So long as there was a human eye upon her, Beatrice of Ferrara governed the mingled and passionate feelings that struggled with each other in her bosom, and would fain have had the mastery of her also. After a time, however, when she had preserved her apparent calmness long enough to deceive completely those around her; when she had drawn, with a hand full of grace and fancy, the groups of flowers which were to serve as patterns for her maiden's embroidery--had struck the chords of her lute with a careless but skilful hand, and talked for some ten minutes on a butterfly--she desired to be left alone.
Then however, when, with the door closed and the arras drawn, there was no eye upon her but that of Heaven, she once more gave way to all she felt. "Oh, God! Oh, God!" she cried, clasping her small hands, "to be thus treated by one whom I have so deeply loved--for whom I have done so much--for whose sake I sacrificed my nights and days, scattered my fortunes, left my state and station, took on me menial offices, put my life in peril, and even my good name to risk--and more, far more, for whom I forgot and pardoned those errors that women forget least easily, and loved him still, even when he sported with my love as a thing of nought! Oh, God! oh, God! that he who, if ever man yet believed the love of woman to be a pure and holy thing, should have held the feelings of my heart most sacred--that he should dare to talk to me the words of shame, the vile sophisms of guilt and infamy; that he should dream that I--I who have stood alone, in the midst of a depraved court, the wonder and hatred of them all--that I should become his paramour, his leman, to be held or discarded at his pleasure--to play him sweet airs upon the lute, and sing to him when he was in the mood, and be called the Italian mistress of the gay Count d'Aubin!" and, as she called up all the images of the degradation he had proposed, she strained her hands upon one another till the clear blood vanished from beneath the small finger nails; and she raised her dark eyes to heaven, as if asking, "Is it possible that God can permit such baseness."
"It is my own fault!" she cried at length; "it is my own fault! I should have known too well what a vile slave man is--how he licks the dust beneath our feet, so long as we tread upon his neck, and turns to smite us as soon as we smile upon him. I should have known it, and with haughty dignity and distant sternness commanded the love that I have stooped to win. It is my own fault, weak girl that I am--it is my own fault! He thought that she who could go masquerading in boy's attire, and make herself the companion of grooms and horse-boys for his sake--that she who could dare the perils of the camp in a strange guise--could come and go, at the risk of question and discovery, through the gates of a beleaguered city--could bind up his wounds with her own hands, and watch for fourteen nights by the side of his sick bed,--would surely refuse him nothing--no, not her honour. Or perhaps even now, in his profligacy of heart, he scoffs and jeers at the thought of my fastidiousness; or deems that, by a cunning device and affectation of virtue, I sought to patch up a ruined reputation by a marriage with him. He may hold me as some light wanton! Out upon him! out upon him! Did he but know the heart he tramples on!" and bursting into tears, she covered her face with her hands, and remained thus for several minutes in silent bitterness of heart.
The tears again seemed to relieve her; and at length she wiped them from her eyes, and looked out vacantly upon the gay and sunny landscape that lay stretched in bright confusion from the height on which the chateau stood, to some distant hills, that, rising again on the opposite side of a deep valley, towered up, now covered with green woods, now massed in the grey distance.
However resolutely the soul may hold itself within the citadel of the heart besieged by grief, the garrison of that sad fortress will be affected by the sight of things that pass beyond its limits. Sweet sounds, though we listen to them not, will tend to soothe; and pleasant objects, though the eye appears void of all remark, will tranquillize and calm. There were lovelier scenes to be found on earth, than that which lay beneath her sight, and Beatrice had seen many fairer far: but over it the sun, now slanting down towards his rest, was casting soft broad shadows; and now and then a slow passing cloud came, like the faint and pleasing shade of melancholy that sometimes steals upon our happiest moments, and touched the bright things below with a blue ethereal hue as it flitted on above them. Nothing was seen to move in the sky or on the earth, but that slow cloud and its soft shadow; but, on a bough before the window, a gay-hearted bird carolled volubly to the evening sun, mingling, however, now and then, with its blither notes, a tone or two in a sad minor key, which made its song harmonise both with the scene and with the heart of her who listened. I am wrong; the heart of Beatrice did not harmonise with it,--her bosom was full of griefs too deep, too lasting, to assimilate with the glad voice of nature; but still the melancholy tones so far chastened the cheerful song of the bird, that she could hear it and not think it harsh, and the shadows of that cloud were just sufficient to make her feel the brightness not blighting. She sat and gazed; and though neither her eye nor her ear marked anything with precision, she fell into a dreamy fit of musing, and that musing was softer and less bitter than it had been.
True, she thought of the course of her love, and of that love's blight. She knew that for her joys of life, the dreams, the hopes, the imaginings--all the green things of a happy heart, in short--were withered, and blasted, and shrivelled up, like the leaves of a bough broken off by the lightning. To be calm and passionless, sad and solitary, were the brightest aspirations which her once ardent bosom could harbour now; but still to think over such a state, was peace, to the bitter paroxysm that went before. Did she ever think that hope might revive in regard to him she had loved? Never! For though her love was not over--ah, no! and she would have given her fortune and her life to have blessed him; yet so lost was all her esteem and all her confidence, that could she have thought her heart would ever betray her into one weak fancy in regard to him, she would have torn it out to trample it beneath her feet. She loved him still, she knew, she felt she loved him; for her heart was as a pile of incense which that passion had lighted, and the fire could only be extinguished by the end of her own being; but still the dream, the bright and golden dream, of happiness was over; and not even love--that ardent and undying love, which was now an indivisible part of her being and her soul--could have bribed her, by the brightest promises of hope, to see that man again, or hear his lips pronounce one other word. No! bitterly, but fully, was she convinced at last of his unworthiness; and though she still loved the erring and earthly being whom her own imagination had purified and adorned, the dream of hope was at an end--the voice of the syren was mute: and yet a consolation gradually stole upon her heart, soothed the anguish and disappointment, and did away the indignation and disdain. On it, too, she framed the scheme of her future life, as she paused and thought of the coming years. That consolation was the conviction, the certainty, the indubitable assurance, that she was beloved; that he who had insulted and injured her--who had repaid her tenderness with ingratitude, and her confidence by baseness--still loved her deeply, passionately, and alone. What then was her resolution? Not to watch him farther, even through the eyes of others--not to seek for tidings of his actions, or to dream that he would amend; but on the contrary, to fly him far and for ever; to shut her ears against every rumour from the land in which he lived, and dead as he was to her, to consider him no more amongst the living; but still, as the balm and the comfort of the long after-years, to remember that she had been beloved--that, impure and dark as was the flame that had been lighted upon the altar of his heart, still it had been kindled, and had burned for her. This was to be the theme of memory--the occupation of her long, lonely hours--the matter for the immortal working of thought--the balsam for her wounded heart--the light of her long night of maiden widowhood,--that she had been loved by him she loved!
As she thus thought, and as she thus determined, the bitterness of her grief diminished. Dark and melancholy, indeed, was the fate that she pictured for herself, but yet it was relief, for it offered her tranquillity at least; and she had learned, amidst the strife of hope, and fear, and passion, to value God's best blessing--peace. Her meditations had been long, and had not exactly followed the even course in which they have been here detailed; for tears were not wanting to chequer them, nor many an angry and a bitter thought to struggle hard against the not unsound philosophy with which she sought to preserve, for future years, all, out of the bright harvest of her hopes now blighted, that had escaped the storm. But the tears grew less frequent, and the bitter pangs of disappointment waxed fainter, as the minutes flew; and at length, when she had determined how to shape her course through the rest of life's long and dangerous voyage, she raised her eyes once more to the heaven above and the landscape below; and the objects which met her gaze were more marked and noted now, than they had been not long before.
The change upon the scene, however, was but slight--the same bird was still tuning its unwearied throat in the tree hard by--the same unmoving stillness dwelt over the whole view--and not a living object was to be seen upon the solitary road that wound away through a thinly peopled part of the much-depopulated realm of France. But the shadows had grown longer, and the little stream which had lately glistened in the sunshine, now rested scarcely visible in the brown shade of the hills; and those changes, slight as they were, to a quick and imaginative mind like that of Beatrice, might well speak of time's rapid pace, and man's slow resolves. Stretching forth her hand to a small silver bell, she rung is sharply; and when the girl Annette appeared, bade her call Bartholo instantly.
It was not long before the dwarf obeyed the summons; and though he entered with that air of deference and respect, which was habitual to him in the presence of Beatrice, yet there was a gleam of satisfaction in his eye which he could not quell; and which, had she been in her usual keen and observing state of mind, would not have escaped the glance of his mistress. But Beatrice scarcely saw him as he stood before her; but sat with her eyes bent upon the ground, and her busy thoughts straying sorrowfully over the past.
"You sent for me, Madam," said the dwarf at length; "and I come joyfully, because I have not been thus honoured of late so often as I used formerly to be, when Bartholo's scheme, or Bartholo's advice was well nigh his lady's oracle."
"I have somewhat distrusted thee, Bartholo!" said Beatrice, gravely. "Many of my plans have failed in thy hands----"
"But by no fault of mine, lady!" cried the dwarf, eagerly. "What have I done to be distrusted? How have I deserved to lose your confidence? What secret have I betrayed? How have I acted to frustrate anything that you proposed?"
"Those, Bartholo," replied the lady, "those who suffer themselves to be discovered in their art, by open acts or heedless words, are politicians of a different stuff from that of which thou art made. But there are such things as looks, and smiles, and frowns, and curlings of the upper lip, which, to the eye of Beatrice of Ferrara, are often as legible as a book fairly printed in the language of her native land. I have somewhat doubted thee; but I may have been deceived--and God send it may be so! for I would not willingly believe that any one whom I have nourished with my bread, and have rewarded not only with dull gold, but also with inestimable favour and affection, would deceive or betray me; far less could I wish to think, that one who has known me from infancy, and on whom my parents, as well as myself, have rained benefits, would wrong my confidence."
"Lady!" replied the dwarf vehemently, "so help me Heaven, as I would sooner die than do ought that you do not wish, except for your own good!"
"Ay, there may we bitterly fall out, good Bartholo, if we speak farther!" replied Beatrice. "What I require is service, and not judgment of my actions; and henceforth let me but see that you even waver in obeying, or fulfil not my behest, whatever it may be, to the very letter, and I will send you from me never to return again. However, I somewhat doubted thee, and therefore have not trusted thee in matters where I required uninquiring promptitude and exact obedience. Those matters now are over, and a smoother trodden path lies out before me."
Bartholo started, for he had heard and marked much that had passed; and yet she spoke so calmly, that he deemed it impossible one of her passionate nature could bear the blight of all her hopes so meekly. "It has wrung my heart, lady," he said, in a tone of deep despondency, that touched Beatrice more at this moment than it might have done at any other, because grief is credulous of grief. "It has wrung my heart, lady, to have been distrusted by you for an hour, though the wound would have gone deeper had I deserved it. But you know not, lady, what it is, when one has been brought up from boyhood near so bright and good a person as yourself; has been habituated to watch your every word, to obey you, and to hasten before your wishes to please you; has become keen of wit and daring of execution for the sole service of your behests; and has watched you expand from loveliness to loveliness, like a flower in the spring tide--you know not what it is to be looked coldly on, even for a moment; to be distrusted by her whom one would give the inmost heart's best blood to serve."
The tone touched Beatrice, for it was unlike the dwarf's ordinary cynicism: but there was something in the words, though they were respectfully spoken, which did not please her; and she might have replied more coldly than the kindness of her heart approved, had not the dwarf gone on rapidly:--"At your birth, lady, I was little more than twelve years old; and from that hour to this, I have followed your fortunes and obeyed you in every word, even to quitting you when you bade me quit you, and taking apparent service, once with a man I hated, and once with a man I despised; and now I find that you have distrusted me, you have looked cold upon me, you have kept me from your presence! Lady, I beseech you, do not so again; rather as you say, send me from you for ever. Call me to you, and say, 'Bartholo, thou pleasest me no longer, get thee gone, and take thy stinted and misshapen form from before my eyes; let me see no more thy apish countenance! Despised of all the world, thou art despised of me also; and though the dwarf has been my sport and mockery, has stood in the place of parrot, or lapdog, or marmoset, I am now tired of the goblin; so get thee hence!' Say this! say a thousand things more biting and bitter still, but never, oh never, lady, distrust me again."
"Nay, Bartholo, nay!" replied Beatrice, better pleased with his last words than those that preceded them. "Thou goest too far, in the bitterness of thine anger. I have never contemned, I have never despised thee! and have felt pity for thy fate, less because it truly deserved pity, than because it grieved thee. As to the past, thou ownest thyself, that if thou hadst deemed my interest required it, thou wouldest have betrayed my confidence; I was just, therefore, in mistrusting thee; but it was thy vanity I doubted--vanity that must judge of my happiness better than I can myself--and not thy love, Bartholo, which I do verily believe would seek that happiness for me at the risk of life."
"Oh! never, never doubt that, lady!" cried the dwarf, casting himself at her feet, and kissing her hand; "never, never doubt that; for your utmost trust therein can only do me scanty justice."
Beatrice withdrew her hand. "Enough, enough!" she said. "We understand each other for the future. You always remember, that I am the best judge of my own happiness; and I----" He shook his head with a mournful look, and clasping his hands together, cast his eyes upon the ground. "What mean you, knave?" cried Beatrice, for his action interrupted her more than words could have done. "What would you by that gesture?"
"I would ask, lady," said the dwarf, in a firm but melancholy tone,--"If you have lately proved yourself so good a judge of your own happiness? Pardon me, my noble lady! Pardon me! but did I not long since predict all that has happened? Did I not tell you, when first you fixed your love on one whose name I will not pronounce, so deeply do I hate him for his conduct towards you----"
"Hate him not, Bartholo!" interrupted Beatrice, fixing her bright dark eyes upon the dwarf as she spoke--"hate him not, Bartholo; for I love him still! and he loves me!"
A bright flush played over the pale cheek of the dwarf, like a gleam of summer lightning upon the twilight sky, and his nether lip quivered; but for some moments he made no reply, except by again clasping his hands together, and gazing down upon the ground, as if in deep meditation. "Lady!" he said at length, "you love him still! I doubt it not; for yours is one of those firm hearts, on which a line once engraved can never be effaced. But alas, alas! he loves not you; and all your sad experience will not convince you, solely because you still love him."
"Not so, Bartholo," replied Beatrice. "All my experience convinces me that he does love me; and I thank God for it, though most likely I shall never see his face again. Do not interrupt me! For once I condescend to speak to you of my past and my future actions; but after this, we mention such things no more. I am not the weak being you believe me. I placed you in the service of Philip d'Aubin, now years ago, not that you might act as a spy for me upon each pitiful and insignificant occurrence of his life, or note every failing or every falsehood he committed against the vows he had plighted to me; but, on the contrary, to satisfy myself on two great points, whereon my future happiness depended, first, whether he loved me, and next, whether he might not become worthy of my love. When he left Paris and retired into Maine, shaken by still greater doubts, I determined to watch him myself more nearly, and made you prepare me an entrance into the family of his uncle; but it was still for those two great objects that I risked so much. Circumstances rendered this scheme nearly fruitless: the death of his uncle, his return towards Paris, his separation from his cousin, all thwarted me; but still, step by step, and little by little, his character developed itself before me. At length, hoping and confiding still, I had the man I loved, followed by my emissaries, traced from place to place, withdrawn from the fatal battle which ruined the cause he had espoused, and brought hither as thou knowest. Here I watched him from sickness unto health. Here the last trait of his character displayed itself. All is open--all is clear! My two questions are resolved! I am satisfied. He loves me, Bartholo! He does love me! But he is unworthy of my love!"
She spoke rapidly and eagerly, but she had by this time regained her command over herself; and not a tear rose in her eye, as she briefly touched upon the various efforts which love, deeper, stronger than even she herself believed, had urged her on to make, and upon the sad result of all her endeavours. As she ended, indeed, she raised her eyes to the sky; and, led away by memory, forgot the presence of the page and the conclusion of her speech, and, gazing out for many minutes, remained in silent but painful meditation. Still she gave no way to grief; and, after awhile, again turned towards the dwarf, saying--"Well, Bartholo, so much for the past! Now for the future. For eleven long years have I sojourned in this fair realm of France, but my stay therein draws towards an end. The last tie that bound me to this place is broken! My soul yearns towards my native land. Bartholo, I am about to tread back my way to Italy."
"Indeed! indeed!" cried the dwarf, his whole face brightening. "Then all is right, indeed. But when, lady--oh, tell me when?"
"I knew not that thou wert such a lover of thy native land!" replied Beatrice, as she gazed upon his small features beaming with a sort of triumphant joy. "I have heard thee call thyself a citizen of the world; and vow that nature, when she made thee smaller than the common race of other countries, by unfitting thee for any, had fitted thee for all alike. But I see that, smother our feelings however we may, the love of our own land will not give way so long as memory binds us to it with the thousand ties of sweet associations and early happiness. Well, be thy mind at ease! Eight days, eight short days, and I am on my way hence, unless some unforeseen event delay me. I have but to withdraw my poor girls from Paris, at least those that like to follow me; to place the somewhat wasted wealth which I have here under the protection of the laws, if the laws, indeed, can give protection now-a-day; to make sure of one point more, which will soon be settled, and then to depart."
The face of the dwarf, which, during the whole of his interview with his lady, had been agitated with strong feelings either of mortification or of joy, now at once resumed the look of calm bitter cynicism, which, though perhaps more natural to his features, was, at all events, more habitual. "Ay, lady!" he said, "so it is ever! There is ever one point more to be made sure of when a lady's love and her judgment lead her different ways; and that one point more will very surely keep your steps from Italy. So I will e'en go and sing."
"Knave, thou art somewhat too bold!" cried Beatrice. "I have pampered thee too much, and made thee insolent; but thou shalt be better taught in future!"
"Not so, lady, not so!" cried the dwarf, in a deprecatory tone. "Forgive the first outbreaking of my disappointment. I thought our journey to Italy sure, when suddenly came that 'one point more;' and I know human nature all too well to doubt, that upon one small point love can raise up such mighty prison-walls, that the best climber, ere he could escape, would break his neck in the attempt to scale them."
"Like others who fancy they know human nature well," answered Beatrice, "thou cheatest thyself with thine own imaginations. That one point more will not detain me here; but whether thy curiosity regarding it--and which I clearly see--originate in folly or in policy, it shall not be gratified. Content thyself with what I choose to tell thee, and ask no more! And now listen to my commands. Make every preparation for a journey; and in regard to this house, on which I have wasted so much wealth that might have been better spent, take order that, if possible, it be guarded against the chances of these civil wars till peace be again established. You understand what I would have. When law is once more recognised in France, perchance it and the hotel in Paris may be sold, and I have nothing more in a land that I no longer love. Now get thee hence and leave me; but let all things be done quickly."
The dwarf replied nothing, but retired at once; and Beatrice, after following him with her eyes to the door, sat for several moments in silence, with an air of anxious thought. "I doubt that imp!" she said at length. "I doubt that imp! There has of late been a fire and an eagerness in his words when he speaks to me that I love not; and I have remarked that his eyes, when he thinks that mine are not on him, have a somewhat bold familiarity with my person." And as she thus thought, a slight shudder passed over her. "I doubt him," she went on; "and he is bold, and cunning, and politic, to a point rarely reached by those whose communion with their fellow-men is more extended than his, and who, consequently, find a thousand things to call their attention from their darling schemes. I doubt him, and will have him watched! I fear he may have betrayed me already, but he shall do so no more. Annette!" she cried aloud, "Annette!"
The girl appeared, and her mistress bade her send Joachim to her. Some minutes then elapsed; but at length appeared the old man who had so skilfully managed the little comedy which had enabled Beatrice and Eugenie de Menancourt to pass the gates of Paris. "Joachim!" said his mistress, as he entered, "have a strict watch put upon the dwarf Bartholo: I doubt him; I doubt his faith and honesty."
"And so do I, lady," replied the man. "I myself heard you command him not to show himself in the sight of the Count d'Aubin, and to my certain knowledge he visited him alone in his chamber."
"Indeed!" said Beatrice, thoughtfully; "indeed! That may mean much! But have him watched, without making it apparent. Quick, Joachim! You, at least, I can trust."
"You may, dear lady!" replied the old man, laying his hand upon his breast; and then, bowing low, he left Beatrice to long, deep, anxious thought.
There be many hearts that, in the full fruition and delight of what they have obtained by evil means, know not remorse, and taste such happiness as gratified passion can bestow. There be also those firm and constant hearts which in the midst of trouble and adversity shake off one half of calamity's heavy load by the strength of conscious virtue and integrity; and there be some so dull and so obtuse, as, under any circumstances, not to see and appreciate the worst portion of their fate. But the curse of curses, the deepest earthly retribution that can be poured upon the head of the wicked, is to find their schemes frustrated, and their desires disappointed, by the very evil means which they have taken to accomplish them. Such was the case of Philip d'Aubin at the moment he left Beatrice of Ferrara; but passion, and mortified vanity, and angry pride, combined to support him for the time, and to shut his eyes to the stinging certainty that his own vices had produced his own misfortune.
For an instant he gazed after the fair girl he had lost for ever, as she turned from him in beautiful disdain; and he felt tempted to follow her, and casting himself once more at her feet, to acknowledge his errors, and throw away his faults in repentance. But with her anger there had mingled a look of scorn, against which the worst weakness of his nature rose in arms. Her indignation, her reproaches, her wrath, he could have borne, but the contempt that curled her lip roused vanity against repentance; and setting his teeth firm, he muttered "Never! never!" and took another path to the chateau. Passing hastily to the apartments which he had occupied, he bade the servant that he found in waiting, summon themaître d'hôtelto his presence, and questioned him on his arrival in regard to what part of the baggage with which he had joined the army of the League at Ivry had been brought thither from the field, and where were the soldiers and attendants who accompanied him.
"Neither baggage nor attendants of your own followed you here, sir," replied the man. "You were carried off from the field insensible by four or five of my lady's horsemen, and came hither still in your buff-coat and part of your broken armour. The purse which was on your person, sir, and its contents, are in that closet, if you have not taken it. Your horse is well, and in the stable; but your troops and your attendants were all dispersed; nor have we heard aught of any of them, except that some found their way to the Chateau d'Aubin; for which, and for your lands in Maine, we learn his majesty the king, at the request of Monsieur de St. Real, has granted an immunity, lest they should be plundered in the war."
There was a dryness in the man's tone that displeased the Count d'Aubin; and eyeing him with a somewhat frowning brow, he said, "Well, then, I will go forth from your lady's dwelling as I entered it, alone. Order my horse to be saddled: doubtless a countryman can easily be hired to guide me on my way to my own lands. How far is it hence to Vibraye or La Ferte?"
"Some thirty leagues, sir, by the road," replied themaître d'hôtel; "but if you cross through the woods and by the hills--where the way is not bad--the distance is hardly more than half as much."
"Well, then," said D'Aubin, "I will take the shortest; seek me a guide;" and while the man was gone upon that errand, he walked up and down the room with his hands clasped, and his eyes bent upon the floor. Even then his better spirit whispered that it was not yet too late; but the fiend rose against such counsel, and setting his teeth hard, he took his purse from the spot where it had been placed, and descended to the court-yard. His horse was already prepared; and one or two of the innumerable retainers that thronged a great mansion in those days were loitering about below. Themaître d'hôtelreturned in a few moments with a guide, riding on one of the small horses of the country, and D'Aubin, putting his foot in the stirrup, slowly mounted his charger. As he did so, he ran his eye over the many small windows of the building; but nothing like a female face was to be seen at any of them; and, turning to the attendants who stood around, somewhat marvelling to see him thus depart alone and unnoticed, after all that had lately passed, he bestowed upon them half the contents of his purse, and then, with a slow pace and frowning brow, rode through the gates into the country beyond.
There was a well of bitterness in his heart, which kept him silent as he rode on; and more than half an hour passed ere he even asked a question of the guide. Nor was his a mind to be soothed or comforted, or rendered better or wiser, by thinking over events in which his own follies had acted so principal a share. Too much a spoilt child of vanity willingly to examine his own conduct with steady and impartial eyes, he felt himself injured, rather than reproved, and meditated chiefly how he might heal the wounds which had been inflicted on his pride. At length, however, the sight of a distant town recalled to his mind the state of the land through which he travelled; and he remembered that it might be absolutely necessary for his own security to ascertain the exact political situation of the different cities in the vicinity. The guide, to whom his questions were of course addressed, was shrewd and intelligent enough; and from his answers D'Aubin found that the track, through which his road lay, thinly peopled, and possessing few places of any importance, had known, as yet, but little of the evils of civil war. A body of troops had, indeed, occasionally crossed it. One or two of the defensible chateaux were held for the king or for the League; now and then, too, a troop of plunderers attached to one of the parties would appear, carry off what pillage they could collect, and then retire; but no regular force was known to be in the neighbourhood, except indeed a company of horse arquebusiers, stationed at the small town of La Loupe, on the part of the king, in order to keep open his communication with Maine and Touraine. The guide, himself, was a strong Royalist; and as the Count d'Aubin soon ascertained that fact, he neither gave him any information in regard to his own party and opinions, nor trusted too much the man's reports of great successes attending the king's arms, and of the return of peace and prosperity, wherever the country heartily resumed the virtues of obedience and submission.
Having now, by the questions necessary to ascertain the state of the country, broken the dull and sullen taciturnity which had bound him for some time, after quitting the chateau of Beatrice of Ferrara, D'Aubin continued the conversation, as a relief from thought; and many was the subject on which he needed information, as during the last few weeks he had given up all his thoughts to happier topics, and to brighter dreams, than either war or policy could supply. Curiosity of every kind had seemed dead within him; but now he learned much from the answers of his guide, and guessed more from many a vague distorted tale, which the man had heard, concerning the late movements of the armies;--tales which, indeed, contained in general less truth than falsehood, but which were easily rectified, by the previous knowledge and better judgment of the narrator's auditor. Much, too, did D'Aubin hear of Beatrice of Ferrara; of her habits of life since she had quitted Paris; of those kindlier virtues and gentler pursuits which a capital suffers not to show themselves; and of the ardent and enthusiastic love which the peasantry around had learned to bear towards her. He listened and mused, and good and evil purposes struggled hard together in his heart; but the evil was still predominant; and though a lingering inclination to cast himself at her feet, and sue for pardon, would make itself felt, more often still did he ponder upon the means of teaching her, who had so bitterly rebuked him, to repent in agony of spirit the resolution she had formed against him. Ever and anon, too, with a feeling of still unconquered triumph, he thought, "She loves me still! she loves me still! and the man who possesses a woman's love holds her in bonds that it is difficult to break."
Thus past the hours; and towards seven o'clock the guide stopped at the pooraubergeof a small open village, in order, as he said, to give the horses rest and provender. The scene was wild and hilly; and D'Aubin now began to recognise the country around, which was little more than twelve French leagues from his own paternal dwelling. His recollection was vague, however, and not sufficient to justify him in dismissing his guide; and, anxious to proceed, he took no refreshment himself, but urged the man to hasten on, hoping, ere night had completely fallen, to reach some spot, whence he could go forward alone on the following morning. But the people of theaubergewere slow, and the guide, who was their acquaintance, still slower; inasmuch as, finding himself in comfortable quarters, he had predetermined to take up his abode there for the night. He looked out towards the west, declared that the sun was lower than he had thought for; looked out towards the south, and predicted a sharp storm. But D'Aubin was neither of a disposition, nor in a mood, to be delayed at any man's will and pleasure; and, in consequence, he urged such cogent arguments in regard to the payment of his guide's services, that the man did at length bestir himself, and the horses were brought to the door.
"How far is it to the little village of Neuville?" demanded D'Aubin, after they had ridden on about a mile.
"Four good leagues, Monseigneur," replied the man; "but before we reach that, we come to the chateau of Armençon, which has ever held out stoutly for the king, and we are sure of a hearty welcome there, should need be;" and as he spoke he looked up to that part of the sky which rested, as it were, upon the edge of the high hilly bank forming the southern boundary of the steep, narrow valley, or rather dell, up which their road led on into the forest. D'Aubin turned his eyes in the same direction, and beheld, what is very common in the valleys of the Seine and the Eure during summer, large leaden masses of cloud, in the shapes of rolling columns and sharp cones, rising up from behind the hill, clear, defined, and harsh upon the sky, like the side-scenes of a theatre. These are the invariable precursors of a thunder-storm; but often they roll on for many hours, changing from one fantastic shape to another, ere the fire within them breaks forth, and the strife begins. The Count paid them no farther attention than was evinced by slightly hurrying his pace. The track upon which he was now entering was broken ground, forest, and hill; but still the road lay on through the same dell, skirting the banks of a small stream which fell at no great distance into the higher Eure. The uplands on either side hid the sun, and afforded a shade which would have been pleasant in that hot season, had not the closeness of the atmosphere, and the want of the slightest wind, rendered the whole air equally oppressive. The day rapidly declined as the travellers rode on, and the clouds stretched wider overhead, while every now and then a faint, shifting, electric light played between the detached masses, and showed that the warfare of the elements was about to commence. D'Aubin was not a little anxious now to hurry on; but ere he had accomplished more than two leagues of the appointed way, night had fallen, and the storm had begun. The lightning D'Aubin heeded but little, though his horse would every now and then start and rear, as the bright glare gleamed across the narrow road; but he knew the violent deluge of rain, in which those storms generally end, would not be long ere it followed; and feeling himself far more fatigued than he expected, he loved not the thought of prolonging his journey under the outpouring of the watery sky. They had now reached the summit of the hill: the trees afforded but little shelter; and a few large drops began to patter upon the leaves. "Ride on, my lord, ride on," cried the guide, who saw D'Aubin's lately acquired strength beginning to flag; "the chateau of Armençon is not above a league off."
"But I do not intend to stop till I reach Neuville," replied D'Aubin, "Think you if we pause here under the shelter of some of the thickest trees that the storm may not pass off?"
"Not to-night, sir, not to-night," replied the man; "but why not stop at Armençon?" he continued with more eagerness, as the rain rapidly increased: "they will show you all hospitality there; and if you be just recovered from a sickness, as themaître d'hôteltold me, it will kill you to ride on for two or three hours more in a night like this."
"Two or three hours!" exclaimed D'Aubin. "What! to travel three leagues!"
"Ay, sir," answered the man, "even so. We are not here as if we were coursing a hare over the plains. We shall have to go up and down twenty steep hills ere we reach Neuville; but we shall be at Armençon in three quarters of an hour."
"But I do not choose to stop there," replied D'Aubin, hastily: and for a moment or two the man paused without reply. The next instant, however, he said in a respectful tone, "I guess how the matter is, sir: you are one of Mayenne's friends, and if so, good faith! you are right not to go near Armençon. They shot the captain's brother in cold blood, not long since, in Paris, and, by my soul, it would go hard with any of the Leaguers if they were found within the chateau walls."
"I had nothing to do with the death of his brother," said D'Aubin, "but still I will not trust to an angry man. Tell me, however, my friend, can I trust toyou?"
"On my life you may, sir," replied the guide; "and I would not take you now into Armençon for my right hand. But it is coming on to pour: your cloak will soon be wet through; and hereabouts there should be a hut where the wood-cutters live in the spring and autumn. That will give better shelter than the trees; and most likely you may find a bed of rushes, and some pine-wood to dry your cloak withal."
"That were luck, indeed!" replied D'Aubin: "let us hasten on then, my friend; and if you can meet with this hut, I will pay you for its shelter better than everaubergistewas paid."
The memory of the guide was exact; and their search was not long. The hut was, indeed, but four walls, thatched with stubble and plastered with mud; and the door, which was made of straw, interwoven with boughs, was lying detached upon the ground: but it was soon replaced; and the frequent flashes of lightning enabled them to discover the bed of moss and rushes which the guide had expected, and a small store of dried fragments of the resinous pine, which, lighted by a flint and steel, soon shed some better light upon the interior than was afforded by the fitful glare without. The interior was too small to admit the horses also; but D'Aubin satisfied himself with placing his own beast under a tree, and mentally saying, "He will do well enough," returned to the shelter of the hut, cast off his dripping cloak, and seated himself upon the pile of dried herbs.
Still the storm continued, and still the incessant pattering of the heavy rain bade the travellers be contented with the refuge they had found. For awhile D'Aubin endeavoured to occupy his thoughts by asking a number of questions of his guide, and listening to the long-winded stories which the other, feeling the moments of inactivity as tedious to his own restless and wandering nature as they were to the Count, willingly poured forth for the sake of doing something. At length, however, his stock exhausted itself; and an hour more passed in silence and expectation; but the storm still went on.
The guide's patience now gave way. "My Lord," he said, "you will be starved here, if I can find you nothing to eat. You took neither bit nor sup at theauberge, though you had ridden many a league; but amongst the houses that lie under the chateau of Armençon, I have a cousin, and can, I doubt not, procure a piece of meat and a flask of wine. I will say that it is for an old lady, whom I am guiding through the wood, and who cannot come on for the storm."
D'Aubin did feel exhausted, and in need of food; but still he hesitated to let the man depart, for in those days acts of treachery were not uncommon; and his life might depend upon his passing the castle of Armençon unobserved. The guide, however, insisted; and as there was no means of staying him without showing suspicions, which often produce the very evils they point at, the Count at length suffered him to depart, and remained alone, determined to try whether he could not sleep away the time while the peasant was absent.
The attempt was vain; and, stretched upon the bed of moss where the hard limbs of honest industry had enjoyed many a night of comfortable repose, the gay and glittering Count d'Aubin strove in vain to banish from his bosom the torment of thought. Memory rested on the past, and conscience knew her hour, and seized it with relentless power. His gone existence was spread out before him like a map; and the upbraiding voice within proclaimed each stage of folly and of vice through which he had proceeded, and still read its sad comment upon every act, showing his gradual downfall from honour, wealth, splendour, reputation, happiness, and love, by his own errors and vanities. The long procrastinated examination was forced upon his heart at length; and oh! with what minute agony the moral torturer wracked forth the inmost secrets of his bosom, and then broke him upon the wheel of despair. His fortune irreparably injured; he himself bound by large debts to an unfeeling mercenary; the party which he had joined against his conscience ruined and falling; his baffled schemes holding him up to the laughter of his light companions; the woman whose wealth was to have repaired the consequences of his own extravagance flying him with horror, and avoiding him with success; and the only woman whom he had ever really loved now regarding him with what had once been affection, changed, by his own infamy, into hatred and contempt. Such were the terrible matters on which reason, and conscience, and remorse had to comment during his hours of solitude; and, from the first moment that those thoughts arose, he felt that it would be a madness to deem that he could sleep. The agony of his mind affected his body too much even to suffer him to lie still; and starting up, he sometimes paced the narrow limits of the hut like a tiger in its cage, sometimes cast himself down in his fury, and cursed the hour that he was born. He reproached, he reviled himself for everything; and, in the torture that he felt when alone, exclaimed, "Fool that I was to let the boor leave me! even he were better than no one, in this gloomy, accursed place, with the lightning flashing eternally in my eyes, and the melancholy rain pattering over head."
As he thus thought, the sound of horses' feet splashing through the wet ground made itself heard in the intervals of the thunder, and the moment after, D'Aubin could distinguish that there was more than one traveller upon the road. A suspicion of his guide instantly crossed his mind, and was immediately confirmed by hearing his voice exclaim, "There, in that hut! You will find him there!"
The Count loosened his dagger in the sheath; and partly drew his sword, while, stepping back to the farther side of the hut, he watched for the opening of the disjointed door. A moment or two elapsed, during which D'Aubin could hear the stranger on the outside speaking as if to his horse, while he tied him under a tree; and then the matted screen was pushed back, and the diminutive figure of Bartholo, the dwarf, stood before him. Without uttering a word, Bartholo advanced towards the Count, and cast himself at his feet with a look of imploring deprecation that D'Aubin did not understand. It was explained in a moment, however. "My Lord," said the dwarf, earnestly, "my Lord, I find that when last I saw you I deceived you; and, by the counsel that I gave you, I have brought insult and disappointment upon your head. My fault was involuntary; but I deserve to be punished; and I have sought you myself; that you may wreak what vengeance upon me you like."
D'Aubin too well knew that to the counsels of his own perverse and pampered heart he had listened more than to those of the dwarf; but he was glad, nevertheless, to find any one on whom he could heap a part of the blame; and while he snatched eagerly at the opportunity of accusing another, he felt a degree of gratitude for the relief which mitigated the bitterness of self-reproach.
"Alas! alas! my poor Bartholo!" he said, "you did deceive me, indeed! But I am willing to believe that you deceived me unwittingly; and I seek not to punish one who wished to serve me, though he failed."
"You are noble and generous ever, sir," replied the dwarf; "and though she does not know the value of the heart she tramples on, others do, and I will conceal it no longer. You little know, sir, how much art, intrigue, and exertion were made use of to estrange from you a heart that loved you, and rob you not only of your promised bride, but of her affection."
"How say you?" cried D'Aubin, eagerly. "Speak more clearly, good Bartholo; I do not understand."
"I know not whether I ought to speak more clearly or not," answered the dwarf; "for although it is her pleasure and her pride to sport with your love, and trample on you, yet it would wring her heart to hear that, notwithstanding all her wiles, you had been successful with her rival; and though to you she may appear but as a cold coquette, to me, who have known her from her childhood, she has ever been a good lady and a kind."
"Bartholo!" cried D'Aubin, sternly, "you have in one thing miscounselled me, and rendered me miserable. You but now professed a wish to atone for that error; and I call upon you at once, to clear away the obscurity which hangs over all these transactions in which I have been engaged, and to let me see how I really stand between Beatrice of Ferrara and Eugenie de Menancourt."
"I will, sir! I will!" cried the dwarf, "let it cost me what it may. But I must be quick, for the tale is intricate, and your guide, who directed me hither, as I was following you to Armençon, will soon be back. Listen, then," he continued, while his face resumed all its bitter cynicism. "Think you, my Lord, that a girl, all gentleness and sweetness, like Mademoiselle de Menancourt, could in a moment be converted into a being as stern and resolute as an old warrior, without some very potent magic? Think you that she who once loved you to all appearance as much as a young maiden ever ventures to show, would all at once affect hate and detestation towards you without some very mighty cause? Think you that a girl who knows nothing of the world, and is as timid as a young deer, could alone find means to cheat hard-judging Mayenne and keen Madame Montpensier, and pass a blaspheming Huguenot soldier off for a Catholic priest, frustrate you and all of them by a false marriage, and then effect her escape from a beleaguered city, where a thousand eyes were upon her; and all this by the simple exertion of her own courage, ingenuity, and daring? Pshaw! One would think to hear it, and to hear that you and Mayenne believed it, that the warriors and the politicians of this world were changed into old women. My Lord! my Lord! Eugenie de Menancourt loved you, loves you, will love you still; and only now weeps the perfidy which my noble lady--thinking, as all women do, that everything is fair in love--taught her to fancy that you had committed against her. Had not Mademoiselle de Menancourt learned to think, from the first moment she set her foot in Paris, that your whole heart and soul were given to the Lady Beatrice, and that you sought her hand only on account of her wealth, she would at once, on her father's death, have flown to your arms for protection. But, day by day, and hour by hour, that idea has been strengthened and confirmed in her mind by a voice whose eloquence no one knows better than you and I. Another time I will point out how; but at present you will trust me--for your wits are not darkened enough to doubt so apparent a fact--when I tell you, that the carrying off the priest, the false marriage, and the escape from Paris, are all owing to the fertile brain and daring courage of Beatrice of Ferrara. She it was who robbed you of your bride; and she it is who now conceals her within three leagues of this place, weeping that Philip d'Aubin is false, and resolving to enter a monastery as soon as she hears of his marriage to another."
"But St. Real!" exclaimed D'Aubin, "St. Real! I have more than suspicions there."
"Pshaw!" cried the dwarf; "she thinks not of him. He may love her, perhaps, but she thinks not of him, but as a brave good-humoured lad, with wit enough to lead a score or two of iron-pated soldiers. But, once convince her that you love her, and that those who have told her you loved another were interested deceivers, and you will soon find the ice will melt, and all the coldness pass away. And now, my Lord, I have told you all. I have given you the key to the mystery; and though, God knows, there are few men in this world that can comprehend clearly anything beyond a schoolboy's sum, done upon a broken slate, yet the matter here is so simple you cannot well mistake. Now I must leave you; for if I be not back ere morning dawn, and my lady discovers my errand, I may chance to die by an earlier death than I have calculated on."
"But stay, stay yet a moment, good Bartholo," cried the count; "you have not told me yet where I may find this fair lady. Think you my marriage with her will touch your mistress so deeply then?"
"That is what I fear, my Lord," replied the dwarf, assuming a look of sorrow, "that is what I fear. I owed you atonement, sir; and I have made it at the risk of mortifying all the proud feelings of a lady and mistress that I love; for I know that she calculates upon seeing you again at her feet, and pouring forth upon you more of her scorn and indignation, before she leaves you for ever, and returns to Italy. She was laughing over the scene with Annette just now."
"It is a scene she shall never see!" said D'Aubin, biting his lip. "But tell me where dwells this fair fugitive--this Mademoiselle de Menancourt? She is, indeed, as beautiful a creature as the eye of man ever yet beheld. One not difficult to love."
"Oh no!" cried the dwarf; "where is the heart that would not be envious of the man who wears a jewel such as that upon his hand. Her dwelling, I have said, is not far off. You know the little stream that separates the lands of Aubin from those of Menancourt. Trace it up to its source amongst these hills, and not half a league from the spot where it bubbles from its green fountain you will find two cottages, in one of which is the object of your search. It is not like the ordinary dwelling of a French peasant; for the Lady Beatrice has taken a pleasure in decking forth her friend's home after the fashion of our own land, where taste, and the love of all that is beautiful, descends even to the lowest tillers of the soil."
"I shall easily find it," replied the count; "and yon fair scornful dame shall find that D'Aubin can seek him a mate as beautiful as herself. Bartholo, I trust you--once more I trust you! but oh! if you deceive in this also, look to your heart's blood; for I will find means to punish you, should you hide in the farthest corner of the globe."
"My Lord, I deceive you not," replied the dwarf, "nor in this am I myself deceived. But, I entreat, undertake no enterprise upon my showing, without resolving to carry it through at all hazards. If you would have the love of that fair creature you seek, spare no vows and persuasions to efface from her mind the evil impression that others have given of your conduct. Nor trust to that alone. Forget that the marriage was null. Act upon it as if she were your wife, till you have her safe in your own chateau; and then let the ceremony be performed again. Neither must you seek her alone, and unattended by a sufficient force to assert your right, should it be opposed. I know that five or six of my lady's bravest followers are always watching near that spot; and there may be more. Stir not a step, without fifty horseman at your back. At all events, remember, my noble lord, that if you undertake this enterprise without sufficient strength and resolution, the failure must not be laid to me. As I hope for life and happiness, I believe that you may be fully successful."
"I am not apt to want in resolution, Bartholo," replied D'Aubin. "Hence I shall speed to my own dwelling without a moment's loss of time; but it may take long in the present state of affairs to collect such a troop as fifty men."
"Yet time is everything!" replied the dwarf. "'Tis more than likely that changes may take place, of which I cannot inform you; and if the lady be removed from her present refuge, our scheme is ruined. To be bold and rapid is the best road to success, after all. Who can tell what even to-morrow may bring forth?"
"True!" answered D'Aubin; "and, if possible to-morrow's sun shall not set ere Eugenie de Menancourt be mine. Then let your mistress and her maids laugh over the scene of my supplications if they will! But I must be guided by circumstances. At present my purse is but lean, my good friend. Nevertheless----"
"Speak not of it, sir! speak not of it!" replied the dwarf. "I came to do what I have done, in order to make atonement for an involuntary error towards one who was to me the most generous of masters; and who never could accuse me of giving him false information before. I sought not gold, and will not take it. But if you succeed, and if you be happy, sometimes remember the poor dwarf when he is far away."
Thus saying, he kissed the hand of his former lord, and departed, drawing the matted door after him. The next moment D'Aubin heard his horse's feet; and, again left alone, he once more cast himself upon the bed of moss, and gave himself up to thought. His feelings, however, were now very different from what they had been an hour before. Although, as we have before shown, the idea of wedding Eugenie de Menancourt, repairing his wasted fortune by her wealth, and triumphing proudly over her who had scorned and rejected him, and made him the common jest of Paris, had never quitted his mind, even while yielding willingly to his passionate love for Beatrice of Ferrara; yet the repulse he had met with, from a being on whose love and compliance he had counted with full confidence, the bitter scorn that she had displayed towards him, and the keen disappointment that her rejection inflicted, had, in spite of all the Titan-like struggles of pride, so abased and overwhelmed him, that he had lost courage, and looked with hopeless eyes upon all the daring schemes on which, at other times, he would have entered so boldly. The words of the dwarf, however, had revived him, not alone by showing him the easy means of accomplishing one part of his purpose, but by pointing out a new end to be obtained, a new object of desire, and that, too, of a nature to give the only alleviation which his heart was capable of receiving in the pain he suffered--the alleviation of revenge. He felt that Beatrice was already unhappy; that his conduct was--must be--a source of misery to her; but that feeling, far from making him pity her, roused up his suffering vanity to strive for means of avenging upon her the insult which her purity had offered to his baseness. The dwarf had pointed out the way; and to dream of wringing her heart by his marriage with Eugenie, while he silenced for ever the stinging laughter of his former companions, was a relief--perhaps a pleasure. At the same time, a thought crossed his mind that the tale of his having dwelt many weeks concealed in the dwelling of Beatrice of Ferrara, joined to his reputation for gallantry, might, perchance, leave her proud reputation for virtue somewhat sullied; and, as he thought thus, a smile, mingling vanity and pride and vengeance altogether, passed over his lip, and gave his fine features the expression of a demon; and yet this was the bright and fascinating Count d'Aubin: whom we have seen so full of light and harmless gaiety in the beginning of this volume, and such was the creature he had, step by step, become.
Before the visit of the dwarf he had tried to sleep in vain; but now he felt the gnawing pain at his heart relieved by a new purpose; and, after the return of his guide with wine and meat, he ate and drank, though sparingly, and then, casting himself down once more, slept undisturbed till morning dawned.