La Dame de Monsoreau (117 page)

Schomberg, D'l^pernon, and Maugiron howled with rage.

"Enough,gentlemen, enough," said Quelus. "Withdraw, M. D'Epernori, we will fight three against three. These gentlemen shall see if, notwithstanding our right, we are men to take advantage of a misfortune which we deplore as much as they do. Come, gentlemen," added the young man, flinging his hat behind him and raising his left hand, while with his right he swept his sword through the air so that it hissed. " Come, and when you see us fighting under the open sky and beneath the eye of God, you will then be able to judge if we be assassins. To your posts, gentlemen ! to your posts ! "

" Ah! I hated you before/' said Schomberg, " now I execrate you."

" And an hour ago I would have killed you," said Antra-guet, " now I would cut you into pieces. On guard! gentlemen, on guard !"

" With doublets or without ? " asked Schomberg.

" Without either doublet or shirt," said Antraguet; " with breasts bare and hearts uncovered."

The young men laid aside their doublets and pulled off their shirts.

" Stay ! " said Quelus, as he was undressing, " I have lost my dagger. It was loose in the sheath and must have fallen on the way."

" Or, perhaps, you left it at M. de Monsoreau's house in the Place de Bastille, and did not dare to draw it from its sheath," said Antra,guet.

Quelus uttered a cry of rage and fell into position.

" But he has no dagger, M. Antraguet, he has no dagger," cried Chicot, who had just arrived on the field of battle.

" So much the worse for him," answered Antraguet; " it is not my fault."

And, drawing his da,gger with his left hand, he fell into position also.

CHAPTEK XCVII.

THE COMBAT.

THE ground where this terrible duel was to be fought was, as we have already stated, sheltered by trees. It was secluded, and usually frequented only by children, who came to play there during the day, or by drunkards and thieves, who came to sleep there during the night.

The barriers, erected by the horsedealers, naturally kept off the crowd, for a crowd, like the waves in a river, follows the current of the stream and does not stop or veer from it unless it is strongly attracted by some contrary current.

As a rule, the wayfarer preferred going round the enclosure to passing through it.

Moreover, it was very early, and people were too eager to hurry to the blood-stained house of Monsoreau to think of anything else.

Chicot, whose heart was beating fast, although he was not of a very tender disposition, sat in front of the pages and lackeys on a wooden railing.

He was not fond of the Angevines and he detested the minions; but they were all brave young fellows, and through their veins there coursed a generous blood which would soon, probably, stream forth before his eyes under the light of day.

D'Epernon risked a last bravado.

" What! are they all afraid of me, then ? " he cried.

" Hold your tongue, babbler," said ^A.ntraguet.

" I want my rights," answered D'Epernon. " It was to be a party of eight, and I was to be one of them."

" Keep off, I say !" said Bibeirac, angrily, barring his passage.

He turned back, and, making a vain attempt to look like a disappointed hero, sheathed his sword.

"Come," said Chicot, "come away, O flower of valor, or you may lose another pair of shoes, as you did yesterday."

" What is this buffoon saying ? "

" I say that there will be soon blood on the ground, and you are sure to walk in it, as you did last night."

D'Epernon turned livid. His effrontery could not hold out against this terrible attack.

He sat ten yards away from Chicot, looking now and then at him fearfully.

Ribeirac and Schomberg approached each other, after the customary salute.

Quelus and Antraguet, who were already on guard, crossed steel, after taking a step forward.

Maugiron and Livarot contented themselves with feinting and watching each the sword-play of his adversary.

The combat began when the clock of Saint-Paul's struck five.

Fury was depicted on the faces of the combatants; but their tightly pressed lips, the menacing pallor of their faces, the involuntary trembling of their wrists, indicated that this fury was a force which it was prudent to retain in all its violence, for when once unchained, like a fiery steed freed from the curb, it would create great devastation in its course.

For several minutes — an enormous space of time on such an occasion — there was a friction rather than a clashing of swords.

Not a stroke was given.

Kibeirac, fatigued, or rather satisfied with his trial of his adversary's style, lowered his hand and waited for a moment.

Schomberg took two rapid steps forward ; his sword gleamed like a flash of lightning from the bosom of a cloud. It was the first stroke.

Kibeirac was hit.

His skin turned livid, and a jet of blood spurted from his shoulder; he fell back to examine the wound.

Schomberg endeavored to repeat the stroke; but Kibeirac struck up his sword, parried in prime, and wounded him in the side.

Each of them, then, had his wound.

" Now let us rest for a few seconds, if you have no objection," said Kibeirac.

Meanwhile, Quelus and Antraguet were hotly at work on their side ; but Quelus, having no dagger, was at a great disadvantage ; he was obliged to parry with his left arm, and, as this arm was bare, every parry cost him a wound.

Although he was not seriously injured, his hand, in a few seconds, was entirely covered with blood.

Antraguet, who saw his advantage, and who was quite as adroit as Quelus, parried with extreme wariness.

With three parries and thrusts he wounded Quelus thrice in the breast.

But Quelus was not mortally hurt, although streams of blood ran down his body, and, every time he was touched, he repeated :

" It is nothing."

Livarot and Maugiron were still engaged in their cautious play.

As for Ribeirac, mad with pain, and feeling that with his loss of blood he was losing his strength, he made a sudden leap at Schomberg.

Schomberg did not recoil a step and simply stretched out his sword.

Both of the young men made several stealthy thrusts at each other.

Ribeirac was pierced through the breast, and Schomberg was wounded in the neck.

Ribeirac's wound was mortal ; he applied his left hand to it, thereby uncovering himself.

Schomberg took advantage of the opportunity and gave him a second thrust which penetrated his side.

But Ribeirac with his right hand grasped the hand of his adversary, and with his left plunged his dagger into his breast up to the hilt.

The blade passed through the heart.

Schomberg uttered a hollow groan and fell on his back, dragging down Ribeirac, still pierced by the sword.

Livarot, seeing his friend fall, retreated a step, and then ran quickly, pursued by Maugiron, to his aid.

He gained on his pursuer, and, helping Ribeirac in his efforts to free himself from Schomberg's sword, he pulled it from his breast.

But Maugiron was now near him, and he was obliged to fight him with the disadvantage of a slippery ground, an imperfect guard, and the glare of the sun in his eyes.

At the end of a second, Maugiron jrierced the head of Livarot, who dropped his sword and fell on his knees.

Quelus was closely pressed by Antraguet. Maugiron stabbed Livarot a second time, and the latter fell flat on the ground.

B'Epernon uttered a loud cry.

And now Antraguet had to face both Quelus and Maugiron. Quelus was covered with blood, but his wounds were slight.

Maugiron was as yet almost scathless.

Antraguet saw his peril; he had not received even a scratch ; but he was beginning to feel fatigued. It was not the moment, however, to ask for a truce from one man who was wounded and from another who was hot for carnage. With a rapid movement he violently thrust aside the sword of Quelus and jumped lightly over a barrier.

Quelus wheeled round and dealt him a blow, but it only cut into the wood.

At the same moment, Maugiron attacked Antraguet behind. The latter turned round.

Quelus profited by this movement to creep under the barrier. ' " He is lost! " thought Chicot.

" Long live the King ! " cried D'lSpernon ; " at him ! my lions, at him ! "

" Silence, if you please, monsieur," said Antraguet. " Do not insult a man who will fight till his last breath."

" And a man who is not yet dead," cried Livarot.

And', at the very moment when no one was any longer thinking of him, Livarot rose upon his knees, hideous with the bloody mire that covered his body, and plunged his dagger between the shoulders of Maugiron, who fell like a log, sighing:

" Jesus ! O God ! I am slain."

Livarot fell back in a swoon ; his last action and his rage had exhausted all the strength that was left in him.

" M. de Quelus," said Antraguet, lowering his sword, " you are a brave man ; yield, and I offer you your life."

"And why should I yield ?" said Quelus; "am I lying on the ground ? "

" No, but you are covered with wounds, and I am safe and sound."

" Long live the King ! I have still my sword, monsieur."

And he made a cut at Antraguet, who parried the stroke^ sudden though it was.

" No, monsieur, you have it no longer," said the latter, seizing the blade near the hilt.

And he twisted the arm of his adversary, who dropped the sword.

But, while doing so, Antraguet slightly cut one of the fingers of his left hand.

" Oh !" groaned Quelus, " a sword ! a sword !"

And leaping like a tiger on Antraguet, he caught him in his arms.

Antraguet made no endeavor to free himself, but changing his sword from his right hand to his left, and his dagger from his left hand to his right, he stabbed him repeatedly in every part of his body, daubing him at each stroke with blood; yet he could not force his enemy to let go his hold; after every wound Quelus shouted: " Long live the King ! "

He even managed to secure the hand that stabbed him, and coiled round his enemy with arms and legs like a serpent.

Antraguet felt that his breath would soon fail him.

In fact, after a second or so, he reeled and fell.

But, as if everything was to be in his favor on this day, he fell on top of Quelus, almost stifling the unfortunate young man.

" Long live the King!" murmured the latter, in tones of agony.

Antraguet succeeded at last in getting out of the clutch of his enemy, and, leaning 011 his arm, he drove the dagger into his chest, piercing him through and through.

" Well! " said he to him, " are you satisfied now ? "

" Long live the " — articulated Quelus, his eyes fast closing.

All was finished ; the silence and terror of death reigned over the field of battle.

Antraguet rose ; he was covered with blood, but it was the blood of his enemy; as we have said, he himself had only had a scratch.

D'Epernon, horror-stricken, made the sign of the cross, and fled as if pursued by a spectre.

Antraguet looked at friends and enemies, the dead and the dying, as Horatius must have looked at the field of battle that decided the fate of Rome.

Chicot ran up and raised Quelus, whose blood was gushing forth from nineteen wounds.

The movement roused him.

He opened his eyes.

" Antraguet, upon my honor," said he, " I am innocent of Bussy's death."

" Oh ! I believe you, monsieur, I believe you," answered Antraguet, much affected.

" Fly," murmured Quelus, " fly; the King would never forgive you."

" No, monsieur, I will not abandon you thus, though the scaffold be my portion."

" Escape at once, young man," said Chicot, " and do not tempt God. You have already escaped by a miracle ; do not expect a second one the same day."

Antraguet approached Kibeirac, who was still breathing.

"'Well ?" asked the latter.

" We have conquered," answered Antraguet, in a whisper, so as not to offend Quelus.

" Thanks," said Kibeirac. " And now get away from here."

And he fell back fainting.

Antraguet picked up his own sword, which he had dropped during the conflict, then the swords of Quelus, Schomberg, and Maugiron.

" Finish me, monsieur," said Quelus, " or else leave me my sword."

" Here it is, M. le Comte," answered Antraguet, offering it to him with a respectful bow.

A tear glistened in the eyes of the wounded man.

" We ought to have been friends," he murmured.

Antraguet tendered him his hand.

" It is well ! " observed Chicot; " nothing could be more chivalrous and noble. But you must escape, Antraguet; you deserve to live."

" And my companions ? " inquired the young man.

" I will take as much care of them as of the King's friends."

Antraguet wrapped himself up in a cloak which was handed to him by his squire, so that no one might see the blood with which he was covered, and, leaving the dead and wounded with the pages and lackeys, he disappeared through the Porte Saint-Antoine.

CHAPTER XCVIII.

CONCLUSION.

THE King, pale with anxiety, and shuddering at every sound, paced the floor of his armory, calculating, with all the experience of a man who was at home in such matters, the time it would take his friends to meet and engage their adversaries, as well as all the good and evil possibilities that might be augured from their temperament, strength, and address.

"They are now crossing the Kue Saint-Antoine," was his first thought.

" By this time they are entering the lists," he muttered, when some minutes had elapsed.

And after an interval:

" Ha ! their swords are unsheathed; the combat is on at last ! "

And then the poor monarch, trembling with fear, fell upon his knees.

But the prayer he uttered came rather from his lips than from his heart, which was almost entirely absorbed in thoughts that had little to do with devotion.