Leaving the Count d'Aubin to pursue his schemes to their conclusion, we must now follow Bartholo home to the chateau of Guery. Few were the friends which the page possessed amongst the servants of his mistress; but in that number was the old warder at the gate, who, warned beforehand of the dwarfs absence, hastened to give him admittance without noise on his return. Bartholo stabled his horse and rubbed him down with his own small hands, and then, entering by a side-door, passed through the great hall, which was lighted by one of the large paper globes of the time--not at all unlike a Chinese lantern--and picking his steps through the midst of the straw mattresses upon which, as was then customary, several of the inferior servants were sleeping, he made his way towards a staircase leading to the room which had been appropriated to himself during the illness of the Count d'Aubin, and he had now resumed. Opening the door, he entered, congratulating himself upon not having been seen, when suddenly he was seized on either side, and held fast to prevent him from using his dagger, while some one at the farther end of the chamber drew a screen from before a concealed lamp, and Bartholo found himself in the hands of the major-domo and two stout grooms, who, with little compassion and less ceremony, proceeded to bind him tightly hand and foot.
The dwarf asked not a question, and said not a word; and the oldmaître d'hôtel, though loving him but little, refrained from any expression of triumph, merely directing the grooms to watch him well and not molest him, and then left him for the night. Early the next morning the cords were slackened upon his ankles, and he was brought into the presence of his mistress, whose quivering lip and flashing eye told how much her anger was roused against him.
"Bartholo, you have deceived me!" she said; "you have basely deceived me!"
"Those who suspect without cause," answered the dwarf, doggedly, "will always be deceived in the end, and will deserve it."
"And do you think me so weak a being," asked Beatrice, sternly, "as to believe that he who could practise the piece of knavery which you executed last night is innocent of foregone deceits? No, poor fool, no! and even were it not that--as is ever the case with favourites in disgrace--the whole household is pouring forth tales of thy former treason now that it no longer avails me to know it, I should still feel as certain of your guilt as I am of living and breathing, and should only daily look for the instances of your knavery. I seek not, man, to make you own either your former or your present baseness; all I seek to know is your motive. Tell me, were you bribed to divulge my secrets and thwart my plans? Were you hired to betray the mistress that trusted and befriended you?"
"No man does anything without the hope of recompense," replied the dwarf, "nor woman either."
"I should have thought," answered Beatrice, in a tone of bitter but sorrowful reproach, "that no recompense would have been sufficient to bribe you to sting the hand which cherished you when all the rest of the world either scorned or forgot you."
"You mistake me, noble lady," said the dwarf, "I see you mistake me. There are men and women both that sell their honour for gold; but I am not of them. There are still more, both men and women, that pawn their virtue for less solid payment, ay, and sell even their souls for vanity; but still no bauble was my bribe. It was neither title given by some profligate king, nor words of flattery spoken by some vicious lover. I had--I own it--a motive before my eyes, a recompense to look forward to; but I choose not to speak it before these gaping fools. Should I ever again have your ear alone, to it I may tell the cause of all that is strange in my behaviour--if aught be strange in the actions of man. But till then I am silent."
"Leave me!" said Beatrice, looking towards her attendants, "retire to the ante-room--no farther!" Her commands were instantly obeyed; but still there was many an ear eager for the sounds of what passed farther; and those who dared, advanced close to the door, which was not entirely closed. The dwarf's voice was heard speaking quick and long, but in tones so low, that the eavesdroppers were all at fault. At length, however, the voice of Beatrice exclaimed, "Madman! dared you to entertain such a hope?"
"I entertained no hope," replied the dwarf, aloud--"I entertained no hope, but that I might never behold you in the arms of another!"
"Here, Joachim, Annette!" cried the voice of Beatrice, and in a moment the room where she sat was again crowded with her attendants. They found her with the eloquent blood glowing in deep crimson through her clear fine skin, and dying her brow and temples and neck with a blush almost painful to behold. "Take him hence!" she cried, pointing to the dwarf with a look of irrepressible disgust, which, as his eye marked it, turned him deadly pale. "Take him hence!--and yet stay," she added, addressing him--"I suppose it is vain to question you as to what you told to him whom you went last night to visit."
A change had come over the appearance of the dwarf, which it were difficult to describe. The paleness that had followed Beatrice's last words remained--even his lips were blanched; and though with his white upper teeth he bit the under lip unconsciously, no mark appeared after, so bloodless was his whole countenance. He replied, however, with a voice of unnatural calmness, "It is not in vain, madam, to ask me anything you seek to know. Life is over with me,--at least, life's hopes and fears; and I may as well tell you all, as conceal anything. The moment that what I have dared to do was discovered, that moment I knew that the game was lost; and it is in vain now to play a few moves more or less."
He then, as shortly as possible, repeated the substance of what had passed between D'Aubin and himself, in regard to Eugenie de Menancourt's abode, and the means of securing her person, and that concluded, calmly suffered himself to be led back to the room where he had passed the night, and where he was now left alone.
In the meantime, Beatrice, with a hasty hand, wrote a few words on several sheets of paper, and ordering horses to be saddled instantly, gave the letters to the servants who were first prepared. "This to La Loupe," she said, giving one, "for the captain of the arquebusiers; and bid him mark within the king's own hand to the command. This to the chatelain of Armençon. Tell him, if he cannot spare many, to send, if it be but twenty men, well armed end mounted. This to the Lady Eugenie, with all speed! Away, away! This purse to him who does his errand soonest. Now, Joachim, now! you gather together all the men that we have here, and all that are in the neighbouring town; arm them to the teeth, and make speed! Tell me when all is ready, and lose no time!--Away! for we must endeavour to be first on the spot, and carry off that poor timid dove from her dovecot, ere the kite pounces upon her. If we are too late to save her from danger, we must do our best to rescue her, whatever befall."
Beatrice's orders were as rapidly obeyed as given; but we must deviate a little from our general plan, and quitting the persons with whom we have begun this chapter, turn once more to the efforts of the Count d'Aubin; efforts which were unfortunately but too successful. The sun had not risen half an hour ere D'Aubin was again in the saddle; and though his horse was somewhat stiff from having passed a night in the open air, in the midst of storm and tempest, the Count urged him on at full speed, and never drew a rein till he was within sight of his own paternal home.
There are feelings touched by the view of such a place, so interwoven with all the texture of our being, that even the coarse hand of vice, or the more cunning touch of worldly-mindedness, can hardly tear them out; but it was not any such emotions that caused D'Aubin to stop and gaze round him as he approached the dwelling of his fathers. It was that, in a field close to the chateau, he beheld a man, dressed in the costume of a German soldier, sauntering idly about, and talking to some women who were weeding the ground. An undefined apprehension of danger made him pause; but the next moment he spurred his horse furiously on, and rode into the court-yard. It was filled with reitters, who were sitting round in various attitudes, eating their morning meal in the early sunshine. The apparition of a single horseman, for the guide was some furlongs behind, did not seem to disturb in the slightest degree their German phlegm; and D'Aubin was suffered to cast his rein over a hook, and push open the great door of the hall without one of the troopers ceasing from his pleasant occupation, to ask the business of the intruder. The first object the Count beheld in the hall was one of his own servants; but the next, which rendered all question unnecessary, was a large breakfast-table, covered with loads of meat and flagons of wine, at which sat Albert of Wolfstrom, and one or two of the officers of his troop. The apparition of D'Aubin was certainly unexpected, for the party of the League believed him dead; but it required no lengthened explanations to make him comprehend that his friend, the captain of the reitters, had hastened with as many of his men as had escaped the bloody fight of Ivry to take possession of the lands and chateau of Aubin, in order to pay himself some certain thousands of crowns, won by him at play, ere the next heir of the supposed dead count put in his claim, either by the sword or otherwise.
As he was well aware that no party would permit of his holding long possession of the lands, the mercenary leader had employed means to raise the sum he claimed, which now caused some sharp and angry words to pass between him and the count,--words which might not have ended bloodless had D'Aubin at the moment been prepared to expel the Germans from his dwelling: but his own retainers and domestics were dispersed; and not above two or three of his old attendants were to be found within the walls of the chateau. The thought of his fine old trees felled to supply the greedy craving of the mercenary, his crops and cattle swept away, his peasantry half ruined, did enrage him almost to striking Wolfstrom where he stood; but in the midst of his anger he remembered that there was but one way to clear off this and many another similar claim upon him, and to emerge into greater splendour and power than ever; and in that dim and misty dream of splendour and power he fancied that the voice of conscience, and remorse, and disappointed love, would never be heard.
"Well, well, Wolfstrom," he added, abruptly breaking off the angry vituperation he was heaping upon the chief of the reitters, "you might have waited a little longer; you might have proceeded a little more moderately; but now send out and order all to be stopped instantly, then lend me your full and active aid for this one day, and you shall receive every farthing in gold before a week be over."
"Ay, indeed! how so?" demanded the other, somewhat doubtingly; for Albert of Wolfstrom had nothing very confiding in his disposition. "As to waiting, you know, sir count, that was out of the question entirely, for we thought you dead; and as to proceeding more moderately, you know I was obliged to make haste, for on the one hand Mayenne might call me to Paris in a day, at any time; and on the other, the Bearnois and your cousin might come down and turn me out; so that I was obliged to make good use of my time. But how can I serve you?"
"How many men have you here?" demanded D'Aubin.
"Why, not many, on my life," answered Wolfstrom; "only a hundred and fifty. All the rest were killed or taken at that cursed Ivry. But what do you want us to do?"
"Listen!" said D'Aubin. "I last night learned, Wolfstrom, that by a foul scheme my promised bride was persuaded that I did not love her, and that it was thus she was induced to fly immediately after our marriage."
"But do you know, Monsieur d'Aubin," interrupted Wolfstrom, "that the good folks in Paris vow, that marriage of yours was no marriage at all; that the priest was a mad Huguenot soldier, and that----"
"Never mind all that," replied D'Aubin, "I have here a priest in the neighbouring village who has done me some services already, and he will bind me in half an hour to Eugenie de Menancourt by a knot that can never be untied, without asking any questions or listening to any objections. Only let me once have her safe within these walls!"
"Ay, but how is that to be done?" demanded Albert of Wolfstrom.
"That is what I was about to tell you," answered the count. "The same person who informed me of the means which had been used to estrange her affection from me, informed me also of the place of her present dwelling. It is within six leagues of this castle, and all that is necessary in the present case is----"
"To carry her off by acoup de main!" cried Wolfstrom, clapping his hands at the sound of a project which combined, in a degree peculiarly adapted to his palate, villany and adventure. "Bravo, sir count I bravo! Let us about it immediately."
"Thanks, thanks, Wolfstrom, for your ready aid," replied D'Aubin. "All that we have to do is to mount fifty men, and to lose no time; the first, because the girl has some guards stationed round about her, and more may be sent; the second, because the keenest eye in France is upon her and me, and she may be removed."
"Well, well, to it at once," cried Wolfstrom, moving towards the door; but ere he reached it he stopped, and, turning to the count said, in a low tone, "Of course you will give my men a day's pay."
"And you a thousand crowns to boot, if we succeed," answered the Count, who knew that there was nothing comparable to gold for quickening his comrade's energies.
"We had better take a hundred men at once," said Wolfstrom, when he heard that they were to be paid; "they are as soon mounted as fifty, and we are then more sure. Fifty can stay to guard the chateau."
D'Aubin made no objection, and Wolfstrom proceeded to give his orders, which were rapidly obeyed by the well-trained veterans still under his command. A fresh horse was provided for D'Aubin, and another for the guide, who, without his consent being asked, was ordered to lead the way, with a trooper on either side, to the spot which D'Aubin described. Two old but nimble jennets from the stable of the Count were led in the rear; and thus the cavalcade issued from the gates of the chateau of Aubin, and took their way towards the dwelling of the unfortunate Eugenie de Menancourt. Scarcely had they proceeded a league, however, when, from the edge of a gentle slope, they perceived three horsemen galloping quickly on a road in the plain below, as if towards the castle they had just left.
The keen eyes of Wolfstrom instantly marked them; but, after gazing at them for a moment, he said, "They are two of my reitters whom I sent yesterday to keep a watch on Armençon; but they have a third man with them, and must bring news. We must take care that our retreat is not cut off." Thus saying, he detached a trooper to intercept the horsemen by a cross road, and bring them to him, and then halted till they arrived. Two proved, as had been supposed, ordinary reitters of Wolfstrom's band, but the third horseman was an armed servant; and D'Aubin instantly recognised one of the attendants of Beatrice of Ferrara. He was tied upon his horse, and the troopers brought him up pistol in hand. Their report was soon made; they had found him galloping, they said, with such speed towards the castle of Armençon that they thought it right to stop him. He fled like the wind, and they pursued; but at length he was overtaken, and they found upon him a letter, which, not being able to read themselves, they were now in the act of conveying to their leader. The paper, as may be already seen, was the letter of Beatrice of Ferrara to the chatelain of Armençon, and it served to show D'Aubin that his movements were suspected, if not discovered. The servant, however, was now in such bodily fear, that he at once informed the Count and his companion, that another messenger had been sent for troops to La Loupe.
"What force have they there, Wolfstrom?" demanded D'Aubin. "Do you know?"
"Certainly not two hundred men!" replied the leader of the reitters.
"Then there is, first, the probability that the commander will not listen to the request of this wild girl," said the Count; "next, he will certainly not dare to detach more than fifty men, and we are here a hundred. Even if she send her own armed people, too, they cannot amount to more than thirty, so that we shall still have great odds. But let me see," he continued, as if a sudden thought struck him, and turning to the servant, he asked, "When did the messenger leave Guery for La Loupe?"
"At the same moment that I left for Armençon," replied the man.
"Then," said D'Aubin, "we shall be there full four good hours before a soldier from La Loupe can be within a league. Let that fellow go, Wolfstrom. You, my good man, ride back with all speed to your mistress, present the Count d'Aubin's humble duty to her, and tell her he is her most devoted slave! Do you hear? There is a piece of gold for you--away!"
The man seemed doubtful if his ears heard true; but at length convinced, he took the gold, cap in hand, and rode slowly away. In the meantime, D'Aubin and Wolfstrom again put the troop in motion; and riding briskly on, calculated once more between them the distance from Guery to La Loupe, and from La Loupe to the spot whither their steps were now directed. D'Aubin was found not to have judged amiss; for even supposing the troops mounted and the captain willing, it appeared that the reitters must arrive at least four hours before them. "When we come up," said D'Aubin, as they concluded, "let your men surround the house, at such a distance as not to be seen; yourself and five or six others come nearer, so as to be within call; and, after ascertaining that there is no force actually present to oppose us, I will go on and plead my cause myself. It were better to persuade her gently, and without frightening her, if possible; but if I find her still obstinate, we must use a little gentle compulsion: for I am resolved," he added, with a smile of triumph, "that by the time the troops from La Loupe reach her late refuge, Eugenie de Menancourt shall be in the chateau of Aubin; ay, and irretrievably the wife of its lord!"
What was once a poor farm-house, in a woody and remote part of the hills in which the Eure and Loire take their rise, had, under the touch of taste and affluence, been transformed into a beautiful little habitation, half rustic cottage, half Italian villa; and all this had been done as easily as the genii built the palace of Aladdin. The wood-work had been painted green, so that the heavy planks which, when shut, closed the windows, looked light; the thatch had been nicely clipped and trimmed; the inside had been hung with arras, and decorated with paintings in the fashion of the day; and along the front had been carried a portico, consisting of unpolished trunks of trees for columns, and a light trellis-work of boughs to soften the strong sunshine. The face of the house was turned towards the south; and it might have commanded, from its elevated situation, a beautiful view over the greater part of Maine, had the tall old trees which screened it in front been partially cut away: but those in whose possession it now was had carefully abstained from the axe; not alone from reverence for the ancient trees, but because quiet concealment was with them a great object of desire. No place, in truth, could have been better chosen for that purpose. There was, indeed, one horse road, which came within a few hundred yards of the house, but it went no farther than to a small isolated village not more than a league distant, and there ended. Another, passing a little farther off, led away to the chateau of Guery, at the distance of three leagues on one side, and to the small town of ---- on the other; but even this was merely a bridle path, upon which there was scarcely any traffic in the best of times, and much less now that civil war had stilled all commercial spirit in the land.
It was in the little portico, then, which we have noticed, that on the evening of a warm clear day in June, occasionally shaded by the masses of a broken thunder-cloud, which, during the night, had poured forth a tempest on the earth, sat the fair Eugenie de Menancourt, into whose cheek the warm glow of health and youth had returned, during a long interval of peace and tranquillity. Hither, after many wanderings, had she been brought by Beatrice of Ferrara, as soon as it was known that the Count d'Aubin was no longer in the neighbourhood; and in order to be sufficiently near her, to give her every sort of aid and protection, without calling further attention upon her retreat by living with her, the fair Italian had retired to the chateau of Guery which she possessed in the neighbourhood. The time had, as we have seen, passed without bringing molestation to Eugenie; and she now sat with an open letter in her hand, gazing out upon the woodland scene before her eyes, and seeing those mixed visions of romance, and tenderness, and melancholy which are so often present to a woman's eyes, and are the more dear, because she is taught to hide that she beholds them. Before her were those dark old trees; on her right a thicket of shrubs of many a varied kind; behind her the room in which she was wont to sit--then called her bower, and on the left, some fields screened again from the road by other trees. It was a calm sweet scene; and Eugenie felt not unhappy, though there might be other things she would have fain brought in, to form her picture of perfect felicity, and although the letter which she held in her hand from Beatrice of Ferrara, by telling her not to be alarmed at anything that might happen, for that friends were near, had, in some degree, created the apprehension is was intended to relieve.
As she sat thus and gazed, she thought she heard the tramp of horse; but the sound, if sound there were, ceased, and she believed that her ears had deceived her. A moment or two after, a long ray of sunshine that found its way between the bolls of the trees, and spread a pencil of light upon the green turf at her feet, was for an instant obscured, as if either a cloud had come over the sun, or some dark object had passed among the trees. Eugenie's heart began to beat quick, and the next minute a rustling sound in the thicket to her right made her start up; but ere she could retreat into her own chamber, the boughs were pushed back, and Philip d'Aubin was at her feet. With a face as pale as death, Eugenie sank into the seat that she had before occupied, and gazed with eyes expressive certainly of anything but love, upon the Count as he knelt before her, and pressed her hand to his lips.
"Eugenie!" said D'Aubin, "Eugenie! I have at length found you, then. My Eugenie! my wife!"
"Oh, no, no!" cried Eugenie, struggling to overcome her terror: "oh, no! not your wife! No, sir, I am not; I never have been; I never will be your wife! Death were preferable--ay, the most terrible death were preferable to that!"
"Hear me, Eugenie!" said D'Aubin. "Eugenie, you must hear me! for this house is surrounded by my soldiers; you are utterly and perfectly in my power; and if I have recourse to reason and persuasion with you, it is alone from tenderness and affection towards you, and because I would rather induce my bride to accompany me willingly and tranquilly, than use towards her those means of compulsion which I have a right to exercise in regard to a disobedient wife. Eugenie, will you hear me?"
"I have no resource, Sir," replied the unhappy girl; "but still I repeat that I am not your wife. In the first place, I have at the altar refused to pledge a vow towards you; and by this time you must well know that the man who read the vain and empty ceremony which you are pleased to call a marriage was not one invested with that sacred function which is requisite to render a marriage legal, even with the willing consent of both parties."
"All I know is, that the marriage ceremony was performed between us," replied D'Aubin, "and that it is registered in the archives of Paris. That you are my wife, therefore, there is no doubt; and that I have the right, as well as the power and the will, to take you home and regard you as my wife, is equally indubitable. Still if you require it, the ceremony shall be performed again; but hope not any longer to avoid taking upon you the duties of the position you hold in regard to me, for, as I told you, I have a hundred men within call ready to obey my lightest word! Shall I make them appear?"
"Oh, no, no, no!" exclaimed Eugenie, wringing her hands. "What, what shall I do?"
"Merely listen to me, Eugenie, my beloved!" cried D'Aubin. "With the power to compel, a thousand times rather would I succeed by entreaty; and instead of seeking to command you, let me at your feet seek to persuade you. Hear me plead my cause, Eugenie, in language that you have never heard me use before, because I was ignorant of the motives which actuated you, and attributed your conduct towards me to mere caprice, whereas I now know it to have been just, excellent, and wise, and like yourself. The same ignorance has made me harsh to you, and unjust towards my cousin St. Real; and I will not rise from my knee till you have heard my exculpation, and fully know how much we have all been deceived."
"Indeed!" said Eugenie, "indeed! yet I am at a loss to guess what you can mean."
"Well may you be so, Eugenie!" replied D'Aubin; "well may you be so! For it was only yesterday that I learned the elucidation of the mystery myself. You have been cheated, Eugenie; you have been deceived; you have been taught to believe a man who loved you, and you alone, a heartless profligate. But first hear me, Eugenie, when I declare that I have never loved any one but you; that from the first moment your hand was promised me by your father, the idea of your young charms has ever been present to my mind, and the hope of soon possessing them been the consolation of my whole existence."
Eugenie coloured deeply: "I am grieved, sir," she replied; but D'Aubin interrupted, saying,--
"Hear me, Eugenie, to the end: I have but given you a picture of my own feelings towards you. Now let me display all the base and crooked means that have been taken to alienate your affection from me, and then tell me if it be right and just to let those means still have effect, when you are convinced of their falsehood and iniquity. Only yesterday did I discover that at Paris you had become acquainted with one of the late Queen Catherine's train of ladies--a train which, I need not tell you, was and will remain marked with infamy to the eyes of all posterity!"
"Perhaps so!" cried Eugenie eagerly; "but the name of Beatrice of Ferrara will always be excepted. The daughter of a sovereign prince, she was always as distinguished by her virtues as by her rank; and my father on his death-bed told me that I might always confide in her, for that, in the midst of the terrible trial of universal bad example, no one had ever been able to cast a reproach upon her fame."
"It may be so!" replied D'Aubin; "it may be so! but doubt not, Eugenie, that she has passions and weaknesses too; and the confidence you gave her was misplaced. All has been revealed to me. I know everything that has passed, and therefore I am justified in saying that she has made us both her tools. Did she not tell you that I loved her--that I had vowed vows and made protestations at her feet? I know she did. I know that both by open words, and slight insinuations, she poisoned your mind against me; that she taught you to believe me profligate and base--"
"Never! never!" cried Eugenie, "never, upon my word."
"No matter," cried D'Aubin, "she made you credit that I loved her, not you; that by vows and promises I was bound to her. She it was that always crossed me in your esteem; she frustrated the arrangements for our marriage; she laid the scheme, and executed the whole of your flight from Paris. Is not this true? and do you think she had not a motive? Eugenie, I tell you she had. It may make me appear vain in your eyes; but, to exculpate myself, I must reveal that motive. Eugenie, she has loved me from our first meeting; she has loved me with all the ardour and all the fire of which an Italian is capable; but so to love unsought, is never to win love. She has teased me; she has persecuted me with her affection. But do not mistake me, Eugenie; I have never loved but you--you alone have I sought, you alone have I sighed for. To her I have turned a deaf ear and a cold heart. I care not for her, I love her not, I have never loved--ay! and though I scruple not to say that, no later than yesterday, I might have made her mine on any terms I chose--"
There was a slight rustle in the room behind--a quick step; and Beatrice of Ferrara stood by the side of Eugenie de Menancourt. D'Aubin started up from his knee. "Liar! traitor! villain!" cried the beautiful girl, with eyes from which mighty indignation lightened forth like fire bursting from a volcano;--"Liar! traitor! villain!" and as he rose, she struck him what seemed but a slight stroke upon the bosom with the quickness of light. D'Aubin grasped his sword, then let it go, and raised his hand to his eyes; a stream of dark gore spouted out from his breast; he reeled, and murmuring "Jesu, Jesu!" fell at the feet of her he had so basely injured.
Still holding the dagger tight in her grasp, Beatrice stood and gazed upon him; and Eugenie too, with her hands clasped, and turned as it were into stone by fear and horror, remained straining her eyes upon the fearful sight before her.
At that moment, the furious galloping of horse was heard along the nearest road, then came the clashing of steel and pistol shots; and Joachim, the servant of Beatrice, glided from the room whence his mistress had issued, and drawing her by the sleeve, exclaimed--"There seems a large force coming up, madam! save yourself, ere this be inquired into. The horses are still where we left them, at the end of the lane."
But Beatrice, without reply, continued to gaze upon the corpse of him she once so passionately loved, apparently unconscious of aught else but the terrible act she had performed. The next moment, the voices of several persons approaching were heard; and through the trees appeared two gentlemen on foot, followed by half a dozen soldiers dragging along Albert of Wolfstrom, with his hands tied.
"We are in time, fair lady, to do your behest," cried Henry IV. who was at the head of the party, speaking in a joyous tone, as, as the distance of the trees he caught a sight of Beatrice without seeing the object at which she gazed. "Your letter reached me, as I marched along, and though addressed to mylocum tenensat La Loupe, I made bold to break the seal. But where is this perverse and rebellious Count d'Aubin?"
"There!" cried Beatrice, in a voice which had lost all its music. "There he lies! never to be perverse or rebellious again! Oh, Philip, Philip! thou hast trod upon a heart that loved thee--cast happiness from thee--sought destruction--and found it from a woman's hand!"
"Indeed!" cried the king, hastening forward with St. Real, who was his companion. "In God's name, what is all this? Pardie, 'tis too true! There he lies, indeed!" The king's eye then glanced to Beatrice, while St. Real gently led Eugenie away from the scene of blood and horror in which she had been made an unwilling sharer. The dagger was still in the hand of the fair Italian, though that hand now hung by her side as if it had never possessed power to strike the blow which had laid such strength and courage low; but her sleeve was dyed with blood; and a slow red drop trickled down the shining blade of the poniard, and fell from the point to the ground.
"From your own speech, lady!" said the king, after a momentary pause, "I learn that you have just committed an awful act, especially for a woman's hand. Nevertheless, I cannot but believe, from all that I have heard, that this was an act of justice! He was a rebel, too, at the moment of his death, in arms against his king; and, therefore, this deed is not to be too strictly investigated; otherwise--although as the head of a sovereign house you are armoured with immunities--it would become me to refer the inquiry to my council. As it is, Philip Count d'Aubin having been slain in arms against his monarch, in the commission of an illegal act, and by your hand, of course justice withholds her sword from avenging his death, yet I think that it is expedient for you, lady, to quit this realm with all convenient speed; and to insure your safety, a party of my own guard shall accompany you to the frontier. My words seem to fall upon an inattentive ear! May I ask if you have heard me?"
"Yes, yes," replied Beatrice; "I have heard, my lord--your majesty is lenient! My crime is great; but be it as you will, I am ready to go! My thoughts, to speak the truth, are not so clear as they might have been some half hour since--I thank your majesty! All I ask is a prisoner's diet, bread and a glass of water,--for I am thirsty, exceeding thirsty! Then I am ready to set out.--Philip, farewell!" she added, gazing upon the corpse: "we shall meet again! Our deeds unite us for ever! Alas! alas! where shall I go, my lord?"
"Her brain is troubled," said the king, in a low tone, turning to one of the officers who followed; "go in with her, call her own people about her; but treat her with all reverence. She must be sent forth from the kingdom as speedily as possible. Madam, this officer will conduct you. Set a sentinel at the door," he added, in a low tone, "as if for honour; but let her people be with her, and lay no restraint upon her, except in watching whither she goes."
"Will no one give me a glass of water?" said Beatrice, moving towards the house.
"It shall be brought in a moment, lady," replied the officer, following. "Where are this lady's attendants?"
"Well, St. Real," said the king, turning to the young cavalier as he issued forth again from the house just as Beatrice entered. "Pardie, we are too late in one sense, after all, though not too late to prevent the mischief these fellows meditated. Ventre Saint Gris! but this cousin of yours was an ungenerous villain; and I am sorry for that poor girl, who, to my thinking, has driven the dagger deeper into her own heart than into his. Well, there he lies, and one of the conspirators against our fair heiress of Menancourt is disposed of; now to despatch the other. Martin, bring forward the prisoner."
"Sir Albert of Wolfstrom," continued the king, "it seems to me that your name was once enrolled amongst the troops of my late cousin, Henry III. and that you chose the chance of a halter and better pay on the part of the League. Traitors against myself, God help me, I am fain to forgive, leaving them to God and their consciences for punishment; but traitors to the late king I forgive not, and, therefore, I shall turn over your case to my good friend De Biron, who is not merciful, but just. Your own heart, therefore, will tell your fate: if it condemn you, be sure that ere to-morrow's noon you will be lying like him you stare at with such open eyes."
"Cannot I take service with my troop?" demanded Wolfstrom, with undaunted effrontery. "Your majesty suffered the Swiss at Ivry to come over to you."
"They were only enemies, not traitors," replied the king; "I can have traitors enow without paying them, sirrah!--What is that outcry within, St. Real? No more tragedies, I trust!--What I have said, Sir, is decided," continued Henry, again turning to Wolfstrom, while St. Real entered the house to ascertain the cause of the sounds of lamentation that they heard. "If your conscience tell you that you deserted the late king, bid good-by to the world! By my faith there must be something the matter there!" he added, as the tones of grief came again from within; and turning hastily, he himself entered the house, and advanced to a room from the open door of which the sound proceeded. The sight that presented itself needed little explanation. In a large chair, near the centre of the room, sat Beatrice of Ferrara, with her head supported upon the breast of her faithful old servant Joachim, while kneeling at her feet, and weeping bitterly as she clasped her friend's knees, was the beautiful form of Eugenie de Menancourt. Around were a number of female attendants, filling the air with lamentations; and on one side stood St. Real, gazing eagerly in the face of the fair Italian. But that lovely face had now lost the loveliness of life, the bright dark eyes were closed, the colour of the warm rose no longer blushed through the clear white skin, the lips themselves were pale, and the dazzling teeth showed like a row of pearls, as the mouth hung partly open. Her right hand was still clasped upon a glass from which she had been drinking; and rolled away upon the floor was a rich carvedbon-bonnière, from which a small quantity of white powder had been spilt as it fell. Throughout the whole room there was a faint odour, as if of bitter almonds; and Henry, who well remembered that same perfume, when some of the noblest in France had died somewhat suddenly, exclaimed at once as he entered, "She has poisoned herself!"
"Too true, I fear, my lord!" replied St. Real; "but a leech has been sent for."
"In vain! in vain!" said the king. "She is dead already, St. Real! That is no fainting fit; and even were she not dead already, no skill on earth could save her from the tomb. I know that hateful drug too well. Come away, St. Real! Mademoiselle de Menancourt, come away! Nay, I command! You do no good here!"
Thus saying, Henry took the fair girl's hand and led her to another room, where, after speaking a few words of comfort, he added, "But I must to horse again and forward towards Le Mans. You, St. Real, I shall leave behind with your regiment, for the protection of this one fair lady, though those that persecuted her are no more. His body shall be carried to his own dwelling, and lie beside his father's. That I will see to. And now, though this is a solemn moment, and the scene a sad one, yet Mademoiselle de Menancourt, I must put it out of fortune's power to persecute you farther, for the treasure of this fair hand. Nay, nay, I must have my will!--Take it, St. Real," he added, placing it in his. "If I judge right, you value it highly; and, as you well deserve it, I give it to you now, lest any of my many friends should crave me for the gift hereafter. I would rather say to those who ask it that it is given, than that I will not give it. To your love and sorrow, lady, I leave the last rites of yon beautiful and hapless girl. Hers was a hard fate, and a noble mind; for, cast by fortune into the midst of corruption, with a heart all warmth and a fancy all brightness, she came out still, pure as gold refined in the fire, which, Heaven forgive us, is what few of us can say for himself. Amidst all the falsehoods and follies of the late court, never did I know the breath of scandal sully her fair name! She was, indeed,one in a thousand!Conceal the manner of her death, if possible; and let such honours as the church permits convey her to her last long home! Now, farewell!"
Of all the many personages which have figured in this tale, there are but few of whom it behoves us to give any farther account. The lives of some stand written on the bright and glorious page of history, never to be effaced till the waters of time have rolled long over this portion of the globe, have levelled our dwellings and our monuments with the sands, have washed away our learning and our records, and blotted out not alone the sweet domestic memories--on which each succeeding generation sets its foot, trampling with all the insolence of youth the withered flower just dead--but have also razed, from the hard tablet of glory, the few names that are really worthy of eternal consecration. When such a change has taken place,--and who shall say that it will not?--when Europe shall be called the land of forests and of barbarism, and some prying strangers alone shall come from their happier lands, and try to trace upon the desert shores the mouldering remnants of arts and sciences and nations long gone by, perhaps the name of Henry IV. of France, and those who resemble him, may be forgotten, but till then they have a glorious existence separate from the rest of men. The Duke of Mayenne, too, ambitious and intriguing, but generous and often wise, has a share of the page of history; and all those who continued to play a conspicuous part in the days of Henry Quatre, either for good or for evil, have their record in the annals of the time. This tale can alone take farther note of those whose fate it has depicted in the preceding pages, and who at this point separate themselves from the general course of history, either to fall into the calm repose of sweet domestic life, or to seek a refuge from unhappy fortunes in the tomb.
The body of Beatrice of Ferrara being removed from the cottage where Eugenie de Menancourt had dwelt so long, was borne to the chateau in which she herself had spent the last hours of her own existence; and with curses and imprecations upon his head, the tale of what his machinations had wrought was told to the dwarf Bartholo by the more faithful yet less attached servants of his late mistress.
He listened to the whole in sullen composure, and even a smile played upon his lip as he heard of the death of the Count d'Aubin; but when the last sad event was mentioned by the narrator, and he learned that Beatrice herself was dead, he struggled with the bonds that tied him, and then cast himself grovelling on the ground, which he dewed with his bitter agonising tears. He strove to tear his flesh with his teeth; and when they took him up, more to gaze upon his torture, than with any feeling of compassion--for no one loved, and no one compassionated him--he raved upon them with frantic and incoherent words, and again cast himself down in raving despair. For several days he refused all food; but at length pity touched some one, and a leech was sent for, who bled him largely, which produced a change. He no longer raved, he no longer refused food, he took what was offered him, did what was bid him; but it was with the slow and sullen stupidity of an idiot. The fire, too, had left his eye; his activity was gone; his witty sauciness at an end; and he would sit for days gazing vacantly upon the floor, without hearing what was said to him, and without addressing a word to any one. At length, the body of Beatrice of Ferrara was conveyed to Italy for the purpose of being interred amongst her princely ancestors; and then, though none knew how he escaped, it was perceived that the dwarf was gone also. It was not, indeed, extraordinary that he had disappeared without notice; for after his frenzy had terminated in idiocy, no one had paid him much attention.
How he travelled so great a distance, and how he supported himself by the way, are equally unknown; but some three months after, the wretched being was seen wandering about in the long vacant streets of Ferrara, enduring the scoff of the schoolboy and the peasant. He remained in that part of the country for several years; and those who had known him when first he had entered the household of the princes of Legnano, often gave food and money out of charity to the poor dwarf, whom they now despised and had formerly hated. At length, one morning, when the sacristan took his early round through the chapel in which the dead of that noble house slept in the cold marble which was their place of last repose, he was startled by seeing something curled up at the end of the new monument erected to the Princess Beatrice. He touched it, but it stirred not; and, familiar with the dead, he carelessly raised up the head, and beheld the lifeless features of the dwarf Bartholo.
The Count d'Aubin lay with his ancestors; and the noble estates of which he had been once the improvident possessor passed to his next male heir, the Marquis of St. Real. To St. Real it was pointed out by skilful and honest lawyers that, as the creditors who had claims upon the late Count could not easily prove their right, his estates might be rendered clear by a very simple process of law. But St. Real preferred a simpler process still; and from the funds accruing from large and well-managed lands discharged the debts, and freed the inheritance. The claims which were the most difficult to arrange were those of the heirs and successors of one Albert of Wolfstrom, who having been executed, under a judicial sentence regularly pronounced by a competent tribunal, for various transactions which did not even permit the harlot compassion of public excitement to attend his end, it was more than doubtful whether any of the demands which were made upon St. Real in his name were really to be sustained. There were some through which the young Marquis at once struck his indignant pen, and others which, though equally illegal, he paid at once; but in the end, as so often happens, the debts which had seemed overwhelming to him whose bad management had incurred them, were easily liquidated by a more provident though not a less liberal lord; and the estates of Aubin made a splendid addition to those of the Marquis of St. Real.
The young lord himself saw Eugenie de Menancourt reinstated in her ancestral halls, and wandered with her for a few days through the scenes they had both loved in childhood--scenes where the memories of the past, both dark and bright, blended into a solemn, but a sweet and soothing light, which, shining mellow and calm upon the happy present, gradually brightened into hope as the eye turned towards the future. It was like the twilight of the summer sky in a far northern land, where the night and the day mingle together in the west; and the soft and shaded, yet radiant, sunset continues till the dawning of the morning appears on the opposite horizon, so that the beams of the past and the future day meet in the zenith of the present.
It might be said that the experience which Eugenie de Menancourt and Huon St. Real already had of the past was sufficient to have justified their immediate marriage. But Eugenie had her scruples, and St. Real had a confidence derived from higher sources than either the usual happy fortunes of his house, or the promising turn which the war had taken. An old female relation was sought to bear the young heiress company for the next six months. To her Eugenie's education had been principally confided during her youth; her instructions had greatly tended to render her what she was, and St. Real thought that the society of no one could be better for her he loved till the day of their marriage at length arrived. In the meantime, he rejoined the king's army, and took part in the various events of the war which ultimately placed Henry IV. in possession of the capital of his kingdom, and put an end to the troublous times by which his reign began; but it will be remembered by all persons well versed in that portion of the history of France, that the part of the country in which the estates of Eugenie de Menancourt were situated never fell again into the hands of the League. Various detached towns in Normandy and Maine that faction did indeed continue to hold for some time, but the progress of the king after the battle of Ivry was uninterrupted, though gradual, till peace crowned his efforts; and his people learned to love, nay, almost to adore, the monarch against whom many of them had drawn their swords.
At length, six months after the death of Beatrice of Ferrara, Eugenie de Menancourt gave her hand to him whom she was not now ashamed to own she had loved from her earliest youth. Henry signed the marriage contract; and when the young Marquis, having seen him firmly seated on the throne of his ancestors, took leave of the monarch and his court, resolved to spend the rest of his life, as his fathers had done before him, in the calm tranquillity of his paternal domains, Henry placed round his neck the order of theSt. Esprit, saying, that as he well knew he should but seldom see his face again, he was resolved to give him something whereby to remember the days he had passed with Henry Quatre.
Do we need to inquire how St. Real and Eugenie passed their after life? It sometimes happens, indeed, that two people who have loved well and truly in the first burst of youthful passion, crossed, disappointed, and soured, persevere against all opposition through long years of withering anxiety, till they meet together at length, with tempers irritated, and hearts no longer the same; and find nothing but misery in that union, from which they had anticipated nothing but happiness. Not so, however, St. Real and Eugenie de Menancourt. They had long loved without knowing it; and had chiefly had to struggle with the opposition of their own principles to their own wishes. They had been thwarted, but not disappointed; they had been grieved, but not irritated. Their sorrows had served like the black leaf on which the diamond is set, to increase, not tarnish, the lustre of the happiness they now enjoyed. But happiness will not bear description. It is the calm stream that neither foams nor murmurs; and theirs continued flowing on like a mighty river, which, troubled and obstructed at its source, soon overbears all obstacles, and then, having once reached the calm level of the open country, flows on increasing in volume, though it loses in brightness, till the full completed stream falls into the bosom of the eternal ocean.