The Conspirators Part 64

Dubois, who had no other consolation to bestow upon Buvat, went out, and placed a sentinel at the door. The explanation of this step is easy.

Dubois feared that, seeing the arrest of Villeroy, they would suspect from whence the information came, and would question Buvat, and that he would confess all. This confession would, doubtless, have arrested the conspirators in the midst of their schemes, which, on the contrary, Dubois, informed beforehand of all their plans, wished to see carried to a point, so that in crushing one monster rebellion he might put an end to all lesser ones.

Toward eight o'clock, as daylight began to fade, Buvat heard a great noise at his door, and a sort of metallic clashing, which did not tend to rea.s.sure him. He had heard plenty of lamentable stories of State prisoners who had been a.s.sa.s.sinated in their prisons, and he rose trembling and ran to the window. The court and gardens of the Palais Royal were full of people, the galleries began to be lighted up, the whole scene was full of gayety and light. He heaved a profound sigh, thinking perhaps that he might be bidding a last adieu to that life and animation. At that instant the door was opened; Buvat turned round shuddering, and saw two tall footmen in red livery bringing in a well-supplied table. The metallic noise which had so much disturbed him had been the clattering of the silver plates and dishes.

Buvat's first impression was one of thankfulness to Heaven, that so imminent a danger as that which he had feared had changed into such a satisfactory event. But immediately the idea struck him that the deadly intentions held toward him were still the same, and that only the mode of their execution were changed--instead of being a.s.sa.s.sinated, like Jeansans-Peur, or the Duc de Guise, he was going to be poisoned, like the Dauphin, or the Duc de Burgundy. He threw a rapid glance on the two footmen, and thought he remarked something somber which denoted the agents of a secret vengeance. From this instant his determination was taken, and, in spite of the scent of the dishes, which appeared to him an additional proof, he refused all sustenance, saying majestically that he was neither hungry nor thirsty.

The footmen looked at each other knowingly. They were two sharp fellows, and had understood Buvat's character at a glance, and not understanding a man not being hungry when before a pheasant stuffed with truffles, or not thirsty before a bottle of Chambertin, had penetrated the prisoner's fears pretty quickly. They exchanged a few words in a low tone, and the boldest of the two, seeing that there was a means of drawing some profit from the circ.u.mstances, advanced toward Buvat, who recoiled before him as far as the room would allow.

"Monsieur," said he, in a rea.s.suring tone, "we understand your fears, and, as we are honest servants, we will show you that we are incapable of lending ourselves to the dealings which you suspect; consequently, during the whole time that you remain here, my comrade and I, each in our turn, will taste all the dishes which are brought you, and all the wines which are sent in, happy if by our devotion we can restore your tranquillity."

"Monsieur," answered Buvat, ashamed that his secret sentiments had been discovered thus, "monsieur, you are very polite, but in truth I am neither hungry nor thirsty."

"Never mind, monsieur," said the man, "as my comrade and myself desire not to leave the smallest doubt on your mind, we will execute what we have offered. Comtois, my friend," continued the fellow, sitting down in the place which had been intended for Buvat, "do me the favor to help me to a little of that soup, a wing of that pullet in rice, a gla.s.s of that Chambertin, there--to your health, monsieur."

"Monsieur," said Buvat, opening his eyes, and looking at the footman who was dining so impudently in his stead, "monsieur, it is I who am your servant, and I should wish to know your name, in order to preserve it in my memory by the side of that of the good jailer who gave to Comte l'Ancien a similar proof of devotion to that which you give me."

"Monsieur," answered the footman modestly, "I am called Bourguignon, and here is my comrade Comtois, whose turn for devotion will come to-morrow, and who, when the moment shall have arrived, will not be behindhand.

Comtois, my friend, a slice of that pheasant, and a gla.s.s of champagne.

Do you not see that, in order to rea.s.sure monsieur completely, I must taste everything; it is a severe test, I know, but where would be the merit of being an honest man if it did not sometimes bring trials like the present? To your health, Monsieur Buvat."

"Heaven preserve yours, Monsieur Bourguignon."

"Now, Comtois, hand me the dessert, so that I may leave no doubt on Monsieur Buvat's mind."

"Monsieur Bourguignon, I beg you to believe that, if I had any, they are completely dissipated."

"No, monsieur, no, I beg your pardon, you still have some. Comtois, my friend, now the hot coffee, very hot; I wish to drink it exactly as monsieur would have done, and I presume it is thus that monsieur likes it."

"Boiling, monsieur, boiling," answered Buvat, bowing.

"Oh!" said Bourguignon, sipping his coffee, and raising his eyes blissfully to the ceiling, "you are right, monsieur. It is only so that coffee is good--half-cold it is a very second-rate beverage. This, I may say, is excellent. Comtois, my friend, receive my compliments, you wait admirably; now help me to take away the table. You ought to know that there is nothing more unpleasant than the smell of wines and viands to those who are not hungry nor thirsty. Monsieur," continued Bourguignon, stepping toward the door, which he had carefully shut during the repast, and which he opened while his companion pushed the table before him, "monsieur, if you have need of anything, you have three bells, one at the head of your bed, and two at the mantelpiece. Those at the fireplace are for us, that at the bed for your valet-de-chambre."

"Thank you, monsieur," said Buvat, "you are too good. I do not wish to disturb any one."

"Do not trouble yourself about that, monsieur--monseigneur desires that you should make yourself at home."

"Monseigneur is very polite."

"Does monsieur require anything else?"

"Nothing more, my friend, nothing more," said Buvat, touched by so much devotion; "nothing, except to express my grat.i.tude."

"I have only done my duty, monsieur," answered Bourguignon, modestly, bowing for the last time, and shutting the door.

"Ma foi!" said Buvat, following Bourguignon with his eyes, "it must be allowed that some proverbs are great liars. One says, 'As insolent as a lackey,' and yet here is an individual practicing that calling, who nevertheless could not possibly be more polite. I shall never believe in proverbs again, or rather, I shall make a difference between them."

And making himself this promise, Buvat found himself alone.

Nothing makes a man so hungry as the sight of a good dinner; that which had just been eaten under the good man's very eyes surpa.s.sed in luxury everything that he had ever dreamed of, and he began--influenced by the decided calls of his stomach--to reproach himself for his too great defiance of his persecutors; but it was too late. Buvat, it is true, might have rung for Monsieur Bourguignon, and requested a second dinner, but he was of too timid a character for that, and the result was, that he had to search among his stock of proverbs for the most consoling, and having found, between his situation and the proverb, "He who sleeps dines," an a.n.a.logy which seemed to him most direct, he resolved to make use of it, and, as he could not dine, to endeavor at least to sleep.

But, at the moment of taking this resolution, Buvat found himself a.s.sailed by new fears. Could they not profit by his sleep to dispatch him? The night is the time of ambushes--he had often heard his mother tell of beds which, by the lowering of their canopies, smothered the unfortunate sleeper; of beds which sank through a trap, so softly as not to wake the occupant; finally, of secret doors opening in panels, and even in furniture, to give entrance to a.s.sa.s.sins. This luxuriant dinner, these rich wines, had they not been sent him to insure a sounder sleep?

All this was possible, nay, probable, and Buvat, who felt the instinct of self-preservation in the highest degree, took his candle, and commenced a most minute investigation. After having opened the doors of all the cupboards, sounded all the paneling, Buvat had gone down on his hands and feet, and was stretching his head timidly under the bed, when he thought he heard steps behind him. The position in which he found himself did not permit him to act on the defensive; he therefore remained motionless, and waited with a beating heart. After a few seconds of solemn silence, which filled Buvat with vague alarms, a voice said:

"Your pardon; but is not monsieur looking for his nightcap?"

Buvat was discovered--there was no means of escaping the danger, if danger there was. He therefore drew his head from under the bed, took his candle, and remaining on his knees, as a humble and beseeching posture, he turned toward the individual who had just addressed him, and found himself face to face with a man dressed in black, and carrying, folded up on his arm, many articles, which Buvat recognized as human clothes.

"Yes, monsieur," said Buvat, seizing the opening which was offered to him, with a presence of mind on which he secretly congratulated himself; "is that search forbidden?"

"Why did not monsieur, instead of troubling himself, ring the bell? I have the honor to be appointed monsieur's valet-de-chambre, and I have brought him a night-cap and night-shirt."

And with these words the valet-de-chambre spread out on the bed a night-shirt, embroidered with flowers, a cap of the finest lawn, and a rose-colored ribbon. Buvat, still on his knees, regarded him with the greatest astonishment.

"Now," said the valet-de-chambre, "will monsieur allow me to help him to undress?"

"No, monsieur, no," said Buvat, accompanying the refusal with the sweetest smile he could a.s.sume. "No, I am accustomed to undress myself.

I thank you, monsieur."

The valet-de-chambre retired, and Buvat remained alone.

As the inspection of the room was completed, and as his increasing hunger rendered sleep more necessary, Buvat began to undress, sighing; placed--in order not to be left in the dark--a candle on the corner of the chimney-piece, and sprang, with a groan, into the softest and warmest bed he had ever slept on.

"The bed is not sleep," is an axiom which Buvat might, from experience, have added to the list of his true proverbs. Either from fear or hunger, Buvat pa.s.sed a very disturbed night, and it was not till near morning that he fell asleep; even then his slumbers were peopled with the most terrible visions and nightmares. He was just waking from a dream that he had been poisoned by a leg of mutton, when the valet-de-chambre entered, and asked at what time he would like breakfast.

Buvat was not in the habit of breakfasting in bed, so he rose quickly, and dressed in haste; he had just finished, when Messieurs Bourguignon and Comtois entered, bringing the breakfast, as the day before they had brought the dinner.

Then took place a second rehearsal of the scene which we have before related, with the exception that now it was Monsieur Comtois who ate and Monsieur Bourguignon who waited; but when it came to the coffee, and Buvat, who had taken nothing for twenty-four hours, saw his dearly-loved beverage, after having pa.s.sed from the silver coffee-pot into the porcelain cup, pa.s.s into the cavernous mouth of Monsieur Comtois, he could hold out no longer, and declared that his stomach demanded to be amused with something, and that, consequently, he desired that they would leave him the coffee and a roll. This declaration appeared to disturb the devotion of Monsieur Comtois, who was nevertheless obliged to satisfy himself with one cup of the odoriferous liquid, which, together with a roll and the sugar, was placed on a little table, while the two scamps carried off the rest of the feast, laughing in their sleeves.

Scarcely was the door closed, when Buvat darted toward the little table, and, without even waiting to dip one into the other, ate the bread and drank the coffee; then, a little comforted by that repast, insufficient as it was, began to look at things in a less gloomy point of view.

In truth, Buvat was not wanting in a certain kind of good sense, and, as he had pa.s.sed the preceding evening and night, and entered on the present morning, without interference, he began to understand that, though from some political motive they had deprived him of his liberty, they were far from wishing to shorten his days, and surrounded him, on the contrary, with cares, of which he had never before been the object.

He had seen that the dinner of the day before was better than his ordinary dinner--that the bed was softer than his ordinary bed--that the coffee he had just drunk possessed an aroma which the mixture of chicory took away from his, and he could not conceal from himself that the elastic couches and stuffed chairs which he had sat upon for the last twenty-four hours were much preferable to the hair sofa and cane chairs of his own establishment. The only thing, then, which remained to trouble him, was the uneasiness which Bathilde would feel at his not returning. He had for an instant the idea--not daring to renew the request which he had made the day before, to have news of him sent to his ward--of imitating the man with the iron mask, who had thrown a silver plate from the window of his prison on to the sh.o.r.e, by throwing a letter from his balcony into the courtyard of the Palais Royal; but he knew what a fatal result this infraction of the will of Monsieur de Saint-Mars had had for the unfortunate prisoner, so that he feared, by such an action, to increase the rigors of his captivity, which at present seemed to him tolerable.

The result of all these reflections was, that Buvat pa.s.sed the morning in a much less agitated manner than he had the evening and the night; moreover, his hunger--appeased by the roll and the coffee--only existed in the form of that appet.i.te which is an enjoyment when one is sure of a good dinner. Add to all this the particularly cheerful look-out which the prisoner had from his window, and it will be easily understood that mid-day arrived without too many sorrows, or too much ennui.

Exactly at one o'clock the door opened, and the table reappeared ready laid, and brought, like the day before and that morning, by the two valets. But this time, it was neither Monsieur Bourguignon nor Monsieur Comtois who sat down to it. Buvat declared himself perfectly rea.s.sured concerning the intentions of his august host; he thanked Messieurs Comtois and Bourguignon for the devotion of which each in turn had given him a proof, and begged them to wait upon him in their turn. The two servants made wry faces, but obeyed. It will be understood that the happy disposition in which Buvat now was became more blissful under the influence of a good dinner. Buvat ate all the eatables, drank all the drinkables, and at last, after having sipped his coffee--a luxury which he usually only allowed himself on Sundays--and having capped the Arabian nectar with a gla.s.s of Madame Anfoux' liquor, was, it must be confessed, in a state bordering upon ecstasy.

That evening the supper was equally successful; but as Buvat had abandoned himself at dinner rather freely to the consumption of Chambertin and Sillery, about eight o'clock in the evening he found himself in a state of glorification impossible to describe. The consequence was, that when the valet-de-chambre entered, instead of finding him like the evening before, with his head under the bed, he found Buvat seated on a comfortable sofa, his feet on the hobs, his head leaning back, his eyes winking, and singing between his teeth, with an expression of infinite tenderness:

"Then let me go, And let me play, Beneath the hazel-tree."

Which, as may be seen, was a great improvement on the state of the worthy writer twenty-four hours before. Moreover, when the valet-de-chambre offered to help him to undress, Buvat, who found a slight difficulty in expressing his thoughts, contented himself with smiling in sign of approbation; then extended his arms to have his coat taken off, then his legs to have his slippers removed; but, in spite of his state of exaltation, it is only just to Buvat to say, that it was only when he found himself alone that he laid aside the rest of his garments.

This time, contrary to what he had done the day before, he stretched himself out luxuriously in his bed, and fell asleep in five minutes, and dreamed that he was the Grand Turk.

He awoke as fresh as a rose, having only one trouble--the uneasiness that Bathilde must experience, but otherwise perfectly happy.

It may easily be imagined that the breakfast did not lessen his good spirits; on the contrary, being informed that he might write to Monsieur the Archbishop of Cambray, he asked for paper and ink, which were brought him, took from his pocket his penknife, which never left him, cut his pen with the greatest care, and commenced, in his finest writing, a most touching request, that if his captivity was to last, Bathilde might be sent for, or, at least, that she might be informed, that, except his liberty, he was in want of nothing, thanks to the kindness of the prime minister.