Lazarre Part 18

"Do you remember nothing of your childhood?"

"Nothing."

"Did you ever see Bellenger before?"

"I never saw him before to-night."

"But I saw him," said Madame de Ferrier, "in London, when I was about seven years old. It made a stronger impression on me than anything else that ever happened in my life, except"--she stopped.

"Except the taking off of my mother and brothers to the guillotine."

The man who told me to call him Louis Philippe turned toward her, with attention as careful as his avoidance when she wished to be un.o.bserved.

She rose, and came around the fire, making a deep courtesy.

"My family may not be unknown to his royal highness the Duke of Orleans.

We are De Ferriers of Mont-Louis; emigres now, like many others."

"Madame, I knew your family well. They were loyal to their king."

"My father died here in America. Before we sailed we saw this man in London."

"And with him--"

"A boy."

"Do you remember the boy well?"

"I remember him perfectly."

The wailing in the cabin became louder and turned to insistent animal howls. Instead of a babe the imprisoned creature was evidently a dog. I wondered that the potter did not let him out to warm his hide at the fire.

"Did you ever see the boy again?"

"I did not see him again until he was brought to Count de Chaumont's house last summer."

"Why to De Chaumont? Le Ray de Chaumont is not one of us. He is of the new n.o.bility. His chateau near Blois was bought by his grandfather, and he takes his name from the estate. I have heard he is in favor with Bonaparte."

"Even we of the old n.o.bility, prince, may be reduced to seek favor of Bonaparte."

"Heaven forbid, madame. I say nothing against him; though I could say much."

"Say nothing against Count de Chaumont. Count de Chaumont befriends all emigres."

"I have nothing to say against Count de Chaumont. He is not of our party; he is of the new. Fools! If we princes had stood by each other as the friends of the Empire stand by their emperor, we could have killed the Terror."

The animal in the cabin by this time was making such doleful cries I said to the potter.

"Let him out. It is dreadful to be shut in by walls."

The potter, stooping half over and rolling stiffly from foot to foot in his walk, filled me with compunction at having been brutal to so pitiful a creature, and I hurried to open the door for him. The animal clawed vigorously inside, and the instant I pushed back the ill-fitted slabs, it strained through and rushed on all fours to the fire. Madame de Ferrier fled backward, for what I liberated could hardly be seen without dread.

It was a human being. Its features were a boy's, and the tousled hair had a natural wave. While it crouched for warmth I felt the shock of seeing a creature about my own age grinning back at me, fishy eyed and black mouthed.

"There!" Bellenger said, straightening up in his place like a bear rising from all fours. "That is the boy your De Ferriers saw in London."

I remembered the boy Madame Tank had told about. Whether myself or this less fortunate creature was the boy, my heart went very pitiful toward him. Madame de Ferrier stooped and examined, him; he made a juicy noise of delight with his mouth.

"This is not the boy you had in London, monsieur," she said to Bellenger.

The potter waved his hands and shrugged.

"You believe, madame, that Lazarre is the boy you saw in London?" said Louis Philippe.

"I am certain of it."

"What proofs have you?"

"The evidence of my eyes."

"Tell that to Monsieur!" exclaimed the potter.

"Who is Monsieur?" I asked.

"The eldest brother of the king of France is called Monsieur. The Count de Provence will be called Monsieur until he succeeds Louis XVII and is crowned Louis XVIII--if that time ever comes. He cannot be called Louis XVII"--the man who told me to call him Louis Philippe took my arm, and I found myself walking back and forth with him as in a dream while he carefully formed sentence after sentence. "Because the dauphin who died in the Temple prison was Louis XVII. But there are a few who say he did not die: that a dying child was subst.i.tuted for him: that he was smuggled out and carried to America, Bellenger was the agent employed.

The dauphin's sister is married to her cousin, the nephew of Monsieur.

She herself believes these things; and it is certain a sum of money is sent out to America every year for his maintenance. He was reduced to imbecility when removed from the Temple. It is not known whether he will ever be fit to reign if the kingdom returns to him. No communication has been held with him. He was nine years old when removed from the Temple: he would now be in his nineteenth year. When I last saw him he was a smiling little prince with waving hair and hazel eyes, holding to his mother's hand"--

"Stop!"

The frenzy of half recollection came on me, and that which I had put away from my mind and sworn to let alone, seized and convulsed me.

Dreams, and sensations, and instincts ma.s.sed and fell upon me in an avalanche of conviction.

I was that uncrowned outcast, the king of France!

BOOK II

WANDERING

I

A primrose dawn of spring touched the mountains as Madame de Ferrier and I stepped into the tunnel's mouth. The wind that goes like a besom before sunrise, swept off the fog to corners of the sky, except a few spirals which still unwound from the lake. The underground path to De Chaumont's manor descended by terraces of steps and entered blackness.