'And let me the canakin clink, clink!A soldier's a man;A life's but a span;Why, then, let a soldier drink!'
I hummed the song of the subtle Iago in the Moor of Venice, and, like him, adding—
'Some wine, ho!' stepped towards the tree under which the Marquis and his two followers were regaling. The latter stared at me with the usual insolence of liveried valets, until their master raised his hat, exclaiming—
'Pardieu! who do I see? M. Blane of the King's Guards—M. Blane here, and dressed as an abbé!'
'Yes, Marquis—but so dressed, for a time only.'
'A strange garb for the king's most faithful soldier—and his rival too, at times, if all tales be true.'
'Marquis, permit me to observe that your remarks are very unwise.'
'Letters from Paris could tell us nothing about you—you were keeping your whereabouts so very quiet, that it was rumoured in the Garde du Corps Ecossais, you were about to become ridiculous.'
'Marquis!'
'By marrying and becoming quite a respectable person.'
'A false rumour, on my honour!' said I, reddening as I remembered the conversation in the forest last night; 'but what have you to tell me of the Garde du Corps, Marquis? Who are dead and who alive now?'
'Faith I can scarcely tell you; but I do not think the cuirassiers muster above seventy-five now. They have been carrying themselves with glory, these lords of the creation, and playing the devil in Alsace and on the Rhine. You delivered my letters to Marion de l'Orme?'
'Yes.'
'And how was the little one looking?'
'Divine as usual.'
'Bon! did you see anything of Madame la Duchesse de Charost?'
'The beautiful divorced—no.'
'Yet you were all winter in Paris!'
'I was studying, my dear friend.'
'Studying—you?'
'Studying practically the interior economy of your French prisons.'
'Tête Dieu! I don't understand you—but your life in Paris seems to have been very circumscribed.'
'Because it was confined to an upper chamber of the Bastille.'
'The Bastille—diable!'
'I expected that exclamation; the prince of darkness being the potentate usually applied to by such wild gallants as you.'
'But let me hear all about this; for even at this distance from Paris, the Bastille has a very alarming sound.'
I told him my story, at least so much of it as I deemed prudent to reveal; and contrived to lay all the blame of my captivity to the score of De Brissac's jealousy.
'So when you reach Paris, M. le Marquis,' said I, in conclusion, 'do me the favour to rip up a little of M. de Brissac's skin. I owe him a peculiar grudge for the part he played in my affair, and especially for his manner of playing it. Do this for me; I shall follow suit if he escapes you, and if I live to see the old towers of Notre Dame again. I had no time to give him an airing on the Boulevards, or at Montmartre, before leaving Paris, being ordered off on such short notice—moreover, he never leaves the side of Marion de l'Orme.'
'Mort de ma vie! then I am wholly at your service,' said the Marquis, whose eyes sparkled with anger at this information.
'Believe me, I shall be ready to do so much for you again.'
'I always deemed De Brissac to be an unsophisticated country Benedick, who luxuriated at his petit château near Versailles, and was actually in love with his own wife. So, so—he has been at the Rue de St. Jacques. Peste! I shall give him a wholesome horror of that locality after I reach Paris.'
On this matter these sparks really fought near the ferry of the Nesle. De Brissac afterwards became involved in the plots formed by the King's dissolute and libertine favourite, Henri de Cinq-Mars against Richelieu in 1642; but the Cardinal played his cards with his usual skill and subtlety, for Cinq-Mars perished on the scaffold at Lyons, and De Brissac was broken on the wheel in the Place de la Grève at Paris. But I am anticipating.
'This is the finest wine I have tasted since I crossed the Rhine,' said the Marquis, setting down his cup and gathering up his reins; 'ere long I shall be in my native province of Champagne, and then I shall have such wine as hath never been pressed in Germany since Father Noah planted the grape and conferred on mankind the benefit of getting drunk. And now farewell; I am bound to Paris, with despatches from the Marechal-Duke, my father. In a week I shall have kissed Marion, thrown myself at the feet of Charost, run De Brissac through the body, danced with the girls at the Hotel d'Argent, and given a benefit to those at the Hotel de Bourgogne. I shall have coquetted with all the fleuristes on Pont aux Colombes; got drunk at the Fleur-de-lis; rattled the bones of Beelzebub in a dice-box with Ferte Imbault, and Heaven knows all what more. 'Tis said this war will soon be over, for Richelieu has discovered and sent to the Bastille, Mademoiselle de Lorraine, whom he will probably marry perforce to some French peer. Thus Louis XIII. will easily bring the Duke her father to terms, it is thought. But, apropos, before we part, let me warn you to beware how you venture near Nanci.'
I had been glancing anxiously from time to time at the porch of the Benedictine church, in expectation of seeing my devotee appear; and I had soon tired of the harebrained young Marquis, whose light conversation savoured so much of Paris and the old style of the French camp. It bored and disgusted me after the pleasant days I had spent in the pure and virtuous society of Nicola; but now his warning interested me.
'I am to avoid Nanci, you say—why, Marquis?'
'It is full of the enemy.'
'This is indeed unfortunate for me.'
'Rather, as it lies in your front. While my valiant papa, the Marechal-Duke, was occupying himself near Strasburg, Charles IV., with his son, the Prince of Vaudemont, and that young fire-eater, Wolfgang Count Pappenheim, with four thousand chosen troops, crossed the Rhine by a bridge of boats, and reaching the old capital of Lorraine by a forced march, are now actually holding high festival in the ancient palace of the duchy.'
'Parbleu! I must be careful—being under orders, or promise rather, to see a lady to the gates of Nanci.'
'A lady?'
'Yes.'
'From whence?'
'Paris.'
'Peste! is she pretty?'
'I cannot say—she is an ecclesiastic.'
'Nom d'un Pape! and do you think to make me believe that you have travelled all the way from Paris with a pretty woman, without seeing so much as her face? Very likely, M. le Garde Ecossais!'
At that moment, Nicola in her sombre garb appeared at the huge Gothic porch of St. Bennet, where she looked around her irresolutely.
'Oho, M. l'Abbé,' said the reckless Marquis, 'there is your little penitent awaiting you. Pleasant this! by my faith, I shall doff the corslet, and don the cassock too—but a safe journey to you—au revoir!'
'Adieu!'
I raised my hat, and, followed by his two attendants, the Marquis galloped gaily down the road which led towards the forest wherein Nicola and I had passed the night.
On joining her, she greeted me with what was almost a caress; and whether it was the effect of her devotion I know not, but now she seemed placid, content, and even cheerful—yet my heart was still wrung.
'To-morrow we will be at Nanci; and on the morrow after we will be parted, Nicola, parted to meet no more,' said I, lifting her into her saddle.
'My dear, dear Arthur,' said she, bending her face close to mine; 'your accent and expression tear my heart with sorrow—you doubt me—oh! what shall I say, to convince, and to reassure you?'
'Why should all this be, Nicola; listen to me. Here are a church and a priest,' (Father Colville was at that moment waving to us an adieu from the porch,) 'why cannot we marry? Here is a ring too—it was my mother's, Nicola. 'Tis but a few words—"with this ring, I thee wed—this gold and silver I give thee—and with all my worldly goods, I thee endow," and then heaven alone could separate us.'
'Poor Arthur! your gold and silver, as yet, the pay of a Scottish cuirassier; your worldly goods in France, the dust of a day's march. Yet would I wed you,' she added, while her tears fell fast and hot; 'but I have others than myself, to consult, others who would rather see me in my grave than the wife of soldier of fortune. Our ranks are unequal; and I—with all your present love—would wed but future misery.'
'Oh! Nicola, and have you no trust in me? What mean you by present love, and future misery?'
'Would you rejoin the proud, fiery, and haughty Garde de Corps Ecossais, with a French soubrette as your bride?'
'No—we would quit France.'
'Does not this admission show there is a shame to shun?'
'A shame, Nicola!' I stammered.
'Yes—and what of the Countess's promises to you—are they as yet fulfilled?'
'Alas! no.'
'And your despatches for M. le Chevalier Hepburn; are they as yet delivered?'
'True—true; but the dread of losing you renders me desperate, and blind to everything.'
'Enough, dear Arthur—let us talk of this no more.'
'Yet, Nicola, for you I would risk any danger; for I love you, as I have never loved any woman, since I buried my poor mother, who sleeps far away from me, in the old churchyard at Glenkens.'
As if she dreaded her own resolution, Nicola whipped up her horse, and muffling her face, and, as I thought, her sobs, in her hood, rode on. I followed, and thus we sorrowfully left the gates and ramparts of St. Michel behind us. I informed her of the risk we ran—I at least—as Nanci was full of the troops of Duke Charles, and of Wolfgang Pappenheim, his intended son-in-law.
She expressed joy to hear that the brave old Duke was in possession of his hereditary home, which, as she was a Lorrainer, was only natural and proper; but she shuddered at the name of young Pappenheim, who, to all his father's brilliant courage, united the cunning of the fox with the pitiless ferocity of the tiger.
As we proceeded, we hourly heard of the terrors and ravages committed by the Count de Bitche, colonel of the petardiers of Lorraine, a man steeped to the lips in crime and sin; and by Wolfgang and his imperial corps, a Croatian regiment, upon those Lorrainers who had made terms with Cardinal de Lavalette, with Hepburn, or La Force; and more especially upon those who had supplied the troops of those leaders with forage, food, or money. Some were broken alive on the wheel, others shot or hung, according to the whim of their captors; and rumour affirmed that the young Prince of Vaudemont went hand in hand with his future brother-in-law in the committal of these atrocities, especially in Alsace, the duke of which was a mere child of nine or ten years old. From her recent residence in Paris, Nicola believed that she had everything to fear from the terrible Croats, and grew paler than a lily, when, near Commercy, a town on the left bank of the Meuse, we passed a row of men hanging by the neck upon trees by the wayside, with their visages black, swollen, and frightful, exposed to our gaze, and to the ravages of a flight of bloated ravens that were wheeling round them.
At Commercy, which is celebrated only for the manufacture of those little cakes called Madeleines, we saw the noble château of the Princes of Vaudemont, an open, black, and roofless ruin, just as it had been left by Lieutenant Frank Ruthven, of Ramsay's musketeers, who had crossed the Meuse one dark night at the head of eighty Scots, stormed the gates, and burned the seat of the heirs-apparent of Lorraine.*
* It is now a French cavalry barrack.
A night in the forest, exposed to the inclemency of such a storm, had not improved the condition of our horses, worn as they were by so long a journey; and Dagobert, whose old military hardihood a winter passed in the snug stables of the Château d'Amboise had considerably impaired, was especially cut up: thus, after a slow and tedious ride of some miles, I found it necessary that we should halt at a little wayside auberge, about a league beyond Commercy. The host, though reluctant at first to admit any stranger, so great was the terror inspired by Pappenheim's Croats, and the Duke's Imperialists, was ready enough to afford us quarters on perceiving our ecclesiastical garb, in his simplicity believing that, in case of foragers or plunderers coming that way, we might give a little protection to his household—a vain hope indeed.
Nicola was so sad, weary, and reflective, that I did not again renew the ever-present subject of my thoughts and of the past day's conversation, but I kissed her tenderly at the door of her apartment, and bade her adieu for the night, adding that I would summon her betimes on the morrow, which would be the last day of our journey together.
Alas! I knew not that it was the last time I should ever see her again—as my beloved Nicola at least.
Over a stoup of wine, I sat moodily in the recess of a window of the little auberge, recharging my pistols to keep them in service order; and then I watched the setting sun, as he sank in all his summer splendour, and cast long golden gleams across the wooded dell, through which flowed the waters of the Meuse, when the report of shots close by gave me analerte, and inspired me with an irresistible and unwise desire to discover the reason thereof. I ordered out my horse, thrust the pistols into my girdle, and mounting, rode leisurely along the highway for half a-mile or so, until I saw the cause of the alarm. A few troopers were galloping over an eminence, bearing each a couple of sheep across his saddle, while a cloud of smoke, streaked with flame, arose from the crumbling walls of a farmhouse, which in mere wantonness they had set on fire.
'If 'tis thus Duke Charles celebrates his temporary return to Lorraine,' thought I, 'his people had better bend their necks to Richelieu and King Louis.'
Turning my horse's head, I rode leisurely back at the same pace towards the auberge, till at a turn of the road, which was bordered by high green hedges, I came abruptly upon two cavaliers, mounted, and armed with sword and pistol. As the path was narrow, we simultaneously saluted each other, and drew up to reconnoitre; for the time, place, and politics, made us alike wary and suspicious.
'Sabre de Bois!' exclaimed a familiar voice, using that exclamation which in France is old as the Crusades, and means a cross or sword of wood; 'I think I should know that face and figure. Oho, M. Blane! we have changed guises since we met last year at Sezanne. 'Tis thou art now the abbé and I the layman. By St. Nicolas of Lorraine, but this is very droll!'
The speaker was the Prince of Vaudemout, and I heard him with mingled anger and irresolution.
'Shall I recal the advice, the threat you made me, on that day at the hotel in Sezanne?'
'You may, M. le Prince; but what was it?'
'Simply this: Retire; leave our vicinity; this espionage is not honourable, and you test me too far. Those words were well calculated to rankle in a heart so proud as mine. Do you remember them?'
'I do.'
'And then you threatened to denounce me and poor Raoul d'Ische, whose soul, I hope, has long since gone to glory. Why should I not denounce you, and deliver you to the nearest provost-marshal?'
'For two sufficient reasons, Monseigneur le Prince.'
'Name them.'
'First, you are too accomplished and brave a soldier to do an act of wanton cruelty; and I am, also, I hope, too accomplished and skilful a swordsman to let any two men in the army of the Empire deprive me of this weapon, which is now my sole inheritance.'
'Milles demons! thou art a gallant fellow, and I love this spirit well; but nevertheless I must have you; so we will fight it out fairly on the sward here, and my aide-de-camp, the Count de Bitche, will be our umpire.'
'With pleasure,' growled the Count, through his enormous moustaches.
'Agreed,' said I, bowing to that ruffianly noble, whom I had given such good cause to remember our meeting in the cavalry charge at Bitche; and his sinister eyes, as they gave me a fierce glance of recognition, flashed like a sword-blade when it is suddenly drawn from the scabbard. 'My life has been risked and jeoparded so often, that when night sets in, I feel at times astonished to find myself still in the land of the living. But, prince, lest I should fall in this encounter, give me your word of honour,' said I, sadly and impressively, 'that you will fulfil my last injunctions.'
'My dear fellow, I have not the least desire to kill you. Mordieu! not I; but I must disarm and take you prisoner.'
'Not if I can prevent you; but should aught fatal to me occur, will you, as a gentleman, promise to conduct safely and honourably to the gates of Nanci a young girl of Lorraine, whom I have brought with me from Paris, and who is now——'
'Where?'
'At a little auberge in yonder hollow near the Meuse.'
'Where three willow trees overshadow the water?'
'Yes.'
'On my honour as a gentleman I will do this, faithfully and truly.'
'Prince, I thank and believe in you.'
The Count de Bitche, a fierce-looking fellow, with a dark and sinister expression, uttered a most unpleasant laugh; upon which I gave him a scornful glance of defiance, and bit my glove. We had now reached a smooth piece of sward, a little way aside from the high road; a grove of chestnut trees grew half round it; the evening light was clear; in the distance lay Commercy, with its spires standing in dark outline against the blood red disc of the setting sun. We all dismounted, and gave our bridles to the Count de Bitche, who linked them to his own. We then threw our hats, cloaks, and gloves, on the ground; buttoned up our pourpoints to the throat, drew our rapiers, and stood on guard, De Bitche keeping near the Prince to prompt and give him hints: thus he was doubly armed against me; but my heart was too full of hope and pride to find space for fear.
I prayed for victory only that I might return to Nicola, who knew so little of the danger I encountered, and whose dear, modest face and loving eyes I might never see again.
Our swords met, clashed, and for a moment were engaged to the very shell; then we withdrew, watching each other warily, blade pressed heavily against blade. The Prince, a skilful swordsman, made a feint on one side, and then a lunge on the other, by which he ripped up an inch or two of my sword-arm. Now, as my skin is a ware upon which I set some value, I became filled with sudden fury, and pressed him with such vigour, that he was driven back, fighting hard, almost to the chestnut trees.
'At him with your rapiera la stoccata!' said De Bitche, who had drawn his dagger, an unwarrantable proceeding, and his voice grew husky as he spoke, 'Ill betide you, Prince! be wary, or he will nail you to a chestnut tree.'
'Silence, Count!' I exclaimed, 'or, by Heaven, I will nail you first!'
He slunk back to where the horses stood, and in an instant after I heard a snort, almost a cry, from one of them, and casting a glance that way, saw Dagobert plunging fearfully. This unusual circumstance so fully arrested my attention, that I narrowly escaped being run through the lungs; but recovering my guard, before the Count could withdraw his useless thrust, I grasped his rapier by the cross, wrested it away, and for a moment menaced his throat with my point; then I stepped back breathless with excitement and fatigue.
The pale face of Vaudemont flushed crimson with shame and vexation. He uttered a fierce oath.
'Conquered again, and by you too—this is too much! I shall never again be able to hold up my head.'
'Nay, monsieur,' said I, bowing low, and presenting to him his sword-hilt; 'let us be friends from this time forward; and be it understood, that on whatever field we meet again, you and I, at least, engage no more.'
'So be it, M. Blane,' said he, grasping my hand with the sudden cordiality of a generous heart; 'we part friends; and in this half-hour's encounter, you have taught me some tricks in fencing which I shall not soon forget. Adieu—return to your pretty one at the auberge, and conduct her, yourself, to the gate of Nanci; but promise me, that you do not enter; for if taken prisoner there, even I may fail to protect you, as in Nanci, at least, the Duke my father reigns supreme.'
He saluted me; leaped on his horse, and, followed by his amiable aide-de-camp, the Count de Bitche, who gave me a peculiar and malevolent smile, galloped away.
'Dagobert, you devil of a nag,' said I, stroking his fine head; 'you nearly caused a kind master to lose his life, by making such an uproar.'
Gathering the reins I prepared to mount, when suddenly the animal snorted again, and swerving round in an unusual manner, nearly fell upon his haunches. Blood on the grass now attracted my attention; and, to my astonishment, I found that the poor animal was wounded in the off hind-leg, and by a slash from a sharp instrument, was irretrievably hamstrung!
I remembered the malevolent expression that lighted the eyes of the wicked Count de Bitche; and that I had seen him near my horse with his dagger drawn; I remembered also, the wild snort and plunge, given at that moment by the animal, a movement which, by startling me, so nearly caused me to lose my self-possession and life together; and my heart filled with anger and compassion, at the cruelty of this barbarous Imperialist; for the noble horse was destroyed by a mutilation, beyond the skill of farriery to cure; and as I wiped, with my handkerchief, the moisture caused by agony in the fine eyes of my beautiful Spanish barb, I felt a tear start to my own; for I knew that now poor Dagobert must die. I thought of my pistols to end his misery—
'No, no, Dagobert—another must do this sad office for you. My old nag, you and I have been too often under fire together—we have too often shared the same meal, the same biscuit, and the same bed of straw, for you to die by my hand. Another shall do this, and place the greenest sods above you too.'
And thinking thus, I led him slowly, halting and with difficulty, along the road, which he marked with blood, towards the little inn that lay in the valley of the Meuse, intending to have him shot and buried there by the aubergiste, to whom I would give my saddle and holsters for his trouble.
Thus I lost a charger, the gift of Clara d'Amboise, and worth at least six hundred crowns of the sun.
On the morrow I meant to conduct Nicola to Nanci; and there, in my own name and character, to enclose to the Duke of Lorraine, a solemn challenge to the cruel and infamous Count de Bitche. Full of these fiery thoughts, and pausing at every two or three paces, for my poor horse moaned in its agony, I proceeded slowly along the narrow path between the hedgerows, and under chestnut-trees in full foliage, towards the auberge; and as I went, the darkness grew deeper, for the sun had long since set. The stars studded the sky; and between its wooded banks, the Meuse gleamed like a silver current, as the round white summer moon rose above the hills.
At the door of the wayside inn (a grotesque-looking house of carved wood, with its upper windows opening from a steep roof, which was buried under a load of woodbine, honeysuckle, hops, and ivy) I was met by the old aubergiste, with fear and wonder expressed in every feature of his otherwise rather stolid visage.
'Oh Monsieur l'Abbé! Monsieur l'Abbé!' he exclaimed; 'and so you are not killed after all!'
'Killed—no.'
'Nor even wounded?'
'No; but why do you ask?'
'Because—but where is mademoiselle, your sister—that dear, pious daughter of Vincent de Paule?'
'Asleep, in her chamber, I presume; but what mean you by all these questions?' I demanded, while a vague emotion of alarm agitated me.
'Mademoiselle, about half-an-hour ago, was told that you had been attacked on the road, and left dangerously wounded; that you were dying, in fact, and had sent for her; so she instantly went with them, in search of you.'
'Withthem!—with whom, fellow?—and who told her all this?'
'M. le Comte de Bitche, who came hither hurriedly and clamorously inquiring for the young girl of Nanci, whom an abbé had brought from Paris. He gave her these dreadful tidings, and sadly terrified and grieved the poor little thing became; but she threw on her hood, and hastened to you.'
'Accompanied by whom?—speak fellow, speak!'
'M. le Comte, and two other gentlemen of Monseigneur de Vaudemont's suite.'
'Eternal infamy! it has all been a decoy—a snare! Oh, Nicola, Nicola! what insanity prompted me to leave you, even for a moment? Was the Prince with them?'
'No monsieur, no,' replied the aubergiste, trembling.
'Which way did they take her?—towards Commercy?'
'No; towards Nanci.'
I was about to spring on poor Dagobert, but remembered his mutilation, and perceived at once the whole details of the trick which had been played me by the Count de Bitche, on hearing my request concerning the safety of Nicola—a request made so solemnly to Vaudemont before we fought. And so she had been carried away by this brutal and unscrupulous noble, whose forcible abduction of the beautiful Countess of Lutzelstein was so notorious throughout all Germany and France; a crime which was followed by another more terrible; for the corpse of that unfortunate lady, who had been savagely strangled, was left ignominiously stripped in the woods near his castle in Lorraine; and in her hands was found a portion of a velvet pourpoint, which she had clutched in her dying struggles, and which, by its remarkable lacing, was known to have been worn by the Count.
And Nicola was in his power!
'The Count is a sorcerer, Monsieur l'Abbé,' said the aubergiste, imploringly; 'so beware what you do. He is said to attend the sabbat in the forest of St. Michel; he anoints himself with the fat of unbaptized children; he dries up the milk of poor men's cattle, and turns the gold of the rich into birchen chips; and he has an ointment which he puts on his eyes, to enable him to see where treasure is hidden. It was thus he found the gold which Charles VII. buried in his old Rendezvous de Chasse, in the forest of Loches, where it was guarded by a dragon. Beware, M. l'Abbé, beware! or at least do not name me; for I am a poor man, whom he would think no more of hanging than he would of drinking a cup of wine.'
Heedless of all these warnings, on foot I rushed along the road, with my sword drawn; but night had now closed in, and objects had become vague and indistinct. I placed an ear on the ground to listen, but heard only the throbbing of my heart; my whole brain seemed to have become one huge pulse. Nicola, whom I might never see again, seemed before me, with all her thousand winning ways, her beauty and her gentleness, her modesty and timidity—Nicola subjected to the rude advances of this brutal and licentious lord!
My heart grew sick!
It was too much to think of—too exasperating a subject for contemplation; and half-blind with rage and grief. I rushed along the Nanci road, which stretched far away before me, lonely and silent in the light of the rising moon.
Thus Nicola was lost or taken from me; and all the injunctions from the Countess, and my responsive promises, came back to my memory with a glow of shame and mortification, for, by my own neglect, I felt that I had forfeited my honour, and would be disgraced in the estimation of them both for ever. But these reflections were altogether secondary to the horror I experienced at the idea of her being subjected to captivity by such a man as Rudolf de Bitche; and now, when I had lost her, oh! how paltry did all my vile conventional scruples about her humble birth and position seem to me! Poor, beloved girl!
And now the song of Bernard de Ventadour, the sweet minstrel who followed Elinor of Guienne, occurred to me:—
'I thought my heart had known the wholeOf love; but small its knowledge proved;For still the more my longing soulLoves on, itself the while unloved.She stole my heart, myself she stole,And all I prized from me removed;She left me but the fierce controlOf vain desires for her I loved!'
How lonely, voiceless, and silent seemed that moonlit landscape to me then!
Nicola was indeed gone!
* * * * * *
In my cloak-bag at the auberge I had left the king's dispatches, addressed to Sir John Hepburn and to the Duc de Lavalette, together with the case containing the baton of a marechal of France, destined for the former; but I forgot everything, save the desperate hope of rescuing Nicola and of tracking her betrayers.
I made a hundred vows of vengeance on De Bitche, whom I was one moment resolved to challenge to a solemn duel; and at another, to pistol without ceremony when or wherever I met him.
A group of dark figures on the roadway now appeared about half-a-mile before me; and the gleam of steel informed me that they were armed. I hastened forward full of new hope and a fierce joy. Some of those persons were on foot, and others on horseback; their number seemed to be about twenty, and they marched in military order. As I gained on them, they halted; and then I perceived that two of the horsemen returned to reconnoitre. On drawing nearer, I could reckon ten mounted troopers, and ten musketeers on foot; but there was not a female with them.
'Stand, monsieur!' cried one, in French, but with a guttural accent; 'was it you who hallooed?'
'Yes, my friend,' said I, breathlessly.
'For what purpose, fellow?'
I paused.
'Answer—I am General Goltz, of the Imperial army.'
'To stop you.'
'To stop us?' reiterated another, haughtily; 'here is an enterprising Gascon for you, gentlemen!'
'A Scot, as you may find to your cost, sirs,' said I, menacing them with my drawn sword. 'Is the Count de Bitche among you?'
'No,' replied one, laughing; 'the Count has more pleasant matters in hand than accompanying us. But what seek you here?'
'A companion I have lost—a young lady attired in a religious habit—'
This was received by a hoarse shout of guttural German merriment; for most of the personages among whom I had so suddenly fallen were Imperialists belonging to the garrisons of Toul or Nanci.
'There is a convent of pretty Bernardine nuns at Commercy,' said General Goltz, turning his horse round; 'apply there, my friend.
''Tis a chevalier in the guise of an abbé!' said one.
'The devil lurking behind the cross!' added another.
'A spy of Louis XIII.—a mouchard! a mouchard!' cried the Lorraine musketeers, surrounding me. 'Hola, M. le General—M. le Provost Marechal—a rope, a rope! To the next tree with him! a rope for the mouchard!'
This epithet for a spy or eavesdropper was peculiarly offensive then in France, being derived from the spies of M. de Mouchy, the Inquisitor-General under Francis II., and it inspired me with new anger.
'Who commands here?' I demanded, proudly, thrusting back the most forward with the hilt and edge of my sword.
'I command—I, Wolfgang Count Pappenheim,' replied a lofty and stern-looking cavalier, who was sheathed in burnished steel from neck to knees, and who wore a broad hat with a tall feather, and had long moustaches pointed straight out in a line with his ears.
'Hear me, Count,' said I, glad in this desperate extremity to avail myself of a little subterfuge; 'you dare not kill one who wears this dress.'
'Bah,' said he, roughly; 'I have an indulgence from the Pope to kill whom I please; but surrender, or by the death of the devil, my fellows will make black puddings of thee!'
'My reputation, Count, is so well established both at Versailles and in the camp of Duke Charles IV., that I need not suffer myself to be needlessly hacked to pieces, rather than be taken; and so, monsieur, I am your prisoner.'
'Your name, abbé, if an abbé you are, indeed?'
'I am Arthur Blane, a gentleman of king Louis's Scottish Guard, and no abbé.'
'A cuirassier.'
'Yes, monsieur.'
''Tis he, Count, of whom poor Raoul d'Ische and the Prince de Vaudemont have spoken so often,' said General Goltz; 'parbleu! he is a brave fellow!'
'But must, nevertheless, swing, M. le General; he is a spy.'
'Count, it is false,' I exclaimed.
'Then what seek you here, so far from your head-quarters, and in this garb too?'
'A lady, M. le Comte, a lady who—'
'How—have you not ladies enough in the French camp?'
'She whom I seek is a lady of Lorraine, whom I had pledged my word of honour to conduct in safety from Paris to the gate of Nanci—being now en route to join the army of Hepburn and Lavalette.'
'And who is this demoiselle, and what are her name and rank, that she required a chevalier of the King's Scottish Guard to escort her from Paris through Champagne and Lorraine?'
Policy and emotions of a somewhat mingled nature made me pause: to mention the name and position of Nicola, as a soubrette of the King's mistress, would only have courted ridicule and mischief.
'Who is she, monsieur?' demanded the Count. 'I think at such a time as this, when rumour affirms that Mademoiselle de Lorraine has been taken at a sequestered château near Paris, and is now languishing in the Bastille, some wonderful interest must be attached to the woman you are in quest of?'
'M. le Comte, she is—'
'What—speak!'
'My sister.'
'A likely story! we never heard that any of our ladies at Nanci had brothers in the Garde du Corps Ecossais; but we shall inquire into all this, at least before we hang you; so give up your sword.'
'To whom?' said I.
'To me—it shall suffer no dishonour in my hands.'
''Tis well, Count; for that sword is the last inheritance of a race that never knew dishonour—until now.'
'Soldiers should never condescend to play the mouchard.'
'Silence, Count, and be generous if you can!' said I, choking with passion. 'If such were said of me after death, I would come back to resent it, though all hell should bar the way.'
Awed by my words, the superstitious German changed colour and turned from me.
'A file of musketeers,' said General Goltz; 'Sergeant Caspar Alsfeldt, guard the prisoner to Nanci, and shoot him if he attempts to escape.'
'I will inquire into all this to-morrow at the Duke's palace, where you will bring him before me,' said Pappenheim; 'farewell, M. le Prisonnier—may we part better friends to-morrow than we do to-night. Forward, gentlemen, for the hours grow apace.'
Pappenheim, with General Goltz and all the mounted men of his party trotted rapidly off; while I, bareheaded, disarmed, downcast and heartbroken, was marched on foot, guarded by ten musketeers of the regiment de Vaudemont, towards the capital of Lorraine.
To attempt escaping would only have insured to me a sudden and barbarous death; and when marched off I struck my hands wildly together, and could have wept, but for very grief and shame, as I thought of my own helplessness and inability to unravel the mystery that enveloped the future fate of my unfortunate but beloved Nicola.
My captor, Wolfgang Count Pappenheim, the intended son-in-law of Duke Charles, was the son and heir of the great Pappenheim of the German wars, he who had received no less than fourteen wounds at the battles of Leipzig and Prague, and was surnamedle Balafré, as he bore on his person exactly one hundred scars received in the field of honour.
Young Pappenheim had won himself a high reputation for bravery in those wars, especially by his defence of the castle of Wilsburg, a stronghold of the Margravine of Anspach, when it was assailed by the King of Sweden, who was anxious to secure it for the Protestants of the Franconian circle; but when summoned, Wolfgang replied—
'I will never surrender to a king of Sweden, but shall perish here, and the ruins of Wilsburg will be my monument.'
Gustavus believed him on his father's reputation, and consequently abandoned the siege. Thus I had 'the mortifying honour,' as Sergeant Alsfeldt told me, 'of having surrendered my sword to one of the finest soldiers in the army of the German emperor.'
In a state of anxiety that amounted almost to agony, I marched towards Nanci, along a road the darkness of which, as it was buried among coppice, was in unison with the gloom and loneliness that oppressed my heart. The cold white moon waned and went down beyond the level horizon. The country thereabout, though richly wooded, is flat and uninteresting, until the plain is bounded by the Vosges. The scenery grew dark, and the orangeries, vineyards, and coppice that bordered the way seemed black and sombre, as the stars, like diamonds in a dark-blue dome, twinkled in the early morning sky.
The yellow dawn began to gild its eastern quarter above the distant chain of the Vosges; green hill tops brightened in the rising tide of light, and the vanes of village spires and of old châteaux embosomed among oaks that were perhaps coeval with Lothario, king of Lorraine, glittered in the rosy beams. Squirrels and rabbits fled before us across the road from hedge to hedge; the larks began to sing joyously, as the brilliant morning came to gladden the hearts of all, apparently, but me; for I had but one thought—Nicola!
'Where was she, then? Where, how, and with whom had she passed the weary hours since our fatal separation?'
I dared not trust myself to think, as footsore, weary, damp with midnight dew, and covered with the dust of the summer roadway, I came in sight of the city of Nanci, which I now regarded with horror as the probable scene of a long and exasperating imprisonment, or (it might be) a cruel and ignominious death; for I was in the hands of soldiers who were without scruple, pity, or remorse—the fierce men of the long and barbarous thirty years' war.
Alsfeldt, the sergeant who had charge of me, proved, however, to be a kind and considerate fellow. Perceiving that I was without a covering for my head, he attempted to appropriate for my use the hat of the first man we met; a proceeding which I would by no means sanction. He was fond of extolling the bravery of his colonel, the Prince of Vaudemont, under whom he had served at the defence of Wilsburg, and in some of the more recent battles of the Empire. At a wayside beer-house I entertained him and the musketeers of my escort with cans of beer each; an act of attention which won me their entire good-will. The sergeant drank to my health and better fortune as he raised the huge wooden tankard to his lips and held it there, with the cheek-plates of his morion and his long, bushy moustaches dipping in the froth, till the contents were drained to the bottom. The soldiers all promised faithfully to prosecute every inquiry in the city and garrison concerning the lady I had lost at the auberge of the Three Willows; but they frankly told me that I had but a slender chance of seeing her again if she was actually lured away by the abductor of Laura of Lutzelstein.
The bells were being merrily rung as we entered Nanci, and we also heard heavy salvos of artillery thundered from the ramparts.
'What does all this mean?' I asked, 'Has a victory been won?'
'No, monsieur,' replied the sergeant; 'but Duke Charles and the Duke of Alsace pass in state through the streets to-day to high mass; and if you would wish to see them proceed from the palace to the church of St. Epurus, instead of marching you direct to where Count Pappenheim ordered me, I shall halt for a time in the great square to oblige you.'
'Thanks, sergeant,' said I; 'but as I neither wish to be stared at nor mocked by the rabble, I would rather proceed to prison at once.'
'Nay, monsieur, 'tis to the palace, and not to a prison I am to conduct you.'
Nanci, long celebrated as one of the most pleasant towns in Lorraine, stands in the midst of a beautiful plain on the left bank of the Meurthe, a river which rolls from the western flank of the Vosges, bearing rafts of timber and faggots on its foaming current to the lower country. Nanci is divided into two quarters: the old town of the eleventh century, and the new one of the fifteenth. The former, which is surrounded by walls, defended by towers, and enclosed by gates and ditches, contains, or contained in 1636, the ducal palace, the great square, which is planted with stately lime-trees, and the ancient parish church of St. Epurus. The streets through which I was conducted to this great square were old and quaint, crooked and narrow.
By a magnificent gate resembling a triumphal arch, but defended by cannon, and moreover decorated by green bays, garlands, and banners, we entered the city. Within were guards of citizens clad in fine velvet doublets, armed with sword, arquebuse, and partizan, wearing the Duke's colours in their scarfs and on their hats; while bodies of Lorraine troops and vassals, mingled with imperial pikemen, lancers, musketeers, and artillery, under the princes of Vaudemont and Lillebonne, filled all the thoroughfares. The Marquis de Marsal, the Counts of Rosiers and Luneville, with other military nobles of the two duchies, all clad in brilliant armour, with plumes in their helmets, gilded truncheons in their hands, and orders of chivalry sparkling on their breasts, rode through the streets, maintaining order among the vast concourse of citizens and peasantry who thronged them, to welcome and behold their gallant native prince—the hero of Prague—proceed from his ducal palace to the city church.
In the principal square and near the palace gate my escort halted and stood close around me. The sergeant placed his arm through mine for the double purpose of protecting me and precluding an escape; and there we stood unobserved among the masses of people who loaded the air of the clear, bright summer morning with clamorous shouts, while cheers, the tolling of bells, with the perpetual thunder of cannon and bombardes rang on every side.
Exactly at the hour of ten a commotion was visible at the palace; a thrill pervaded the dense multitude; all men present who were not soldiers uncovered their heads, and all grew silent for a moment; then there burst forth a hurrah of welcome as the procession issued from the bannered portal of the palace.
Duke Charles had been long absent from his native city, serving under his patron and protector the Emperor; and now, to celebrate his sudden return, all the loyalty of his people had flashed up, as if to gild with a farewell splendour the expiring glory of his house, and power—for the ancient Duchy of Lorraine was doomed ere long to be merged and lost in the growing kingdom of the line of St. Louis. Yet his forefathers had been men of power and valour, who had transmitted to him a noble inheritance, with numerous titles, for he was Duke of Lorraine and Merc[oe]ure; of Calabria, Bar, and Guelderland; Marquis of Pontamoussin, and Nomenay; of Provence, Vaudemont, Zutphen, Blamond, Saar-warden and Salm; Hereditary Provost of Kummelsberg and Governor of Anjou.
First came the principal citizens of Nanci, four abreast, bearing steel partizans and clad in scarlet velvet pourpoints and black serge breeches, slashed with red, guarding the council of state, with the Master of Requests, their secretary, eight advocates and two ushers, all wearing thick ruffs and black gowns furred with white miniver.
Then followed the Great Master of the Household with his twenty-eight officials, including the marshal of the kitchen.
The Great Chamberlain, with the physician, apothecary, &c. in black robes, attended by twenty-four valets de chambre in the livery of the Duke.
The Masters of the Horse, the Hounds, the Waggons and the Wardrobe, each with his staff of officials, all of whom were named to me by old Sergeant Alsfeldt. Then came a company of petardiers under the Count de Bitche, whom I longed to grasp by the throat.
The Grand Almoner in full canonicals with the banner of St. Nicolas of Lorraine borne before him; having a covered chalice in his hands, and his eyes cast downward on the earth.
The Grand Marshal, with the Marshals of Lorraine and Bar, all clad in cloth of gold, magnificently mounted, with their batons, banners, and helmets borne before them by esquires or pages.
The priests of the Scottish college at Pontamoussin in their sombre vestments, with the banners of St. Andrew and St. Lucy borne before them. The latter in the hands of old Father Colville.
Then followed the commanders of the ducal troops; of the two companies of gendarmerie; of the garde du corps of Charles IV.; of the regiment of guards, and the Grand Master of the Artillery of Lorraine, all accoutred in brilliant half-armour and jack-boots, mounted on fine horses richly caparisoned. All these cavaliers were elderly men, as their moustaches seemed grey or white; and their cuirasses glittered with the orders of the Empire.
Attended by the Prince of Vaudemont and Count Pappenheim, and surrounded by his richly-dressed garde du corps, composed of one hundred chosen Switzers, with their trumpets sounding and kettledrums beating, and followed by all the officials of his civil tribunals, the Advocate General and messieurs the Councillors of the Chamber of Accounts for Nanci and Bar-le-Duc, came Charles IV., Duke of Lorraine, a fine-looking old soldier, compact and stately in form, with his head worn bare less by time than by the peak of his helmet; he had keen dark eyes and large grizzled moustaches. He was dressed in a suit of black velvet trimmed with narrow lace and silver cord. He wore a high stiff ruff, a diamond-hilted sword, and the order of the Golden Fleece. He bowed kindly to the people, who greeted him with a storm of acclamation, as he rode slowly past on a powerful black charger, which he had ridden scatheless through many a battlefield.
The Duke of Alsace, a son of the house of Suabia, who feudally held his duchy of the house of Lorraine, rode on his left hand, with his coronet borne before him, by an armed Knight of Malta. This Duke was a child about nine years of age, and though I knew it not then, was destined to bear an important position in this my narrative; but of that more in time.
A young lady clad in a suit of that rich white satin for the manufacture of which Nanci is so famed, brocaded with gold, rode at his right hand, and managed her horse's reins of red silken fringe, with singular grace. Her hair was of a colour resembling gold, and escaped in brilliant locks from under her broad hat, which had two long and drooping white feathers. Her face was turned from me, as she was conversing with young Pappenheim; but the enthusiasm of the people grew to a frenzy, in their shouts of welcome: for this golden-haired girl was the Duke's only daughter; and as they approached, the dense masses in the square swayed to and fro, with such an impetus, that twice I was nearly thrown down and trod under foot.
'Vive Mademoiselle Marie-Louise!' was the cry.
'Vive le Duc d'Alsace!'
'Vive Louise de Lorraine et M. le Comte de Pappenheim!'
Such were the shouts that burst like a storm around me.
'Is that young lady the daughter of the Duke?' I asked of the sergeant, who still held me fast by the arm.
'Yes, monsieur. Pardieu! but she is lovely! Her horse is stopped by the crowd—a moment, and she will look this way.'
'I thought she was in the Bastille, at Paris.'
'So we all thought; but, last night, she returned to Nanci. That is the gallant Count Pappenheim (son of Godfreyle Balafré), whom she is to many, that now she is chatting to so gaily. Now, she turns our way—look! Monsieur, look! O vive Mademoiselle de Lorraine!'
The fair young lady heard the stentorian shout of Alsfeldt; she turned to us, and bowed.
'My God!'tis Nicola!' I ejaculated in a breathless voice—a voice, at least, unheard amid the clamour round us; and so overwhelming were my emotions, on making this discovery, that, had not that good fellow, the sergeant, supported me, I must have fallen at his feet.
Bareheaded, travel-stained, crest-fallen in bearing, and crushed in spirit, I stood a guarded prisoner in the open streets of Nanci, while this brilliant pageant passed before me; and a tide of strange emotions, but chiefly astonishment and grief, with many bitter, bitter thoughts, swept in one wild current through my heart. There was a buzz in my ears; but I heard nothing now, neither the clanging of the church bells, the salvoes from tower and rampart, nor the acclamations of the people; I saw only Nicola; and this fantastic procession in quaint costumes, glittering garbs and armour, that like some fairy pageant or the phantasmagoria of delirium, were bearing her away from me—she whom I loved so well! Yet it was no dream, no delusion, and no mockery of the brain, for I knew that beloved face too well to be mistaken for a moment now.
'Nicola! Nicola!'
I strove to speak, but my voice could only whisper; I strove to stretch my arms towards her, but they sank powerless by my side.
As the Switzers of the ducal garde du corps roughly beat back the people with the staves of their halberds, and opened a passage again, the procession moved on. As she passed, I thought her eye caught a sight of my upturned face, amid that sea of faces round her; and, if so, I am assured that the stupefaction and agony it expressed, must have struck a pang in her heart—for she trembled, grew ghastly pale, and nearly fell from her white horse, but Pappenheim caught her hand; the pageant moved on, and I saw her no more—for that day at least.
Pen cannot describe all that whirled through my heart and brain on that dreadful day, in the streets of Nanci—a day, to me, of sorrow and bewilderment.
A huge cup of wine, brought by the old sergeant, and dashed with brandy, restored me to a certain extent; and in one hour after this, I found myself, with my escort, in a chamber of the ducal palace, awaiting the behest of Count Pappenheim, who had not yet returned from the church of St. Epurus.
'It is all a dream—a nightmare—from which I shall soon awaken!' thought I.
The Duke's garde du corps of horse, consisting of a hundred Lorraine troopers, who wore white hocquetons over their cuirasses, with a regiment of German imperial infantry, clad in buff coats, with black helmets of hammered iron, occupied the gates, approaches, and lower apartments of the palace in which they had been quartered, so that the people of Nanci might be as little as possible oppressed by their presence.
The princely residence of the Dukes of Lorraine stands in the oldest portion of the city. It has a magnificent entrance, within which was a vestibule, lined by lacqueys, guards, and pages. From thence, we passed into a noble quadrangle, encircled by a piazza, the columns and arches of which are covered by florid carving, and embellished by many statues and bassi-rilievi. It has also several towers, one of which served for an arsenal and magazine of arms; the others were staircases. It has gardens of great space and beauty, enclosed on one side by the ramparts of the city. Surrounded by my escort and a crowd of staring lacqueys and pages, I remained in the guard-chamber of the palace, oblivious and heedless alike of their impertinence, and the peculiarity of my position, occupied by one overwhelming thought, until I was roused by a sub-brigadier of the gendarmerie, who rode in, with an order from Monseigneur the Prince of Vaudemont, who had just been accidentally informed of my capture, to conduct me to a proper apartment, where every comfort and attention should be given me; that my escort were to retire, and that I should consider myself as a prisoner on parole of honour.
I thanked the sub-brigadier, and bade the sergeant, Alsfeldt, adieu, giving him a crown of the sun to drink my health with his comrades. I was then led by a valet-de-chambre up one of the staircases to a portion of the palace that overlooked the gardens, and there three apartments, each of which might have satisfied a marechal of France, were assigned to me. The valet gave me every means of repairing or improving my toilet, which a night spent in the custody of the musketeers, and especially some cuts and slashes received in my late encounter with Vaudemont, had somewhat deranged.
My sitting-room was lofty, and had three casemated windows filled with painted glass; its walls were hung with dark-green velvet, starred with gilded mullets. An oak cabinet, bearing a service of plate and shining crystal, stood at One end, and above it hung a Madonna of Raphael. On the white marble mantelpiece was carved the celebrated device of the Guises, an A within an O—chacunAson tour—meaning that every angle had its turning.
I seated myself by the table at an open window, with my head resting on my hand, seeking to arrange my thoughts, and to recover from the astonishment, the sorrow, and disappointment which oppressed me.
The soft breeze of noon fanned my brow and cheek, which were flushed and hot. It brought to me the perfume of flowers and the fragrance of the orangeries. The gardens were beautiful with a thousand varied flowers; the sunshine was bright and warm; the summer day in Lorraine was ambient and glorious; but my heart was full of bitterness and heavy grief—bitterness for my humiliating position, and grief for the loss of Nicola—for I justly deemed that I had lost her for ever.
The anguish of my disappointment was great; that this artful little beauty should have fooled me, and trifled with a love so honest and so true, so honourable and so pure as mine; for I loved, and in the rash blindness of my boyish love would have married her, when I believed her to be but a nameless and penniless soubrette, and thus, for her sake, would have trampled under foot all the inborn prejudice of race and name, all that family pride and tradition which were ever the second creed of a Scottish gentleman.
I could neither separate nor analyse all the fierce and bitter thoughts that grew up within me, but an overwhelming sense of deception and disappointment were uppermost; for in the brocaded lady, sparkling with jewels, with necklaces of diamonds and strings of pearls, mounted on a pawing steed of spotless white, surrounded by dukes and princes, guards, counts, and cavaliers—in Marie Louise of Lorraine, I could no longer realise Nicola, the gentle, timid, and loving Nicola, of my pleasant journey from Paris to the banks of the Meurthe—she with whom I had passed so strange a night among the rocks in the forest of Champagne.
While deceiving me as to her name and rank, she had doubted my honour and trifled with my love: a bitter conviction and a humiliating one.
Then other memories came, and I could scarcely doubt that I had won an interest in her heart when I rehearsed over and over again our conversations, all of which were graven in my mind, especially that which took place in the forest near St. Michel. When I dwelt on her accents, and the expression of her blue eyes and softly-feminine face, when she spoke to me then, and on similar occasions, could I doubt that she loved me?
Yes, I did doubt now, and in the anguish of that doubt I could have wept.
I recalled the joy she had expressed on learning that Duke Charles (but Duke Charles was her father) and Count Pappenheim were at Nanci; I remembered, too, how merrily she seemed to be conversing with the Count, as their brilliant pageant passed through the public square. These were doubtless 'trifles light as air,' yet they were heavy as cannon-shot to me.
'It is enough!' I exclaimed, with growing anger; 'I have been befooled; this girl never loved me; and if she did, what would her love avail me now?'
At that moment the rattle of kettle-drums, and sound of trumpets and trampling of horses, announced the return of the Duke, whose train rode into the echoing quadrangle. I knew that Nicola was there; but instead of looking from the windows of the corridor, I placed my hands upon my ears, and strove to shut out the sounds of triumph that tortured me.
M. Schreckhorn, an officer of the Swiss guard, was now ushered into my chamber, and with much formality, and more bad French, announced that the Duke required my presence in the hall of the palace, so early as might be convenient for me. This announcement was, of course, a command to be obeyed. Duke Charles, the father of Nicola—I mean of Marie Louise, for so I must in future name her—was about to question me. How my heart beat as I started from my chair!
'I am ready,' said I.
'But your toilette, monsieur,' said the Swiss.
'True, I had forgotten it; excuse me for one moment, M. le Suisse, and then I am at your service.'
I hastily removed all traces of my recent adventures and discomforts, arranged my costume as well as its capabilities permitted, and placed upon my left breast the cross of St. Lazare, which I had hitherto carried in a secret pocket: I was then conducted by the Swiss across the quadrangle and up one of the guarded staircases, to the great hall of the palace; the place where feasts were given, ambassadors received, and high festival held.
This hall was a noble apartment of more than one hundred feet in length. I perceived that it was floridly decorated, and that towards the upper end it was crowded by gentlemen in glittering costumes and armed soldiers, for the halberds of the hundred Swiss guards gleamed as their bearers stood ranked along the wall, fifty on each side. Tattered and dusty banners, taken in ancient battles, hung darkly down from the arched roof; and around the wall, on shields of carved stone, were painted all the heraldic bearings of Duke Charles: the three winglets of Lorraine, covered by a ducal mantle, and surmounted by an eagle; bureleargent, andgulesfor Hungary; the fleur-de-lisor, on a barbelgulesfor Naples; the crosslets of Jerusalem; the four palesgulesof Arragon; the fleur-de-lis with a bordergulesfor Anjou; the golden lion of Guelderland, and the black lion of Juliers, with two barbels of Bar-le-Duc.
Under these honours hung the portraits of those dukes of Lorraine who had won them by war or alliance, painted by Jan de Mahuse, by Titian, Rubens, or Poussin. There was grim Godfrey of Ardennes in the chain armour in which he was slain by the Saracens at the battle of Louvain; Gothelo who stormed Verdun from Conrad the Salique; Baldwin, King of Jerusalem and Duke of Lorraine; Duke Theobald II., who fought so valiantly at Spire; Duke Raoul, who was slain at Cressy; Duke Claude, armed cap-a-pie, as he appeared at the passage of the Alps in 1515; his daughter, (the mother of Mary Stuart,) Marie of Lorraine, whose birth-place, the old ducal castle of Bar, had—in memory of her—been spared from sack and fire last winter by the Garde du Corps Ecossais; Anthony Duke of Lorraine and Calabria, who fought the Lutherans and conquered Alsace, a stern warrior sheathed in black armour, and bearing on his left wrist a Scottish falcon, the gift of our monarch James V.; in short, the hall was surrounded by portraits, real or imaginary, of all the thirty-two dukes of the old Merovingian house of Lorraine, and the thirty-third in succession awaited me under a canopy or cloth of estate, seated at a table, which was covered by papers and letters, the usual paraphernalia of a council-board; and as I gazed about me and thought of all the past glories of this ancient line of ducal princes, even the hope that Marie Louise would pity the passion with which she had so wantonly inspired me died away in my aching heart.
The Duke was still attired as I had last seen him in the morning. Pappenheim stood by his chair, eyeing me with dark scrutiny, for he had a keen, penetrating eye and imperious expression of face. De Bitche stood a little in the background in his half armour, as colonel of the petardiers, and under his open helmet I read an expression of undisguised malice in his eye. I had a debt to settle with this worthy personage; but the trick he had played me, and the destruction of my fine horse, were, at that moment, less near my heart than a sense of bitterness at the discovery I had made, and of the humiliation of standing before Charles of Lorraine in the character of a spy.
I looked anxiously round for Vaudemont, but he was not in the hall, neither was his sister, though many ladies of rank were present; and as I approached, with an air of as much firmness and honest dignity as I could assume, the courtiers of the military Duke, the councillors of state, master of requests, keeper of the seals, and others drew near, while the officer of Swiss presented, saying, in a low voice,—
'Monseigneur le Duc, this is the gentleman our prisoner—M. l'Abbé.'
'I am no abbé, M. le Suisse,' said I, bluntly; 'I am Arthur Blane, a Scottish gentleman in the service of king Louis.'
'And none in his garde du corps is more gallant or more true,' said the old Duke, drawing off his long leather glove, and presenting his hand to me; not to kiss, after the absurd fashion of princes, but to press, like a brave, honest man; for this venerable soldier, though usually calm and grave, and lofty without pride, could act act very impulsively at times.
'By this honour, Monseigneur,' said I, in a voice that grew tremulous with conflicting emotions, 'I presume that I am not to be treated as a prisoner of war.'
'Prisoner?—no, no my brave stranger—my daughter has told me all.'
'All?' I reiterated in my heart; 'what can he mean by all'?'
'I have much to thank you for, M. Blane; but I am an old soldier, and have few words to spare; yet I can well appreciate deeds of honour, faith, and loyalty. I would speak with you of my daughter, Mademoiselle Marie-Louise, whom you have hitherto known under the very homely name of Nicola.'
'Of Nicola—oh yes, Nicola!' I faltered involuntarily, for that dear name, rendered by association so delightful to my ear, made me start, as it stirred my inner heart. A large mirror hung near me; I surveyed my own face in it, and the immobility of its features surprised even myself. This expression was fortunate, as I was the centre of many curious eyes, that stared at me without the slightest ceremony.
'You hear me?' said the Duke, gently.
'Monseigneur, I am all dutiful attention.'
'Mademoiselle Louise was discovered last night at a country hostelry, between this and Commercy.'
'Discovered——'
'By the Count de Bitche, colonel of our petardiers, who had gone there on a mission of kindness, believing her to be a lady, whose protector had been killed by some of our people in a brawl; but imagine his astonishment, on finding there the Princess of Lorraine, attired like a little sister of Vincent de Paule!'
I gave the Count a furtive glance of hatred and defiance, to which he replied by a smile of scornful pride.
'M. Blane,' continued the Duke, 'you have been the means of saving, from the degradation of the Bastille, a princess of a house which, though menaced now by ruin and destruction, is fully equal to, and more ancient than, many of the royal lines in Europe—a house which, through Marie of Guelders and Marie of Lorraine, has been twice allied to the sovereign princes of your own country. I repeat to you, that my daughter has told me all—(allagain!)—and I must seek the means to repay you—not for the observance of your word of honour, pledged to Clara d'Amboise, faithfully to conduct Mademoiselle here—but for the unmerited humiliation to which that duty has been the means of subjecting you.'
'I thank you, Monseigneur le Duc. An exile from my own country, I have but the inheritance of a Scottish gentleman—a poor soldier of fortune—'
'And this, Monsieur—'
'Is my father's sword—with glory and adversity.'
'That sword shall be restored to you. M. de Bitche, restore his rapier to M. Blane,' said the Duke, again pressing my hand; 'Monsieur, I see by the order which you wear, that you are a man of merit as well as of courage. What say you to enter the service of my daughter's intended husband?'
'Ah—she has not told himall,' thought I, bitterly; 'or Charles IV. would not speak thus to me.'
'His regiment of horse lacks a Major—but you frown; you Scots are all devoted to the service of France. Well, well; I seek not to tempt you from your allegiance; but for the good deed you have done him, Charles of Lorraine will ever esteem you as one of his dearest friends.'
'Oh Monseigneur, you overwhelm me by this condescension.'
'And now, M. Blane, you are welcome to reside at our palace of Nanci so long as you please.'
'Your hospitality, Monseigneur, would endanger my honour as a loyal soldier,' said I, impatient to leave for ever the home and vicinity of one who had cost my heart so dear.
'Well—well; the main-body of your army is far from here, beyond the Rhine, under the Marechal de la Force. How stand you for funds?'
'I am at zero, Monseigneur,' said I; for I had spent so much in procuring luxuries for my fair companion, that I had scarcely a denier left.
The Duke wrote for me an order on his Comptroller-General of Finance for a thousand crowns; but when presented, only fifty were forthcoming; for war and impending conquest had sorely impaired the resources of his once princely inheritance.
He presented me with a beautiful pair of silver-mounted girdle pistols; and now many gentlemen and cavaliers of his court, who had hitherto held coldly aloof, pressed around me, with those compliments and congratulations that flow so readily from a courtier's oily tongue; but I observed that still the suspicious or haughty Pappenheim, and the sullen De Bitche, were resolved to shun me. After some frivolous conversation I retired, and was conducted, by M. Schreckhorn, the Swiss, to my own apartments, where again I seated myself at the table as before, to ponder over all that had passed.