Aramis rose. “Certainly,” said he; “I have nothing further to say to a man who mistrusts me as you do.”
“And I, monsieur,” said the prisoner, in the same tone, “have nothing to say to a man who will not understand that a prisoner ought to be mistrustful of everybody.”
“Even of his old friends?” said Aramis. “Oh! monseigneur, you are too prudent!”
“Of my old friends?—you one of my old friends,—you?”
“Do you no longer remember,” said Aramis, “that you once saw, in the village where your early years were spent—”
“Do you know the name of the village?” asked the prisoner.
“Noisy-le-Sec, monseigneur,” answered Aramis firmly.
“Go on,” said the young man, with an immovable aspect.
“Stay, monseigneur,” said Aramis; “if you are positively resolved to carry on this game, let us break off. I am here to tell you many things, ’tis true; but you must allow me to see that, on your side, you have a desire to know them. Before revealing the important matters I conceal, be assured I am in need of some encouragement, if not candour; a little sympathy, if not confidence. But you keep yourself intrenched in a pretended ignorance which paralyses me. Oh, not for the reason you think; for, ignorant as you may be, or indifferent as you feign to be, you are none the less what you are, monseigneur, and there is nothing,-nothing, mark me, which can cause you not to be so.”
“I promise you,” replied the prisoner, “to hear you without impatience. Only it appears to me that I have a right to repeat the question I have already asked- ‘Who are you?’ ”
“Do you remember, fifteen or eighteen years ago, seeing at Noisy-le-Sec a cavalier accompanied by a lady in black silk, with flame-coloured ribbons in her hair?”
“Yes,” said the young man; “I once asked the name of this cavalier, and they told me he called himself the Abbé d’Herblay. I was astonished that the Abbé had so warlike an air, and they replied that there was nothing singular in that, seeing that he was one of Louis XIII’s musketeers.”
“Well,” said Aramis, “that musketeer and Abbé, afterwards Bishop of Vannes, is your confessor now.”
“I knew it; I recognised you.”
“Then, monseigneur, if you know that, I must further add a fact of which you are ignorant—that if the King were to know this evening of the presence of this musketeer, this Abbé, this bishop, this confessor, here—he, who has risked everything to visit you, would to-morrow see glitter the executioner’s axe at the bottom of a dungeon more gloomy and more obscure than yours.”
While hearing these words, delivered with emphasis, the young man had raised himself on his couch, and gazed more and more eagerly at Aramis.
The result of his scrutiny was that he appeared to derive some confidence from it. “Yes,” he murmured, “I remember perfectly. The woman of whom you speak came once with you, and twice afterwards with another.” He hesitated.
“With another woman, who came to see you every month,—is it not so, monseigneur?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know who this lady was?”
The light seemed ready to flash from the prisoner’s eyes. “I am aware that she was one of the ladies of the court,” he said.
“You remember that lady well, do you not?”
“Oh, my recollection can hardly be very confused on this head,” said the young prisoner. “I saw that lady once with a gentleman about forty-five years old. I saw her once with you, and with the lady dressed in black. I have seen her twice since with the same person. These four people, with my master, and old Perronnette, my jailer, and the governor of the prison, are the only persons with whom I have ever spoken, and, indeed, almost the only persons I have ever seen.”
“Then you were in prison?”
“If I am a prisoner here, there I was comparatively free, although in a very narrow sense—a house which I never quitted, a garden surrounded with walls I could not clear, these constituted my residence; but you know it, as you have been there. In a word, being accustomed to live within these bounds, I never cared to leave them. And so you will understand, monsieur, that not having seen anything of the world, I have nothing left to care for; and therefore, if you relate anything, you will be obliged to explain everything to me.”
“And I will do so,” said Aramis bowing, “for it is my duty, monseigneur. ”
“Well, then, begin by telling me who was my tutor.”
“A worthy and, above all, an honourable gentleman, monseigneur ; fit guide both for body and soul. Had you ever any reason to complain of him?”
“Oh, no; quite the contrary. But this gentleman of yours often used to tell me that my father and mother were dead. Did he deceive me, or did he speak the truth?”
“He was compelled to comply with the orders given him.”
“Then he lied?”
“In one respect. Your father is dead.”
“And my mother?”
“She is dead for you.”
“But then she lives for others, does she not?”
“Yes.”
“And I—and I, then” (the young man looked sharply at Aramis) “am compelled to live in the obscurity of a prison?”
“Alas! I fear so.”
“And that, because my presence in the world would lead to the revelation of a great secret?”
“Certainly, a very great secret.”
“My enemy must indeed be powerful, to be able to shut up in the Bastille a child such as I then was.”
“He is.”
“More powerful than my mother, then?”
“And why do you ask that?”
“Because my mother would have taken my part.”
Aramis hesitated. “Yes, monseigneur; more powerful than your mother.”
“Seeing, then, that my nurse and preceptor were carried off, and that I, also, was separated from them—either they were, or I am, very dangerous to my enemy?”
“Yes; a peril from which he freed himself, by causing the nurse and preceptor to disappear,” answered Aramis quietly.
“Disappear!” cried the prisoner—“but how did they disappear? ”
“In the surest possible way,” answered Aramis;—“they are dead.”
The young man turned visibly pale, and passed his hand tremblingly over his face. “From poison?” he asked.
“From poison.”
The prisoner reflected a moment. “My enemy must indeed have been very cruel, or hard beset by necessity, to assassinate these two innocent people, my sole support; for the worthy gentleman and the poor nurse had never harmed a living being.”
“In your family, monseigneur, necessity is stern. And so it is necessity which compels me, to my great regret, to tell you that this gentleman and the unhappy lady have been assassinated.”
“Oh, you tell me nothing I am not aware of,” said the prisoner, knitting his brows.
“How?”
“I suspected it.”
“Why?”
“I will tell you.”
At this moment the young man, supporting himself on his two elbows drew close to Aramis’s face, with such an expression of dignity, of self-command, and of defiance even, that the Bishop felt the electricity of enthusiasm strike in devouring flashes from that seared heart of his, into his brain of adamant.
“Speak, monseigneur. I have already told you that by conversing with you, I endanger my life. Little value as it has, I implore you to accept it as a ransom of your own.”
“Well,” resumed the young man, “this is why I suspected that they had killed my nurse and my preceptor.”
“Whom you used to call your father.”
“Yes; whom I called my father, but whose son I well knew I was not.”
“Who caused you to suppose so?”
“For the same reason that you, monsieur, are too respectful for a friend, he was also too respectful for a father.”
“I, however,” said Aramis, “have no intention to dis
guise myself.”
The young man nodded assent, and continued:—“Undoubtedly I was not destined to perpetual seclusion,” said the prisoner; “and that which makes me believe so, above all, now, is the care that was taken to render me as accomplished a cavalier as possible. The gentleman attached to my person taught me everything he knew himself—mathematics, a little geometry, astronomy, fencing, and riding. Every morning I went through military exercises, and practised on horseback. Well, one morning during summer, it being very hot, I went to sleep in the hall. Nothing up to that period, except the respect paid me, had enlightened me, or even roused my suspicions. I lived as children, as birds, as plants, as the air and the sun do. I had just turned my fifteenth year—”
“This, then, is eight years ago.”
“Yes, nearly; but I have ceased to reckon time.”
“Excuse me; but what did your tutor tell you to encourage you to work?”
“He used to say that a man was bound to make for himself, in the world, that fortune which Heaven had refused him at his birth. He added, that, being a poor obscure orphan I had no one but myself to look to; and that nobody either did, or ever would, take any interest in me. I was then in the hall I have spoken of, asleep from fatigue in fencing. My preceptor was in his room on the first floor just over me. Suddenly I heard him exclaim : and then he called, ‘Perronnette! Perronnette!’ It was my nurse whom he called.”
“Yes, I know,” said Aramis. “Continue, monseigneur.”
“Very likely she was in the garden; for my preceptor came hastily downstairs. I rose, anxious at seeing him anxious. He opened the garden-door still crying out, ‘Perronnette! Perronnette!’ The window of the hall looked into the court; the shutters were closed; but through a chink in them I saw my tutor draw near a large well, which was almost directly under the windows of his study. He stooped over the brim, looked into the well, again cried out, and made wild and affrighted gestures. Where I was, I could not only see, but hear—and see and hear I did.”
“Go on, I pray you,” said Aramis.
“Dame Perronnette came running up, hearing the governor’s cries. He went to meet her, took her by the arm, and drew her quickly towards the edge; after which, as they both bent over it together, ‘Look, look,’ cried he, ‘what a misfortune!’
“‘Calm yourself, calm yourself,’ said Perronnette; ‘what is the matter?’
“‘The letter!’ he exclaimed; ‘do you see that letter?’ pointing to the bottom of the well.
“‘What letter?’ she cried.
“‘The letter you see down there; the last letter from the Queen.’
“At this word I trembled. My tutor—he who passed for my father, he who was continually recommending me modesty and humility—in correspondence with the Queen!
“‘The Queen’s last letter!’ cried Perronnette, without showing more astonishment than at seeing this letter at the bottom of the well; ‘but how came it there?’
“‘A chance, Dame Perronnette—a singular chance. I was entering my room, and on opening the door, the window, too, being open, a puff of air came suddenly and carried off this paper—this letter of Her Majesty’s; I darted after it and gained the window just in time to see it flutter a moment in the breeze and disappear down the well.’
“‘Well,’ said Dame Perronnette; ‘and if the letter has fallen into the well, ’tis all the same as if it was burned, and as the Queen burns all her letters every time she comes—’
“And so you see this lady who came every month was the Queen,” said the prisoner.
“‘Doubtless, doubtless,’ continued the old gentleman; ‘but this letter contained instructions—how can I follow them?’
“ ‘Write immediately to her; give her a plain account of the accident, and the Queen will no doubt write you another letter in place of this.’
“‘Oh! the Queen would never believe the story,’ said the good gentleman, shaking his head; ‘she will imagine that I want to keep this letter instead of giving it up like the rest, so as to have a hold over her. She is so distrustful, and M. de Mazarin so—This devil of an Italian is capable of having us poisoned at the first breath of suspicion.’ ”
Aramis almost imperceptibly smiled.
“‘You know, Dame Perronnette, they are both so suspicious in all that concerns Philippe.’
“Philippe was the name they gave me,” said the prisoner.
“‘Well, ’tis no use hesitating,’ said Dame Perronnette, ‘somebody must go down the well.’
“‘Of course; so that the person who goes down may read the paper as he is coming up.’
“‘But let us choose some villager who cannot read, and then you will be at ease.’
“‘Granted; but will not any one who descends guess that a paper must be important for which we risk a man’s life? However, you have given me an idea, Dame Perronnette; somebody shall go down the well, but that somebody shall be myself.’
“But at this notion Dame Perronnette lamented and cried in such a manner, and so implored the old nobleman with tears in her eyes, that he promised her to obtain a ladder long enough to reach down, while she went in search of some stout-hearted youth, whom she was to persuade that a jewel had fallen into the well, and that this jewel was wrapped in a paper. ‘And as paper,’ remarked my preceptor, ‘naturally unfolds in water, the young man would not be surprised at finding nothing, after all, but the letter wide open.’
“‘But perhaps the writing will be already effaced by that time,’ said Dame Perronnette.
“‘No consequence, provided we secure the letter. On returning it to the Queen, she will see at once that we have not betrayed her; and consequently, as we shall not rouse the distrust of Mazarin, we shall have nothing to fear from him.’
“Having come to this resolution they parted. I pushed back the shutter, and, seeing that my tutor was about to re-enter, I threw myself on my couch, in a confusion of brain caused by all I had just heard. My governor opened the door a few moments after, and, thinking I was asleep, gently closed it again. As soon as it was shut, I rose, and, listening, heard the sound of retiring footsteps. Then I returned to the shutter, and saw my tutor and Dame Perronnette go out together. I was alone in the house. They had hardly closed the gate before I sprang from the window and ran to the well. Then, just as my governor had leaned over, so leaned I. Something white and luminous glistened in the green and quivering ripples of the water. The brilliant disc fascinated and allured me; my eyes became fixed, and I could hardly breathe. The well seemed to draw me in with its large mouth and icy breath; and I thought I read, at the bottom of the water, characters of fire traced upon the letter the Queen had touched. Then, scarcely knowing what I was about, and urged on by one of those instinctive impulses which drive men upon their destruction, I lowered the cord from the windlass of the well to within about three feet of the water, leaving the bucket dangling, and at the same time taking infinite pains not to disturb that coveted letter, which was beginning to change its white tint for a greenish hue,—proof enough that it was sinking,—and then, with the rope weltering in my hands, slid down into the abyss. When I saw myself hanging over the dark pool, when I saw the sky lessening above my head, a cold shudder came over me, a chill fear got the better of me, I was seized with giddiness, and the hair rose on my head; but my strong will still reigned supreme over all the terror and disquietude. I gained the water, and at once plunged into it, holding on by one hand, while I immersed the other and seized the dear letter, which alas! came in two in my grasp. I concealed the two fragments in my body coat, and, helping myself with my feet against the sides of the pit, and clinging on with my hands, agile and vigorous as I was, and, above all, pressed for time, I regained the brink, drenching it as I touched it with the water that streamed off me. I was no sooner out of the well with my prize, than I rushed into the sunlight, and took refuge in a kind of shrubbery at the bottom of the garden. As I entered my hiding-place, the bell which resounded when the great gate was opene
d, rang. It was my preceptor come back again. I had but just time. I calculated that it would take ten minutes before he would gain my place of concealment, even, if, guessing where I was, he came straight to it; and twenty if he were obliged to look for me. But this was time enough to allow me to read the cherished letter, whose fragments I hastened to unite again. The writing was already fading, but I managed to decipher it all.”
“And what read you there, monseigneur?” asked Aramis, deeply interested.
“Quite enough, monsieur, to see that my tutor was a man of noble rank, and that Perronnette, without being a lady of quality, was far better than a servant; and also to perceive that I must myself be high-born, since the Queen, Anne of Austria, and Mazarin, the prime minister, commended me so earnestly to their care.”
Here the young man paused, quite overcome.
“And what happened?” asked Aramis.
“It happened, monsieur,” answered he, “that the workman they had summoned found nothing in the well, after the closest search; that my governor perceived that the brink was all watery; that I was not so well dried by the sun as to escape Dame Perronnette’s observing that my garments were moist; and, lastly, that I was seized with a violent fever, owing to the chill and the excitement of my discovery, an attack of delirium supervening, during which I related the whole adventure; so that, guided by my avowal, my governor found under the bolster the two pieces of the Queen’s letter.”
“Ah!” said Aramis, “now I understand.”
“Beyond this, all is conjecture. Doubtless the unfortunate lady and gentleman, not daring to keep the occurrence secret, wrote all to the Queen, and sent back to her the torn letter.”
“After which,” said Aramis, “you were arrested and moved to the Bastille.”
“As you see.”
“Then your two attendants disappeared?”
“Alas! ”
“Let us not take up our time with the dead, but see what can be done for the living. You told me you were resigned?”
“I repeat it.”
“Without any desire for freedom?”
“As I told you.”
“Without ambition, sorrow, or thought?”
Man in the Iron Mask (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) Page 27
