She saw and heard all this, and more, and reasoned dully on it. But all the time her mind was paralysed by the numbing sense of one great evil awaiting her, of something with which she must presently come face to face, though her faculties had not grasped it yet. Men’s lives! Ah, yes, men’s lives! The girl had been bred a Huguenot. She had been taught to revere the men of the religion, the men whose names were household words; and not the weakness of the cause, not even her lover’s influence, had sapped her loyalty to it.
Presently there was a stir about the table. Some of the men rose. “Then that arrangement meets your views, sire?” said La Nouë.
“I think it is the better suggestion. Let it hold. I sleep to-night at my good friend Mazeau’s,” the king answered, turning to the person he named; “and leave to-morrow about noon by St. Martin’s gate. That is understood, is it? Then let it stand so.”
He did not see — none of them saw — how the girl in the shadow by the stove started; nor did they mark how the last trace of colour fled from her cheeks. She was face to face with her fate now, and knew that her own hand must work it out. The men were separating. Henry had risen and was bidding farewell to one and another; until no more than four or five beside Toussaint and La Nouë remained with him. Then he prepared himself to go, and girt on his sword, talking earnestly the while. Still engaged in low converse with one of the strangers, he walked slowly, lighted by his host to the door; he had forgotten to take leave of the girl. In another minute he and they would have disappeared in the passage, when a hoarse sound escaped from Madeline’s lips.
It was not so much a cry as a groan, but it was enough for men whose nerves were strained to the breaking point. All — at the moment they had their backs to her, their faces to the king — turned swiftly. “Ha!” Henry cried on the instant, “I had forgotten my manners. I was leaving my most faithful sentry without a word of thanks, or a keepsake by which to remember Henry of France.”
She had risen, and was supporting herself — but she swayed as she stood — by the arm of the chair. Never had her lover been so dear to her; never had his faults seemed so small, his love so precious. As the king approached, the light fell on her face, on her agonized eyes, and he stopped short. “Toussaint!” he cried sharply, “your daughter is ill. Look to her!” But it was noticeable that he laid his hand on his sword.
“Stay!” she cried, the word ringing shrilly through the room. “You are betrayed! There is some one — there!” she pointed to the closet— “who has heard — all! All! Oh, sire, mercy! mercy!”
As the last words passed the girl’s writhing lips she clutched at her throat: she seemed to fight a moment for breath, for life: then with a stifled shriek fell in a swoon to the ground.
A second’s silence. Then a whistling sound as half a dozen swords were snatched from the scabbards. The veteran La Nouë sprang to the door: others ran to the windows and stood before them. Only Henry — after a swift glance at Toussaint, who, pale and astonished, leaned over his daughter — stood still, his fingers on his hilt. Another second of suspense, and before any one spoke, the cupboard door swung slowly open, and Felix Portail, pale to the lips, stood before them.
“What do you here?” cried Henry, restraining by a gesture those who would have instantly flung themselves upon the spy.
“I came to see her,” Felix said. He was quite calm, but a perspiration cold as death stood on his brow, and his dilated eyes wandered from one to another. “You surprised me. Toussaint knows — that I was her sweetheart,” he murmured.
“Ay, wretched man, you came to see her! And for what else?” Henry replied, his eyes, as a rule, so kindly, bent on the other in a gaze fixed and relentless.
A sudden visible quiver — as it were the agony of death — shot through Portail’s frame. He opened his mouth, but for a while no sound came. His eyes sought the nearest sword with a horrid side-glance. “Kill me at once,” he gasped, “before she — before — —”
He never finished the sentence. With an oath the nearest Huguenot lunged at his breast, and fell back foiled by a blow from the king’s hand. “Back!” cried Henry, his eyes flashing as another sprang forward, and would have done the work. “Will you trench on the King’s justice in his presence? Sheath your swords, all save the Sieur de la Nouë, and the gentlemen who guard the windows!”
“He must die!” several voices cried; and two men still pressed forward viciously.
“Think, sire! Think what you do,” cried La Nouë himself, warning in his voice. “He has in his hand the life of every man here! And they are your men, risking all for the crown.”
“True,” Henry replied smiling; “but I ask no man to run a risk I will not take myself.”
A murmur of dissatisfaction burst forth. Several who had sheathed, drew their swords again. “I have a wife and child!” cried one, bringing his point to the thrust. “He dies!”
“He dies!” cried another following his example. And the two pressed forward.
“He does not die!” exclaimed the King, his voice so ringing through the room that all fell back once more; fell back not so much because it was the king who spoke as in obedience to the voice which two years before had rallied the flying squadrons at Arques, and years before that had rung out hour after hour and day after day above the long street fight of Cahors. “He does not die!” repeated Henry, looking from one to another, with his chin thrust out, and his eyes glittering. “France speaks, dare any contradict. Surely, my masters, there are no traitors here!”
“Your majesty,” said La Nouë after a moment’s pause, “commands our lives.”
“Thanks, Francis,” Henry replied, instantly changing his tone. “And now hear me, gentlemen. Think you that it was a light thing in this girl to give up her lover? She might have let us go to our doom, and we none the wiser! Would you take her gift and make her no requital? That were not just! That were not royal! That cannot the King of France do! And now for you, sir” — he turned with another manner to Felix, who was leaning half-fainting against the wall— “hearken to me. You shall go free. I, who this morning played the son to your dead father, I give you your life for your sweetheart’s sake. For her sake be true. You shall go out alive and safe into the streets of Paris, which five minutes ago you little thought to see again. The girl you love has ransomed you: go therefore and be worthy of her. Or if I am wrong, if you still will betray me — still go! Go to be damned to all eternity! Go, to leave a name that shall live for centuries — and stand for treachery!”
He spoke the last words with such scorn that a murmur of applause broke out even among those stern men. He took instant advantage of it. “Now go!” he said hurriedly. “You can take the girl with you. She has but fainted. A kiss will bring her to life. Go, and, as you love, be silent.”
The man took up his burden and went, trembling; still unable to speak. But no hand was now raised to stop him.
When he had disappeared, La Nouë turned to the king. “You will not now sleep at Mazeau’s, sire?”
Henry rubbed his chin. “Yes; let the plan stand,” he answered after a brief pause. “If he betray one, he shall betray all.”
“But this is madness,” La Nouë urged.
The King shook his head, and smiling, clapped the veteran on the shoulder. “Not so,” he said. “The man is no traitor: I say it. And you have never met with a longer head than Henry’s.”
“Never,” assented La Nouë bluntly, “save when there is a woman in it!”
The curtain falls. The men have lived and are dead. La Nouë, the Huguenot Bayard, now exists only in a dusty memoir and a page of Motley. Madame de Montpensier is forgotten; all of her, save her golden scissors. Mayenne, D’Aumale, a verse preserves their names. Only Henry — the “good King,” as generations of French peasants called him — remains a living figure: his strength and weakness, his sins and virtues, as well known, as thoroughly appreciated by thousands now as in the days of his life.
It follows that we cannot hope to
learn much of the fortunes of people so insignificant — save for that moment when the fate of a nation hung on their breath — as the Portails and Toussaints. We do know that Felix proved worthy. For though the attack on Paris which was planned at Toussaint’s house, failed, it did not fail through treachery. And we know that Felix married Madeline, and that Adrian won Marie: but no more. Unless certain Portails now living in various parts of the world, whose ancestors left France at the time of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, are their descendants. And certainly it is curious that in these families it is not rare to find the eldest son bearing the name of Henry, and the second of Felix.
THE KING’S STRATAGEM
In the days when Henry the Fourth of France was as yet King of Navarre only, and in that little kingdom of hills and woods which occupies the south-western corner of the larger country, was with difficulty supporting the Huguenot cause against the French court and the Catholic League — in the days when every little moated town, from the Dordogne to the Pyrenees, was a bone of contention between the young king and the crafty queen-mother, Catherine de Medicis, a conference between these warring personages took place in the picturesque town of La Réole. And great was the fame of it.
La Réole still rises grey, time-worn, and half-ruined on a lofty cliff above the broad green waters of the Garonne, forty odd miles from Bordeaux. It is a small place now, but in the days of which we are speaking it was important, strongly fortified, and guarded by a castle which looked down on some hundreds of red-tiled roofs, rising in terraces from the river. As the meeting-place of the two sovereigns it was for the time as gay as Paris itself. Catherine had brought with her a bevy of fair maids of honour, and trusted more perhaps in the effect of their charms than in her own diplomacy. But the peaceful appearance of the town was as delusive as the smooth bosom of the Gironde; for even while every other house in its streets rang with music and silvery laughter, each party was ready to fly to arms at a word if it saw that any advantage could be gained thereby.
On an evening shortly before the end of the conference two men were seated at play in a room, the deep-embrasured window of which looked down from a considerable height upon the river. The hour was late; below them the town lay silent. Outside, the moonlight fell bright and pure on sleeping fields, on vineyards, and dark far-spreading woods. Within the room a silver lamp suspended from the ceiling threw light upon the table, but left the farther parts of the chamber in shadow. The walls were hung with faded tapestry, and on a low bedstead in one corner lay a handsome cloak, a sword, and one of the clumsy pistols of the period. Across a high-backed chair lay another cloak and sword, and on the window seat, beside a pair of saddle-bags, were strewn half a dozen trifles such as soldiers carried from camp to camp — a silver comfit-box, a jewelled dagger, a mask, a velvet cap.
The faces of the players, as they bent over the cards, were in shadow. One — a slight, dark man of middle height, with a weak chin — and a mouth that would have equally betrayed its weakness had it not been shaded by a dark moustache — seemed, from the occasional oaths which he let drop, to be losing heavily. Yet his opponent, a stouter and darker man, with a sword-cut across his left temple, and the swaggering air that has at all times marked the professional soldier, showed no signs of triumph or elation. On the contrary, though he kept silence, or spoke only a formal word or two, there was a gleam of anxiety and suppressed excitement in his eyes; and more than once he looked keenly at his companion, as if to judge of his feelings or to learn whether the time had come for some experiment which he meditated. But for this, an observer looking in through the window would have taken the two for that common conjunction — the hawk and the pigeon.
At last the younger player threw down his cards with an exclamation.
“You have the luck of the evil one,” he said, bitterly. “How much is that?”
“Two thousand crowns,” the other replied without emotion. “You will play no more?”
“No! I wish to heaven I had never played at all!” was the answer. As he spoke the loser rose, and moving to the window stood looking out. For a few moments the elder man remained in his seat, gazing furtively at him; at length he too rose, and, stepping softly to his companion, he touched him on the shoulder. “Your pardon a moment, M. le Vicomte,” he said. “Am I right in concluding that the loss of this sum will inconvenience you?”
“A thousand fiends!” the young gamester exclaimed, turning on him wrathfully. “Is there any man whom the loss of two thousand crowns would not inconvenience? As for me — —”
“For you,” the other continued smoothly, filling up the pause, “shall I be wrong in supposing that it means something like ruin?”
“Well, sir, and if it does?” the young man retorted; and he drew himself up, his cheek a shade paler with passion. “Depend upon it you shall be paid. Do not be afraid of that!”
“Gently, gently, my friend,” the winner answered, his patience in strong contrast to the other’s violence. “I had no intention of insulting you, believe me. Those who play with the Vicomte de Noirterre are not wont to doubt his honour. I spoke only in your own interest. It has occurred to me, Vicomte, that the matter may be arranged at less cost to yourself.”
“How?” was the curt question.
“May I speak freely?” The Vicomte shrugged his shoulders, and the other, taking silence for consent, proceeded: “You, Vicomte, are governor of Lusigny for the King of Navarre; I, of Créance, for the King of France. Our towns lie but three leagues apart. Could I by any chance, say on one of these fine nights, make myself master of Lusigny, it would be worth more than two thousand crowns to me. Do you understand?”
“No,” the young man answered slowly, “I do not.”
“Think over what I have said, then,” was the brief answer.
For a full minute there was silence in the room. The Vicomte gazed from the window with knitted brows and compressed lips, while his companion, seated near at hand, leant back in his chair, with an air of affected carefulness. Outside, the rattle of arms and hum of voices told that the watch were passing through the street. The church bell rang one o’clock. Suddenly the Vicomte burst into a forced laugh, and, turning, took up his cloak and sword. “The trap was well laid, M. le Capitaine,” he said almost jovially; “but I am still sober enough to take care of myself — and of Lusigny. I wish you good night. You shall have your money, do not fear.”
“Still, I am afraid it will cost you dearly,” the Captain answered, as he rose and moved towards the door to open it for his guest. And then, when his hand was already on the latch, he paused. “My lord,” he said, “what do you say to this, then? I will stake the two thousand crowns you have lost to me, and another thousand to boot — against your town. Oh, no one can hear us. If you win you go off a free man with my thousand. If you lose, you put me in possession — one of these fine nights. Now, that is an offer. What do you say to it? A single game to decide.”
The younger man’s face reddened. He turned; his eyes sought the table and the cards; he stood irresolute. The temptation came at an unfortunate moment; a moment when the excitement of play had given way to depression, and he saw nothing outside the door, on the latch of which his hand was laid, but the bleak reality of ruin. The temptation to return, the thought that by a single hand he might set himself right with the world, was too much for him. Slowly — he came back to the table. “Confound you!” he said passionately. “I think you are the devil himself!”
“Don’t talk child’s talk!” the other answered coldly, drawing back as his victim advanced. “If you do not like the offer you need not take it.”
But the young man was a born gambler, and his fingers had already closed on the cards. Picking them up idly he dropped them once, twice, thrice on the table, his eyes gleaming with the play-fever. “If I win?” he said doubtfully. “What then? Let us have it quite clearly.”
“You carry away a thousand crowns,” the Captain answered quietly. “If you lose you contrive to le
ave one of the gates of Lusigny open for me before next full moon. That is all.”
“And what if I lose, and do not pay the forfeit?” the Vicomte asked, laughing weakly.
“I trust to your honour,” the Captain answered. And, strange as it may seem, he knew his man. The young noble of the day might betray his cause and his trust, but the debt of honour incurred at play was binding on him.
“Well,” said the Vicomte, with a deep breath, “I agree. Who is to deal?”
“As you will,” the Captain replied, masking under an appearance of indifference the excitement which darkened his cheek, and caused the pulse in the old wound on his face to beat furiously.
“Then do you deal,” said the Vicomte.
“With your permission,” the Captain assented. And gathering the cards he dealt them with a practised hand, and pushed his opponent’s six across to him.
The young man took up the hand and, as he sorted it, and looked from it to his companion’s face, he repressed a groan with difficulty. The moonlight shining through the casement fell in silvery sheen on a few feet of the floor. With the light something of the silence and coolness of the night entered also, and appealed to him. For a few seconds he hesitated. He made even as if he would have replaced the hand on the table. But he had gone too far to retrace his steps with honour. It was too late, and with a muttered word, which his dry lips refused to articulate, he played the first card.
Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman Page 799