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The next thing was the great supper in the hall. Although this was Beauvais’s affair, I was not without responsibility. I had devised a new and splendid form of candlestick for these royal suppers. These candlesticks consisted of a hundred Uhlans, the handsomest men in the battalion, in uniforms of silk and velvet, holding their lances upright, and from the lance-head blazed a flame of perfumed wax. Then there were those damnable little pages. It was their duty to hand the wine at supper and to attend the more distinguished guests; but they were certain to play some pranks if I were not on hand to stop them. So I always remained through the supper.
The king’s table was set as always, on a dais raised a couple of inches from the floor, under a royal canopy of crimson velvet with goldenfleur-de-lis. To this table he invited Francezka, besides Madame Villars, Count Saxe, the Duc de Richelieu and one or two others, but he did not ask Monsieur Voltaire. I heard a subdued murmur of speculation as to whether he would be asked or not, and I never yet saw Monsieur Voltaire discomfited that it did not give the assemblage a wicked delight. Madame du Châtelet was already beginning to fume and scowl. It was said that sometimes she and Monsieur Voltaire quarreled to the point of throwing dishes at each other across the table, but they were always ready enough to quarrel with the world on each other’s account.
Francezka, escorted by the Duc de Richelieu, walked the length of the great hall, herself a picture of grace and dignity. On her way she passed Monsieur Voltaire. He stood on one leg, like a stork, his eyes blazing with381rage, chagrin, hope and expectancy. He had not yet been invited to the king’s table, although Francezka had, and this man, who was capable of writingNanine, andThe Tattler, was in acute misery because he had not been asked to take a seat at a certain table! I saw compassion for him in Francezka’s face, and thought she might contrive to help Monsieur Voltaire. She curtsied low to the king, ascended the dais at his invitation, and then I heard her say, as if to herself:
“I must leave room for Monsieur Voltaire,” and at the same time flashed from under her long lashes a look so full of meaning, so droll, and saying at the same time, “I pray your Majesty will excuse my awkward country ways.”
The king burst out laughing and told Count Saxe to fetch Monsieur Voltaire, which he did. I never saw a creature so pleased as Monsieur Voltaire was at this. I am sure Molière did not show the same childish delight when Louis le Grand divided with him the celebrated wing of chicken.
Supper over, the king led the way to the ballroom, where, from a great orchestra of twenty-four violins, an ocean of music rose and fell like the waves of the sea. Count Saxe walked theminuet de la courwith Francezka. It seemed as if this night was to be her apotheosis, for everything seemed designed to show her off and to give her the first place. Monsieur Voltaire did not dance, but overwhelmingly grateful for the ruse by which Francezka had got him to the king’s table, could not be too assiduous to her or praise her wit too highly. From that hour she was queen at Chambord. It was after midnight that the ball began. I remained382only an hour or two, and then went to my rest, but not in my chamber next Count Saxe’s for once. I had not had much sleep for several nights, so I betook myself to the stables, where, upon a pile of oats designed for the morning’s feed, I wrapped myself in my cloak and fell into a deep slumber.
383CHAPTER XXIXAS HAVING NO PAST
I awakened, as always, at five o’clock, and on inquiring of the grooms and stablemen, found that the music at the castle had just ceased. The ball was barely over in time for the stag hunt, which was to take place at sunrise. It was as yet pitchy dark, but the scene of commotion almost equaled the ball, for there were one thousand horses to be fed. However, I rather liked that sort of commotion; the cheerful stamping and champing, as the horses, a hundred at the time, were led out of their stalls into the sharp December air, with the stars still shining in the blue-black vault of heaven; the tussle at the great watering troughs, into which fifty men and boys pumped continually; the fresh smell of the hay, at which the horses sniffed joyfully; the steady combing and dressing of the creatures—all going on with a kind of orderly confusion.
The hunters were attended to first—something over a hundred of them—and when the chief huntsman winded his silver horn, at the first paling of the stars and flushing of the sky, and the fierce, sharp yelping of the dogs in leash was heard, troops of ladies and gentlemen in hunting dress came down the great staircase into the courtyard. Among them was Francezka. I384myself swung her into her saddle. She looked as radiant as if she had not been traveling, rehearsing, acting and dancing for many hours before. As she gathered up the reins, she cried:
“Ah, Babache, this is to live! I have just changed my ball costume for my hunting dress. It is almost as good as those days before and after Uzmaiz!”
Action and adventure were in her blood, and she was a strong woman, capable of much exertion, but I had never seen in her before this thirst for pleasure.
And to the music of silver hunting horns and the bell-like baying of the dogs, I saw the hunt, with the king, Count Saxe and Francezka, sweep across the Bridge of the Lions and along the broad, bare, leafless avenue, into the forest, in the cold, bright December sunrise.
I had not time to join the hunt, and, busy with many duties, scarcely noted how the day slipped away. Toward three o’clock I saw a solitary figure—a woman—ride across the bridge. No one else had returned, nor was the hunting party expected until sunset. I recognized Francezka’s form and surmised that, fatigued with all she had undergone, she had slipped away from the hunting party and had returned to the castle to rest.
About five o’clock, when the short winter afternoon was closing and the sun was red, I received a message from Francezka. She desired to see me in her apartment. I climbed the stairs to her rooms at once. Her door was opened for me by old Elizabeth, Peter Embden’s sister, who, I remembered, had been Francezka’s waiting maid long ago on that journey from Königsberg. Elizabeth was harder featured than ever, and rheumatic, so she told me; but Francezka had a way385of keeping those about her, who had once loved her, even if they became a little infirm.
Elizabeth went to tell her mistress. I looked about the room, which had a sweet aroma of Francezka about it, something which made the place appear as if meant for her and her only. The harpsichord was by the fireplace—Francezka was always devoted to the harpsichord and played more skilfully upon it every year. There was her book of music, copied with her own hands, her embroidery frame, and the book she had been reading lay on the table, by which sat a chair with her scarf thrown over it, and a delicate perfumed handkerchief was where she had dropped it.
A fire burned upon the great hearth, and already, the room was shadowy with the coming dusk. There were two windows, one looking out upon the marvelous spiral staircase, the other facing the sunset. In a moment or two, Francezka came out of the inner room. She wore a white robe and her hair was neither dressed nor powdered, but braided down her back, as the Brabant peasant women wear theirs. Perhaps it was weariness on her part, but never was there a creature more changed than she, from the radiant being of the night before. She looked sad and dispirited, and the welcome in her eyes when she greeted me reminded me painfully of how she had met me in the sorrowful years of the past. But I chose not to see too much of this.
“It is the greatest good in the world to me, Madame,” I said, “seeing you so happy and so admired. Any woman on earth might have envied you last night.”
Francezka smiled a little—she was then seated and looking into the fire.
386
“Yes, I ever loved to act, and I felt no more tremor last night, although I was to play opposite the great Monsieur Voltaire himself, than in those days, so long ago, when I played opposite the baker’s boy in the garden of the Hôtel Kirkpatrick. It would have been better for me, perhaps, if I had been born to earn my living as Mademoiselle Lecouvreur did, on the stage, than to have been the heiress of the Capellos.”
I was thunderstruck when she said this. I had never known her to express a wish for any other station in life than the one to which she had been born; and, indeed, she had no reason to do so. And while I was wondering at this speech, she astounded me still more, by saying calmly:
“It is, however, God’s mercy that I can act; for I am acting a part every hour and moment of my life—the part of a happy woman—when I am of all of God’s creatures, the most miserable.”
She spoke quite softly and composedly, but I guessed readily that she had sent for me that she might have a friend to whom to pour out her overcharged heart.
“Gaston Cheverny,” was all I could say, meaning that he must be the source of her misery.
“There is no fault at all to be found with my husband. He is kindness and devotion itself. He likes the world—so do I. He is gallant, is complimentary to the ladies; I would not have him otherwise. I have only to express a wish, and, if possible, it is fulfilled. Yet, I am the wretchedest of women. For, Babache, I believe—now, do not laugh at me, Babache, and say it is my Scotch blood that makes me superstitious—but—but—” she paused a moment, and then said in a387whisper, “I believe Regnard Cheverny’s soul has got into Gaston Cheverny’s body.”
Francezka was always more superstitious than she was willing to allow, but this wildness of delusion staggered me, especially in a woman of her otherwise strong sense.
I hesitated a little before answering her. I saw in her bright and restless eyes, and in the varying color upon her cheek, that she was speaking under the influence of powerful emotion.
“Madame,” said I, “I must speak plainly. It amazes me that a woman of your excellent understanding should stoop to the folly of what you have just said.”
Francezka showed no anger. She only replied:
“It is not so idle as it sounds. I mean, that although Gaston himself has returned to me, he seems to have Regnard’s nature. Remember, I knew them both well. Do you recollect how the old dog, Bold, saw the change in Gaston? Well, one day about a month after you left Capello, the dog, which had shown a steady dislike to Gaston, flew at him—flew at his master whom he had loved so well. Some hours after, I went to my husband—he was standing on the terrace—and said:
“‘You must have worried the dog, I never knew him to attack any one before.’ ‘He will not attack any one again,’ replied Gaston. ‘I thought it best that he should be put out of the way, and to spare you the knowledge I had the dog drowned an hour ago.’ I can not express to you, Babache, my feelings at this. I do not know what I did, or what I said, but that, without hat or mantle, I rushed to the lake, below the Italian garden—I seemed to know by instinct that it was there they388would drown him. Some stablemen were then dragging the poor drowned creature—my dog—my Bold—out of the water. They were frightened at what they had done, when they saw me. I retained my senses enough to say nothing before those men,—I, Francezka Capello, unable to reprove mere stablemen for the destruction of a creature dear to me for years!
“I fled to the Italian garden; I was in an agony of terror, as well as grief. I repeated to myself, over and over again, ‘It was but a worn-out old dog—Gaston did it in mercy to me—’ I tried, amid all my distress, to reason with myself—to present Gaston’s cause. ‘It is a trifle,’ I said, but some inward voice told me it was no trifle, but a matter of the greatest moment to me. Suppose he should turn against me in the same way? I know not how long I sat there; it seemed to me not a quarter of an hour, but it was a long, long time.
“Presently, I saw Gaston approach. He seated himself by me; he took my hand; he begged my pardon a thousand times over; he swore to me it was solely for love of me he had it done—that the dog might have turned against me as against him, and that apprehension had made him have the poor creature drowned; and knowing I would object, he had it done secretly—and much more of the same kind. He was so affectionate to me that my heart was melted. He told me he would have the dog buried anywhere I wished and see it decently done himself. I said I would have my poor friend buried under the statue of Petrarch—and it was done that very afternoon. We left the garden, hand in hand, like lovers. I never felt more in love with my husband than at that moment—and yet—and yet—there389was a concealed fear of something—I know not what—in the very depths of my soul. To think that he should cherish such a design and that I should not know it; that he should be so utterly indifferent as he had been, ever since his return, to a creature once so dear to him as his dog! This is one of the mysterious and unexplored places in Gaston’s nature since his return, that gives me the strangest, the most terrifying sense of unfamiliarity with him—and he, the tenderest, the most devoted husband—a man I should admire even if I did not love him.”
This story, told with Francezka’s dramatic fire, impressed me more than I would have admitted to her; and however wildly fanciful her idea was that Regnard’s soul had got into Gaston’s body, yet, had not I, myself, felt that strangeness she described toward the man I had lived with as a brother for more than seven years? But I was not guilty of the folly of encouraging her in the unfortunate notions of which she was already possessed.
“It is a pity, Madame,” I said, coolly, “that you seem to attach more consequence to a dead dog than to a living husband, whom you admit you would admire even if you did not love. There is a troublesome old dog who shows malice. You are inordinately fond of this old dog. Your husband, tenderly anxious for you, has the brute drowned without your knowledge. For that you call yourself the most miserable creature on earth.”
Francezka’s face turned scarlet with wrath. She half arose from her chair, looking at me in surprise and anger. I bore her scrutiny calmly, my heart reproaching390me somewhat for speaking as I had done of my old friend Bold.
Francezka seated herself in her old pensive attitude, her cheek upon her hand, and there was a long silence, broken only by the dropping of the embers, and occasionally a faint cry from afar. The hunting party had returned, and the chase was proceeding merrily in the great corridors below.
“Babache,” she said presently. “One of the chief joys of love is the living over of past delights. But Gaston and I live together as having no past. One of the cruelest things about the wound in his head is that he had long periods of forgetfulness, and certain parts of his life are absolutely blotted from his mind. And one of those great gaps is everything that pertained to our courtship and marriage. He remembers the summer in which we were married, but could not recall the date until I told him. He also remembers that we were secretly married and why. By some strange misfortune—perhaps because his mind was always groping after me in those sad days of wandering, both in mind and body—all else—those days when we were boy and girl traveling through Courland; those evenings on the island in the lake—all, all that pertains to our love is lost to him. He does not even remember whyO Richard, O mon roiwas so dear to us. It was not strange that he should lose his voice for singing, but it is so sad that he can not remember any of those songs which interpreted our hearts to each other.
“I tried at first to bring it all back to his mind, telling him the whole sweet story so deeply written on my heart, but it only distressed him with the sense of his lapse of391memory. He told me it was his chief agony when he was recovering, in those intolerable days in the isles of the East, when he knew not how or why he came there, trying to recall this lost happiness; he never forgot me, but he could not remember, for a long time, whether we were married or not.”
“Those cases are common enough,” I said. “I once knew a soldier—a common man—who was shot as he was in the act of demanding the countersign. He lingered months between life and death, but lived, with just such an impaired memory as you describe. At last a surgeon, experimenting on him, raised a piece of broken bone from his skull—straightway he recovered memory and understanding, remembered the countersign—remembered everything, except what had occurred from the time he was shot until he was finally cured. Of that time, he was confused and inaccurate, just as Gaston Cheverny is. And, Madame, those risks are taken by all soldiers alike, and if you can not accept this you should have married one of the gentlemen of the long robe, who stay at home and never risk their carcasses in battle.”
I thought Francezka would truly have scratched my eyes out at that, so did her own dark and eloquent eyes blaze. But she said nothing, for, at bottom, there was in her, as in Madame Riano, as I have often said, a strong good sense that always had the last word. Nothing—nothing could make her disbelieve in the true and hearty devotion I bore her—so much was plain. Presently she spoke again.
“It is hard—is it not—that I should see so much of Regnard, whom I ever hated, in Gaston whom I ever392loved? I see, as I tell you, Regnard’s soul shining out of Gaston’s eyes; I see Regnard’s nature speaking in Gaston’s words and acts. Brothers often grow the more alike as time goes on, but why could not Regnard have grown like Gaston, instead of Gaston like Regnard?”
“Has anything been heard of Monsieur Regnard lately?” I asked.
Francezka shook her head.
“I have asked Gaston repeatedly why he did not contrive to communicate with his brother; an officer in the army of the East India Company can not be lost, as my Aunt Peggy says, like a needle in a haystack. But Gaston shows a strange indifference that is unlike his nature. He was ever the most affectionate of brothers, nor was Regnard wanting in love for him—yet, Gaston does not like me to mention Regnard to him—except—”
I saw she wished to tell me all—all these painful things that preyed upon her heart in secret, and that might be dispersed by letting daylight in upon them.
“Except what, Madame?”
“You remember, Babache, that Regnard paid me great court the year of my marriage, when he knew nothing of it. I think the most painful interview of my whole life was when I was forced to tell Regnard that I was his brother’s wife; and most painful it must forever be to Regnard. Well, I thought it my duty to tell Gaston about it—and—and—”
She hesitated and then went on, her face coloring warmly.
“He laughed at it—he made me tell it him twice running. It was mortifying to me and cruel to his393absent brother; but he roared with laughter, and referred to it more than once, until I asked him not to speak of it again.”
“And he has not again spoken of it?”
“Oh, no. He always respects my wishes, when he knows them. But he does not seem to have any instinctive knowledge of them. He often troubles me by not knowing what I wish.”
“In short, Madame, Gaston Cheverny has not second sight, as the Kirkpatricks have.”
Francezka smiled a little at this, but I saw that her uneasiness was deeply rooted, and I had not succeeded in tearing it away.
Just then there was a shout of laughter, the winding of a hunting horn, echoing afar, a sound of scurrying feet up the great stairway. Involuntarily we both turned toward the window looking out upon it, which the reddening sun made bright. Madame Fontange, one of the beauties of the court, rushed up the stairway laughing and disheveled, her hoop awry, and her satin robe half torn off her back by a rascal of a little page, who had seized her and who was calling loudly for Monsieur Cheverny. Gaston Cheverny, wearing his hunting dress, his horn in his hand, was close behind, covering the great steps two at a time. As he dashed past the window and his laughing face flashed by in the blaze of the setting sun, I saw, as I am a living man, Regnard Cheverny’s soul shining out of Gaston Cheverny’s eyes. Francezka so expressed it, and I can not express it any better or any differently. I drew back from the window into the room, and avoided Francezka’s searching glance.
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“You have seen it, I see,” she said calmly. “Do you wonder that I am a wretched woman?”
I gathered my wits about me, dismissed the strange impression I had got, and said, rising:
“Madame, you have, after long waiting, had the husband of your first youth restored to you. He is not precisely what he was when you lost him. All men change, and most women. You, perhaps, are the same, but Gaston Cheverny is not. He is, however, devoted to you, high-minded, honorable, of the same strong intelligence, but with seven years of hardship and adventure behind him. All that you have told me is fanciful. Dismiss it, I beg of you, from your mind. Let not a dead dog and a look of your husband’s eye, and an inconsiderate fit of laughter wreck your happiness.”
“Do you believe all you say, Babache?” she asked, coming up to me with a world of entreaty in her eyes.
I am not a gallant, but I am enough of a gentleman to tell a lie, if necessary, to a lady, and to swear to it until I am black in the face; so I said:
“I swear it to you, Madame, on my sacred honor.” And all the time I saw and knew that Francezka had reason to be wretched with Gaston Cheverny as he now was.
I left the room, and did not again see Francezka until that evening when there was a masked ball for the king.
395CHAPTER XXXTHE BOAR HUNT
It was bruited about the castle that Madame Cheverny was ill and could not appear, which did not in the least surprise me, after our interview that afternoon. In the midst of the ball, however, Francezka appeared, perfectly radiant, and repeated her triumphs of the night before. I hoped from this that our conversation had dissipated all those strange ideas concerning Gaston which had lodged in her mind.
If Francezka was admired by the men, Gaston certainly succeeded in captivating the ladies. Many of them declared that any woman could have been faithful to a man as charming, as witty, as gallant, as Gaston Cheverny. The king retired from the ball at midnight; he had grown lazy by that time, but the gentlemen and the “flying squadrons” kept going for two hours more, although they had to rise at daylight, to go upon a great boar hunt, and this was the second day and night they had been pleasure-driven. Francezka was among the last to leave the ball room, and if a sparkling face and smiles and laughter are any indication of a heart at ease, Francezka was a happy woman. But she was, also, a consummate actress.
Next morning, daybreak saw us assembled in the396courtyard. The hunting of the wild boar is serious business. There is a song about the
—firm seat and eagle eyeHe must acquire who would aspireTo see the wild boar die.
For my part, I dread to see many men and any woman take part in this dangerous sport. I especially wished that Gaston Cheverny, with his infirm right arm, and Francezka, with her adventurous spirit, should not be of the hunting party; but I had no doubt they would be, and my apprehension was verified; for both of them were in the great courtyard when the company was mustered.
The king, being lazy and brave—for most lazy men are brave—frankly declared he meant only to be a spectator of it. So did the old Marshal de Noailles. There are some men who have attained the highest form of courage in being able to refuse danger. There are others who fear to refuse it; others again, who despise it; and a small remnant by whom the zest of danger can no more be resisted than the drunkard can resist wine. These last are always found in a boar hunt.
The preparation for this sport shows that it is seriously regarded. All who take part in it must eat lightly on that morning. The host, before starting, gives such instructions as he thinks necessary, especially to listen for a shout of “Take care!” Also, he warns all present against the boar when he seems to be dying or even dead, for the brute is capable of doing397great damage in the very article of death. The final words spoken on these occasions are always solemn—
“And may God have us in His keeping.”
Although ladies were allowed upon this hunt, and were even armed with hunting knives, it was not expected, nor indeed permitted, that they should take an active part in it, being mostly spectators, and especially keeping at a safe distance when the final tussle with the boar is on. A full-grown boar, luckily, is bulky and noisy and not swift of foot, as reckoned with other animals, so it is quite possible to see the sport without being in actual danger. I was in hopes that this was Gaston Cheverny’s plan, but found I was mistaken. He had acquired considerable dexterity with his left arm, and carried his boar spear in his left hand with both ease and strength. But the command of a left arm gained by a man after he is thirty years of age is not to be depended upon in an encounter with the most savage animal of which we have any record.
We set out as soon as the king appeared, and proceeded to a place in the forest, about two leagues away, in which the beaters had found for us amarcassin, or wild pig, which would afford very good sport, and not so dangerous as a full-grown boar. But the lovers of danger in our party—and there were many—I knew, would never be satisfied with hunting the pig, and there would probably be some dangerous business before we returned to the castle. We had dogs of the ancient boar-hound breed, black marked with tan, as large as mastiffs, and with prodigious ears. Ourpiqueurswere especially trained to hunt the boar, and it was inspiring to see how both men and dogs took to their work. We398reached the forest before the sun was high. The woods had already been beaten by boys with kiaki—a kind of wooden clapper, of which the name describes the noise. Themarcassinhad been found, and the dogs put in at once. The whole thing could have been over in fifteen minutes, but the piqueurs, with great skill, managed to make a whole morning’s amusement out of it, and it was noon before the joyoushalliliof the huntsman’s horn proclaimed that the wild pig was dead.
All the ceremonies of presenting the boar’s head were gone through with before the king, in an open glade in the forest. Although it was December, the day was mild and the sun warmed the brown earth and the crystal-clear air. A great fire was built, and from it a royal dinner was served by a regiment of cooks. The rude tables were covered with embroidered cloths, and gold and silver plate abounded. It was a feast worthy of Francis the First. Monsieur Voltaire was at the dinner, along with others of the guests who did not take part in the hunt; and the notary’s son kept the whole company in a roar with his witticisms. Francezka was in high spirits, and had the honor of much notice by the king, by Count Saxe, and Monsieur Voltaire, to say nothing of the Dukes of Bourbon and Richelieu.
It was two o’clock before the dinner was over, and then the major part of the company made ready to return to the castle. The word was quietly passed around, however, that for those who wished real work, there was an old “solitary” which had been placed, and those who liked might go after him. The ladies were not informed of this, and when Count Saxe, and half a dozen others remained, it was supposed that they would have399nothing more dangerous or exciting than another chase after amarcassin. When the cavalcade, including the king, were riding off, Francezka turned in her saddle, and, looking toward Gaston, who remained behind, cried:
“Remember, you have but one good arm and part of another one—so, having so lately got you back, let me not lose you now.”
“I promise to take all care,” Gaston answered. The look they exchanged, full of genuine affection, made yesterday’s interview seem dreamlike to me.
There were not more than a dozen of us in this party, including Count Saxe and Gaston Cheverny. It was not for me to warn Gaston against what we were about to engage in. Count Saxe gave him a gently civil intimation of the danger ahead, but Gaston took no note of it, and was as eager as any one to find the “solitary.” We put off into another part of the forest. I rode by Gaston Cheverny’s side, and privately resolved to remain there. We talked together and I found him more like the old Gaston than I had yet seen him.
This foolhardy expedition was exactly like Gaston; but when I saw the quickness of his eye, and the alertness of his movements, I concluded he could take care of himself better than any of us supposed. It was about three o’clock when we got to the circle in which the beaters had surrounded the old boar. He had been hunted twice that season and had escaped both times. Huntsmen are very superstitious, and they had got the notion that if this boar were not killed in the third chase, there was something unearthly about him. This was fostered by some laughing remark of Count Saxe400about the hunt of Thibaut of Champagne, and the “solitary” being the ghost of a boar. His ghostship, however, was soon disproved, by finding his huge tracks in the soft brown earth.
Soon the dogs gave tongue, and the chase was on. We could get occasional glimpses of the boar’s vast bulk, as he made prodigious speed for so heavy an animal through the thickets. There was a small ravine through which a brook flowed, and for this the boar made. We could hear him crashing through the underwood, and he got across the brook. The dogs and huntsmen followed quickly after him. The dogs found the scent again immediately after crossing the water, but on reaching a large, open plateau above the ravine, they suddenly and inexplicably lost it. There were no tracks to be seen, and the boar must have turned off either to the right or the left, in a fringe of thick underwood that bordered the ravine. The dogs ran aimlessly about, keeping up a dismal yelping of despair. The huntsmen encouraged them by horn and voice, but were evidently chagrined by this singular disappearance. My master twitted them with stories of the ghostly hunt of Thibaut, but it was plain the huntsmen thought it no joking matter. They succeeded in putting the hounds into the thicket on the right, but, although there was an infinity of barking and yelping and whining, it was plain that the scent had not yet been found.
Meanwhile, as we were standing about this open space, in the clear December afternoon, listening to the dogs and men, Gaston Cheverny dismounted, and ran a short distance toward the thicket on the left. Count Saxe called out to him to keep a firm hold on his spear,401which he held in his left hand. He turned to answer, when we saw, breaking from the cover directly behind Gaston, the boar, his horrible mouth wide open, his tusks grinding and churning blood and foam, his eyeballs like coals of fire, and his bristles rising like a mane.
We all involuntarily shouted “Take care! Take care!” but no one of us was closer than thirty yards to Gaston or the boar either. As the creature raised himself to bury his tusks in his enemy, I saw Gaston, with the quickness of thought, drop the spear from his left hand, and drawing his hunting knife with his right hand, plunge it once, twice, thrice in the boar’s throat. These powerful thrusts were the beast’s deathblow, but he was still capable of killing Gaston Cheverny, had there been the least remission in those tremendous strokes with the hunting knife. By that time we were on the ground close to him, and I was about to use my spear when Count Saxe motioned me away. The boar, although still fighting savagely, was clearly overmastered; a dozen dogs were tearing at him from behind.
It would have been an outrage to interfere then, so we stood ready for emergencies, while Gaston, with the assistance of the dogs, despatched the huge beast. The huntsmen were all on hand then, and when, at last, the great carcass fell over, they surrounded Gaston with shouts of delight. He was covered with blood, but had not a scratch on him. He could not explain how the boar got so close to him, except that he was listening to the dogs in the distance, and the first thing he knew he was looking down the boar’s throat. The next thing he remembered, was the plunging of his knife402into the beast’s throat, time after time. Like all truly brave men Gaston did not try to make out the accidents of good fortune as deliberately planned by him. But seldom have I, in war or sport, seen greater courage, address and strength than Gaston Cheverny showed on this occasion.
Count Saxe congratulated him warmly, reminding him of that other occasion when by his quickness he had passed himself off for Count Saxe, and so had earned for himself seven years of captivity, but had saved Count Saxe. Gaston received this and all our congratulations with becoming modesty. He turned away from our praises to give liberal drink-money to the huntsmen, who were delighted beyond reason at the killing of the old “solitary,” and that, too, without a man or a dog being injured. It was then determined to return to Chambord, whose distant towers glowed in the sun.
Gaston, as may be imagined, was in a very wretched condition. He washed off some of the blood in the little brook, threw away his handsome hunting coat, borrowed a jacket from one of the huntsmen, and we set off at a smart pace toward the castle.
From the moment I had noticed that Gaston Cheverny wielded his knife in his right hand, my mind had been in a whirl. That right hand and arm, so swift, so sure, so steady, so strong, was the one he had said was so weak, that he could not even guide a pen with it, nor play the guitar. Francezka’s parting warning had been to remember the infirmity of that arm—and then—
We rode along briskly the two leagues to the castle.403Gaston Cheverny was naturally elate, and even in the bravest of men, there is an exhilaration, a sort of intoxication at finding one’s self alive when the chance of death was very imminent. I fell behind all the party, and was rallied by Count Saxe on mytaciturnity, and accused of jealousy of Gaston Cheverny’s prowess, but I let him have his joke.
When we reached the castle, we went to our rooms. Mine was the little one I speak of, next to Count Saxe’s bedchamber. When I was washing off by candle-light the stains of the chase—for it was then after dark—my master entered. He looked at me significantly, going through with Gaston’s motion of plunging the knife into the wild boar; he knew the story of that weakly arm. I looked back at him and shook my head; I could no more understand it than he.
We hastened down to the state supper in the great dining hall. The king was indisposed or lazy, so his Majesty did not appear, and I think the party was the gayer thereby. There was but one long table in the dining hall, and at it were seated above a hundred persons. I was near the foot, and Gaston Cheverny, in honor of his exploit, sat next Count Saxe. Francezka sat about midway the table, with a gallant on each side of her.
The aspect of happiness she had shown since the night before remained with her. She wore both powder and patches, and according to the fashion, there was a tinge of rouge upon her cheek. She was magnificently dressed in a pale green gown, the color of water-cress, embroidered in silver, and wore a splendid head-dress. I thought I had never seen her more truly the great404lady. She knew, of course, what Gaston’s adventure had been, but I suppose he had not given her all the particulars.
The supper was singularly merry, perhaps owing to the absence of the king. The singing at the table was entirely of hunting songs; the little rascals of pages took good care to keep Gaston’s glass filled—he was a great hero with them then. When it came time for the toasts, Count Saxe arose and after drinking to the king and the ladies, gave Gaston Cheverny’s health, together with an account, as only Maurice of Saxe could give it, of the exploit of the afternoon.
I knew not at the time if Count Saxe intended it, but he seemed to lay the greatest stress upon Gaston’s feat being performed with the right arm—as if any man could have done it with his left one. My master told me afterward, that it was quite involuntary with him mentioning Gaston Cheverny’s right arm, that he meant rather to avoid it, but, to his chagrin, the words kept coming up in his speech, he, all the while, feeling that it sounded foolish to mention that it was done with the right arm.
I glanced toward Francezka while Count Saxe was speaking. There are some inconveniences attached to sharpness of intellect—nothing escapes it. As Count Saxe proceeded with his recital, I saw that Francezka had seen at a glance the mystery in it. I had no apprehension of any show of agitation on her part, she was a woman of too flawless courage and too good an actress, but she would not suffer the less. I saw a shadow come over her eyes as I had seen a black cloud darken the face of the lake at Capello. I saw her hands tremble405slightly. She looked steadily at Count Saxe, and avoided the gaze of Gaston Cheverny which became fixed on her. He had taken more wine than usual. His steady glances, although smiling enough, were calculated to draw her gaze toward him.
At last, as if forced against her will, she raised her eyes to his, and in them was doubt and despair. All this went on secretly as it were, amid the talking, the laughing, the singing of a hundred persons at the supper, with a band of more than forty musicians twanging in the music gallery above us. Soon after this, the company arose and went into the grand ball room. Thebranlewas at once formed, and Francezka, as on the night before, led it with Count Saxe. She showed not the slightest tremor or agitation, but I knew of the wild beating of her heart under the lace and jewels.
Gaston Cheverny was the hero of the hour. He danced, too, and the women, who all adore brute courage, wooed him with their smiles and arch glances. I saw him dancing with Madame Fontange, whom both Francezka and I had seen him chasing up the great staircase two days before. Francezka was dancing in the sameminuet de la cour. There is a part when, to languorous music, the gentlemen, with their plumed hats, sweeping the ground, bow low to the ladies. As Gaston Cheverny did this, I saw suddenly flash into his eyes that look of Regnard Cheverny’s. Francezka saw it, too. It was the very end of the minuet.
In the confusion that followed the breaking up of the dance Francezka disappeared. In a little while there was a hue and cry raised for Madame Cheverny. Messengers were sent after her. She was in her rooms, and406sent word back that she was fatigued with the chase that day, and as she was to rehearse next day as well as act, she begged to be excused. When I heard this message repeated, I left the ball room, and going up the great spiral staircase, open to the moonlight which flooded the earth, stopped opposite Francezka’s window. The sky was studded with glowing stars, and a great silver lamp of a moon made the night radiant. Below, lights were shining from every window, and the swell of the music kept rhythm with the beat of the dancers’ feet. But there, at that lonely height, all was still as death. Francezka’s window opened. It was not four feet from me.
“I knew your step,” she said.
I remained silent and awkward. My heart, aching for her pain, had brought my body thither, but after I had reached her, I knew not what to say. She still wore her splendid gown and all her jewels.
“I know all about thatcoup de grâcewith his right arm,” she said in a voice quiet, though trembling a little. “Do you wonder that I am always in terror of something, I know not what? One thing is certain. I do not know Gaston any longer. He is as strange, even stranger to me than he is to you. Also, he is as kind, as devoted to me as ever he was. I hate and dread mysteries—and I am enveloped in one.”
She continued looking at me for a moment; I still knew not what to say. Then, she softly closed the window. I remained out there on the stairs until the December cold forced me to seek the fire in the great hall below. There sat Gaston Cheverny, among a number of gentlemen. He was the gayest, and might be adjudged407the comeliest, gracefullest, most accomplished man there, excepting always Maurice, Count of Saxe.
The next day, the king left Chambord, but the other guests stayed on for a full fortnight.
It often occurred to me, that Chambord in its palmiest days, of Francis the First with his Ronsard, of Louis le Grand with his Molière, never sheltered more wit, beauty and courage, than it did at this time. The wit and courage of Count Saxe are too well-known to need comment, and the same may be said of the Duc de Noailles, Marshal Boufflers, Monsieur d’Argental, and others then at Chambord. As for beauty, combined with wit, Francezka Capello led all the ladies, but there were other gifted ones. Even Madame du Châtelet, in spite of her everlasting algebra and Newton’s Principia, was not an ill-looking woman. Madame Villars and Madame Fontange were charming. The presence of these ladies and others, all remarkable for spirit, was ever after alleged as the reason for the disappearance of the celebrated pane of glass, in one of the windows of the yellow saloon which was used as the theater.
On this window pane Francis the First had scratched this ungallant distich:
Toute femme varie,Mal habile qui s’y fie.
One night, Monsieur Voltaire read this aloud, and kept the whole saloon in a roar over his idea of what Francis the First would have said were he to come to life then. His tirade was interrupted by Francezka and Madame Villars seizing him, blindfolding and tying408him with their scarfs and putting him for punishment into a sort of improvised stocks. In vain Monsieur Voltaire called upon the gentlemen to assist him; he was left helpless in the hands of the ladies, who maltreated him severely. Monsieur Voltaire’s evident enjoyment of his punishment at the hands of these captivating creatures brought about one of those domestic tempests which frequently disturbed the atmosphere of Cirey and of the “Petit Palais” on the isle of St. Louis.
It was said that in the heat of the discussion next morning about it, Madame du Châtelet threw Newton’s Principia at Monsieur Voltaire’s head, and he made a narrow miss by dodging. Certain it is, they had high words, and Madame du Châtelet in a huff left the castle some days before Monsieur Voltaire; and it was noted that he seemed much gayer and more gallant after the lady’s departure than before.
Meanwhile, the pane of glass mysteriously disappeared. I have no doubt it was accidentally broken by one of those little rogues of pages of honor, who was afraid to acknowledge his fault; but Monsieur Voltaire chose to put it on the ladies in general and on Francezka in particular, and there was great sport and much wit over the matter. Francezka was the gayest, the airiest, the most daring of the ladies; she never more said a single word to me concerning that misery which she had represented to me as eating her heart out; and though as kind, as tender to me as ever, she rather avoided private conversations with me—for which I was glad.
Gaston seemed to me to become more like the Gaston409of old than he had been, but my heart did not warm to him, nor could I forget that incident of his killing the wild boar. He made no allusion to this whatever, and continued to use his left arm only. I would have given much to know what he supposed we thought of it.
Of course, the play was high, on the nights when there were cards, and Count Saxe enriched several of his guests by his losses. He lost magnificently, and won with the greatest modesty.
During this fortnight the consumption of victuals, wine and horse feed was something stupendous, but my master never grumbled about the charges. Luckily, he had Beauvais to look after the wine and victual, and myself to look after the horse feed.
At last came the day of departure. The servants and baggage wagons were sent on some hours in advance and at nine o’clock in the morning the company all set out together for Blois, where they were to disperse. Gaston Cheverny rode with the gentlemen, and Francezka traveled alone in her coach. She bade me an affectionate good by and begged me to come with Count Saxe to the château of Capello, in the spring. Apparently she was happy and composed, but I knew she was neither. There was a searching and anxious expression in her eyes which, in spite of her smiles and gaiety, showed me a heart disturbed. That night every soul in the castle was in bed a little after nine o’clock, and I think we all slept a week.