CHAPTER XVIII.
ANDROMEDA, PERSEUS BEING ABSENT.
Little by little--while they fought below--the gloom had thickened,and night had fallen in the room above. But Mademoiselle would nothave candles brought. Seated in the darkness, on the uppermost step ofthe stairs, her hands clasped about her knees, she listened andlistened, as if by that action she could avert misfortune; or as if,by going so far forward to meet it, she could turn aside the worst.The women shivering in the darkness about her would fain have struck alight and drawn her back into the room, for they felt safer there. Butshe was not to be moved. The laughter and chatter of the men in theguard-room, the coming and going of Bigot as he passed, below but outof sight, had no terrors for her; nay, she breathed more freely on thebare open landing of the staircase than in the close confines of aroom which her fears made hateful to her. Here at least she couldlisten, her face unseen; and listening she bore the suspense moreeasily.
A turn in the staircase, with the noise which proceeded from theguard-room, rendered it difficult to hear what happened in the closedroom below. But she thought that if an alarm were raised there shemust hear it; and as the moments passed and nothing happened, shebegan to feel confident that her lover had made good his escape by thewindow.
Presently she got a fright. Three or four men came from the guard-roomand went, as it seemed to her, to the door of the room with theshattered casement. She told herself that she had rejoiced too soon,and her heart stood still. She waited for a rush of feet, a cry, astruggle. But except an uncertain muffled sound which lasted for someminutes, and was followed by a dull shock, she heard nothing more. Andpresently the men went back whispering, the noise in the guard-roomwhich had been partially hushed broke forth anew, and perplexed butrelieved she breathed again. Surely he had escaped by this time.Surely by this time he was far away, in the Arsenal, or in some placeof refuge! And she might take courage, and feel that for this day theperil was overpast.
"Mademoiselle will have the lights now?" one of the women ventured.
"No! no!" she answered feverishly, and she continued to crouch whereshe was on the stairs, bathing herself and her burning face in thedarkness and coolness of the stairway. The air entered freely througha window at her elbow and the place was fresher, were that all, thanthe room she had left. Javette began to whimper, but she paid no heedto her; a man came and went along the passage below, and she heard theouter door unbarred, and the jarring tread of three or four men whopassed through it. But all without disturbance; and afterwards thehouse was quiet again. And as on this Monday evening the primevirulence of the massacre had begun to abate--though it held after afashion to the end of the week--Paris without was quiet also. Thesounds which had chilled her heart at intervals during two days wereno longer heard. A feeling almost of peace, almost of comfort--adrowsy feeling, that was three parts a reaction from excitement--tookpossession of her. In the darkness her head sank lower and lower onher knees. And half an hour passed, while Javette whimpered, andMadame Carlat slumbered, her broad back propped against the wall.
Suddenly Mademoiselle opened her eyes, and saw, three steps below her,a strange man whose upward way she barred. Behind him came Carlat, andbehind him Bigot, lighting both; and in the confusion of her thoughtsas she rose to her feet the three, all staring at her in a commonamazement, seemed a company. The air entering through the open windowbeside her blew the flame of the candle this way and that, and addedto the nightmare character of the scene; for by the shifting light themen seemed to laugh one moment and scowl the next, and their shadowswere now high and now low on the wall. In truth they were as muchamazed at coming on her in that place as she at their appearance; butthey were awake, and she newly roused from sleep; and the advantagewas with them.
"What is it?" she cried in a panic. "What is it?"
"If Mademoiselle will return to her room?" one of the men saidcourteously.
"But--what is it?" She was frightened.
"If Mademoiselle----"
Then she turned without more and went back into the room, and thethree followed, and her woman and Madame Carlat. She stood resting onehand on the table while Javette with shaking fingers lighted thecandles. Then, "Now, monsieur," she said in a hard voice, "if you willtell me your business?"
"You do not know me?" The stranger's eyes dwelt kindly and pitifullyon her.
She looked at him steadily, crushing down the fears which knocked ather heart. "No," she said. "And yet I think I have seen you."
"You saw me a week last Sunday," the stranger answered sorrowfully."My name is La Tribe. I preached that day, Mademoiselle, before theKing of Navarre. I believe that you were there."
For a moment she stared at him in silence, her lips parted. Then shelaughed, a laugh which set the teeth on edge. "Oh, he is clever!" shecried. "He has the wit of the priests! Or the devil! But you come toolate, monsieur! You come too late! The bird has flown."
"Mademoiselle----"
"I tell you the bird has flown!" she repeated vehemently. And herlaugh of joyless triumph rang through the room. "He is clever, but Ihave outwitted him! I have----"
She paused and stared about her wildly, struck by the silence; struck,too, by something solemn, something pitiful in the faces that wereturned on her. And her lip began to quiver. "What?" she muttered. "Whydo you look at me so? He has not"--she turned from one to another--"hehas not been taken?"
"M. Tignonville?"
She nodded.
"He is below."
"Ah!" she said.
They expected to see her break down, perhaps to see her fall. But sheonly groped blindly for a chair and sat. And for a moment there wassilence in the room. It was the Huguenot minister who broke it in atone formal and solemn.
"Listen, all present!" he said slowly. "The ways of God are pastfinding out. For two days in the midst of great perils I have beenpreserved by His hand and fed by His bounty, and I am told that Ishall live if, in this matter, I do the will of those who hold me intheir power. But be assured--and hearken all," he continued, loweringhis voice to a sterner note. "Rather than marry this woman to this managainst her will--if indeed in His sight such marriage can be--ratherthan save my life by such base compliance, I will die not once but tentimes! See. I am ready! I will make no defence!" And he opened hisarms as if to welcome the stroke. "If there be trickery here, if therehas been practising below, where they told me this and that, it shallnot avail! Until I hear from Mademoiselle's own lips that she iswilling, I will not say over her so much as Yea, yea, or Nay, nay!"
"She is willing!"
La Tribe turned sharply, and beheld the speaker. It was CountHannibal, who had entered a few seconds earlier, and had taken hisstand within the door.
"She is willing!" Tavannes repeated quietly. And if, in this moment ofthe fruition of his schemes, he felt his triumph, he masked it under aface of sombre purpose. "Do you doubt me, man?"
"From her own lips!" the other replied, undaunted--and few could sayas much--by that harsh presence. "From no other's!"
"Sirrah, you----"
"I can die. And you can no more, my lord!" the minister answeredbravely. "You have no threat can move me."
"I am not sure of that," Tavannes answered, more blandly. "But had youlistened to me and been less anxious to be brave, M. La Tribe, whereno danger is, you had learned that here is no call for heroics!Mademoiselle is willing, and will tell you so."
"With her own lips?"
Count Hannibal raised his eyebrows. "With her own lips, if you will,"he said. And then, advancing a step and addressing her, with unusualgravity, "Mademoiselle de Vrillac," he said, "you hear what thisgentleman requires. Will you be pleased to confirm what I have said?"
She did not answer, and in the intense silence which held the room inits freezing grasp a woman choked, another broke into weeping. Thecolour ebbed from the cheeks of more than one; the men fidgeted ontheir feet.
Count Hannibal looked round, his head high. "
There is no call fortears," he said; and whether he spoke in irony or in a strangeobtuseness was known only to himself. "Mademoiselle is in nohurry--and rightly--to answer a question so momentous. Under thepressure of utmost peril, she passed her word; the more reason that,now the time has come to redeem it, she should do so at leisure andafter thought. Since she gave her promise, monsieur, she has had morethan one opportunity of evading its fulfilment. But she is a Vrillac,and I know that nothing is farther from her thoughts."
He was silent a moment; and then "Mademoiselle," he said, "I would nothurry you."
Her eyes were closed, but at that her lips moved.
"I am--willing," she whispered. And a fluttering sigh, of relief, ofpity, of God knows what, filled the room.
"You are satisfied, M. La Tribe?"
"I do not----"
"Man!" With a growl as of a tiger, Count Hannibal dropped the mask. Intwo strides he was at the minister's side, his hand gripped hisshoulder; his face, flushed with passion, glared into his. "Will youplay with lives!" he hissed. "If you do not value your own, have youno thought of others? Of these? Look and count! Have you no bowels? Ifshe will save them, will not you?"
"My own I do not value."
"Curse your own!" Tavannes cried in furious scorn. And he shook theother to and fro. "Who thought of your life? Will you doom these? Willyou give them to the butcher?"
"My lord," La Tribe answered, shaken in spite of himself, "if she bewilling----"
"She is willing."
"I have nought to say. But I caught her words indistinctly. Andwithout her consent----
"She shall speak more plainly. Mademoiselle----"
She anticipated him. She had risen, and stood looking straight beforeher, seeing nothing. "I am willing," she muttered with a strangegesture, "if it must be."
He did not answer.
"If it must be," she repeated slowly, and with a heavy sigh. And herchin dropped on her breast. Then, abruptly, suddenly--it was a strangething to see--she looked up. A change as complete as the change whichhad come over Count Hannibal a minute before came over her. She sprangto his side; she clutched his arm and devoured his face with her eyes."You are not deceiving me?" she cried. "You have Tignonville below?You--oh, no, no!" And she fell back from him, her eyes distended, hervoice grown suddenly shrill and defiant, "You have not! You aredeceiving me! He has escaped, and you have lied to me!"
"I?"
"Yes, you have lied to me!" It was the last fierce flicker of hopewhen hope seemed dead: the last clutch of the drowning at the strawthat floated before the eyes.
He laughed harshly. "You will be my wife in five minutes," he said,"and you give me the lie? A week, and you will know me better! Amonth, and--but we will talk of that another time. For the present,"he continued, turning to La Tribe, "do you, sir, tell her that thegentleman is below. Perhaps she will believe you. For you know him."
La Tribe looked at her sorrowfully; his heart bled for her. "I haveseen M. de Tignonville," he said. "And M. le Comte says truly. He isin the same case with ourselves, a prisoner."
"You have seen him?" she wailed.
"I left him in the room below, when I mounted the stairs."
Count Hannibal laughed, the grim mocking laugh which seemed to revelin the pain it inflicted. "Will you have him for a witness?" he cried."There could not be a better, for he will not forget. Shall I fetchhim?"
She bowed her head, shivering. "Spare me that," she said. And shepressed her hands to her eyes while an uncontrollable shudder passedover her frame. Then she stepped forward: "I am ready," she whispered."Do with me as you will!"
* * * * *
When they had all gone out and closed the door behind them, and thetwo whom the minister had joined were left together, Count Hannibalcontinued for a time to pace the room, his hands clasped at his back,and his head sunk somewhat on his chest. His thoughts appeared to runin a new channel, and one, strange to say, widely diverted from hisbride and from that which he had just done. For he did not look herway, or, for a time, speak to her. He stood once to snuff a candle,doing it with an absent face; and once to look, but still absently, asif he read no word of it, at the marriage writing which lay, the inkstill wet, upon the table. After each of these interruptions heresumed his steady pacing to and fro, to and fro, nor did his eyewander once in the direction of her chair.
And she waited. The conflict of emotions, the strife between hope andfear, the final defeat had stunned her; had left her exhausted, almostapathetic. Yet not quite, nor wholly. For when in his walk he came alittle nearer to her, a chill perspiration broke out on her brow, andshudderings crept over her; and when he passed farther from her--andthen only, it seemed--she breathed again. But the change lay beneaththe surface, and cheated the eye. Into her attitude, as she sat, herhands clasped on her lap, her eyes fixed, came no apparent change orshadow of movement.
Suddenly, with a dull shock, she became aware that he was speaking.
"There was need of haste," he said, his tone strangely low and freefrom emotion, "for I am under bond to leave Paris to-morrow forAngers, whither I bear letters from the King. And as matters stood,there was no one with whom I could leave you. I trust Bigot; he isfaithful, and you may trust him, Madame, fair or foul! But he is notquick-witted. Badelon also you may trust. Bear it in mind. Your womanJavette is not faithful; but as her life is guaranteed she must staywith us until she can be securely placed. Indeed, I must take all withme--with one exception--for the priests and monks rule Paris, and theydo not love me, nor would spare aught at my word."
He was silent a few moments. Then he resumed in the same tone, "Youought to know how we, Tavannes, stand. It is by Monsieur and theQueen-Mother; and _contra_ the Guises. We have all been in thismatter; but the latter push and we are pushed, and the old crack willreopen. As it is, I cannot answer for much beyond the reach of my arm.Therefore, we take all with us except M. Tignonville, who desires tobe conducted to the Arsenal."
She had begun to listen with averted eyes. But as he continuedto speak surprise awoke in her, and something stronger thansurprise--amazement, stupefaction. Slowly her eyes came to him, andwhen he ceased to speak, "Why do you tell me these things!" shemuttered, her dry lips framing the words with difficulty.
"Because it behoves you to know them," he answered, thoughtfullytapping the table. "I have no one, save my brother, whom I can trust."
She would not ask him why he trusted her, nor why he thought he couldtrust her. For a moment or two she watched him, while he, with hiseyes lowered, stood in deep thought. At last he looked up and his eyesmet hers. "Come!" he said abruptly and in a different tone, "we mustend this! Is it to be a kiss or a blow between us?"
She rose, though her knees shook under her; and they stood face toface, her face white as paper. "What--do you mean?" she whispered.
"Is it to be a kiss or a blow?" he repeated. "A husband must be alover, Madame, or a master, or both! I am content to be the one or theother, or both, as it shall please you. But the one I will be."
"Then, a thousand times, a blow," she cried, her eyes flaming, "fromyou!"
He wondered at her courage, but he hid his wonder. "So be it!" heanswered. And before she knew what he would be at, he struck hersharply across the cheek with the glove which he held in his hand. Sherecoiled with a low cry, and her cheek blazed scarlet where he hadstruck it. "So be it!" he continued sombrely. "The choice shall beyours, but you will come to me daily for the one or the other. If Icannot be lover, Madame, I will be master. And by this sign I willhave you know it, daily, and daily remember it."
She stared at him, her bosom rising and falling, in an astonishmenttoo deep for words. But he did not heed her. He did not look at heragain. He had already turned to the door, and while she looked hepassed through it, he closed it behind him. And she was alone.
Historical Romances: Under the Red Robe, Count Hannibal, A Gentleman of France Page 33