Making so early a start from Etampes that the inn, which had continued in an uproar till long after midnight, lay sunk in sleep when we rode out of the yard, we reached Meudon about noon next day. I should be tedious were I to detail what thoughts my mistress and I had during that day’s journey—the last, it might be, which we should take together; or what assurances we gave one another, or how often we, repented the impatience which had impelled us to put all to the touch. Madame, with kindly forethought, detached herself from us, and rode the greater part of the distance with Fanchette; but the opportunities she gave us went for little; for, to be plain, the separation we dreaded seemed to overshadow us already. We uttered few words, through those few were to the purpose, but riding hand-in-hand, with full hearts, and eyes which seldom quitted one another, looked forward to Meudon and its perils with such gloomy forebodings as our love and my precarious position suggested.
Long before we reached the town, or could see more of it than the Chateau, over which the Lilies of France and the broad white banner of the Bourbons floated in company, we found ourselves swept into the whirlpool which surrounds an army. Crowds stood at all the cross-roads, wagons and sumpter-mules encumbered the bridges; each moment a horseman passed us at a gallop, or a troop of disorderly rogues, soldiers only in name, reeled, shouting and singing, along the road. Here and there, for a warning to the latter sort, a man, dangled on a rude gallows; under which sportsmen returning from the chase and ladies who had been for an airing rode laughing on their way.
Amid the multitude entering the town we passed unnoticed. A little way within the walls we halted to inquire where the Princess of Navarre had her lodging. Hearing that she occupied a house in the town, while her brother had his quarters in the Chateau, and the King of France at St. Cloud, I stayed my party in a by-road, a hundred paces farther on, and, springing from the Cid, went to my mistress’s knee.
‘Mademoiselle,’ I said formally, and so loudly that all my men might hear, ‘the time is come. I dare not go farther with you. I beg you, therefore, to bear me witness that as I took you so I have brought you back, and both with your good-will. I beg that you will give me this quittance, for it may serve me.’
She bowed her head and laid her ungloved hand on mine, which I had placed on, the pommel of her saddle. ‘Sir,’ she answered in a broken voice, ‘I will not give you this quittance, nor any quittance from me while I live.’ With that she took off her mask before them all, and I saw the tears running down her white face. ‘May God protect you, M. de Marsac,’ she continued, stooping until her face almost touched mine, ‘and bring you to the thing you desire. If not, sir, and you pay too dearly for what you have done for me, I will live a maiden all my days. And, if I do not, these men may shame me!’
My heart was too full for words, but I took the glove she held out to me, and kissed her hand with my knee bent. Then I waved—for I could not speak—to madame to proceed; and with Simon Fleix and Maignan’s men to guard them they went on their way. Mademoiselle’s white face looked back to me until a bend in the road hid them, and I saw them no more.
I turned when all were gone, and going heavily to where my Sard stood with his head drooping, I climbed to the saddle, and rode at a foot-pace towards the Chateau. The way was short and easy, for the next turning showed me the open gateway and a crowd about it. A vast number of people were entering and leaving, while others rested in the shade of the wall, and a dozen grooms led horses up and down. The sunshine fell hotly on the road and the courtyard, and flashed back by the cuirasses of the men on guard, seized the eye and dazzled it with gleams of infinite brightness. I was advancing alone, gazing at all this with a species of dull indifference which masked for the moment the suspense I felt at heart, when a man, coming on foot along the street, crossed quickly to me and looked me in the face.
I returned his look, and seeing he was a stranger to me, was for passing on without pausing. But he wheeled beside me and uttered my name in a low voice.
I checked the Cid and looked down at him. ‘Yes,’ I said mechanically, ‘I am M. de Marsac. But I do not know you.’
‘Nevertheless I have been watching for you for three days,’ he replied. ‘M. de Rosny received your message. This is for you.’
He handed me a scrap of paper. ‘From whom?’ I asked.
‘Maignan,’ he answered briefly. And with that, and a stealthy look round, he left me, and went the way he had been going before.
I tore open the note, and knowing that Maignan could not write, was not surprised to find that it lacked any signature. The brevity of its contents vied with the curtness of its bearer. ‘In Heaven’s name go back and wait,’ it ran. ‘Your enemy is here, and those who wish you well are powerless.’
A warning so explicit, and delivered under such circumstances, might have been expected to make me pause even then. But I read the message with the same dull indifference, the same dogged resolve with which the sight of the crowded gateway before me had inspired me. I had not come so far and baffled Turenne by an hour to fail in my purpose at the last; nor given such pledges to another to prove false to myself. Moreover, the distant rattle of musketry, which went to show that a skirmish was taking place on the farther side of the Castle, seemed an invitation to me to proceed; for now, if ever, my sword might earn protection and a pardon. Only in regard to M. de Rosny, from whom I had no doubt that the message came, I resolved to act with prudence; neither making any appeal to him in public nor mentioning his name to others in private.
The Cid had borne me by this time into the middle of the throng about the gateway, who, wondering to see a stranger of my appearance arrive without attendants, eyed me with a mixture of civility and forwardness. I recognised more than one man whom I had seen about the Court at St. Jean d’Angely six months before; but so great is the disguising power of handsome clothes and equipments that none of these knew me. I beckoned to the nearest, and asked him if the King of Navarre was in the Chateau.
‘He has gone to see the King of France at St. Cloud,’ the man answered, with something of wonder that anyone should be ignorant of so important a fact. ‘He is expected here in an hour.’
I thanked him, and calculating that I should still have time and to spare before the arrival of M. de Turenne, I dismounted, and taking the rein over my arm, began to walk up and down in the shade of the wall. Meanwhile the loiterers increased in numbers as the minutes passed. Men of better standing rode up, and, leaving their horses in charge of their lackeys, went into the Chateau. Officers in shining corslets, or with boots and scabbards dulled with dust, arrived and clattered in through the gates. A messenger galloped up with letters, and was instantly surrounded by a curious throng of questioners; who left him only to gather about the next comers, a knot of townsfolk, whose downcast visages and glances of apprehension seemed to betoken no pleasant or easy mission.
Watching many of these enter and disappear, while only the humbler sort remained to swell the crowd at the gate, I began to experience the discomfort and impatience which are the lot of the man who finds himself placed in a false position. I foresaw with clearness the injury I was about to do my cause by presenting myself to the king among the common herd; and yet I had no choice save to do this, for I dared not run the risk of entering, lest I should be required to give my name, and fail to see the King of Navarre at all.
As it was I came very near to being foiled in this way; for I presently recognised, and was recognised in turn, by a gentleman who rode up to the gates and, throwing his reins to a groom, dismounted with an air of immense gravity. This was M. Forget, the king’s secretary, and the person to whom I had on a former occasion presented a petition. He looked at me with eyes of profound astonishment, and saluting me stiffly from a distance, seemed in two minds whether he should pass in or speak to me. On second thoughts, however, he came towards me, and again saluted me with a peculiarly dry and austere aspect.
‘I believe, sir, I am speaking to M. de Marsac?’ he said in a low voice, but not impolitely.
I replied in the affirmative.
‘And that, I conclude, is your horse?’ he continued, raising his cane, and pointing to the Cid, which I had fastened to a hook in the wall.
I replied again in the affirmative.
‘Then take a word of advice,’ he answered, screwing up his features, and speaking in a dry sort of way. ‘Get upon its back without an instant’s delay, and put as many leagues between yourself and Meudon as horse and man may.’
‘I am obliged to you,’ I said, though I was greatly startled by his words. ‘And what if I do not take your advice?’
He shrugged his shoulders. ‘In that case look to yourself!’ he retorted. ‘But you will look in vain!’
He turned on his heel, as he spoke, and in a moment was gone. I watched him enter the Chateau, and in the uncertainty which possessed me whether he was not gone—after salving his conscience by giving me warning—to order my instant arrest, I felt, and I doubt not I looked, as ill at ease for the time being as the group of trembling townsfolk who stood near me. Reflecting that he should know his master’s mind, I recalled with depressing clearness the repeated warnings the King of Navarre had given me that I must not look to him for reward or protection. I bethought me that I was here against his express orders: presuming on those very services which he had given me notice he should repudiate. I remembered that Rosny had always been in the same tale. And en fin I began to see that mademoiselle and I had together decided on a step which I should never have presumed to take on my own motion.
I had barely arrived at this conclusion when the trampling of hoofs and a sudden closing in of the crowd round the gate announced the King of Navarre’s approach. With a sick heart I drew nearer, feeling that the crisis was at hand; and in a moment he came in sight, riding beside an elderly man, plainly dressed and mounted, with whom he was carrying on an earnest conversation. A train of nobles and gentlemen, whose martial air and equipments made up for the absence of the gewgaws and glitter, to which my eyes had become accustomed at Blois, followed close on his heels. Henry himself wore a suit of white velvet, frayed in places and soiled by his armour; but his quick eye and eager, almost fierce, countenance could not fail to win and keep the attention of the least observant. He kept glancing from side to side as he came on; and that with so cheerful an air and a carriage so full at once of dignity and good-humour that no one could look on him and fail to see that here was a leader and a prince of men, temperate in victory and unsurpassed in defeat.
The crowd raising a cry of ‘VIVE NAVARRE!’ as he drew near, he bowed, with a sparkle in his eye. But when a few by the gate cried ‘VIVENT LES ROIS!’ he held up his hand for silence, and said in a loud, clear voice, ‘Not that, my friends. There is but one king in France. Let us say instead, “Vive le Roi!”’
The spokesman of the little group of townsfolk, who, I learned, were from Arcueil, and had come to complain of the excessive number of troops quartered upon them, took advantage of the pause to approach him. Henry received the old man with a kindly look, and bent from his saddle to hear what he had to say. While they were talking I pressed forward, the emotion I felt on my own account heightened by my recognition of the man who rode by the King of Navarre—who was no other than M. de la Noue. No Huguenot worthy of the name could look on the veteran who had done and suffered more for the cause than any living man without catching something of his stern enthusiasm; and the sight, while it shamed me, who a moment before had been inclined to prefer my safety to the assistance I owed my country, gave me courage to step to the king’s rein, so that I heard his last words to the men of Arcueil.
‘Patience, my friends,’ he said kindly. ‘The burden is heavy, but the journey is a short one. The Seine is ours; the circle is complete. In a week Paris must surrender. The king, my cousin, will enter, and you will be rid of us. For France’s sake one week, my friends.’
The men fell back with low obeisances, charmed by his good-nature, and Henry, looking up, saw me before him. In the instant his jaw fell. His brow, suddenly contracting above eyes, which flashed with surprise and displeasure, altered in a moment the whole aspect of his face; which grew dark and stern as night. His first impulse was to pass by me; but seeing that I held my ground, he hesitated, so completely chagrined by my appearance that he did not know how to act, or in what way to deal with me. I seized the occasion, and bending my knee with as much respect as I had ever used to the King of France, begged to bring myself to his notice, and to crave his protection and favour.
‘This is no time to trouble me, sir,’ he retorted, eyeing me with an angry side-glance. ‘I do not know you. You are unknown to me, sir. You must go to M. de Rosny.’
‘It would be useless sire,’ I answered, in desperate persistence.
‘Then I can do nothing for you,’ he rejoined peevishly. ‘Stand on one side, sir.’
But I was desperate. I knew that I had risked all on the event, and must establish my footing before M. de Turenne’s return, or run the risk of certain recognition and vengeance. I cried out, caring nothing who heard, that I was M. de Marsac, that I had come back to meet whatever my enemies could allege against me.
‘VENTRE SAINT GRIS!’ Henry exclaimed, starting in his saddle with well-feigned surprise. ‘Are you that man?’
‘I am, sire,’ I answered.
‘Then you must be mad!’ he retorted, appealing to those behind him. ‘Stark, staring mad to show your face here! ‘VENTRE SAINT GRIS! Are we to have all the ravishers and plunderers in the country come to us?’
‘I am neither the one nor the other!’ I answered, looking with indignation from him to the gaping train behind him.
‘That you will have to settle with M. de Turenne!’ he retorted, frowning down at me with his whole face turned gloomy and fierce. ‘I know you well, sir, now. Complaint has been made that you abducted a lady from his Castle of Chize some time back.’
‘The lady, sire, is now in charge of the Princess of Navarre.’
‘She is?’ he exclaimed, quite taken aback.
‘And if she has aught of complaint against me,’ I continued with pride,’ I will submit to whatever punishment you order or M. de Turenne demands. But if she has no complaint to make, and vows that she accompanied me of her own free-will and accord, and has suffered neither wrong nor displeasure at my hands, then, sire, I claim that this is a private matter between myself and M. de Turenne.’
‘Even so I think you will have your hands full,’ he answered grimly. At the same time he stopped by a gesture those who would have cried out upon me, and looked at me himself with an altered countenance. ‘Do I understand that you assert that the lady went of her own accord?’ he asked.
‘She went and has returned, sire,’ I answered.
‘Strange!’ he ejaculated. ‘Have you married her?’
‘No, sire,’ I answered. ‘I desire leave to do so.’
‘Mon dieu! she is M. de Turenne’s ward,’ he rejoined, almost dumbfounded by my audacity.
‘I do not despair of obtaining his assent, sire,’ I said patiently.
‘SAINT GRIS! the man is mad!’ he cried, wheeling his horse and facing his train with a gesture of the utmost wonder. ‘It is the strangest story I ever heard.’
‘But somewhat more to the gentleman’s credit than the lady’s!’ one said with a smirk and a smile.
‘A lie!’ I cried, springing forward on the instant with a boldness which astonished myself. ‘She is as pure as your Highness’s sister! I swear it. That man lies in his teeth, and I will maintain it.’
‘Sir!’ the King of Navarre cried, turning on me with the utmost sternness, ‘you forget yourself in my presence! Silence, and beware another time how you let your tongue run on those above you. You have enough trouble, let me tell you, on your hands already.’
‘Yet the man lies!’ I answered doggedly, remembering Crillon and his ways. ‘And if he will do me the honour of stepping aside with me, I will convince him of it!’
‘VENTRE SAINT GRIS!’ Henry replied, frowning, and dwelling on each syllable of his favourite oath. ‘Will you be silent, sir, and let me think? Or must I order your instant arrest?’
‘Surely that at least, sire,’ a suave voice interjected. And with that a gentleman pressed forward from the rest, and gaining a place, of ‘vantage by the King’s side, shot at me a look of extreme malevolence. ‘My lord of Turenne will expect no less at your Highness’s hands,’ he continued warmly. ‘I beg you will give the order on the spot, and hold this person to answer for his misdeeds. M. de Turenne returns to-day. He should be here now. I say again, sire, he will expect no less than this.’
The king, gazing at me with gloomy eyes, tugged at his moustaches. Someone had motioned the common herd to stand back out of hearing; at the same time the suite had moved up out of curiosity and formed a half-circle; in the midst of which I stood fronting the king, who had La Noue and the last speaker on either hand. Perplexity and annoyance struggled for the mastery in his face as he looked darkly down at me, his teeth showing through his beard. Profoundly angered by my appearance, which he had taken at first to be the prelude to disclosures which must detach Turenne at a time when union was all-important, he had now ceased to fear for himself; and perhaps saw something in the attitude I adopted which appealed to his nature and sympathies.
‘If the girl is really back,’ he said at last, ‘M. d’Aremburg, I do-not see any reason why I should interfere. At present, at any rate.’
‘I think, sire, M. de Turenne will see reason,’ the gentleman answered drily.
The king coloured. ‘M. de Turenne,’ he began—
‘Has made many sacrifices at your request, sire,’ the other said with meaning. ‘And buried some wrongs, or fancied wrongs, in connection with this very matter. This person has outraged him in the grossest manner, and in M. le Vicomte’s name I ask, nay I press upon you, that he be instantly arrested, and held to answer for it.’
‘I am ready to answer for it now!’ I retorted, looking from face to face for sympathy, and finding none save in M. de la Noue’s, who appeared to regard me with grave approbation. ‘To the Vicomte de Turenne, or the person he may appoint to represent him.’
‘Enough!’ Henry said, raising his hand and speaking in the tone of authority he knew so well how to adopt. ‘For you, M. d’Aremburg, I thank you. Turenne is happy in his friend. But; this gentleman came to me of his own free will and I do not think it consistent with my honour to detain him without warning given. I grant him an hour to remove himself from my neighbourhood. If he be found after that time has elapsed,’ he continued solemnly, ‘his fate be on his own head. Gentlemen, we are late already. Let us on.’
I looked at him as he pronounced this sentence, and strove to find words in which to make a final appeal to him. But no words came; and when he bade me stand aside, I did so mechanically, remaining with my head bared to the sunshine while the troop rode by. Some looked back at me with curiosity, as at a man of whom they had heard a tale, and some with a jeer on their lips; a few with dark looks of menace. When they were all gone, and the servants who followed them had disappeared also, and I was left to the inquisitive glances of the rabble who stood gaping after the sight, I turned and went to the Cid, and loosed the horse with a feeling of bitter disappointment.
The plan which mademoiselle had proposed and I had adopted in the forest by St. Gaultier—when it seemed to us that our long absence and the great events of which we heard must have changed the world and opened a path for our return—had failed utterly. Things were as they had been; the strong were still strong, and friendship under bond to fear. Plainly we should have shewn ourselves wiser had we taken the lowlier course, and, obeying the warnings given us, waited the King of Navarre’s pleasure or the tardy recollection of Rosny. I had not then stood, as I now stood, in instant jeopardy, nor felt the keen pangs of a separation which bade fair to be lasting. She was safe, and that was much; but I, after long service and brief happiness, must go out again alone, with only memories to comfort me.
It was Simon Fleix’s voice which awakened me from this unworthy lethargy—as selfish as it was useless—and, recalling me to myself, reminded me that precious time was passing while I stood inactive. To get at me he had forced his way through the curious crowd, and his face was flushed. He plucked me by the sleeve, regarding the varlets round him with a mixture of anger and fear.
‘Nom de Dieu! do they take you for a rope-dancer?’ he muttered in my ear. ‘Mount, sir, and come. There is not a moment to be lost.’
‘You left her at Madame Catherine’s?’ I said.
‘To be sure,’ he answered impatiently. ‘Trouble not about her. Save yourself, M. de Marsac. That is the thing to be done now.’
I mounted mechanically, and felt my courage return as the horse moved under me. I trotted through the crowd, and without thought took the road by which we had come. When we had ridden a hundred yards, however, I pulled up ‘An hour is a short start,’ I said sullenly. ‘Whither?’
‘To St. Cloud,’ he answered promptly. ‘The protection of the King of France may avail for a day or two. After that, there will still be the League, if Paris have not fallen.’
I saw there was nothing else for it, and assented, and we set off. The distance which separates Meudon from St. Cloud we might have ridden under the hour, but the direct road runs across the Scholars’ Meadow, a wide plain north of Meudon. This lay exposed to the enemy’s fire, and was, besides, the scene of hourly conflicts between the horse of both parties, so that to cross it without an adequate force was impossible. Driven to make a circuit, we took longer to reach our destination, yet did so without mishap; finding the little town, when we came in sight of it, given up to all the bustle and commotion which properly belong to the Court and camp.
It was, indeed, as full as it could be, for the surrender of Paris being momentarily expected, St. Cloud had become the rendezvous as well of the few who had long followed a principle as of the many who wait upon success. The streets, crowded in, every part, shone with glancing colours, with steel and velvet, the garb of fashion and the plumes of war. Long lines of flags obscured the eaves and broke the sunshine, while, above all, the bells of half a dozen churches rang merry answer to the distant crash of guns. Everywhere on flag and arch and streamer I read the motto, ‘Vive le Roi!’—words written, God knew then, and we know now, in what a mockery of doom!
We had made our way slowly and with much jostling as far as the principal street, finding the press increase as we advanced, when I heard, as I turned a corner, my name called, and, looking up, saw at a window the face of which I was in search. After that half a minute sufficed to bring M. d’Agen flying to my side, when nothing, as I had expected, would do but I must dismount where I was and share his lodging. He made no secret of his joy and surprise at sight of me, but pausing only to tell Simon where the stable was, haled me through the crowd and up his stairs with a fervour and heartiness which brought the tears to my eyes, and served to impress the company whom I found above with a more than sufficient sense of my importance.
Seeing him again in the highest feather and in the full employment of all those little arts and graces which served as a foil to his real worth, I took it as a great honour that he laid them aside for the nonce; and introduced me to the seat of honour and made me known to his companions with a boyish directness and a simple thought for my comfort which infinitely pleased me. He bade his landlord, without a moment’s delay, bring wine and meat and everything which could refresh a traveller, and was himself up and down a hundred times in a minute, calling to his servants for this or that, or railing at them for their failure to bring me a score of things I did not need. I hastened to make my excuses to the company for interrupting them in the midst of their talk; and these they were kind enough to accept in good part. At the same time, reading clearly in M. d’Agen’s excited face and shining eyes that he longed to be alone with me, they took the hint, and presently left us together.
‘Well,’ he said, coming back from the door, to which he had conducted them, ‘what have you to tell me, my friend? She is not with you?’
‘She is with Mademoiselle de la Vire at Meudon,’ I answered, smiling. ‘And for the rest, she is well and in better spirits.’
‘She sent me some message? he asked.
I shook my head. ‘She did not know I should see you,’ I answered.
‘But she—she has spoken of me lately?’ he continued, his face falling.
‘I do not think she has named your name for a fortnight,’ I answered, laughing. ‘There’s for you! Why, man,’ I continued, adopting a different tone, and laying my hand on his shoulder in a manner which reassured him at least; as much as my words, ‘are you so young a lover as to be ignorant that a woman says least of that of which she thinks most? Pluck up, courage! Unless I am mistaken, you have little to be afraid of except the past. Only have patience.’
‘You think so?’ he said gratefully.
I assured him that I had no doubt of it; and on that he fell into a reverie, and I to watching him. Alas for the littleness of our natures! He had received me with open arms, yet at sight of the happiness which took possession of his handsome face I gave way to the pettiest feeling which can harbour in a man’s breast. I looked at him with eyes of envy, bitterly comparing my lot with that which fate had reserved for him. He had fortune, good looks, and success on his side, great relations, and high hopes; I stood in instant jeopardy, my future dark, and every path which presented itself so hazardous that I knew not which to adopt. He was young, and I past my prime; he in favour, and I a fugitive.
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 en fin, 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.