A Gentleman of France
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Stanley Weyman >> A Gentleman of France
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The moon had risen high, and flooding with light the small open
space about the house enabled me to see clearly all round the
foot of the ladder, to my surprise Fresnoy was not at his post,
nor was he to be seen anywhere; but as, at the moment I observed
this, an outcry away to my left, at the rear of the chateau, came
to my ears, and announced that the danger was no longer confined
to the interior of the house, I concluded that he had gone that
way to intercept the attack. Without more, therefore, I began to
descend as quickly as I could, my sword under one arm and the bag
under the other.
I was half-way down, and mademoiselle was already stepping on to
the ladder to follow, when I heard footsteps below, and saw him
run up, his sword in his hand.
'Quick, Fresnoy!' I cried. 'To the horses and unfasten them!
quick!'
I slid down the rest of the way, thinking he had gone to do my
bidding. But my feet were scarcely on the ground when a
tremendous blow in the side sent me staggering three paces from
the ladder. The attack was so sudden, so unexpected, that but
for the sight of Fresnoy's scowling face, wild with rage, at my
shoulder, and the sound of his fierce breathing as he strove to
release his sword, which had passed through my saddle-bag, I
might never have known who struck the blow, or how narrow had
been my escape.
Fortunately the knowledge did come to me in time, and before he
freed his blade; and it nerved my hand. To draw my-blade at such
close quarters was impossible, but, dropping the bag which had
saved my life, I dashed my hilt twice in his face with such
violence that he fell backwards and lay on the turf, a dark stain
growing and spreading on his upturned face.
It was scarcely done before the women reached the foot of the
ladder and stood beside me. 'Quick!' I cried to them, 'or they
will be upon us.' Seizing mademoiselle's hand, just as half-a-
dozen men came running round the corner of the house, I jumped
with her down the haha, and, urging her to her utmost speed,
dashed across the open ground which lay between us and the belt
of trees. Once in the shelter of the latter, where our movements
were hidden from view, I had still to free the horses and mount
mademoiselle and her woman, and this in haste. But my
companions' admirable coolness and presence of mind, and the
objection which our pursuers, who did not know our numbers, felt
to leaving the open ground, enabled us to do all with,
comparative ease. I sprang on the Cid (it has always been my
habit to teach my horse to stand for me, nor do I know any
accomplishment more serviceable at a pinch), and giving Fresnoy's
grey a cut over the flanks which despatched it ahead, led the way
down the ride by which I had gained the chateau in the afternoon.
I knew it to be level and clear of trees, and the fact that we
chose it might throw our pursuers off the track for a time, by
leading them to think we had taken the south road instead of that
through the village.
CHAPTER V.
THE ROAD TO BLOIS.
We gained the road without let or hindrance, whence a sharp burst
in the moonlight soon brought us to the village. Through this we
swept on to the inn, almost running over the four evangelists,
whom we found standing at the door ready for the saddle. I bade
them, in a quick peremptory tone, to get to horse, and was
overjoyed to see them obey without demur or word of Fresnoy. In
another minute, with a great clatter of hoofs, we sprang clear of
the hamlet, and were well on the road to Melle, with Poitiers
some thirteen leagues before us. I looked back, and thought I
discerned lights moving in the direction of the chateau; but the
dawn was still two hours off, and the moonlight left me in doubt
whether these were real or the creatures of my own fearful fancy.
I remember, three years before this time, on the occasion of the
famous retreat from Angers--when the Prince of Conde had involved
his army beyond the Loire, and saw himself, in the impossibility
of recrossing the river, compelled to take ship for England,
leaving every one to shift for himself--I well remember on that
occasion riding, alone and pistol in hand, through more than
thirty miles of the enemy's country without drawing rein. But my
anxieties were then confined to the four shoes of my horse. The
dangers to which I was exposed at every ford and cross road were
such as are inseparable from a campaign, and breed in generous
hearts only a fierce pleasure, rarely to be otherwise enjoyed.
And though I then rode warily, and where I could not carry
terror, had all to fear myself, there was nothing secret or
underhand in my business.
It was very different now. During the first few hours of our
flight from Chize I experienced a painful excitement, an alarm, a
feverish anxiety to get forward, which was new to me; which
oppressed my spirits to the very ground; which led me to take
every sound borne to us on the wind for the sound of pursuit,
transforming the clang of a hammer on the anvil into the ring of
swords, and the voices of my own men into those of the pursuers.
It was in vain mademoiselle rode with a free hand, and leaping
such obstacles as lay in our way, gave promise of courage and
endurance beyond my expectations. I could think of nothing but
the three long day's before us, with twenty-four hours to every
day, and each hour fraught with a hundred chances of disaster and
ruin.
In fact, the longer I considered our position--and as we pounded
along, now splashing through a founderous hollow, now stumbling
as we wound over a stony shoulder, I had ample time to reflect
upon it--the greater seemed the difficulties before us. The loss
of Fresnoy, while it freed me from some embarrassment, meant also
the loss of a good sword, and we had mustered only too few
before. The country which lay between us and the Loire, being
the borderland between our party and the League, had been laid
desolate so often as to be abandoned to pillage and disorder of
every kind. The peasants had flocked into the towns. Their
places had been taken by bands of robbers and deserters from both
parties, who haunted the ruined villages about Poitiers, and
preyed upon all who dared to pass. To add to our perils, the
royal army under the Duke of Nevers was reported to be moving
slowly southward, not very far to the left of our road; while a
Huguenot expedition against Niort was also in progress within a
few leagues of us.
With four staunch and trustworthy comrades at my back, I might
have faced even this situation with a smile and a light heart;
but the knowledge that my four knaves might mutiny at any moment,
or, worse still, rid themselves of me and all restraint by a
single treacherous blow such as Fresnoy had aimed at me, filled
me with an ever-present dread; which it taxed my utmost energies
to hide from them, and which I strove in vain to conceal from
mademoiselle's keener vision.
Whether it was this had an effect upon her, giving her a meaner
opinion of me than that which I had for a while hoped she
entertained, or that she began, now it was too late, to regret
her flight and resent my part in it, I scarcely know; but from
daybreak onwards she assumed an attitude of cold suspicion
towards me, which was only less unpleasant than the scornful
distance of her manner when she deigned, which was seldom, to
address me.
Not once did she allow me to forget that I was in her eyes a
needy adventurer, paid by her friends to escort her to a place of
safety, but without any claim to the smallest privilege of
intimacy or equality. When I would have adjusted her saddle, she
bade her woman come and hold up her skirt, that my hands might
not touch its hem even by accident. And when I would have
brought wine to her at Melle, where we stayed for twenty
minutes, she called Fanchette to hand it to her. She rode for
the most part in her mask; and with her woman. One good effect
only her pride and reserve had; they impressed our men with a
strong sense of her importance, and the danger to which any
interference with her might expose them.
The two men whom Fresnoy had enlisted I directed to ride a score
of paces in advance. Luke and John I placed in the rear. In
this manner I thought to keep them somewhat apart. For myself, I
proposed to ride abreast of mademoiselle, but she made it so
clear that my neighbourhood displeased her that I fell back,
leaving her to ride with Fanchette; and contented myself with
plodding at their heels, and striving to attach the later
evangelists to my interests.
We were so fortunate, despite my fears, as to find the road
nearly deserted--as, alas, was much of the country on either
side--and to meet none but small parties travelling along it; who
were glad enough, seeing the villainous looks of our outriders,
to give us a wide berth, and be quit of us for the fright. We
skirted Lusignan, shunning the streets, but passing near enough
for me to point out to mademoiselle the site of the famous tower
built, according to tradition, by the fairy Melusina, and rased
thirteen years back by the Leaguers. She received my information
so frigidly, however, that I offered no more, but fell back
shrugging my shoulders, and rode in silence, until, some two
hours after noon, the city of Poitiers came into sight, lying
within its circle of walls and towers on a low hill in the middle
of a country clothed in summer with rich vineyards, but now brown
and bare and cheerless to the eye.
Fanchette turned and asked me abruptly if that were Poitiers.
I answered that it was, but added that for certain reasons I
proposed not to halt, but to lie at a village a league beyond the
city, where there was a tolerable inn.
'We shall do very well here,' the woman answered rudely. 'Any
way, my lady will go no farther. She is tired and cold, and wet
besides, and has gone far enough.'
'Still,' I answered, nettled by the woman's familiarity, 'I think
mademoiselle will change her mind when she hears my reasons for
going farther.'
'Mademoiselle does not wish to hear them, sir,' the lady replied
herself, and very sharply.
'Nevertheless, I think you had better hear them,' I persisted,
turning to her respectfully. 'You see, mademoiselle--'
'I see only one thing, sir,' she exclaimed, snatching off her
mask and displaying a countenance beautiful indeed, but flushed
for the moment with anger and impatience, 'that, whatever
betides, I stay at Poitiers to-night.'
'If it would content you to rest an hour?' I suggested gently.
'It will not content me!' she rejoined with spirit. 'And let me
tell you, sir,' she went on impetuously, 'once for all, that you
take too much upon yourself. You are here to escort me, and to
give orders to these ragamuffins, for they are nothing better,
with whom you have thought fit to disgrace our company; but not
to give orders to me or to control my movements. Confine
yourself for the future, sir, to your duties, if you please.'
'I desire only to obey you,' I answered, suppressing the angry
feelings which rose in my breast, and speaking as coolly as lay
in my power. 'But, as the first of my duties is to provide for
your safety, I am determined to omit nothing which can conduce to
that end. You have not considered that, if a party in pursuit of
us reaches Poitiers to-night, search will be made for us in the
city, and we shall be taken. If, on the other hand, we are known
to have passed through, the hunt may go no farther; certainly
will go no farther to-night. Therefore we must not,
mademoiselle,' I added firmly, 'lie in Poitiers to-night.'
'Sir,' she exclaimed, looking at me, her face crimson with wonder
and indignation, 'do you dare to--?'
'I dare do my duty, mademoiselle,' I answered, plucking up a
spirit, though my heart was sore. 'I am a man old enough to be
your father, and with little to lose, or I had not been here. I
care nothing what you think or what you say of me, provided I can
do what I have undertaken to do and place you safely in the hands
of your friends. But enough, mademoiselle, we are at the gate.
If you will permit me, I will ride through the streets beside
you. We shall so attract less attention.'
Without waiting for a permission which she was very unlikely to
give, I pushed my horse forward, and took my place beside her,
signing to Fanchette to fall back. The maid obeyed, speechless
with indignation; while mademoiselle flashed a scathing glance at
me and looked round in helpless anger, as though it was in her
mind to appeal against me even to the passers-by. But she
thought better of it, and contenting herself with muttering the
word 'Impertinent' put on her mask with fingers which trembled, I
fancy, not a little.
A small rain was falling and the afternoon was well advanced when
we entered the town, but I noticed that, notwithstanding this,
the streets presented a busy and animated appearance, being full
of knots of people engaged in earnest talk. A bell was tolling
somewhere, and near the cathedral a crowd of no little size was
standing, listening to a man who seemed to be rending a placard
or manifesto attached to the wall. In another place a soldier,
wearing the crimson colours of the League, but splashed and
stained as with recent travel, was holding forth to a breathless
circle who seemed to hang upon his lips. A neighbouring corner
sheltered a handful of priests who whispered together with gloomy
faces. Many stared at us as we passed, and some would have
spoken; but I rode steadily on, inviting no converse.
Nevertheless at the north gate I got a rare fright; for, though
it wanted a full half-hour of sunset, the porter was in the act
of closing it. Seeing us, he waited grumbling until we came up,
and then muttered, in answer to my remonstrance, something about
queer times and wilful people having their way. I took little
notice of what he said, however, being anxious only to get
through the gate and leave as few traces of our passage as might
be.
As soon as we were outside the town I fell back, permitting
Fanchette to take my place. For another league, a long and
dreary one, we plodded on in silence, horses and men alike jaded
and sullen, and the women scarcely able to keep their saddles for
fatigue. At last, much to my relief, seeing that I began to fear
I had taxed mademoiselle's strength too far, the long low
buildings of the inn at which I proposed to stay came in sight,
at the crossing of the road and river. The place looked blank
and cheerless, for the dusk was thickening; but as we trailed one
by one into the courtyard a stream of firelight burst on us from
doors and windows, and a dozen sounds of life and comfort greeted
our ears.
Noticing that mademoiselle was benumbed and cramped with long
sitting, I would have helped her to dismount; but she fiercely
rejected my aid, and I had to content myself with requesting the
landlord to assign the best accommodation he had to the lady and
her attendant, and secure as much privacy for them as possible.
The man assented very civilly and said all should be done; but I
noticed that his eyes wandered while I talked, and that he seemed
to have something on his mind. When he returned, after disposing
of them, it came out.
'Did you ever happen to see him, sir?' he asked with a sigh; yet
was there a smug air of pleasure mingled with his melancholy.
'See whom?' I answered, staring at him, for neither of us had
mentioned any one.
'The Duke, sir.'
I stared again between wonder and suspicion. 'The Duke of Nevers
is not in this part, is he?' I said slowly. 'I heard he was on
the Brittany border, away to the westward.'
'Mon Dieu!' my host exclaimed, raising his hands in
astonishment. 'You have not heard, sir?'
'I have heard nothing,' I answered impatiently.
'You have not heard, sir, that the most puissant and illustrious
lord the Duke of Guise is dead?'
'M. de Guise dead? It is not true!' I cried astonished.
He nodded, however, several times with an air of great
importance, and seemed as if he would have gone on to give me
some particulars. But, remembering, as I fancied, that he spoke
in the hearing of half-a-dozen guests who sat about the great
fire behind me, and had both eyes and ears open, he contented
himself with shifting his towel to his other arm and adding only,
'Yes, sir, dead as any nail. The news came through here
yesterday, and made a pretty stir. It happened at Blois the day
but one before Christmas, if all be true.'
I was thunderstruck. This was news which might change the face
of France. 'How did it happen?' I asked.
My host covered his mouth with his hand and coughed, and, privily
twitching my sleeve, gave me to understand with some
shamefacedness that he could not say more in public. I was about
to make some excuse to retire with him, when a harsh voice,
addressed apparently to me, caused me to turn sharply. I found
at my elbow a tall thin-faced monk in the habit of the Jacobin
order. He had risen from his seat beside the fire, and seemed to
be labouring under great excitement.
'Who asked how it happened?' he cried, rolling his eyes in a
kind of frenzy, while still observant, or I was much mistaken, of
his listeners. Is there a man in France to whom the tale has not
been told? Is there?'
'I will answer for one,' I replied, regarding him with little
favour. 'I have heard nothing.'
'Then you shall! Listen!' he exclaimed, raising his right hand
and brandishing it as though he denounced a person then present.
'Hear my accusation, made in the name of Mother Church and the
saints against the arch hypocrite, the perjurer and assassin
sitting in high places! He shall be Anathema Maranatha, for he
has shed the blood of the holy and the pure, the chosen of
Heaven! He shall go down to the pit, and that soon. The blood
that he has shed shall be required of him, and that before he is
one year older.'
'Tut-tut. All that sounds very fine, good father,' I said,
waxing impatient, and a little scornful; for I saw that he was
one of those wandering and often crazy monks in whom the League
found their most useful emissaries. 'But I should profit more by
your gentle words, if I knew whom you were cursing.'
'The man of blood!' he cried; 'through whom the last but not the
least of God's saints and martyrs entered into glory on the
Friday before Christmas.'
Moved by such profanity, and judging him, notwithstanding the
extravagance of his words and gestures, to be less mad than he
seemed, and at least as much knave as fool, I bade him sternly
have done with his cursing, and proceed to his story if he had
one.
He glowered at me for a moment, as though he were minded to
launch his spiritual weapons at my head; but as I returned his
glare with an unmoved eye--and my four rascals, who were as
impatient as myself to learn the news, and had scarce more
reverence for a shaven crown, began to murmur--he thought better
of it, and cooling as suddenly as he had flamed up, lost no more
time in satisfying our curiosity.
It would ill become me, however, to set down the extravagant and
often blasphemous harangue in which, styling M. de Guise the
martyr of God, he told the story now so familiar--the story of
that dark wintry morning at Blois, when the king's messenger,
knocking early at the duke's door, bade him hurry, for the king
wanted him. The story is trite enough now. When I heard it
first in the inn on the Clain, it was all new and all marvellous.
The monk, too, telling the story as if he had seen the events
with his own eyes, omitted nothing which might impress his
hearers. He told us how the duke received warning after warning,
and answered in the very antechamber, 'He dare not!' How his
blood, mysteriously advised of coming dissolution, grew chill,
and his eye, wounded at Chateau Thierry, began to run, so that he
had to send for the handkerchief he had forgotten to bring. He
told us, even, how the duke drew his assassins up and down the
chamber, how he cried for mercy, and how he died at last at the
foot of the king's bed, and how the king, who had never dared to
face him living, came and spurned him dead!
There were pale faces round the fire when he ceased, and bent
brows and lips hard pressed together. Then he stood and cursed
the King of France--cursing him openly by the name of Henry of
Valois, a thing I had never looked to hear in France--though no
one said 'Amen,' and all glanced over their shoulders, and our
host pattered from the room as if he had seen a ghost, it seemed
to be no man's duty to gainsay him.
For myself, I was full of thoughts which it would have been
unsafe to utter in that company or so near the Loire. I looked
back sixteen years. Who but Henry of Guise had spurned the
corpse of Coligny? And who but Henry of Valois had backed him in
the act? Who but Henry of Guise had drenched Paris with blood,
and who but Henry of Valois had ridden by his side? One 23rd of
the month--a day never to be erased from France's annals--had
purchased for him a term of greatness. A second 23rd saw him,
pay the price--saw his ashes cast secretly and by night no man
knows where!
Moved by such thoughts, and observing that the priest was going
the round of the company collecting money for masses for the
duke's soul, to which object I could neither give with a good
conscience nor refuse without exciting suspicion, I slipped out;
and finding a man of decent appearance talking with the landlord
in a small room beside the kitchen, I called for a flask of the
best wine, and by means of that introduction obtained my supper
in their company.
The stranger was a Norman horsedealer, returning home, after
disposing of his string. He seemed to be in a large way of
business, and being of a bluff, independent spirit, as many of
those Norman townsmen are, was inclined at first to treat me with
more familiarity than respect; the fact of my nag, for which he
would have chaffered, excelling my coat in quality, leading him
to set me down as a steward or intendant. The pursuit of his
trade, however, had brought him into connection with all classes
of men and he quickly perceived his mistake; and as he knew the
provinces between the Seine and Loire to perfection, and made it
part of his business to foresee the chances of peace and war, I
obtained a great amount of information from him, and indeed
conceived no little liking for him. He believed that the
assassination of M. de Guise would alienate so much of France
from the king that his majesty would have little left save the
towns on the Loire, and some other places lying within easy reach
of his court at Blois.
'But,' I said,'things seem quiet now. Here, for instance.'
'It is the calm before the storm,' he answered. 'There is a monk
in there. Have you heard him?'
I nodded.
'He is only one among a hundred--a thousand,' the horsedealer
continued, looking at me and nodding with meaning. He was a
brown-haired man with shrewd grey eyes, such as many Normans
have. 'They will get their way too, you will see,' he went on.
'Well, horses will go up, so I have no cause to grumble; but, if
I were on my way to Blois with women or gear of that kind, I
should not choose this time for picking posies on the road. I
should see the inside of the gates as soon as possible.'
I thought there was much in what he said; and when he went on to
maintain that the king would find himself between the hammer and
the anvil--between the League holding all the north and the
Huguenots holding all the south--and must needs in time come to
terms with the latter seeing that the former would rest content
with nothing short of his deposition, I began to agree with him
that we should shortly see great changes and very stirring times.
'Still if they depose the king,' I said, 'the King of Navarre
must succeed him. He is the heir of France.'
'Bah!' my companion replied somewhat contemptuously. 'The
League will see to that. He goes with the other.'
'Then the kings are in one cry, and you are right,' I said with
conviction. 'They must unite.'
'So they will. It is only a question of time,' he said.
In the morning, having only one man with him, and, as I guessed,
a considerable sum of money, he volunteered to join our party as
far as Blois. I assented gladly, and he did so, this addition to
our numbers ridding me at once of the greater part of my fears.
I did not expect any opposition on the part of mademoiselle, who
would gain in consequence as well as in safety. Nor did she
offer any. She was content, I think, to welcome any addition to
our party which would save her from the necessity of riding in
the company of my old cloak.
CHAPTER VI.
MY MOTHER'S LODGING.
Travelling by way of Chatelherault and Tours, we reached the
neighbourhood of Blois a little after noon on the third day
without misadventure or any intimation of pursuit. The Norman
proved himself a cheerful companion on the road, as I already
knew him to be a man of sense and shrewdness while his presence
rendered the task of keeping my men in order an easy one. I
began to consider the adventure as practically achieved; and
regarding Mademoiselle de la Vire as already in effect
transferred to the care of M. de Rosny, I ventured to turn my
thoughts to the development of my own plans and the choice of a
haven in which I might rest secure from the vengeance of M. de
Turenne.
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