Francezka Part 37

There were not more than a dozen of us in this party, including Count Saxe and Gaston Cheverny. It was not for me to warn Gaston against what we were about to engage in. Count Saxe gave him a gently civil intimation of the danger ahead, but Gaston took no note of it, and was as eager as any one to find the "solitary." We put off into another part of the forest. I rode by Gaston Cheverny's side, and privately resolved to remain there. We talked together and I found him more like the old Gaston than I had yet seen him.

This foolhardy expedition was exactly like Gaston; but when I saw the quickness of his eye, and the alertness of his movements, I concluded he could take care of himself better than any of us supposed. It was about three o'clock when we got to the circle in which the beaters had surrounded the old boar. He had been hunted twice that season and had escaped both times. Huntsmen are very superst.i.tious, and they had got the notion that if this boar were not killed in the third chase, there was something unearthly about him. This was fostered by some laughing remark of Count Saxe about the hunt of Thibaut of Champagne, and the "solitary" being the ghost of a boar. His ghostship, however, was soon disproved, by finding his huge tracks in the soft brown earth.

Soon the dogs gave tongue, and the chase was on. We could get occasional glimpses of the boar's vast bulk, as he made prodigious speed for so heavy an animal through the thickets. There was a small ravine through which a brook flowed, and for this the boar made. We could hear him crashing through the underwood, and he got across the brook. The dogs and huntsmen followed quickly after him. The dogs found the scent again immediately after crossing the water, but on reaching a large, open plateau above the ravine, they suddenly and inexplicably lost it. There were no tracks to be seen, and the boar must have turned off either to the right or the left, in a fringe of thick underwood that bordered the ravine. The dogs ran aimlessly about, keeping up a dismal yelping of despair. The huntsmen encouraged them by horn and voice, but were evidently chagrined by this singular disappearance. My master twitted them with stories of the ghostly hunt of Thibaut, but it was plain the huntsmen thought it no joking matter.

They succeeded in putting the hounds into the thicket on the right, but, although there was an infinity of barking and yelping and whining, it was plain that the scent had not yet been found.

Meanwhile, as we were standing about this open s.p.a.ce, in the clear December afternoon, listening to the dogs and men, Gaston Cheverny dismounted, and ran a short distance toward the thicket on the left.

Count Saxe called out to him to keep a firm hold on his spear, which he held in his left hand. He turned to answer, when we saw, breaking from the cover directly behind Gaston, the boar, his horrible mouth wide open, his tusks grinding and churning blood and foam, his eyeb.a.l.l.s like coals of fire, and his bristles rising like a mane.

We all involuntarily shouted "Take care! Take care!" but no one of us was closer than thirty yards to Gaston or the boar either. As the creature raised himself to bury his tusks in his enemy, I saw Gaston, with the quickness of thought, drop the spear from his left hand, and drawing his hunting knife with his right hand, plunge it once, twice, thrice in the boar's throat. These powerful thrusts were the beast's deathblow, but he was still capable of killing Gaston Cheverny, had there been the least remission in those tremendous strokes with the hunting knife. By that time we were on the ground close to him, and I was about to use my spear when Count Saxe motioned me away. The boar, although still fighting savagely, was clearly overmastered; a dozen dogs were tearing at him from behind.

It would have been an outrage to interfere then, so we stood ready for emergencies, while Gaston, with the a.s.sistance of the dogs, despatched the huge beast. The huntsmen were all on hand then, and when, at last, the great carca.s.s fell over, they surrounded Gaston with shouts of delight. He was covered with blood, but had not a scratch on him. He could not explain how the boar got so close to him, except that he was listening to the dogs in the distance, and the first thing he knew he was looking down the boar's throat. The next thing he remembered, was the plunging of his knife into the beast's throat, time after time.

Like all truly brave men Gaston did not try to make out the accidents of good fortune as deliberately planned by him. But seldom have I, in war or sport, seen greater courage, address and strength than Gaston Cheverny showed on this occasion.

Count Saxe congratulated him warmly, reminding him of that other occasion when by his quickness he had pa.s.sed himself off for Count Saxe, and so had earned for himself seven years of captivity, but had saved Count Saxe. Gaston received this and all our congratulations with becoming modesty. He turned away from our praises to give liberal drink-money to the huntsmen, who were delighted beyond reason at the killing of the old "solitary," and that, too, without a man or a dog being injured. It was then determined to return to Chambord, whose distant towers glowed in the sun.

Gaston, as may be imagined, was in a very wretched condition. He washed off some of the blood in the little brook, threw away his handsome hunting coat, borrowed a jacket from one of the huntsmen, and we set off at a smart pace toward the castle.

From the moment I had noticed that Gaston Cheverny wielded his knife in his right hand, my mind had been in a whirl. That right hand and arm, so swift, so sure, so steady, so strong, was the one he had said was so weak, that he could not even guide a pen with it, nor play the guitar. Francezka's parting warning had been to remember the infirmity of that arm--and then--

We rode along briskly the two leagues to the castle. Gaston Cheverny was naturally elate, and even in the bravest of men, there is an exhilaration, a sort of intoxication at finding one's self alive when the chance of death was very imminent. I fell behind all the party, and was rallied by Count Saxe on my taciturnity, and accused of jealousy of Gaston Cheverny's prowess, but I let him have his joke.

When we reached the castle, we went to our rooms. Mine was the little one I speak of, next to Count Saxe's bedchamber. When I was washing off by candle-light the stains of the chase--for it was then after dark--my master entered. He looked at me significantly, going through with Gaston's motion of plunging the knife into the wild boar; he knew the story of that weakly arm. I looked back at him and shook my head; I could no more understand it than he.

We hastened down to the state supper in the great dining hall. The king was indisposed or lazy, so his Majesty did not appear, and I think the party was the gayer thereby. There was but one long table in the dining hall, and at it were seated above a hundred persons. I was near the foot, and Gaston Cheverny, in honor of his exploit, sat next Count Saxe. Francezka sat about midway the table, with a gallant on each side of her.

The aspect of happiness she had shown since the night before remained with her. She wore both powder and patches, and according to the fashion, there was a tinge of rouge upon her cheek. She was magnificently dressed in a pale green gown, the color of water-cress, embroidered in silver, and wore a splendid head-dress. I thought I had never seen her more truly the great lady. She knew, of course, what Gaston's adventure had been, but I suppose he had not given her all the particulars.

The supper was singularly merry, perhaps owing to the absence of the king. The singing at the table was entirely of hunting songs; the little rascals of pages took good care to keep Gaston's gla.s.s filled--he was a great hero with them then. When it came time for the toasts, Count Saxe arose and after drinking to the king and the ladies, gave Gaston Cheverny's health, together with an account, as only Maurice of Saxe could give it, of the exploit of the afternoon.

I knew not at the time if Count Saxe intended it, but he seemed to lay the greatest stress upon Gaston's feat being performed with the right arm--as if any man could have done it with his left one. My master told me afterward, that it was quite involuntary with him mentioning Gaston Cheverny's right arm, that he meant rather to avoid it, but, to his chagrin, the words kept coming up in his speech, he, all the while, feeling that it sounded foolish to mention that it was done with the right arm.

I glanced toward Francezka while Count Saxe was speaking. There are some inconveniences attached to sharpness of intellect--nothing escapes it. As Count Saxe proceeded with his recital, I saw that Francezka had seen at a glance the mystery in it. I had no apprehension of any show of agitation on her part, she was a woman of too flawless courage and too good an actress, but she would not suffer the less. I saw a shadow come over her eyes as I had seen a black cloud darken the face of the lake at Capello. I saw her hands tremble slightly. She looked steadily at Count Saxe, and avoided the gaze of Gaston Cheverny which became fixed on her. He had taken more wine than usual. His steady glances, although smiling enough, were calculated to draw her gaze toward him.

At last, as if forced against her will, she raised her eyes to his, and in them was doubt and despair. All this went on secretly as it were, amid the talking, the laughing, the singing of a hundred persons at the supper, with a band of more than forty musicians tw.a.n.ging in the music gallery above us. Soon after this, the company arose and went into the grand ball room. The _branle_ was at once formed, and Francezka, as on the night before, led it with Count Saxe. She showed not the slightest tremor or agitation, but I knew of the wild beating of her heart under the lace and jewels.

Gaston Cheverny was the hero of the hour. He danced, too, and the women, who all adore brute courage, wooed him with their smiles and arch glances. I saw him dancing with Madame Fontange, whom both Francezka and I had seen him chasing up the great staircase two days before. Francezka was dancing in the same _minuet de la cour_. There is a part when, to languorous music, the gentlemen, with their plumed hats, sweeping the ground, bow low to the ladies. As Gaston Cheverny did this, I saw suddenly flash into his eyes that look of Regnard Cheverny's. Francezka saw it, too. It was the very end of the minuet.

In the confusion that followed the breaking up of the dance Francezka disappeared. In a little while there was a hue and cry raised for Madame Cheverny. Messengers were sent after her. She was in her rooms, and sent word back that she was fatigued with the chase that day, and as she was to rehea.r.s.e next day as well as act, she begged to be excused. When I heard this message repeated, I left the ball room, and going up the great spiral staircase, open to the moonlight which flooded the earth, stopped opposite Francezka's window. The sky was studded with glowing stars, and a great silver lamp of a moon made the night radiant. Below, lights were shining from every window, and the swell of the music kept rhythm with the beat of the dancers' feet. But there, at that lonely height, all was still as death. Francezka's window opened. It was not four feet from me.

"I knew your step," she said.

I remained silent and awkward. My heart, aching for her pain, had brought my body thither, but after I had reached her, I knew not what to say. She still wore her splendid gown and all her jewels.

"I know all about that _coup de grace_ with his right arm," she said in a voice quiet, though trembling a little. "Do you wonder that I am always in terror of something, I know not what? One thing is certain.

I do not know Gaston any longer. He is as strange, even stranger to me than he is to you. Also, he is as kind, as devoted to me as ever he was. I hate and dread mysteries--and I am enveloped in one."

She continued looking at me for a moment; I still knew not what to say. Then, she softly closed the window. I remained out there on the stairs until the December cold forced me to seek the fire in the great hall below. There sat Gaston Cheverny, among a number of gentlemen. He was the gayest, and might be adjudged the comeliest, gracefullest, most accomplished man there, excepting always Maurice, Count of Saxe.

The next day, the king left Chambord, but the other guests stayed on for a full fortnight.

It often occurred to me, that Chambord in its palmiest days, of Francis the First with his Ronsard, of Louis le Grand with his Moliere, never sheltered more wit, beauty and courage, than it did at this time. The wit and courage of Count Saxe are too well-known to need comment, and the same may be said of the Duc de Noailles, Marshal Boufflers, Monsieur d'Argental, and others then at Chambord. As for beauty, combined with wit, Francezka Capello led all the ladies, but there were other gifted ones. Even Madame du Chatelet, in spite of her everlasting algebra and Newton's Principia, was not an ill-looking woman. Madame Villars and Madame Fontange were charming. The presence of these ladies and others, all remarkable for spirit, was ever after alleged as the reason for the disappearance of the celebrated pane of gla.s.s, in one of the windows of the yellow saloon which was used as the theater.

On this window pane Francis the First had scratched this ungallant distich:

Toute femme varie, Mal habile qui s'y fie.

One night, Monsieur Voltaire read this aloud, and kept the whole saloon in a roar over his idea of what Francis the First would have said were he to come to life then. His tirade was interrupted by Francezka and Madame Villars seizing him, blindfolding and tying him with their scarfs and putting him for punishment into a sort of improvised stocks. In vain Monsieur Voltaire called upon the gentlemen to a.s.sist him; he was left helpless in the hands of the ladies, who maltreated him severely. Monsieur Voltaire's evident enjoyment of his punishment at the hands of these captivating creatures brought about one of those domestic tempests which frequently disturbed the atmosphere of Cirey and of the "Pet.i.t Palais" on the isle of St.

Louis.

It was said that in the heat of the discussion next morning about it, Madame du Chatelet threw Newton's Principia at Monsieur Voltaire's head, and he made a narrow miss by dodging. Certain it is, they had high words, and Madame du Chatelet in a huff left the castle some days before Monsieur Voltaire; and it was noted that he seemed much gayer and more gallant after the lady's departure than before.

Meanwhile, the pane of gla.s.s mysteriously disappeared. I have no doubt it was accidentally broken by one of those little rogues of pages of honor, who was afraid to acknowledge his fault; but Monsieur Voltaire chose to put it on the ladies in general and on Francezka in particular, and there was great sport and much wit over the matter.

Francezka was the gayest, the airiest, the most daring of the ladies; she never more said a single word to me concerning that misery which she had represented to me as eating her heart out; and though as kind, as tender to me as ever, she rather avoided private conversations with me--for which I was glad.

Gaston seemed to me to become more like the Gaston of old than he had been, but my heart did not warm to him, nor could I forget that incident of his killing the wild boar. He made no allusion to this whatever, and continued to use his left arm only. I would have given much to know what he supposed we thought of it.

Of course, the play was high, on the nights when there were cards, and Count Saxe enriched several of his guests by his losses. He lost magnificently, and won with the greatest modesty.

During this fortnight the consumption of victuals, wine and horse feed was something stupendous, but my master never grumbled about the charges. Luckily, he had Beauvais to look after the wine and victual, and myself to look after the horse feed.

At last came the day of departure. The servants and baggage wagons were sent on some hours in advance and at nine o'clock in the morning the company all set out together for Blois, where they were to disperse. Gaston Cheverny rode with the gentlemen, and Francezka traveled alone in her coach. She bade me an affectionate good by and begged me to come with Count Saxe to the chateau of Capello, in the spring. Apparently she was happy and composed, but I knew she was neither. There was a searching and anxious expression in her eyes which, in spite of her smiles and gaiety, showed me a heart disturbed.

That night every soul in the castle was in bed a little after nine o'clock, and I think we all slept a week.

CHAPTER x.x.xI

THE BITTERNESS OF DOUBT

My master went to Paris for Christmas, to our old lodging at the Luxembourg. The king was very anxious for Count Saxe to be permanently lodged at Versailles, but my master, by a variety of clever subterfuges, declined to exchange his splendid and s.p.a.cious apartments at the Luxembourg, for the dog-hole which was all they had to offer him at Versailles. Two thousand persons were lodged in the palace. It may be imagined what sort of lodging much of it was; mere closets for ladies of quality, a landing at a stair's head curtained off for gentlemen. My master was offered a couple of rooms under the roof for himself, myself and Beauvais. Count Saxe responded that he was not a snail, and required a lodging somewhat larger than himself. He was told that a bishop was satisfied with one room and an alcove for his valet. My master replied that a bishop was a holier man than he. The fact is, my master did not like the everlasting restraints of Versailles. Some malicious people said he preferred Paris on account of Mademoiselle Verieres, the actress. G.o.d knows. There are always people who can ascribe the worst motives to the simplest actions.

Francezka and Gaston Cheverny spent the winter at the Hotel Kirkpatrick. Madame Riano had gone to England then, but only made a brief stay. From thence she went to Rome, and Monsieur Voltaire declared it was for the purpose of getting the pope to put himself at the head of the Kirkpatricks to march to London and wrest the throne of England from the Hanoverians for Prince Charles Edward Stuart. At all events, news reached Paris that Madame Riano had fallen out violently with the Holy Father, as she had done with the Kings of France, of Spain and of England, and was breathing out fire and slaughter against the Holy See.

It was to be expected that Francezka and Gaston should live with splendor and gaiety at the Hotel Kirkpatrick, and they did; this, too, upon a scale that probably made Francezka's father, the prudent old Scotchman, writhe in his grave. b.a.l.l.s, masques, concerts and ballets followed each other with dazzling swiftness. A temporary theater was built in the garden on the site of the one where Francezka had made her first dramatic adventure with the baker's boy, under the management of Jacques Haret. Here were given the best comedies of the day, with Francezka as the star. Monsieur Voltaire was often in the cast, and some of his own masterpieces were given at this theater for the first time.

Nor was he the only wit who frequented the Hotel Kirkpatrick. Not only wits, but scholars like Maupertius, the two Bernouillis, many poets and literary men, Cardinal de Polignac and Marquis de Beauvau, soldiers like Marshal Count de Belle-Isle, his brother the Chevalier, the Prince de Soubise, the Prince de Clermont, and others, made Francezka's saloon shine. She was the extreme of the mode and her saloon became the rage. Monsieur Voltaire went about threatening the ladies, that if they did not look out, Madame Cheverny would bring virtue into fashion. But there was no panic among them, although it can not be denied that Francezka was admired for her virtue as for her wit, and, with such a fortune as hers, neither would be likely to remain under an eclipse.

She was in the greatest demand at Versailles, too, and danced in all of the finest ballets given for the king. She had her English curricle, and with her English _joki_ standing up behind her, was often seen driving in the Bois de Boulogne. She dressed superbly, and was altogether glorious. The same felicity seemed to attend Gaston.

The Duc de Richelieu took a violent fancy to him, which, of course, recommended him to the king. He was of all the royal hunting parties.

The king loved to hear him tell of his adventures in the East, which were extremely interesting, and Gaston was ever eloquent of tongue. He was gallant to the ladies, and much run after by them, but I do not think he ever gave Francezka cause for a moment's jealousy. In short, if two human beings might be supposed to walk the sunny heights of joy, it was Francezka and Gaston Cheverny.

Paris was seething during the winter of 1740-41, which preceded the outbreak of the first Silesian war on the part of the great Frederick of Prussia against the greater Maria Theresa of Austria-Hungary.

France and Paris were dragged hither and thither, Cardinal Fleury, a peaceful old man, urging that France remain neutral; Marshal Belle-Isle, a genius in war, insisting that France must side with Prussia. Naturally, the military element wanted war, and when it seemed likely that Cardinal Fleury would keep France at peace, Marshal Belle-Isle went about storming that this old parson would ruin everything. It was understood that no active military operations would take place until the late summer, so the gay dogs of officers and the merry ladies who danced in the court ballets, and flitted about like b.u.t.terflies in the sun, had to make the most of Paris then. The pace at which they went was killing--and Francezka and Gaston Cheverny were not the last in this race.

One day, shortly before the carnival, there was a great fete at the Louvre, and the courtyard was filling up with magnificent coaches. The finest of all was a gilt coach superbly horsed with six horses, with four outriders in the crimson and gold of Francezka's liveries. She sat alone in the coach, waiting her turn to drive up to the great entrance. She was, as always, dressed with splendor, and as she sat back in the coach, fanning herself with a beautiful fan that slightly moved the white plumes of her head-dress, I made my way through the crush and spoke to her. She had one of her lackeys let down the coach steps, and I stood on them while speaking to her. I congratulated her on her splendid equipage.