In and out of Three Normandy Inns Part 16

She and her company of friends might have been stopping, that very instant, without, in the open court. I, also, seemed to hear the very tones of their voices; their talk was as audible as the wind rustling in the vines. In the growing stillness the vision grew and grew, till this was what I saw and heard:

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHAMBRE DES MARMOUSETS--DIVES]

TWO BANQUETS AT DIVES.

CHAPTER XX.

A SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY REVIVAL.

Outside the inn, some two hundred years ago, there was a great noise and confusion; the cries of outriders, of mounted guardsmen and halberdiers, made the quiet village as noisy as a camp. An imposing cavalcade was being brought to a sharp stop; for the outriders had suddenly perceived the open inn entrance, with its raised portcullis, and they were shouting to the coachmen to turn in, beneath the archway, to the paved court-yard within.

In an incredibly short s.p.a.ce of time the open quadrangle presented a brilliant picture; the dashing guardsmen were dismounting; the maids and lackeys had quickly descended from their perches in the caleches and coaches; and the gentlemen of the household were dusting their wide hats and lace-trimmed coats. The halberdiers, ranging themselves in line, made a prismatic grouping beneath the low eaves of the picturesque old inn. In the very middle of the court-yard stood a coach, resplendent in painted panels and emblazoned with ducal arms.

About this coach, as soon as the four horses which drew the vehicle were brought to a standstill, cavaliers, footmen, and maids swarmed with effusive zeal. One of the footmen made a rush for the door: another let down the steps; one cavalier was already presenting an outstretched, deferential hand, while still another held forth an arm, as rigid as a post, for the use of the occupants of the ducal carriage.

Three ladies were seated within. Large and roomy as was the vehicle, their voluminous draperies and the paraphernalia of their belongings seemed completely to fill the wide, deep seats. The ladies were the d.u.c.h.esse de Chaulnes, Madame de Kerman, and Madame de Sevigne. The faces of the d.u.c.h.esse and of Madame de Kerman were invisible, being still covered with their masks, which, both as a matter of habit and of precaution against the sun's rays, they had religiously worn during the long day's journey. But Madame de Sevigne had torn hers off; she was holding it in her hand, as if glad to be relieved from its confinement.

All three ladies were in the highest possible spirits, Madame de Sevigne obviously being the leader of the jests and the laughter.

They were in a mood to find everything amusing and delightful. Even after they had left the coach and were carefully picking their way over the rough stones--walking on their high-heeled "mules" at best, was always a dangerous performance--their laughter and gayety continued in undiminished exuberance. Madame de Sevigne's keen sense of humor found so many things to ridicule. Could anything, for example, be more comical than the spectacle they presented as they walked, in state, with their long trains and high-heeled slippers, up these absurd little turret steps, feeling their way as carefully as if they were each a pickpocket or an a.s.sa.s.sin? The long line behind of maids carrying their m.u.f.fs, and of lackeys with the m.u.f.f-dogs, and of pages holding their trains, and the grinning innkeeper, bursting with pride and courtesying as if he had St. Vitus's dance, all this crowd coiling round the rude spiral stairway--it was enough to make one die of laughter. Such state in such savage surroundings!--they and their patch-boxes, and towering head-gears and trains, and dogs and fans, all crowded into a place fit only for peasants!

When they reached their bedchambers the ridicule was turned into a condescending admiration; they found their rooms unexpectedly clean and airy. The furniture was all antique, of interesting design, and though rude, really astonishingly comfortable. Beds and dressing-tables, mostly of Henry III's time, were elaborately canopied in the hideous crude draperies of that primitive epoch. How different were the elegant shapes and brocades of their own time! Fortunately their women had suitable hangings and draperies with them, as well, of course, as any amount of linen and any number of mattresses. The settees and benches would do very well, with the aid of their own ha.s.socks and cushions, and, after all, it was only for a night, they reminded the other.

The toilet, after the heat and exposure of the day, was necessarily a long one. The d.u.c.h.esse and Madame de Kerman had their faces to make up--all the paint had run, and not a patch was in its place. Hair, also, of this later de Maintenon period, with its elaborate artistic ranges of curls, to say nothing of the care that must be given to the coif and the "follette," these were matters that demanded the utmost nicety of arrangement.

In an hour, however, the three ladies rea.s.sembled, in the panelled lower room--in "la Chambre de la Pucelle." In spite of the care her two companions had given to repairing the damages caused by their journey, of the three, Madame de Sevigne looked by far the freshest and youngest. She still wore her hair in the loosely flowing de Montespan fashion; a style which, though now out of date, was one that exactly suited her fair skin, her candid brow, and her brilliant eyes. These latter, when one examined them closely, were found to be of different colors; but this peculiarity, which might have been a serious defect in any other countenance, in Madame de Sevigne's brilliant face was perhaps one cause of its extraordinarily luminous quality. Not one feature was perfect in that fascinatingly mobile face: the chin was a trifle too long for a woman's chin; the lips, that broke into such delicious curves when she laughed, when at rest betrayed the firmness of her wit and the almost masculine quality of her reasoning judgment.

Even her arms and hands and her shoulders were "_mal tailles_" as her contemporaries would have told you. But what a charm in those irregular features! What a seductiveness in the ensemble of that not too-well-proportioned figure! What an indescribable radiance seemed to emanate from the entire personality of this most captivating of women!

As she moved about the low room, dark with the trembling shadows of light that flowed from the bunches of candles in the sconces, Madame de Sevigne's clear complexion, and her unpowdered chestnut curls, seemed to spot the room with light. Her companions, though dressed in the very height of the fashion, were yet not half as catching to the eye.

Neither their minute waists, nor their elaborate underskirts and trains, nor their tall coffered coifs (the d.u.c.h.esse's was not unlike a bishop's mitre, studded as it was with ruby-headed pins), nor the correctness of these ladies' carefully placed patches, nor yet their painted necks and tinted eyebrows, could charm as did the unmodish figure of Madame de Sevigne--a figure so indifferently clad, and yet one so replete with its distinction of innate elegance and the subtle charm of her individuality.

With the entrance of these ladies dinner was served at once. The talk flowed on; it was, however, more or less restrained by the presence of the always too curious lackeys, of the bustling innkeeper, and the gentlemen of the household in attendance on the party. As a spectacle, the little room had never boasted before of such an a.s.semblage of fashion and greatness. Never before had the air under the rafters been so loaded with scents and perfumes--these ladies seeming, indeed, to breathe out odors. Never before had there been grouped there such splendor of toilet, nor had such courtly accents been heard, nor such finished laughter. The fire and the candlelight were in compet.i.tion which should best light up the tall transparent caps, the lace fichus, the brocade bodices, and the long trains. The little m.u.f.f-dogs, released from their prisons, since the m.u.f.fs were laid aside at dinner time, blinked at the fire, curling their minute bodies--clipped lion-fashion--about the huge andirons, as they snored to kill time, knowing their own dinner would come only when their mistresses had done.

After the dessert had been served the ladies withdrew; they were preceded by the ever-bowing innkeeper, who a.s.sured them, in his most reverential tones, that they would find the room opening on the other court-yard even warmer and more comfortable than the one they were in.

In spite of the walk across the paved court-yard and the enormous height of their heels, always a fact to be remembered, the ladies voted to make the change, since by that means they could be a.s.sured the more entire seclusion. Mild as was the May air, Madame de Kerman's hand-gla.s.s hanging at her side was quickly lifted in the very middle of the open court-yard; she had scarcely pa.s.sed the door when she had felt one of her patches blowing off.

"I caught it just in time, dear d.u.c.h.esse," she cried, as she stood quite still, replacing it with a fresh one picked from her patch-box, as the others pa.s.sed her.

"The very best patch-maker I have found lives in the rue St. Denis, at the sign of La Perle des Mouches; have you discovered him, dear friend?" said the d.u.c.h.esse, as they walked on toward the low door beneath the galleries.

"No, dear d.u.c.h.esse, I fear I have not even looked for him--the science of patches I have always found so much harder than the science of living!" gayly answered Madame de Sevigne.

Madame de Kerman had now re joined them, and all three pa.s.sed into la Chambre des Marmousets.

CHAPTER XXI.

THE AFTER-DINNER TALK OF THREE GREAT LADIES.

The three ladies grouped themselves about the fire, which they found already lighted. The d.u.c.h.esse chose a Henry II. carved aim chair, one, she laughingly remarked, quite large enough to have held both the King and Diana. A lackey carrying the inevitable m.u.f.f-dogs, their fans, and scent-bottles, had followed the ladies; he placed a ha.s.sock at the d.u.c.h.esse's feet, two beneath the slender feet of Madame de Kerman, and, after having been bidden to open one of the cas.e.m.e.nts, since it was still so light without, withdrew, leaving the ladies alone.

Although Madame de Sevigne had comfortably ensconced herself in one of the deep window seats, piling the cushions behind her, no sooner was the window opened than with characteristic impetuosity she jumped up to look out into the country that lay beyond the leaded gla.s.s. In spite of the long day's drive in the open air, her appet.i.te for blowing roses and sweet earth smells had not been sated. Madame de Sevigne all her life had been the victim of two loves and a pa.s.sion; she adored society and she loved nature; these were her lesser delights, that gave way before the chief idolatry of her soul, her adoration for her daughter.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MADAME DE SeVIGNe]

As she stood by the open window, her charming face, always a mirror of her emotions, was suffused with a glow and a bloom that made it seem young again. Her eyes grew to twice their common size under the "wandering" eyelids, as her gaze roved over the meadows and across the tall gra.s.ses to the sea. A part of her youth was being, indeed, vividly brought back to her; the sight of this marine landscape recalled many memories; and with the recollection her whole face and figure seemed to irradiate something of the inward ardor that consumed her. She had pa.s.sed this very road, through this same country before, long ago, in her youth, with her children. She half smiled at the remembrance of a description given of the impression produced by her appearance on the journey by her friend the Abbe Arnauld; he had ecstatically compared her to Latona seated in an open coach, between a youthful Apollo and a young Diana. In spite of the abbe's poetical extravagance, Madame de Sevigne recognized, in this moment of retrospect, the truth of the picture. That, indeed, had been a radiant moment! Her life at that time had been so full, and the rapture so complete--the rapture of possessing her children--that she could remember to have had the sense of fairly evaporating happiness. And now, the sigh came, how scattered was this gay group! her son in Brittany, her daughter in Provence, two hundred leagues away! And she, an elderly Latona, mourning her Apollo and her divine huntress, her incomparable Diana.

The inextinguishable name of youth was burning still, however, in Madame de Sevigne's rich nature. This adventure, this amazing adventure of three ladies of the court having to pa.s.s the night in a rude little Normandy inn, she, for one, was finding richly seasoned with the spice of the unforeseen; it would be something to talk of and write about for a month hence at Chaulnes and at Paris. Their entire journey, in point of fact, had been a series of the most delightful episodes. It was now nearly a month since they had started from Picardy, from the castle of Chaulnes, going into Normandy _via_ Rouen. They had been on a driving tour, their destination being Rennes, which they would reach in a week or so. They had been travelling in great state, with the very best coach, the very best horses; and they had been guarded by a whole regiment of cavaliers and halberdiers. Every possible precaution had been taken against their being disagreeably surprised on their route.

Their chief fear on the journey had been, of course, the cry common in their day of "_Au voleur!_" and the meeting of brigands and a.s.sa.s.sins; for, once outside of Paris and the police reforms of that dear Colbert, and one must be prepared to take one's life in one's hand. Happily, no such misadventures had befallen them. The roads, it is true, they had found for the most part in a horrible condition; they had been pitched about from one end of their coach to the other they might easily have imagined themselves at sea. The dust also had nearly blinded them, in spite of their masks. The other nuisances most difficult to put up with had been the swarm of beggars that infested the roadsides; and worst of all had been the army of crippled, deformed, and mangy soldiers. These latter they had encountered everywhere; their whines and cries, their armless, legless bodies, their hideous filth, and their insolent importunities, they had found a veritable pest.

Another annoyance had been the over-zealous courtesy of some of the upper middle-cla.s.s. Only yesterday, in the very midst of the dust and under the burning noon sun, they had all been forced to alight, to receive the homage tendered the d.u.c.h.esse, of some thirty women and as many men. Each one of the sixty must, of course, kiss the d.u.c.h.esse's hand. It was really an outrage to have exposed them to such a form of torture! Poor Madame de Kerman, the delicate one of the party, had entirely collapsed after the ceremony. The d.u.c.h.esse also had been prostrated; it had wearied her more than all the rest of the journey.

Madame de Sevigne alone had not suffered. She was possessed of a degree of physical fort.i.tude which made her equal to any demand. The other two ladies, as well as she herself, were now experiencing the pleasant exhilaration which comes with the hour of rest after an excellent dinner. They were in a condition to remember nothing except the agreeable. Madame de Sevigne was the first to break the silence.

She turned, with a brisk yet graceful abruptness, to the two ladies still seated before the low fire. With a charming outburst of enthusiasm she exclaimed aloud:

"What a beauty, and youth, and tenderness this spring has, has it not?"

"Yes," answered the d.u.c.h.esse, smiling graciously into Madame de Sevigne's brilliantly lit face; "yes, the weather in truth has been perfect."

"What an adorable journey we have had!" continued Madame de Sevigne, in the same tone, her ardor undampened by the cooler accent of her friend--she was used to having her enthusiasm greeted with consideration rather than response. "What a journey!--only meeting with the most agreeable of adventures; not the slightest inconvenience anywhere; eating the very best of everything; and driving through the heart of this enchanting springtime!"

Her listeners laughed quietly, with an accent of indulgence. It was the habit of her world to find everything Madame de Sevigne did or said charming. Even her frankness was forgiven her, her tact was so perfect; and her spontaneity had always been accounted as her chief excellence; in the stifled air of the court and the _ruelles_ it had been frequently likened to the blowing in of a fresh May breeze. Her present mood was one well known to both ladies.

"Always 'pretty pagan,' dear madame," smiled Madame de Kerman, indulgently. "How well named--and what a happy hit of our friend Arnauld d'Audilly! You are in truth a delicious--an adorable pagan! You have such a sense of the joy of living! Why, even living in the country has, it appears, no terrors for you. We hear of your walking about in the moonlight-you make your very trees talk, they tell us, in Italian--in Latin; you actually pa.s.s whole hours alone with the hamadryads!" There was just a suspicion of irony in Madame de Kerman's tone, in spite of its caressing softness; it was so impossible to conceive of anyone really finding nature endurable, much less pretending to discover in trees and flowers anything amusing or suggestive of sentiment!

But Madame de Sevigne was quite impervious to her friend's raillery.

She responded, with perfect good humor:

"Why not?--why not try to discover beauties in nature? One can be so happy in a wood! What a charming thing to hear a leaf sing! I know few things more delightful than to watch the triumph of the month of May when the nightingale, the cuckoo, and the lark open the spring in our forests! And then, later, come those beautiful crystal days of autumn--days that are neither warm, nor yet are they really cold! And then the trees--how eloquent they can be made; with a little teaching they may be made to converse so charmingly. _Bella cosa far aniente_, says one of my trees; and another answers, _Amor odit inertes_. Ah, when I had to bid farewell to all my leaves and trees; when my son had to dispose of the forest of Buron, to pay for some of his follies, you remember how I wept! It seemed to me I could actually feel the grief of those dispossessed sylvans and of all those homeless dryads!"

"It is this, dear friend--this life you lead at Les Rochers--and your enthusiasm, which keep you so young. Yes, I am sure of it. How inconceivably young, for instance, you are looking this very evening!

You and the glow out yonder make youth seem no longer a legend."

The d.u.c.h.esse delivered her flattering little speech with a caressing tone. She moved gently forward in her chair, as if to gain a better view of the twilight and her friend. At the sound of the d.u.c.h.esse's voice Madame de Sevigne again turned, with the same charming smile and the quick impulsiveness of movement common to her. During her long monologue she had remained standing; but she left the window now to regain her seat amid the cushions of the window. There was something better than the twilight and the spring in the air; here, within, were two delightful friends-and listeners; there was before her, also, the prospect of one of those endless conversations that were the chief delight of her life.

She laughed as she seated herself--a gay, frank, hearty little laugh--and she spread out her hands with the opening of her fan, as, with her usual vivacious spontaneity, her mood changed.

"Fancy, dear d.u.c.h.esse, the punishment that comes to one who commits the crime of looking young--younger than one ought! My son-in-law, M. de Grignan, actually avows he is in daily terror lest I should give him a father-in-law!"