Which shows the truth of the French adage, “L’habit ne fait pas le moine.”
I KNOW I am very wrong, very partial, and very inconsiderate, to give two consecutive chapters to the Count de Blenau, when I have more people to despatch than had Captain Bobadil in the play, and less time to do it in. But I could not help it; those two last chapters would go together, and they were too long to be clapped up into one pat, as I have seen Sarah the dairy-maid do with the stray lumps of butter that float about in the butter-milk, after the rest of the churn’s produce has been otherwise disposed of. So I am very sorry, and so forth.—And now, if you please, my dear reader, we will go on to some one else. What would you think of the Norman?—Very well!—For my part, I look upon him as the true hero of the story; for according to the best accounts, he eat more, drank more, lied more, and fought more than any one else, and was a great rogue into the bargain; all which, in the opinion of Homer, is requisite to the character of a hero. See the Odyssey passim.
At Troyes, the Norman’s perquisitions were very successful. No Bow-street officer could have detected all the proceedings of Fontrailles with more acuteness. Step by step he traced him, from his first arrival at Troyes, till the day he set out for Mesnil St. Loup; and learning the road he had taken, he determined upon following the same track, for he shrewdly concluded, that whatever business of import the conspirator had been engaged in, had been transacted in the two days and one night, which, according to the story of the garçon d’auberge at the Hotel du Grand Soleil, he had been absent from the good city of Troyes.
Now, our friend Monsieur Marteville had learned another piece of news, which made him the more willing to bend his steps in the direction pointed out as that which Fontrailles had taken. This was no other than that a considerable band of robbers had lately come down into that part of the country to collect their rents; and that their principal haunt was supposed to be the thick woods which lay on the borders of the high road to Troyes, in the neighbourhood of Mesnil.
True it is, the Norman had abandoned his free companions of the forest, and received the wages of Monsieur de Chavigni; but still he kept up a kind of desultory correspondence with his former associates, and had not lost sight of them till certain reports got about, that the Lieutenant Criminel was going to visit the forest of Laye, which induced them to leave the vicinity of St. Germain, for fear that there should not be room enough in the forest for them and the Lieutenant too. It was natural enough that Marteville should wish to make a morning call upon his old friends: besides—I’ll tell you a story. There was once upon a time a man who had a cat, of which he was so fond, that, understanding one Mr. Pigmalion had got an ivory statue changed into a wife by just asking it, he resolved to see what he could do for his cat in the same way. But I dare say you know the story just as well as I do—how the cat was changed into a woman, and how she jumped out of bed after a mouse, and so forth; showing plainly, that “what is bred in the bone will never go out of the flesh;” that “nature is better than a schoolmaster;” and that “you can never make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear;” as Sancho would say. But, however, the Norman had a strange hankering after his good old trade, and was very well inclined to pass a day or two in the free forest, and do Chavigni’s work into the bargain. There was a little embarras indeed in the case, respecting Louise, for whom, in these first days of possession, he did feel a certain degree of attachment; and did not choose to leave her behind, though he did not like to take her with him, considering the society he was going to meet. “Pshaw!” said he at length, speaking to himself, “I’ll leave her at Mesnil.”
This resolution he began to put in execution, by placing Louise upon one horse, and himself upon the other, together with their several valises; and thus, in the same state and order in which they had arrived at Troyes, so they quitted it for Mesnil St. Loup. All the information that Marteville possessed to guide him in his farther inquiries, amounted to no more than this, (which he learned from the aforesaid garçon d’auberge;) namely, that the little gentleman in grey had taken the road apparently to Mesnil; that he had been absent, as before said, two days and one night; and that his horse, when it came home, appeared to have been furnished with a new shoe en route. This, however, was quite sufficient as a clue, and the Norman did not fail to turn it to its full account.
Passing through the little villages of Mehun and Langly, the Norman eyed every blacksmith’s forge as he went; but the one was next to the post-house, and the other was opposite the inn; and the Norman went on, saying within himself—“A man who was seeking concealment, would rather proceed with his beast unshod than stop there.” So, resuming his conversation with Louise, they jogged on, babbling, not of green fields, but of love and war; both of which subjects were much within the knowledge of the Sieur Marteville, his battles being somewhat more numerous than his wives, and having had plenty of both in his day.
At all events, Louise was very well satisfied with the husband that Heaven had sent her, and looked upon him as a very fine gentleman, and a great warrior; and though, now and then, she would play the coquette a little, and put forth all the little minauderie which a Languedoc soubrette could assume, in order to prevent the Norman from having too great a superiority, yet Monsieur Marteville was better satisfied with her than any of his former wives; and as she rode beside him, he admired her horsemanship, and looked at her from top to toe in much the same manner that he would have examined the points of a fine Norman charger. No matter how Louise was mounted: suffice it to say, that it was not on a side-saddle, such things being but little known at the time I speak of.
While they were thus shortening the road with sweet discourse, at the door of a little hovel by the side of the highway, half hidden from sight by a clumsy mud wall against which he leaned, half exposed by the lolloping position he assumed, appeared the large, dirty, unmeaning face and begrimed person of a Champenois blacksmith, with one hand grubbing amongst the roots of his grizzled hair, and the other hanging listlessly by his side, loaded with the ponderous hammer appropriated to his trade. “C’est ici,” thought the Norman; “Quatre vingt dix neuf moutons et un Champenois font cent—Ninety-nine sheep and a Champenois make a hundred; so we’ll see what my fool will tell me.—Holla! Monsieur!”
“Plait-il?” cried the Champenois, advancing from his hut.
“Pray has Monsieur Pont Orson passed here to-day?” demanded the Norman.
“Monsieur Pont Orson! Monsieur Pont Orson!” cried the Champenois, trying to assume an air of thought, and rummaging in his empty head for a name that never was in it: “Pardie, I do not know.”
“I mean,” said the Norman, “the same little gentleman in grey, who stopped here ten days agone, to have a bay horse shod, as he was coming back from—what’s the name of the place?”
“No!” cried the Champenois; “he was going, he was not coming, when he had his horse shod.”
“But I say he was coming,” replied the Norman. “How the devil do you know he was going?”
“Mais dame!” exclaimed the other; “How do I know he was going? Why, did not he ask me how far it was to Mesnil? and if he had not been going, why should he wish to know?”
“It was not he, then,” said the Norman.
“Mais dame! ouai!” cried the Champenois. “He was dressed all in grey, and had a bay horse, on whose hoof I put as nice a piece of iron as ever came off an anvil; and he asked me how far it was to Mesnil, and whereabouts was the old Castle of St. Loup. ‘Monsieur Pont Orson! Monsieur Pont Orson? Dieu! qui aurait déviné que c’étoit Monsieur Pont Orson?’”
“Mais je vous dis que ce n’étoit pas lui,” cried the Norman, putting spurs to his horse. “Allons, chérie. Adieu, Monsieur Champenois, adieu!—Ha! ha! ha!” cried he, when at a little distance. “Ganache! he has told me all that I wanted to know. Then he did go to Mesnil—the old Chateau of St. Loup! What could he want there? I’ve heard of this old chateau.”
“But who is Monsieur Pont Orson?” demanded Louise, interrupting the broken cogitations of her husband.
“Nay, I know not, ma chère,” replied her husband. “The man in the moon, with a corkscrew to tap yon fool’s brains, and draw out all I wanted to know about the person whom I told you I was seeking for Monsieur de Chavigni.—It was a mere name. But there, I see a steeple on yon hill in the wood. Courage! we shall soon reach it. It is not above a league.—That must be Mesnil.”
The Norman’s league, however, proved at least two, and Louise, though a good horsewoman, was complaining most bitterly of fatigue, when they arrived in the little street of Mesnil St. Loup, and, riding up to the dwelling of our old friend Gaultier the innkeeper, alighted under the withered garland that hung over the door.
“Holla! Aubergiste! Garçon!” cried the Norman, “Holla!”
But no one came; and on repeating the summons, the sweet voice of the dame of the house was all that could be heard, screaming forth a variety of tender epithets, applicable to the garçon d’écurie, and intended to stimulate him to come forth and take charge of the strangers’ horses. “Don’t you know, Lambin,” cried she, “that that hog your master is lying up-stairs dying for no one knows what? And am I to go out, Maraud, and take people’s horses with my hands all over grease, while you stand l—s—ng yourself there? Cochon! if you do not go, I’ll throw this pot-lid at you.” And immediately a tremendous rattle on the boards at the farther side of the stable, announced that she had been as good as her word.
This seemed the only effectual method of arousing the occult sensibilities of the garçon d’écurie, who listened unconcerned to her gentler solicitations, but, yielding to the more potent application of the pot-lid, came forth and took the bridle of the horses, while our Norman lifted his lady to the ground.
The sight of such goodly limbs as those possessed by Monsieur Marteville, but more especially the blue velvet pourpoint to which we have formerly alluded, and which he wore on the present occasion, did not fail to produce the most favourable impression on the mind of the landlady; and, bustling about with the activity of a grasshopper, she prepared to serve the athletic cavalier and his pretty lady to the best cheer of the auberge.
“Would Madame choose some stewed escargots pour se restaurer? Would Monsieur take un coup de vin before dinner to wash the dust out of his mouth? Would Madame step up-stairs to repose herself? Would Monsieur take a gouter?” These and a thousand other civil proffers the hostess showered upon the Norman and Louise, some of which were accepted, some declined; but the principal thing on which the Norman seemed to set his heart was the speedy preparation of dinner, which he ordered with the true galloping profusion of a beggar on horseback, demanding the best of every thing. While this was in progress, he forgot not the principal object of his journey, but began with some circumlocution to draw the hostess towards the subject of Fontrailles’ visit to Mesnil.
At the very mention, however, of a little man in grey, the good landlady burst forth in such a torrent of invective that she went well nigh to exhaust her copious vocabulary of epithets and expletives; while the Norman, taken by surprise, stood gazing and shrugging his shoulders, wondering at her facility of utterance, and the vast rapidity with which she concatenated her hard names. The little man in grey, who had been there precisely ten days before, was, according to her opinion, a liar, and a rogue, and a cheat; a conjuror, a Huguenot, and a vagabond; a man without honour, principle, or faith; a maraud, a matin, a misérable; together with a great many other titles the enumeration of which she summed up with “et s’il n’est pas le Diable, le Diable l’emporte!”
“C’est vrai,” cried the Norman every time she paused to take breath; “C’est vrai. But how came you to find out he was so wicked?”
The lady’s reply was not of the most direct kind; but from it the Norman gathered, with his usual acuteness, that after our friend Gaultier had pointed out to Fontrailles the road to the old Castle of St. Loup, he returned home, his mind oppressed with the consciousness of being the confidant of a Sorcerer. He laboured under the load of this terrific secret for some days; and then, his constitution not being able to support his mental struggles, he sickened and took to his bed, where he still lay in a deplorable state, talking in his sleep of the conjuror in grey, and of Père Le Rouge, and the Devil himself, and sundry other respectable people of the same class. But when awake, it must be remarked, the aubergiste never opened his lips upon the subject, notwithstanding all the solicitations which his better half, being tempted by the curiosity of her sex, did not fail to make. From all this the good dame concluded that the little man in grey had bewitched her husband and driven him mad, causing him to lie up there upon his bed like a hog, neglecting his business and leaving her worse than a widow.
All this was corn, wine and oil to the mind of the Norman, who, wisely reserving his opinion on the subject, retired to consult with Louise, having a great esteem for woman’s wit in such cases. After some discussion, a plan was manufactured between them, which, though somewhat bold in conception, was happily brought to issue in the following manner.
During the dinner, at which the bourgeoise waited herself, she was not a little surprised to hear Louise more than once call Marteville by the reverend appellation of mon père; and if this astonished, how much was her wonder increased when afterwards, during a concerted absence of the Norman, the fair lady informed her, under a promise of profound secrecy, that the goodly cavalier, whose blue velvet doublet she had so much admired, was neither more nor less than the celebrated Père Alexis, directeur of the Jesuits of Alençon, who was travelling in disguise in order to place her (one of his penitents) in a monastery at Rome.
True, Louise either forgot or did not know that they were not precisely in the most direct road to Rome, but she was very safe in the person she spoke to, who had even less knowledge of where Rome stood than herself. Now the story of Louise was a very probable one in every other respect, considering the manners of the day; for les bons pères Jesuites very often travelled about in disguise for purposes best known to themselves, and very few of the bons pères, whether Jesuits or not, were averse to a fair penitent. Be that as it may, the simple bourgeoise never doubted it for a moment, and casting herself at the feet of Louise, she entreated her, with tears in her eyes, to intercede with the reverend directeur to confess and absolve her sinful husband, who lay up-stairs like a hog, doing nothing.
Just at this moment the Norman re-entered the room; and though his precise object, in the little drama they had got up, was neither more nor less than to confess the unhappy aubergiste, yet, as a matter of form, he made some difficulty to meddling with the penitent of another; but after faintly advising that the Curé of the village should be sent for, he agreed, as the case was urgent, to undertake the office of confessor himself, though he mildly reproached Louise, in presence of the hostess, for having betrayed his real character, and bade her be more careful in future.
As soon as he had signified his consent, the bourgeoise ran to tell her husband that the very reverend Père Alexis, directeur of the Jesuits of Alençon, had kindly consented to hear his confession and absolve him of his sins; and in the mean while the Norman gave directions to Louise, whose adroitness had often served him in discovering the secrets of the Palace, while she had remained with Madame de Beaumont, to gain, in the present instance, all the information she could from the wife, while he went to interrogate the husband.
This being settled, as a blue velvet pourpoint was not exactly the garb to play a confessor in, Louise ran in all haste to strip the Astrologer’s robe we have already mentioned of all its profane symbols, and the Norman, casting its shadowy folds over his lusty limbs, and drawing the hood over his head, appeared to the eye as goodly a friar as ever cracked a bottle. No great regard to costume was necessary, for the landlady took it all for granted; and when she beheld the Norman issue forth from the room in which the valise had been placed, clothed in his long dark robes, she cast herself at his feet in a transport of reverence and piety.
Monsieur Marteville, otherwise the Père Alexis, did not fail to give her his blessing with great gravity, and with a solemn demeanour and slow step followed to the chamber of the sick man.
Poor Gaultier was no longer the gay rosy-cheeked innkeeper which he had appeared to Fontrailles, but, stretched upon his bed, he lay pale and wan, muttering over to himself shreds and tatters of prayers, and thinking of the little man in grey, Père Le Rouge, and the Devil. As soon as he beheld the pretended Père Alexis enter his chamber, he essayed to rise in his bed; but the Norman motioned him to be still, and sitting down by him, exhorted him to make a full confession of his sins, and then, to give greater authenticity to his character, he knelt down and composed an extempore prayer, in a language equally of his own manufacture, but which the poor aubergiste believed devoutly to be Latin, hearing every now and then the words sanctissimus, in secula seculorum, and benedictus, with which the Norman did not fail to season it richly, being the only stray Latin he was possessed of.
“Humgumnibus quintessentialiter expositu dum dum; benedictus sint foolatii et sanctissimus fourbi. Hi sty Aubergisti rorum coram nobis excipe capones poulardici generi, fur grataverunt pectus, legbonibus venzon in secula seculorum sanctissimus benedictus,” said the Norman.
“Amen!” cried the innkeeper from the bottom of his heart, with such fervency that the Père Alexis could scarcely maintain his gravity.
The Norman now proceeded to business, and putting down his ear to a level with the lips of Gaultier, he once more desired him to make a clear breast.
“Oh, mon Père,” cried Gaultier, “Je suis un pauvre pécheur, un misérable!”
The good Father exhorted him to take courage, and to come to a detail of his crimes.
“Oh, mon Père,” cried he, “I have sold cats for rabbits, and more especially for hares. I have moistened an old hareskin with warm water and bloodied it with chicken’s blood, to make my cats and my badgers and my weasels pass for what they really were not. I have cooked up snakes for eels, and dressed vipers en matelot. I have sold bad wine of Bois-marly for good wine of Epernay; and, Oh, mon Père, je suis un pauvre pécheur.”
“Well, well, get on,” cried the Norman somewhat impatiently, “I’ll give you absolution for all that. All innkeepers do the same. But what more have you done?”
“Oh, mon Père, je suis un pauvre pécheur,” proceeded Gaultier in a low voice; “I have charged my customers twice as much as I ought to charge. I have vowed that fish was dear when it was cheap; and I have—”
“Nom de Dieu!” cried the Norman, getting out of temper with the recapitulation of Gaultier’s peccadilloes. “Nom de Dieu! that is to say, in the name of God, I absolve you from all such sins as are common to innkeepers, masters of taverns, cooks, aubergistes and the like—sins of profession as they may be called—only appointing you to kneel before the altar of your parish church for two complete hours, repeating the Pater and the Ave during the whole time, by way of penance;” thought he, for making me hear all this nonsense.—“But come,” he continued, “bring up the heavy artillery—that is, let me hear your more uncommon sins. You have some worse things upon your conscience than any you have told, or I am mistaken.”
“Oh, mon Père! Oh, mon bon Père!” groaned Gaultier, “Je suis un pauvre pécheur, un misérable.”
“Now it comes,” thought the Norman; “Allons, allons, mon fils, ayez courage! l’Eglise est pleine de miséricorde.”
“There was an old owl in the barn,” said Gaultier, “and woodcocks being scarce—”
“Ventre Saint Gris!” cried Marteville to himself, “this will never come to an end;” “Mais, mon fils,” he said aloud, “I have told you, all that is pardoned. Speak, can you charge yourself with murder, treason, conspiracy, sorcery,”—Gaultier groaned—“astrology,”—Gaultier groaned still more deeply—“or of having concealed any such crimes, when committed by others?” Gaultier groaned a third time. The Norman had now brought him to the point; and after much moaning, hesitation, and agony of mind, he acknowledged that he had been privy to a meeting of sorcerers.—Nay, that he had even conducted a notorious Astrologer, a little man in grey, on the road to meet the defunct Père Le Rouge and his companion the Devil, at the old Chateau of St. Loup; and that it was his remorse of conscience for this crime, together with his terror at revealing it, after the menaces of the Sorcerer, that had thrown him into the lamentable state in which he then lay.
By degrees, the Norman drew from him every particular, and treasuring them up in his memory, he hastened to give the suffering innkeeper absolution; which, though not performed in the most orthodox manner, quite satisfied Gaultier; who concluded, that any little difference of form from that to which he had been used, proceeded from the Norman being a Jesuit and a directeur; and he afterwards was heard to declare, that the Père Alexis was the most pious and saintly of men, and that one absolution from him was worth a hundred from any one else; although the Curé of the village, when he heard the method in which it had been administered, pronounced it to be heterodox and heretical, and in short a damnable error.
And here be it remarked, that a neighbouring Curé having taken up the quarrel of Père Alexis, and pronounced his form to be the right one, a violent controversy ensued, which raged in Champagne for more than fifty years, producing nine hundred pamphlets, three thousand letters, twenty public discussions, and four Papal bulls, till at length it was agreed on all hands to write to the Jesuits of Alençon, and demand their authority for such a deviation from established rules: when it was discovered that they administered absolution like every one else; and that they never had such a person as Père Alexis belonging to their very respectable and learned body.
But to return to the Norman. As soon as he had concluded all the ceremonies he thought right to perform, for the farther consolation of Gaultier, he said to him—“Fear not, my son, the menaces of the Sorcerer; for I forbid all evil beings, even were it the Devil himself, to lay so much as the tip of a finger upon you; and moreover, I will go this very night to the old Chateau of St. Loup, and will exorcise Père Le Rouge and drive his spirit forth from the place, and, morbleu! if he dare appear to me I will take him by the beard, and lead him into the middle of the village, and all the little children shall drum him out of the regiment—I mean out of the town.”
With this bold resolution, Monsieur Marteville descended to the ground floor, and communicated his design to Louise and the bourgeoise, who were sitting with their noses together over a flaggon of vin chaud. “Donnez moi un coup de vin,” said he, “et j’irai.”
But Louise, who did not choose to trust her new husband out of her sight, having discovered by a kind of instinct, that in his case “absence was worse than death,” declared she would go with him, and see him take Père Le Rouge by the beard. The Norman remonstrated, but Louise persisted with a sort of sweet pertinacity which was quite irresistible, and, though somewhat out of humour with her obstinacy, he was obliged to consent.
However, he growled audibly while she assisted to disembarrass him of his long black robe; and probably, had it not been for his assumed character, would have accompanied his opposition with more than one of those elegant expletives with which he was wont to season his discourse. Louise, notwithstanding all this, still maintained her point, and the horses being brought forth, the bags were placed on their backs, and the Norman and his spouse set forth for the old Chateau of St. Loup, taking care to repeat their injunction to the landlady not to discover their real characters to any one, as the business of the Père directeur required the utmost secrecy.
The landlady promised devoutly to comply, and having seen her guests depart, entered the public room, where several of the peasantry had by this time assembled, and told every one in a whisper that the tall gentleman they had seen get on horseback was the Père Alexis, directeur of the Jesuits of Alençon, and that the lady was Mademoiselle Louise de Crackmagnole, sa penitente. Immediately, they all ran in different directions, some to the door, some to the window, to see so wonderful a pair as the Père Alexis and his penitente. The bustle, rushing, and chattering which succeeded, and which the landlady could no way abate, called the attention of the Sieur Marteville, who, not particularly in a good humour at being contradicted by Louise, was so much excited into anger by the gaping of the multitude, that he had well nigh drawn the portentous Toledo which hung by his side, and returned to satisfy their curiosity by presenting his person rather nearer than they might have deemed agreeable. He bridled in his wrath, however, or rather, to change the figure, kept it in store for some future occasion; and consoling himself with a few internal curses, in which Louise had her share, he rode on, and soon arrived at that part of the wood which we have already said was named the Sorcerer’s Grove.
Of the unheard of adventures which there befel, the giants that he slew, and the monsters that he overcame, we shall treat in a future chapter, turning our attention at present to other important subjects which call loudly for detail.
Being a Chapter of Explanations, which the reader has no occasion to peruse if he understands the story without it.
“GREAT news! Cinq Mars!” exclaimed Fontrailles. “Great news! the Cardinal is sick to the death, and goes without loss of time to Tarascon: he trembles upon the brink of the grave.”
Cinq Mars was stretched upon three chairs, the farthest of which he kept balanced on its edge by the weight of his feet, idly rocking it backwards and forwards, while his mind was deeply buried in one of the weak romances of the day, the reading which was a favourite amusement with the Master of the Horse, at those periods when the energies of his mind seemed to sleep. “Too good news to be true, Fontrailles,” he replied, hardly looking up; “take my word for it, the Devil never dies.”
“That may be,” answered Fontrailles, “but nevertheless the Cardinal, as I said, is dying, and goes instantly to Tarascon to try another climate.”
“Why, where hast thou heard all this? and when didst thou come from Spain?” demanded Cinq Mars, rousing himself. “Thou hast made good speed.”
“Had I not good reason?” asked the other. “But they tell me that I must question you for news; for that it is something in regard to your friend, the young Count de Blenau, which has so deeply struck the Cardinal.”
“Well then, I will give the story, in true heroic style,” answered Cinq Mars, tossing the book from him. “Thou dost remember, O my friend!” he continued, imitating the language of the romance he had just been reading, “how stormy was the night, when last I parted from thee, at the old Chateau of Mesnil St. Loup; and if the thunder clouds passed away, and left the sky clear and moonlighted, it was but to be succeeded by a still more violent tempest. For, long after thou wert snugly housed at Troyes, De Thou and myself were galloping on through the storm of night. The rain fell, the lightning glanced, the thunder rolled over head, and the way seemed doubly long, and the forest doubly dreary, when by a sudden blaze of the red fire of heaven, I descried some one, mounted on a white horse, come rapidly towards us.”
“Come, come, Cinq Mars!” exclaimed Fontrailles, “for grace, leave the land of romance—remember I have a long story to tell, and not much time to tell it in. Truce with imagination therefore, for we have more serious work before us.”
“It’s truth—it’s truth, thou unbelieving Jew,” cried Cinq Mars. “No romance, I can assure you. Well, soon as this white horseman saw two others wending their way towards him, he suddenly reined in his beast, and turning round, galloped off as hard as he could go. Now, if curiosity be a failing, it is one I possess in an eminent degree; so, clapping spurs to my horse, after him I went, full faster than he ran away. As for De Thou, he calls out after me, loud enough to drown the thunder, crying, ‘Cinq Mars, where are you going? In God’s name stop—We know the place is full of banditti—If these are robbers, they may murder you,’—and so on; but finding that I did not much heed, he also was smitten with a galloping fit, and so we followed each other, like a procession, though with no procession pace: the white horseman first—I next—and De Thou last—with about a hundred yards between each of us—going all at full speed, to the great peril of our necks, and no small danger of our heads from the boughs. I was best mounted however, on my stout black horse Sloeberry—you know Sloeberry;—and so distancing De Thou all to nothing, I began to come closer to my white horseman, who, finding that he could not get off, gradually pulled in, and let me come up with him. ‘Well, Sir,’ said he directly, with all possible coolness—‘you have ridden hard to-night.’—‘In truth, I have, my man,’ answered I, ‘and so have you, and I should much like to know why you did so.’—‘For the same reason that you did, I suppose,’ replied the boy, for such it was who spoke.—‘And what reason is that?’ I asked.—‘Because we both liked it, I suppose,’ replied he.—‘That may be,’ answered I; ‘but we have all a reason for our likings.’—‘True, Sir,’ said the boy, ‘and I dare say your’s was a good one; pray, believe that mine was so also,’—All the time he spoke, he kept looking round at me, till at last he got a good sight of my face. ‘Are not you Monsieur de Cinq Mars?’ cried he at length.—‘And if I am, what follows then?’—‘Why it follows that you are the person I want,’ said the boy.—‘And what want you with me?’—‘Who is that?’ demanded he, pointing to De Thou, who now came up. I soon satisfied him on that score, and he went on. ‘My name is Henry de La Mothe, and I am Page to your good friend, the Count de Blenau, whom I have seen arrested and carried to the Bastille.’
“Now, you know, Fontrailles, how dear I hold De Blenau; so you may guess how pleasantly this rang upon my ear. My first question to the Page was, whether my friend had sent him to me. ‘No, no, Seigneur,’ answered the boy; ‘but as I knew you loved my master, and the King loved you, I thought it best to let you know, in case you might wish to serve him. He was taken as he was about to go with the Queen to Chantilly, and they would not let me or any other go with him, to serve him in prison. So I cast about in my mind, how I could serve him out of it, and consequently came off to seek you.’—‘But how did you know where to find me?’ demanded I, not a little fearing that our movements were watched; but the boy relieved me from that by answering, ‘Why, Sir, there was a messenger came over from Chantilly to desire the Queen’s presence; and amongst all the questions I asked him, there was one which made him tell me that you had gone to Troyes upon some business of inheritance, and as I heard that the path through this wood would save me a league, I took it, hoping to reach the town to-night.’
“Well, all the Page’s news vexed me not a little, and I thought of a thousand things to relieve De Blenau ere I could fix on any. But it happened, as it often does in this world, that chance directed me when reasoning failed. Having made the best of my way, I arrived with De Thou and the boy at Chantilly, at the hour of nine the next night, and passing towards my own apartments in the Palace, I saw the King’s cabinet open, and on inquiry, found that he had not yet retired to rest. My resolution was instantly taken; and without waiting even to dust my boots, I went just as I was, to pay my duty to his Majesty. My short absence had done me no harm with Louis, who received me with more grace than ever; so while the newness was on, I dashed at the subject next my heart at once. Like a well-bred falcon, I soared my full pitch, hovered an instant in my pride of place, and then stooped at once with irresistible force. In short, Fontrailles, for the first time I believe in my life, I boasted. I told Louis how I loved him; I counted over the services I had done him. His noble heart—you may smile, Sir, but he has a noble heart—was touched; I saw it, and gave him a moment to think over all old passages of affection between us, and to combine them with the feelings of the moment, and then I told him that my friend—my bosom friend—was suffering from the tyranny of the Cardinal, and demanded his favour for De Blenau. ‘What can I do, Cinq Mars?’ demanded he, ‘you know I must follow the advice of my ministers and counsellors.’
“It was an opportunity not to be lost,” exclaimed Fontrailles, eagerly; “I hope you seized it.”—“I did,” replied Cinq Mars. “I plied him hard on every point that could shake the influence of Richelieu. I showed him the shameful bondage he suffered. I told him, that if he allowed the sovereign power, placed by God in his hands, to be abused by another, he was as guilty as if he misused it himself; and then I said—‘I plead alone for the innocent, Sire. Hear De Blenau yourself, and if you find him guilty, bring him to the block at once. But if he have done nothing worthy of death, I will trust that your Majesty’s justice will instantly set him free.’ Well, the King not only promised that he would go to Paris and examine De Blenau himself, but he added—‘And I will be firm, Cinq Mars; I know the power is in my own hands, and I will exert it to save your friend, if he be not criminal.’
“This was all fair, Fontrailles; I could desire no more; but Louis even out did my expectation. Something had already irritated him against the Cardinal—I think it was the banishment of Clara de Hauteford. However, he went to the Bastille with Richelieu, Chavigni, and others of the council. Of course I was not admitted; but I heard all that passed from one who was present. De Blenau bore him nobly and bravely, and downright refused to answer any questions about the Queen, without her Majesty’s own commands. Well; Richelieu, according to custom, was for giving him the torture instantly. But the King had many good reasons for not suffering that to be done. Besides wishing to pleasure me, and being naturally averse to cruelty, he had a lingering inclination to cross Richelieu, and De Blenau’s firmness set him a good example: so the Cardinal was overruled; and the Queen’s commands to De Blenau to confess all being easily procured, he owned that he had forwarded letters from her Majesty to her brother the King of Spain. Now, you see, Richelieu was angry, and irritated at being thwarted; and he did the most foolish thing that man ever did; for though he saw that Louis was roused, and just in the humour to cross him, he got up, and not considering the King’s presence, at once pronounced a sentence of exile against De Blenau, as if the sovereign power had been entirely his own, without consulting Louis, or asking his approbation at all. Though, God knows, the King cares little enough about using his power, of course he does not like to be treated as a mere cipher before his own Council; and accordingly he revoked the Cardinal’s sentence without hesitation, sending De Blenau, merely for form’s sake, into Bourbon, and then rising, he broke up the Council, treating Richelieu with as scanty consideration as he had shown himself. By Heaven! Fontrailles, when I heard it, I could have played the fool for joy. Richelieu was deeply touched, you may suppose; and what with his former ill health and this new blow, he has never been himself since; but I knew not that he was so far gone as you describe.”
“It is so reported in Paris,” replied Fontrailles, “and he has become so humble that no one would know him. But mark me, Cinq Mars. The Cardinal is now upon the brink of a precipice, and we must urge him quickly down; for if he once again gain the ascendency, we are not only lost for ever, but his power will be far greater than it was before.”
“He will never rise more in this world,” answered Cinq Mars. “His day, I trust, is gone by: his health is broken; and the King, who always hated him, now begins to fear him no longer. I will do my best to strengthen Louis’s resolution, and get him into a way of thinking for himself. And now, Fontrailles, for the news from Spain.”
“Why, my story might be made longer than yours, if I were to go through all that happened to me on the road. It was a long and barren journey, and I believe I should have been almost starved before I reached Madrid, if I had not half filled my bags with biscuits. However, I arrived at length, and not without some difficulty found a place to lodge, for these cold Spaniards are as fearful of admitting a stranger to their house, as if he were a man-tiger. My next step was to send for a tailor, and to hire me a lacquais or two, one of whom I sent instantly to Madame de Chevreuse, praying an audience of her, which was granted immediately.”
“Why thou wert not mad enough to make a confidante of Madame de Chevreuse?” exclaimed Cinq Mars; “why, it is carrying water in a sieve. A thousand to one, she makes her peace with Richelieu, by telling him the whole story.”
“Fear not, Cinq Mars,” answered Fontrailles. “Have you yet to learn that a woman’s first passion is revenge? To such extent is the hatred of Madame de Chevreuse against the Cardinal, that I believe, were she asked to sacrifice one of her beautiful hands, she would do it, if it would but conduce to his ruin.”
Cinq Mars shook his head, still doubting the propriety of what had been done; but Fontrailles proceeded.
“However, I told her nothing; she knew it all, before I set foot in Spain. You must know, King Philip is a monarch no way insensible to female charms, and the Duchess is too lovely to pass unnoticed any where. The consequences are natural—A lady of her rank having taken refuge in his dominions, of course the King must pay her every attention. He is always with her—has a friendship, a penchant, an affection for her—call it what you will, but it is that sort of feeling which makes a man tell a woman every thing: and thus very naturally our whole correspondence has gone direct to Madame de Chevreuse. My object in first asking to see her, was only to gain an immediate audience of the King, which she can always command; but when I found that she knew the whole business, of course, I made her believe that I came for the express purpose of consulting her upon it. Her vanity was flattered. She became more than ever convinced, that she was a person of infinite consequence, and acknowledged discernment; entered heart and hand into all our schemes; stuck out her pretty little foot, and made me buckle her shoe; brought me speedily to the King’s presence, and made him consent to all I wished; got the treaty signed and sealed, and sent me back to France with my object accomplished, remaining herself fully convinced that she is at the head of the most formidable conspiracy that ever was formed, and that future ages will celebrate her talents for diplomacy and intrigue.”
Cinq Mars, though not fully satisfied at the admission of so light a being as Madame de Chevreuse into secrets of such importance, could not help smiling at the account his companion gave; and as it was in vain to regret what was done, he turned to the present, asking what was to be done next. “No time is now to be lost,” said he. “For the whole danger is now incurred, and we must not allow it to be fruitless.”
“Certainly not,” answered Fontrailles. “You must ply the King hard to procure his consent as far as possible. In the next place, a counterpart of the treaty must be signed by all the confederates, and sent into Spain, for which I have pledged my word; and another, similarly signed, must be sent to the Duke of Bouillon in Italy. But who will carry it to the Duke? that is the question. I cannot absent myself again.”
“I will provide a messenger,” said Cinq Mars. “There is an Italian attached to my service, named Villa Grande, a sort of half-bred gentleman, who, lacking gold himself, hangs upon any who will feed him. They laugh at him here for his long mustaches, and his longer rapier; but if he tell truth, his rapier has done good service; so, as this will be an undertaking of danger, he shall have it, as he says he seeks but to distinguish himself in my service, and being an Italian, he knows the country to which he is going.”
“If you can trust him, be it so,” replied Fontrailles. “At present let us look to other considerations. We must seek to strengthen our party by all means; for though circumstances seem to combine to favour us, yet it is necessary to guard against any change. Do you think that the Queen could be brought to join us?”
“Certainly not!” replied the Master of the Horse; “and if she would, to us it would be far more dangerous than advantageous. She has no power over the mind of the King—she has no separate authority; and besides, though Richelieu’s avowed enemy, she is so cautious of giving offence to Louis, that she would consent to nothing that was not openly warranted by him.”
“But suppose we are obliged to have recourse to arms,” said Fontrailles, “would it not be every thing in our favour to have in our hands the Queen and the Heir apparent to the throne.”
“True,” answered Cinq Mars; “but if we are driven to such extremity, she will be obliged to declare for some party, and that of necessity must be our’s; for she will never side with Richelieu. We can also have her well surrounded by our friends, and seize upon the Dauphin should the case require it.”
“What say you, then, to trying the Count de Blenau? He is your friend. He is brave, expert in war, and just such a man as leads the blind multitude. But more, he is wealthy and powerful, and has much credit in Languedoc.”
“I do not know,” said Cinq Mars thoughtfully, “I do not know.—De Blenau would never betray us, even if he refused to aid our scheme. But I much think his scruples would go farther than even De Thou’s. I have often remarked, he has that sort of nicety in his ideas which will not suffer him to enter into any thing which may, by even a remote chance, cast a shade upon his name.”
“Well, we can try him at all events,” said Fontrailles. “You, Cinq Mars, can ask him whether he will join the liberators of his country.”
“No, Fontrailles,” answered the Master of the Horse in a decided tone; “no, I will not do it. Claude de Blenau is a man by whom I should not like to be refused. Besides, I should hesitate to involve him, young and noble-hearted as he is, in a scheme which might draw down ruin on his head.”
“In the name of Heaven, Cinq Mars,” cried Fontrailles, with real astonishment at a degree of generosity of which he could find no trace in his own bosom, “of what are you dreaming? Are you frenzied? Why, you have engaged life and fortune, hope and happiness, in this scheme yourself, and can you love another man better?”
“There is every difference, Fontrailles—every difference. If I cut my own throat, I am a fool and a madman, granted; but if I cut the throat of another man, I am a murderer, which is somewhat worse. But I will be plain with you. I have embarked in this with my eyes open, and it is my own fault. Therefore, whatever happens, I will go on and do my best for our success. But mark me, Fontrailles, if all were to come over again, I would rather lay down one of my hands and have it chopped off, than enter into any engagement of the kind.”
A cloud came over the brow of Fontrailles for a moment, and a gleam of rage lighted up his dark grey eye, which soon, however, passed away from his features, though the rankling passion still lay at his heart, like a smouldering fire, which wants but a touch to blaze forth and destroy. But his look, as I have said, was soon cleared of all trace of anger; and he replied with that show of cheerfulness which he well knew how to assume, “Well, Cinq Mars, I do not look upon it in so gloomy a light as you do; though perhaps, were it now to begin, I might not be so ready in it either, for the chances we have run were great; but these, I trust, are over, and every thing certainly looks prosperous at present. However, there is no use in thinking what either of us might do had we now our choice. We are both too far engaged to go back at this time of day; so let us think alone of insuring success, and the glory of having attempted to free our country will at least be ours, let the worst befall us.”
The word glory was never without its effect on Cinq Mars. It was his passion, and was but the more violent from the restraint to which his constant attendance on the King had subjected it, seldom having been enabled to display in their proper field those high qualities which he possessed as a soldier. “So far you are right, Fontrailles,” replied he; “the glory even of the attempt is great, and we have but one course to pursue, which is straightforward to our object. You, do every thing to bind the fickle goddess to our cause, and so will I; but thinking as I do, I cannot find it in my heart to involve De Blenau. Manage that as you like; only do not ask me to do it.”
“Oh that is easily done,” answered Fontrailles, “without your bearing any part in it. Of course each of the confederates has a right to invite whomsoever he may think proper to join his party, and it would be highly dishonourable of any other to dissuade the person so invited from aiding the scheme on which all our lives depend. The Count de Blenau, I think you say, is now retired to Bourbon. There also is the Duke of Orleans, and I will take care that he shall broach the subject to the Count without implicating you.”
Cinq Mars started from his seat, and began pacing the room with his eyes bent on the ground, feeling an undefined sensation of dissatisfaction at the plans of Fontrailles, yet hardly knowing how to oppose them. “Well, well,” said he at length; “it is your business, not mine; and besides, I do not, in the least, think that De Blenau will listen to you for a moment. He has other things to think of. Mademoiselle de Beaumont is absent, no one knows where; and he must soon hear of it.”
“Be that as it may,” replied Fontrailles, “I will try. And now, Cinq Mars, let me touch upon another point;” and the wily conspirator prepared all his powers to work upon the mind of his less cautious companion, and to urge him on to an attempt which had already been the object of more than one conspiracy in that day, but which, by some unaccountable means, had always failed without any apparent difficulty or obstacle. This was no other than the assassination of the Cardinal de Richelieu: and those who read the memoirs of the faction-breathing Gondi, or any other of the historical records of the time, will wonder how, without any precaution for his personal safety, Richelieu escaped the many hands that were armed for his destruction.
Princes and nobles, warriors and politicians had thought it no crime to undertake the death of this tyrant Minister; but yet there was something in the mind of Cinq Mars so opposite to every thing base and treacherous, that Fontrailles feared to approach boldly the proposal he was about to make. “Let us suppose, my noble friend,” said he, in that slow and energetic manner which often lends authority to bad argument, “that all our schemes succeed—that the tyrant is stripped of the power he has so abused—that the tiger is enveloped in our toils. What are we to do? Are we to content ourselves with having caught him? Are we only to hold him for a moment in our power, and then to set him loose again, once more to ravage France, and to destroy ourselves? And if we agree to hold him in captivity, where shall we find chains sufficient to bind him, or a cage in which we can confine him with security, when there are a thousand other tigers of his race ready to attack the hunters of their fellow?”
“I propose nothing of the kind,” answered Cinq Mars; “once stripped of his authority, let him be arraigned for the crimes which he has committed, and suffer the death he has merited. The blood of thousands will cry out for justice, and his very creatures will spurn the monster that they served from fear.”
“Then you think him worthy of death,” said Fontrailles, in that kind of undecided manner which showed that he felt he was treading on dangerous ground.
“Worthy of death!” exclaimed Cinq Mars; “who can doubt it?—Fontrailles, what is it that you mean? You speak as if there was something in your mind that you know not how to discover. Speak, man. What is it you would say?”
“Who will deny that Brutus was a patriot?” said Fontrailles; “a brave, a noble, and a glorious man? And Brutus stabbed Cæsar in the Capitol!—Cinq Mars, when the freedom of our country is at stake, shall we wait tamely till we have preached a timid Monarch into compliance, or drawn a foreign power to our aid, when one—single—hand could do the work of justice, and rid the world of a tyrant who has lived so much too long?”
“Ha!” exclaimed Cinq Mars, starting back, and laying his hand upon his sword; “dost thou suppose me an assassin? Art thou one thyself, that thou canst so well gloze over murder with a stale tale of antiquity?—Monsieur de Fontrailles,” he continued more calmly, but still with stern indignation, “you have mistaken the person to whom you addressed yourself. Pardon me. We will speak no more upon this subject, lest we end worse friends than we began.”
Fontrailles was not a common hypocrite; he saw at once that on this point persuasion would be vain, and defence of his first proposal would but leave the worse impression on the mind of his companion; and therefore his determination was formed in a moment to take up the exact reverse position to that which he had just occupied, and if possible to force Cinq Mars into a belief that the proposal had only been made to try him. The first wild start of his companion had caused Fontrailles to draw back almost in fear; but instantly recovering himself, like a well-trained actor, every muscle of whose face is under command, he fixed his eyes on Cinq Mars, and instead of any sign of anger or disappointment, he threw into his countenance an expression of gratified admiration. “Cinq Mars, my noble friend!” he exclaimed, opening his arms to embrace him as the other concluded; “you are the man I thought you! Pardon me if I have sought to try you! but when I heard you propose to affect the Cardinal’s life by our plans, I knew not how far that idea might lead you, and I wished to be sure of the man with whom I was so deeply engaged. I declare before Heaven, that had I found that you proposed to do Richelieu to death by aught but legal means, I should have been deeply grieved, and would have fled from France where-e’er my fortune might lead, leaving you to follow your plans as best you might. But I am now satisfied, and demand your pardon for having ever doubted you.”
Cinq Mars suffered the embrace which Fontrailles proffered, but returned it coldly. Acting is ever acting, however near it may approach to nature; and notwithstanding all the hypocritical art of which Fontrailles was a master, and which he took care to exert on the present occasion, the mind of Cinq Mars still retained its doubts as to the character of the man with whom he had so closely linked his fate. “If he is a villain,” thought the Master of the Horse, “he is a most black and consummate villain;” and though they parted apparently friends, the recollection of that morning’s conversation still haunted the imagination of Cinq Mars like some ill vision; nor did the impression cease with his waking thoughts, but visited him even during the hours of repose, making him believe himself chained in a dungeon with Fontrailles standing over him turning a dagger round and round in his heart, while ever and anon he cried “Thou art a murderer!”