Historical Romances: Under the Red Robe, Count Hannibal, A Gentleman of France

by Stanley John Weyman

  CHAPTER XI.

  THE MAN AT THE DOOR.

  There are some things, not shameful in themselves, which it shames oneto remember, and among these I count the succeeding hurry andperturbation of that night: the vain search, without hope or clue, towhich passion impelled me, and the stubborn persistence with which Irushed frantically from place to place long after the soberness ofreason would have had me desist. There was not, it seems to me,looking back now, one street or alley, lane or court, in Blois which Idid not visit again and again in my frantic wanderings; not a beggarskulking on foot that night whom I did not hunt down and question; nota wretched woman sleeping in arch or doorway whom I did not see andscrutinise. I returned to my mother's lodging again and again, alwaysfruitlessly. I rushed to the stables and rushed away again, or stoodand listened in the dark, empty stalls, wondering what had happened,and torturing myself with suggestions of this or that. And everywhere,not only at the North-gate, where I interrogated the porters and foundthat no party resembling that which I sought had passed out, but onthe _parvis_ of the Cathedral, where a guard was drawn up, and in thecommon streets, where I burst in on one group and another with myqueries, I ran the risk of suspicion and arrest, and all that mightfollow thereon.

  It was strange indeed that I escaped arrest. The wound in my chinstill bled at intervals, staining my doublet; and as I was without mycloak, which I had left in the house in the Rue Valois, I had nothingto cover my disordered dress. I was keenly, fiercely anxious. Straypassers meeting me in the glare of a torch, or seeing me hurry by thegreat braziers which burned where four streets met, looked askance atme and gave me the wall; while men in authority cried to me to stayand answer their questions. I ran from the one and the other with thesame savage impatience, disregarding everything in the feverishanxiety which spurred me on and impelled me to a hundred imprudences,such as at my age I should have blushed to commit. Much of thisfeeling was due, no doubt, to the glimpse I had had of mademoiselle,and the fiery words she had spoken; more, I fancy, to chagrin andanger at the manner in which the cup of success had been dashed at thelast moment from my lips.

  For four hours I wandered through the streets, now hot with purpose,now seeking aimlessly. It was ten o'clock when at length I gave up thesearch, and, worn out both in body and mind, climbed the stairs at mymother's lodgings and entered her room. An old woman sat by the fire,crooning softly to herself, while she stirred something in a blackpot. My mother lay in the same heavy, deep sleep in which I had lefther. I sat down opposite the nurse (who cried out at my appearance)and asked her dully for some food. When I had eaten it, sitting in akind of stupor the while, the result partly of my late exertions, andpartly of the silence which prevailed round me, I bade the woman callme if any change took place; and then going heavily across to thegarret Simon had occupied, I lay down on his pallet, and fell into asound, dreamless sleep.

  The next day and the next night I spent beside my mother, watching thelife ebb fast away, and thinking with grave sorrow of her past and myfuture. It pained me beyond measure to see her die thus, in a garret,without proper attendance or any but bare comforts; the existencewhich had once been bright and prosperous ending in penury and gloom,such as my mother's love and hope and self-sacrifice little deserved.Her state grieved me sharply on my own account too, seeing that I hadformed none of those familiar relations which men of my age havecommonly formed, and which console them for the loss of parents andforbears; Nature so ordering it, as I have taken note, that men lookforward rather than backward, and find in the ties they form with thefuture full compensation for the parting strands behind them. I wasalone, poverty-stricken, and in middle life, seeing nothing before meexcept danger and hardship, and these unrelieved by hope or affection.This last adventure, too, despite all my efforts, had sunk me deeperin the mire; by increasing my enemies and alienating from me some towhom I might have turned at the worst. In one other respect also ithad added to my troubles not a little; for the image of mademoisellewandering alone and unguarded through the streets, or vainly callingon me for help, persisted in thrusting itself on my imagination when Ileast wanted it, and came even between my mother's patient face andme.

  I was sitting beside Madame de Bonne a little after sunset on thesecond day, the woman who attended her being absent on an errand, whenI remarked that the lamp, which had been recently lit, and stood on astool in the middle of the room, was burning low and needed snuffing.I went to it softly, and while stooping over it, trying to improve thelight, heard a slow, heavy step ascending the stairs. The house wasquiet, and the sound attracted my full attention. I raised myself andstood listening, hoping that this might be the doctor, who had notbeen that day.

  The footsteps passed the landing below, but at the first stair of thenext flight the person, whoever it was, stumbled, and made aconsiderable noise. At that, or it might be a moment later, the stepstill ascending, I heard a sudden rustling behind me, and, turningquickly with a start, saw my mother sitting up in bed. Her eyes wereopen, and she seemed fully conscious; which she had not been for days,nor indeed since the last conversation I have recorded. But her face,though it was now sensible, was pinched and white, and so drawn withmortal fear that I believed her dying, and sprang to her, unable toconstrue otherwise the pitiful look in her straining eyes.

  'Madame,' I said, hastily passing my arm round her, and speaking withas much encouragement as I could infuse into my voice, 'take comfort.I am here. Your son.'

  'Hush!' she muttered in answer, laying her feeble hand on my wrist andcontinuing to look, not at me, but at the door. 'Listen, Gaston! Don'tyou hear? There it is again. Again!'

  For a moment I thought her mind still wandered, and I shivered, havingno fondness for hearing such things. Then I saw she was listeningintently to the sound which had attracted my notice. The step hadreached the landing by this time. The visitor, whoever it was, pausedthere a moment, being in darkness, and uncertain, perhaps, of theposition of the door; but in a little while I heard him move forwardagain, my mother's fragile form, clasped as it was in my embrace,quivering with each step he took, as though his weight stirred thehouse. He tapped at the door.

  I had thought, while I listened and wondered, of more than one whomthis might be: the leech, Simon Fleix, Madame Bruhl, Fresnoy even. Butas the tap came, and I felt my mother tremble in my arms,enlightenment came with it, and I pondered no more. I knew as well asif she had spoken and told me. There could be only one man whosepresence had such power to terrify her, only one whose mere step,sounding through the veil, could drag her back to consciousness andfear! And that was the man who had beggared her, who had traded solong on her terrors.

  I moved a little, intending to cross the floor softly, that when heopened the door he might find me face to face with him; but shedetected the movement, and, love giving her strength, she clung to mywrist so fiercely that I had not the heart, knowing how slender washer hold on life and how near the brink she stood, to break from her.I constrained myself to stand still, though every muscle grew tense asa drawn bowstring, and I felt the strong rage rising in my throat andchoking me as I waited for him to enter.

  A log on the hearth gave way with a dull sound startling in thesilence. The man tapped again, and getting no answer, for neither ofus spoke, pushed the door slowly open, uttering before he showedhimself the words, 'Dieu vous benisse!' in a voice so low and smooth Ishuddered at the sound. The next moment he came in and saw me, and,starting, stood at gaze, his head thrust slightly forward, hisshoulders bent, his hand still on the latch, amazement and frowningspite in turn distorting his lean face. He had looked to find a weak,defenceless woman, whom he could torture and rob at his will; he sawinstead a strong man armed, whose righteous anger he must have beenblind indeed had he failed to read.

  Strangest thing of all, we had met before! I knew him at once--he me.He was the same Jacobin monk whom I had seen at the inn on the Claine,and who had told me the news of Guise's death!


  I uttered an exclamation of surprise on making this discovery, and mymother, freed suddenly, as it seemed, from the spell of fear, whichhad given her unnatural strength, sank back on the bed. Her grasprelaxed, and her breath came and went with so loud a rattle that Iremoved my gaze from him, and bent over her, full of concern andsolicitude. Our eyes met. She tried to speak, and at last gasped, 'Notnow, Gaston! Let him--let him----'

  Her lips framed the word 'go,' but she could not give it sound. Iunderstood, however, and in impotent wrath I waved my hand to him tobegone. When I looked up he had already obeyed me. He had seized thefirst opportunity to escape. The door was closed, the lamp burnedsteadily, and we were alone.

  I gave her a little Armagnac, which stood beside the bed for such anoccasion, and she revived, and presently opened her eyes. But I saw atonce a great change in her. The look of fear had passed altogetherfrom her face, and one of sorrow, yet content, had taken its place.She laid her hand in mine, and looked up at me, being too weak, as Ithought, to speak. But by-and-by, when the strong spirit had done itswork, she signed to me to lower my head to her mouth.

  'The King of Navarre,' she murmured--'you are sure, Gaston--he willretain you in your--employments?'

  Her pleading eyes were so close to mine, I felt no scruples such assome might have felt, seeing her so near death; but I answered firmlyand cheerfully, 'Madame, I am assured of it. There is no prince inEurope so trustworthy or so good to his servants.'

  She sighed with infinite content, and blessed him in a feeble whisper.'And if you live,' she went on, 'you will rebuild the old house,Gaston. The walls are sound yet. And the oak in the hall was notburned. There is a chest of linen at Gil's, and a chest with yourfather's gold lace--but that is pledged,' she added dreamily. 'Iforgot.'

  'Madame,' I answered solemnly, 'it shall be done--it shall be done asyou wish, if the power lie with me.'

  She lay for some time after that murmuring prayers, her head supportedon my shoulder. I longed impatiently for the nurse to return, that Imight despatch her for the leech; not that I thought anything could bedone, but for my own comfort and greater satisfaction afterwards, andthat my mother might not die without some fitting attendance. Thehouse remained quiet, however, with that impressive quietness whichsobers the heart at such times, and I could not do this. And about sixo'clock my mother opened her eyes again.

  'This is not Marsac,' she murmured abruptly, her eyes roving from theceiling to the wall at the foot of the bed.

  'No, Madame,' I answered, leaning over her, 'you are in Blois. But Iam here--Gaston, your son.'

  She looked at me, a faint smile of pleasure stealing over her pinchedface. 'Twelve thousand livres a year,' she whispered, rather toherself than to me, 'and an establishment, reduced a little, yetcreditable, very creditable.' For a moment she seemed to be dying inmy arms, but again opened her eyes quickly and looked me in the face.'Gaston?' she said, suddenly and strangely. 'Who said Gaston? He iswith the King--I have blessed him; and his days shall be long in theland!' Then, raising herself in my arms with a last effort ofstrength, she cried loudly, 'Way there! Way for my son, the Sieur deMarsac!'

  They were her last words. When I laid her down on the bed a momentlater, she was dead, and I was alone.

  Madame de Bonne, my mother, was seventy at the time of her death,having survived my father eighteen years. She was Marie de Roche deLoheac, third daughter of Raoul, Sieur de Loheac, on the Vilaine, andby her great-grandmother, a daughter of Jean de Laval, was descendedfrom the ducal family of Rohan, a relationship which in after-times,and under greatly altered circumstances, Henry Duke of Rohancondescended to acknowledge, honouring me with his friendship on moreoccasions than one. Her death, which I have here recorded, took placeon the fourth of January, the Queen-Mother of France, Catherine deMedicis, dying a little after noon on the following day.

  In Blois, as in every other town, even Paris itself, the Huguenotspossessed at this time a powerful organisation; and with the aid ofthe surgeon, who showed me much respect in my bereavement, andexercised in my behalf all the influence which skilful and honest menof his craft invariably possess, I was able to arrange for my mother'sburial in a private ground about a league beyond the walls and nearthe village of Chaverny. At the time of her death I had only thirtycrowns in gold remaining, Simon Fleix, to whose fate I could obtain noclue, having carried off thirty-five with the horses. The whole ofthis residue, however, with the exception of a handsome gratuity tothe nurse and a trifle spent on my clothes, I expended on the funeral,desiring that no stain should rest on my mother's birth or myaffection. Accordingly, though the ceremony was of necessity private,and indeed secret, and the mourners were few, it lacked nothing, Ithink, of the decency and propriety which my mother loved; and whichshe preferred, I have often heard her say, to the vulgar show that isequally at the command of the noble and the farmer of taxes.

  Until she was laid in her quiet resting-place I stood in constant fearof some interruption on the part either of Bruhl, whose connectionwith Fresnoy and the abduction I did not doubt, or of the Jacobinmonk. But none came; and nothing happening to enlighten me as to thefate of Mademoiselle de la Vire, I saw my duty clear before me. Idisposed of the furniture of my mother's room, and indeed ofeverything which was saleable, and raised in this way enough money tobuy myself a new cloak--without which I could not travel in the wintryweather--and to hire a horse. Sorry as the animal was, the dealerrequired security, and I had none to offer. It was only at the lastmoment I bethought me of the fragment of gold chain which mademoisellehad left behind her, and which, as well as my mother's rings andvinaigrette, I had kept back from the sale. This I was forced to lodgewith him. Having thus, with some pain and more humiliation, providedmeans for the journey, I lost not an hour in beginning it. On theeighth of January I set out for Rosny, to carry the news of myill-success and of mademoiselle's position whither I had looked a weekbefore to carry herself.