Lord Montagu's Page Part 33

"Why, the roads seem very bad, it is true," said Montagu. "I had hoped that my good friend the Duke of Lorraine kept his highways in better order."

"I am afraid, my lord," said the stranger, "that the French Government must bear the blame in this instance; for you are now upon French soil.

That landmark points out the boundary."

"I did not mark the landmark," answered the Englishman; "but, if I be upon French territory, may I know to whom I am indebted for this hospitable reception?"

"My name, my lord, is Bourbonne,--the Count de Bourbonne," said the other. "I only last night heard of your lordship's arrival in these parts; and I at once made preparation to receive you in my chateau."

"We expected something of the kind," rejoined Montagu; "for a personage who had attached himself to my service on the road thought fit to absent himself last night, and we judged he would most likely spread the rumor of my coming. In truth, I wished to spare all n.o.ble gentlemen the hospitable trouble you seem inclined to take, and, indeed, would a great deal rather not inflict it upon you now."

"No trouble in the world, my lord," replied the count. "And, indeed, I must insist upon the honor of entertaining you till you can be better lodged. As to the poor man who favored me with notice of your approach, I am afraid he has met with a little accident. I heard the report of a pistol, and saw one of the people there fall off his horse."

"A pure accident," said Montagu, in an indifferent tone. "One of my attendants had a pistol in his hand and his finger upon the trigger. He was seized at that moment with a convulsive affection to which he is sometimes subject: the hammer fell, and the bullet flew out of the muzzle. In those cases, monsieur le comte, the ball, as you must have often remarked, flies right at the greatest villain it can find. It is invariable, I believe."

"Very probably," answered De Bourbonne: "I will ask a philosopher his opinion. But, in the mean time, may I ask your lordship if there are more accidents of the same kind likely to happen? Are there any other gentlemen of yours with their fingers on their triggers?"

"Oh, no!" replied Montagu. "I made them put all their pistols up as soon as I comprehended the pressing nature of the invitation I was about to receive, and the forcible arguments ready to back it. Am I to understand that it is extended to my attendants also?"

"To every one," replied the count, with a low bow. "I could never think of asking your lordship to my house without including your friends and followers."

"You do me too much honor," said Montagu. "But amongst my followers you will find a comrade of the worthy gentleman who did me the favor of being my harbinger. Now, if I have any influence with you, my lord count, I would bespeak for him a high place, not in your esteem, but on your castle. Doubtless you have battlements, or iron stanchions, or things of that kind, about, to which you could raise him _sus per_ _col_. He has all the same qualities as his friend, whom you already know, and is a Savoyard, he says,[5]--though we have some doubts upon the subject."

"I should be most happy to oblige your lordship in any thing," answered the Count de Bourbonne; "but you know the king is the bestower of all dignities and the fountain of all honors; and therefore I cannot take upon me to raise the gentleman to the elevated position you desire for him."

"Well, well," replied Montagu, "time works wonders; and doubtless he will meet his deserts sooner or later. May I ask if you have lately heard from our mutual friend the Cardinal de Richelieu?"

"Last night, my lord," answered Bourbonne. "He was quite well, and desired me to inquire particularly after your health."

"I expected no less of his courtesy," said the English n.o.bleman. "But I see your people are closing up pretty near, and, if I mistake not, have got possession of my valet's horse, with a desire of lightening the poor beast's load. We had probably better join them, as the man does not comprehend much French; and Englishmen are sometimes so surly and stupid that it is impossible to get them to comprehend the force of numbers."

"At your pleasure," replied the count; and, making a sign to his followers on the road to the north to join him, he went quietly to the spot where Mr. Oakingham and Lord Montagu's servants had remained.

He now somewhat changed his tone, and, abandoning the bantering mood in which he and Lord Montagu had indulged, but still with undiminished courtesy of manner, required all present but his own followers to give up their arms. Edward for one did so with regret; but still it was some satisfaction to him to see the treacherous blacksmith lying on the bank with his comrade busily engaged in bandaging his wounded shoulder.

"I will now have the honor of conducting you to my poor house," said the count, bowing to Lord Montagu; and, with five or six armed men before and a larger number following, with three on each side to guard against any evasion, he commenced his march. Before departing, however, he spoke a word or two to one of his attendants; and Edward remarked that, as they went, a diligent examination was made of all the pistols which his party had given up, as if to ascertain which had been discharged; and he doubted not that some consequences not very agreeable to himself would follow the inevitable discovery that he had fired the shot which had wounded the traitor.

The road wound through one of the wildest parts of France, just upon the frontier of Champagne and Bar; two or three small rivers had to be crossed; the country was but little cultivated, bearing more the aspect of a sandy moor than of the entrance to one of the richest wine-districts in the world; and more than once Edward cast his eyes around, thinking that it might be no difficult matter to escape and find a refuge in Lorraine if he could but avoid the pistol-shots which were sure to follow him. Had he been intrusted with the care of Lord Montagu's papers he would certainly have made the attempt, but he knew not even who carried them, and he resolved not to abandon his lord except for his service.

Whether Montagu divined what was pa.s.sing in his mind or not, I cannot tell; but, after they had gone about half a mile, he called Edward to his side and said to him, in English, "Keep still, Ned. Activity will do no good here. The best thing for all of us is to be perfectly pa.s.sive.

If I had trusted to your young, sharp eyes sooner, it might have been better; but it is too late now either to regret or amend what is done."

"May I request your lordship to speak to your attendants in French?"

said Monsieur de Bourbonne. "You speak our tongue in such perfection, my lord, that it must be as familiar to you as your own."

"I shall probably have time to study it more profoundly," answered Montagu, with a smile. "But you can inform me yourself, count, if that fine old chateau upon the height is Bourbonne, where we shall rest, I presume."

"That is Bourbonne," replied the count; "and the little town you may catch sight of down there in the hollow, a little to the left. But, though we will stop there to take some refreshment, I think that the Castle of Coiffy will afford your lordship a more convenient resting-place."

"Oh, yes! I remember Coiffy," answered Montagu, laughing. "I pa.s.sed close to it some three months ago. It is a strong place, and so well built, I am told, count, that the garrison cannot hear the drums of Lorraine beat at Bar."

"That is only because they do not pay attention to them, my lord,"

replied Bourbonne.

As they rode on, the old chateau grew more and more clearly defined; and the state of decay into which the ancient defences had fallen showed plainly why it had not been chosen for the place of Montagu's detention.

In the village the party stopped to breakfast, and the English n.o.bleman was treated with every sort of respectful attention; but a strict guard was kept at the door of the chamber where he was served. The attendants had some food placed before them in another room; but they were as carefully watched. In about an hour the march recommenced, and shortly after, while gazing forward, Edward perceived rising over the trees at the distance of several miles the towers of Coiffy, a much stronger place than Bourbonne, which he never lost sight of till they reached the drawbridge.

It was apparent that their coming had been made known beforehand, for all was evidently prepared to receive Lord Montagu with ceremonious politeness. An old gentleman whom they called Monsieur de Boulogne stood in the gateway, hat in hand, and immediately proceeded to conduct the n.o.ble prisoner to his apartments.

Mr. Oakingham followed, and Edward Langdale was about to do the same, when the Count de Bourbonne took him by the arm, saying, "Stop, young man! I destine another chamber for you."

His tone was somewhat menacing, and Edward turned round and gazed full in his face.

"Tell me," said the count, "and mind you tell me true----"

"If I tell you any thing at all, I shall tell you the truth," answered Edward, interrupting him: "so spare such exhortations, sir count. But it is probable that I shall not answer a small gentleman of Champagne at all, especially if he interrogates me in a manner which much greater personages than himself have never displayed toward me."

It is probable that this rude answer was intended to stop all inquiries into Lord Montagu's affairs,--for Edward did not doubt that they were about to be the subject of De Bourbonne's questions; but the count gazed on him with extreme surprise, exclaiming, "Ha! Whom have we here? A small gentleman of Champagne! Will your magnificence have the condescension, then, to inform the small gentleman of Champagne if it was your hand that sent a pistol-ball into the shoulder of a poor personage who came up with my train when I first had the honor of seeing you?"

"It was by accident I shot him in the shoulder," replied Edward: "I intended the ball for his head."

"If he dies we may find a rope that will fit you, young man," said the count; and, beckoning up the man who had examined the pistols on the road, he said, "Take him away and put him in the dungeon where I told you."

"If you hang me, sir count," said Edward, without the slightest alarm, "you will do so with the pa.s.sport in my breast which was given me by his Eminence of Richelieu with his own hand. You had better ask the two spies a few questions before you treat me with any thing like indignity."

So saying, he followed the man to whom Bourbonne had spoken. Another soldier took a lantern from a hook and came after; and in a minute or two Edward found himself pushed into a room where the faint light of the lantern only served to show the shining damp which clung to the stone walls.

[Footnote 5: These two men, who adhered to Lord Montagu through his whole journey, first tracking him from place to place with the sagacity and pertinacity of well-trained hounds, and then contriving to get admitted to his service, were in reality Basques. Some have supposed that they were creatures of Monsieur de Bourbonne; but there seems no doubt they were two of the many skilful agents whom Richelieu took care to provide himself with in every rank of life.]

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

A dungeon is by no means an agreeable place; and the dungeon of poor Edward Langdale was not an agreeable dungeon. As was common at that time, before Vauban and others had introduced a better system of fortification, the princ.i.p.al defence of the Castle of Coiffy was a wet ditch or fosse, which differed little from those we see surrounding old castles of the feudal period. This wet ditch was supplied with abundance of water from a spring a little higher up the hill, which, indeed, was the source of one of the princ.i.p.al confluents of the Aube; but the soil, as I have said elsewhere, being somewhat sandy, the banks suffered the water to percolate, somewhat to the detriment of the foundations of the castle; and, had not the masonry been very heavy and the mortar somewhat better than we use in building c.o.c.kney villas, the square flanking-tower to the right of the gateway as you look east would have been down fifty years before and crushed to death the denizens of poor Edward's dungeon,--if it had been furnished with tenants at that time.

Now, doubtless the reader learned in romance-composition may imagine that I am merely preparing the way for a fine scene of escape from prison, with melodramatic incidents, new songs, scenery, and decorations. But, as I am sorry to say no such heroic result was at this time achieved by Lord Montagu's page, I cannot use it as an incident in this part of my true history. I only mention the percolation of the water of the fosse, and its effect upon the foundations amongst which that and other dungeons were placed, to show that the place of the poor youth's confinement was as damp and disagreeable as it could be. Some stones had fallen from the vault above, some large detached pieces of mortar, green and shiny, covered the mud or stone floor, and the walls were all glistening with dampness; but those walls were too thick and the blocks of stone of which they were composed too heavy for any unaided prisoner to have worked his way out, with the utmost diligence.

In one corner of the miserable hole was a sort of camp-bedstead, with a straw bed covered with yellow and green stains from long exposure to the foul, moist air,--disgust and sickness and death to lie upon; and in another corner, high up on the wall, was a little grated window, not so high as the opposite parapet of the glacis, but sufficiently so to admit the air and the sounds from without. The wall was too thick to allow of a prisoner catching even a glimpse of the blue sky or to permit one ray of the sun to enter, even at his rising or his setting. It was indeed a desolate chamber. What an expressive word that _desolate_ is! Although sometimes in the heats of an almost tropical climate--heats often more intense than I ever heard of in the tropics themselves--I sometimes grumble a little at the power and ardor of the sun, yet what would the earth be without him? what is any place on the earth's surface which he does not visit? Desolate, desolate indeed!

The first sound which Edward heard after the bolts had ceased to grate in their sockets was that of a cannon, apparently from the walls of the castle. Some few minutes after the same sound seemed to be repeated from a distance. It might be an echo. He could not tell. But a moment or two after another report was heard, certainly nearer; and then two more confirmed his fancy that they were signal-guns announcing that the well-watched English envoy had been captured and was a prisoner at Coiffy. Some three hours then pa.s.sed, if not in perfect silence, at least only enlivened by the voices of some soldiers on the ramparts; and then came the squeaking of the wry-necked fife and the beating of drums, intimating to Edward that troops of some kind were drawing round Coiffy.

Then were heard voices on the drawbridge, and gay laughter, as if officers were being received into the castle with signs of honor.

All that pa.s.sed away, and silence resumed her reign till night fell. The light in the lantern burned down almost to the socket. No meat, no drink, had been brought to the prisoner; and he began to ask himself if it could be their intention to starve him there in darkness. His feelings were not pleasant.

Just about that time there was some noise and bustle heard from without,--probably on the drawbridge or at the gate,--the tramp of horses, and voices speaking. Then for a few minutes all was silent again. Then there were sounds just above, more distinct and clear than any he had hitherto heard,--people speaking, and others moving slowly about,--evidently penetrating to the cell which Edward tenanted by the broken parts of the vault on which the flooring of the upper chamber rested.

"Oh!" cried a voice, with a groan, "you have got me by the shoulder just on the wound! Do not do that! Put your hand lower down: not there, not there!--lower still. That young devil! he does not miss his mark, indeed!"