CHAPTER IIIA PAVILION AT VERSAILLESThe Marquis took lodgings the following week in the little town that centred round the palace and park of Versailles, and there met his former colonel, M. de Biron.The young Duke was amiable, if cynical, at Luc’s persistence in endeavouring to enter politics; he came to his rooms and attempted to enlighten him as to the state of the Court and the characters of the men who guided it. Luc smiled and forgot what he said as soon as the words were spoken; he knew M. de Biron was shallow, and he gave little weight to his impressions of men or affairs.M. de Caumont had offered to present him to the King, but had not yet arrived at Versailles; and M. de Biron urged him not to wait, but to at once attend His Majesty.Luc’s strict code of courtesy would not permit him to slight M. de Caumont by ignoring the introduction offered and accepted; but when M. de Biron brought him an invitation for one of the fête days on which the King would not be present, he decided to go, with some bold idea under his shy manner of meeting M. Amelot and speaking to him directly.He was now corresponding regularly with M. de Voltaire, and though the subject of their letters was still the respective merits of Corneille and Racine, Luc drew from the great man’s words a far wider inspiration than mere enthusiasm for the famous poets. He had always—almost without knowing it—been fond of letters, and now, in his unavoidable leisure, he had begun writing down his thoughts, and hopes, and aspirations.The very day that he went for the first time to the palace he had put the last sentence to a paper he had written on the glorious and beloved young King.Since he had left Aix his desire for meditation had increased and emphasized his shyness, which was almost sufficient to render him awkward despite his native grace and breeding. Certainly his first experiences of the château were not pleasant to him; the gorgeous park was too vast, too full of people. He felt too utterly uncongenial to their obvious gaiety. Not that his temper or his mood was gloomy, or that he was incapable of the exquisite pleasures of youth and carelessness—there was probably no one there who could have brought a keener delight to the enjoyment of the fair things of life—but Luc had too fine a nature to be satisfied by sensation at second hand. Because every one else affected light-heartedness, because the coloured lamps were lit in the trees, because all were rich and presumably happy, his soul could not keep festival.M. de Biron soon left him. He felt as lonely as he had done when standing on the Pont Neuf, and as serene. As soon as he could disengage himself from the crowd he made his way from the terraces, arbours, and fountains in front of the great château, and turned down one of the magnificent alleys that opened mysteriously and alluring into dusky vistas lit only by occasional beams from the young moon.He walked rapidly, his spirits rising with the solitude. He had soon passed the garlands of rich lights swung from tree to tree, the couples walking slowly with swish of silk, soon completely lost sight of the wonderful palace raised up luminous against the spring sky, and distanced the fine strains of music from the violins and hautboys.He reached a beautiful glade across which deer were wandering; the silence was so marvellous that he caught his breath. Regardless of where he was, of Ministers, of M. de Biron, he continued his way through the spring night. The trees were almost in full leaf, and not a tremble disturbed their dignity. Luc crossed the glade and came into a little grove of elms, beyond which a small lake lay argent and motionless.A sudden gust of perfume made him shiver with pleasure. All round the water were planted thick rose bushes full in flower; the long trails of foliage and blossom fell over and touched the smooth surface of the lake. A little bridge of twisted rustic wood led to a pavilion that shone, shaded with delicate trees, from a tiny island on the bosom of the water.A peach-coloured light issued from the windows and open door of this pavilion and fell in long, still reflections across the water.In a thicket of white thorn beyond a nightingale was singing, and there were clouds of a pearl-blue colour lying softly about the moon.Luc paused by the bridge; the exquisite enchantment of the place and hour captivated his senses. He drew a sigh and bent over the roses; their perfume came and went like the drawing of a breath. The nightingale halted in his importunate song and was still. Luc could not stay his feet; he softly crossed the little bridge and approached the door of the pavilion that seemed the centre of this magic spot.The flood of tremulous pink-gold light showed more roses clustering close about the doorstep: white roses these, turned now to all hues of soft amber and ivory and shimmering away into the luminous shadow that concealed the walls of the pavilion.Luc supposed that this was but one of the lavish festal arrangements; he had seen several pavilions in the park, though none as remote as this. As there was not a sign of movement nor any whisper of voices he thought the place empty.With his usual light step unconsciously still further subdued he entered the pavilion.It was one room, oval shaped, with white walls and ceiling and four windows shaded with peach-tinted silk and open on the lake.On the panels between the windows hung delicate drawings in pastel framed by gilt ribbons, and in front of one window was a small table of kingswood, which bore some tall Venetian wineglasses and a blue enamel dish of bonbons. The furniture consisted of a low couch covered with pale rich satin cushions all embroidered with garlands and coronals of flowers, several chairs of the most delicate shape and make, and a gold clavichord and harp, both wreathed with natural white roses.The light came from a silver lamp shaded with silk that hung from the ceiling.In one corner was a pink satin screen, and as Luc’s first glance was satisfying him that he was alone in this delicious apartment, a gentleman came round this screen and stepped to the nearest window, evidently without seeing the Marquis, who was, indeed, half in the shadow of the outer air. This gentleman was of an appearance befitting the occupier of such an exquisite place. He wore a white velvet coat so embroidered with gold and pearl that the skirts stood stiff about him; his waistcoat was pale violet silk glittering with crystal flowers; his sword-hilt was gold and diamond; and there were diamonds in the black cravat which fell over the gorgeous lace on his bosom. This much and the extreme grace of his tall person Luc noticed in an instant; in the next he was aware that he looked at the man whom he had seen a few days before in the Rue du Bac cowering before the black coffin. Even though he could only see a profile and the long grey curls that flowed beside it he was sure.Almost immediately the gentleman turned and was looking at him with a pair of great dark blue eyes of a marvellous colour and lustre. The face proved as fascinatingly beautiful as Luc had believed from his brief glimpse. The expression was now reserved, haughty, and melancholy; the perfect mouth with the dark upper lip, that showed how deep-hued his hair was beneath the powder, was set firmly, the cleft chin slightly raised. Handsome as the face was in line of feature, the most noticeable thing about it was the superb colour of the eyes—literally a sapphire blue, soft and yet flashing and vivid as the tint of a summer sky at even. Luc had read of such eyes in poetry, but had never thought to see them looking at him from a human face. With one hand, half hidden in the delicate lace at his wrist, holding back the fine silk curtain that concealed the silver lake, the gentleman stood, very much at his ease, and addressed Luc.“Do I know you?” he asked languidly.It seemed to Luc an extraordinary question.“No,” he answered on a smile. “I am, like yourself, one of His Majesty’s guests.”The other seemed to consider that answer with a kind of cold reflection; his superb eyes travelled over Luc’s person with an open scrutiny which the Marquis resented.“I break upon your leisure, Monsieur,” he said.“Stay,” answered the handsome gentleman calmly; “I am tired of being alone. Perhaps you are amusing.”Luc smiled again.“Are you in want of amusement, Monsieur,” he asked, “on such a night—in such a spot?”The blue eyes stared.“Such a night?” their owner repeated blankly.“Do you,” asked Luc, “see no difference ’twixt one night and another?”The beautiful face smiled.“Why, youareamusing.”Luc laughed out loud.“I never was thought to be so before,” he answered.The gorgeous stranger moved the pink screen behind him and revealed a small gilt table covered with cards.“Do you play?” he asked.“I never had the time or the money,” said the Marquis simply. “You do?”“I was the finest gambler in France, they say, before I was ten years old,” was the listless reply; as he spoke he took the white chair before the card table.“Why, those who brought you up have something to answer for,” smiled Luc. He took off his hat and seated himself on the corner of the sofa, an elegant dark figure in his deep blue velvet against the light background.The other man was silent a moment, then he said in an even voice—“God judge them—I think they have.”He interested Luc intensely, by reason of his great beauty, his tragic melancholy, and something indefinable in his manner that Luc could not place. He was obviously a noble—possibly a great noble—but his air was the air of some class Luc had never met. He was as much puzzled by it as if he had suddenly found himself talking to some shopkeeper of the Rue St. Honoré in disguise as a gentleman, or some foreigner passing as a Frenchman; yet he could not have named what this man did or said that was out of the ordinary.“Monsieur,” he said, “you seem to me very melancholy, and yet, methinks, you appear one of fortune’s favourites.”“In what way?” was the almost wondering answer.Luc was near moved to laughter again, then to a great pity.“You have youth and health, I know, Monsieur, and, I think, money and leisure—probably a great name and power. Am I right?”“I have all those,” answered the other wearily. “But what have those things to do with content?”“There are men,” smiled Luc, “who have neither money nor health nor power, only great ambitions—unsatisfied.”“Ambitions!” The blue eyes widened.“If you have power you can gratify your ambitions, doubtless, Monsieur,” remarked the Marquis dryly; “but you seem to me one who hath known nothing but ease.”The other leant forward a little; his gaze was fixed on Luc in an interested fashion.“Who are you?”Luc’s shyness returned.“I was a soldier,” he said briefly; “I am now merely M. de Vauvenargues, who has still his use to find.”“What do you wish to do?”“To serve the King,” answered Luc without affectation.“The King! I suppose it is a profitable employment to serve the King.”The sneer was so manifest that Luc replied with some warmth—“No, Monsieur; but it is honourable, and I look for honour.”“Then,” returned the gentleman with even deeper scorn, “you are unique in France.”Luc flushed to his brow and his reserve vanished again.“If you think that,” he replied earnestly, “it is clear that you have never been with the army.”“The army!” repeated the other with an air of cynical haughtiness, and Luc began to be impatient with the gloomy voluptuary who appeared to be sunk in such a sloth of mind that he was incapable even of appreciation.“Had you been with us during the retreat from Prague, Monsieur, you would know how real heroism can be; there was neither profit nor glory for many thousands there who lay down to die in the snow—content to serve the King.”The stranger gazed at him without a change of expression.“What doyouhope for at Court?” he asked.“I have nothing to offer but my zeal,” replied Luc, “and I expect nothing but some scope in which to serve His Majesty.”He was answered by a short laugh.“I repeat that you are quite unique, Monsieur.”“There are more men in France than you or I could count, Monsieur, who feel as I,” returned Luc proudly, “and you are unfortunate that you have spent your life in such a fashion as never to have met them.”The other narrowed his eyes with that superb insolence that seemed to Luc at variance with his obvious high breeding.“I can assure you,” he said, “youareunique—at least in my experience,” he added, with no softening in his voice, which was as beautiful as his person, but marred with an inflexion of gloom and scorn.Luc rose; he longed to be out in the night again, alone with his own aspirations.“We waste time very foolishly,” he said. “Pardon me that I intruded on you, Monsieur.” He turned towards the door and looked with joy on the moonlit lake.“Waste time!” repeated the other; “you use extraordinary words. How can one waste what is so endless, so wearisome?”Luc paused, with his hand on the pale, glimmering door. His impulse was to leave without more words, but as he looked at the other man the circumstances of his first knowledge of him, and the sumptuous beauty of this spoilt favourite of fortune, moved him to further speech; curiosity and a certain almost passionate contempt stirred him. For this man was not like M. de Richelieu; he redeemed himself with no gaiety or wit or energy, but seemed too proud or too supine to make the least effort to please or even to comprehend others.“How old are you?” asked Luc abruptly.“Twenty-seven,” was the answer, given in a kind of haughty surprise.“And tired of life!” smiled the Marquis. “Is there anything in the world you have not enjoyed to satiety? is there anything under heaven you are not weary of?”The other answered with deep melancholy.“You are quite right, Monsieur, there is nothing that can give me the least pleasure; I find everything very miserable and stale.”“Yet,” said Luc, thinking of the black coffin, “probably you are afraid of death.”The cynic crossed himself with a trembling hand and paled perceptibly.“How dare you use that word?” he cried. “Have I not said that I will not hear it? But those who believe are saved,” he added, with more animation than he had yet shown, “and I am saved, for I believe. No one can say that I am not a religious man.”“You hang between loathing of life and fear of damnation, then,” returned Luc, marvelling. “Monsieur, I very greatly pity you that your superstitions bring you no greater comfort.”“Superstitions?”“I take it you are a Christian,” said the Marquis calmly.The other shrank back from him.“And you?” he asked.“I follow a creed that enables me to smile at death and hell-fire,” said Luc simply.“An atheist!” murmured the stranger. “Well,youare damned, ” he added with a sullen satisfaction. He crossed himself again and muttered a few words of a prayer. “There are too many of you in France,” he continued, “and now I think you begin to creep into the Court.”“We speak of matters too deep, Monsieur, for our acquaintance,” answered the Marquis.“An atheist!” repeated the other. “How can God’s blessing be upon us with such corrupting France?”The grossness and superstition of this man’s slavish religion fired Luc to a sudden fine wrath.“It is such as you, Monsieur, who corrupt Court and city and nation,” he said quietly; “such as you, dulled by luxury, enervated by ease, afraid of death, afraid of life, staled by amusement and frivolity, cynical of any good in others, contemptuous of honour and glory—it is such as you who cause the people to curse the nobility—yea, even to shake them in their loyalty; it is such as you who have no right to serve the King with your weary flatteries; it is such as you who are not needed in this our splendid France.”“I—not needed?”“I speak as a soldier and plainly. I am no older than you, Monsieur, and not of your doubtless great position, but I have seen things—seen men live and die with no hope or reward save the glory of serving the King of France.”Luc’s grey eyes lost their dreaminess as he thought of the young monarch who was his lodestar.“Little can I offer His Majesty but an unstained sword; but that is more worthy of his acceptance than anything your wealth could bring.”The wonderful blue eyes darkened with a sneer.“You have a high conception of the King!”“Yes,” smiled Luc proudly. “I know what real loyalty is—no courtier can teach me. I have walked among the dying, who eased their torments by murmuring the name of King Louis. I have beheld men spurred to great achievement by the thought of him; his name is a power that you perhaps cannot conceive of. I believe with thousands that he will, in the splendid ardour of his youth, lead France to greater glories that she has yet attained. Louis the Great will be overshadowed by Louis the Well Beloved!”His thin cheek flushed with enthusiasm; he looked beyond the gorgeous pavilion to the exquisite night.“His Majesty is to be envied,” said the other coldly.Luc drew a deep breath.“To be envied! Imagine, on such a night as this, to stand beneath the heavens, young, a king—and King of France! The whole world waiting to give you her best—the power, the scope, the ardent love and devotion at your feet. Ah, Monsieur, to be such a man is to almost pass humanity.”He turned impetuously to find his listener watching him curiously with the same expression of cold melancholy, and a certain chill came over his own ardour.“I do not know why I speak so,” he said with a flush, “nor why I have been drawn to talk at all.”“Because,” replied the other wearily, “you are a fool.” He yawned and then gave a little sigh.Luc’s instant anger as instantly died, for there was something tragic in the beautiful face so utterly hopeless, so blind to the spiritual, so weary of the senses.“Good night, Monsieur,” said the Marquis gravely.The other made no answer. His blue eyes fluttered lazily from Luc and rested on the floor; his chin sunk on the jewelled laces on his breast. The absolute indifference of his manner was a marked discourtesy. The Marquis gave him a narrowed glance and left him.As Luc saw the water, the sky, the roses, and the moonlight, the image of the jaded, sad, and sneering young man went from his mind; he could not think melancholy thoughts on such a night of gold and pearl, dark trees and fragrant flowers.
The Marquis took lodgings the following week in the little town that centred round the palace and park of Versailles, and there met his former colonel, M. de Biron.
The young Duke was amiable, if cynical, at Luc’s persistence in endeavouring to enter politics; he came to his rooms and attempted to enlighten him as to the state of the Court and the characters of the men who guided it. Luc smiled and forgot what he said as soon as the words were spoken; he knew M. de Biron was shallow, and he gave little weight to his impressions of men or affairs.
M. de Caumont had offered to present him to the King, but had not yet arrived at Versailles; and M. de Biron urged him not to wait, but to at once attend His Majesty.
Luc’s strict code of courtesy would not permit him to slight M. de Caumont by ignoring the introduction offered and accepted; but when M. de Biron brought him an invitation for one of the fête days on which the King would not be present, he decided to go, with some bold idea under his shy manner of meeting M. Amelot and speaking to him directly.
He was now corresponding regularly with M. de Voltaire, and though the subject of their letters was still the respective merits of Corneille and Racine, Luc drew from the great man’s words a far wider inspiration than mere enthusiasm for the famous poets. He had always—almost without knowing it—been fond of letters, and now, in his unavoidable leisure, he had begun writing down his thoughts, and hopes, and aspirations.
The very day that he went for the first time to the palace he had put the last sentence to a paper he had written on the glorious and beloved young King.
Since he had left Aix his desire for meditation had increased and emphasized his shyness, which was almost sufficient to render him awkward despite his native grace and breeding. Certainly his first experiences of the château were not pleasant to him; the gorgeous park was too vast, too full of people. He felt too utterly uncongenial to their obvious gaiety. Not that his temper or his mood was gloomy, or that he was incapable of the exquisite pleasures of youth and carelessness—there was probably no one there who could have brought a keener delight to the enjoyment of the fair things of life—but Luc had too fine a nature to be satisfied by sensation at second hand. Because every one else affected light-heartedness, because the coloured lamps were lit in the trees, because all were rich and presumably happy, his soul could not keep festival.
M. de Biron soon left him. He felt as lonely as he had done when standing on the Pont Neuf, and as serene. As soon as he could disengage himself from the crowd he made his way from the terraces, arbours, and fountains in front of the great château, and turned down one of the magnificent alleys that opened mysteriously and alluring into dusky vistas lit only by occasional beams from the young moon.
He walked rapidly, his spirits rising with the solitude. He had soon passed the garlands of rich lights swung from tree to tree, the couples walking slowly with swish of silk, soon completely lost sight of the wonderful palace raised up luminous against the spring sky, and distanced the fine strains of music from the violins and hautboys.
He reached a beautiful glade across which deer were wandering; the silence was so marvellous that he caught his breath. Regardless of where he was, of Ministers, of M. de Biron, he continued his way through the spring night. The trees were almost in full leaf, and not a tremble disturbed their dignity. Luc crossed the glade and came into a little grove of elms, beyond which a small lake lay argent and motionless.
A sudden gust of perfume made him shiver with pleasure. All round the water were planted thick rose bushes full in flower; the long trails of foliage and blossom fell over and touched the smooth surface of the lake. A little bridge of twisted rustic wood led to a pavilion that shone, shaded with delicate trees, from a tiny island on the bosom of the water.
A peach-coloured light issued from the windows and open door of this pavilion and fell in long, still reflections across the water.
In a thicket of white thorn beyond a nightingale was singing, and there were clouds of a pearl-blue colour lying softly about the moon.
Luc paused by the bridge; the exquisite enchantment of the place and hour captivated his senses. He drew a sigh and bent over the roses; their perfume came and went like the drawing of a breath. The nightingale halted in his importunate song and was still. Luc could not stay his feet; he softly crossed the little bridge and approached the door of the pavilion that seemed the centre of this magic spot.
The flood of tremulous pink-gold light showed more roses clustering close about the doorstep: white roses these, turned now to all hues of soft amber and ivory and shimmering away into the luminous shadow that concealed the walls of the pavilion.
Luc supposed that this was but one of the lavish festal arrangements; he had seen several pavilions in the park, though none as remote as this. As there was not a sign of movement nor any whisper of voices he thought the place empty.
With his usual light step unconsciously still further subdued he entered the pavilion.
It was one room, oval shaped, with white walls and ceiling and four windows shaded with peach-tinted silk and open on the lake.
On the panels between the windows hung delicate drawings in pastel framed by gilt ribbons, and in front of one window was a small table of kingswood, which bore some tall Venetian wineglasses and a blue enamel dish of bonbons. The furniture consisted of a low couch covered with pale rich satin cushions all embroidered with garlands and coronals of flowers, several chairs of the most delicate shape and make, and a gold clavichord and harp, both wreathed with natural white roses.
The light came from a silver lamp shaded with silk that hung from the ceiling.
In one corner was a pink satin screen, and as Luc’s first glance was satisfying him that he was alone in this delicious apartment, a gentleman came round this screen and stepped to the nearest window, evidently without seeing the Marquis, who was, indeed, half in the shadow of the outer air. This gentleman was of an appearance befitting the occupier of such an exquisite place. He wore a white velvet coat so embroidered with gold and pearl that the skirts stood stiff about him; his waistcoat was pale violet silk glittering with crystal flowers; his sword-hilt was gold and diamond; and there were diamonds in the black cravat which fell over the gorgeous lace on his bosom. This much and the extreme grace of his tall person Luc noticed in an instant; in the next he was aware that he looked at the man whom he had seen a few days before in the Rue du Bac cowering before the black coffin. Even though he could only see a profile and the long grey curls that flowed beside it he was sure.
Almost immediately the gentleman turned and was looking at him with a pair of great dark blue eyes of a marvellous colour and lustre. The face proved as fascinatingly beautiful as Luc had believed from his brief glimpse. The expression was now reserved, haughty, and melancholy; the perfect mouth with the dark upper lip, that showed how deep-hued his hair was beneath the powder, was set firmly, the cleft chin slightly raised. Handsome as the face was in line of feature, the most noticeable thing about it was the superb colour of the eyes—literally a sapphire blue, soft and yet flashing and vivid as the tint of a summer sky at even. Luc had read of such eyes in poetry, but had never thought to see them looking at him from a human face. With one hand, half hidden in the delicate lace at his wrist, holding back the fine silk curtain that concealed the silver lake, the gentleman stood, very much at his ease, and addressed Luc.
“Do I know you?” he asked languidly.
It seemed to Luc an extraordinary question.
“No,” he answered on a smile. “I am, like yourself, one of His Majesty’s guests.”
The other seemed to consider that answer with a kind of cold reflection; his superb eyes travelled over Luc’s person with an open scrutiny which the Marquis resented.
“I break upon your leisure, Monsieur,” he said.
“Stay,” answered the handsome gentleman calmly; “I am tired of being alone. Perhaps you are amusing.”
Luc smiled again.
“Are you in want of amusement, Monsieur,” he asked, “on such a night—in such a spot?”
The blue eyes stared.
“Such a night?” their owner repeated blankly.
“Do you,” asked Luc, “see no difference ’twixt one night and another?”
The beautiful face smiled.
“Why, youareamusing.”
Luc laughed out loud.
“I never was thought to be so before,” he answered.
The gorgeous stranger moved the pink screen behind him and revealed a small gilt table covered with cards.
“Do you play?” he asked.
“I never had the time or the money,” said the Marquis simply. “You do?”
“I was the finest gambler in France, they say, before I was ten years old,” was the listless reply; as he spoke he took the white chair before the card table.
“Why, those who brought you up have something to answer for,” smiled Luc. He took off his hat and seated himself on the corner of the sofa, an elegant dark figure in his deep blue velvet against the light background.
The other man was silent a moment, then he said in an even voice—
“God judge them—I think they have.”
He interested Luc intensely, by reason of his great beauty, his tragic melancholy, and something indefinable in his manner that Luc could not place. He was obviously a noble—possibly a great noble—but his air was the air of some class Luc had never met. He was as much puzzled by it as if he had suddenly found himself talking to some shopkeeper of the Rue St. Honoré in disguise as a gentleman, or some foreigner passing as a Frenchman; yet he could not have named what this man did or said that was out of the ordinary.
“Monsieur,” he said, “you seem to me very melancholy, and yet, methinks, you appear one of fortune’s favourites.”
“In what way?” was the almost wondering answer.
Luc was near moved to laughter again, then to a great pity.
“You have youth and health, I know, Monsieur, and, I think, money and leisure—probably a great name and power. Am I right?”
“I have all those,” answered the other wearily. “But what have those things to do with content?”
“There are men,” smiled Luc, “who have neither money nor health nor power, only great ambitions—unsatisfied.”
“Ambitions!” The blue eyes widened.
“If you have power you can gratify your ambitions, doubtless, Monsieur,” remarked the Marquis dryly; “but you seem to me one who hath known nothing but ease.”
The other leant forward a little; his gaze was fixed on Luc in an interested fashion.
“Who are you?”
Luc’s shyness returned.
“I was a soldier,” he said briefly; “I am now merely M. de Vauvenargues, who has still his use to find.”
“What do you wish to do?”
“To serve the King,” answered Luc without affectation.
“The King! I suppose it is a profitable employment to serve the King.”
The sneer was so manifest that Luc replied with some warmth—
“No, Monsieur; but it is honourable, and I look for honour.”
“Then,” returned the gentleman with even deeper scorn, “you are unique in France.”
Luc flushed to his brow and his reserve vanished again.
“If you think that,” he replied earnestly, “it is clear that you have never been with the army.”
“The army!” repeated the other with an air of cynical haughtiness, and Luc began to be impatient with the gloomy voluptuary who appeared to be sunk in such a sloth of mind that he was incapable even of appreciation.
“Had you been with us during the retreat from Prague, Monsieur, you would know how real heroism can be; there was neither profit nor glory for many thousands there who lay down to die in the snow—content to serve the King.”
The stranger gazed at him without a change of expression.
“What doyouhope for at Court?” he asked.
“I have nothing to offer but my zeal,” replied Luc, “and I expect nothing but some scope in which to serve His Majesty.”
He was answered by a short laugh.
“I repeat that you are quite unique, Monsieur.”
“There are more men in France than you or I could count, Monsieur, who feel as I,” returned Luc proudly, “and you are unfortunate that you have spent your life in such a fashion as never to have met them.”
The other narrowed his eyes with that superb insolence that seemed to Luc at variance with his obvious high breeding.
“I can assure you,” he said, “youareunique—at least in my experience,” he added, with no softening in his voice, which was as beautiful as his person, but marred with an inflexion of gloom and scorn.
Luc rose; he longed to be out in the night again, alone with his own aspirations.
“We waste time very foolishly,” he said. “Pardon me that I intruded on you, Monsieur.” He turned towards the door and looked with joy on the moonlit lake.
“Waste time!” repeated the other; “you use extraordinary words. How can one waste what is so endless, so wearisome?”
Luc paused, with his hand on the pale, glimmering door. His impulse was to leave without more words, but as he looked at the other man the circumstances of his first knowledge of him, and the sumptuous beauty of this spoilt favourite of fortune, moved him to further speech; curiosity and a certain almost passionate contempt stirred him. For this man was not like M. de Richelieu; he redeemed himself with no gaiety or wit or energy, but seemed too proud or too supine to make the least effort to please or even to comprehend others.
“How old are you?” asked Luc abruptly.
“Twenty-seven,” was the answer, given in a kind of haughty surprise.
“And tired of life!” smiled the Marquis. “Is there anything in the world you have not enjoyed to satiety? is there anything under heaven you are not weary of?”
The other answered with deep melancholy.
“You are quite right, Monsieur, there is nothing that can give me the least pleasure; I find everything very miserable and stale.”
“Yet,” said Luc, thinking of the black coffin, “probably you are afraid of death.”
The cynic crossed himself with a trembling hand and paled perceptibly.
“How dare you use that word?” he cried. “Have I not said that I will not hear it? But those who believe are saved,” he added, with more animation than he had yet shown, “and I am saved, for I believe. No one can say that I am not a religious man.”
“You hang between loathing of life and fear of damnation, then,” returned Luc, marvelling. “Monsieur, I very greatly pity you that your superstitions bring you no greater comfort.”
“Superstitions?”
“I take it you are a Christian,” said the Marquis calmly.
The other shrank back from him.
“And you?” he asked.
“I follow a creed that enables me to smile at death and hell-fire,” said Luc simply.
“An atheist!” murmured the stranger. “Well,youare damned, ” he added with a sullen satisfaction. He crossed himself again and muttered a few words of a prayer. “There are too many of you in France,” he continued, “and now I think you begin to creep into the Court.”
“We speak of matters too deep, Monsieur, for our acquaintance,” answered the Marquis.
“An atheist!” repeated the other. “How can God’s blessing be upon us with such corrupting France?”
The grossness and superstition of this man’s slavish religion fired Luc to a sudden fine wrath.
“It is such as you, Monsieur, who corrupt Court and city and nation,” he said quietly; “such as you, dulled by luxury, enervated by ease, afraid of death, afraid of life, staled by amusement and frivolity, cynical of any good in others, contemptuous of honour and glory—it is such as you who cause the people to curse the nobility—yea, even to shake them in their loyalty; it is such as you who have no right to serve the King with your weary flatteries; it is such as you who are not needed in this our splendid France.”
“I—not needed?”
“I speak as a soldier and plainly. I am no older than you, Monsieur, and not of your doubtless great position, but I have seen things—seen men live and die with no hope or reward save the glory of serving the King of France.”
Luc’s grey eyes lost their dreaminess as he thought of the young monarch who was his lodestar.
“Little can I offer His Majesty but an unstained sword; but that is more worthy of his acceptance than anything your wealth could bring.”
The wonderful blue eyes darkened with a sneer.
“You have a high conception of the King!”
“Yes,” smiled Luc proudly. “I know what real loyalty is—no courtier can teach me. I have walked among the dying, who eased their torments by murmuring the name of King Louis. I have beheld men spurred to great achievement by the thought of him; his name is a power that you perhaps cannot conceive of. I believe with thousands that he will, in the splendid ardour of his youth, lead France to greater glories that she has yet attained. Louis the Great will be overshadowed by Louis the Well Beloved!”
His thin cheek flushed with enthusiasm; he looked beyond the gorgeous pavilion to the exquisite night.
“His Majesty is to be envied,” said the other coldly.
Luc drew a deep breath.
“To be envied! Imagine, on such a night as this, to stand beneath the heavens, young, a king—and King of France! The whole world waiting to give you her best—the power, the scope, the ardent love and devotion at your feet. Ah, Monsieur, to be such a man is to almost pass humanity.”
He turned impetuously to find his listener watching him curiously with the same expression of cold melancholy, and a certain chill came over his own ardour.
“I do not know why I speak so,” he said with a flush, “nor why I have been drawn to talk at all.”
“Because,” replied the other wearily, “you are a fool.” He yawned and then gave a little sigh.
Luc’s instant anger as instantly died, for there was something tragic in the beautiful face so utterly hopeless, so blind to the spiritual, so weary of the senses.
“Good night, Monsieur,” said the Marquis gravely.
The other made no answer. His blue eyes fluttered lazily from Luc and rested on the floor; his chin sunk on the jewelled laces on his breast. The absolute indifference of his manner was a marked discourtesy. The Marquis gave him a narrowed glance and left him.
As Luc saw the water, the sky, the roses, and the moonlight, the image of the jaded, sad, and sneering young man went from his mind; he could not think melancholy thoughts on such a night of gold and pearl, dark trees and fragrant flowers.
CHAPTER IVDESPAIRAs Luc stood at the window of his modest bedroom the night of the fête, he was thinking of two definite themes, curiously woven and twisted into one strand of reflection.The first theme was the diamond ring he had seen the Countess Carola wearing. He wondered how she came by it, and he was rather vexed by the thought that perhaps the page had never told his master it had been refused, but kept and sold it secretly; for that it was the same jewel he had held in his hand in the Governor’s house at Avignon that was now in the possession of the Polish lady he did not, in his heart, for a moment doubt.The second theme, in no way connected, yet mingled, with the other, was the man he had held that curious conversation with in the fairylike pavilion at Versailles—a man with life strong within him, yet tired of life, the most melancholy of spectacles, and one new to Luc.While men like this one and M. de Richelieu held the great places of the land, perhaps M. de Biron was right in saying that penniless, unsupported zeal would find no scope in Paris.Perhaps, after all, Roland was dead at Roncesvalles, Charlemagne buried, and all the peers perished, taking chivalry with them to their graves.The moon had long since set, and a vivid dawn was spreading above the housetops of the little town.Luc softly opened the window and looked out, up and down the bare, silent little street, fresh and clean in the new light. Supposing it was all a delusion, supposing glory always evaded him, vanished into clouds of disappointment, supposing he was always met by the cold look those blue eyes had turned on him last night?Ah, well, in that case it would have been far better if he had died with Hippolyte de Seytres in Prague or with Georges d’Espagnac among the snow and darkness. And Carola—his highest thoughts had clung to the vision of her very tenderly. But what did he know of her?In the cold silence of the dawn he asked himself if he loved her, if she was worthy to be loved; also what her eyes had said when she raised them from the wallflower stalk she was turning about in her long, expressive, smooth fingers.He thought those eyes, so full of inspiration and courage and eagerness, had said, “This is love—somewhere between us—shall we find it or lose it?”He trembled at the thought, which he had, till now, never dared formulate; but he could not dismiss it. That look of hers had touched his conception of her with fire. He now admitted to himself that he had been stung keenly to see her wearing a jewel once in the possession of M. de Richelieu; it caused him to think of the wretched magician’s last words, addressed to the young Duke: “Beware of her who comes from Bohemia!” He found himself wishing that she was neither so wealthy nor so highly placed; yet it was no matter to him. If she was worthy to be loved he could love her as Rudel loved the Lady of Tripoli, and she need never know it even. He sternly checked his thoughts. What did he know of her? She was a foreigner; her conduct towards him had been always cold; and he—he had his place to find, his way to make, his goal to achieve.He closed the window and sat down rather wearily, resting his head against the mullions. The little room was full of a melancholy light, the furniture enveloped with heavy shadows. A large black crucifix above the curtained bed showed distinct and gloomy; it recalled to Luc the noble of the pavilion, with his horror of death, his distaste of life, weighed down by the shadow of the Cross, blind to the roses, yawning in the face of the moon.He rose with a little shiver and began pacing up and down the room; his old fierce yearning for his former life suddenly rushed over him. He wanted to be away from all these people, out on the march again with his beloved companions, Hippolyte and Georges.He paused and clutched the back of a chair in his effort to control this sudden passionate desire for the past, and fixed his eyes on the square of lightening sky above the roofs that were slowly beginning to take on colour and shape and shadow.A decided but light knock at his door recalled him to commonplace things. He glanced instinctively at the brass bracket clock near the window; it was a little after three o’clock. He wondered who could be rousing him at this hour, and almost persuaded himself that he had not heard the knock, when it was repeated, firmly, twice.The Marquis went to the door at once and opened it. Immediately outside, half obscured by the dim shadows of the landing, was a young man, fully dressed like himself.“Your pardon, Monsieur,” he said at once, in an even, sweet voice; “are you not an Abbé?”“No,” answered Luc, greatly amazed.“Ah, forgive me; I thought I had been told that an Abbé lodged here.” He seemed slightly disappointed, but made no movement of leaving.“Are you staying in this house, Monsieur?” asked Luc.“Yes; I have the chambers opposite.” He glanced with a smile at Luc’s blue velvet and black satins, court sword and powdered hair. “You have not been sleeping either, I perceive,” he added.“I was at the fête last night,” answered the Marquis, “and fell into thought when I returned, and now it seems strange to go to bed by daylight.”The young man hesitated a moment, while Luc held the door courteously open.“Are you alone?” he asked at last.“I have my servant—he is asleep in the other chamber.”Again the other hesitated, then said with a kind of wistful earnestness—“Monsieur, would you come to my room and keep me company a little while? I thought if you had been a priest I could have asked this in the name of God. As it is, may I ask it in the name of our common youth, our common humanity?”“I have no reason in the world for refusing,” answered the Marquis; “but if you require a priest, shall I not go for one? There is, I think, a convent near by.”The young man shook his head.“No, if you will come, Monsieur—just for a little while.”Luc closed his own door and followed the other across the landing into the room opposite.He found it was much larger than his own and rather gloomily furnished. The house was old, and the floor was sloping in this room and the two windows with the deep sills had slightly sunk; the walls were panelled in black waxed oak, and the ceiling was low and beamed.A heavy bed, with dark blue brocade curtains drawn closely round it, stood in one corner, and near it hung a long mirror in a thick tortoiseshell frame; in the murky depths of the greenish glass the rest of the chamber was reflected.A brass hand-lamp and an hour-glass stood on a circular worm-eaten oak table between the windows, from which the sombre tapestry curtains had been looped back.Hanging on the wall above this table was a black crucifix similar to that which the Marquis had in his own apartment.The few chairs were large and worn, with sunken seats and arms polished with much use. The occupier of this ordinary, yet gloomy, apartment offered one of these chairs to the Marquis and took one himself, seating himself with his back to the light and his face towards Luc.The light, though increasing every moment, was still grey and colourless, and only entered with difficulty through the deep-set small windows.Luc looked keenly at the stranger.He saw a man of no more than his own age, of the appearance of a well-bred gentleman, dressed in a worn suit of dark red corded tabinet, with a plain muslin shirt ruffled at the neck and wrists; he wore a simple sword, ornamented by a bunch of steel tassels hanging from the scabbard, and a lady’s handkerchief, deeply bordered with lace, beneath the black band of his neck ribbon.Owing to the way in which he sat and his attitude, with his head slightly bent, Luc could not clearly distinguish his features; but his hair, which was a bright brown, inclined to reddish, and gathered into a club, was full in the meagre light of the window.“In what way can I serve you, Monsieur?” asked the Marquis. He was slightly interested, slightly diverted, but weary mentally and languid after his sleepless night. His pure, proud face was thrown up by the strengthening dawn against the old black chair in which he sat, and his deep grey eyes rested on the other with perfect courtesy and perfect serenity.“I am the Marquis de Vauvenargues, formerly of therégiment du roi,” he said.The young man moved suddenly, looped the curtain yet farther back, and pulled his chair round so that the light fell over his face; it was like taking a mask from his features, so suddenly were countenance and personality revealed.He had, as the Marquis noticed with a slight sense of horror, something of the look of Georges d’Espagnac in his fair, regular outline; but his expression was one of hopeless despair, keen wretchedness, and bitter self-contempt. His light brown eyes were sunk and shadowed, his mouth strained, his cheeks hollow; over his whole face was a bluish tinge that contrasted with the bright colour of his hair. This might have been caused by the chill, hard light of the dawn, or the effect of ill-health. Whatever the reason of it, it gave him a peculiar, ghastly appearance.Luc sat forward in his chair; for the second time within a few hours he was looking at an expression of absolute despair on a young, fair face. He compared the two countenances—the seen and the remembered—and there was this great difference in them, that, whereas the noble in the pavilion had revealed the bitter languor of satiety, the faded distaste of life caused by unending pleasure and cloying luxury, this man looked like one who had burnt out his soul in some useless endeavour, and was now on the verge of uttermost failure.“Monsieur,” said the Marquis, not without a tremor in his tone, “why did you ask my company?”“Ah,” replied the other, in a voice that had retained more of its youth and freshness than his face, “you are afraid that I am about to disturb your tranquillity by some recital of grief; but you need not be. And besides,” he added, “you are as serene as a very old monk who has never left his cloister—I can see it in your eyes.”“Not so serene,” replied Luc, “that I am not troubled by the sight of despair, and I have looked on it before this night.”“Very well, Monsieur,” was the answer: “return to your room and forget I ever broke in upon your meditations.”“Who are you?” asked Luc.“A painter—perhaps a poet.”“What have you done with your life,” asked the Marquis, “that at your age you seem so hopeless?”The painter smiled bitterly.“I have wasted all my years in the quest of glory.”Luc felt the blood beating at his heart.“And you have found——?” he questioned half fearfully.“I have found that there is no such thing as glory on earth. And I have no belief in any heaven.”As he spoke these words his face took on another tinge of pallor and a certain rigidity came over his features, giving them a look of death.“You are unfortunate,” said Luc; “but you cannot say glory is not there because you have not achieved it with a paint-brush and a few yards of canvas.”The painter broke into long and harsh laughter.“That is good, very good!” he cried. “And you still believe in it, though you have failed to gain it with your sword and your cannon and all your noisy details of war?”The Marquis rose and paced up and down the waxed, uneven floor. The painter’s laughter ended suddenly.“If you could question the god, the creature, the beast who made me,” he said fiercely, “you would see that I commenced my life searching for the ideal—the ideal love, the ideal work, the ideal reward at the end of it; and though my heart was pure, my courage high, and my industry enormous, I failed in everything—the world played me false every time, every time; and now I am a moral bankrupt, who does not even possess the asset of hope.”“You have had terrible experiences, to make you speak like this,” answered the Marquis, in a moved tone.“I have had all experiences, and I have found out that glory is only the lure used to beguile us to our wretched, our solitary ends.”“I think,” said Luc, “you never discovered the true meaning of it.”The painter lifted eyes in which there gleamed the feeble remains of what had once been the noble fires of enthusiasm and ambition.“I understand the meaning very well,” he replied; then he rose from his chair and stood looking out at the neat quiet street.Luc was silent. Tremendous thoughts assailed him—why could he not bring comfort down from the clouds to console this man?—why could he not lend him a spark from his own fire to rekindle the desire for glory in his breast?Presently he said—“Monsieur, you are still so young.” The words sounded commonplace even to himself, and the artist made no answer.“I should like to see your pictures,” said the Marquis. Now the light was strengthening, he observed a pile of canvases standing against the wall by the side of the bed.The painter answered without turning his head—“I painted a picture once that Watteau, or Boucher, or Fragonard might have been pleased to sign. It was a portrait of the woman I loved.”“Where is it now?” asked Luc.“In her house, I think. I found her in the gutters of St. Antoine—she left me in a silk dress I had starved myself to buy, I never succeeded after that, and as I went down she went up, and now you will find very high personages indeed at her little suppers. She is now, I believe, a spy among the Courts of Europe—and once she was my inspiration,” he added, in a dry tone.The sordidness of this disgusted Luc.“It is weakness to pin your fortunes to the skirts of a woman,” he said.The painter looked at him.“Areyougoing your way uncheered by any thought of any woman? Can you manage without laying your ambitions at some one’s feet?”Luc flushed.“I have never met the woman who could break my heart,” he answered.“Yet——” added the painter. “As for my picture,” he continued, “I took her, for some reason, as Bellona, with the hounds in leash and her drapery carried by a light wind. The drapery was very well put in.”The daylight was now full in the sombre room, and the dark furniture stood out clear against the shining walls; it fully revealed, too, the young artist, and showed that his peculiar pallor was no trick of light, but the colour of his face.Luc watched him keenly. There seemed a wildness in his words, in his expression, in his action in asking for the company of a stranger, that made Luc think that perhaps some anguish had sent him out of his wits; but even while he was thinking this, and wondering what comfort he could offer, the painter turned in a perfectly composed manner, and raising the hour-glass from the table between the windows, looked at it with a smile.The sand had nearly run through.“Now I will keep you no longer, Monsieur,” he said, in an even voice. “And if you wish to see my pictures—there is one I should like to show you, a little later in the morning; it is not yet quite completed.”Luc could see no brushes, paints, or easel in the plain bedchamber, nor any sign that the painter could finish any canvas; again he thought he detected a wildness in the man’s speech.“I shall be glad to see you again,” he said. “I fear this visit, Monsieur, has been of little use; but since you would give me no confidence, I could give you no consolation.”The painter smiled; he was still looking at the hour-glass.“Where there is no hope, how can there be any consolation?” he replied. “You have rendered me all the service I required—half an hour’s company.”He set down the hour-glass, went to the door and opened it.“You are searching for glory, are you not, Monsieur?” he asked, as Luc passed him. “Well, the word is a lie; there is no such thing—it is all a cloud of delusion; and when you have pierced the cloud, you find there is nothing there but the blankness of despair.”“No!” cried Luc, with energy. “No!”The painter shook his head in contradiction with a ghastly smile and closed the door on the Marquis, who heard immediately the bolts being slipped into place.
As Luc stood at the window of his modest bedroom the night of the fête, he was thinking of two definite themes, curiously woven and twisted into one strand of reflection.
The first theme was the diamond ring he had seen the Countess Carola wearing. He wondered how she came by it, and he was rather vexed by the thought that perhaps the page had never told his master it had been refused, but kept and sold it secretly; for that it was the same jewel he had held in his hand in the Governor’s house at Avignon that was now in the possession of the Polish lady he did not, in his heart, for a moment doubt.
The second theme, in no way connected, yet mingled, with the other, was the man he had held that curious conversation with in the fairylike pavilion at Versailles—a man with life strong within him, yet tired of life, the most melancholy of spectacles, and one new to Luc.
While men like this one and M. de Richelieu held the great places of the land, perhaps M. de Biron was right in saying that penniless, unsupported zeal would find no scope in Paris.
Perhaps, after all, Roland was dead at Roncesvalles, Charlemagne buried, and all the peers perished, taking chivalry with them to their graves.
The moon had long since set, and a vivid dawn was spreading above the housetops of the little town.
Luc softly opened the window and looked out, up and down the bare, silent little street, fresh and clean in the new light. Supposing it was all a delusion, supposing glory always evaded him, vanished into clouds of disappointment, supposing he was always met by the cold look those blue eyes had turned on him last night?
Ah, well, in that case it would have been far better if he had died with Hippolyte de Seytres in Prague or with Georges d’Espagnac among the snow and darkness. And Carola—his highest thoughts had clung to the vision of her very tenderly. But what did he know of her?
In the cold silence of the dawn he asked himself if he loved her, if she was worthy to be loved; also what her eyes had said when she raised them from the wallflower stalk she was turning about in her long, expressive, smooth fingers.
He thought those eyes, so full of inspiration and courage and eagerness, had said, “This is love—somewhere between us—shall we find it or lose it?”
He trembled at the thought, which he had, till now, never dared formulate; but he could not dismiss it. That look of hers had touched his conception of her with fire. He now admitted to himself that he had been stung keenly to see her wearing a jewel once in the possession of M. de Richelieu; it caused him to think of the wretched magician’s last words, addressed to the young Duke: “Beware of her who comes from Bohemia!” He found himself wishing that she was neither so wealthy nor so highly placed; yet it was no matter to him. If she was worthy to be loved he could love her as Rudel loved the Lady of Tripoli, and she need never know it even. He sternly checked his thoughts. What did he know of her? She was a foreigner; her conduct towards him had been always cold; and he—he had his place to find, his way to make, his goal to achieve.
He closed the window and sat down rather wearily, resting his head against the mullions. The little room was full of a melancholy light, the furniture enveloped with heavy shadows. A large black crucifix above the curtained bed showed distinct and gloomy; it recalled to Luc the noble of the pavilion, with his horror of death, his distaste of life, weighed down by the shadow of the Cross, blind to the roses, yawning in the face of the moon.
He rose with a little shiver and began pacing up and down the room; his old fierce yearning for his former life suddenly rushed over him. He wanted to be away from all these people, out on the march again with his beloved companions, Hippolyte and Georges.
He paused and clutched the back of a chair in his effort to control this sudden passionate desire for the past, and fixed his eyes on the square of lightening sky above the roofs that were slowly beginning to take on colour and shape and shadow.
A decided but light knock at his door recalled him to commonplace things. He glanced instinctively at the brass bracket clock near the window; it was a little after three o’clock. He wondered who could be rousing him at this hour, and almost persuaded himself that he had not heard the knock, when it was repeated, firmly, twice.
The Marquis went to the door at once and opened it. Immediately outside, half obscured by the dim shadows of the landing, was a young man, fully dressed like himself.
“Your pardon, Monsieur,” he said at once, in an even, sweet voice; “are you not an Abbé?”
“No,” answered Luc, greatly amazed.
“Ah, forgive me; I thought I had been told that an Abbé lodged here.” He seemed slightly disappointed, but made no movement of leaving.
“Are you staying in this house, Monsieur?” asked Luc.
“Yes; I have the chambers opposite.” He glanced with a smile at Luc’s blue velvet and black satins, court sword and powdered hair. “You have not been sleeping either, I perceive,” he added.
“I was at the fête last night,” answered the Marquis, “and fell into thought when I returned, and now it seems strange to go to bed by daylight.”
The young man hesitated a moment, while Luc held the door courteously open.
“Are you alone?” he asked at last.
“I have my servant—he is asleep in the other chamber.”
Again the other hesitated, then said with a kind of wistful earnestness—
“Monsieur, would you come to my room and keep me company a little while? I thought if you had been a priest I could have asked this in the name of God. As it is, may I ask it in the name of our common youth, our common humanity?”
“I have no reason in the world for refusing,” answered the Marquis; “but if you require a priest, shall I not go for one? There is, I think, a convent near by.”
The young man shook his head.
“No, if you will come, Monsieur—just for a little while.”
Luc closed his own door and followed the other across the landing into the room opposite.
He found it was much larger than his own and rather gloomily furnished. The house was old, and the floor was sloping in this room and the two windows with the deep sills had slightly sunk; the walls were panelled in black waxed oak, and the ceiling was low and beamed.
A heavy bed, with dark blue brocade curtains drawn closely round it, stood in one corner, and near it hung a long mirror in a thick tortoiseshell frame; in the murky depths of the greenish glass the rest of the chamber was reflected.
A brass hand-lamp and an hour-glass stood on a circular worm-eaten oak table between the windows, from which the sombre tapestry curtains had been looped back.
Hanging on the wall above this table was a black crucifix similar to that which the Marquis had in his own apartment.
The few chairs were large and worn, with sunken seats and arms polished with much use. The occupier of this ordinary, yet gloomy, apartment offered one of these chairs to the Marquis and took one himself, seating himself with his back to the light and his face towards Luc.
The light, though increasing every moment, was still grey and colourless, and only entered with difficulty through the deep-set small windows.
Luc looked keenly at the stranger.
He saw a man of no more than his own age, of the appearance of a well-bred gentleman, dressed in a worn suit of dark red corded tabinet, with a plain muslin shirt ruffled at the neck and wrists; he wore a simple sword, ornamented by a bunch of steel tassels hanging from the scabbard, and a lady’s handkerchief, deeply bordered with lace, beneath the black band of his neck ribbon.
Owing to the way in which he sat and his attitude, with his head slightly bent, Luc could not clearly distinguish his features; but his hair, which was a bright brown, inclined to reddish, and gathered into a club, was full in the meagre light of the window.
“In what way can I serve you, Monsieur?” asked the Marquis. He was slightly interested, slightly diverted, but weary mentally and languid after his sleepless night. His pure, proud face was thrown up by the strengthening dawn against the old black chair in which he sat, and his deep grey eyes rested on the other with perfect courtesy and perfect serenity.
“I am the Marquis de Vauvenargues, formerly of therégiment du roi,” he said.
The young man moved suddenly, looped the curtain yet farther back, and pulled his chair round so that the light fell over his face; it was like taking a mask from his features, so suddenly were countenance and personality revealed.
He had, as the Marquis noticed with a slight sense of horror, something of the look of Georges d’Espagnac in his fair, regular outline; but his expression was one of hopeless despair, keen wretchedness, and bitter self-contempt. His light brown eyes were sunk and shadowed, his mouth strained, his cheeks hollow; over his whole face was a bluish tinge that contrasted with the bright colour of his hair. This might have been caused by the chill, hard light of the dawn, or the effect of ill-health. Whatever the reason of it, it gave him a peculiar, ghastly appearance.
Luc sat forward in his chair; for the second time within a few hours he was looking at an expression of absolute despair on a young, fair face. He compared the two countenances—the seen and the remembered—and there was this great difference in them, that, whereas the noble in the pavilion had revealed the bitter languor of satiety, the faded distaste of life caused by unending pleasure and cloying luxury, this man looked like one who had burnt out his soul in some useless endeavour, and was now on the verge of uttermost failure.
“Monsieur,” said the Marquis, not without a tremor in his tone, “why did you ask my company?”
“Ah,” replied the other, in a voice that had retained more of its youth and freshness than his face, “you are afraid that I am about to disturb your tranquillity by some recital of grief; but you need not be. And besides,” he added, “you are as serene as a very old monk who has never left his cloister—I can see it in your eyes.”
“Not so serene,” replied Luc, “that I am not troubled by the sight of despair, and I have looked on it before this night.”
“Very well, Monsieur,” was the answer: “return to your room and forget I ever broke in upon your meditations.”
“Who are you?” asked Luc.
“A painter—perhaps a poet.”
“What have you done with your life,” asked the Marquis, “that at your age you seem so hopeless?”
The painter smiled bitterly.
“I have wasted all my years in the quest of glory.”
Luc felt the blood beating at his heart.
“And you have found——?” he questioned half fearfully.
“I have found that there is no such thing as glory on earth. And I have no belief in any heaven.”
As he spoke these words his face took on another tinge of pallor and a certain rigidity came over his features, giving them a look of death.
“You are unfortunate,” said Luc; “but you cannot say glory is not there because you have not achieved it with a paint-brush and a few yards of canvas.”
The painter broke into long and harsh laughter.
“That is good, very good!” he cried. “And you still believe in it, though you have failed to gain it with your sword and your cannon and all your noisy details of war?”
The Marquis rose and paced up and down the waxed, uneven floor. The painter’s laughter ended suddenly.
“If you could question the god, the creature, the beast who made me,” he said fiercely, “you would see that I commenced my life searching for the ideal—the ideal love, the ideal work, the ideal reward at the end of it; and though my heart was pure, my courage high, and my industry enormous, I failed in everything—the world played me false every time, every time; and now I am a moral bankrupt, who does not even possess the asset of hope.”
“You have had terrible experiences, to make you speak like this,” answered the Marquis, in a moved tone.
“I have had all experiences, and I have found out that glory is only the lure used to beguile us to our wretched, our solitary ends.”
“I think,” said Luc, “you never discovered the true meaning of it.”
The painter lifted eyes in which there gleamed the feeble remains of what had once been the noble fires of enthusiasm and ambition.
“I understand the meaning very well,” he replied; then he rose from his chair and stood looking out at the neat quiet street.
Luc was silent. Tremendous thoughts assailed him—why could he not bring comfort down from the clouds to console this man?—why could he not lend him a spark from his own fire to rekindle the desire for glory in his breast?
Presently he said—
“Monsieur, you are still so young.” The words sounded commonplace even to himself, and the artist made no answer.
“I should like to see your pictures,” said the Marquis. Now the light was strengthening, he observed a pile of canvases standing against the wall by the side of the bed.
The painter answered without turning his head—
“I painted a picture once that Watteau, or Boucher, or Fragonard might have been pleased to sign. It was a portrait of the woman I loved.”
“Where is it now?” asked Luc.
“In her house, I think. I found her in the gutters of St. Antoine—she left me in a silk dress I had starved myself to buy, I never succeeded after that, and as I went down she went up, and now you will find very high personages indeed at her little suppers. She is now, I believe, a spy among the Courts of Europe—and once she was my inspiration,” he added, in a dry tone.
The sordidness of this disgusted Luc.
“It is weakness to pin your fortunes to the skirts of a woman,” he said.
The painter looked at him.
“Areyougoing your way uncheered by any thought of any woman? Can you manage without laying your ambitions at some one’s feet?”
Luc flushed.
“I have never met the woman who could break my heart,” he answered.
“Yet——” added the painter. “As for my picture,” he continued, “I took her, for some reason, as Bellona, with the hounds in leash and her drapery carried by a light wind. The drapery was very well put in.”
The daylight was now full in the sombre room, and the dark furniture stood out clear against the shining walls; it fully revealed, too, the young artist, and showed that his peculiar pallor was no trick of light, but the colour of his face.
Luc watched him keenly. There seemed a wildness in his words, in his expression, in his action in asking for the company of a stranger, that made Luc think that perhaps some anguish had sent him out of his wits; but even while he was thinking this, and wondering what comfort he could offer, the painter turned in a perfectly composed manner, and raising the hour-glass from the table between the windows, looked at it with a smile.
The sand had nearly run through.
“Now I will keep you no longer, Monsieur,” he said, in an even voice. “And if you wish to see my pictures—there is one I should like to show you, a little later in the morning; it is not yet quite completed.”
Luc could see no brushes, paints, or easel in the plain bedchamber, nor any sign that the painter could finish any canvas; again he thought he detected a wildness in the man’s speech.
“I shall be glad to see you again,” he said. “I fear this visit, Monsieur, has been of little use; but since you would give me no confidence, I could give you no consolation.”
The painter smiled; he was still looking at the hour-glass.
“Where there is no hope, how can there be any consolation?” he replied. “You have rendered me all the service I required—half an hour’s company.”
He set down the hour-glass, went to the door and opened it.
“You are searching for glory, are you not, Monsieur?” he asked, as Luc passed him. “Well, the word is a lie; there is no such thing—it is all a cloud of delusion; and when you have pierced the cloud, you find there is nothing there but the blankness of despair.”
“No!” cried Luc, with energy. “No!”
The painter shook his head in contradiction with a ghastly smile and closed the door on the Marquis, who heard immediately the bolts being slipped into place.
CHAPTER VTHE PAINTERLuc heard that the King and M. Amelot had returned to Paris early the same morning that he had been in converse with the young painter. There was now nothing to keep him in Versailles: he had not seen the Countess Carola, and yesterday M. de Biron, who was now rejoining his regiment, could tell him nothing of her. She was probably still in Paris.Versailles, at least, had no attractions for Luc; he was more than ever anxious to see M. Amelot, as a second crisis had arisen between France, Austria, and the advancing power of Prussia. Now Fleury was dead, greater things were hoped from the diplomats of Paris, and Luc believed that he might find this a favourable moment for obtaining employment in politics.A few days before he came to Versailles he had heard from his father; he re-read the letter now, and it revived the sense of the dead weight of the chains of home. His father was waiting eagerly for news of his success; his mother wanted him back, and sent anxious inquiries after his health; Joseph and all his friends would have been so happy if he would have returned after his hardships at the war and settled down in Aix——Why could he not do it? He loved them all; he often felt ill and lonely. Why not go back and forget these vain visions that M. de Biron so laughed at? Why not marry Mademoiselle de Séguy and take up the life his father and his brother were leading? His sense of responsibility towards his parents was heavy: they had done everything for him, he nothing for them; he grudged even the money his stay in Paris was costing. Joseph had never been able to afford to come to Court.That they should be indulgent, even making sacrifices for him, was the last intolerable chain; how could he proceed on his way fettered by obligation, burdened by affection and sentiment? He wept a little over this love that was so rare and precious, and yet so useless!He almost wished that he was penniless, friendless—Masterof himself, with no one to care if he lived or died; a state that was supposed to be the epitome of human misery. But the man so situated was at least free.Other thoughts instantly checked and thrust this aside, but it had been formed.After all, what all these conflicting emotions amounted to was that he must in some way justify himself; must obey the passionate impulse within him, and obtain a scope for his energies.He left his chamber, and walked near the great park where he had met the beautiful young noble in the peach-coloured light of the pavilion last night. One sentence of his kept recurring to Luc; it was the only moment when he had shown any glimpse of feeling, and it was when Luc had said, “Those who brought you up have something to answer for,” and the young man had answered, in a moved tone, “God judge them—I think they have!”Luc felt sorry for him, but contemptuous too; he wondered if he should see him again entering the house in the Rue du Bac, or if the adventure of the coffin had caused him to abandon his place of rendezvous. Somehow Luc did not think he would risk the narrow street again after dark. How extraordinary cowardice was——The Marquis could not remotely conceive the fear of death as an active factor in anyone’s life.As he sat over his dinner in an inn near the populous market square, he thought of the young painter whose quest for glory had brought him to despair, even to madness. Glory—what was it that so many, in this frivolous age, pursued with panting breath and staring eyes? The great sceptic Voltaire, even as the great believer Bossuet, had been swept on to achievement by the desire of it; the blue-eyed noble who might have had it by lifting his finger sat inert and melancholy; the obscure young artist was livid with anguish because he had missed it. Where was it, what was it? A kind of frenzy, a wordless exaltation; perhaps the only sign there is of the godlike in man; the gateway to the infinite; the talisman that would turn the world to gold and heaven into a reality; the pursuit of the San Graal; the journey to the land of Canaan; the search for El Dorado, for the Islands of the Blest—under all these symbols had the quest of glory been disguised. Luc trembled in his heart, for who had yet found the Fortunate Isles?By the time he returned to his lodgings, his servant had packed his portmanteau and had the horses ready for their return to Paris. It was considerably past midday, and later than he had intended; he thought of the artist, and asked Jean if he had seen him go out.The man answered “No,” and Luc crossed the landing and knocked on the door opposite.There was no answer, and after waiting a little, Luc, who was already in his riding-cloak, turned the handle and entered the sombre, old-fashioned bedchamber where he had found himself in that morning’s dawn.He then saw that his servant had been mistaken, for the painter had certainly gone out; the room was empty.The Marquis was leaving again when he noticed on the dark table between the windows where the brass lamp and hour-glass stood a folded piece of paper. He approached, and saw it was addressed to himself. It contained only a few lines, and was unsigned.“Monsieur,—I am unfortunately obliged to leave you on a journey I have long contemplated. As you were courteous enough to wish to see some of my work, you will find my first and last masterpiece on the bed—I call it ‘The End of the Quest of Glory.’ It has the merit of truth, at least.”Luc glanced round the room: not a thing had been disarranged—some clothes even still lay across a chair; a portmanteau stood, loosely unstrapped, at the foot of the bed. Luc felt an absolute conviction that no one had left this room since he had himself, several hours before—save one way——“Suicide,” he said, and folded the letter across. Then, with a callousness that surprised himself, he went to the bed and pulled aside the heavy blue brocade curtains, which were drawn closely together as they had been before.He saw what he had expected to see: the young painter, prone and still, with fixed open eyes and a sneer on his stiff lips.Luc stood gazing; his serene brows contracted with an expression of pity, anger, and regret. He stooped and laid his hand on the dulled hair of the young suicide, damp with the death-agony.The coverlet was slightly disturbed by the last struggle of departing life, the dead man’s limbs slightly contracted, as if he had died in the convulsion of a shudder. His left hand and arm lay across his breast, showing that his final action had been to draw the curtains about him.Luc thought of the bitter sarcasm of the letter, and the hand he laid on the painter’s forehead quivered. There was no mark of any violence; the young painter had evidently made an end of himself with poison.Luc moved away from the bed; he checked an almost mechanical impulse to lay the melancholy crucifix hanging above the bed on the dead man’s breast, and, moving to the canvases piled against the wall, turned the first two or three round. They were marked and defaced by a knife, which had completely disfigured the original paintings.Luc looked no more. A sword lay across a chair, and near it an open snuff-box filled with gold pieces. The Marquis felt a blankness of all sensation save weariness and aversion. He left the room and called the servant of the house, and soon the chamber of the dead was filled with people, with question, curiosity, wonder.Nothing, it appeared, was known of the dead man. He had come a few days before by the coach from Paris; he had given his name as Henri de Bèze; the day before he had paid for his week’s lodging. He had received no letters while in Versailles, nor, as far as could be known, had he sent any. No one had visited him, but he had been much from the house.Nor did a search among his effects provide any further information. If he had had any papers, he had destroyed them. He had died with his story, which might have been common or tragical, wrapped at least in the dignity of silence.There was enough money in the snuff-box to pay for his decent burial. A manifest suicide, and one who had died without absolution or any of the offices of the Church, his grave would be in the lonely strip of land outside consecrated ground where play-actors and vagabonds and Jews were laid.Luc returned to his own room, his head sick with fatigue, and seated himself by the window. In the commotion, his departure for Paris had been delayed; he wondered if he should return to-day. A slackness had fallen on his thoughts.While he was answering the respectful questions of the master of the house concerning his brief acquaintance with the dead man, he had been recalling his short stay in the painter’s chamber during the dawn of this same day. Evidently the painter had drunk the poison before he had asked for company, and Luc had been talking to a dying man who was measuring his life by the grains of sand in an hour-glass; for Luc recalled how he had taken up the hour-glass, and seeing that the sands were nearly run through, had abruptly ended the interview.Luc found himself picturing what had happened in the room after he had left it. He had heard the door bolted—but afterwards the dying man had altered that with some change of thought, probably when the idea of his ironical letter occurred to him.“He had a bitter humour,” thought Luc, with a sweet amaze. As for himself, the melancholy, the disgust, and the pity roused in him by the hopeless cynicism of the young painter’s sudden end had not extinguished or even for a second damped the fires of his own ardour; they only burnt the clearer and brighter in contrast with the gloom he had just witnessed in two other human beings—the luxurious, soulless youth and worn-out painter. He felt like a man walking on an upland in the full light of the sun, while below him others struggled through the mists and morasses, shadows and sloughs of a dismal valley, and never lifted their eyes to the sun. He might look down on these blinded people, he might pity, though he could not comfort them; but they could not long trouble him nor put a shade across his bright path.As he sat at the window watching the clean empty street, a very handsome equipage swept round the corner, swinging on its leathers.With a faint flush Luc recognized the liveries and arms of Carola Koklinska, and when the coach drew up before the door his heart gave a little lift into a region that knew not melancholy.He saw one of her servants descending, and on a sudden impulse went down himself. The house was still full of the tragedy, the modest establishment disorganized; the doctor and the magistrate’s clerk were busy in the chamber of the dead man. Luc met the lackey in the doorway, and a sudden confusion seized him that perhaps the Countess was not in the coach, or perhaps had not come to see him.While he hesitated, the servant inquired if he was M. de Vauvenargues. Luc responded, and added, “If your mistress is in the coach, I will come and speak to her.”Then, before the man could answer, he caught sight of the Countess at the coach window, holding back the stamped leather blind.Luc, bare-headed and with the sun shining in his loosely curled fine hair, came to the coach step.“I found out from M. de Biron where you were lodging,” said Carola, “and called on my way back to Paris to leave a message for you, Monsieur.”She spoke in her usual cold, rather precise accents, and her delicate face was rather sad and tired in expression.“You were not at the fête last night,” she added. “I wished to present you to M. Amelot.”“Madame,” he answered, “I was there, but certainly did not see you.”The Countess leant a little way from the window of the coach; she had a gold and scarlet figured scarf round her dark, unpowdered hair.“What has happened?” she asked. “You look—strange.”Luc remembered that he had not been to bed that night, and was, despite his inner exaltation, feeling giddy and weary. Of late he could ill stand any fatigue; he recalled also the suicide that for the moment he had completely forgotten.“A man died this morning,” he answered gravely, “in the room opposite mine—died by his own hand, Madame.”“You must be so used to death,” she answered. She looked up at the house, and straight, as by a kind of instinct, at the drawn heavy curtains of the painter’s room. “Who was he?” she asked.“Why should I sadden you?” he answered. “And who the man was, no one knows.”“Oh,” she answered quickly, “it does not sadden me at all.” She smiled wistfully. “But you are very pale, Monsieur le Marquis.”Luc looked into her clear, ardent brown eyes, that were fixed on him with an eager and intense expression. A wave of faintness came over him; he felt impelled to catch at the long embroidered window strap that hung over the side of the coach door to prevent himself from falling. He could make no answer.“This is my message,” said the Countess, rather hurriedly and in a lowered voice: “I want you to come to my garden to-morrow about four o’clock. Knock at the door in the Rue Deauville—you remember that it is the street that runs at the end of the garden. You will know the door, for the knocker is shaped like a woman’s head.”Luc caught his breath; he was still feeling dizzy. His look was a question as to what she meant.“Do you care to come?” she said. “It is a question of politics.”“I am very honoured,” he answered formally.“You can be of use to me,” remarked the Countess. “I shall be grateful if you will come—but perhaps you are not leaving Versailles so soon?”“Yes,” he replied, “I was leaving immediately. Of course I will come, Madame.”She sighed and leant back in her coach.“Very well, Monsieur, the Rue Deauville.”Luc bowed, and the sumptuous coach rolled noisily down the narrow cobbled street.
Luc heard that the King and M. Amelot had returned to Paris early the same morning that he had been in converse with the young painter. There was now nothing to keep him in Versailles: he had not seen the Countess Carola, and yesterday M. de Biron, who was now rejoining his regiment, could tell him nothing of her. She was probably still in Paris.
Versailles, at least, had no attractions for Luc; he was more than ever anxious to see M. Amelot, as a second crisis had arisen between France, Austria, and the advancing power of Prussia. Now Fleury was dead, greater things were hoped from the diplomats of Paris, and Luc believed that he might find this a favourable moment for obtaining employment in politics.
A few days before he came to Versailles he had heard from his father; he re-read the letter now, and it revived the sense of the dead weight of the chains of home. His father was waiting eagerly for news of his success; his mother wanted him back, and sent anxious inquiries after his health; Joseph and all his friends would have been so happy if he would have returned after his hardships at the war and settled down in Aix——
Why could he not do it? He loved them all; he often felt ill and lonely. Why not go back and forget these vain visions that M. de Biron so laughed at? Why not marry Mademoiselle de Séguy and take up the life his father and his brother were leading? His sense of responsibility towards his parents was heavy: they had done everything for him, he nothing for them; he grudged even the money his stay in Paris was costing. Joseph had never been able to afford to come to Court.
That they should be indulgent, even making sacrifices for him, was the last intolerable chain; how could he proceed on his way fettered by obligation, burdened by affection and sentiment? He wept a little over this love that was so rare and precious, and yet so useless!
He almost wished that he was penniless, friendless—Masterof himself, with no one to care if he lived or died; a state that was supposed to be the epitome of human misery. But the man so situated was at least free.
Other thoughts instantly checked and thrust this aside, but it had been formed.
After all, what all these conflicting emotions amounted to was that he must in some way justify himself; must obey the passionate impulse within him, and obtain a scope for his energies.
He left his chamber, and walked near the great park where he had met the beautiful young noble in the peach-coloured light of the pavilion last night. One sentence of his kept recurring to Luc; it was the only moment when he had shown any glimpse of feeling, and it was when Luc had said, “Those who brought you up have something to answer for,” and the young man had answered, in a moved tone, “God judge them—I think they have!”
Luc felt sorry for him, but contemptuous too; he wondered if he should see him again entering the house in the Rue du Bac, or if the adventure of the coffin had caused him to abandon his place of rendezvous. Somehow Luc did not think he would risk the narrow street again after dark. How extraordinary cowardice was——
The Marquis could not remotely conceive the fear of death as an active factor in anyone’s life.
As he sat over his dinner in an inn near the populous market square, he thought of the young painter whose quest for glory had brought him to despair, even to madness. Glory—what was it that so many, in this frivolous age, pursued with panting breath and staring eyes? The great sceptic Voltaire, even as the great believer Bossuet, had been swept on to achievement by the desire of it; the blue-eyed noble who might have had it by lifting his finger sat inert and melancholy; the obscure young artist was livid with anguish because he had missed it. Where was it, what was it? A kind of frenzy, a wordless exaltation; perhaps the only sign there is of the godlike in man; the gateway to the infinite; the talisman that would turn the world to gold and heaven into a reality; the pursuit of the San Graal; the journey to the land of Canaan; the search for El Dorado, for the Islands of the Blest—under all these symbols had the quest of glory been disguised. Luc trembled in his heart, for who had yet found the Fortunate Isles?
By the time he returned to his lodgings, his servant had packed his portmanteau and had the horses ready for their return to Paris. It was considerably past midday, and later than he had intended; he thought of the artist, and asked Jean if he had seen him go out.
The man answered “No,” and Luc crossed the landing and knocked on the door opposite.
There was no answer, and after waiting a little, Luc, who was already in his riding-cloak, turned the handle and entered the sombre, old-fashioned bedchamber where he had found himself in that morning’s dawn.
He then saw that his servant had been mistaken, for the painter had certainly gone out; the room was empty.
The Marquis was leaving again when he noticed on the dark table between the windows where the brass lamp and hour-glass stood a folded piece of paper. He approached, and saw it was addressed to himself. It contained only a few lines, and was unsigned.
“Monsieur,—I am unfortunately obliged to leave you on a journey I have long contemplated. As you were courteous enough to wish to see some of my work, you will find my first and last masterpiece on the bed—I call it ‘The End of the Quest of Glory.’ It has the merit of truth, at least.”
Luc glanced round the room: not a thing had been disarranged—some clothes even still lay across a chair; a portmanteau stood, loosely unstrapped, at the foot of the bed. Luc felt an absolute conviction that no one had left this room since he had himself, several hours before—save one way——
“Suicide,” he said, and folded the letter across. Then, with a callousness that surprised himself, he went to the bed and pulled aside the heavy blue brocade curtains, which were drawn closely together as they had been before.
He saw what he had expected to see: the young painter, prone and still, with fixed open eyes and a sneer on his stiff lips.
Luc stood gazing; his serene brows contracted with an expression of pity, anger, and regret. He stooped and laid his hand on the dulled hair of the young suicide, damp with the death-agony.
The coverlet was slightly disturbed by the last struggle of departing life, the dead man’s limbs slightly contracted, as if he had died in the convulsion of a shudder. His left hand and arm lay across his breast, showing that his final action had been to draw the curtains about him.
Luc thought of the bitter sarcasm of the letter, and the hand he laid on the painter’s forehead quivered. There was no mark of any violence; the young painter had evidently made an end of himself with poison.
Luc moved away from the bed; he checked an almost mechanical impulse to lay the melancholy crucifix hanging above the bed on the dead man’s breast, and, moving to the canvases piled against the wall, turned the first two or three round. They were marked and defaced by a knife, which had completely disfigured the original paintings.
Luc looked no more. A sword lay across a chair, and near it an open snuff-box filled with gold pieces. The Marquis felt a blankness of all sensation save weariness and aversion. He left the room and called the servant of the house, and soon the chamber of the dead was filled with people, with question, curiosity, wonder.
Nothing, it appeared, was known of the dead man. He had come a few days before by the coach from Paris; he had given his name as Henri de Bèze; the day before he had paid for his week’s lodging. He had received no letters while in Versailles, nor, as far as could be known, had he sent any. No one had visited him, but he had been much from the house.
Nor did a search among his effects provide any further information. If he had had any papers, he had destroyed them. He had died with his story, which might have been common or tragical, wrapped at least in the dignity of silence.
There was enough money in the snuff-box to pay for his decent burial. A manifest suicide, and one who had died without absolution or any of the offices of the Church, his grave would be in the lonely strip of land outside consecrated ground where play-actors and vagabonds and Jews were laid.
Luc returned to his own room, his head sick with fatigue, and seated himself by the window. In the commotion, his departure for Paris had been delayed; he wondered if he should return to-day. A slackness had fallen on his thoughts.
While he was answering the respectful questions of the master of the house concerning his brief acquaintance with the dead man, he had been recalling his short stay in the painter’s chamber during the dawn of this same day. Evidently the painter had drunk the poison before he had asked for company, and Luc had been talking to a dying man who was measuring his life by the grains of sand in an hour-glass; for Luc recalled how he had taken up the hour-glass, and seeing that the sands were nearly run through, had abruptly ended the interview.
Luc found himself picturing what had happened in the room after he had left it. He had heard the door bolted—but afterwards the dying man had altered that with some change of thought, probably when the idea of his ironical letter occurred to him.
“He had a bitter humour,” thought Luc, with a sweet amaze. As for himself, the melancholy, the disgust, and the pity roused in him by the hopeless cynicism of the young painter’s sudden end had not extinguished or even for a second damped the fires of his own ardour; they only burnt the clearer and brighter in contrast with the gloom he had just witnessed in two other human beings—the luxurious, soulless youth and worn-out painter. He felt like a man walking on an upland in the full light of the sun, while below him others struggled through the mists and morasses, shadows and sloughs of a dismal valley, and never lifted their eyes to the sun. He might look down on these blinded people, he might pity, though he could not comfort them; but they could not long trouble him nor put a shade across his bright path.
As he sat at the window watching the clean empty street, a very handsome equipage swept round the corner, swinging on its leathers.
With a faint flush Luc recognized the liveries and arms of Carola Koklinska, and when the coach drew up before the door his heart gave a little lift into a region that knew not melancholy.
He saw one of her servants descending, and on a sudden impulse went down himself. The house was still full of the tragedy, the modest establishment disorganized; the doctor and the magistrate’s clerk were busy in the chamber of the dead man. Luc met the lackey in the doorway, and a sudden confusion seized him that perhaps the Countess was not in the coach, or perhaps had not come to see him.
While he hesitated, the servant inquired if he was M. de Vauvenargues. Luc responded, and added, “If your mistress is in the coach, I will come and speak to her.”
Then, before the man could answer, he caught sight of the Countess at the coach window, holding back the stamped leather blind.
Luc, bare-headed and with the sun shining in his loosely curled fine hair, came to the coach step.
“I found out from M. de Biron where you were lodging,” said Carola, “and called on my way back to Paris to leave a message for you, Monsieur.”
She spoke in her usual cold, rather precise accents, and her delicate face was rather sad and tired in expression.
“You were not at the fête last night,” she added. “I wished to present you to M. Amelot.”
“Madame,” he answered, “I was there, but certainly did not see you.”
The Countess leant a little way from the window of the coach; she had a gold and scarlet figured scarf round her dark, unpowdered hair.
“What has happened?” she asked. “You look—strange.”
Luc remembered that he had not been to bed that night, and was, despite his inner exaltation, feeling giddy and weary. Of late he could ill stand any fatigue; he recalled also the suicide that for the moment he had completely forgotten.
“A man died this morning,” he answered gravely, “in the room opposite mine—died by his own hand, Madame.”
“You must be so used to death,” she answered. She looked up at the house, and straight, as by a kind of instinct, at the drawn heavy curtains of the painter’s room. “Who was he?” she asked.
“Why should I sadden you?” he answered. “And who the man was, no one knows.”
“Oh,” she answered quickly, “it does not sadden me at all.” She smiled wistfully. “But you are very pale, Monsieur le Marquis.”
Luc looked into her clear, ardent brown eyes, that were fixed on him with an eager and intense expression. A wave of faintness came over him; he felt impelled to catch at the long embroidered window strap that hung over the side of the coach door to prevent himself from falling. He could make no answer.
“This is my message,” said the Countess, rather hurriedly and in a lowered voice: “I want you to come to my garden to-morrow about four o’clock. Knock at the door in the Rue Deauville—you remember that it is the street that runs at the end of the garden. You will know the door, for the knocker is shaped like a woman’s head.”
Luc caught his breath; he was still feeling dizzy. His look was a question as to what she meant.
“Do you care to come?” she said. “It is a question of politics.”
“I am very honoured,” he answered formally.
“You can be of use to me,” remarked the Countess. “I shall be grateful if you will come—but perhaps you are not leaving Versailles so soon?”
“Yes,” he replied, “I was leaving immediately. Of course I will come, Madame.”
She sighed and leant back in her coach.
“Very well, Monsieur, the Rue Deauville.”
Luc bowed, and the sumptuous coach rolled noisily down the narrow cobbled street.