Henry of Guise Volume Ii Part 2

Perhaps--and Heaven grant it!--that, as some of our fathers held, the one love may lead us on to the other, and the perishable be but a step to the immortal. However," he added, "such love as that which you say possesses your brother, will certainly never lead him on to any thing that is great, or high, or n.o.ble. Most certainly it will not lead him to the hand of Marie de Clairvaut as long as Henry of Guise can draw a sword. If he have not betrayed me, he has abandoned me; if he have not shown himself a coward, he has shown himself a weak defender of those intrusted to his charge; and under such circ.u.mstances, had he the wealth of either India and the power of Caesar, he should never wed Marie de Clairvaut." He laid his hand upon the shoulder of Charles of Montsoreau, and he said, "You have heard my words, good friend; those words are irrevocable: and now knowing that your brother can never be really your rival, act as you will. I would fain have your confidence, Charles, but I will not wring it from you. This girl is beautiful and sweet and fascinating; and if I judge right, you love her not less but more n.o.bly than your brother. Tell me, or tell me not as you will, but we all feel pleased with confidence."

"Oh, my Lord," replied Charles of Montsoreau, "how can I deny you my confidence when you load me with such proofs of your goodness? I do love Mademoiselle de Clairvaut as deeply, as intensely, as pa.s.sionately, as my brother,--more, more a thousand fold than he or any body else, I believe, is capable of loving. I had some opportunities of rendering her services, and on one of those occasions I was betrayed into words and actions which I fancied must have made her acquainted with all my feelings. It was after that I discovered, my Lord, how madly my brother loved her: it was after that I discovered that the pursuit of my love must bring contention and destruction on my father's house. Had I believed that she loved me, nothing should have made me yield her to any one; for I had the prior claim, I had the prior right: but when I had reason to believe that she had not marked, and did not comprehend all the signs of my affection; when I felt that I could quit her without the appearance of trifling with her regard, though not without the continued misery of my own life, my determination was taken in a moment, and I determined to make the sacrifice, be the consequences what they might. Such, my Lord, is the simple truth; such is the only secret of all my actions."

The Duke of Guise bent down his eyes upon the ground with a smile, in the expression of which there was a degree of cynical bitterness. It was somewhat like one of the smiles of the Abbe de Boisguerin; but the Duke's words explained it at once, which the Abbe's never did.

"I fear, my young friend," he said, "that the science of women's hearts is a more difficult one than the science of war. You have learnt the one, it would seem, by intuition; in the other you are yet a novice. However, you shall pursue your own course, bearing with you the remembrance that I swear by my own honour--"

"Oh swear not, my Lord," replied Charles of Montsoreau; "circ.u.mstances may change; she may love him; her love may alter him, and lead him back to n.o.ble things."

The Duke smiled again. "What I have said," he answered, "is as good as sworn. But have it your own way; I thank you for the confidence you have reposed in me. And now, to show you how I can return it, I have a task to put upon you, an adventure on which to send forth my new made knight. I do not think that Henry either will or dare refuse to give up to me my own relation and ward. The king and I are great friends, G.o.d wot! But still I must demand her, and somebody must take a journey to Paris for that purpose. To the capital, doubtless, they have conveyed her; and I trust, my good Logeres, that you will not think it below your dignity and merit to seek and bring back a daughter of the House of Guise."

Charles of Montsoreau paused thoughtfully for a moment, ere he replied. All the difficulties and dangers to which he might be exposed, in acting against the views of the King of France, were to him as nothing; but the difficulties and dangers which might arise from his opposition to his own brother, were painful and fearful to him to contemplate. He saw not, however, how he could refuse the task; and it cannot be denied that love for Marie de Clairvaut had its share also in making him accept it. He doubted not for a moment, that if she were in the hands of the King, she was there against her own will; and could he, he asked himself, could he even hesitate to aid in delivering her from a situation of difficulty, danger, and distress?

The thought of aiding her, the thought of seeing her again, the thought of hearing the sweet tones of that beloved voice, the thought of once more soothing and supporting her, all had their share; the very contemplation made his heart beat; and lifting his eyes, he found those of the Duke of Guise fixed upon his countenance, reading all the pa.s.sing emotions, the shadows of which were brought across him by those thoughts. The colour mounted slightly into his cheek as he replied, "My Lord, I will do your bidding to the best of my ability.

When shall I march?"

"Oh, you mistake," said the Duke, laughing; "you are not to go at the head of your men, armed _cap-a-pie_, to deliver the damsel from the giant's castle; but in the quality of my envoy to Henry; first of all demanding, quietly and gently, where the Lady is, and then requiring him to deliver her into your hands, for the purpose of escorting her to me, where-ever I may be. You shall have full powers for the latter purpose; but you must keep them concealed till such time as you have discovered, either from the King's own lips--though no sincerity dwells upon them--or by your own private inquiries and investigations, where this poor girl is. Then you may produce to the King your powers from me, and to herself I will give you a letter, requesting her to follow your directions in all things. Now, you must show yourself as great a diplomatist as a soldier, for I can a.s.sure you that you will have to deal with as artful and as wily a man as any now living in Europe."

"I will do my best, my Lord; and to enable me to deal with them before all their plans are prepared, I had better set out at break of day to-morrow, with as many men as your Highness thinks fit should accompany me."

The Duke mused for a moment or two; "No," he said, "no; I must not let you go, Logeres, without providing for your safety. You have risked your life sufficiently for me and mine already. You go into new scenes, with which you are unacquainted; into dangers, with which you may find it more difficult to cope than any that you have hitherto met with. I cannot then suffer you to depart without such pa.s.sports and safeguards as may diminish those dangers as far as possible."

"Oh, I fear not, my Lord," replied Charles of Montsoreau, "the King and your Highness are not at war. I have done nothing to offend, and--"

"It cannot be, it cannot be," replied the Duke. "You must go back with me to Soissons. I will send a messenger from this place to demand the necessary pa.s.sports for you. No great time will be lost, for a common courier can pa.s.s where you or I would be stopped. Then," he continued, "as to the men that you should take with you, I should say, the fewer the better. Mark me," he continued, with a smile, "there are secret springs in all things; and I will give you letters to people in Paris, which will put at your disposal five hundred men on the notice of half an hour. Ay, more, should you require them. But use not these letters except in the last necessity, for they might hurry on events which I would rather see advance slowly till they were forced upon me, than do aught to bring them forward myself. No; you shall go back with me to Soissons, guarding me with your band; and I doubt not, our messenger from Paris will not be many hours after us. Now leave me, and to rest, good Logeres, and send in the servant, whom you will find half way down the stairs."

The young Count withdrew without another word, and he found that while the conversation between himself and the Duke had been going on, a man had been stationed, both above and below the door of the apartment, as if to insure that n.o.body approached to listen. Such were the sad precautions necessary in those days.

Early on the following morning the whole party mounted their horses, the wounded men of Logeres were left under the care and attendance of the good townsmen of Montigny, and the young Count riding with the party of the Duke of Guise, proceeded on the road to Soissons. No adventure occurred to disturb their progress; and, as so constantly happens in the midst of scenes of danger, pain, and difficulty, almost every one of the whole party endeavoured to compensate for the frequent endurance of peril and pain by filling up the intervals with light laughter and unthinking gaiety. The Duke of Guise himself was not the least cheerful of the party, though occasionally the cloud of thought would settle again upon his brow, and a pause of deep meditation would interrupt the jest or the sally. It was late at night when they arrived at Soissons, and the Duke, after supping with the Cardinal de Bourbon, retired to rest, without conversing with any of his party. It was about eight o'clock on the following morning, and while, by the dull grey light of a cloudy spring day, Charles of Montsoreau was dressing himself, with the aid of one of his servants, that the door opened without any previous announcement, and the Duke of Guise, clad in a dressing-gown of crimson velvet trimmed with miniver, entered the room, bearing in his hand a packet of sealed letters, and one open one. A page followed him with something wrapped up in a skin of leather, which he placed upon one of the stools, and instantly retired.

"Send away your man, Count," said the Duke, seating himself; "resume your dressing-gown, and kindly give me your full attention for half an hour. You will be so good," he continued, turning to the man who was quitting the chamber, "as to take your stand on the first landing-place below this door. You will tell any body whom you see coming up to pa.s.s by the other staircase; any one you may see coming down, you will direct to pa.s.s by this door quickly."

There was a stern command in the eye of the Duke of Guise which had a strong effect upon those it rested on; and the man to whom he now spoke made his exit from the room, stumbling over twenty things in his haste to obey. As soon as he was gone, the Duke turned to his young friend, and continued, "Here is the King's safeguard under his own hand, and the necessary pa.s.sports for yourself and two attendants.

Here is your letter of credit to him in my name, requiring him to give you every sort of information which he may be possessed of regarding the subjects which you will mention to him; and here is a third letter giving you full power to demand at his hands the person of Mademoiselle de Clairvaut, for the purpose of escorting her and placing her under my protection. This, again, is to Mary herself, bidding her follow your counsels and direction in every thing; and these others are to certain citizens of Paris, whose names you will find written thereon. If you will take my advice, you will again take with you the boy Ignati, and one stout man-at-arms, unarmed, however, except in such a manner as the dangers of the road require. You understand, I think, clearly, all that I wish."

"I believe, my Lord, I do," replied the Count. "But how am I to insure safety for Mademoiselle de Clairvaut on the road, without an adequate force?"

"Write to me but one word," replied the Duke of Guise, "as soon as she is delivered into your hands, and I will send you with all speed whatever forces I can spare. But I have one or two things to communicate to you, which it is necessary for you to know, both for your own security and the success of your mission. The princ.i.p.al part of my niece's lands lie in the neighbourhood of Chateauneuf, between Dreux and Mortagne in Normandy. It is not at all unlikely, that, if driven to remove her from your sight, Henry may be tempted to send her thither, well knowing that it is what I have always opposed, and that I preferred rather that she should dwell even in Languedoc than be in that neighbourhood. For this I had a reason; and that reason is the near relationship in which her father stood to the most daring and the most dangerous man in France. One of the first of those whom you will see near the person of the King, the man who governs and rules him to his own infamy and destruction, in whose hands the minions are but tools and Henry an instrument, who, more than any one else, has tended to change a gracious prince, a skilful general, and a brave man, into an effeminate and vicious king, is Rene de Villequier, Baron of Clairvaut. He was first cousin to Marie de Clairvaut's father, and he is consequently her nearest male relation out of the family of Guise.

He has, indeed, sometimes hinted at a right to share in the guardianship of his cousin's daughter. But such things a Guise permits not. However, with this claim upon the disposal of her hand, Henry may, perhaps, hesitate to yield her, unless with the consent of Villequier. With him, then, you may be called upon to deal; but Villequier, I think, knows the hand of a Guise too well to call down a blow from it unnecessarily. However, he is as daring as he is artful, and impunity in crime has rendered him perfectly careless of committing it. He is Governor of Paris, one of the King's ministers, a Knight of the Holy Ghost. Now hear what he has done to merit all this.

More than one a.s.sa.s.sin broken on the wheel has avowed himself the instrument of Villequier, sent to administer poison to those he did not love. Complaisant in every thing to his King, he sought to sacrifice to him the honour of his wife: but she differed from him in her tastes; and, on the eighteenth of last September, in broad daylight, in the midst of an effeminate court, he murdered her with his own hand at her dressing-table. Nor was this all: there was a girl--a young sweet girl--the natural daughter of a n.o.ble house, who was holding before the unhappy lady a mirror to arrange her dress when the fatal blow was struck. The fiend's taste for blood was roused. One victim was not enough, and he murdered the wretched girl by the side of her dead mistress. This was done in open day, was never disowned, was known to every one, and was rewarded by the order of the Holy Ghost--an insult to G.o.d, to France, and to humanity.[1] However, as with this man you may have to deal, I have to give you two cautions.

Never drink wine with him, or eat food at his table; never go into his presence without wearing under your other dress the bosom friend which I have brought you there;" and he took from the leathern skin in which it was wrapped, a shirt of mail, made of rings linked together, so fine that it seemed the lightest stroke would have broken it, and yet so strong, that the best tempered poinard, driven by the most powerful hand, could not have pierced it. "Have also in your bosom," continued the Duke of Guise, "a small pistol; and if the villain attempts to lay his hand upon you, kill him like a dog. This is the only way to deal with Rene de Villequier."

[Footnote 1: All these charges were but too true.]

The young Count smiled: "And is it needful my Lord Duke," he asked, "to take all these precautions in the courtly world of Paris?--Do you yourself take them, my Lord?--I fear not sufficiently."

"Oh! with regard to myself," replied the Duke, it is different. "I am so marked out and noted, they dare not do any thing against me. They would raise up a thousand vengeful hands against them in a moment, and they know that, too well to run such a risk. Neither Henry nor Villequier would hold their lives by an hour's tenure after Guise was dead. But you must take these precautions, my young friend. And now I have nothing more to say, except that, whatever you do to withdraw Marie de Clairvaut from the hands into which she has fallen, I will justify. If any ill befall you, I will avenge you as my brother; and if you deliver her from those whom she hates and abhors, she shall, give you any testimony of her grat.i.tude that she pleases, without a man in France saying you nay."

"Oh, my Lord, it is not for that I go!" exclaimed Charles of Montsoreau, with the blood rushing up again into his cheek. "It is not; surely you believe--"

"Hush! hush!" replied the Duke. "I have fallen into the foolish error of saying too much, my good young friend. But now, fare you well. Make your arrangements as speedily as you can; mount your horse, and onward to Paris, while I apply myself to matters which may well occupy every minute and every thought."

CHAP. III.

It was about nine o'clock at night, in the spring of the year 1588, that Charles of Montsoreau, with two companions, his faithful Gondrin and the little page, presented himself at the gate of Paris which opened upon the Soissons road. A surly arquebusier with a steel cap on his head, his gun upon his shoulder, and the rest thereof in his hand, was the first person that he encountered at the bridge over the fosse.

Some other soldiers were sitting before the guardhouse; and the wicket-gate of the city itself was open, with an armed head protruded through, talking to a country girl with a basket on her arm, who had just pa.s.sed out of the gate, none the better probably for her visit to the city.

The arquebusier planted himself immediately in the way of the young cavalier and his followers, and seemed prepared to stop them, though on the young Count applying to him for admission, he replied in a surly tone, "I have nothing to do with it. Ask the lieutenant at the gate."

To him, in the next place, then, Charles of Montsoreau applied; but though his tone was somewhat more civil than that of the soldier, he made a great many difficulties, examining the young n.o.bleman all over, and looking as if he thought him a very suspicious personage. The Count after a certain time grew impatient, and asked, "You do not mean, I suppose, to refuse the pa.s.sport of the King?"

"No," replied the other grinning. "We won't refuse the pa.s.sport of the King, or the King's pa.s.sport; but in order that the pa.s.sport may be verified, it were as well, young gentleman, that you come to the gates by day. You can sleep in the faubourg for one night I take it."

"Certainly not without great inconvenience to myself," replied the Count, "and more inconvenience to the affairs of the Duke of Guise."

"The Duke of Guise!" said the man starting. "Your tongue has not the tw.a.n.g of Lorraine."

"But nevertheless," replied the Count, "the business I come upon is that of the Duke of Guise, which you would have seen if you had read the pa.s.sport and safe-conduct. Does it not direct therein, to give room and free pa.s.sage, safeguard, and protection to one gentleman of n.o.ble birth and two attendants, coming and going hither and thither in all parts of the realm of France, on the especial business of our true and well-beloved cousin, Henry, Duke of Guise? and is there not written in the Duke's own hand underneath, 'Given to our faithful friend and counsellor, Charles of Montsoreau, Count of Logeres, for the purposes above written, by me, Henry of Guise?'"

The man held the paper for a moment to a lantern that hung up against the heavy stonework of the arch, and then exclaimed in a loud voice, "Throw open the gates there, bring the keys. Monseigneur, I beg you a thousand pardons for detaining you a minute. If I had but seen the writing of the Duke of Guise the doors would have been opened instantly."

As rapidly as possible the heavy gates, which had remained immoveable at the order of the King, sw.a.n.g back at the name of the Guise, and one of the attendants and the captain of the night running by the side of the Count's horse to prevent all obstruction, caused the second gate to be opened as rapidly, and the Count entered the capital city of his native country for the first time in his life.

The streets were dark and gloomy, narrow and high; and as one rode along them looking up from time to time towards the sky, the small golden stars were seen twinkling above the deep walls of the houses, as if beheld from the bottom of a well. Charles of Montsoreau had not chosen to ask his way at the gate, and though utterly unacquainted with the great city in which he now plunged, he rode on, trusting to find some shop still open where he might inquire his way without the chance of being deceived. Every booth and shop was then shut, however; and for a very long way up the street which he had first entered, he met with not a single living creature to whom he could apply for direction. At length, however, that street ended abruptly in another turning to the left, and a sudden glare of light burst upon his eyes, proceeding from a building about a hundred yards farther on, which seemed to be on fire.

There was no bustle, however, or indication of any thing unusual in the street; and Charles of Montsoreau riding on, found that the blaze proceeded from a dozen or more of flambeaus planted in a sort of wooden barricade[2] before a large mansion, which fell back some yards from the general facade of the street, while a fat porter clothed in manifold colours, with a broad shoulder-belt and a sword by his side, walked to and fro in the light, tr.i.m.m.i.n.g the torches with stately dignity. The young Count then remembered having heard of the custom of thus illuminating the barriers, which were before all the princ.i.p.al mansions in Paris during the first part of every night; and riding up towards the porter, he demanded whose hotel it was, and begged to be directed to one of the best inns in the neighbourhood.

[Footnote 2: One or two of these houses with barriers were still existing in Paris not many years ago.]

The man gazed at him for a moment with the evident purpose of looking upon him as a b.u.mpkin; but the porters of that day were required to be extremely discriminating, and the air and appearance of the young Count were not to be mistaken, and bowing low he replied, "I see you are a stranger, sir. This is the house of Monsieur d'Aumont. As to the best inn, inns are always but poor places; but I have heard a good account of the White House in the next street, at the sign of the Crown of France. If you go on quite to the end of this street and then turn to your right, you will come into another street as large and longer, at the very end of which, just looking down to the Pont Neuf, you will see a large white house with a gateway and the crown hanging over it. I have heard that every thing is good there, and the host civil; but he will make you pay for what you have."

"That is but just," replied the young Count; and giving the porter thanks for his information, he rode on and took up his abode at the sign of the Crown of France.

The aspect of the inn was very different from that of an auberge in the country; for, though the court-yard into which Charles of Montsoreau rode was littered with straw, and a large and splendid stable appeared behind, it was not now grooms and stable-boys that appeared on the first notice of a traveller's approach, but cooks and scullions and turnspits; while the master himself with a snow-white cap upon his head, a jacket of white cloth, and a white ap.r.o.n turned up sufficiently to show his black breeches and stockings with red clocks, appeared more like what he really was, the head of the kitchen, than the master of the house.