxiety which endeared him to me
more and more. When I had done--and by that time Simon had
joined us, and was waiting at the lower end of the room--he
pronounced that I must see the king.

'There is nothing else for it,' he said.

'I have come to see him,' I answered.

'Mon dieu, yes!' he continued, rising from his seat and looking
at me with a face of concern. 'No one else can help you.'

I nodded.

'Turenne has four thousand men here. You can do nothing against
so many?'

'Nothing,' I said. 'The question is, will the king protect me?'

'It is he or no one,' M. d'Agen answered warmly. 'You cannot see
him to-night: he has a Council. To-morrow at daybreak you may.
You must lie here to-night, and I will set my fellows to watch,
and I think you will be safe. I will away now and see if my
uncle will help. Can you think of anyone else who would speak
for you?'

I considered, and was about to answer in the negative, when
Simon, who had listened with a scared face, suggested M. de
Crillon.

'Yes, if he would,' M. d'Agen exclaimed, looking at the lad with
approbation. 'He has weight with the king.'

'I think he might,' I replied slowly. 'I had a curious encounter
with him last night. And with that I told M. d'Agen of the duel
I fought at the inn.

'Good!' he said, his eyes sparkling. 'I wish I had been there
to see. At any rate we will try him. Crillon fears no one, not
even the king.'

So it was settled. For that night I was to keep close in my
friend's lodging, showing not even my nose at the window.

When he had gone on his errand, and I found myself alone in the
room, I am fain to confess that I fell very low in my spirits.
M. d'Agen's travelling equipment lay about the apartment, but
failed to give any but an untidy air to its roomy bareness. The
light was beginning to wane, the sun was gone. Outside, the
ringing of bells and the distant muttering of guns, with the
tumult of sounds which rose from the crowded street, seemed to
tell of joyous life and freedom, and all the hopes and ambitions
from which I was cut off.

Having no other employment, I watched the street, and keeping
myself well retired from the window saw knots of gay riders pass
this way and that through the crowd, their corslets shining and
their voices high. Monks and ladies, a cardinal and an
ambassador, passed under my eyes--these and an endless procession
of townsmen and beggars, soldiers and courtiers, Gascons, Normans
and Picards. Never had I seen such a sight or so many people
gathered together. It seemed as if half Paris had come out to
make submission, so that while my gorge rose against my own
imprisonment, the sight gradually diverted my mind from my
private distresses, by bidding me find compensation for them in
the speedy and glorious triumph of the cause.

Even when the light failed the pageant did not cease, but,
torches and lanthorns springing into life, turned night into day.
From every side came sounds of revelry or strife. The crowd
continued to perambulate the streets until a late hour, with
cries of 'VIVE LE ROI!' and 'VIVE NAVARRE!' while now and again
the passage of a great noble with his suite called forth a fresh
outburst of enthusiasm. Nothing seemed more certain, more
inevitable, more clearly predestinated than that twenty-four
hours must see the fall of Paris.

Yet Paris did not fall.

When M. d'Agen returned a little before midnight, he found me
still sitting in the dark looking from the window. I heard him
call roughly for lights, and apprised by the sound of his voice
that something was wrong, I rose to meet him. He stood silent
awhile, twirling his small moustaches, and then broke into a
passionate tirade, from which I was not slow to gather that M. de
Rambouillet declined to serve me.

'Well,' I said, feeling for the young man's distress and
embarrassment, 'perhaps he is right.'

'He says that word respecting you came this evening,' my friend
answered, his cheeks red with shame, 'and that to countenance you
after that would only be to court certain humiliation. I did not
let him off too easily, I assure you,' M. d'Agen continued,
turning away to evade my gaze; 'but I got no satisfaction. He
said you had his good-will, and that to help you he would risk
something, but that to do so under these circumstances would be
only to injure himself.'

'There is still Crillon,' I said, with as much cheerfulness as I
could assume. 'Pray Heaven he be there early! Did M. de
Rambouillet say anything else?'

'That your only chance was to fly as quickly and secretly as
possible.'

'He thought; my situation desperate, then?'

My friend nodded; and scarcely less depressed on my account than
ashamed on his own, evinced so much feeling that it was all I
could do to comfort him; which I succeeded in doing only when I
diverted the conversation to Madame de Bruhl. We passed the
short night together, sharing the same room and the same bed,
and talking more than we slept--of madame and mademoiselle, the
castle on the hill, and the camp in the woods, of all old days in
fine, but little of the future. Soon after dawn Simon, who lay
on a pallet across the threshold, roused me from a fitful sleep
into which I had just fallen, and a few minutes later I stood up
dressed and armed, ready to try the last chance left to me.

M. d'Agen had dressed stage for stage with me, and I had kept
silence. But when he took up his cap, and showed clearly that he
had it in his mind to go with me, I withstood him. 'No, I said,
'you can do me little good, and may do yourself much harm.'

'You shall not go without one friend,' he cried fiercely.

'Tut, tut!' I said. 'I shall have Simon.'

But Simon, when I turned to speak to him, was gone. Few men are
at their bravest in the early hours of the day, and it did not
surprise me that the lad's courage had failed him. The defection
only strengthened, however, the resolution I had formed that I
would not injure M. d'Agen; though it was some time before I
could persuade him that I was in earnest, and would go alone or
not at all. In the end he had to content himself with lending me
his back and breast, which I gladly put on, thinking it likely
enough that I might be set upon before I reached the castle. And
then, the time being about seven, I parted from him with many
embraces and kindly words, and went into the street with my sword
under my cloak.

The town, late in rising after its orgy, lay very still and
quiet. The morning was grey and warm, with a cloudy sky. The
flags, which had made so gay, a show yesterday, hung close to the
poles, or flapped idly and fell dead again. I walked slowly
along beneath them, keeping a sharp look-out on every side; but
there were few persons moving in the streets, and I reached the
Castle gates without misadventure. Here was something of life;
a bustle of officers and soldiers passing in and out, of
courtiers whose office made their presence necessary, of beggars
who had flocked hither in the night for company. In the middle
of these I recognised on a sudden and with great surprise Simon
Fleix walking my horse up and down. On seeing me he handed it to
a boy, and came up to speak to me with a red face, muttering that
four legs were better than two. I did not say much to him, my
heart being full and my thoughts occupied with the presence
chamber and what I should say there; but I nodded kindly to him,
and he fell in behind me as the sentries challenged me. I
answered them that I sought M. de Crillon, and so getting by,
fell into the rear of a party of three who seemed bent on the
same errand as myself.

One of these was a Jacobin monk, whose black and white robes, by
reminding me of Father Antoine, sent a chill to my heart. The
second, whose eye I avoided, I knew to be M. la Guesle, the
king's Solicitor-General. The third was a stranger to me.
Enabled by M. la Guesle's presence to pass the main guards
without challenge, the party proceeded through a maze of passages
and corridors, conversing together in a low tone; while I,
keeping in their train with my face cunningly muffled, got as far
by this means as the ante-chamber, which I found almost empty.
Here I inquired of the usher for M. de Crillon, and learned with
the utmost consternation that he was not present.

This blow, which almost stunned me, opened my eyes to the
precarious nature of my position, which only the early hour and
small attendance rendered possible for a moment. At any minute I
might be recognised and questioned, or my name be required; while
the guarded doors of the chamber shut me off as effectually from
the king's face and grace as though I were in Paris, or a hundred
leagues away. Endeavouring to the best of my power to conceal
the chagrin and alarm which possessed me as this conviction took
hold of me, I walked to the window; and to hide my face more
completely and at the same time gain a moment to collect my
thoughts, affected to be engaged in looking through it.

Nothing which passed in the room, however, escaped me. I marked
everything and everyone, though all my thought was how I might
get to the king. The barber came out of the chamber with a
silver basin, and stood a moment, and went in again with an air
of vast importance. The guards yawned, and an officer entered,
looked round, and retired. M. la Guesle, who had gone in to the
presence, came out again and stood near me talking with the
Jacobin, whose pale nervous face and hasty movements reminded me
somehow of Simon Fleix. The monk held a letter or petition in
his hand, and appeared to be getting it by heart, for his lips
moved continually. The light which fell on his face from the,
window showed it to be of a peculiar sweaty pallor, and distorted
besides. But supposing him to be devoted, like many of his kind,
to an unwholesome life, I thought nothing of this; though I liked
him little, and would have shifted my place but for the
convenience of his neighbourhood.

Presently, while I was cudgelling my brains, a person came out
and spoke to La Guesle; who called in his turn to the monk, and
started hastily towards the door. The Jacobin followed. The
third person who had entered in their company had his attention
directed elsewhere at the moment; and though La Guesle called to
him, took no heed. On the instant I grasped the situation.
Taking my courage in my hands, I crossed the floor behind the
monk; who, hearing me, or feeling his robe come in contact with
me, presently started and looked round suspiciously, his face
wearing a scowl so black and ugly that I almost recoiled from
him, dreaming for a moment that I saw before me the very spirit
of Father Antoine. But as the man said nothing, and the next
instant averted his gaze, I hardened my heart and pushed on
behind him, and passing the usher, found myself as by magic in
the presence which had seemed a while ago as unattainable by my
wits as it was necessary to my safety.

It was not this success alone, however, which caused my heart to
beat more hopefully. The king was speaking as I entered, and the
gay tones of his voice seemed to promise a favourable reception.
His Majesty sat half-dressed on a stool at the farther end of the
apartment, surrounded by five or six noblemen, while as many
attendants, among whom I hastened to mingle, waited near the
door.

La Guesle made as if he would advance, and then, seeing the
king's attention was not on him, held back. But in a moment the
king saw him and called to him. 'Ha, Guesle!' he said with
good-temper, 'is it you? Is your friend with you?'

The Solicitor went forward with the monk at his elbow, and I had
leisure to remark the favourable change which had taken place in
the king, who spoke more strongly and seemed in better health
than of old. His face looked less cadaverous under the paint,
his form a trifle less emaciated. That which struck me more than
anything, however, was the improvement in his spirits. His eyes
sparkled from time to time, and he laughed continually, so that I
could scarcely believe that he was the same man whom I had seen
overwhelmed with despair and tortured by his conscience.

Letting his attention slip from La Guesle, he began to bandy
words with the nobleman who stood nearest to him; looking up at
him with a roguish eye, and making bets on the fall of Paris.

'Morbleu!' I heard him cry gaily, 'I would give a thousand
pounds to see the 'Montpensier this morning! She may keep her
third crown for herself. Or, PESTE! we might put her in a
convent. That would be a fine vengeance!'

'The veil for the tonsure,' the nobleman said with a smirk.

'Ay. Why not? She would have made a monk of me,' the king
rejoined smartly. 'She must be ready to hang herself with her
garters this morning, if she is not dead of spite already. Or,
stay, I had forgotten her golden scissors. Let her open a vein
with them. Well, what does your friend want, La Guesle?'

I did not hear the answer, but it was apparently satisfactory,
for in a minute all except the Jacobin fell back, leaving the
monk standing before the king; who, stretching out his hand, took
from him a letter. The Jacobin, trembling visibly, seemed
scarcely able to support the honour done him, and the king,
seeing this, said in a voice audible to all, 'Stand up, man. You
are welcome. I love a cowl as some love a lady's hood. And now,
what is this?'

He read a part of the letter and rose. As he did so the monk
leaned forward as though to receive the paper back again, and
then so swiftly, so suddenly, with so unexpected a movement that
no one stirred until all was over, struck the king in the body
with a knife! As the blade flashed and was hidden, and His
Majesty with a deep sob fell back on the stool, then, and not
till then, I knew that I had missed a providential chance of
earning pardon and protection. For had I only marked the Jacobin
as we passed the door together, and read his evil face aright, a
word, one word, had done for me more than the pleading of a score
of Crillons!

Too late a dozen sprang forward to the king's assistance; but
before they reached him he had himself drawn the knife from the
wound and struck the assassin with it on the head. While some,
with cries of grief, ran to support Henry, from whose body the
blood was already flowing fast, others seized and struck down the
wretched monk. As they gathered round him I saw him raise
himself for a moment on his knees and look upward; the blood
which ran down his face, no less than the mingled triumph and
horror of his features, impressed the sight on my recollection.
The next instant three swords were plunged into his breast, and
his writhing body, plucked up from the floor amid a transport of
curses, was forced headlong through the casement and flung down
to make sport for the grooms and scullions who stood below.

A scene of indescribable confusion followed, some crying that the
king was dead, while others called for a doctor, and some by name
for Dortoman. I expected to see the doors closed and all within
secured, that if the man had confederates they might be taken.
But there was no one to give the order. Instead, many who had
neither the ENTREE nor any business in the chamber forced their
way in, and by their cries and pressure rendered the hub-bub and
tumult a hundred times worse. In the midst of this, while I
stood stunned and dumbfounded, my own risks and concerns
forgotten, I felt my sleeve furiously plucked, and, looking
round, found Simon at my elbow. The lad's face was crimson, his
eyes seemed, starting from his head.

'Come,' he muttered, seizing my arm. 'Come!' And without
further ceremony or explanation he dragged me towards the door,
while his face and manner evinced as much heat and impatience as
if he had been himself the assassin. 'Come, there is not a
moment to be lost,' he panted, continuing his exertions without
the least intermission.

'Whither?' I said, in amazement, as I reluctantly permitted him
to force me along the passage and through the gaping crowd on the
stairs. 'Whither, man?'

'Mount and ride!' was the answer he hissed in my ear. 'Ride for
your life to the King of Navarre--to the King of France it may
be! Ride as you have never ridden before, and tell him the news,
and bid him look to himself! Be the first, and, Heaven helping
us, Turenne may do his worst!'

I felt every nerve in my body tingle as I awoke to his meaning.
Without a word I left his arm, and flung myself into the crowd
which filled the lower passage to suffocation. As I struggled
fiercely with them Simon aided me by crying 'A doctor! a doctor!
make way there!' and this induced many to give place to me under
the idea that I was an accredited messenger. Eventually I
succeeded in forcing my way through and reaching the courtyard;
being, as it turned out, the first person to issue from the
Chateau. A dozen people sprang towards me with anxious eyes and
questions on their lips; but I ran past them and, catching the
Cid, which was fortunately at hand, by the rein, bounded into the
saddle.

As I turned the horse to the gate I heard Simon cry after me.
'The Scholars' Meadow! Go that way!' and then I heard no more.
I was out of the yard and galloping bare-headed down the pitched
street, while women snatched their infants up and ran aside, and
men came startled to the doors, crying that the League was upon
us. As the good horse flung up his head and bounded forward,
hurling the gravel behind him with hoofs which slid and clattered
on the pavement, as the wind began to whistle by me, and I seized
the reins in a shorter grip, I felt my heart bound with
exultation. I experienced such a blessed relief and elation as
the prisoner long fettered and confined feels when restored to
the air of heaven.

Down one street and through a narrow lane we thundered, until a
broken gateway stopped with fascines--through which the Cid
blundered and stumbled--brought us at a bound into the Scholars'
Meadow just as the tardy sun broke through the clouds and flooded
the low, wide plain with brightness. Half a league in front of
us the towers of Meudon rose to view on a hill. In the distance,
to the left, lay the walls of Paris, and nearer, on the same
side, a dozen forts and batteries; while here and there, in that
quarter, a shining clump of spears or a dense mass of infantry
betrayed the enemy's presence.

I heeded none of these things, however, nor anything except the
towers of Meudon, setting the Cid's head straight for these and
riding on at the top of his speed. Swiftly ditch and dyke came
into view before us and flashed away beneath us. Men lying in
pits rose up and aimed at us; or ran with cries to intercept us.
A cannon-shot fired from the fort by Issy tore up the earth to
one side; a knot of lancers sped from the shelter of an earthwork
in the same quarter, and raced us for half a mile, with frantic
shouts and threats of vengeance. But all such efforts were
vanity. The Cid, fired by this sudden call upon his speed, and
feeling himself loosed--rarest of events--to do his best, shook
the foam from his bit, and opening his blood-red nostrils to the
wind, crouched lower and lower; until his long neck, stretched
out before him, seemed, as the sward swept by, like the point of
an arrow speeding resistless to its aim.

God knows, as the air rushed by me and the sun shone in my face,
I cried aloud like a boy, and though I sat still and stirred
neither hand nor foot, lest I should break the good Sard's
stride, I prayed wildly that the horse which I had groomed with
my own hands and fed with my last crown might hold on unfaltering
to the end. For I dreamed that the fate of a nation rode in my
saddle; and mindful alike of Simon's words, 'Bid him look to
himself,' and of my own notion that the League would not be so
foolish as to remove one enemy to exalt another, I thought
nothing more likely than that, with all my fury, I should arrive
too late, and find the King of Navarre as I had left the King of
France.

In this strenuous haste I covered a mile as a mile has seldom
been covered before; and I was growing under the influence of the
breeze which whipped my temples somewhat more cool and hopeful,
when I saw on a sudden right before me, and between me and
Meudon, a handful of men engaged in a MELEE. There were red and
white jackets in it--leaguers and Huguenots--and the red coats
seemed to be having the worst of it. Still, while I watched,
they came off in order, and unfortunately in such a way and at
such a speed that I saw they must meet me face to face whether I
tried to avoid the encounter or not. I had barely time to take
in the danger and its nearness, and discern beyond both parties
the main-guard of the Huguenots, enlivened by a score of pennons,
when the Leaguers were upon me.

I suppose they knew that no friend would ride for Meudon at that
pace, for they dashed at me six abreast with a shout of triumph;
and before I could count a score we met. The Cid was still
running strongly, and I had not thought to stay him, so that I
had no time to use my pistols. My sword I had out, but the sun
dazzled me and the men wore corslets, and I made but poor play
with it; though I struck out savagely, as we crashed together, in
my rage at this sudden crossing of my hopes when all seemed done
and gained. The Cid faced them bravely--I heard the distant
huzza of the Huguenots--and I put aside one point which
threatened my throat. But the sun was in my eyes and something
struck me on the head. Another second, and a blow in the breast
forced me fairly from the saddle. Gripping furiously at the air
I went down, stunned and dizzy, my last thought as I struck the
ground being of mademoiselle, and the little brook with the
stepping-stones.

CHAPTER XXXV.

'LE ROI EST MORT!'

It was M. d'Agen's breastpiece saved my life by warding off the
point of the varlet's sword, so that the worst injury I got was
the loss of my breath for five minutes, with a swimming in the
head and a kind of syncope. These being past, I found myself on
my back on the ground, with a man's knee on my breast and a dozen
horsemen standing round me. The sky reeled dizzily before my
eyes and the men's figures loomed gigantic; yet I had sense
enough to know what had happened to me, and that matters might
well be worse.

Resigning myself to the prospect of captivity, I prepared to ask
for quarter; which I did not doubt I should receive, since they
had taken me in an open skirmish, and honestly, and in the
daylight. But the man whose knee already incommoded me
sufficiently, seeing me about to speak, squeezed me on a sudden
so fiercely, bidding me at the same time in a gruff whisper be
silent, that I thought I could not do better than obey.

Accordingly I lay still, and as in a dream, for my brain was
still clouded, heard someone say, 'Dead! Is he? I hoped we had
come in time. Well, he deserved a better fate. Who is he,
Rosny?'

'Do you know him, Maignan?' said a voice which sounded strangely
familiar.

The man who knelt; upon me answered, 'No, my lord. He is a
stranger to me. He has the look of a Norman.'

'Like enough!' replied a high-pitched voice I had not heard
before. 'For he rode a good horse. Give me a hundred like it,
and a hundred men to ride as straight, and I would not envy the
King of France.'

'Much less his poor cousin of Navarre,' the first speaker
rejoined in a laughing tone, 'without a whole shirt to his back
or a doublet that is decently new. Come, Turenne, acknowledge
that you are not so badly off after all!'

At that word the cloud which had darkened my faculties swept on a
sudden aside. I saw that the men into whose hands I had fallen
wore white favours, their leader a white plume; and comprehended
without more that the King of Navarre had come to my rescue, and
beaten off the Leaguers who had dismounted me. At the same
moment the remembrance of all that had gone before, and
especially of the scene I had witnessed in the king's chamber,
rushed upon my mind with such overwhelming force that I fell into
a fury of impatience at the thought of the time I had wasted; and
rising up suddenly I threw off Maignan with all my force, crying
out that I was alive--that I was alive, and had news.

The equerry did his best to restrain me, cursing me under his
breath for a fool, and almost; squeezing the life out of me. But
in vain, for the King of Navarre, riding nearer, saw me
struggling. 'Hallo! hallo! 'tis a strange dead man,' he cried,
interposing. 'What is the meaning of this? Let him go! Do you
hear, sirrah? Let him go!'

The equerry obeyed and stood back sullenly, and I staggered to my
feet, and looked round with eyes which still swam and watered.
On the instant a cry of recognition greeted me, with a hundred
exclamations of astonishment. While I heard my name uttered on
every side in a dozen different tones, I remarked that M. de
Rosny, upon whom my eyes first fell, alone stood silent,
regarding me with a face of sorrowful surprise.

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