‘Very well,’ said Canolles. ‘I shall wait.’
And since he could hear a lot of noise coming from the direction of the kitchen, he went to pass the time and see what was going on in that important part of the house.
It was the poor scullery boy, coming back more dead than alive. At the bend in the road he had been stopped by four men, who had questioned him about the purpose of his nocturnal walk and who, learning that he was going to take supper to the woman in the isolated house, had divested him of his chef’s hat, his white jacket and his apron. The youngest of the four men had then put on the badges of his profession, balanced the basket on his head and continued, in the young cook’s stead, towards the little house. Ten minutes later he had returned and spoken in an undertone to the man who seemed to be the leader of the troop. Then he gave the boy back his jacket, hat and apron, planted the basket on his head and gave him a kick up the backside to send him in the right direction. The poor devil asked nothing better than to continue on his way. He set off at a run and arrived almost dead with fright in the doorway of the inn, where they had come to retrieve him.
This adventure was quite incomprehensible to everyone except Canolles, but since he had no reason to explain it, he left the innkeeper, waiters, servants, cook and scullery boy to make their own conjectures, and, while they were hunting around as best they could, he went up to the viscount’s room, where, assuming that the first enquiry that he had made through Castorin had removed the need for any further request of the same kind, he opened the door and walked straight in.
A well-lit table with two places set was standing in the middle of the room and waiting only for the dishes of food to complete it. Canolles observed these two places and drew a happy conclusion from them.
The viscount, however, on seeing him, leapt so abruptly to his feet that it was easy to see that he had been surprised by his visitor and that it was not for himself, as Canolles had at first assumed, that the second place was intended. This suspicion was confirmed by the first words that the viscount addressed to him.
‘Might I ask, Baron,’ the young man said, coming over and greeting him stiffly, ‘to what new circumstance I owe the honour of your visit?’
‘To a very natural one,’ Canolles replied, somewhat miffed by this discourteous reception. ‘Hunger overcame me, and I thought that it might have affected you as well. You are alone, I am alone, and I wanted to have the honour of suggesting that you dine with me.’
The viscount looked at Canolles with evident mistrust and seemed to be at a loss to reply.
‘On my honour!’ Canolles exclaimed with a laugh. ‘Anyone would think you were afraid of me… Are you a Knight of Malta, by any chance? Are you destined for the Church or has your respectable family brought you up with a horror of the Canolles? Come, now, you won’t be damned for an hour spent together with me on different sides of a table.’
‘I can’t possibly come to your room, Baron.’
‘Well, then, don’t. And as I’ve come to yours…’
‘Still less possible, I’m afraid. I am expecting someone.’
This time it was Canolles’s turn to be thrown off balance.
‘Oh! You’re expecting someone?’
‘Yes.’
‘My goodness,’ said Canolles, after a moment’s silence. ‘I swear, I would almost rather that you had let me continue on my way and take the risk of whatever might happen than to spoil the favour that you did me, and for which I thought I had not thanked you enough, by this repugnance that you are showing towards me.’
The young man blushed and came over to Canolles.
‘Please forgive me, Monsieur,’ he said, his voice trembling. ‘I realize how rude I have been. If it were not a matter of serious business, of family business that I have to discuss with the person for whom I am waiting, it would be both an honour and a pleasure for me to invite you to join us, although…’
‘Enough!’ said Canolles. ‘Whatever you say, I have decided that I shall not get angry with you.’
‘Although,’ the young man continued, ‘our acquaintance is one of those unexpected matters of chance, one of those accidental meetings, those brief encounters…’
‘Why should that be?’ asked Canolles. ‘On the contrary, this is how a long and sincere friendship starts: one has only to see the hand of Providence in what you attribute to chance.’
‘Monsieur,’ the viscount answered with a laugh, ‘Providence has decided that I should leave in two hours and that in all probability I shall be taking the opposite direction to yours. So please accept my regret at not being able to respond as I should wish to this offer of friendship, which you have so warmly made and which I appreciate at its true worth.’
‘My word,’ said Canolles, ‘you certainly are an unusual lad and to begin with your generous impulse gave me a quite different idea of your character. But after all let it be as you wish: I have no right to make any demands on you, since I am the one who is obligated to you, and you have done far more for me than I had any reason to expect from a stranger. So, I shall go back and take supper alone, though I have to admit, Viscount, that I don’t like it. I’m not used to monologues.’
And, in reality, despite what Canolles had said and his expressed determination to leave, he did not do so. Something kept him rooted to the spot, something of which he was almost unaware. He felt overwhelmingly attracted to the viscount. But the young man picked up a torch and, taking it to Canolles, said with a charming smile and offering his hand: ‘Monsieur, however things may be and however short our acquaintance, please believe that I am delighted to have been of some service to you.’
Canolles heard only the compliment. He grasped the hand that the viscount offered him, but which, instead of replying to his friendly, masculine pressure, shrank back, warm and trembling. Then, realizing that, though it had been wrapped up in a flattering phrase, the young man’s dismissal of him was nonetheless a dismissal, he withdrew, disappointed and, above all, thoughtful.
At the door he met the toothless grin of the old valet, who took the torch from the viscount’s hands, conducted Canolles with much ceremony back to his apartment and straightaway went back to his master who was waiting at the top of the stairs.
‘What is he doing?’ the viscount whispered.
‘I think he has decided to sup alone,’ Pompée replied.
‘So he will not come back up?’
‘I hope not.’
‘Order the horses, Pompeé – we shall save that much time at least. But what’s that noise?’ the viscount added, listening attentively.
‘It sounds like the voice of Monsieur Richon.’
‘And that of Monsieur de Canolles.’
‘I think they are arguing.’
‘No, quite the contrary, they know one another – listen…’
‘As long as Richon keeps quiet about everything.’
‘Oh, don’t worry about that. He is a very cautious man.’
‘Hush!’
The two listeners stopped talking and they heard Canolles shouting. ‘Two places, Master Biscarros! Two places! Monsieur Richon is going to sup with me.’
‘No, no,’ said Richon. ‘Please, I can’t.’
‘Why on earth not? Do you want to dine alone, like the young gentleman?’
‘What gentleman?’
‘The one upstairs.’
‘What is his name?’
‘The Viscount de Cambes.’
‘Do you know the viscount, then?’
‘Huh! He saved my life.’
‘He did?’
‘Yes, he did.’
‘How was that?’
‘Take supper with me, and I’ll tell you about it while we are eating.’
‘I can’t. I’m due to sup with him.’
‘Yes, he said he was waiting for someone.’
‘That was me and as I am late, Baron, you will be good enough to let me go.’
‘No, I won’t! I forbid it!’ Canolles exclaimed. ‘
I’ve got it into my head that I am going to have company for dinner, so you will eat with me and I with you. Biscarros! Two places!’
But while Canolles was turning round to see if the order was being carried out, Richon set off rapidly up the staircase. When he reached the top stair, his hand met another, small hand, which led him into the Viscount de Cambes’s room. The door was shut behind him, and, to make assurance doubly sure, the two locks ensured that it would not be opened.
‘Well, I never,’ Canolles muttered, looking in vain for the vanished Richon, then sitting down alone at the table. ‘I really don’t know what they have against me in this accursed country. One lot of them are chasing after me to kill me, while the others are fleeing from me as though I had the plague. Confound it!I’m losing my appetite. I can feel a sadness coming over me, and I might well get as drunk as a coachman this evening… Hey, there, Castorin, come here and let me beat you!
‘They’re locking themselves in up there as though they were hatching a conspiracy. Oh! What a numbskull I am! Of course, they are conspiring! That’s it: it explains everything. Now, on whose behalf are they conspiring? For the coadjutor? For the princes? For the Parliament? For the king? For the queen? For Monsieur de Mazarin? Dammit, let them conspire against whoever they wish, I couldn’t care less. My appetite has returned.
‘Castorin, order my supper and pour me some wine. I forgive you.’
Philosophically, Canolles got to work on the first supper that had been prepared for the Viscount de Cambes, and which, having no further provisions, Master Biscarros was obliged to serve up to him reheated.
IV
While the Baron de Canolles was searching in vain for someone to dine with him and, exhausted by his fruitless endeavours, was finally resigning himself to supping alone, let us see what was going on at Nanon’s.
Nanon, whatever may have been written and said about her by her enemies – and most of the historians who have written about her must be counted in that number – was at this time a charming creature of between twenty-five and twenty-six years old, small in height and dark-skinned, but with a supple, gracious manner, bright, fresh colouring and deep, dark eyes whose limpid corneas sparkled, like those of cats, with fire and light. Despite being superficially light-hearted and apparently cheerful, Nanon was far from being carried away by all the whims and frivolity that usually weave such baroque embellishments into the richly gilded pattern that makes up the life of a fashionable young woman. On the contrary, the most serious meditations, matured and long weighed in her mischievous head, acquired an appearance that was at once full of charm and lucidity when they emerged in the vibrant tones of her voice, with its strong Gascon accent. No one would have guessed at the tireless persistence, the concealed tenacity and the statesmanlike understanding that lay behind this pink mask, with its fine, smiling features, and this look, full of voluptuous promise and sparkling with passion. Yet these were Nanon’s qualities – or her defects, depending on whether one chooses to look at the head or the reverse of the medal: this was the calculating mind and the ambitious heart beneath the outer covering of a most elegant body.
Nanon came from Agen.25 This petite bourgeoise, daughter of a country lawyer, had been raised in station by the Duke d’Epernon, son of that inseparable friend of Henri IV,26 who was in the king’s carriage at the moment when Ravaillac’s knife struck him and who was the object of suspicions that extended even to Catherine de’ Médicis.27 The Duke d’Epernon himself had been appointed Governor of Guyenne, where his arrogance, his haughty manners and his oppressive rule had made him generally loathed; he had courted Nanon, only triumphing in his suit with great difficulty and against a defence that had been conducted with the skills of a great tactician, who wishes to make her conqueror feel the full cost of his victory. As the price of her already lost reputation, Nanon had deprived the duke of his power and his freedom. Six months into her affair with the Governor of Guyenne, it was she who in reality governed that lovely province, repaying with interest the wrongs and insults that she had received to all those who had previously wronged her or slighted her. Queen by chance, she became a tyrant by design, anticipating with her fine understanding that she would have to compensate by exploitation for the probable brevity of her reign.
For that reason, she seized everything: wealth, influence and honours. She became rich, appointed officials, received visits from Mazarin28 and the leading nobles at court. Showing admirable skill in deploying all the assets that she possessed, she combined them into a whole that was to the advantage of his name and profitable to her purse. Every service that Nanon did was assessed at its own value. A rank in the army or an office in the judiciary each had their price: Nanon arranged for the rank or the job to be granted and was paid for them in coin of the realm or by a splendid, regal present. In this way, while relinquishing a fraction of her power to someone’s benefit, she recovered the fraction in a different form, granting the authority, while keeping the money that is its sinew.
This explains the length of her reign, because however much they may hate, men are reluctant to overthrow an enemy who will be left with a consolation. What vengeance craves is total ruin and utter prostration. A nation is loath to drive away a tyrant who will take its gold and quit it with a laugh. Nanon de Lartigues was a millionaire twice over!
In this way, she lived with some kind of security on the volcano that was constantly rocking everything around her. She had felt popular anger rising like a tide, its waves swelling and beating against the power of Monsieur d’Epernon, who, driven out of Bordeaux in a moment of rage, had towed Nanon with him as the ship tows its bumboat. Nanon bent to the wind, ready to rise again when the storm was over; she took Monsieur de Mazarin as her model and at a distance adopted the policies of the clever and pragmatic Italian like an obedient pupil. The cardinal noticed this woman, who was rising in society and becoming rich by the same means that had made him a prime minister and the owner of fifty million in gold. He admired the little Gascon girl; more than that, he let her be. Later we may learn why.
In spite of all this, and though there were some who claimed to be better informed and who said that she was in direct correspondence with Mazarin, there was little gossip about the political intrigues of the lovely Nanon. Canolles himself – who, being young, good-looking and rich, could not understand the need for intrigue – did not know what to believe on the matter. As for her amorous intrigues, either because Nanon had put these aside for the time being, having more serious matters to worry about, or because Monsieur d’Epernon’s love for her resounded so loudly that it drowned out the murmurs made by any lesser affairs she might have, even her enemies kept relatively quiet on his score, so that Canolles had some reason to believe (which flattered his personal and native pride) that Nanon had been invincible until he arrived on the scene. Whether indeed Canolles had enjoyed the first loving impulse of a heart until then touched only by ambition, or whether prudence had inspired absolute discretion in his predecessors, Nanon as a mistress must have been a charming woman. And Nanon, when provoked, would be a fearful enemy.
Nanon and Canolles had met in the most natural way. Canolles, a lieutenant in the regiment of Navailles, wished to become a captain and for this he had to write to Monsieur d’Epernon, Colonel-in-Chief of Infantry. Nanon, it was, who read the letter and replied in her usual manner, expecting to have some business to deal with and giving Canolles a business appointment. Canolles chose a magnificent ring among the family jewels, a ring worth some five hundred pistoles 29 (it was still cheaper than buying a company of soldiers), and went to his appointment. But this time the victorious Canolles, supported by the fine array of gifts that fate had bestowed on him, routed Mademoiselle de Lartigues’s calculating business sense. It was the first time that he had seen Nanon, and the first time that Nanon saw him: they were both young, handsome and quick-witted. The interview consisted of mutual compliments; the matter in hand was not mentioned (and yet it was resolved). On the following da
y, Canolles received his captain’s licence, and when the precious ring passed from his finger to that of Nanon, it was no longer as the price of ambition satisfied, but as a token of requited love.
V
As for explaining how Nanon came to reside near the village of Matifou, history can do that. As we said, the Duke d’Epernon had attracted hatred in Guyenne. Nanon had been done the honour of being considered his evil genius and was abhorred. An uprising drove them from Bordeaux, and they retreated to Agen, but in Agen, the riot resumed. One day, the gilded coach in which Nanon was going to meet the duke was overturned while crossing a bridge. Nanon, somehow or other, found herself in the river, and it was Canolles who fished her out. One night, Nanon’s town house was engulfed in flames, and it was Canolles who just managed to get to her bedroom and save her from the fire. Nanon decided that, if they tried for a third time to kill her, the people of Agen might succeed. Even though Canolles stayed as close to her as he could, it would have been a miracle if he could always be there just when she needed to be saved from danger. She took advantage of the duke’s absence, while he was making a visit to his province, and of the presence of an escort of twelve hundred men, in which the regiment of Navailles had its share, to leave town at the same time as Canolles. As she did so, she taunted the populace through the window of her coach – a coach that they would gladly have torn to pieces, had they dared.
So the duke and Nanon chose (or, rather, Canolles secretly chose for them) the little village where it was decided that Nanon would live, while a house was prepared for her in Libourne. Canolles took some leave, allegedly to go and arrange family matters at home, but in reality so that he could leave his regiment, which had returned to Agen, and not go too far away from Matifou, where his tutelary presence was more urgently needed than ever. Events were indeed starting to take a disturbingly serious turn. The princes of Condé, Conti and Longue-ville,30 having been arrested the previous 17 January and imprisoned in Vincennes, provided the five or six rival factions that existed in France at the time with an excellent excuse for a civil war. The Duke d’Epernon’s unpopularity, of which the court was fully aware, continued to grow – though reason should have given hope that it could grow no further. A catastrophe that all parties desired (since, given the strange situation in the country, they no longer knew themselves where they stood) was becoming imminent. Nanon, like those birds that sense the approach of a storm, vanished from the horizon and went back into her leafy nest to await the outcome of events in anonymity and obscurity.
The Women's War Page 7