Читать книгу An Enemy to the King - Robert Neilson Stephens - Страница 11

It was already dark when I started, on the evening appointed, for the house indicated by Mlle. d'Arency. I went without attendance, as was my custom, relying on my sword, my alertness of eye, and my nimbleness of foot. I had engaged a lackey, for whose honesty De Rilly had vouched, but he was now absent on a journey to La Tournoire, whither I had sent him with a message to my old steward. I have often wondered at the good fortune which preserved me from being waylaid, by thieving rascals, on my peregrinations, by night, through Paris streets. About this very time several gentlemen, who went well attended, were set upon and robbed almost within sight of the quarters of the provost's watch; and some of these lost their lives as well as the goods upon their persons. Yet I went fearlessly, and was never even threatened with attack.

On the way to the house, I reviewed, for the hundredth time, the conversation in the church. There were different conjectures to be made. Mlle. d'Arency may have made that surprising request merely to convince me that she did not love De Noyard, and intending, subsequently, to withdraw it; or it may have sprung from a caprice, a desire to ascertain how far I was at her bidding—women have, thoughtlessly, set men such tasks from mere vanity, lacking the sympathy to feel how precious to its owner is any human life other than their own;—or she may have had some substantial reason to desire his death, something to gain by it, something to lose through his continuing to live. Perhaps she had encouraged his love and had given him a promise from which his death would be the means of release easiest to her—for women will, sometimes, to secure the smallest immunity for themselves, allow the greatest calamities to others. This arises less from an active cruelty than from a lack of imagination, an inability to suppose themselves in the places of others. I soon felt the uselessness of searching, in my own mind, for the motive of Mlle. d'Arency's desire, or pretence of desire, for the death of De Noyard. What had passed between them I could not guess. So, after the manner of youth, I gave up the question, satisfied with knowing that I had before me an interview with a charming woman, and willing to wait for disclosures until events should offer them.

The street in which the house was situated was entirely dark and deserted when I stepped into it. The house was wider than its neighbors, and each of its upper stories had two chambers overlooking the street. At the window of one of these chambers, on the second story, a light shone. It was the only light visible in any of the houses, all of which frowned down menacingly; and hence it was like a beacon, a promise of cheer and warmth in the midst of this black, cold Paris.

I knocked three times on the street door, as she had directed me. Presently the wicket at the side of the door was opened, and a light was held up to it, that my face might be seen by a pair of eyes that peered out through the aperture. A moment later the bolts of the door were drawn, and I was let in by the possessor of the eyes. This was the elderly woman who always attended Mlle. d'Arency when the latter was abroad from the palace. She had invariably shown complete indifference to me, not appearing aware of my existence, and this time she said only:

"This way, monsieur."

Protecting the flame of her lamp with her hand, she led me forward to a narrow staircase and we ascended, stopping at a landing on which opened the second story chamber whose street window had shone with light. She gave three knocks at the door of this chamber. At the last knock, her lamp went out.

"Curse the wind!" she muttered.

So I stood with her, on the landing, in darkness, expecting the door in front of me to open, immediately, and admit me to the lighted chamber.

Suddenly I heard a piercing scream from within the chamber. It was the voice of Mlle. d'Arency.

"Help! Help!" she cried. "My God, he will kill me!"

This was followed by one long series of screams, and I could hear her running about the chamber as though she were fleeing from a pursuer.

I stood for an instant, startled.

"Good God!" cried the old woman at my elbow. "An assassin! Her enemies have planned it! Monsieur, save her life!"

And the dame began pounding on the door, as if to break into the room to assist her mistress.

I needed no more than this example. Discovering that the door was locked on the inside, and assuming that Mlle. d'Arency, in the flight which she maintained around the room, could not get an opportunity to draw the bolt, I threw my weight forward, and sent the door flying open on its hinges.

To my astonishment, the chamber was in complete darkness. Mlle. d'Arency had doubtless knocked the light over in her movements around the room.

She was still screaming at the top of her voice, and running from one side to another. The whiteness of the robe she wore made it possible to descry her in the absence of light.

I stood for a second, just inside the threshold, and drew my sword. At first, I could not see by whom or what she was threatened; but I heard heavy footsteps, as of some one following her in her wild course about the place. Then I made out, vaguely, the figure of a man.

"Fear not, mademoiselle!" I cried.

"Oh, monsieur!" she screamed. "Save me! Save my life!"

I thrust my sword at the figure of the man. An ejaculation of pain told me that it touched flesh. A second later, I heard a sword slide from its scabbard, and felt the wind of a wild thrust in my direction.

At this moment, Mlle. d'Arency appeared between me and the street window of the room. There was enough light from the sky to enable her head and shoulders to stand out darkly against the space of the window. Her head was moving with the violent coming and going of her breath, and her shoulders were drawn up in an attitude of the greatest fright. Is it any wonder that I did not stop to ascertain who or what her assailant might be, or how he had come there? I could make out only that the man in the darkness was a large and heavy one, and wielded a swift blade. All other thoughts were lost in the immediate necessity of dealing with him. The extreme terror that she showed gave me a sense of his being a formidable antagonist; the prompt response that he had given to my own thrust showed that he was not to be quelled by a mere command. In fine, there was nothing to do but fight him as best I could in the blackness; and I was glad for so early an opportunity to show Mlle. d'Arency how ready I was to do battle for her when I found her threatened with danger.

From the absence of any sound or other demonstration, except what was made by Mlle. d'Arency and the man and myself, I knew that we three were the only ones in the room. The elderly woman had not entered with me—a fact whose strangeness, in view of the great desire she had first evinced to reach her mistress's side, did not occur to me until afterward.

I made another thrust at the man, but, despite the darkness, he parried it with his sword; and a quick backward step was all that saved me from his prompt reply. Angered at having to give ground in the presence of the lady, I now attacked in turn, somewhat recklessly, but with such good luck as to drive him back almost to the window. Mlle. d'Arency gave another terrified scream when he came near her, and she ran past me towards the door of the apartment. Both my antagonist and myself were now beginning to have a clearer impression of each other's outlines, and there was sharp sword-work between us by the window. As we stood there, breathing rapidly with our exertion and excitement, I heard the door close through which I had entered. I knew from this that Mlle. d'Arency had left the chamber, and I was glad that she was out of danger. It was natural that she should close the door, instinct impelling her to put any possible barrier between her assailant and herself.

The man and myself were alone together to maintain the fight which, having once entered, and being roused to the mood of contest, I had no thought of discontinuing now that Mlle. d'Arency was out of immediate danger. It had reached a place at which it could be terminated only by the disarming, the death, or the disabling of one of us.

I gradually acquired the power of knowing all my opponent's movements, despite the darkness. I supposed that he was equipped with dagger as well as with sword, but as he made no move to draw the shorter weapon, I did not have recourse to mine. Though I would not take an advantage over him, even in the circumstances, yet I was not willing to be at a disadvantage. Therefore, as he was not encumbered with cloak or mantle, I employed a breathing moment to tear off my own cloak and throw it aside, not choosing to use it on my left arm as a shield unless he had been similarly guarded.

So we lunged and parried in the darkness, making no sound but by our heavy breathing and an occasional ejaculation and the tramping of our feet, the knocking of our bodies against unseen pieces of furniture, and the clashing of our blades when they met. Each of us fenced cautiously at times, and at times took chances recklessly.

Finally, in falling back, he came to a sudden stop against a table, and the collision disturbed for an instant his control over his body. In that instant I felt a soft resistance encounter my sword and yield to it. At once, with a feeling of revulsion, I drew my sword out of the casing that his flesh had provided, and stood back. Something wet and warm sprinkled my face. The man gave a low moan and staggered sideways over towards the window. Then he plunged forward on his face. I stooped beside him and turned him over on his back, wetting my gloves with the blood that gushed from his wound and soaked his doublet. At that moment a splash of moonlight appeared on the floor, taking the shape of the window. His head and shoulders lay in this illumined space. I sprang back in horror, crying out his name:

"De Noyard! My God, it is you!"

"Yes, monsieur," he gasped, "it is De Noyard. I have been trapped. I ought to have suspected."

"But I do not understand, monsieur. Surely you could not have attacked

Mlle. d'Arency?"

"Attacked her! I came here by her appointment!"

"But her cry for help?"

"It took me by complete surprise. There was a knock on the door—"

"Yes—mine. I, too, came by her appointment!"

"Mademoiselle instantly put out the light and began to scream. I thought that the knock frightened her; then that she was mad. I followed to calm her. You entered; you know the rest."

"But what does it mean?"

"Can you not see?" he said, with growing faintness. "We have been tricked—I, by her pretense of love and by this appointment, to my death; you, by a similar appointment and her screams, to make yourself my slayer. I ought to have known! she belongs to Catherine, to the Queen-mother. Alas, monsieur! easily fooled is he who loves a woman!"

Then I remembered what De Rilly had told me—that De Noyard's counsels to the Duke of Guise were an obstacle to Catherine's design of conciliating that powerful leader, who aspired to the throne on which her son was seated.

"No, no, monsieur!" I cried, unwilling to admit Mlle. d'Arency capable of such a trick, or myself capable of being so duped. "It cannot be that; if they had desired your death, they would have hired assassins to waylay you."

Yet I knew that he was right. The strange request that Mlle. d'Arency had made of me in the church was now explained.

A kind of smile appeared, for a moment, on De Noyard's face, struggling with his expression of weakness and pain.

"Who would go to the expense of hiring assassins," he said, "when honest gentlemen can be tricked into doing the work for nothing? Moreover, when you hire assassins, you take the risk of their selling your secret to the enemy. They are apt to leave traces, too, and the secret instigator of a deed may defeat its object by being found out."

"Then I have to thank God that you are not dead. You will recover, monsieur."

"I fear not, my son. I do not know how much blood I lose at every word I speak. Parbleu! you have the art of making a mighty hole with that toy of yours, monsieur!"

This man, so grave and severe in the usual affairs of life, could take on a tone of pleasantry while enduring pain and facing death.

"Monsieur," I cried, in great distress, "you must not die. I will save you. I shall go for a surgeon. Oh, my God, monsieur, tell me what to do to save your life!"

"You will find my lackeys, two of them, at the cabaret at the next corner. It is closed, but knock hard and call for Jacques. Send him to me, and the other for a surgeon."

De Noyard was manifestly growing weaker, and he spoke with great difficulty. Not daring to trust to any knowledge of my own as to immediate or temporary treatment of his wound, I made the greatest haste to follow his directions. I ran out of the chamber, down the stairs, and out to the street, finding the doors neither locked nor barred, and meeting no human being. Mlle. d'Arency and her companion had silently disappeared.

I went, in my excitement, first to the wrong corner. Then, discovering my blunder, I retraced my steps, and at last secured admittance to the place where De Noyard's valets tarried.

To the man who opened the door, I said, "Are you Jacques, the serving-man of Monsieur de Noyard?"

"I am nobody's serving man," was the reply, in a tone of indignation; but a second man who had come to the door spoke up, "I am Jacques."

"Hallo, Monsieur de la Tournoire," came a voice from a group of men seated at a table. "Come and join us, and show my friends how you fellows of the French Guards can drink!"

It was De Rilly, very merry with wine.

"I cannot, De Rilly," I replied, stepping into the place. "I have very important business elsewhere." Then I turned to Jacques and said, quietly, "Go, at once, to your master, and send your comrade for a surgeon to follow you there. Do you know the house in which he is?"

The servant made no answer, but turned pale. "Come!" he said to another servant, who had joined him from an obscure corner of the place. The two immediately lighted torches and left, from which fact I inferred that Jacques knew where to find his master.

"What is all this mystery?" cried De Rilly, jovially, rising and coming over to me, while the man who had opened the door, and who was evidently the host, closed it and moved away. "Come, warm yourself with a bottle! Why, my friend, you are as white as a ghost, and you look as if you had been perspiring blood!"

"I must go, at once, De Rilly. It is a serious matter."

"Then hang me if I don't come, too!" he said, suddenly sobered, and he grasped his cloak and sword. "That is, unless I should be de trop."

"Come. I thank you," I said; and we left the place together.

"Whose blood is it?" asked De Rilly, as we hurried along the narrow street, back to the house.

"That of M. de Noyard."

"What? A duel?"

"A kind of duel—a strange mistake!

"The devil! Won't the Queen-mother give thanks! And won't the Duke of

Guise be angry!"

"M. de Noyard is not dead yet. His wound may not be fatal."

I led the way into the house and up the steps to the apartment. It was now lighted up by the torch which Jacques had brought. De Noyard was still lying in the position in which he had been when I left him. The servant stood beside him, looking down at his face, and holding the torch so as to light up the features.

"How do you feel now, monsieur?" I asked, hastening forward.

There was no answer. The servant raised his eyes to me, and said, in a tone of unnatural calmness, "Do you not see that he is dead, M. de la Tournoire?"

Horror-stricken, I knelt beside the body. The heart no longer beat; the face was still—the eyes stared between unquivering lids, in the light of the torch.

"Oh, my God! I have killed him!" I murmured.

"Come away. You can do nothing here," said De Rilly, quietly. He caught me by the shoulder, and led me out of the room.

"Let us leave this neighborhood as soon as possible," he said, as we descended the stairs. "It is most unfortunate that the valet knows your name. He heard me speak it at the tavern, and he will certainly recall also that I hailed you as one of the French Guards."

"Why is that unfortunate?" I asked, still deprived of thought by the horror of having killed so honorable a gentleman, who had not harmed me.

"Because he can let the Duke of Guise know exactly on whom to seek vengeance for the death of De Noyard."

"The Duke of Guise will seek vengeance?" I asked, mechanically, as we emerged from that fatal house, and turned our backs upon it.

"Assuredly. He will demand your immediate punishment. You must bespeak the King's pardon as soon as possible. That is necessary, to protect oneself, when one has killed one's antagonist in a duel. The edicts still forbid duels, and one may be made to pay for a victory with one's life, if the victim's friends demand the enforcement of the law—as in this case the Duke of Guise surely will demand."

"M. de Quelus can, doubtless, get me the King's pardon," I said, turning my mind from the past to the future, from regret to apprehension. The necessity of considering my situation prevented me from contemplating, at that time, the perfidy of Mlle. d'Arency, the blindness with which I had let myself be deceived, or the tragic and humiliating termination of my great love affair.

"If M. de Quelus is with you, you are safe from the authorities. You will then have only to guard against assassination at the hands of Guise's followers."

"I shall go to M. de Quelus early in the morning," I said.

"By all means. And you will not go near your lodgings until you have assured your safety against arrest. You must reach the King before the Duke can see him; for the Duke will not fail to hint that, in killing De Noyard, you were the instrument of the King or of the Queen-mother. To disprove that, the King would have to promise the Duke to give you over to the authorities. And now that I think of it, you must make yourself safe before the Queen-mother learns of this affair, for she will advise the King to act in such a way that the Duke cannot accuse him of protecting you. My friend, it suddenly occurs to me that you have got into a rather deep hole!"

"De Rilly," I asked, with great concern, "do you think that I was the instrument of Catherine de Medici in this?"

"Certainly not!" was the emphatic answer. "The fight was about a woman, was it not?"

"A woman was the cause of it," I answered, with a heavy sigh. "But how do you know?"

"To tell the truth," he said, "many people have been amused to see you make soft eyes at a certain lady, and to see De Noyard do likewise. Neither young men like you, nor older men like him, can conceal these things."

Thus I saw that even De Rilly did not suspect the real truth, and this showed me how deep was the design of which I had been the tool. Everybody would lay the quarrel to rivalry in love. The presence of so manifest a cause would prevent people from hitting on the truth. Mlle. d'Arency had trusted to my youth, agility, and supposed skill to give me the victory in that fight in the dark; and then to circumstances to disclose who had done the deed. "It was De Noyard's jealous rival," everybody would say. Having found a sufficient motive, no one would take the trouble to seek the real source—to trace the affair to the instigation of Catherine de Medici. The alert mind of De Rilly, it is true, divining the equally keen mind of the Duke of Guise, had predicted that Guise might pretend a belief in such instigation, and so force the King to avenge De Noyard, in self-vindication. Mlle. d'Arency well knew that I would not incriminate a woman, even a perfidious one, and counted also on my natural unwillingness to reveal myself as the dupe that I had been. Moreover, it would not be possible for me to tell the truth in such a way that it would appear probable. And what would I gain by telling the truth? The fact would remain that I was the slayer of De Noyard, and, by accusing the instigators, I would but compel them to demonstrate non-complicity; which they could do only by clamoring for my punishment. And how could I prove that things were not exactly as they had appeared—that the woman's screams were not genuine: that she was not actually threatened by De Noyard? Clearly as I saw the truth, clearly as De Noyard had seen it in his last moments, it could never be established by evidence.

With bitter self-condemnation, and profound rancor against the woman whose tool I had been, I realized what an excellent instrument she had found for her purpose of ridding her mistress of an obstacle.

It was not certain that the King, himself, had been privy to his mother's design of causing De Noyard's death. In such matters she often acted without consulting him. Therefore, when De Quelus should present my case to him as merely that of a duel over a love affair, Henri would perhaps give me his assurances of safety, at once, and would hold himself bound in honor to stand by them. All depended on securing these before Catherine or the Duke of Guise should have an opportunity to influence him to another course.

I felt, as I walked along with De Rilly, that, if I should obtain immunity from the punishment prescribed by edict, I could rely on myself for protection against any private revenge that the Duke of Guise might plan.

De Rilly took me to a lodging in the Rue de L'Autruche, not far from my own, which was in the Rue St. Honore. Letting myself be commanded entirely by him, I went to bed, but not to sleep. I was anxious for morning to come, that I might be off to the Louvre. I lay speculating on the chances of my seeing De Quelus, and of his undertaking to obtain the King's protection for me. Though appalled at what I had done, I had no wish to die—the youth in me cried for life; and the more I desired life, the more fearful I became of failing to get De Quelus's intercession.

I grew many years older in that night. In a single flash, I had beheld things hitherto unknown to me: the perfidy of which a woman was capable, the falseness of that self-confidence and vanity which may delude a man into thinking himself the conqueror of a woman's heart, the danger of going, carelessly, on in a suspicious matter without looking forward to possible consequences. I saw the folly of thoughtlessness, of blind self-confidence, of reckless trust in the honesty of others and the luck of oneself. I had learned the necessity of caution, of foresight, of suspicion; and perhaps I should have to pay for the lesson with my life.

Turning on the bed, watching the window for the dawn, giving in my mind a hundred different forms to the account with which I should make De Quelus acquainted with the matter, I passed the most of that night. At last, I fell asleep, and dreamt that I had told De Quelus my story, and he had brought me the King's pardon; again, that I was engaged in futile efforts to approach him; again, that De Noyard had come to life. When De Rilly awoke me, it was broad daylight.

I dressed, and so timed my movements as to reach the Louvre at the hour when De Quelus would be about to officiate at the King's rising. De Rilly left me at the gate, wishing me good fortune. He had to go to oversee the labors of some grooms in the King's stables. One of the guards of the gate sent De Quelus my message. I stood, in great suspense, awaiting the answer, fearing at every moment to see the Duke of Guise ride into the Place du Louvre on his way to crave an interview with the King.

At last a page came across the court with orders that I be admitted, and I was soon waiting in a gallery outside the apartments of the chamberlains. After a time that seemed very long, De Quelus came out to me, with a look of inquiry on his face.

Ignoring the speech I had prepared for the occasion, I broke abruptly into the matter.

"M. de Quelus," I said, "last night, in a sudden quarrel which arose out of a mistake, I was so unfortunate as to kill M. de Noyard. It was neither a duel nor a murder—each of us seemed justified in attacking the other."

De Quelus did not seem displeased to hear of De Noyard's death.

"What evidence is there against you?" he asked.

"That of M. de Noyard's servant, to whom I acknowledged that I had killed his master. Other evidence may come up. What I have come to beg is your intercession with the King—"

"I understand," he said, without much interest. "I shall bring up the matter before the King leaves his bed."

"When may I expect to know?" I asked, not knowing whether to be reassured or alarmed at his indifference.

"Wait outside the King's apartments. I am going there now," he replied.

I followed him, saw him pass into the King's suite, and had another season of waiting. This was the longest and the most trying. I stood, now tapping the floor with my foot, now watching the halberdiers at the curtained door, while they glanced indifferently at me. Various officers of the court, whose duty or privilege it was to attend the King's rising, passed in, none heeding me or guessing that I waited there for the word on which my life depended. I examined the tapestry over and over again, noticing, particularly, the redoubtable expression of a horseman with lance in rest, and wondering how he had ever emerged from the tower behind him, of which the gateway was half his size.

A page came out of the doorway through which De Quelus had disappeared.

Did he bring word to me? No. He glanced at me casually, and passed on,

leaving the gallery at the other end. Presently he returned, preceding

Marguerite, the Queen of Navarre, whom he had gone to summon.

"More trouble in the royal family," I said to myself. The King must have scented another plot, to have summoned his sister before the time for the petite levée. I feared that this would hinder his consideration of my case.

Suddenly a tall figure, wearing a doublet of cloth of silver, gray velvet breeches, gray mantle, and gray silk stockings, strode rapidly through the gallery, and curtly commanded the usher to announce him. While awaiting the usher's return, he stood still, stroking now his light mustaches, and now his fine, curly blonde beard, which was little more than delicate down on his chin. As his glance roved over the gallery it fell for a moment on me, but he did not know me, and his splendid blue eyes turned quickly away. His face had a pride, a nobility, a subtlety that I never saw united in another. He was four inches more than six feet high, slender, and of perfect proportion, erect, commanding, and in the flower of youth. How I admired him, though my heart sank at the sight of him; for I knew he had come to demand my death! It was the Duke of Guise. Presently the curtains parted, he passed in, and they fell behind him.

And now my heart beat like a hammer on an anvil. Had De Quelus forgotten me?

Again the curtains parted. Marguerite came out, but this time entirely alone. As soon as she had passed the halberdiers, her eyes fell on me, but she gave no sign of recognition. When she came near me, she said, in a low tone, audible to me alone, and without seeming to be aware of my presence:

"Follow me. Make no sign—your life depends on it!"

She passed on, and turned out of the gallery towards her own apartments. For a moment I stood motionless; then, with a kind of instinctive sense of what ought to be done, for all thought seemed paralyzed within me, I made as if to return to the chamberlains' apartments, from which I had come. Reaching the place where Marguerite's corridor turned off, I pretended for an instant to be at a loss which way to go; then I turned in the direction taken by Marguerite. If the halberdiers, at the entrance to the King's apartments, saw me do this, they could but think I had made a mistake, and it was not their duty to come after me. Should I seek to intrude whither I had no right of entrance, I should encounter guards to hinder me.

Marguerite had waited for me in the corridor, out of sight of the halberdiers.

"Quickly, monsieur!" she said, and glided rapidly on. She led me boldly to her own apartments and through two or three chambers, passing, on the way, guards, pages, and ladies in waiting, before whom I had the wit to assume the mien of one who was about to do some service for her, and had come to receive instructions. So my entrance seemed to pass as nothing remarkable. At last we entered a cabinet, where I was alone with her. She opened the door of a small closet.

"Monsieur," she said, "conceal yourself in this closet until I return. I am going to be present at the petite levée of the King. Do not stir, for they will soon be searching the palace, with orders for your arrest. Had you not come after me, at once, two of the Scotch Guards would have found you where you waited. I slipped out while they were listening to the orders that my mother added to the King's."

I fell on my knee, within the closet.

"Madame," I said, trembling with gratitude, "you are more than a queen.

You are an angel of goodness."

"No; I am merely a woman who does not forget an obligation. I have heard, from one of my maids, who heard it from a friend of yours, how you knocked a too inquisitive person into the moat beneath my window. I had to burn the rope that was used that night, but I have since procured another, which may have to be put to a similar purpose!"

And, with a smile, she shut the closet door upon me.