Francezka Part 41

Neither Monsieur Voltaire nor Madame Villars saw anything in it, except the most ordinary conversation. Monsieur Voltaire was smiling and glancing toward the masks.

"Ah, ladies," he cried, "if you would but disclose your charming selves we should have something more agreeable to talk about than the winding of a muddy brook, or the right of the Honsbrouck to kill game in the forest near-by."

Madame Villars waved her hand for Monsieur Voltaire to proceed, which he did.

"Gentlemen," he said, "since these ladies are not yet pleased to tell us who they are, let us, at least, try to entertain them by any means in our power. Shall I read to you my last letter from the King of Prussia, and my reply?"

Gaston and Jacques Haret at once agreed enthusiastically, and we, the masked, rose and bowed our approval. Monsieur Voltaire went to his _escritoire_, unlocked it, and took out two letters, which he read to us in that n.o.ble great voice of his. The one from the King of Prussia was a very good letter for a king to write. That man knew enough of mankind always to advance fine sentiments, and was a man, although a robber. Such was my master's opinion of Frederick, known as the Great.

In reply to this letter was that celebrated one of Monsieur Voltaire's, in which he says: "I respect metaphysical ideas; rays of lightning they are in the midst of deep night. More, I think, is not to be hoped from metaphysics. It does not seem likely that the first principles of things will ever be known. The mice that nestle in some little holes in an immense building know not whether it is eternal, nor who the architect, nor why he built it. Such mice are we, and the Divine Architect who built the universe has never, that I know of, told His secret to one of us."

Voltaire paused at this and rested his head upon his hand.

"How sad it all is!" he cried, his great gloomy eloquent eyes fixed upon the stars visible through the open doors.

There was a silence. Every person there, not excluding Monsieur Voltaire and Jacques Haret, hoped differently from this melancholy creed, but no one spoke until Jacques Haret said, with the gravity under which he disguised most of his flippancies:

"Monsieur, you can not say that the Architect of the Universe has told His secret to no one. You forget the Kirkpatricks, and especially Scotch Peg. She knows all the designs of the Supreme Being. He never dares to call a Kirkpatrick out of this world without sending a gentleman usher in the shape of a black knight or a white lady, or something of the kind, to find out whether it is agreeable to that particular Kirkpatrick to leave this world just then, I presume. There never was one of that family who did not consider himself ent.i.tled to much consideration from the Supreme Being. They are not all, however, so candid about it as Peggy is."

Considering this direct reflection upon Francezka, I looked to see Gaston Cheverny forget the presence of his host, forget the presence of the ladies, and knock Jacques Haret's impudent head off. Not at all. His face flushed suddenly, and he turned again in his chair, but said no word, although Jacques Haret's laughing face was thrust toward him.

Monsieur Voltaire evidently forgot, in the interest of his letters, the close connection between the Kirkpatricks and one of his guests, so he went on reading.

For my part, the impression I had got the afternoon in the gardens of the Hotel Kirkpatrick, that Gaston Cheverny in some way was afraid of Jacques Haret, became a conviction. Francezka sat motionless. What thoughts must have pa.s.sed through that quick, clear brain of hers!

Monsieur Voltaire finished his reading, and the ladies, to show their appreciation, rose and bowed again to him. I think he was amused by their silence, and it became a kind of duel between him and them to find out who they were, and it was not without interest to Gaston Cheverny. Jacques Haret, I was convinced, already knew them. By way of making them betray themselves, Monsieur Voltaire asked, with a mischievous gleam in his l.u.s.trous eyes:

"What ladies of the great world, think you, gentlemen, are remarkable for _esprit_?"

At that Madame Villars ran forward and tapped him smartly with her fan by way of rebuke.

Gaston Cheverny mentioned several, as did Monsieur Voltaire. Both of them included both Madame Villars and her mother-in-law, Madame la Marechale Villars, and Monsieur Voltaire made the handsomest possible allusion to Madame Gaston Cheverny's wit and charm, which Gaston suitably acknowledged. Jacques Haret declared that it had been so long since he had talked with a woman of quality he had almost forgotten there were such creatures in the world.

"But," he added, laughing, "I shall renew my acquaintance with fine ladies and gentlemen when I go to Capello this summer to visit Monsieur and Madame Cheverny."

I could scarcely believe my ears, and I feared to look toward Francezka.

"You are not the only one who will enjoy that privilege," cried Monsieur Voltaire, "for Madame Cheverny has invited me, and Monsieur Cheverny has approved of me."

Francezka rose and made a signal to Madame Villars that it was time to depart. All rose. Francezka, advancing to the table, took up the pen and in her clear, bold handwriting, wrote on a slip of paper:

Jacques Haret: Do not you dare to come to Capello.

Francezka Cheverny de Capello del Medina y Kirkpatrick.

She slipped her hands into the sleeves of her domino and stood erect before Jacques Haret, her eyes blazing at him through the eyeholes in her mask. I was reminded of that Captain Agoust who, by the intensity of his gaze, goaded the Prince de Conti into a duel. Francezka's look at Jacques Haret was equivalent to running a sword through him.

Nothing, however, could change Jacques Haret's native and incurable levity. He rose, and grinning, made Francezka a low bow.

"I am sorry, Madame, I can not oblige you," he said, "but my arrangements are all made, even to my wardrobe, and it is now too late to change, disagreeable as it is to me to disoblige a lady."

The blood of the Kirkpatricks was rising in Francezka's veins; the air suddenly seemed full of electricity. I saw her involuntarily place her hand upon the inkstand, a heavy, bronze one, lying on the table, and I thought the chance was that she would throw it in Jacques Haret's face. To save her from so wild an act was my only thought. I reached over, and getting a good grip on Jacques Haret, which I could do easily, as he was entirely off his guard, I flung him headlong through the open door into the garden below. Then, not wishing Francezka's ident.i.ty to be revealed, I motioned to her and Madame Villars, and we hurried out of the room.

I forgot until the ladies were in their sedans that the sc.r.a.p of writing in Francezka's hand lay on the table and would be seen by Gaston Cheverny and probably by Monsieur Voltaire. My trouble was all in vain, but I was glad I had thrown Jacques Haret through the door.

The chairmen went off at a rapid pace, I following. We turned a corner, which gave me a clear look through the garden of the room we had just left. Gaston was standing stock still, holding the sc.r.a.p of paper in his hand. He knew then who the masked visitors were. I walked by the side of Francezka's chair, through the dark streets until we came to the Hotel Kirkpatrick. Madame Villars lived close by, and we parted with her first. She said good night, but made no comment on the events of the evening. She was no fool, and saw that something had happened, although she knew not what.

We pa.s.sed through the small gate of the courtyard and around to the private entrance, where Francezka dismissed the chairmen and I took off my mask and domino. We were standing in a quiet little court at one side of the great entrance. It was very still and dark, and the stars, palpitating, and bright, and distant, seemed to be laughing at the miseries of the poor mice, as Voltaire called them, hidden away in the small holes of the immense building called the Universe.

Francezka, panting for breath, took off her mask. Her pale face and her eyes, somber, but full of smoldering fire, were half shrouded in the hood of her domino. In her black garb, and with a look of despair upon her face, she was as far removed from that dazzling Francezka of the former time as could well be imagined. I was not disposed to make light of what she had seen and heard that night. Nothing is more uncomfortable than to live with a mystery, and when that mystery is in the person one should love best in the world, when it poisons all the springs of joy and makes the things known best in life strange to one, it is a very dreadful thing. Francezka spoke after a while.

"Do you wonder, Babache, that I am a miserable woman?"

And I said with perfect honesty in my heart:

"No, Madame. I do not wonder in the least."

She paused, and I supposed she was about to say something to me about Gaston, when she uttered these words which remain forever in my heart, which not one waking hour has failed to recall since she uttered them:

"Babache, remember, when I am gone, that n.o.body in the world was ever so good a friend to me as you. I speak not of lovers--Gaston was once my lover."

She paused as if overcome, and then hurriedly vanished within the open door.

Her words thrilled me with joy and pain. What did she mean by saying, "When I am gone?" Who was more likely to live than Francezka? Why should she be contemplating the end of all things? I was roused from my anxious reverie by the sound of locking the great iron gates, the bolts and bars making a huge noise in the stillness of the night. This grating sound, however, did not drown those words of Francezka's.

Something led my footsteps again to the street, where I could get from the back a clear view of Monsieur Voltaire's room. When I reached the place all was dark, and the doors and windows were closed for the night, but on the corner stood a plain coach, which I recognized in the half darkness of the summer night as belonging to Gaston Cheverny.

If I had been surprised at his patience with Jacques Haret's impertinence an hour ago, I now saw that it was not so long suffering as I had thought, for Gaston, sitting in the coach and holding the door open, was swearing at Jacques Haret with a concentration of rage I had never seen excelled in any human being before. Every word that he said was true, but there was a defiance in it which further sustained my notion that Jacques Haret held some power over Gaston Cheverny.

Jacques was taking it with the same coolness he had taken the beating I had given him in the Luxembourg gardens. Gaston was shouting out insults to him, and when Gaston stopped at the point where any other man would have drawn his sword, Jacques coolly remarked:

"You have called me a liar, a blackmailer, a leper, a dog and a devil's imp. I take it that you are of a different opinion from me on certain points. Your withdrawing your invitation to me to the chateau of Capello is most unhandsome. However, it is not your chateau, anyhow."

Gaston leaped out of the coach after him, but Jacques Haret disappeared somewhere in the darkness, for he had no scruples about avoiding a fight, yet I believe him to have been singularly insensible to fear.

Within three days I heard that Monsieur and Madame Cheverny had left Paris for their estates in Brabant. As they went together, it was plain there had been no outward break between them.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV

A GARRET IN PRAGUE

The great parties at Chambord followed and lasted all through June.

They were like the one in December, but they were not illuminated by the wit, the beauty, the ineffable charm of Francezka. It may be imagined how little I enjoyed them. My heart was like lead in my bosom. Every waking hour, and often in my dreams, I saw Francezka's face as I had last seen it, pale and despairing.

There was something else besides pleasuring at Chambord; the fetes were meant to disguise more serious events. On an August morning at daylight Count Saxe changed his ball costume for his riding dress and set forth to take command of the van of Marshal Belle-Isle's army, which was to cross the Rhine at Fort Louis, thirty miles below Strasburg. Gaston Cheverny was not to be with us. He was to go with the army of Marshal Maillebois, which was to cross the Rhine near Dusseldorf.

Count Saxe had been in a quandary about inviting Gaston Cheverny to resume his old place as aide-de-camp. There could be no doubt that Gaston merited much from Count Saxe, as it was owing to Count Saxe's own imprudence in remaining unguarded at Huningen that Gaston Cheverny had been lost to life and love for seven years. Yet my master felt toward him the same coldness of heart that I did. It is true that Gaston's alleged inability to use his right arm properly would be a drawback, but one likely to be pa.s.sed over by any commander who really wished his services, and especially by Count Saxe, taking the past into consideration. In truth there was every reason why Count Saxe should again offer a place in his military family to Gaston Cheverny.

But he felt a singular indisposition to do it.