As he flew at the broken archway, Benoit met him with a heavy blow from his weapon upon his head. To another man it would have caused instant death. Upon Bras d’Acier it had no other effect than making him reel back against Lachaussée, who was behind him.
‘Fly, ma’amselle!’ said Benoit; ‘straight before you, towards that light at the end of the souterrain. I warned you,’ he continued, turning to the others. ‘You will find as strong arms in Languedoc as in Paris.’
Bras d’Acier was for the minute stunned; he caught Lachaussée by the arm and leant upon him for support. Benoit took advantage of the circumstance to put the final coup to his enterprise.
‘When we hunt out vermin,’ he said, ‘it is of no use unless we destroy their nest. Now, save yourselves as you like; but you shall not come near me.’
He was already on the other side of the passage, when,
scrambling forward, he stood once more on the broken masses of the quarry, brandishing his iron weapon. And then, with Herculean force, he drove it against the side of the chamber which Lachaussée had pointed out as adjoining the Bièvre. Another and another blow succeeded, whilst a foaming stream followed the spike every time he withdrew it, until, weakened by the ruptures, an immense portion of the gypsum gave way, and, with the roar of a mighty cataract, an enormous body of water burst through the wall, carrying everything before it, as it rushed at once, leaping and chafing, to every part of the chamber.
As the irruption took place, Benoit leaped back to the aperture he had himself broken open. Lachaussée and Bras d’Acier, in the alarm of the moment, prepared to follow him, for the lashing water had already reached nearly unto their knees. But the force of the torrent drove them back, and as it rushed to the readiest and lowest outlet—that leading to the large vault—hurried them along with it, washing down all the barrier that had been made in the archway by the fallen blocks. By the lamp which still hung from the ceiling, Benoit saw them whirled through the narrow passage; and the next instant the water reached the level of the gallery wherein he stood.
‘Now! now, sweetheart, make use of your legs, if ever you did!’ he cried to Louise, who had remained close to him. ‘We must travel fast to outstrip it; but, thank heaven, it is all up-hill. Ah—lash away; we shall beat you yet.’
He addressed the last words to some waves which dashed over the broken gypsum at his feet; for, in spite of the vast carrières into which it had burst, the water was rising rapidly, in consequence of the inequalities of their levels.
Then, seizing Louise, they fled rapidly, hand in hand, along the gallery—which was altogether a different one from that by which she had arrived—towards the end of it, where he had taken the precaution to leave a light, chased by the furious stream that was hurrying with a noise like thunder after them, coupled with the crashing and falling of the blocks of limestone, which continually broke down before its resistless force.
Fast and faster they sped through the labyrinth of vaults—now crouching along a rough and narrow passage, and now flying over the hard floor of a large vault, or scrambling across an eboulement of the gypsum. And louder came the roar of the water, as it seemed animated in the pursuit by a spirit of life. With the courage which despair gives to the weakest, Louise kept up with and sometimes out-stripped her companion, who cheered her as he best could; and whilst he threaded the intricate way with a readiness that showed his perfect familiarity with the carrières, promised her a safe asylum when they left them.
At last they emerged; not, however, into the pure air, but the damp and dim obscurity of a vault under one of the questionable dwellings in the Rue d’Enfer. This street was then inhabited almost entirely by the low and criminal population, which French statists have named ‘les classes dangereuses.’
Louise knelt in the vault and prayed. Benoit, after a moment’s pause, reverently crossed himself and knelt by her.
‘Eh bien, ma’amselle!’ said he, when his devotions were finished, although still out of breath. ‘Here is the worst part of our journey over. Still——’
And Benoit paused and scratched his head violently.
‘Run into no further danger on my account, good friend,’ said Louise, guessing at once the cause of his embarrassment. ‘It is enough that I have escaped the fearful danger of those caverns. Leave me now; I will find some shelter and employment. A convent——’
‘The religieuses do not look upon young women exactly as godsends, unless their pockets happen to be better garnished than I take yours to be, ma colombe,’ said Benoit. ‘I would take you back to the boat-mill, and welcome, but that would be the first place to which they would come to find you. Now I have a friend—Lord forgive me for abusing the word!—an acquaintance hereabouts, where you would be safe enough from M. Lachaussée and his band; if they are not settled by the Bièvre long before this. Mais——’
And Benoit shrugged his shoulders in most eloquent bewilderment.
‘Who and what is your acquaintance?’ said Louise.
‘Why, he calls himself a professeur, ma’amselle,’ replied Benoit; ‘but what he is just now is not quite so easily told. I have known him already in the last half-dozen years as juggler, Bohemian, bravo, cattle-doctor, rope-dancer, archer—ay, and courtier too. But courage! It is but a trial.’
Louise paused, and Benoit proceeded towards the outlet of the vault or cellar in which they stood, looking back to his pale charge when he reached the stairs. The appeal of his honest open face was irresistible, and Louise followed him. They ascended and found themselves in a rude corridor. The filth and damp of years was thick and clammy on the walls; and the dim light that struggled through the narrow windows, scattered at random up and down, showed long passages that branched from the palier where they stood, lined with doors on either side. Benoit, after looking about him for a moment as if to recall his memory of the localities, struck down the one which faced them.
They paused at the third door. Benoit raised his hand to knock, when the sound of a woman’s voice within arrested it. Louise held her breath and listened earnestly. Benoit turned and looked at her, as she motioned with her hand that they should return towards the point from whence they had come. But her guide shook his head, and, with a sort of desperate grin, knocked loudly with the iron bar he still held in his hand. The sounds within ceased, and a heavy step approached the entrance. Benoit repeated his assault on the door.
‘Who knocks?’ said a shrill voice.
‘Tsa tshen pal!’5 was Benoit’s reply.
The tongue in which he spoke was unintelligible to Louise, but the words seemed to reassure the occupant of the room, who at once proceeded to withdraw two heavy bolts, and gave admittance to Benoit and his companion.
The person who opened the door now stood before them. He was a slender well-proportioned man, in a close-fitting doublet and chausses of black serge. The sharp and angular features, the saffron complexion, and large filmy black eye, showed the real gipsy blood. He looked at Louise with a strange fixed stare, but it was impossible to read anything in the gaze, either of astonishment or alarm.
‘Who is she?’ he asked shortly of Benoit, in the gipsy tongue.
‘A sister of mine,’ replied the Languedocian. ‘She needs shelter and concealment for a while.’
‘She cannot have them here,’ was the answer.
‘By the morro6 and the lon7 she must,’ said Benoit calmly.
The man pointed to an inner door, and said—
‘There is a ranee8 there already confided to my safe keeping. What does your sister fear, that she comes here for safety?’
‘The pursuit of a grand seigneur of the court, who has taken a fancy to her, and be hanged to him!’ said Benoit. ‘Come, it will be but for a day or two—perhaps but for an hour. Remember we are brothers, and the law of the Rommany binds you to help me.’
‘True,’ said the gipsy. He advanced towards Louise and, addressing her in French, told her she could remain where she was so long as it suited her convenience, but on one condition.
‘Name it,’ said Louise.
‘To pay no heed to what does not concern you,’ returned the other. ‘I will give you a companion, who, if she amuses you as she has entertained me, will make the time pass pleasantly enough.’
So saying, he opened the door leading to an inner room, and beckoned her to follow.
From the squalor of the outer apartment Louise Gauthier was little prepared for the scene which presented itself. The room into which they passed was small, but furnished with a richness and elegance that would have fitted a royal boudoir. The walls were painted with flowers, and cupids sporting amidst them. Rich curtains of damask almost covered the single window. Piles of cushions, fauteuils of velvet and ormolu, costly tables, and a marble chimney-piece, with its gay pendule, almost dazzled poor Louise; and it was not until she had taken a rapid inventory of all these that she found the room contained an inmate. A young girl, richly dressed, was half-sitting, half-lying on a divan, in the darkest corner. It was Marotte Dupré—the actress who had vainly implored Sainte-Croix, but a short time previously, to rescue her from the Marquis of Brinvilliers. But she had apparently become reconciled to her abduction, or feigned to be so, for, starting gaily to her feet and springing forward, with a merry laugh, she exclaimed—
‘Welcome, mon preux gardien! You have brought me a companion of my own sex, to keep me company until the Marquis returns from the Tuileries. Did you think I wanted one whilst you were here?’
And she threw a witching glance from her dark eye upon the gitano, who, taking her hand, kissed it passionately.
‘She is a young girl, sister to a friend of mine,’ returned the man; ‘who seeks an asylum here for a time.’
‘We welcome her to our court,’ said the actress, with mock dignity, extending her hand to Louise. ‘Sit by us, and tell us of your wishes, hopes, sorrows—everything about you, in fact. And you, my cavalier, dismiss that gentleman with the round face, who is gaping over your shoulder. We would be alone with our new friend.’
The gipsy, thus addressed, turned to Benoit, and a rapid conversation in the dialect of his tribe ensued between them. When it was over, Benoit took Louise aside, and saying, ‘I will find a safer place for you than this—fear nothing, I will return soon,’ left the room, in company with the Bohemian.
‘Who is the other lady?’ asked Benoit as they quitted the apartment.
‘I don’t know, nor do I much care,’ replied the man. ‘She was brought here by the Marquis de Brinvilliers, who was sent for to the Tuileries almost the instant he arrived.’
‘Is she here against her will, then?’
‘Mass! I don’t know what to make of it. It seems that the Marquis was nearly being set upon, in mistake, by his friend, Captain de Sainte-Croix, for carrying her off.’
A hurried exclamation escaped Benoit’s lips.
‘Whereabouts?’ he asked eagerly.
‘Between the Captain’s lodgings and the Hotel d’Aubray, you may be sure,’ was the reply.
Benoit heard no more; but hurriedly bidding his acquaintance farewell, left the house. How he succeeded in his enterprise has been already explained.
As the door of the room closed the manner of Marotte Dupré entirely changed. Hastily and breathlessly drawing Louise to the window, she whispered—
‘I am kept here by force and treachery. The gipsy is a creature of the Marquis of Brinvilliers, who has carried me from the theatre. He is absent for a while; and I am trying the force of my fascinations upon my gaoler, the more readily to compass the means of escape. From whom do you seek asylum here?’
‘I know not,’ said poor Louise, ‘who is my enemy. I do not believe that Gaudin would ever——’
She was interrupted by Marotte. ‘Gaudin de Sainte-Croix?’
Louise assented.
‘Fear the worst,’ said her companion. ‘If Sainte-Croix is your friend,’ and she laid an ironical expression on the word, ‘you are indeed deserving of pity.’
Louise was about to speak, when a clamour in the street below attracted their attention. Marotte uttered a cry of joy, and pointing down the Rue d’Enfer, of which the window commanded a view, cried—
‘Look! look!—we are saved!—we are saved!’
Louise followed the direction of her finger, and saw a heavy and magnificently decorated carriage, which, with its attendant lackeys, had just drawn up at the miserable door of a house exactly opposite to the one in which they were. A beautiful young woman, in rich costume, descended from it, and entered the house. Marotte Dupré, with clasped hands, followed her movements with intense anxiety.
‘There is not a moment to lose. O mon Dieu!’ she exclaimed as she hastily drew some writing-tablets from her bosom, and, tearing out a leaf, wrote a few lines upon it with marvellous rapidity. ‘Now—now!’ she continued, rolling it up into a ball. ‘Open the window!’
‘Alas!’ returned Louise, as she tried the hasp of the heavy casement; ‘it is secured. I cannot unfasten it.’
‘I have it!’ cried Marotte, whilst a sudden inspiration lighted up her pale features; ‘my ring will open the glass.’
And drawing a diamond ring from her finger—the rich gift of some habitué of the Théâtre du Temple—she drew it around the pane, and then with a gentle pressure forced the glass to yield without. Had they broken it, the sound would have alarmed the gitano in the outer room.
Their chamber was on the entresol; the street was narrow, and the lackey of the carriage was nearly on a level with them. Marotte passed her white arm carefully through the opening, and threw the writing towards the lackey, accompanying the action by a low ‘Hist!’ But it was not heard; and the little note, falling short of its aim, lay in the mud of the street, yet still perceptible in the gleam of the lamps on the carriage.
He was on the point of driving away, when a slight call from Marotte attracted his attention. With some little difficulty he at last perceived the note on the ground, and got down to seize it. Its contents seemed to surprise him; for, after reading it, he passed into the house which the lady had just entered. Marotte followed his movements with feverish anxiety, and Louise caught the infection.
‘Who is that lady?’ she asked; ‘and what was the import of your note?’
‘It is Madame Scarron,’ returned Marotte; ‘the widow of my best friend. She is now in high favour at the court. Oh! she is so good—so kind. I wrote to implore her assistance to deliver us from this house; and she will do it.’
At this moment the gitano returned. Marotte, with the skill of her calling, rose to receive him. All trace of anxiety had disappeared from her face, and she was radiant with smiles. Advancing to the man, she exclaimed—
‘Bien, my gallant protector! You will not leave us to ourselves, then?’
The gipsy’s dull eye dilated, and the large pupil flashed with a strange light as he looked at the beautiful woman before him.
‘I cannot stay without and know that you are here,’ he replied. ‘I love to hear you speak and to look at you.’
Louise shuddered at the tone in which he spoke. Marotte had risen; and, while she stood half-turned from the window, threw a rapid glance into the street. The next moment she seized a mandoline that lay on a console of marble, and burst into a gay and jovial song, keeping time to the measure with graceful and wild movements. The gipsy listened with wide open eyes, and lips apart. He had no sight nor ears but for his bewitching prisoner and her song. Louise comprehended Marotte’s object. It was to cover the noise of footsteps and voices on the staircase.
As she expected, a knock sounded at the door of the outer room. The gipsy, with a half-spoken curse, turned his head in the direction of the interruption, but did not stir from the spot as Marotte finished her song.
‘It is Benoit returned,’ said Louise.
‘I hope it may be,’ said the gipsy. ‘I best like mademoiselle here to be alone.’ And he left the room, without closing the door.
Louise’s remark was made in so natural a tone, that no suspicion entered his mind. He did not even pause to ask who knocked, but ushered in the stranger at once.
The tall and beautiful lady whom Louise had seen step from the carriage entered the apartment, followed by four stout and well-armed lackeys.
The gipsy, with the quickness of his tribe, saw his error; but it was too late to repair it. Marotte and Louise, who had watched with intense eagerness the opening of the door, rushed from the inner room, and the former, throwing herself at the feet of Madame de Maintenon (for Madame Scarron had lately received the lands and title of Maintenon from the King) seized her hands, and kissing them, poured forth mingled thanks and prayers. With that winning and grave gentleness which belonged to her, the lady calmed her, and addressing herself to Louise, said—
‘Marotte’s note tells me you too are in danger, and need a friend and a refuge. Come with me, both of you.’
The gitano saw that resistance was useless. The lackeys clutched their long batons in a style that showed it would take but little pressure to make them use them. With all the suppleness of a true Bohemian, he was profuse in his apologies to Madame de Maintenon, to Marotte, and to Louise, and asked their witness to the kindness and civility of his treatment towards them.
Madame de Maintenon cut short his protestations with a contemptuous gesture, and bidding her lackeys mark the number of the house, and the appearance of the gipsy, left the room, accompanied by her two protegees.
Then mounting her carriage, she placed them opposite to her, and giving the order to her attendants, ‘A Vaugirard’—they drove off rapidly along the Rue d’Enfer.
There are very few portions of Paris which have retained their physiognomy of the moyen âge with less change than the Quartier Latin. The narrow tortuous streets have undergone little alteration since they were first built; few new thoroughfares have intersected the dense cluster of tall gloomy houses that bound them; in fact, as far as the line of the Rue des Fosses, whereon the ramparts were still partly situated at the time of this romance, everything has remained nearly in the same state for centuries. The humble nature of the articles exposed for sale in the different shop windows, and the small prices attached thereunto, were the same formerly as now. For the denizens of this learned pays have been, time out of mind, the members of the different schools; and poverty and clerkship ever wandered hand-in-hand together about its venerable streets, or ruminated in its cloistered quietudes.
Yet have not the livelier parts of the city, most known to passing sojourners, a fiftieth part of the interest which is attached to the dirty old quartier wherein our scene now passes, although money has ever been the scarcest article to be found within its limits, since the days when the ‘Cloistre St. Benoyt’ and ‘Hostel de Clugny’ were newly erected buildings. We ourselves have lived merrily therein, in small cabins at the extreme summits of houses, where carnival irregularities drove us to restrict our expenses, literally to a few sous a-day—when three hard eggs, some bread, and a cruet of wine formed a jovial dinner; and a pair of bright eyes could sometimes be found to laugh in company over such an humble meal as this, and desire none better. Certainly if such a thing as disinterested affection exists in the world—which at times we feel inclined to doubt—it is to be found in the Quartier Latin. And then its associations! It conjures up no visions of English parvenus, vulgar tourists, and Meurice’s Table d’Hôte; you would not find a Galignani’s Messenger, or a cake of Windsor soap throughout its entire range. No; all your thoughts would be of doublets and pointed shoes—of rapiers and scholars of Cluny; of anything, in fact, the reverse to what would suggest itself on the other side of the river.
But our hobby is fairly running away with us over a course we have before traversed; we must return once more to that which has long past. In 1665 there stood at the corner of the Rue des Mathurins and Rue de la Harpe, in the very heart of this venerable division of Paris, the shop of ‘Maître Picard, chapelier.’ It was a modest edifice, with one large window, in which were displayed hats and caps of every age and style. For the students then, as now, held prevalent fashions in great contempt, and dressed according to their whims and finances, or in whatever they contrived to capture in night skirmishes from the persons of the bourgeoisie.
To advertise his calling Maître Picard had erected a sign in front of his house, over and above the intimation just mentioned. It was a huge hat of red tin, gaily adorned with gilt edges, from which, on certain festivals, bright ribbons floated in the draughts of wind that whisked round the corner of the streets, to the great admiration of the passers-by in general, coupled with wonder that it had remained so long unmolested in such a precarious locality as the neighbourhood of the Hôtel Dieu and Sorbonne. But this was because it was a little too high up for them to clutch it; a few feet lower, and long ago, Maître Picard would have been horrified some fine morning at perceiving his sign had vanished: for, as we have seen, the rotund little patrol was one of the marching watch; and the same antipathie vouée which the student of the Quartier Latin at the present time exhibits towards the Sergent de ville, existed quite as forcibly two hundred years ago between the scholar of Cluny and the Garde Bourgeois.
Since the rude treatment which Maître Picard had received from the hands of his sworn persecutors at the ‘Lanterne,’ in the Rue Mouffetard, he had neglected no opportunity of interfering with their enjoyments, and various had been the schemes which Camille Theria and Phillipe Glazer had planned for revenge. But they had all failed; especially every enterprise against the hat, to which their designs were principally directed. For they knew that the gigantic metal sign was the pride of Maître Picard’s heart, and the glory of the Rue des Mathurins—that its abstraction would crush his public spirit; and that as such, no stone should be left unturned in effecting its destruction. And indeed, as far as that went, they tried to carry out their intentions in a very literal spirit, as the broken state of the rude pavement below, and several large dents in the enormous hat above, fully testified.
At last, by what appeared to be a fortunate chance for the marauders, Jean Blacquart, the Gascon, took a lodging on the upper floor of the house; being principally led to such a step by a feeling of gratitude for the timely intercession of Maître Picard, when his fellow-students were about to hang him. The instant this became known, it was resolved that advantage should be taken of his occupancy to carry off the hat. Blacquart, at first, plumply refused to assist in such an irregular proceeding; but after Theria had assured him that in the event of his non-compliance he would be dropped in the Bièvre, or slowly roasted before the fire of the cabaret in the Rue Mouffetard, the Gascon assented. A particular night was fixed upon for the attempt, and a meeting of the ‘Gens de la Courte Epée’ called at a tavern in the Rue des Cordeliers—the site of the present Rue de l’École de Médecine—to effect this object.
That night Maître Picard, not being on guard, resolved upon indulging in potent drinks and toothsome viands in his little parlour behind the shop. He had closed his wareroom at an early hour; and having invited Jean Blacquart to join him—for the Gascon was not of the marauding party, although he had an indirect part to perform in the outrage—was discussing hot wine with his lodger a little after curfew, and listening to his rhodomontades connected with his profession and deeds and actions generally.
Jean had told a great many narratives about encounters he had won (which had never taken place) and enemies he had killed (who were still alive), increasing the marvels of each with each cup of wine, until the fulness of his heart, coupled with his fear of being mixed up in the affair, led him to inform Maître Picard of the intended attempt upon his hat to be made that very evening. The apartment occupied by the Gascon was at the top of the house; it had formerly been a granary—such as may still be seen in Paris—and outside a small but strong wooden crane was fixed, hanging over the doomed sign. To the rope of this a loop was to be made, and then Camille Theria, who had taken the danger and the glory of the enterprise to himself, was to be hauled up until he came within reach of the hat, which he was to take from its fixings and bear off in triumph.
The first feelings inspired in the breast of Maître Picard, as he heard this bold scheme unfolded, were those of fright; the next partook largely of revenge.
‘How many will there be?’ he asked.
‘Oh! a hundred,’ replied Blacquart. It was the ‘Gascon’ for twenty.
‘Bless me!’ said Maître Picard; ‘a great number—an awful number. You have told me to-night that you once fought a score yourself; but I don’t think you could face so many.’
‘I don’t think I could,’ said Blacquart. ‘I will try, if you please; only if my courage led me into any rash attack, I might be fatally wounded, and then what a scrape you would get into.’
‘True—true,’ said Maître Picard, wiping his face, and taking a long draught of wine; ‘and it is the same with me. My frame is rather round than large; but there is a great spirit at work within it, which I cannot always command. I will call together the Garde Bourgeois.’
‘Will not their assembling alarm the others,’ said Blacquart.
‘Not at all—not at all,’ returned the chapelier. ‘We will have them come by twos and threes, and hide in my shop.’
‘Excellent!’ said the Gascon.
‘Will you summons them, then?’ asked Maître Picard.
‘I think not,’ said Blacquart; ‘although they know me as a daring and gallant coadjutor. My appearance in the streets might provoke suspicion with any of the students I might meet.’
To the joy of the Gascon, who thought inside the house the safest position with such an event about to come off, Maître Picard rose, with some trouble, from his settle, and, puffing and blowing, started out to summons his brother-guards. The Gascon remained to finish the wine; which, having done, he felt so nerved that he sang bold and warlike songs to himself, and then drawing his sword fought imaginary duels with nobody, and slaughtered many chimerical adversaries, concluding from mere want of breath, in high good humour with himself and his prowess. He was yet panting from his late courageous exertions, when his landlord returned with a few of his brethren in the guard, and these were speedily followed by others, who were stationed in the shop and parlour. Their presence increased the Gascon’s valour to such a pitch that, when he saw they had all arrived, he even offered to go and fight the students himself. And had it not been for one of the guard, who, from sheer wickedness, recommended Jean to do so, to his extreme terror, there is no knowing to what lengths he might have gone, or what wonderful actions he might have committed.
The curfew sounded; the lights disappeared in the Quartier Latin, as the shops were closed, and the glimmer of the lanterns alone illumined the thoroughfares. Maître Picard disposed the Garde Bourgeois for a proper sortie, and then went up to Blacquart’s room, accompanied by the student, whom he placed to keep a look out at the window.
‘I think I hear them coming,’ said Jean, after he had been a short time at his post.
‘They are marching in order,’ observed Maître Picard, with breathless attention; ‘the students have mustered strongly.’
‘No; it is the Guet Royal,’ returned the Gascon, as the night-patrol came round the corner of the Rue de la Harpe.
‘I think we had better call them in, too,’ said the affrighted little hatter.
‘No—no,’ answered Jean; ‘the disturbance and the clank of their arms will alarm the others. Beside, is there not enough to protect you? You have me.’
‘Very true,’ said Maître Picard. But he said it as if he did not think it was. However, he was resigned to his fate, and the Guet Royal passed along the Rue des Mathurins, turning off towards the Sorbonne.
‘They will not be back for half an hour,’ murmured Maître Picard, as the last cresset disappeared round the corner.
‘Then they will be too late for our gentlemen,’ said the Gascon; ‘for I hear them now coming in reality.’
In effect he was right. The students had evidently waited until the patrol had passed, knowing they would thus be for a certain time uninterrupted, and they now came quietly in front of the house. One of them, whom Blacquart knew to be Camille Theria, clapped his hands, and the Gascon replied to the signal.
‘They wanted to hang me the other night,’ said he; ‘but I mean to succeed better with them than they did with me. And yet,’ he added as he looked below, ‘there seems to be a great many of them.’
‘What are you waiting for?’ asked the chapelier.
‘Me? oh! nothing—nothing,’ said the Gascon. His blood was ebbing down rapidly every instant. ‘Only I was thinking if you were to make a speech from the window, and forgive them, how they would esteem you; and perhaps it would save bloodshed.’
Theria, who was below, repeated the signal.
‘Lower down your rope,’ said Maître Picard, who was peeping over the parapet.
‘Upon my honour, I don’t much like to do so,’ said Blacquart, as his last atom of heroism evaporated.
‘If you don’t let the line down immediately, I will give you into custody below as an accomplice,’ said the bourgeois, in wrathful accents.
Another impatient signal from Theria was heard; and poor Jean, in a terrible fright, proceeded to unwind the cord from its winch; whilst the hatter kept looking just over the parapet to see what was going on.
‘It is almost close to the ground,’ he said. ‘Now it touches it; and that rascal Theria has got hold of the end. He puts his foot in it. Huzza! huzza! now wind away; he is ours.’
And the rotund little man delivered himself up to the performance of such joyful gymnastics, that at last his hat fell off and tumbled into the street. A student, who saw it fall, thought it was Theria’s, and cramming his casquette into his cloak-pocket, put it on, until the other should come down.
‘Now, stop! for your life!’ said Maître Picard to the Gascon, who kept winding away in great trepidation, but saying through it all that he was easily accomplishing the work of six men. ‘Now stop! he is on a level with the sign; let him remain there.’
Jean implicitly obeyed; the catch fell into the toothed wheel, and he came to the window, whilst Maître Picard hurried down stairs very rapidly, by reason of his gravity, and told his fellow police that it was time to make their charge. They accordingly rushed into the street, and were face to face with the students.
‘Trapped!’ ejaculated Theria, as he felt his progress stopped, and saw the tumult below. ‘Oh, Master Blacquart, you shall pay for this.’
A terrible riot ensued. What the students wanted in numbers, they made up in strength and daring. They wrested the partisans from their opponents to turn against them, and in all probability would have come off the conquerors, had not Maître Picard opened one of his upper windows and discharged a blunderbus therefrom—not to injure his enemies, but to give the alarm by the report of this novel weapon, not long imported from Holland.9 It had the desired effect, and in a few minutes brought back the Guet Royal.
Some of the students fled at once as they saw the night-patrol advance, for they were men with whom there was no trifling. Those who remained, being a small number, were now captured by the bourgeois; and then Maître Picard emerged from his house, and Theria was let down and seized.
‘Huzza!’ cried the little chapelier, giving way to fresh antics. ‘We have caught you—eh? Take him away; to the guard-house with such a brawler. Stop—no—the glory shall be with me. Gentlemen of the Guet Royal, march on with your other prisoners; the Garde Bourgeois will take charge of the ringleader. Mauvais sujet—ugh!’
Camille took no notice of Maître Picard’s address. He was, however, chafing with anger inwardly at being thus caught.
‘To the guard-house!’ continued Maître Picard, ‘without loss of time. I have rid Paris of a brigand—a cut-purse. En avant!’
Drawing his sword as well as his short arms and fat little body permitted, Maître Picard placed himself before the prisoner, and two of the others followed. In this state they started off, the hatter leaving Blacquart in charge of his shop, and proceeded towards the nearest corps du garde. But, as they were passing down the Rue de la Harpe, Camille, who had been watching his opportunity, suddenly tripped up the chapelier, and sent him rolling into the kennel that rushed down the middle of the street, before he had time to save himself. He then as rapidly dealt a couple of heavy blows to his followers, and whilst they were aghast at the unexpected attack, rushed down the Rue du Foin, in the obscurity of which he was immediately lost. But we must follow him along it, leaving the two guards, first to recover themselves and then to pick up Maître Picard, in as sorry a plight as might well be.
Flying along the narrow thoroughfare, a few minutes brought Camille to his abode in the Place Maubert. He went directly to the apartment of Philippe Glazer, who was at home, and briefly told him what had happened.
‘It will not stop here,’ said Theria. ‘That wretched bourgeois can make a nasty business of it if he likes, and I must leave Paris at once.’
‘Immediately?’ asked Glazer.
‘Directly. My studies, such as they have been, are nearly finished, and Liège will do for me to settle at as well as anywhere else. Besides, it is my home.’
‘Can I assist you in anything?’ asked Philippe.
‘In one thing only—a little money, for I am quite cleaned out by mes camarades. In return, Philippe, I leave you everything—my books, my rapier, and my Estelle—poor Estelle! Don’t ever part with my rapier whatever you do.’
Glazer smiled at his friend’s speech, as he collected what little money he had by him, and gave to the other.
‘Ten thousand thanks, Philippe,’ said Camille, ‘it shall be repaid some day; we do not cheat one another.’
‘I will trust you,’ said Glazer; ‘is there anything else I can do for you?’
‘One thing,’ said Camille, more seriously. ‘I am not one to boast of favours bestowed, or even hint at them, but you will find a packet of love-letters in my old escriban. Burn them all—they are from Madame de Brinvilliers.’
Glazer uttered an exclamation of mingled incredulity and surprise.
‘It is true,’ said Camille; ‘she wrote them to me, telling me that I was the only one she ever loved—that all the other attachments had been madness—folly. Pshaw! each avowal was stereotyped, and did for others as well as it will again do for the next. Burn them all. Adieu! and tell Estelle to console herself.’
And, warmly shaking his friend by the hand, Theria flew down stairs, leaving Glazer almost bewildered at the rapidity of the interview and the avowal he had just heard.
The tower of the Bastille, which the Under-Governor had designated as the Tour du Nord upon Sainte-Croix’s arrival, was generally known as the Tour de la Liberté, which title, from the mockery of the appellation, was not in frequent use. The Bastille, it may be known, consisted at that time of eight towers. Two of these—the Tour du Trésor, so called because it was chosen as the depot of the wealth amassed by the sagacious Sully for Henry IV., and the Tour de la Chapelle, were the most ancient, and had formerly been merely the towers which flanked the entrance to Paris by the Faubourg St. Antoine. Subsequently the Tour de la Liberté and the Tour de la Bertandière were added opposite to those just spoken of—the latter being the one chosen, some centuries afterwards, as the prison of the unfortunate ‘Man in the Iron Mask.’ The Tour de la Liberté was at this early period the most northern elevation—hence its second name; and the entrance to the city lay between those four towers, on the spot where the huge cast of the elephant, intended for the fountain, may be recollected by the visitor on the way to Père la Chaise. To those four towers Charles VI. added four others; about 1383 chambers were hewn in the thickness of the wall between them, drawbridges were erected, a fosse dug around, and the Bastille was completed.
All these towers contained the cells for the prisoners; and as a portion of our story must now necessarily pass in the Bastille, we will call the attention of the reader to them; but briefly as possible. In each tower were five ranges of cells. The lowest of these, or cachots,10 were the most horrible, receiving what little light they had from the lower part of the fosse. The floor was covered with a nauseous slime, perpetually oozing from the low grounds around, and laden with rank and poisonous exhalations. Here noisome reptiles—the toad, the lizard, and the rat, had their homes—sweltering and crawling on the damp floor; from which the only refuge allowed to the wretched prisoner was a species of bed, formed by iron bars projecting from the wall, a few inches above the ground. In many of these sinks, still greater misery was contrived for the occupant. The lower part was a mere well, cut out in the form of an inverted sugar-loaf, in which the prisoner was compelled to exist, so that the feet found no level resting-place, nor could the body repose.
Next in order of the chambres rigoureuses, were the iron cages. They were above the cachots, and were formed of small beams of wood plated with iron, being about six feet square. The next were termed the calottes. These chambers were the highest, being built in the summit of the towers, and so contrived that the prisoner could only stand upright exactly in the middle, and there was scarcely space in them for the length of a bed, although the depth of the loopholes was ten feet, being the thickness of the wall. These were small, admitting very little light, which was farther excluded by two ranges of thick iron bars, within and without. Being close to the roof, the heat of the sun in summer was insupportable, converting them almost into ovens; in winter the cold was equally terrible, since there was little space for a fire. In these rooms the victims were usually confined who were destined for the oubliettes—the wheels armed with cutting points, which, turning round, drew the sufferer between them and cut or tore him to pieces.
The intermediate chambers were somewhat more comfortable. They were fourteen or fifteen feet high; and, although the windows were heavily barred and counter-barred, were tolerably well lighted; whilst, from some of them, views could be obtained of the boulevards and various parts of the city. The rooms were generally numbered, and named after the towers in which they were situated. The one that Gaudin de Sainte-Croix now entered was the Onzième Liberté—and by the same title was the occupant known during his sojourn in the prison.
The recognition, both on the part of Gaudin and Exili, was instantaneous, and an expression of surprise burst from the lips of the former as he discovered the falcon countenance of the physician. But he directly recovered his composure, recollecting that the gaoler was still in the room, and remained silent until Galouchet departed, closing after him, one upon another, the three massy doors which, covered with heavy locks, bolts, and iron studs, guarded each of the chambers.
The first impression of Exili had been that some new punishment was in store for him, upon seeing his late enemy enter, accompanied by the functionary. But as the man left, and Gaudin, dashing his hat upon the ground, threw himself in an old fauteuil at the foot of the pallet destined for him, he perceived that he also was a prisoner. A savage gleam of triumph passed across his livid countenance as he bade Sainte-Croix welcome in a tone of mockery.
‘My prophecy has been speedily fulfilled,’ said Exili; ‘I gave you six months—little more than thrice six hours have passed, and we meet again. You may find good reason now to burn me as a sorcerer, when you wish entirely to get rid of me.’
Gaudin smarted under the taunt; but his face betokened no trace of the annoyance. He took the empty sheath of his sword, which still hung at his side, and, smiling carelessly, played with the lace that was fixed round his boot.
‘It is an odd rencontre,’ he said; ‘but you are no sorcerer, or you would not have been here. On that score you are safe. We stand a chance of being together for some time—perhaps we may become better friends.’
‘Friends!’ replied Exili, with a short, dreary laugh. ‘Never: we are not made of the stuff that can harbour such a dull sentiment. Crime—purpose—common interest—might set up some tie between us; but not friendship.’
‘I care not what you call it,’ said Gaudin; ‘our battle has become a drawn game, and we must make the best of it. Yesterday I had my revenge—to-night your turn has arrived. On the score of vengeance, then, we are quits. At least towards each other,’ he added, after a moment’s pause.
Exili had never taken his eyes from Sainte-Croix since he entered; his piercing glance appeared to be scanning the thoughts that prompted every word the other uttered. Gaudin’s last speech appeared to have awakened fresh attention.
‘And to no one else?’ asked Exili emphatically, still looking fixedly at him. ‘May I ask through whom you were sent here?’
‘Through the cause of all that can most wring and crush us, either in this world or that which is to follow, for aught I know.’
‘A woman?’
‘Your divination is again right.’
‘And that woman is the Marchioness of Brinvilliers.’
‘I mentioned no name,’ said Sainte-Croix quickly.
‘You did not,’ replied Exili; ‘and yet I knew it. You cannot suppose that I should remain ignorant of what has been the gossip of the shops and carrefours of Paris throughout many a fine spring afternoon this year.’
‘Her husband never knew it,’ said Sainte-Croix, for the minute thrown off his guard, and admitting the truth of what had been a random venture on the part of Exili.
‘In such case the husband is always the last,’ returned the physician, ‘to credit his own dishonour. And yet it was not Antoine Gobelin who sent you here.’
‘You are right once more,’ said Gaudin. ‘It was M. d’Aubray, the lieutenant-civil, her father. Curses wither him!’
The features of Exili assumed an expression that was perfectly fiendish, as he gazed upon Sainte-Croix, who was divesting himself of his garments, and flinging them carelessly about the room here and there, before lying down upon the truckle-bed. Not wishing to extinguish the lamp, yet disliking the glare in his eyes, he had removed it to the chimney-corner, near which was placed a rude table.
‘It is cold!’ he said, as he endeavoured to warm his hands before the dying embers.
‘So I thought last night,’ said Exili; ‘but I am already inured to it. It is, however, a different change for you, from the Hôtel d’Aubray. I am used to strange apartments; and I have no lady-love who may play me false during my imprisonment.’
A spasmodic tremor passed through Sainte-Croix’s frame; his hands were clenched and his lip quivered. The convulsion was slight and rapid, but it was observed by Exili. He went on.
‘It is annoying, too, to dream that others may share her affections whilst you are imprisoned here. Her years are but few—her blood is young and vivid. The Marquis, too, neglects her—so goes report in Paris—and she must have some one to attach herself to.’
‘No more!—no more!’ cried Gaudin, with a sudden and violent outburst of passion. ‘Fiend! demon! what drives you thus to madden me?’
‘These are harsh terms to christen me by,’ returned Exili, with a ghastly smile; ‘especially when it is in my power to place in your possession what you now desire above anything else the world could bestow.’
‘And what is that?’ asked Gaudin, assuming an indifference through his anger.
‘Vengeance!’ returned Exili, as he raised himself on the pallet, and glared upon Sainte-Croix like a basilisk.
A scornful expression of contempt was Gaudin’s only reply.
But Exili saw that his prey was coquetting with the bait. He continued—
‘There are dull moralists and fools who will tell you that revenge is an ignoble passion, fitted only to those grovelling spirits who dare not resent an injury, and yet are too sharply stung to pass it over. Believe them not; it is a glorious triumph of retribution, although the success of the cast will alone decide whether it will be called justice or cowardice by the world. You are indebted for your present position to Dreux d’Aubray; you burn for vengeance. If you fail the world will call you pitiful, mean, lâche: succeed, and you become a hero. Suppose I make that success certain!’
‘Pshaw! you are leading me on to some new toil,’ said Gaudin. ‘We are powerless here; were we otherwise, I should mistrust you. This is no place for bandying smooth phrases; nor are our relations towards each other such as require them. You know my sentiments towards you.’ Then, after a moment’s pause, he added, ‘What plan do you propose?’
‘As I expected,’ thought Exili; ‘his curiosity is aroused.’ ‘It is full late,’ he continued aloud, as the sound of the bell vibrated through the building from the Tour de la Chapelle. ‘To-morrow your excitement will have somewhat abated, and all will be explained. Doubtless your couch will prove a trifle harder than the one you have been accustomed to. Good-night; and may she visit you in your dreams, for you will have little chance here of seeing her otherwise.’
And with this last observation, which had the full effect he intended, the physician turned on his pallet and was soon asleep, or affected to be so.
But it was long before Gaudin slumbered. The events of the evening were in themselves enough to drive anything from his mind, and the last conversation with Exili had added fresh wrath to the mingled blaze of anger, jealousy, and impotent desire of revenge that consumed him. At last the objects in the room imperceptibly faded from his sight, or merged into the strange forms which his half-slumbering senses conjured up; and in this state he lay for upwards of an hour, with a consciousness of existence, but motionless and silent.
Suddenly he awoke—if it could be called awaking from a state that was scarcely a sleep—and cast his eyes across the room towards the bed of his companion. Exili was awake as well. He had raised himself in bed, and, by the light of the lamp which still burned in the chimney-corner, was staring fixedly at Sainte-Croix, with the same riveting gaze he had before directed towards him. It was not the look of human intent—a serpent would have fascinated a bird with the same expression, until the victim fell into its yawning mouth. Gaudin quailed before it—he knew not why; but there was something terrible in the unclosed and glaring eyes of the physician, which almost precluded him from inquiring what he desired.
‘You need not be alarmed,’ replied Exili, in an unconcerned tone. ‘Whatever my wishes might have been towards you yesternight, at all events, you are safe here. I was attracted by that curious bauble hanging round your neck. Where did you get it?’
He directed Sainte-Croix’s attention to a small gold heart, about the size of a walnut, which hung round his neck, and which he had not laid aside in divesting himself of his clothes for the night.
‘It is an amulet,’ said Gaudin, ‘and contains a charm against an evil eye. I have heard it will also yield visions of the future. I never put it on one side.’
As he spoke, he opened the heart in its centre, and took out a crystal of a reddish colour, set in a circle of silver. Exili gazed at it still more earnestly than before.
‘It is a beryl!’ he exclaimed.
‘Eyes less piercing than yours might tell that,’ replied Sainte-Croix. ‘Your fool affected to expose one for sale on the Carrefour du Châtelet but a short time since.’
‘I will tell you more,’ continued Exili, still fixing his scrutinising gaze upon the amulet. ‘The names of the four angels are graven round it: they come in order thus—Uriel, Raphael, Michael, Gabriel. I have seen that stone before. Where did you get it?’
‘It matters little to you,’ replied Gaudin; ‘suffice it to say it is my own.’
‘And you did not read your arrest on its surface?’
‘I have kept it merely as a charm,’ answered Gaudin.
‘Then you have abused its power,’ continued Exili. ‘Listen! do you hear the night wind howling round the towers of the Bastille and rushing down the chimney of our apartment? To common ears it is but the wind—a viewless thing that comes and goes, hurrying on around the world until its force is spent and it dies in nothingness. To me it is far otherwise,’ he continued, as his eyes blazed with unwonted fire, and he raised his arm on high. ‘Each gust is laden with the wrath of some damned spirit waiting to be called upon to make that beryl a mirror of the future, and you neglect the appeal. Give me the stone, and let me read the fate you care not to know.’
Gaudin gazed at Exili with fixed astonishment. The physician extended his hand, and the other took the amulet from his neck and gave it to him.
‘It is the same!’ exclaimed Exili with a smothered exclamation of surprise, as he again looked intently at Gaudin. Then, fixing his eye on the stone, he continued—
‘Its surface is dull. I can see forms moving on it, but they are indistinct, and dance from before my sight like motes, all except your own, and that remains. You may yet triumph.’
Gaudin was awed by the manner of Exili; at another time he would have laughed his predictions to scorn, but the circumstances, the hour, and the place, combined to make him think very seriously of his companion’s remarks.
‘What do you mean?’ he asked.
‘I will reply by putting another question,’ said Exili; ‘where did you get this mineral?’
‘I have had it many years; let that suffice. Now, I claim to know the import of your speech.’
‘You may yet triumph,’ repeated the Italian; ‘and by my means alone. I am not, you see, the enemy you thought me. Again, I say, wait until to-morrow.’
‘Nay, to-night,’ exclaimed Sainte-Croix. ‘I beseech you tell me what you mean.’
‘The charm may be broken,’ continued the other; ‘it is not yet time.’
The manner of the physician had worked upon Sainte-Croix’s curiosity strangely. He again implored to know what the other alluded to.
‘To-night—now—this instant!’ he exclaimed.
‘I will gratify you,’ replied Exili. ‘To-morrow they will bring me my chemical glasses from the boat-mill, together with such dull elements as the ground yields—simple and harmless—in order, as they suppose, that I may practise alchemy. Fools! they little know the change that paltry lamp can work in innocuous earths.’
‘What do you propose to do?’ asked Sainte-Croix.
‘To put you in possession of all I know myself,’ continued Exili, ‘and bring Marie de Brinvilliers once more near you, unquestioned, undisturbed. Seek no further. The life and death of those you love or hate shall be alike within your grasp. The destroying angel shall become your slave, and go abroad, obedient to your will alone. Your bosom should now harbour but one thought—and that must be revenge.’
Exili threw back the amulet to Sainte-Croix, and sank back on his pillow; whilst Gaudin, finding he returned no reply to his questions, once more sought to fly from himself, and the black thoughts that haunted him, in sleep.
It was not until Galouchet, the gaoler, entered the chamber of the Tour de la Liberté the next morning that Sainte-Croix awoke from his slumbers—from one of those bright dreams of freedom, triumph, and happiness, albeit always tempered with some vague mistrust, which haunt our sleeping existence; the fairer in their visioned prospects, the more gloomy and hopeless the reality.
Exili had already risen. He was looking over the contents of a small chest of carved wood, placed on the table before him. The gaoler was apparently making preparations for breakfast, clattering some metal plates upon the undraped and rude table; and in the fireplace the dense smoke was creeping through some hissing pieces of damp wood, as the sap sputtered and bubbled from their ends. Gaudin stared about him confusedly. The last impression of his dreams was mingled with his waking sensations, and he remained silent for a few moments, after some incoherent words, to collect his senses. Exili muttered some conventional salute, and then went on with his scrutiny, whilst Galouchet, having put the table in order, according to his own notions, offered his assistance towards completing Sainte-Croix’s toilet.
‘What charge will monsieur choose to defray for his nourishment?’ asked the gaoler, as Gaudin rose from his pallet.
‘What do you expect?’ inquired Sainte-Croix.
‘Parbleu! we have all prices. You may live like a prince for fifty livres a-day, or starve like a valet for two. This will include your washing, if you are not over-fond of clean linen, and a candle a-night. The firewood you must pay for separately.’
Gaudin looked towards the fireplace, and the struggling flame.
‘Ah!’ said Galouchet, divining his thoughts; ‘the wood is rather damp, to be sure, but that makes it last the longer; and as you and Monsieur Exili occupy the same room, it will come cheaper.’
‘Is there news in the city this morning, Galouchet?’ asked Exili.
‘But little,’ returned the functionary. ‘Pierre, the scullion, sleeps out of the fortress, and tells me that an eboulement took place last night, and the Bièvre burst into some of the carrières of St. Marcel; and fell so rapidly, in consequence, that all the mills this side of St. Medard were stopped for three hours.’
‘Was anybody lost?’ inquired the physician.
‘It is believed so. A party of Bras d’Acier’s gang were hunted out of the vaults between the Cordelières and Montrouge, like rats in our cachots, when the rains come; and one of the superintendents at the Gobelins was fished up, half-drowned, from a shaft in the Rue Mouffetard.’
‘Do you know his name?’ asked Sainte-Croix eagerly.
‘I can’t say I do,’ returned Galouchet. ‘What rate will you fix your nourriture at, monsieur?’ he continued.
‘I care not,’ said Gaudin; ‘only let it be something that I can eat.’
The day passed on, but the hours lagged so tediously that Time himself appeared to be a prisoner. Little conversation passed between the two inmates of the cell. Exili was occupied in writing nearly the whole day; and Gaudin, who could ill bear the confinement, with his restless and excitable spirit, after the hour’s exercise in the great court allowed to all the prisoners, obtained permission to walk on the ramparts in front of the sentinels. This position commanded a view along the Rue St. Antoine, as well as of the houses in the Rue St. Paul. Towards this point were Gaudin’s eyes constantly directed. He beheld people moving in the streets, and over the plains in the immediate vicinity of the city walls—the coup d’œil was alive with commerce—and the buzz of their voices plainly reached his ear; but he envied them not, nor drew one comparison between their freedom and his state of durance, except when he saw them turn from the great thoroughfare into the small street wherein the Hôtel d’Aubray was situated. He fancied he could pick out the pointed roof of the mansion from amongst the others, and once he imagined that he saw the delicate figure of the Marchioness emerge from the Rue St. Paul, and pass towards the city, without so much as throwing back a glance towards the fortress in which she knew he was confined. And then the hell of jealousy raged in his veins, and he felt the bitterness of captivity. He thought of the circumstances under which he had found her with Theria the preceding evening; then came back the recollection of the impassioned interview, and her apparent devotion to him, until the struggle of his conflicting feelings to establish what he hoped for, over what he dreaded, nearly maddened him.
At length it got dusk, and he could see no more. The murmur of the peopled city died away; the lights appeared in the embrasures of the Bastille, and the night-wind chilled him. He descended once more to his cell, and found his gaoler there.
‘I was coming to seek you, monsieur,’ he said, ‘for the curfew will soon ring. Mass! your supper is nearly cold. Here is a slice of rôti, a plate of eggs, and a salad; you could not fare better at home.’
‘Have any of my things come?’ asked Gaudin.
‘They are being overlooked in the corps du garde,’ replied the man. ‘By the way, monsieur, my sweetheart, Françoise Roussel, gave me this note for you, when I met her without the walls this afternoon. She did not care that it should be read by the governor.’
Gaudin snatched the note, and discerned the handwriting of the Marchioness. Hastily tearing it open, he read—
‘Be true and patient; all may yet be well, and you will be revenged. Rely on me to aid you; we have gone too far to retract. In life, and after it, yours only,
‘Marie.’
‘I must put out your light,’ said Galouchet. ‘Last night you were brought in late, and nothing was said; but neither fire nor lamp can be allowed between curfew and sunrise.’
‘You can have it, my good fellow,’ said Gaudin, still quivering with the emotion which the letter had called up. ‘Here—here is some money for you. I will keep your secret. You may retire.’
The man raked out the embers on the grate, and departed. As soon as the clanking of the three doors that shut in the cell had ceased, Exili, who till now had remained quiet, arose from his table, and approaching Sainte-Croix in the darkness, said rapidly—
‘I will now show you some of the mysteries by which my career has, up to yesterday, thriven. But, first—precaution!’
He took his cloak, and by the aid of the forks on the table fixed it so that it covered the window, the position of which could be plainly ascertained by the faint moonlight from without, and then he returned towards the table at which he had been sitting.
‘The clods without think that our light and darkness is subservient to their will alone; but the elements obey not such idiots. The ether which percolates all things—vitalised and inorganic—setting up a communion between them, reveals not itself to the uninitiated. With me, the various elements are as abject slaves, whom I can summons at my bidding.’
As he spoke, he dashed a small rod he held against the wall, and a flame, so bright that Gaudin could hardly look upon it, burst from its extremity. In another moment he had relighted the lamp, and he then shook the blaze amongst the embers on the hearth, which were presently rekindled. Sainte-Croix looked upon his companion with the gaze of one bewildered. Exili read the expression of the other’s features and continued, perceiving his advantage—
‘Life and death are equally within my grasp. Whom shall I call up? Will you see the ghastly corpse of the Croce Bianca, at Milan?’
‘No! No!’ cried Gaudin, covering his eyes with his hand, as if he dreaded to meet the horrid sight.
‘Will that serve to recall its memory as well?’ asked Exili, throwing a phial upon the table.
A glance sufficed to show its nature to Sainte-Croix. It was a small bottle of the terrible Aqua Tofana—the ‘Manna of St. Nicholas de Barri.’
‘That menstruum is powerless, compared to what I am about to show you. But first, look here.’
He stooped beneath the table, and pulled out a species of cage, in which several rats were huddled together, fighting, and scrambling over their fellows.
‘Where did you get those vermin from?’ inquired Gaudin.
‘There are more in the Bastille than are wanted,’ replied Exili. ‘They have been willingly granted by some poor wretch at the base of our tower. Galouchet bought them. I told him they were to study anatomy from.’
He plunged his hand fearlessly amongst them, and drew forth one of the shrieking animals. Then squeezing its throat, he poured a drop or two of the fluid down the mouth. The rat gave a few convulsive throes, and he threw it down, dead, upon the table.
‘You see the effect of the potion,’ he continued. ‘Now, look here.’
Pouring the greater part of the remaining liquid of the phial into a glass, he coolly drank it off before Gaudin could arrest his hand. But no effect supervened. Instead of falling lifeless as Sainte-Croix had anticipated, Exili gazed at him, and, with a short, hollow laugh, threw the empty bottle amongst the embers.
‘Are you man or demon?’ asked Gaudin, scarcely trusting to his senses.
‘Neither,’ said Exili. ‘I have lost the sympathies of the former; the latter I may be hereafter. I have studied poisons, as you see; but I have also studied their antidotes. Have you kept the small phial by you, which you bought of me at Milan?’
‘It has never been out of my keeping until now,’ said Gaudin.
‘With that you could command twenty lives,’ said Exili; ‘and yet my remedies could so blunt and weaken its malignity that I would take it all at one draught. You shall learn more. Attend!’
From his box of carved wood he drew forth a series of test glasses, and half-filled them with water from the prison cruche. He next took a small flacon, and pinched a few atoms of the powder it contained into the first glass, varying the addition in each. Then dropping some colourless fluid into them, one after the other, a precipitate fell down in all, in clouds of the brightest tints, but each different.
‘See how completely these dull minerals do my bidding,’ he exclaimed. ‘To you the potion offers no trace by which its nature could be told; to me there is not an atom suspended in it, in its invisible but imperishable form, which cannot be reproduced before our eyes. Do you believe in me?’
‘I do—I do,’ returned Gaudin. ‘What price do you put upon the revelation of these mysteries?’
‘Nothing—beyond your attention and secrecy.’
‘And yet you love revenge,’ said Sainte-Croix, eyeing him with mistrust.
‘It is my life—my very blood,’ answered Exili. ‘And my revenge—the deepest I can have—is to teach you all I know.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Simply what I have said. You may call it good for evil if you choose, but still it is my revenge. You have time and leisure before you. Make the best of both.’
Again Exili gazed at Sainte-Croix with the expression of a vulture hovering about its prey, as Gaudin advanced to the table, and, with some curiosity, handled the apparatus which was spread about it. The physician opened a drawer in the box, which was apparently filled with sand. This, however, was but on a false top, which he drew away, and discovered several small bottles, of the size of one’s finger, which he took out.
‘These small messengers have worked great events in their time,’ he said. ‘This,’ taking up one, ‘was the terror of Rome, of Verona, and Milan. I could add much to the records of the Scaliger and Borromeo families, respecting its efficacy. This,’ he added, pointing to another, ‘is so potent that a century and a half has not impaired its power. It is the foam of a dying boar, slain by poison, collected as you see, and was the scourge with which the Borgias swept away their enemies.’
‘Why is one of the phials gilt?’ asked Gaudin.
‘Because its contents are the most precious,’ returned Exili. ‘Its power baffled even the attempts at imitation of Spara and Tofana. It was discovered by a monk in a convent at Palermo, and the secret has remained with me alone.’
‘It is clear as water,’ observed Gaudin, holding it against the light.
‘And like water, without taste or odour. It aided many whose hearts clung to one another,’ he continued, watching Sainte-Croix with his eagle eyes; ‘by clearing away the obstacles that impeded their union.’
Gaudin stretched out his hand, trembling with emotion, and clutched the phial, which he regarded intently, his dilated pupil, parted lips, and short, hurried breathing, showing the conflict of passions that was going on within him. Exili passed a few more of the phials in review before him. From one he let fall a few drops upon the hearth; it hissed and boiled, and the stone remained black where it had been; into another he dipped a piece of gold, and its yellow and polished surface was changed to a dull gray by the contact.
Then throwing out several of the allusions which he found had most deeply stung his companion the night before, he placed himself by the side of Gaudin, and proceeded to explain to him the rough composition of the different articles the box contained. And as he saw the intense attention, the almost gasping eagerness with which Sainte-Croix followed his instructions, he exclaimed almost unconsciously,
‘Mine—mine for ever!’