Volume 2 — Introductory material (continued 5)

Mario, bewildered and wounded, did not turn. It seemed as if he were asleep; the Moor alone saw that he was weeping; but the marquis rose and retorted with more animation than he usually displayed:

"I will wager, my dear neighbor, that your raillery is intended as a rebuke for our silence, so we will break it. You will forgive me, Guillaume; for, as surely as heaven is above us, I esteem you the best and most loyal man in the world, worthy in every respect to be our Lauriane's happy husband. But, with no desire to injure you in her eyes, I hereby declare that my suit preceded yours, and that I was encouraged by her and her father when I urged my suit."

"You, cousin?" exclaimed Guillaume in amazement.

"Yes, I," replied Bois-Doré, "as uncle, guardian and father by adoption of Mario de Bois-Doré here present."

"Here present? Nay," said Monsieur de Beuvre, still laughing, "for he is sleeping the sleep of innocence."

"As a child should do!" added Guillaume gently.

"I am not asleep!" cried Mario, rushing into his father's arms, and revealing his face all discolored with the sobs he had stifled in his hands.

"Hoity-toity!" said Monsieur de Beuvre, "he says that with his eyes half-closed with sleep!"

"Nay," rejoined the marquis, scrutinizing his child's face, "with his eyes inflamed with tears!"

Lauriane started; Mario's grief reminded her of the scene in the labyrinth, and brought before her mind once more the apprehensions she had forgotten. The child's tears pained her deeply, and Mercedes's glance disturbed her like a reproach.

Lucilio seemed to share her anxiety. Lauriane felt that she held in her hands for a long while, perhaps forever, the happiness of that family which had bestowed so much happiness on herself. She became altogether depressed, and, seeing that the marquis too was weeping, she gave the old man and the young man each an equally affectionate kiss, entreating them to be reasonable and not to borrow trouble concerning a future which she had not yet faced.

De Beuvre shrugged his shoulders.

"You are all very foolish," he said; "and as to you, Bois-Doré, I consider you thrice mad to have fed this poor schoolboy's brain on your absurd romances. You see the result of spoiling a child. He deems himself a man, and wishes to marry, forsooth! at an age when all he needs is the birch."

These harsh words put the finishing touch to Mario's despair; they made the marquis seriously angry.

"You seem to be in the mood for making unnecessarily cruel remarks, neighbor," he said. "The birch has no place in my method with a child who has displayed the courage of a gallant man. I am well aware that he should not marry for several years; but it seemed to me that I remembered that our Lauriane herself did not wish to marry for seven years from that day last year, when, in this very room, she gave me a pledge."

"Oh! let us not speak of that ghastly pledge!" cried Lauriane.

"Nay, let us speak of it and give thanks to God," replied the marquis, "since that dagger was the means of restoring to me my brother's child. Thus it was through your blessed hands, dear Lauriane, that that happiness entered my house; and, if I was mad to hope that you too would enter it, forgive me. The happier one is, the more greedy one is of happiness. As for you, friend De Beuvre, you surely will not deny your encouragement of my idea. Your letters prove it; you said: 'If Lauriane chooses to have patience and not go mad over the thought of marriage until Mario is nineteen or twenty years of age, I assure you that I shall be very glad.'"

"I do not deny it!" rejoined De Beuvre; "but I should be an idiot not to look at the question of my daughter's marriage in both aspects: the future and the present. Now, the future is less secure; who will assure me that we shall all be in this world six years hence? And then, when I wrote as you say, my dear neighbor, my position was not all that could be desired; and I tell you plainly that now it is much better than you imagine. So listen to me, Monsieur d'Ars, and you, marquis, and you above all, my dear daughter. I rely upon secrecy being maintained as to that which I am about to confide to none but persons of honor and discretion. I have doubled my fortune in this last campaign. That was my principal purpose, and I have accomplished it, while serving my cause at the risk of my life. I fought bad men to the best of my ability, and contributed, like others, to the honorable terms of peace which the king grants us. And so, Monsieur d'Ars, if you do me honor by asking for my daughter's hand, it is only by virtue of your name and your personal merit; for I am probably as rich as you.—And do you, friend Sylvain, when you manifest your friendship for me by the same request, understand that your treasure has no power to dazzle me; for I have my own treasure, three ships upon the sea, all full of silver, gold and precious wares, as says the ballad.

"And so, my dear and noble lords, you will give me time for reflection before replying to you; and my daughter, knowing now that it will not be difficult to find another husband for her, will take counsel with herself and form her own decision."

Thereupon there was nothing more to be done than to say good-night.

Guillaume, like a man of the world, treated Mario's pretensions lightly, but without acrimony or malice; for the child was excited enough to demand satisfaction, and Guillaume loved him too well to care to irritate him to that point. He took his leave with the not unreasonable hope of triumphing over a rival who did not come to his shoulder.

Mario slept poorly and had no appetite the next day. His father took him home, fearing that he would fall ill, and beginning to conclude that it is not well to play with the future of children in their presence. But this tardy repentance did not cure him. His abnormal, romantic brain, which had never ceased to be the brain of a child, could not understand the sound conception of time. Just as he believed that he was still young, so he imagined that Mario was ripe for the kind of love, cold and loquacious, chaste and affected, with which Astrée had permeated his mind.

Mario knew nothing of the subtle distinctions of words. He simply felt an intolerable heart-ache, the only deep-rooted and lasting torture.

He said: "I love Lauriane;" and if he had been asked with what kind of love, he would have answered in good faith that there were not two kinds. Pure as the angels, he had the true ideal of life, which is to love for the sake of loving.

As soon as De Beuvre and his daughter were left alone, he strongly urged her to decide in favor of Guillaume d'Ars.

"I did not wish to displease the marquis by declaring my preference," he said; "but his dream is rank madness, and I fancy that you do not care to wear the black cap six years longer, until this little brat has lost all his milk teeth."

"I did not enter into this engagement myself," replied Lauriane; "but I am afraid that you unconsciously entered into it for me with the marquis."

"I would snap my fingers at it, if I had," rejoined De Beuvre; "but that is not the case. So much the worse for the old fool and his cub if they take thoughtless words seriously; one will console himself with a wooden horse, the other with a new doublet; for they are equally childish."

"My dear father," said Lauriane, "it is no longer possible for me to jest about the marquis. He has been more than a father to me, something like a father, mother and brother all together, there has been so much protecting care, motherly affection and pleasant raillery in his manner toward me! And if Mario is only a child, he is not like other children. He is a girl in gentleness and delicacy; and he is a man in courage, for you know what he has done, and, furthermore, that he is very learned for his years.. He could teach both of us!"

"Faith, my girl," cried De Beuvre, puffing himself out, "you dote too much on the Beaux Messieurs de Bois-Doré, and it seems to me that I am no longer of much account in your eyes. You seem to think a vast deal of their grief and nothing at all of my consent, since you turn a deaf ear to me when I speak of Guillaume d'Ars."

"Guillaume d'Ars is a good friend," replied Lauriane, "but he is too old as a husband for me. He will soon be thirty years old, and he knows the world too well; he would soon begin to consider me silly or uncivilized. His suit would have flattered me perhaps before the peace; he would have deserved some credit for offering us the support of his name when we were persecuted. He deserves little to-day, when our rights are acknowledged and our tranquillity assured. He will deserve still less if he persists in his suit, now that he knows that we are richer than we were."

De Beuvre tried in vain to induce her to change her mind. He was exceedingly vexed with her; for, even if their ages had been the same, he would have much preferred Guillaume to Mario. A son-in-law devoted to physical exercise and to the heedless pursuit of pleasure suited him much better than a cultivated mind and an exceptional character.

Lauriane remonstrated, although she used after every sentence the formula: "Your will shall be mine."—But when she said it she relied upon the promise her father had made, since, her widowhood, never to force her inclination.

De Beuvre, who had become more covetous as soon as he became richer—this transformation takes place suddenly in those of mature years,—was sorely tempted to take her at her word and to say: "It is my will."—But he was not an unkind man, and his daughter was almost the only object of his affection.

He contented himself with harassing her and depressing her spirits by talking incessantly of those material interests to which she had believed him to be so indifferent when he made his last Huguenot crusade.

She did not give way, but, in order not to wound him, she agreed to show the greatest consideration in rejecting Guillaume's suit, and to receive his visits until further notice.

LXVI

The Beaux Messieurs did not return to La Motte for a week. Mario had a slight attack of fever. Lauriane was anxious and wept. Her father refused to take her to Briantes, saying that it was useless to keep illusions alive. There was a slight quarrel between them.

"You will make them think me most ungrateful," she said. "After all the care and attention I received from them, it is my duty to go to nurse Mario. You should at least go there every day. They will say that you have forgotten them, now that we no longer need them. Ah! why am I not a boy? I would ride there every hour in the day; I would be that poor child's friend and companion, and I could show my friendship for him without putting a noose around my neck, or incurring blame!"

At last she induced her father to take her to Briantes. She found Mario almost recovered from his grief and cured of his fever. He seemed to have determined once more to be a child. The marquis was a little hurt by Monsieur de Beuvre's conduct. But they could not remain at odds. The parents gradually entered into conversation as if nothing had happened; Lauriane began to laugh and romp with her innocent lover.

"My dear neighbor," said De Beuvre to Bois-Doré, "you must not be offended with me. Your plan for these children was pure dreaming. See on what excellent terms they are in those innocent games! That is a sign that in the game of love they would be always at war. Remember that a too young husband is not long content with a single wife, and that a deserted wife is jealous and shrewish. Moreover there is another obstacle between the children, which we have not considered: one is a Catholic, the other a Protestant."

"That is not an obstacle," said the marquis. "They can be married at the same church, reserving the right to return to the one they prefer."

"Oh! yes, that is all very well for you, you old unbeliever, who belong to both churches, that is to say, to neither; but for us——"

"For you, neighbor? I don't know to what communion you belong; but I believe implicitly in God, and you don't believe in Him at all."

"Perhaps! Who can say?" as Montaigne says; "but my daughter is a believer, and you cannot induce her to give way."

"She would not have to give way. Here, she was always free to pray as she chose. Mario and she used to say their evening prayer together, and they never thought of disputing. Besides, Mario would be all ready to do as I did."

"Yes, to say as you did in the days of the good king: 'Long live Sully and long live the pope!'"

"Lauriane would be no more obstinate in her Calvinism, be sure of that!"

Bois-Doré was mistaken. The more frankly De Beuvre avowed his scepticism, the more earnest was Lauriane in her disinterested attachment to the Reformation. De Beuvre, who knew it well and who was seeking an opportunity to create obstacles, raised the question during dinner. Lauriane stated her views in mild language, but with remarkable firmness.

The marquis had never discussed religion with her or before her. In fact, he never discussed it with anyone, and found the half-Gallic, half-pagan divinities of Astrée quite reconcilable with his vague notions concerning the Deity. He was distressed to see Lauriane take up the cudgels in that way, and he could not resist the temptation to say to her:

"Ah! you bad girl, you would not be so obstinate in your opinions if you loved us a little more!"

Lauriane had not detected her father's purpose. The marquis's reproach made it clear to her. It was the first reproach he had ever addressed to her, and she was deeply grieved. But the fear of irritating her father prevented her from answering as her heart prompted. She looked down at her plate and held back a tear that trembled on her eyelid.

Mario, who seemed entirely engrossed in preparing little Fleurial's dainty dinner, spied that tear, and said abruptly, in a grave, almost manly tone, in striking contrast to the puerile occupation of his hands:

"We are making Lauriane sad, father; let us say no more about it. She has a brain of her own, and she is right. For my part, if I were in her place I would do as she does, and I would not abandon my party in misfortune."

"Well said, my little man!" said De Beuvre, impressed by Mario's intelligent air.

"And it suggests to me," said the marquis, "that we are above such profitless discussions. My son already has the free spirit of noble minds, and he would never be the one to dispute Lauriane's opinions."

"Dispute them, no indeed," said Mario; "but——"

"But what?" queried Lauriane eagerly; "you do not mean that you would share them, Mario, even through affection for me?"

"Ah! if that were the case," exclaimed De Beuvre, once more struck by a sudden thought, "if the child, with his name and his wealth, should decide to espouse our cause heartily, I do not say that I would not advise Lauriane to wear her black cap some time longer."

"Then it is all right!" said the marquis; "when the time comes——"

"No, no, father!" interposed Mario with extraordinary vehemence; "that time will never come for me. I was baptized a Catholic by Abbé Anjorrant; I was brought up in the idea that I ought never to change; and, although he did not ask me to take any oath to it when he was dying, it would seem to me as if I should disobey him by leaving the church in which he put me. Lauriane has set me the example and I will follow it; we will remain as we are, and it will be all right. That will not prevent me from loving her, and if she doesn't love me, she will do wrong and be a bad girl."

"What do you say to that, my child?" queried De Beuvre; "doesn't it strike you that he is the sort of little husband who, when he saw you burning, would say: 'I feel deeply grieved, but I can do nothing, because it is the pope's will?'"

Lauriane and Mario disputed like the children they were; that is to say, their cheeks grew red as fire. Lauriane sulked; Mario did not move an inch, and finally exclaimed with much heat:

"You say, Lauriane, that you would degrade yourself if you should change. Then you would despise me if I changed, would you not?"

Lauriane realized the justness of the retort, and said no more; but she was piqued, like a woman with whom her lover makes conditions, and her glance said to Mario: "I thought that you loved me more than you do."

When she was riding home with her father, he did not fail to say to her:

"Well, my child, do you not see now that Mario, that charming youth, is a Papist of the old stock, like his own father, who served the Spaniard against us? And some day, ashamed of his old uncle's inanity, he will make war on us! Then what will you say, when you see your husband in one camp and your father in the other, shooting bullets at each other, or fighting hand to hand?"

"Really, father," said Lauriane, "you speak as if I had evinced a desire to remain a widow; but I have never determined upon that. I cannot see, however, why Monsieur d'Ars is not equally exposed to the evil fate which you predict. Is not he a Catholic and a devoted partizan of the royal power?"

"Monsieur d'Ars has no will of his own," replied De Beuvre, "and I will answer for it that we shall be able to bend him to all our purposes, on every occasion. More bigoted men than he have changed sides when the prospects of the Reformation seemed bright."

"If Monsieur d'Ars has no will," rejoined Lauriane, "so much the worse for him; he is no man; and yet he is a man in years!"

Lauriane was not mistaken. Guillaume was a weak character; but he was a handsome fellow, a pleasant neighbor, brave as a lion, and very generous to his friends. He was mild and easy-going with the peasantry, and allowed himself to be robbed without paying the slightest heed; but he followed the example of the nobles of his time: he allowed the peasantry to wallow in ignorance and poverty. It seemed to him a very fine thing that Lauriane's vassals were neat and well-fed, and very amusing that Bois-Doré's were stout; but when he was told that, at Saint-Denis-de-Touhet, the peasants died like flies during the epidemics; that at Chassignoles and Magny they did not know the taste of wine and meat—hardly that of bread; and that, in the Brenne country, they ate grass, while in other even more unhappy provinces they ate one another, he would say:

"What do you expect to do about it? Everybody cannot be happy!"

And he did not exert his mind beyond its powers to find a remedy. It had never occurred to him to live on his estate, as Bois-Doré did, and to share his well-being with all those who were dependent upon him. He passed as much time as he could at Bourges and Paris, and aspired to a rich marriage, in order that he might lead a more joyous life than ever, with a woman whom he would probably make perfectly happy on condition that she had no more brain and sensitiveness than he.

He was the type of his caste and his epoch, and no one thought of blaming him.

On the other hand, Lauriane was considered a fanatical heretic and Bois-Doré an old imbecile. Lauriane herself did not judge Guillaume so severely as we do, but she felt that he lacked pith and substance, and she experienced unconquerable ennui when, she was in his company. At such times the days passed at Briantes would come back to her like a delightful dream. Well might she have said: Et in Arcadia ego!

However, she had no idea of becoming Mario's wife. In her inmost thoughts she remained his older sister, proud of him and striving to emulate him; but she found no suitor to her liking, although many a one came forward as soon as her father was seen to be purchasing additional estates. By dint of making involuntary comparisons between her father, who was so practical and selfish, who criticized her so often in regard to her charities, and the excellent Monsieur Sylvain, who always lived himself and caused everybody about him to live as in a fairy tale, she conceived a dislike for cold reason, and became in secret the most dreamy and romantic maiden on earth, according to Monsieur de Beuvre and her other relations of both religions. In private, they laughed at her and at what they called her ridiculous love for a baby in arms.

By dint of hearing it said that she was in love with Mario, Lauriane, being persecuted to some extent in her own home, was driven, as it were in spite of herself, to look upon that love as possible. So it was that she admitted the idea of it when Mario was fifteen.

But she speedily rejected that idea again, for Mario at fifteen did not seem as yet to distinguish between love and friendship. He was respectful in his manner toward her, and at the same time familiar in his speech after the fashion of a well-bred brother. He did not say a word which could lead her to think that passion had revealed itself to him. Sometimes, it is true, he flushed deeply when Lauriane suddenly appeared in some place where he did not expect her, and he turned pale when some new project of marriage for her was broached in his presence. At least, Adamas so informed his master, and Mercedes confided the same observations to Lucilio. But it may be that they were mistaken. The boy was growing rapidly and reading a great deal; perhaps he had pains in his head and limbs.

We will say but one word concerning this period, when Mario was fifteen years of age and Lauriane nineteen. Their placid existence and tranquil relations were so happily monotonous that we can find no traces thereof in our documents concerning Briantes and La Motte-Seuilly.

We find there, however, mention of the marriage of Guillaume d'Ars to a wealthy heiress of Dauphiné. The nuptials were celebrated in Berry, and it does not appear that Lauriane's rejection of his suit had displeased honest Guillaume, for she was of the party, as were the Bois-Dorés.

A year later, in 1626, the lives of our characters are more clearly outlined. That was the epoch of the baptism of Monseigneur le Duc d'Enghien—afterward the great Condé—which hastened the course of events for them.

This baptism took place at Bourges on the 5th of May. The young prince was then about five years of age. The splendid festivities in connection with the ceremony attracted all the nobility and all the bourgeoisie of the province.

The Marquis de Bois-Doré, who had at last secured the salutary indifference, if not the dangerous favor of Condé and the Jesuit faction, yielded to the wishes of Mario, who was curious to see a little of the world, and to his own inclinations, which led him to exhibit his heir under more favorable circumstances than in 1622, when he was in a very painful and disquieting situation.

LXVII

When his mind was once made up, Bois-Doré, who could do nothing by halves, employed Adamas's genius and industry for a whole month in superintending the preparation of the splendid costumes and sumptuous equipages which he proposed to exhibit before the court and the city.

The supply of horses and gorgeous accoutrements was replenished; they made investigations concerning the new styles. They exerted themselves to eclipse all rivals. The old nobleman, still erect on his legs and straight of back, still becurled and anointed, still in good health and young in fancy, chose to be dressed in the same fabrics cut in the same style as his grandson's. So Mario was called at court, because the prince, seeking to jest pleasantly with Bois-Doré, and forgetting the degree of kinship between the Beaux Messieurs, asked him if it was from economy that he dressed his grandson in the clippings of his own clothes. Mario understood the great vassal's contempt, and felt more of a royalist than ever.

Lauriane also had expressed a wish to see a very great fête for the first time in her life. As her father had taken no part in the new uprising of the Huguenots, and, moreover, as a new treaty of peace had been signed within three months, they could appear at Bourges without risk. It was agreed that they should all go together.

Magnificent banquets, banners with Latin distichs and anagrams in honor of the little prince, regiments of children, in brave array and exceedingly well drilled, for his escort, the singing of motets, speeches by the magistrates, presentation of the keys of the city, concerts, dances, a play given by the Jesuit college, angels descending from triumphal arches and presenting rich gifts to the young duke—that is to say, to monsieur his father, who would not have been content with sweetmeats,—manœuvres by the militia, ceremonial functions and merry-makings—all this lasted five days.

They saw many great personages there.

The comely and famous Montmorency—whom Richelieu afterward sent to the scaffold—and the Dowager Princesse de Condé—called the poisoner—represented the godfather and godmother, who were no others than the King and Queen of France. Monseigneur le Duc received baptism in the chrémeau—a little cap trimmed with precious stones—and a long dress of cloth of silver. The Prince de Condé wore a gray coat all stamped with gold and silver.

The Beaux Messieurs de Bois-Doré were invited by Monsieur Biet to take their places on the platform reserved for the higher nobility, not because they were among the best friends of the little court, but because of their rich attire, which did honor to the spectacle.

Mario's beauty attracted even more notice than his costume.

Lauriane heard the ladies—notably the little prince's youthful and lovely mother—call attention to the beautiful boy's charms. She felt disturbed for the first time, as if she were jealous of the glances and smiles of which he was the recipient.

Mario paid no heed to them. He looked at the princely child with curiosity. He was ugly and of sickly aspect; but there was much intelligence in his eyes and resolution in his gestures.

On the 6th of May, as our friends were preparing to depart, De Beuvre led the marquis aside.

They had been sojourning at the house of a friend.

"Look you," said he, "we must have done with this, and come to some decision."

"Have a little patience. The horses will soon be ready," replied Bois-Doré, thinking that he was in haste to start for home.

"You do not understand me, neighbor; I say that we must make up our minds to marry our children, since that is their idea and our own. I must tell you that I am about to make another journey. I came here only to make arrangements with certain people who assure me of excellent opportunities in England, and if I must entrust my Lauriane to you once more, it will be quite as well that she should be married to your heir. It is an excellent chance for him; for my vessels are in a fair way to multiply, so I am told, and the peace will simply double the opportunities of Anglo-Protestant piracy. So that my daughter might have aspired to better men than you, as to name and wealth, but not as to heart; and as the trouble of taking care of her will interfere with my taking proper care of my business, I desire, on resuming my freedom of action, to place my Lauriane in good hands. So say yes and let us hasten matters."

The marquis was staggered by this proposition, which. Monsieur de Beuvre had seemed little inclined to receive favorably during the past four years, if it had been made to him. But it did not require much reflection to convince him of the impropriety of this plan, and of Lauriane's father's selfish heedlessness. Bois-Doré was often heedless himself, often injudicious; but he was a father in the truest sense, and Mario in love and married at sixteen seemed to him to be in a more perilous situation than Mario romantically and conjugally inclined at eleven.

"You cannot mean it," he replied; "let our children be betrothed, if you please; but as to marrying them, it is altogether too soon."

"That is what I meant," said De Beuvre. "Let them be betrothed, and do you take my daughter with you once more. You can watch over the lovers, and in two or three years I will return for the wedding."

Bois-Doré was romantic enough to yield; and yet he hesitated. He had forgotten all about love, about its tempests at all events. But a glance from Adamas, who pretended to be arranging the luggage, and who was listening intently with both ears, reminded him of the flushes and pallors he had noticed on Mario's face, which might be the manifestation of suffering carefully concealed.

"No, no," he said. "I will not put my child beside the fire; I will not expose him to the risk of burning up or disobeying the laws of honor. Abide in your château, neighbor, and let us be prudent. You are rich enough. Let us exchange oaths, without the knowledge of our children. Why deprive either of them of sleep? Three years hence we will make them happy without perplexity or self-reproach."

De Beuvre realized that ambition and greed had led him to make an absurd suggestion. But he had become obstinate and choleric. He lost his temper, refused to give his word, and decided to take his daughter to Poitou, to her kinswoman the Duchesse de la Trémouille.

Mario nearly swooned when, as they were about entering the carriage, he was informed that Lauriane would not return with them and was going away for an indefinite period. His father had tried to lighten the blow; but De Beuvre insisted upon dealing it, either to test the boy's sentiments, or to have his revenge for the lesson in prudence he had received with a bad grace from the least prudent of men. Lauriane, who knew nothing as yet—her father having told her simply that they were to remain a few days longer at Bourges,—rushed downstairs when she heard the marquis's pained exclamation at the sight of Mario pale and swooning. But Mario soon recovered, declared that he had had an attack of cramp, and jumped into the great carriage with his eyes closed. He did not wish to see Lauriane, whose tranquillity, down to that moment, wounded him to the lowest depths of his heart. He supposed that she knew everything, and had decided, without regret, to part from him forever.

The marquis longed to remain, to have an explanation with De Beuvre. He had the courage to refrain, when he saw how brave Mario was: whatever the result, the young man had reached an age when separation for a few years had become necessary.

Mario, expansive as he was on all other subjects, opened his heart to no one, and affected the most perfect serenity during the journey.

At Briantes the marquis questioned him adroitly, Mercedes imprudently. He held his ground, saying that he loved Lauriane much, but that his grief would affect neither his reason nor his work.

He kept his word. His health suffered a little; but he assented to all the measures that he was urged to adopt in that regard, and he soon recovered.

"I hope," the marquis would say sometimes to Adamas, "that he will not be too sentimental, and will forget that wicked girl who does not love him."

"For my part," said the sage Adamas, "I hope that she loves him more than she seems to do; for if our Mario should lose the hope that keeps him alive, we should have cause for anxiety!"

In 1627, that is to say the next year, the château of Briantes was threatened anew with disaster. It was proposed to raze its stout walls, its little bastions and its fortified towers.

Richelieu, being definitely established in supreme authority, had decreed and ordered the destruction of the fortifications of cities and citadels throughout the kingdom. This excellent measure, construed most broadly, extended to "all fortifications constructed within thirty years, about the houses and châteaux of private individuals, without the express permission of the king."

Briantes was not in that category; its defences dated from feudal days and were useless against cannon. The sheriffs and magistrates of La Châtre, displeased at having to shave themselves, as Adamas the ex-barber said, would have been glad to shave all the noble lords, their neighbors. But Bois-Doré, feeling the necessity of protection against bands of adventurers and highwaymen, maintained his rights and forced them to be respected. He was too much beloved by his vassals to fear that they would act like those of many other nobles, who voluntarily posed as executors of the great cardinal's orders.

The measure was very popular and at the same time very sweeping. It was hunting down the spirit of the League in its feudal lairs. But the orders were carried out only in Protestant neighborhoods, and that bold decree remained upon paper, like many of Richelieu's bold conceptions.

Berry escaped by showing its claws, as always. Monsieur le Prince did not allow a stone to be removed from his fortress of Montrond; the châteaux of the great and petty nobility remained standing, and the great tower of Bourges did not fall until the reign of Louis XIV.

Bois-Doré had hardly recovered from this excitement when he was assailed by another, more serious yet less alarming.

"Monsieur," said Adamas to him one evening, "I must needs regale you with a story which Monsieur d'Urfé would have put in the form of a romance, for it is most pleasant."

"Let us have your story, my friend!" said the marquis, pulling his lace cap over his bald skull.

"It relates, monsieur to your virtuous druid and the fair Moor."

"Adamas, you are becoming a joker and a satirist, my good man. No calumny, I beg you, concerning my excellent friend and the chaste Mercedes!"

"Why, monsieur, where would be the harm if those two worthy persons should be united by the bonds of matrimony? Do you know, monsieur, that this morning, as I was arranging the learned man's library—he will allow nobody but me to touch his books, and, in truth, it requires a man with some little learning—I saw the Moor stealthily kiss a bouquet of roses which she places on his table every morning while he is breakfasting with you. Then she suddenly saw me, and, turning as pale as the scarf she wears on her head, she fled as if she had committed some great crime. I have suspected something, monsieur, for a long time, a very long time. All this friendship, all these little attentions of hers—I was sure that they would lead them both to love."

"To be sure," said the marquis. "But go on, Adamas!"

"Well, monsieur, the discovery made me laugh loud and long, not in mockery, but with satisfaction, for one is always pleased to guess or surprise a secret, and when you are pleased, you laugh. And so Master Jovelin, returning to his room, asked me mildly, with his eyes, why I was laughing so heartily, and I told him, innocently enough, to make him laugh too—and also, I confess, to see how he would take it."

"And how did he take it?"

"His face shone like a sunbeam, exactly like a pretty girl's; and one cannot but believe that happiness remakes a man; for his face, with its great mouth and great black moustache, lighted up like a star, and he seemed to me as beautiful as he is sometimes when he is playing his sweet-toned bagpipe."

"Very good, Adamas, you are training yourself to be a fine speaker. And then?"

"Then I went out, or rather I pretended to go out; and, on looking back through the partly open door, I saw dear Lucilio take up the flowers, kiss them passionately, and put them in his doublet, flowers, thorns and all, as if he took pleasure in being pricked and feeling the soft petals at the same time. And he paced the floor, pressing that love-token to his breast with both hands."

"Better and better, Adamas! What next?"

"Then the Moor entered by another door and said to him:

"'Is it time to call Mario for his lesson?'"

"What was his reply?"

"He said no with his eyes and his head; so that I could see that he wished to detain her. She started to go away, thinking that he was busy with some of his monkey-tricks; for she acts with him, monsieur, like a servant who has no hope of pleasing her master. But he knocked on the table to recall her. She went back. They looked at each other; not long, for she soon lowered her lovely black eyes and said to him in Arabic, at least I judged so from her manner:

"What is your wish, master?"

He pointed to the goblet in which she had placed the roses; and she, seeing that they were not there, said:

"'It must be that sly creature Adamas who took them away, for I never forget them.'"

"She said that?"

"Yes, monsieur, in Arabic. I could guess at every word! Then she ran to fetch more flowers, and he followed her to the door like a man fighting against himself. He went back to his table, put his head in his hands, and, my word for it, monsieur, he found the noblest sentiments imaginable in his heart to reconcile his love with his virtue."

"But why should he fight so against it?" cried the marquis; "does he not know that I should be overjoyed to have him marry that beautiful, good woman? Go, bring him to me, Adamas; he retires late and will still be at work. Mario is asleep, and this is the most propitious moment for discussing so delicate a subject."

LXVIII

The good marquis had no difficulty in confessing Lucilio.

He frankly admitted that he had adored the Moor for a long while and that for some time he had fancied that his love was returned. But he summed up the situation with his concise pen.

In the first place he was afraid of attracting persecution which he had thus far escaped in France only by a miracle. Then, when it had seemed to him beyond question that Richelieu, despite all his warfare against the Reformed religion, had adopted as an inflexible policy the maintenance of the Edict of Nantes in favor of liberty of conscience in every form, he had decided to await Mario's marriage to Lauriane or to some other woman who had won his heart. Whatever his dear pupil's frame of mind might be, whatever hope or regret, placid expectation or secret excitement, he did not choose to set before him the selfish and perilous spectacle of a marriage for love.

The marquis approved his friend's generous forethought; but he found an expedient.

"My excellent friend," he said to him, "the Moor is close upon thirty, and you have passed your fortieth year. You are still young enough to attract each other, and your ages are well balanced; but, without offence, you are no longer boy and girl, to leave blank pages in the book of your felicity! Make the most of the happy years that still remain. Marry. I will travel with Mario for a few months, and while we are absent I will tell him that I alone conceived the idea of a marriage of reason between Mercedes and you. I will invent some pretext to explain why you could not wait until our return, and when he sees you again, his mind will be accustomed to the new condition of affairs. Marriage always has a sobering effect, and then I trust to you to conceal the joys of the honeymoon behind the thick clouds of prudence and self-restraint."

So it was that the marquis took Mario to Paris. He showed him the king and his court, but at a distance; for society had changed greatly in the fifteen years that worthy Sylvain had been living on his estates. The friends of his youth were dead, or had withdrawn, as he had, from the hurly-burly of the new society. The few great personages still on the stage with whom he had formerly had some acquaintance, hardly remembered him, and, except for his antiquated attire, would not have recognized him.

Mario's attractive and modest manners were observed however: the Beaux Messieurs were warmly welcomed in some houses of distinction, but no one suggested taking them any higher; and indeed neither of them desired very earnestly to approach the pale sun of Louis XIII.

Mario was terribly disappointed when he saw the fainthearted son of Henri IV. ride by, and the marquis had discovered in that face no encouragement to pursue his design of obtaining the royal confirmation of his title of marquis.

New edicts appeared every day against the usurpation of titles; edicts little respected, for the nobles, old and new, continued to assume names of domains of very doubtful authenticity. Their obscurity protected them. Bois-Doré was forced to recognize that he had no better refuge than that.

Furthermore, he could not avoid the discovery that in Paris nobody was a beau monsieur who was not of the court. To be sure, in their daily drives and on Place Royale, more or less people turned to gaze at the strange contrast between his painted face and Mario's deliciously fresh complexion; and for some time the goodman, thinking that he was recognized, smiled at the passers-by, and put his hand to his hat, ready to welcome overtures which no one thought of making. That gave him an air of dazed hesitancy and vulgar affability which aroused laughter. The ladies who sat under the young trees in the Cours-la-Reine, or walked back and forth fan in hand, said to one another:

"Who is that tall old fool, pray?"

And if those ladies were of the society in which Bois-Doré had reappeared, or bourgeoises of the quarter where he lodged, sometimes there would be one who would reply:

"He is a nobleman from the provinces, who prides himself on having been a friend of the late king."

"Some Gascon, I suppose? They all saved France! Or some Béarnais? They were all foster-brothers of our dear Henri!"

"No, an old ass from Berry or Champagne. There are Gascons everywhere."

So it was that honest Sylvain was quite effaced in that forgetful, ostentatious crowd, strive as he would to appear to advantage there. He said to himself with some vexation that it was better to be first in one's village than last at court. It is certain however that, with a little impudence and scheming, he could have pushed Mario ahead as so many others were pushed; but he dreaded some affront on the score of his problematical marquisate.

He resigned himself therefore to play the part of the provincial boor, and would have suffered terribly from ennui, had not Mario, who was always studious and intelligently artistic in his tastes, taken him to see the monuments of art and science which were the principal attractions of the capital of the kingdom in his eyes.

The pleasure and profit which the young man derived from them consoled the old man in some measure for what he called in his secret thoughts an abortive journey.

He did not tell Mario of all his disappointments. He still cherished the hope of discovering his mother's family and acquiring thereby a fine Spanish title, an inheritance of some sort. He had written many times to Spain to make inquiries and to furnish information concerning Mario, in case the said family should display any interest. He had never received any but vague, perhaps evasive replies.

At Paris he determined to go in person to the Embassy. He was received there by a sort of private secretary, who informed him, in substance, that, in compliance with his frequent requests they had at last elucidated a mysterious affair. The young woman who had eloped and disappeared did in fact belong to the noble family of Merida, and Mario was the issue of a secret marriage, the validity of which might be contested.

The young woman had left no claim to any fortune, and her family were by no means anxious to recognize a young man reared by an old heretic, only partially purged of his heresy.

The marquis, deeply incensed, determined to stop there and to repay the contempt of those haughty Spaniards with oblivion. It had cost his pride dearly enough to besiege the doors of an embassy which he, as a former Protestant and a good Frenchman, bitterly detested.

And yet he was sad, and confided his distress to his inseparable Adamas.

"Of a surety," he said to him, "the pleasantest and most honorable life is that of the provincial nobility. But, while it is suited to those who have fought and suffered, it may become burdensome and even shameful in the case of a young heart like Mario's. Have I reared him with the greatest care, have we made of him, thanks to his precocious talents, an accomplished gentleman, fit for any station, only to bury him in a country manor, on the pretext that he has no need to make his fortune, and that he is tender-hearted and humane? Should he not have a little taste of war and adventure, and by some brilliant deed win that marquisate which the great cardinal's ideas of universal levelling may take from him any day? I know that the child is very young, and that we have lost no time as yet; but his inclinations seem to tend in the direction of study, and I ransack my wits to determine how he will find a way to distinguish himself in that direction."

"Monsieur," replied Adamas, "if you think that your son will be more of a cripple than you in battle, you hardly know him."

"I do not know my son?"

"Well, no, monsieur, you do not know him: he is a mysterious creature who loves you so dearly that he never dares to have an idea to perplex you or a trouble for you to share. But I know what is in the bag: Mario dreams of war as much as of love, and the time is near at hand when, if you do not divine his ambition, you will have him either sick or melancholy on your hands."

"God forbid!" cried the marquis. "I will question him on this subject to-morrow!"

In such a matter, when a man says to-morrow, it means that he is inclined to shirk, and the marquis did in fact shirk. Paternal weakness fought a great battle with paternal pride, and won the day. Mario was not yet strong enough to endure the fatigues of war; and, furthermore, the war with England or Spain to which all indications pointed, seemed to be postponed for a brief space by Richelieu's mighty efforts to create a French navy. There was no need of haste; there was plenty of time; the opportunity would come soon enough!

So they returned to Briantes late in the autumn and found Lucilio married to Mercedes.

Mario, on being informed of this event in Paris, manifested more satisfaction than surprise. He had felt for a long while, in the burning air which his Moor involuntarily breathed upon him, as well as in Lucilio's gentle melancholy and in the adroit and affectionate language of his bagpipes, the waves of passion which sometimes set his own blood on fire. His heart felt as if it were caught in a vise at the thought of happy love; but he had extraordinary control over himself. As his father lived only in his life, he had at an early age accustomed himself to conceal his emotions from him; and, when Adamas reproved him for keeping his thoughts too much to himself, he would reply:

"My father is old; he is wrapped up in me as a mother is in her child. It is my duty not to shorten his days by causing him anxiety, and heaven has entrusted to me the mission of making him live a long while."

Lauriane was living in Poitou, and they rarely heard from her. She wrote in an affectionate and respectful tone to the marquis, but she hardly mentioned Mario's name, as if she dreaded to remind him of herself.

By way of compensation she wrote in the most affectionate terms of the Moor, Lucilio, and the faithful retainers of the family. It seemed that her affection, held in check with those who had the first claim upon it, instinctively took its revenge with the others. She announced several times, with a sort of affectation, that there were divers projects of marriage under consideration, and that she would soon inform them of her decision, desiring, she said, to make a choice that would be agreeable to the marquis, whom she looked upon as a second father.

The strange feature of these alleged marriage projects was that she recurred to them year after year, as if they were constantly abandoned and revived, without imparting anything of interest to her friends as to her choice; as if her real purpose were to say to them: "I do not marry because I am not so inclined; but do not for one moment think that I am reserving myself for you."

Such was, in fact, her purpose in writing these letters, and her state of mind may be thus described:

When he took her away from Berry, intending soon to part from her, Monsieur de Beuvre had inflicted a cruel wound upon her heart by inventing a fable to the effect that the marquis and his heir, when consulted by him at Bourges, had met his advances very coldly. Mario had shown himself a very fervent Catholic on that occasion; he had sworn that he would never enter into a mixed marriage.

Lauriane should have distrusted a father in whom the thirst for gold had penetrated to the very entrails, and who, being in haste to go away, was determined at any price to persuade her to marry promptly. She refused to marry in anger and without due consideration; but she promised to reflect upon it, and in her heart proudly abandoned the ungrateful Mario. She had loved him at Bourges—really loved him for the first time after years of placid friendship. And that first love of her life, almost before it was admitted, hardly revealed to herself, she had had to blush for in very shame, and to crush it without a sign of weakening!

She had some suspicions; but, while her father did not swear that he exaggerated nothing, he could at least give her his word of honor that he had proposed their betrothal to the marquis, and that he had evaded the proposal on the pretext that Mario was still too young to have the idea of love suggested to him. Lauriane was too pure to realize the risks she might have run by returning to Briantes. She remembered that, at the moment of parting from her, Mario, who was said to be ill, had shrugged his shoulders and turned his head away, saying:

"You make too much ado about a little cramp. I have no pain now."

So she said again to her father what she had said to him with all sincerity some time before, that she had never looked upon that marriage as a possibility; and she encouraged him to go away, as he desired to do, promising him that she would marry any suitable aspirant who did not inspire aversion in her.

But such an aspirant did not appear. All those whom Madame de la Trémouille presented to her failed to please her. She found in them the positivism which had invaded her father like a passion, but she found it in the form of cold and somewhat cynical selfishness. The halcyon days of the Reformation were passing away, like the social structure of the preceding century. The Reformed religion was heroic only under cruel persecution, and Richelieu, crushing the remains of the party by the inevitable logic of events, bore no resemblance to a persecutor. France said to the Protestants by his mouth: "Confine yourselves to religious liberty; let politics alone. Turn your faces with us against the enemies without the realm!"—The Protestants proposed to become a republic; they became a Vendée.

Save the French Puritans—that redoubtable, heroic, indomitable party, which stood at bay and immolated itself at La Rochelle two years later—all French Protestants were at this time inclined to adhere to the principle of French unity; but many had determined not to give in their adhesion until after a victory which should secure favorable and lasting terms for their party.

Now, among those who reasoned well, but who were about to be led on to reason ill and to choose between a foreign alliance and final extermination, the nobility were generally speaking less pure in their purposes than the bourgeoisie and the common people. They made reservations in their own interest; those most highly placed insisted upon being purchased, and translated their craving for religious liberty into a craving for offices and money.

Lauriane was intensely indignant at these numerous defections which were announced every day, or which awaited their turn in shameful anticipation. She had formed a more chivalrous idea of the honor of the party. She was forced now to recognize the fact that her father, whose greed had so humiliated her, was simply doing a little more tardily what most men of his age had done all their lives, and what most young men were eager to do in their turn. Still, Monsieur de Beuvre was one of the best; for he had no idea of betraying his flag. He simply made haste to make his bargain before the flag was dragged in the dust.

It was possible that Lauriane might fall in with an exception to the general rule. There were exceptions, for she herself was one. She did not fall in with them, perhaps because she was so pensive and distraught that she did not know how to look for them.

Youth and beauty are justifiably proud. They wait to be discovered and reveal naught themselves, because they dread to have the appearance of offering themselves.

LXIX

Although we have hitherto done our utmost to follow our characters step by step through the ordinary life of the stay-at-home nobility, which our authorities enabled us to study with some care, we are forced now to pass over a brief interval of time, and to seek the Beaux Messieurs de Bois-Doré far from their peaceful domain.

It was in 1629, the first day of March, I believe. Mont Genèvre, covered with snow, presented a scene of extraordinary animation upon both slopes, and even to the very opening of the ravine called the Pas de Suse.

The French army was marching upon the Duc de Savoie, that is to say upon Spain and Austria, his trusty allies.

The king and the cardinal climbed the mountain in spite of the intense cold. The cannon were dragged up through the snow. It was one of those scenes of grandeur which the French soldier has always acted so magnificently amid the sublime grandeur of the Alps, under Napoléon as under Richelieu, and under Richelieu as under Louis XII., without diverting himself with attempts to dissolve the rocks, as Hannibal's genius is said to have done, and without other artifice than intrepid determination, ardor and cheerfulness.

In one of the paths trodden through the snow parallel with the road, two horsemen happened to be ascending side by side the precipitous slope of the mountain on the French side. One was a young man of some nineteen years, of robust frame and with a grace of movement most pleasant to behold under the becoming warlike costume of the age. So far as colors were concerned, the young man was dressed in accordance with his own fancy. His equipment and his weapons, as well as his isolation, indicated a gentleman making the campaign as a volunteer.

Mario de Bois-Doré—the reader will assume that it is he whom I am describing—was the comeliest cavalier in the whole army. The development of his youthful strength had in no wise diminished the wonderful charm of his noble and intelligent face. His expression was like an angel's in purity; but the sprouting beard reminded one that this youth with the divine glance was but a simple mortal; and that young moustache faintly outlined the curve of a smile, somewhat indifferent, perhaps, but with a cordial kindliness showing through its melancholy.

Magnificent brown hair, of a soft shade and curling naturally, framed the face to the neck, and fell in a heavy braid—the cadenette was more in vogue than ever—below the shoulder. The face wore a delicate flush, but was pale rather than ruddy. The exquisite distinction of manners and dress was the principal characteristic of that figure, which did not attract the glance, but from which the glance found it difficult to detach itself when it had rested upon it.

Such was the impression of the horseman whom chance had brought side by side with Mario.

The last-mentioned horseman was about forty years of age; he was thin and sallow, with regular features, very mobile lips, a piercing eye, and an expression of cunning tempered by a disposition to serious reflection. He was dressed in rather a problematical costume, all in black, and in a short cassock, like a priest on a journey, but armed and booted like a soldier.

His bony, active horse easily kept pace with his companion's ardent and impetuous steed.

The two horsemen had saluted each other without speaking, and Mario had slackened his pace to allow the other, as his senior, to ride first. The traveller seemed to appreciate that scrupulous courtesy, and declined to pass the younger man.

"In truth, monsieur," said Mario, "our horses seem to keep step, which fact proves the good-will of both, for I have difficulty in keeping mine to a pace which does not leave all the others behind, and I have had to give my companions a long start, in order not to reach the top of the pass before them."

"That which is a fault in your noble beast is a good quality in mine," replied the stranger. "As I almost always travel alone, I go my way without giving anyone reason to blame me for fatiguing my horse. But may I ask you, monsieur, where I have had the honor of seeing you? Your amiable face is not altogether strange to me."

Mario looked closely at him and said:

"The last time that I had the honor of seeing you was at Bourges, four years since, at the baptism of Monseigneur le Duc d'Enghien."

"Then you are really the young Comte de Bois-Doré?"

"Yes, Monsieur l'Abbé Poulain," replied Mario, putting his hand once more to his plumed hat.

"I am overjoyed to find you as you are, monsieur le comte," rejoined the rector of Briantes; "you have grown in stature, in attractiveness, and in merit as well, I can see by your manners. But do not call me abbé; for I am not one as yet, alas! and it is possible that I may never be."

"I know that Monsieur le Prince has always refused to assent to your appointment; but I thought——"

"That I had found something better than the Abbey of Varennes? Yes and no. While awaiting the opportunity to assume some title, I succeeded in leaving Berry, and chance attached me to the fortunes of the cardinal, in the service of Père Joseph, to whom I am devoted body and soul. I can say to you, between ourselves, that I am one of his messengers; and that is why I have a good horse."

"I congratulate you, monsieur. Père Joseph's service can call for no work that a patriotic Frenchman may not do, and the cardinal's fortune is the destiny of France."

"Do you really mean what you say, Monsieur Mario?" queried the priest with an incredulous smile.

"Yes, monsieur, on my honor!" the young man replied, with an accent of sincerity which overcame the diplomatic priest's suspicions. "I do not wish Monsieur le Cardinal to know that he has two cordial admirers in my father and myself; but do us the honor to believe that we are loyal enough to desire to serve the cause of the great minister and of the fair kingdom of France, with our hearts and bodies, as well as you, if we can."

"I believe in you implicitly," replied Monsieur Poulain, "but I have less faith in monsieur your father! For example, he did not send you to the siege of La Rochelle last year. You were still very young, I know; but younger men than you were there, and you must have chafed at having to miss the glorious rendezvous of all the young nobility of France."

"Monsieur Poulain," rejoined Mario, with some severity, "I thought that you were bound to my father by the ties of gratitude. All that he was able to do for you he did, and if the Abbey of Varennes has been secularized for the benefit of Monsieur le Prince, you can not blame my father, who was largely defrauded in that affair."

"Oh! I do not doubt it!" exclaimed Monsieur Poulain; "give me the Prince de Condé of all men to tangle up accounts! and I blame him and him alone. As for your father, monsieur le comte, let me tell you that I still love and esteem him infinitely. Far from having any thought of injuring him, I would give my life to know that he had devoted himself without mental reservation, to the Catholic cause."

"My father does not need to devote himself to the cause of his country, monsieur! I mean to say that he warmly embraces the cardinal's cause against all the enemies of France."

"Even against the Huguenots?"

"The Huguenots are no more, monsieur! Let us leave the dead in peace!"

Monsieur Poulain was impressed anew with the dignified expression of that sweet face. He felt that he was not dealing with an ambitious and frivolous youth, like others with whom he was familiar.

"You are right, monsieur," he said. "Peace to the ashes of the men of La Rochelle, and may God hear you, to the end that they may not come to life again at Montauban and elsewhere. Since your father has recovered so fully from his religious indifference, let us hope that he will, if need be, permit you to march against the rebels in the South."

"My father always has permitted me to follow my own inclination; but understand, monsieur, that it will never lead me to march against Protestants, unless I see that the monarchy is in great danger. Never will I draw the sword against Frenchmen, from ambition or vainglory; never can I forget that that cause, once glorious, now brought low, placed Henri IV. on the throne. You were reared in the spirit of the League, Monsieur Poulain, and now you are fighting against it with all your strength. You have changed from the wrong to the right, from the false to the true; I have lived and I shall die in the path upon which my feet were placed: loyalty to my country, detestation of intrigues with the foreigner. I am entitled to less credit than you, having never had occasion to change my views; but I promise you that I will do my best, and that while respecting freedom of conscience in others, I will fall with all my strength upon the allies of Monsieur de Savoie."

"You forget that they are the allies of the Reformed religion to-day."

"Say of Monsieur de Rohan! Thereby Monsieur de Rohan is consummating the ruin of his party; and that is why I said to you: Peace to the dead!"

"Well, well!" said Père Joseph's trusted agent, "I see that, like the excellent marquis, you have a romantic mind, and that you will be guided, according to his example, by sentiment. May I, without indiscretion, inquire for the health of monsieur your father?"

"You will soon see him in person, monsieur. He will be glad to see you. He is riding ahead, and we shall overtake him within a quarter of an hour."

"What do you say? Monsieur de Bois-Doré, at seventy-five or eighty years of age——"

"Takes the field against the enemies and assassins of Henri IV.! Does that surprise you, Monsieur Poulain?"

"No, my child," replied the ex-Leaguer, now become, by the force of events, a continuator and admirer of the policy of the Béarnais; "but it seems to me that he is a little late in setting about it!"

"What would you have, monsieur? he did not choose to take the field all alone; he waited for the King of France to set the example."

"Faith," said Monsieur Poulain with a smile, "you have an answer for everything! I long to salute the marquis's noble old age! But it is impossible to trot here. Pray tell me of a man to whom I owe my life: Master Lucilio Giovellino, otherwise called Jovelin, the great bag-piper."

"He is happy, thank heaven! He has married my dearest friend, and they are doing us the favor to take charge of our house and our property during our absence."

"Your dearest friend? Do you refer to Mercedes, the beautiful Moor? I should have supposed that you preferred to her—with feelings of a different nature, it is true—a younger and even lovelier friend."

"Do you mean Madame de Beuvre?" rejoined Mario, with a frankness in striking contrast to Monsieur Poulain's insinuating curiosity. "I can readily answer you as I would answer the whole world. She is, in very truth, a person whom I loved fervently in my childhood, and whom I shall respect all my life; but her affection for me is very placid, and you may question me concerning her without reserve."

"Is she not married yet?"

"I have no idea, monsieur. As we have been travelling for several months, we have little news of our friends at a distance."

Monsieur Poulain scrutinized Mario by stealth. He had the tranquillity of a broken heart, but not the prostration of a hopeless soul.

"Do you not know," said the rector, "that Monsieur de Beuvre was with the English fleet before La Rochelle?"

"I know that he was killed there, and that Lauriane has no one but herself to depend upon."

"She was in Poitou when the Duc de Trémouille, after the desertion of the English, went to the king's camp to abjure his heresy."

"She did not accompany him there!" said Mario, hastily. "She asked permission to share the captivity of the heroic Duchesse de Rohan, who refused to submit; and, having failed to obtain that favor, she was preparing to return to Berry when we left our province."

"I knew all that," said Monsieur Poulain, who seemed, in truth, to be well posted upon all subjects.

"If you did not know it," Mario replied, "I should not regret having told you. Surely you would not furnish the Prince de Condé with a new pretext for confiscating Madame de Beuvre's property?"

"No, indeed!" replied the rector laughing outright, with a sort of cordiality. "You reason well, and a man may, without great risk, be as frank as you are, when he knows his companions. But have entire confidence in me, for I have broken entirely with the Jesuits, at my risk and peril!"

Monsieur Poulain spoke the truth.

A few moments later he was in the Marquis de Bois-Doré's presence, and the interview was very civil—almost friendly—on both sides.

LXX

The marquis did not need to convoke the ban and arrière-ban in order to raise a small troop of volunteers. His best men, sure of being well rewarded, had followed him enthusiastically.

The intrepid Aristandre took a keen personal delight in the idea of thrashing messieurs the Spaniards, whom he detested in memory of Sancho; the faithful Adamas rode a gentle palfrey in the rear-guard, and carried in his saddle-bags his master's perfumes and curling-tongs, nothing more!

Save for a touch of the tongs to what little hair was still left on his neck, and a little scented water for his own enjoyment, the marquis was as simple in his toilet as he had formerly been dazzling. No more wigs, no more paint, almost no lace, embroidery and purl; simply an ample doublet of woolen cloth, with open sleeves, short-clothes of the same material extending below the knee, boots fitting tight to the leg, with plain linen ruffles falling over the tops, a broad unembroidered neckband, and over the whole an immense, thick fur-lined cloak—such was the costume of the Beau Monsieur de Bois-Doré.

The metamorphosis can be explained in a few words.

Mario had fought a duel to discipline an impertinent knave who in his presence had made sport of the marquis's plaster mask, black hair and innumerable bows and buckles. Mario had dealt severely with his adversary—it was his first affaire!—but Bois-Doré, being informed of the episode after it was over, did not choose to expose his son to a repetition of it. Suddenly, and without a word to any one, he abandoned his dye and his wig one day on the pretext that Monsieur de Richelieu was justified in proscribing luxury, and that everyone should set a good example. Being thus resigned to appear old and ugly, he heroically appeared before his family. But to his great surprise they all uttered an exclamation of pleasure, and the Moor artlessly said to him:

"Ah! how handsome you are, master! I thought you much older than you are!"

The fact is that the marquis was exceedingly well preserved under his mask, and was extraordinarily handsome considering his great age. He did not know—he was not likely to know—what infirmities were. He still retained his teeth; his ample, bald forehead was furrowed by graceful wrinkles, without a trace of malice or hatred; his moustache and royale, white as snow, stood out against his yellowish-brown complexion, and his great eye, keen and laughing, still shone mildly through his long, bushy, bristling eyebrows.

He was still erect as a young poplar, and stiff in proportion; but he no longer shrank from placing his foot in Aristandre's powerful hand to mount his horse. Once in the saddle, he was as firm as a rock.

Thereafter he received so many sincere compliments upon his beautiful old age, that he changed his whole system of coquetry: instead of concealing his age, he exaggerated it, representing himself as eighty years old although he was but seventy-seven, and taking the keenest pleasure in astonishing his young comrades-in-arms by his tales of the old wars, long buried in the archives of his memory.

On the 3d of March—that is to say on the second day after the meeting of the Beaux Messieurs de Bois-Doré with Monsieur Poulain—the royal vanguard, consisting of ten or twelve thousand picked men, camped at Chaumont, the last village on the frontier. The volunteers, having no materials for a camp, passed the night as best they could in the village.

The marquis tranquilly retired in the first bed that came to hand, and fell asleep like a man inured to the trade of war, who knew how to make the best of the hours of repose, to sleep for one hour when he had but one, and for twelve, to provide against emergencies, when he had nothing better to do.

Mario, intensely excited and impatient to fight, sat up with several, young men, volunteers like himself, with whom he had become acquainted on the road.

It was in a wretched inn, the common room of which was so crowded that one could hardly turn about, and so filled with tobacco smoke that men could not recognize one another.

While the regular troops were as sedate and silent as the most rigid community of monks, the bands of volunteers were merry and uproarious. They drank and laughed and sang obscene songs, recited erotic or amusing verses; they talked of politics and love-making; they quarreled and embraced.

Mario sat by the fireplace dreaming, amid the uproar. Close beside him stood Clindor, become as stout-hearted a youth as his master, but somewhat awed to find himself surrounded by the nobility. He took no part in the noisy conversation; but he was burning to muster courage to do so, while Mario's reverie was cradled by the tumult, which neither tempted nor annoyed him.

Suddenly Mario saw a creature of most extraordinary aspect enter the room. It was a small, thin, dark girl, dressed in an incomprehensible costume; five or six skirts of brilliant hues, each one shorter than the next below; a waist glistening with tinsel and spangles, a quantity of multi-colored plumes in her crimped and curled hair, innumerable necklaces and gold and silver chains; she was covered with bracelets, rings, and glass ornaments, to her very shoes.

That strange creature was of no age. She might have been a precocious child or a worn-out woman. She was very small, ugly when she chose to smile and talk like other people, beautiful when she flew into a temper, which latter seemed to be with her a constant necessity or a normal condition. She insulted the inn-servants because they did not serve her quickly enough, swore at the troopers because they did not make room for her, clawed those who tried to take liberties with her, and retorted with indescribable blasphemy upon those who made sport of her absurd costume and her savage humor.

Mario was wondering with what purpose so shrewish a creature had introduced herself into such company, when a stout woman with a pimply face, absurdly bedizened with wretched gewgaws, also entered the room, laden with boxes like a mule, and called for silence. She had some difficulty in obtaining it, but at last delivered in French a sort of announcement, overflowing with hyperbolical laudation of her companion, the incomparable Pilar, Moorish dancer and infallible soothsayer, possessed of all the learning of the Arabs.

That name Pilar aroused Mario from his lethargy. He examined the two gypsies, and, despite the change that had taken place in them, recognized in one the pupil, victim and executioner of the miserable La Flèche; in the other the ex-Bellinde of Briantes, the ex-Proserpine of Captain Macabre, now styling herself Narcissa Bobolina, lute-player, dealer in laces, and on occasion mender and plaiter of ruffles.

The company assented to an exhibition of the talents proclaimed. Bellinde played the lute with more energy than correctness, and the dancer, for whom they made room by climbing on the tables, gave a display of epileptic agility, her extraordinary suppleness and energetic grace winning frantic applause from an assemblage already much excited by wine, tobacco and discussion.

Pilar's success with those inflamed imaginations simply intensified Mario's disgust, and he was about to retire; but he had sufficient curiosity to listen to the predictions which she was beginning to make on general subjects, while waiting for someone to ask her to reveal the secret of his future.

"Speak, speak, young sibyl!" was the cry on all sides. "Shall we be lucky in war? Shall we force the Pas de Suse to-morrow?"

"Yes, if you are in a state of grace," she replied disdainfully; "but as there is not a man among you who is not covered with mortal sins as with blotches of leprosy, I am sorely afraid for your soft white skins!"

"Stay," said someone, "we have here a chaste and gentle stripling, an angel from heaven, Mario de Bois-Doré! Let him begin the test and question the soothsayer."

"Mario de Bois-Doré?" cried Pilar, her sparkling eyes becoming dull and lifeless. "He is here, you say? where? where? Show him to me!"

"Come, Bois-Doré," they shouted on all sides, "do not hide your face, but hold out your hands."

Mario came forth from his corner and showed himself to the two women, one of whom darted forward to grasp his hand, while the other turned her head away as if to avoid being recognized.

"I saw you, Bellinde," said Mario to the latter; "and as for you, Pilar," he added, withdrawing his hand, which she seemed to wish to put to her lips, "look at my lines, that is enough."

"Mario de Bois-Doré!" cried Pilar, suddenly losing control of herself, "I know them well enough, the lines in your fatal hand! I studied them carefully enough long ago. I never told your fortune; it is too cruel and too unhappy."

"And I know your science," retorted Mario, shrugging his shoulders. "It depends on your whim, your hatred, your folly."

"Very well, put it to the test!" cried Pilar, more and more incensed; "and if you do not believe in my science, do not fear to listen to your sentence. To-morrow, my pretty Mario, you will sleep on your back, on the edge of a ditch; but to no purpose will your lovely eyes be open and staring, you will never again see the light of the stars."

"Because there will be clouds in the sky," observed Mario, undisturbed.

"No, the weather will be fair; but you will be dead!" said the sibyl, wiping the cold perspiration from her forehead with her hair. "Enough! let no one else question me! I shall say things that are too harsh to all of you here!"

"You will take back your words, you wicked she-devil!" cried the young man who had procured for Mario the pleasure of this agreeable prophecy. "Do not let her leave the room, friends! These infernal witches lead us into death by the confusion they sow in our minds. They are the cause of our losing, in the face of danger, the confidence that saves. Let us compel her to swallow her words and to confess that she said them from pure deviltry."

Pilar, supple as a snake, had already glided from the room. Some ran after her. Bellinde fled by another door.

"Let them go," said Mario. "They are two venomous beasts whose story I will tell you some other time. I am not at all disturbed by the prediction; I have paid for my knowledge of what that noble science is worth!"

They pressed Mario with questions.

"To-morrow," he said, "after the battle, after my threatened death! Permit me now to go to see if my father is carefully guarded by his people; for I know one of those women, perhaps both of them, to be quite capable of seeking to injure him."

"And we," replied his young friends, "will make a circuit of the village to be sure that there is no band of thieving, murdering gypsies in hiding anywhere."

They made the circuit with great care. It seemed quite useless, the regular camp having sentries posted and vigilant patrols who covered all the neighborhood to a considerable distance. They learned from the villagers that the two women had arrived alone on the preceding day and lodged in a house which they pointed out. They declared that the women were then in the house, and Mario did not consider it necessary to set a watch upon them. It was enough in his judgment, to guard the house in which his father was.

The night passed very quietly; too quietly for the liking of the impatient young gentlemen, who hoped to be awakened by the signal for battle. But they were disappointed. The Prince of Piedmont, brother-in-law of Louis XIII., had come on behalf of the Duc de Savoie to open negotiations, and the conferences effected a suspension of hostilities to the great dissatisfaction of the French army.

The following day passed in feverish suspense, and the gypsy's prediction, having come to naught, ceased to alarm Mario's friends.

The two vagabonds had packed up and passed through the vanguard on their way to France, there to ply their wandering trade. There was no fear that they would be allowed to retrace their steps. The cardinal had issued the strictest orders that all women and children, and especially women of disorderly lives, should be rigorously excluded from the camp-followers. Lewd women, gypsies, dancing girls and sorceresses were threatened with death if caught within the lines.

During the evening of the 4th of March, Mario was called upon to narrate the adventures of big Bellinde and little Pilar. He did it in a clear and simple way that drew upon him the attention of all who were present. Hitherto his modesty had prevented him from attracting notice: his interesting narrative, and the touching, natural, and at the same time entertaining way in which he told it caused his delighted comrades to forget the pleasures of the gaming-table and the advanced hour.

He might, had he chosen, have told the whole story of his life; but an indescribable feeling of timidity made him omit any mention of Lauriane's name.

LXXI

It was after midnight when they separated. Each group repaired at once to the more or less execrable lodgings it had secured, and Mario was standing with Clindor at the door of his own lodgings, when a vague shadow, crouching on the threshold, rose and came toward him.

It was Pilar.

"Mario," she said, "do not be afraid of me. I have never injured you, and I have no reason to wish your old father ill. I do not espouse Bellinde's hatred of you."

"Does Bellinde still hate my father?" said Mario. "Has she forgotten that he saved her from being hanged as Captain Macabre was?"

"Yes, Bellinde has forgotten it, or perhaps she never knew it; but it is too late to tell her of it, and she doesn't hate anyone now."

"What do you mean?"

"That I have done to her what she wanted to do to you."

"What was that? Tell me!"

"No, Mario, it's of no use; you would not love me any more for it; and you hate me now, I know."

"I hate no one," replied Mario; "I hate evil, and evil instincts horrify me. You have retained yours, unfortunate girl! I knew it yesterday, when you took a frantic delight in trying to disturb my mind. You will never succeed, you may as well understand that and leave me in peace; it is better for you that I forget you."

"Listen, Mario," exclaimed Pilar half aloud, in a choking voice. "This is not the way to treat me. Really, it is not, if you love anyone on earth! for I love you and I have always loved you. Yes, in the days when we were equally poor, sleeping on the same heather and begging on the same road, I was in love with you. I was born so; I cannot remember a single day in my whole life when I was not consumed by the passion of love or hatred. I never had any childhood! I was born of flame and I shall die of flame, a genuine spark from the stake! What does it matter? Even so, I am worth more to you than your Lauriane, who has always despised you and who will never love anything but her old heretics—luckily for her! Yes, luckily for her, I tell you! for I know all about both of your lives. I have been twice in your province, and one day I passed close to you without your recognizing me. You tossed me a small coin. See, here it is at my neck, concealed under my necklaces as my most precious treasure; I made a hole in it, and I wrote your name on it with the point of a knife. It is my talisman. When I no longer have it, I shall die!"

"Come, come," said Mario, "enough of this nonsense! What do you want now? Why did you return here at the peril of your life, and why did you wait for me at this door? Give me back that coin, and take these gold pieces which you may need."

"Keep your gold, Mario; I do not need it; I wish to keep and I shall keep your pledge, although you blush to know that your name is written on my breast. I have come here to tell you my story, and you must listen to it."

"Tell it quickly then; it is very cold and I am sleepy."

"I wish to tell it to you alone, and your page is listening. Come outside the walls with me."

"No, my page is sleeping against the door. Speak here, and make haste, or I leave you."

"Listen then, I shall soon have told it all. You know that my father was hanged and my mother burned!"

"Yes, I remember that you often told me so. Well?"

"Well, La Flèche brought me up to torment me. It was he who broke my bones to make me more flexible, and carried me about in a cage to make me ill and frantic. He exhibited me like a wild beast that bites everybody."

"But you took a horrible revenge upon him, did you not?"

"Yes, I suffocated him with sand and stones and dirt, when he was calling: 'Help! I am thirsty! I am thirsty!'—One of his arms still moved, and he tried to choke me with it. But, at the risk of my life, I forced what life he had left down his throat. Didn't I owe him that? Wasn't it my right? You would have saved him perhaps, and he would have paid you like Bellinde, who, but for me, would have succeeded in poisoning you all yesterday, you and your father and your servants, in order, so she said, to fulfil the prediction I had made before witnesses, and to protect my fame as a soothsayer."

"And then you——"

"I owed her that, too! Listen, listen to my story! After avenging myself on La Flèche, I hid in the pavilion in your garden. I had seen that you were angry with me, and I was waiting for your anger to pass. I thought that you would look for me, that you would be anxious about me, and would keep me in your château to love me. But toward evening, you came there with your Lauriane, and you told her that you hated me and I heard every word! Then I dropped a stone on her to kill her, and I hid myself. But you thought the stone had fallen of itself and you left me there.

"I passed the night there, dying with cold and hunger. I was in a frenzy of rage; that kept me up. I cursed you both; I cursed myself for having offended you. I meant to let myself die; but I had not the courage, and as I wanted nothing more of you, whom I believed that I hated, I went to Brilbault to get Sancho's money, which La Flèche had made me steal two or three months before, at La Caille-Bottée's house.

"In those days I didn't know the value of money, and I hated La Flèche so bitterly that I gave it all back to Sancho, who had hidden it so carefully that he was able to manage the gypsies with promises and a few crowns from time to time. But I knew where he had buried his treasure, and there was a good deal of it left; a good deal to me, at least, I needed so little. I divided it into several parts and hid them in different places.

"I had taken it into my head that I could live alone without being dependent on anybody, and wander all over the world at will, child that I was! But I soon got tired of it, and as I happened to fall in with Bellinde, who was flying from the country, with her head shaved and in a miserable plight, I told her that I had some little hidden treasures, but was very careful not to tell her where they were! Oh! how she flattered me, tormented me, made me tipsy and questioned me even in my sleep, trying to find out! She never lost the hope of extorting my secret from me; that is why she became my mother and my servant, always fawning on me and betraying me. Ah! yes, she betrayed me shamefully! She sold me, she abandoned me when I was still a child; and when, later, I realized and felt my shame, I swore that I would be revenged upon her when I no longer needed her. Now, the crows are feeding oh her flesh, and it was a righteous deed, God knows!"

"You are a wretched, horrible girl!" said Mario. "Now have you finished?"

"Now, I want you to love me, Mario, or I will avenge myself on your Lauriane, whom you still love, I know that; for you didn't choose to speak of her to your comrades in the inn just now. Oh! I was there too, hidden in the garret, where I heard all the evil you said of me."

"Since you heard all, how can you be mad enough to ask me to love you?"

"I am not mad! One can pass from hatred to love, I know by my own experience. You abhor and adore at the same time. Besides, you admitted that I had fine eyes now, and slender arms, and a sort of diabolical beauty. That is what you said at the inn just now. And many of those gentlemen offered me the night before money to buy other silk skirts and other ear-rings, because, beautiful or ugly, I had turned their heads. But I want nothing from them and nothing from you! I still have money hidden in Berry, and I can go there when I choose. Beware, Mario! Your Lauriane will answer to me for you. Take me with you, or renounce her."

"As you confess your evil purposes so boldly, I arrest you," said Mario.

He tried to seize her, being determined to turn her over to the camp authorities; but he seized nothing but her scarf: the girl herself, fleeter and more unsubstantial than the clouds driven by the wind, eluded him and vanished. He pursued her and might have caught her, for he too knew how to run; but he had hardly turned the corner when the bugles sounded boots and saddles; it was the signal of departure for the long-expected battle.

Mario forgot the wild threats that had excited him and hastened to his father, who was hurriedly dressing.

At daybreak the whole army was on the march.

"The Pas de Suse is a gorge about a quarter of a league in length, in some places less than twenty paces wide, and obstructed here and there by fallen rocks. The tergiversation of the Prince of Piedmont had had no other purpose than to delay the advance of our army for a few days. The enemy had used the interval to good advantage in strengthening their position.

"The gorge was intersected by three strong barricades protected by bastions and ditches. The cliffs commanding it on each side were alive with soldiers, and protected by small redoubts.

"Lastly, the cannon of Fort Tallasse, built on a neighboring mountain, swept the open space between Chaumont and the entrance to the gorge. It was one of those positions where it seems possible for a handful of men to check the advance of an army.

"Nothing, however, could check the furie française."[10]

So many accomplished historians have described this glorious action, that we shrink from attempting the task after them; it is not our business to write history according to official facts, but to seek it in episodes that have been overlooked. That is why we shall follow the Beaux Messieurs de Bois-Doré through the carnage, and not allow ourselves to be dazzled by the majesty of the picture as a whole. An additional reason for adopting this course is that they had little leisure to contemplate it themselves.

It was a magnificent scene: a combat of heroes on a sublime stage!

The first cannon-shot awoke echoes of intense excitement in Mario's heart. How he passed the first barricade, whether upon a winged horse or "upon the fiery breath of the god Mars himself;" how he forgot his sworn promise to his father not to leave his side, he never knew. All the passion of his soul, all the fever in his blood, ordinarily restrained by modesty and filial love, produced a sort of volcanic eruption within him.

He even forgot for a moment that his father was following him into the very midst of the fray, and, in order not to lose sight of him, was exposing himself to no less risk.

Aristandre was there, it is true, stationed like a marble wall about his master; but Mario, when the fighting was most desperate, turned more than once to look for the old man's gray plume, which towered above all the rest, and each time, as he saw it waving still, he thanked God and trusted to his lucky star.

The whole affair was carried through so impetuously that it did not cost France the lives of fifty men. It was one of those miraculous days when every man has faith, and when nothing is impossible.

The position carried, Mario was galloping along the Suse road in pursuit of the fugitives, among whom was the Duc de Savoie in person, when he saw a masked horseman riding toward him at full speed on his right.