The traitor's way

I started at the words; but they brought me to myself, and with a bow I turned and passed into the ante-chamber. Some one was just quitting the room as I entered, for I caught the flash of a gay cloak as the Italian closed the door opposite to me, after his departing visitor, and then turned round with that eternal, treacherous smile of his, saying:

“Per Bacco! Your audience has been a long one!”

“’Tis likely to be longer still. Her Majesty wishes to see you. We go to the King.”

He lifted his eyebrows slightly at my last words, only saying, however, as he stepped to the archway:

“Her nightly visit. It will not continue for long.”

“Is it really so bad?”

He stopped, his hands resting on the folds of the curtain; then, bending forward, he said in a low tone:

“I keep relays of horses to two frontiers.”

There was no more said, and we stepped into the cabinet. Marcilly had returned, radiant and happy; but, in the quick glance I cast around me on entering I did not see Marie, and from my soul I was glad of this. I could not have endured meeting her. In the tumult then in my heart it would have been impossible to have faced her without betraying myself.

There was a whispered word or so between Catherine and her chamberlain, and then she spoke loudly, and with an imperious note in her voice:

“To the King—by the private way!” and, the Italian leading, we followed the Queen-Mother through the door by which she had entered the cabinet, and along a passage lighted by a small lamp at its extreme end. Here we came to another door, which Bentivoglio opened with a master-key, and, free of this, found ourselves at the base of a wide stairway that led to the apartments of the King.

All was in light—in white, dazzling light. There was a quick word of command, a flash of steel, the guard of the King’s Carabiniers presented arms, and Richelieu stepped forward, no longer the reckless soldier, but the suave courtier. The Star of the Order gleamed upon his silver cuirass, his short scarlet cloak was thrown back over his broad shoulders, and the blood-red plumes of his hat swept the polished flooring as he bowed before the Medicis.

“The King—my son—how is he?” asked Catherine.

“But as before, madame. His Majesty has asked for your Grace twice.”

The Queen-Mother crossed herself, and, preceded by Richelieu and followed by us, began to ascend the stairs, at the head of which we could see a gaily dressed group assembled, and among them some ladies, maids of honor, no doubt, to the reigning Queen.

The balustrade terminated in a square column of veined granite, upon which was set a marble Aphrodite, one arm outstretched as if casting a flower. From the rear of the party, where I was with Bentivoglio, who had dropped to my side, the lights made the goddess burn a rose-red, as if the statue were a living, palpitating thing. And, as I looked, a figure moved out of the throng above us, and stood beside the Venus; the figure of a woman, tall and stately, with deep, sleepy eyes and passionate lips, a living embodiment of the artist’s dream.

The Italian nudged me, for he saw too. “The Limeuil,” he whispered, “for whom your Condé will lose his honor.”

Ay! The words were almost prophetic, for it was for the sake of this woman before us that Condé, he for whom we were risking so much, trailed the honor of Bourbon in the dust, and broke the true heart of his wife, casting aside the priceless ruby for the sham, glittering crystal. If ever man was a moral murderer, he was; but he died like a gentleman and a soldier, while I—no, I dare not cast a stone!

And even as I write this there comes to me the memory of that grim story of the field of Jarnac, of that last devoted charge, for the sweet peril of Christ and the Fatherland, of Montesquieu’s deed of blood, and of that red sunset when Anjou stood in doubt and hesitation before a stripped and mangled corpse.

And there came a cry from those around, “She comes! She comes!” and a tall, veiled woman stepped slowly forward through the battle-worn group. Casting aside her veil, she looked long, with cold, hard eyes, on the disfigured features of the dead, and suddenly she laughed—a laugh that chilled the blood of all—as she pointed in triumph with her jewelled hand to the thing at her feet.

“It is he, Condé,” she said. “Enfin!” and she kicked the dead face with her dainty shoe.

And while I gazed at her, we reached the landing, where all bowed with reverence to the Widow of France, as Catherine was called.

As we came up there was a slight murmur of surprise and curiosity, which even the presence of the Queen-Mother was unable to totally suppress, and there were inquiring looks and glances interchanged, for it takes but a short time to forget in a court, and we, who had been but last year so well known, were almost as strangers now.

I could not forbear a glance at the Limeuil, which she returned with interest, coquette to her finger-tips; and then, dropping her large eyes, she whispered something to a girl beside her, with a little laugh, as musical as the chime of a bell.

We were, however, not altogether unknown. Some one—I could not see whom—did recognize us, and I distinctly caught the words:

“What madness! To come back now!”

“Ay! Two more flies in the cobweb.”

I turned to the voices. The first speaker I could not make out, but the second I was certain of. It was the jester of the Martroi. He was leaning against the wall, swinging his bauble, and surrounded by a group of three or four people, listening, no doubt, to his quips and jests.

All this occurred very rapidly, and then we passed the landing, passed the folding-doors, and entered the ante-chamber beyond. Some of those who were on the landing followed us, the jester among the number; but here we were all stopped by a chamberlain, and Catherine, attended but by Sancerre and Cipierre, entered the private apartments of the King.

Marcilly and I stood alone, a little apart from the rest, who were grouped in knots, conversing in low, subdued tones. Bentivoglio had approached the jester and some others who were gathered round Mademoiselle de Limeuil, and Richelieu, after a quick word or so with the guard at the King’s door, turned as if to join them, but, changing his mind, came toward us and, bowing, said:

“Permit me, messieurs, to present myself.”

“It is unnecessary,” I said; “the Sieur de Richelieu needs no presentation.”

“In a way we are already acquainted,” smiled Jean.

“Ah!” and Richelieu twisted his heavy moustache; “I never thought I could have been so deceived. Your resemblance to the Prince is simply marvellous.”

“Your mistake was fortunate for me, though,” said Marcilly.

Richelieu laughed. “For the first time in my life I thought I had seen a ghost. I confess I was fairly unnerved. But, messieurs, since two at least of us have exchanged a pass together, and since, as I understand, the King has recovered two good swords, I would ask the favor of your joining me at my quarters, after this is over, to empty a skin of Gascony.”

“It is impossible, I regret to say,” replied Marcilly, and I added my excuses.

“We will get le Brusquet to come,” he urged; “the jester sings rarely, and has a merry wit.”

But it was not to be, and Richelieu took our excuses with an air of disappointment and a little annoyance.

I, for one, had my doubts about this sudden geniality on the part of Antony de Richelieu, and these doubts were not set at rest by the chagrin he displayed. My thoughts, however, were diverted from this matter, for, as Richelieu expressed his disappointment to us, the door of the King’s chamber opened as if to let some one pass, and at the same moment we heard a high-pitched, querulous voice:

“Lights! I want more lights! Where is Marie? I cannot see her.”

It was the King who spoke. Every murmur was stilled where we were, and the door closed softly again, no one coming forth. For a moment or so there was absolute silence, and all glanced anxiously at one another, reading in each other’s faces and eyes the confirmation of their misgivings. For there was in that voice an expression of pain and suffering, an intolerable agony, that told its own tale. It was a presage of the end to be, that filled us with pity and awe, and kept the most heedless tongue checked. At last some one—I know not whom—said softly, yet not so low but that the words reached us:

“He calls for the Queen.”

“She is with him,” answered the Limeuil; adding: “He is better; the fever has quite gone. René himself told me so.”

“That was the Jesuit’s Bark,” remarked Bentivoglio; “’tis a rare specific.”

“Ay, rare indeed!” said the one who had first spoken, adding, “Is it true he is to be blooded in the tongue?”

Bentivoglio shrugged his shoulders; but now the door opened once more, and there stepped out a tall figure, robed in brown taffeta, with a small cap of black velvet on his head. It was René himself, and he was immediately surrounded by a group, and eagerly questioned as to the King’s health. But for the present their curiosity had to be satisfied with a brief “The King is better,” and René, to whom we were known, turned to us and, beckoning with his hand, said:

“Messieurs! Have the goodness to follow me.”

Then, as we followed the physician, we heard whispers and murmurs, while eager questions, mingled with our names, flew from mouth to mouth, for curiosity had not been idle as we stood awaiting our audience. There were one or two who had recognized us, not to speak of Bentivoglio and Richelieu, and these were only too ready to pass their information on; so that as much as could be known of us was known already to that idle crowd of human moths, that clung to the corridors and tapestries of the palace.

“They have been pardoned, I hear,” said one.

“How can that be?” was the reply; “the amnesty is over.”

“They might use Marcilly as a living effigy for the Prince—he would do well for a proxy,” said the jester; and then amid the buzzing I caught another speech that made me burn. It came from the red lips of Isabel de Limeuil.

“So that is de Vibrac! What was that story about him and——” I did not hear the rest, although I could guess; and with an inward curse at the tongue of scandal, that seemed to be able to stretch across space and time, I followed the physician and Jean into the King’s chamber, the huissier, in violet and gold, closing the door after us, shutting out the buzzing voices, and the prying eyes of the restless crowd in the ante-room.

“Lights! I want more light!” The breeze, as it sweeps through my open study window, and past the dark, shaking curtains, seems to bring with it the thin, high voice of the King; and as I write these lines, I can see before me that room, in bright, glaring light—a light that almost pained the eyes to look upon, and yet was but twilight to the dim sight of that poor, dying boy, who stared at us from his proppings of cushions, and who was now on the threshold of that long, dark night, that, with God’s mercy, was to bring with it a morning, brilliant with the splendor that the eye of man has not seen, glorious with the glory of the infinite star-lands of Eternity.

But what caught us, what arrested our attention, so that it could not linger for a moment on the rich and luxurious room, so that we hardly saw the group before us, so that we but seemed to realize, as though it were an angelic thing of air, the figure of a woman standing at the bedside, and looking with infinite compassion and tenderness on the pain-worn face beneath her, was that face itself. There it was, shining out white and pallid from the white pillows, with that one red spot on the forehead, the crimson seal of that terrible sickness, of that awful disease, which showed itself in the last stages of Francis’s illness, and which, even if he had lived, would have placed him among those whom men set aside from themselves as accursed by God, among those whom man may pity in his heart, yet never look upon without horror and loathing.

There are those who deny the story, and, in truth, the King died before the new sickness had developed. Its presence was unsuspected by all except two—even the Queen, Mary of Scotland, who now stood bending with sweet, pitiful eyes over her husband, did not dream of it; but René knew, and Catherine knew, and I knew when I saw, for it had come upon a man so in the Sicilies, when I served there with Ponthieu, and it was not to be mistaken.

To my mind the King might have lived, but for that scar on his forehead. He died, as we know, of a pain in the ear, as Bentivoglio mockingly said, and the phrase has become a byword.

There is, however, a chapter of history that has yet to be told, but he who writes it must first learn the secrets that lie locked up in the hearts of the dead, for Catherine is gone and René sleeps his last sleep.

Ay! I can picture it all—the hopes, the fears, and then the dread certainty. Then comes the struggle between the love of a mother and the pride of race. It is a choice between unspeakable shame and death that hides all things. The Queen-Mother and René are alone together with the King. He sleeps, and the lights that ever blaze within the room burn on that red splash, the mark of the Unclean. The eyes of Catherine meet those of René, and the man of science knows that the choice has been made—that pride has conquered love.

“It must be now,” she says, and then, with head held high, and dry, burning eyes, the Medicis steps from the room.

And René was alone with his King. What happened then will never be known until the last great trumpet blares out its call, and you and I, my friends, stand at God’s Throne to answer for our souls; but when the morning came, Charles the Ninth was King of France.

All this was to happen in a few days, nay, in a few hours; but at the moment, in the hearts of those who stood around, had sprung up a hope—the fever was gone—the King would live.

We stepped forward and knelt by the bedside, and the thin hand of the boy wavered over us as he asked:

“Are these my friends come back?”

Then Catherine bent down and whispered in his ear, and Francis spoke again.

“Pardon them! I would have pardoned them all. There was Castelnau, who used to play with me when I was a boy. There was Ste. Marie, who taught me to ride. There is Condé, always gay and laughing. And I—I have not laughed for months.” He stopped for a moment, and went on, “But my cousin of Guise and the Cardinal will not let me pardon any one—they forbid it,” he added weakly.

“My son,” said the Medicis, “are you not King of France?”

A faint flush spread over the ivory face, the pale lips drew themselves together obstinately, and he muttered to himself:

“Yes! Yes! I am King,” and then, in a louder tone, “I will be King for once—shall I not, Marie?” and he turned to his wife.

And the most beautiful lips in the world pleaded for us, and put courage into the heart of the King; and, boy as he was, there seemed to come upon him all the dignity of his high estate, as he stretched out his hand again to us.

“I pardon you the past, messieurs—I give you the King’s Peace—the peace that the King himself knows not.”

Then we touched the thin hand with our lips, and, rising without a word, for there was something in the moment that took speech from us, stepped behind the group at the head of the bed, as the little King leaned back again on his pillows, all trace of the momentary strength in his face vanishing. Catherine turned toward us, as if about to give us the signal to go, when the King spoke again.

“My mother,” he said, “am I going to die?”

A look of pain came over the marble features of Catherine; she bent over the boy, as if to hide her features, and her voice was very low as she answered: “No, no, my son!”

And the child had become a child once more.

“I do not want to die,” he wailed. “I am King. Why should a King die?” He stopped and beckoned to Cipierre.

“Monsieur,” he said, as the Vicomte approached, “you are a brave soldier; you have fought many battles. You must save your King from death.”

The veteran half turned away as he answered:

“I, and all your soldiers, my King, would die to save you.”

“Then you will not let death come? It comes in the dark, monsieur; that is why I always have these lights. You must not let death come. You must stand there! There!” He pointed to the foot of the bed, and went on: “And my guards, who would die for me, must stand around, then death will not touch the King of France.”

I saw the features of the old war-wolf work convulsively as he bowed before the King and muttered hoarsely, “It shall be done.”

There was no word spoken now. There was nothing to say. The lights burned brightly on the pallid features of the boy, who had flung himself back amid his pillows, and wearily closed his eyes.

We stood still, looking at each other in silence. I saw Catherine and René exchange a glance, and then from behind us came a single, half-suppressed sob. It was from the heart of the fair young Queen, as, with a quick, sudden movement, she turned and passed into an inner apartment.

And the Medicis spoke now in her icy, measured voice:

“Messieurs, the King sleeps.”