La Dame de Monsoreau (89 page)

When she had finished her embraces Catharine sat down by the duke's pillow, and Bussy made a sign to his companions to withdraw. As for himself, he acted as if he were at home, leaned against one of the bedposts, and listened tranquilly.

" Would you not be kind enough to look after my poor attendants, my dear M. de Bussy?" said Catharine, abruptly. " Next to our son, you are our dearest friend; and you are quite familiar with the palace, are you not ? You will, then, I am sure, do me this favor."

It was impossible not to obey.

" Caught! " said Bussy to himself.

" Madame," he answered, " I am only too happy to do anything for your majesty, and so I take my leave."

Then he added, in his own mind :

" You are not as well acquainted with the doors here as you are with those of the Louvre ; I'll return."

And he passed out, unable to make even a sign to the duke. Catharine distrusted him, and so never took her eyes off him for a moment.

Catharine tried first to find out if her son was really sick or only pretending to be so.

She would base all her diplomatic operations on the result of her discoveries.

But Francois, as was to be expected from his mother's son, played his part to perfection.

She had wept; he was in a burning fever.

Catharine was deceived; she believed him really ill, and hoped to have more influence over a mind enfeebled by sufferings.

Her marks of tender affection for the duke became more numerous than ever; she embraced him anew and wept so freely that Franqois was amazed and inquired the cause of her emotion.

" You have run so great a risk, my child," she answered.

" While escaping from the Louvre, mother ? "

" Oh, no ; after you had escaped." .

« How is that ? "

" Those who aided you in this unhappy flight"

« Well ? "

" Were your most bitter enemies."

" She knows nothing," he thought, " but she would like to know."

" The King of Navarre," she broke out, bluntly, " the eternal scourge of our race — oh ! I was well aware it was he."

" Ah ! " said Francois to himself ; " so she knows."

" Do you know," said she," that he boasts of it, and believes that he will now carry all before him ? "

" It is impossible, mother," he answered; " some one has been practising on your credulity."

" Why do you say that ? "

" Because he had nothing to do with my escape, and, even though he had, I. am perfectly safe, as you see — I have not met the King of Navarre for two years."

" That is not the only danger I want to speak to you about, my son," said Catharine, feeling that the stroke had not told.

" And what is the other one, mother ? " he replied, directing a glance frequently at the tapestry in front of the alcove behind the queen, which was shaking.

Catharine approached Franqois, and, in tones she intended should inspire him with terror :

" The King's anger! " said she, " the furious anger that now threatens you." ,

" Oh, that danger," he answered, "is pretty much on a level with the other, madame; I have no doubt my brother is in a furious rage ; but I am safe."

" You really believe that ? "• said she, in a voice calculated to intimidate the boldest.

The tapestry trembled.

" I am sure of it," said the duke; " the more so, my kind mother, that you yourself have come hither to warn me of it."

"Why so?" asked Catharine, disturbed by the prince's, calmness.

" Because," said he, after another look at the tapestry, " if you had been charged only with threats you would not have come, and the King, in that case, would have hesitated before he placed such a hostage as your majesty in my power."

Catharine raised her head, alarmed.

"la hostage ! " she exclaimed.

" The most sacred and venerable of all hostages," he answered with a smile, kissing her hand, and directing another triumphant glance at the tapestry.

Catharine dropped her arms by her side, completely overwhelmed ; she could not guess that Bussy was watching his master through a secret and partly open door, holding him in check under her very eyes, and, almost ever since the conversation had opened, quickening his courage whenever he showed signs of faltering.

" My son," said she, at length, " you are quite right; my message to you is a message of peace."

" I will listen, mother," said Francois; " with all the respect I am in the habit of showing for every word you utter; I think it looks as if we were beginning to understand each other."

CHAPTER LXVIII.

GREAT ISSUES OFTEN HAVE SMALL CAUSES.

IT was evident to Catharine that her efforts so far had been abortive.

Her discomfiture was so unexpected and, above all, so different from anything in her experience, that she wondered if her son could be as firm in his refusal as he seemed, when a quite trivial incident suddenly changed the aspect of affairs.

We have seen battles that were almost lost won by a change in the direction of the wind, and vice versa ; Marengo and Waterloo are cases in point.

A grain of sand can alter the working of the most powerful machine.

Bussy, as we have mentioned already, was stationed in a secret lobby running into the Due d'Anjou's alcove, and so placed that he could be seen only by the prince ; from his hiding-place he thrust his head out through a slit in the tapestry whenever a word was uttered that appeared dangerous to his cause.

His cause, as must be already plain to the reader, was war at any price. He had to stop in Anjou as long as M. de Mon-soreau remained there, so as to be in a position to watch the husband and visit the wife.

Notwithstanding the extreme simplicity of this policy of his, it unsettled the entire policy of France to an extraordinary degree; great issues often have small causes.

This was the reason why Bussy, with many a wink and many a furious grimace, and swaggering gestures and terrific frowns, was inciting his master to assume an attitude of positive truculence.

The duke, who was afraid of Bussy, allowed himself to be incited, and, as we have seen, no one could have been more truculent with a mother than he was with Catharine.

Catharine was, then, beaten at all points, and was thinking only of effecting an honorable retreat, when a trifling occurrence, almost as unlooked for as the Due d'Anjoil's obstinacy, came to her rescue.

Suddenly, just at the most racy part of the conversation between mother and son, just when the Due d'Anjou was exhibiting the most stubbornness, Bussy felt some one pulling at his cloak.

Anxious not to lose a word of the dialogue, he stretched his hand round to the place where he experienced the tugging, and, without ever turning, caught a fist; travelling up further, he discovered an arm, after the arm a shoulder, and after the shoulder a man.

Seeing then that the matter was worth attending to, he turned round.

The man was Remy.

Bussy was going to speak, but Remy laid a finger on his lips, and gently drew his master into the adjoining chamber.

" What is thelnatter, Remy ? " asked the count, impatiently, " and why do you disturb me at such a moment ? "

" A letter," said Kemy, in a low voice.

" The devil take you ! For a mere letter you drag me away from a colloquy as important as the one I and the Due d'Anjou have just been having together ! "

Remy was not at all put out by this sally.

" There are letters and letters," said he.

" He 's sure to have a reason for what he does," thought Bussy. " Where does this come from ? " he asked.

" From Meridor."

" Ah ! " cried Bussy, eagerly ; " from Meridor ! Thanks, my dear Remy, thanks ! "

" I have not done wrong, then ? "

" As if you ever did wrong ! Where is the letter ? "

" Ah, that is the very thing that led me to think it of the highest importance ; the messenger will give it to none but you."

" He is right. Is he here ? "

« Yes."

" Bring him in."

Eemy opened the door and beckoned to a man that looked like a groom to enter.

" This is M. de Bussy," said he, pointing to the count.

" Give it to me," said Bussy ; " I am the person you are looking for," and he handed him a demi-pistole.

" Oh, I know you well," said the groom, giving him the letter.

" Was it from her you received it ? "

" No, not from her, but from him."

" Whom do you mean by him ? " asked Bussy, glancing at the address.

" M. de Saint-Luc."

"Ah! ah!"

Bussy had become slightly pale, for at the words " but from him " he fancied the letter might have come from the husband and not from the wife, and the mere thought of Monsoreau had the curious effect of making Bussy change color.

Bussy turned round to read, and to hide, while reading, that emotion which every one must manifest on the receipt of an important letter, unless he be Caesar Borgia, Machiavelli, Catharine de Medicis, or the devil.

Our poor Bussy did right to turn round, for, before he had finished the letter, with which our readers are already acquainted, the blood surged to his temples and into his eyes like a storm-driven sea ; from pale he became purple, was for a moment stunned, and, feeling that he should fall, he tottered to an armchair near the window and sank into it.

" Go away," said Remy to the groom, who was quite bewildered by the effect produced by the letter he had brought.

Eemy pushed him outside, and then the messenger took to his heels; he felt the news in the letter was bad, and feared he might be asked to surrender the money he had just received.

Remy returned to the count and shook his arm.

" Mordieu! " cried he, " answer me on the instant, or by Saint ^Esculapius, I '11 bleed every limb in your body! "

Bussy looked up. He was no longer red, he was no longer dazed ; but he was very gloomy.

" Look," said he, " at what Saint-Luc has done for me."

And he handed Remy the letter.

Remy read eagerly.

" Well,' 7 he replied, " all this strikes me as very fine. M. de Saint-Luc is a gallant man. I rather like people who expedite the passage of a sonl to purgatory in this fashion."

" It is incredible !" stammered Bussy.

" Certainly, it is incredible ; but that has nothing to do with the question. This is how we stand now : in nine months 1 '11 have a Comtesse de Bussy for my patient. Mordieu ! have no fear,; as an accoucheur I 'in a match for Ambroise Pare himself."

" Yes," said Bussy; " she shall be my wife."

" I don't see that there can be much trouble about that ; she is a good deal more your wife now than she has ever been her husband's."

" Monsoreau dead! "

" Dead ! " repeated Le Haudouin ; " it was his fate."

"Oh, it seems to me, Remy, as if I were in a dream. What ! never again to behold the spectre that was always coming between me and happiness. Oh, Remy, we must be mistaken."

" Not the least in the world. Mordieu — read the letter again : ( fell upon a bed of poppies and dandelions' — see ! — ( had such a hard fall that he is now dead ' — see ! — I have often noticed that it is a very dangerous thing to fall on poppies ; but I used to be under the impression formerly that only women were exposed to this peril."

" But," said Bussy, who paid very little attention to the quips of his companion, and was trying to pursue his own thoughts through the turns and windings of their%omplicated course, " Diane cannot remain at Meridor. I do not wish it. She must go somewhere else, somewhere where she can forget."

" I don't know a better place than Paris," answered Le Haudouin ; " no place in the world where you forget more easily than Paris."

" You are right. She can occupy her little house in the Rue des Tournelles, and we '11 spend the ten months of her widowhood there in close retirement, that is, if it be possible for happiness to remain concealed from public eyes. Then, the morning of the celebration of our marriage will be but the renewal of the bliss of the evening before."

" I agree with you," said Remy ; " but. in order to be able to go to Paris " —

" Well ? "

" One thing is necessary."

« What is it ? "

" Peace in Anjou."

" True," answered Bussy, " nothing truer. Great heavens ! what a lot of time lost, and lost uselessly ! "

" Which means that you are going to get on horseback and ride to Meridor."

" No, no, not I, but you. I cannot possibly leave here at present. Besides, at such a time, my presence would be almost improper."

" Where am I to see her ? Shall I go to the castle ? "

" No; go first to the old thicket; she may be walking there, in expectation of my arrival. Then, if you perceive no sign of her, proceed to the castle."

« What shall I tell her ? "

"Tell her I'm half mad."

And pressing the hand of the young man upon whom his experience had taught him to rely as if he were a second self, he hurried to resume his place in the corridor at the entrance to the alcove behind the tapestry.

During Bussy's absence Catharine had been endeavoring to regain the ground his presence had caused her to lose.

" My son," she had said," I will never believe that a mother and son can fail to understand each other."

" Still, you see," was the duke's answer, " that such a thing sometimes happens."

" Never, when she wishes it."

" You mf an, madame, when they wish it," retorted the prince, quite proud of his courage and looking at the alcove in the expectation of being rewarded by an approving glance from Bussy.

" But I wish it! " cried Catharine ; " surely, Francois, that must be clear to you! — I wish it."