CHAPTER XIV.
ST. MARTIN'S SUMMER.
Yes, at the great Cardinal's _levee_ I was the only client. I staredround the room, a long narrow gallery, through which it was his customto walk every morning, after receiving his more important visitors. Istared, I say, round this room, in a state of stupefaction. The seatsagainst either wall were empty, the recesses of the windows empty too.The hat, sculptured and painted here and there, the staring R, theblazoned arms, looked down on a vacant floor. Only, on a little stoolby the main door, sat a quiet-faced man in black, who read, orpretended to read, in a little book, and never looked up. One of thosemen, blind, deaf, secretive, who fatten in the shadow of the great.
At length, while I stood confounded and full of shamed thought,--for Ihad seen the ante-chamber of Richelieu's old hotel so crowded that hecould not walk through it,--this man closed his book, rose, and camenoiselessly towards me. "M. de Berault?" he said.
"Yes," I answered.
"His Eminence awaits you. Be good enough to follow me."
I did so, in a deeper stupor than before. For how could the Cardinalknow that I was here? How could he have known when he gave the order?But I had short time to think of these things. We passed through tworooms, in one of which some secretaries were writing; we stopped at athird door. Over all brooded a silence which could be felt. The usherknocked, opened, and with his finger on his lip, pushed aside acurtain, and signed to me to enter. I did so, and found myselfstanding behind a screen.
"Is that M. de Berault?" asked a thin, high-pitched voice.
"Yes, Monseigneur," I answered, trembling.
"Then come, my friend, and talk to me."
I went round the screen; and I know not how it was, the watching crowdoutside, the vacant antechamber in which I had stood, thestillness,--all seemed concentrated here, and gave to the man I sawbefore me, a dignity which he had never possessed for me when the worldpassed through his doors, and the proudest fawned on him for a smile.He sat in a great chair on the farther side of the hearth, a little redskull-cap on his head, his fine hands lying motionless in his lap. Thecollar of lawn which fell over his red cape was quite plain, but theskirts of his red robe were covered with rich lace, and the order ofthe Holy Ghost shone on his breast. Among the multitudinous papers onthe great table near him I saw a sword and pistols lying; and sometapestry that covered a little table behind him failed to hide a pairof spurred riding-boots. But he--in spite of these signs oftrouble--looked towards me as I advanced, with a face mild and almostbenign; a face in which I strove in vain to find traces of lastnight's passion. So that it flashed across me that if this man reallystood--and afterwards I knew he did--on the thin razor-edge betweenlife and death, between the supreme of earthly power, lord of France,and arbiter of Europe, and the nothingness of the clod, he justifiedhis fame. He gave weaker natures no room for triumph.
The thought was no sooner entertained than it was gone. "And so youare back at last, M. de Berault?" he said, gently. "I have beenexpecting to see you since nine this morning."
"Your Eminence knew then--" I muttered.
"That you returned to Paris by the Orleans gate last evening, alone?"He fitted together the ends of his fingers, and looked at me over themwith inscrutable eyes. "Yes, I knew all that last night. And now ofyour mission? You have been faithful, and diligent, I am sure. Whereis he?"
I stared at him, and was dumb. Somehow the strange things I had seensince I left my lodging, the surprises I had found awaiting me here,had driven my own fortunes, my own peril, out of my head, until thismoment. Now, at his question, all returned with a rush. My heartheaved suddenly in my breast. I strove for a savour of the oldhardihood; but for the moment I could not find a word.
"Well?" he said lightly, a faint smile lifting his mustache. "You donot speak. You left Auch with him on the twenty-fourth, M. de Berault.So much I know. And you reached Paris without him last night. He hasnot given you the slip?" with sudden animation.
"No, Monseigneur," I muttered.
"Ha! That is good," he answered, sinking back again in his chair. "Forthe moment--but I knew I could depend on you. And now where is he?" hecontinued. "What have you done with him? He knows much, and the soonerI know it, the better. Are your people bringing him, M. de Berault?"
"No, Monseigneur," I stammered, with dry lips. His very good humour,his benignity, appalled me. I knew how terrible would be the change,how fearful his rage, when I should tell him the truth. And yet thatI, Gil de Berault, should tremble before any man! I spurred myself, asit were, to the task. "No, Your Eminence," I said, with the courage ofdespair. "I have not brought him, because I have set him free."
"Because you have--_what?_" he exclaimed. He leaned forward, his handson the arm of his chair; and his glittering eyes, growing each instantsmaller, seemed to read my soul.
"Because I have let him go," I repeated.
"And why?" he said, in a voice like the rasping of a file.
"Because I took him unfairly," I answered desperately. "Because,Monseigneur, I am a gentleman, and this task should have been given toone who was not. I took him, if you must know," I continuedimpatiently,--the fence once crossed, I was growing bolder,--"bydogging a woman's steps, and winning her confidence, and betraying it.And, whatever I have done ill in my life,--of which you were goodenough to throw something in my teeth when I was last here,--I havenever done that, and I will not!"
"And so you set him free?"
"Yes."
"After you had brought him to Auch?"
"Yes."
"And in point of fact saved him from falling into the hands of thecommandant at Auch?"
"Yes," I answered desperately.
"Then what of the trust I placed in you, sirrah?" he rejoined, in aterrible voice; and stooping still farther forward, he probed me withhis eyes. "You who prate of trust and confidence, who received yourlife on parole, and but for your promise to me would have been carrionthis month past, answer me that! What of the trust I placed in you?"
"The answer is simple," I said, shrugging my shoulders with a touch ofmy old self. "I am here to pay the penalty."
"And do you think that I do not know why?" he retorted, striking hisone hand on the arm of the chair with a force which startled me."Because you have heard, Sir, that my power is gone! That I, who wasyesterday the King's right hand, am to-day dried up, withered, andparalyzed! Because--but have a care! Have a care!" he continued notloudly, but in a voice like a dog's snarl. "You, and those others!Have a care I say, or you may find yourselves mistaken yet!"
"As Heaven shall judge me," I answered solemnly, "that is not true.Until I reached Paris last night I knew nothing of this report. I camehere with a single mind, to redeem my honour by placing again in YourEminence's hands that which you gave me on trust."
For a moment he remained in the same attitude, staring at me fixedly.Then his face somewhat relaxed. "Be good enough to ring that bell," hesaid.
It stood on a table near me. I rang it, and a velvet-footed man inblack came in, and gliding up to the Cardinal placed a paper in hishand. The Cardinal looked at it while the man stood with his headobsequiously bent; my heart beat furiously. "Very good," the Cardinalsaid, after a pause, which seemed to me to be endless. "Let the doorsbe thrown open."
The man bowed low, and retired behind the screen. I heard a littlebell ring, somewhere in the silence, and in a moment the Cardinalstood up. "Follow me!" he said, with a strange flash of his keen eyes.
Astonished, I stood aside while he passed to the screen; then Ifollowed him. Outside the first door, which stood open, we found eightor nine persons,--pages, a monk, the major-domo, and several guardswaiting like mutes. These signed to me to precede them, and fell inbehind us, and in that order we passed through the first room and thesecond, where the clerks stood with bent heads to receive us. The lastdoor, the door of the ante-chamber, flew open as we approached; ascore of voices cried, "Place! Place for His Eminence!" We pass
edwithout pause through two lines of bowing lackeys, and entered--anempty room!
The ushers did not know how to look at one another. The lackeystrembled in their shoes. But the Cardinal walked on, apparentlyunmoved, until he had passed slowly half the length of the chamber.Then he turned himself about, looking first to one side; and then toanother, with a low laugh of derision. "Father," he said, in his thinvoice, "what does the psalmist say? 'I am become like a pelican in thewilderness, and like an owl that is in the desert!'"
The monk mumbled assent.
"And later, in the same psalm is it not written, 'They shall perish,but thou shalt endure!'"
"It is so," the father answered. "Amen."
"Doubtless that refers to another life," the Cardinal continued, withhis slow, wintry smile. "In the meantime we will go back to our book?and our prayers, and serve God and the King in small things, if not ingreat. Come, father, this is no longer a place for us. _Vanitasvanitatum; omnia vanitas!_ We will retire."
So, as solemnly as we had come, we marched back through the first andsecond and third doors, until we stood again in the silence of theCardinal's chamber; he and I and the velvet-footed man in black. For awhile Richelieu seemed to forget me. He stood brooding on the hearth,with his eye's on the embers. Once I heard him laugh; and twice heuttered in a tone of bitter mockery, the words, "Fools! Fools! Fools!"
At last he looked up, saw me, and started. "Ah!" he said. "I hadforgotten you. Well, you are fortunate, M. de Berault. Yesterday I hada hundred clients. To-day I have only one, and I cannot afford to hanghim. But for your liberty--that is another matter."
I would have said something, but he turned abruptly to the table, andsitting down wrote a few lines on a piece of paper. Then he rang hisbell, while I stood waiting and confounded.
The man in black came from behind the screen. "Take that letter andthis gentleman to the upper guard-room," His Eminence said sharply. "Ican hear no more," he continued wearily, raising his hand to forbidinterruption. "The matter is ended, M. de Berault. Be thankful."
And in a moment I was outside the door, my head in a whirl, my heartdivided between gratitude and resentment. Along several passages Ifollowed my guide; everywhere finding the same silence, the samemonastic stillness. At length, when I had begun to consider whetherthe Bastile or the Chatelet would be my fate, he stopped at a door,gave me the letter, and, lifting the latch, signed to me to enter.
I went in in amazement, and stopped in confusion. Before me, alone,just risen from a chair, with her face one moment pale, the next redwith blushes, stood Mademoiselle de Cocheforet. I cried out her name.
"M. de Berault!" she said, visibly trembling. "You did not expect tosee me?"
"I expected to see no one so little, Mademoiselle," I answered,striving to recover my composure.
"Yet you might have thought that we should not utterly desert you,"she replied, with a reproachful humility which went to my heart. "Weshould have been base indeed, if we had not made some attempt to saveyou. I thank Heaven that it has so far succeeded that that strange manhas promised me your life. You have seen him?" she continued eagerly,and in another tone, while her eyes grew suddenly large with fear.
"Yes, Mademoiselle, I have seen him," I said. "And he has given me mylife."
"And?"
"And sent me to imprisonment."
"For how long?" she whispered.
"I do not know," I answered. "I expect, during the King's pleasure."
She shuddered. "I may have done more harm than good," she murmured,looking at me piteously. "But I did it for the best. I told him all,and--yes, perhaps I did harm."
But to hear her accuse herself thus, when she had made this long andlonely journey to save me; when she had forced herself into herenemy's presence, and had, as I was sure she had, abased herself forme, was more than I could bear. "Hush, Mademoiselle, hush!" I said,almost roughly. "You hurt me. You have made me happy: and yet I wishthat you were not here, where I fear you have few friends, but back atCocheforet. You have done more than I expected, and a hundred timesmore than I deserved. But I was a ruined man before this happened. Iam no more now, but I am still that; and I would not have your namepinned to mine on Paris lips. Therefore, good-bye. God forbid I shouldsay more to you, or let you stay where foul tongues would soon malignyou."
She looked at me in a kind of wonder; then with a growing smile, "Itis too late," she said gently.
"Too late?" I exclaimed. "How, Mademoiselle?"
"Because--do you remember, M. de Berault, what you told me of yourlove story, by Agen? That it could have no happy ending? For the samereason I was not ashamed to tell mine to the Cardinal. By this time itis common property."
I looked at her as she stood facing me. Her eyes shone, but they weredowncast. Her figure drooped, and yet a smile trembled on her lips."What did you tell him, Mademoiselle?" I whispered, my breath comingquickly.
"That I loved," she answered boldly, raising her clear eyes to mine."And therefore that I was not ashamed to beg, even on my knees. Norashamed to be with my lover, even in prison."
I fell on my knees, and caught her hand before the last word passedher lips. For the moment I forgot King and Cardinal, prison and thefuture, all--all except that this woman, so pure and so beautiful, sofar above me in all things, loved me. For the moment, I say. Then Iremembered myself. I stood up and thrust her from me, in a suddenrevulsion of feeling. "You do not know me," I said. "You do not knowme. You do not know what I have done."
"That is what I do know," she answered, looking at me with a wondroussmile.
"Ah, but you do not," I cried. "And besides, there is this--thisbetween us." And I picked up the Cardinal's letter. It had fallen onthe floor.
She turned a shade paler. Then she said, "Open it! Open it! It is notsealed, nor closed."
I obeyed mechanically, dreading what I might see. Even when I had itopen I looked at the finely scrawled characters with eyes askance. Butat last I made it out. It ran thus:--
"The King's pleasure is, that M. de Berault, having mixed himself upwith affairs of state, retire forthwith to the manor of Cocheforet,and confine himself within its limits, until the King's pleasure befurther known.
"Richelieu."
On the next day we were married. The same evening we left Paris, and Iretraced, in her company, the road which I had twice traversed aloneand in heaviness.
A fortnight later we were at Cocheforet, in the brown woods under thesouthern mountains; and the great Cardinal, once more triumphant overhis enemies, saw, with cold, smiling eyes, the world pass through hischamber. The flood-tide, which then set in, lasted thirteen years; inbrief, until his death. For the world had learned its lesson, and wasnot to be deceived a second time. To this hour they call that day,which saw me stand for all his friends, "The day of Dupes."
THE END
COUNT HANNIBAL
SORORI SUA CAUSSA CARAE PIO ERGA MATREM AMORE ETIAM CARIORI HOC FRATER
Historical Romances: Under the Red Robe, Count Hannibal, A Gentleman of France Page 14