The Grey Cloak Part 28

"Who?" calmly.

"Ah! Well, then, Monsieur le Marquis: do you suppose he has sent Jehan to verify the report that you sail for Quebec?"

"I do not suppose anything, Victor. As for Monsieur le Marquis, I have already ceased to hate him. How beautiful the sea is! And yet, contemplate the horror of its rolling over your head, beating your life out on the reefs. All beautiful things are cruel."

"But you are glad, Paul," affectionately, "that I am with you?"

"Both glad and sorry. For after a time you will return, leaving me behind."

"Perhaps. And yet who can say that we both may not return, only with fame marching on ahead to announce us in that wonderfully pleasing way she has?"

"It is your illusions that I love, Victor: I see myself again in you.

Keep to your ballades, your chant-royals, your triolets; you will write an epic whenever you lose your illusions; and epics by Frenchmen are dull and sorry things. When you go below tell Breton to unpack my portmanteau."

On the wharf nearest the vessel stood two women, hooded so as to conceal their faces.

"There, Gabrielle; you have asked to see the Chevalier du Cevennes, that is he leaning against the railing."

"So that is the Chevalier. And he goes to Quebec. In mercy's name, what business has he there?"

"You are hurting my arm, dear. Victor would not tell me why he goes to Quebec."

"Ah, if he goes out of friendship for Victor, it is well."

"Is he not handsome?"

"Melancholy handsome, after the pattern of the Englishman's Hamlet. I like a man with a bright face. When does the Henri IV sail?" suddenly.

"Two weeks from to-morrow. To-morrow is Fools' Day."

"Why, then, do not those on yonder ship sail to-morrow instead of to-day?"

"You were not always so bitter."

"I must have my jest. To-morrow may have its dupes as well as its fools. . . . Silence! The Comte d'Herouville in Roch.e.l.le? I am lost if he sees me. Let us go!" And Madame de Brissac dragged her companion back into the crowd. "That man here? Anne, you must hide me well."

"Why do you ask about the gloomy ship which is to take me to Quebec?"

asked Anne, her curiosity aroused of a sudden.

Madame put a finger against her lips. "I shall tell you presently.

Just now I must find a hiding place immediately. He must not know that I am here. He must have traced me here. Oh! am I not in trouble enough without that man rising up before me? I am afraid of him, Anne."

The two soon gained their chairs and disappeared. Neither of them saw the count go on board the ship.

On board all was activity. There came a lurch, a straining of ropes and a creaking of masts, and the good ship Saint Laurent swam out to sea. Suddenly the waters trembled and the air shook: the king's man-of-war had fired the admiral's salute. So the voyage began.

Priests, soldiers, merchants, seamen, peasants and n.o.bles, all stood silent on the p.o.o.p-deck, watching the rugged promontory sink, turrets and towers and roofs merge into one another, black lines melt into grey; stood watching till the islands became misty in the sunshine and nothing of France remained but a long, thin, hazy line.

"The last of France, for the present," said the poet.

"And for the present," said the vicomte, "I am glad it is the last of France. France is not agreeable to my throat."

The Chevalier threw back his shoulders and stood away from the rail.

The Comte d'Herouville, his face purple with rage and chagrin, came up.

He approached Victor.

"Monsieur," he said, "you lied. Madame is not on board." He drew back his hand to strike the poet in the face, but fingers of iron caught his wrist and held it in the air.

"The day we land, Monsieur," said the Chevalier, calmly. "Monsieur de Saumaise is not your equal with the sword."

"And you?" with a sneer.

"Well, I can try."

CHAPTER XII

ACHATES WRITES A BALLADE OF DOUBLE REFRAIN

The golden geese of day had flown back to the Master's treasure house; and ah! the loneliness of that first night at sea!--the low whistling song of the icy winds among the shrouds; the cold repellent color tones which lay thinly across the west, pressing upon the ragged, heaving horizon; the splendor and intense brilliancy of the million stars; the vast imposing circle of untamed water, the purple of its flowing mountains and the velvet blackness of its sweeping valleys; the monotonous seething round the boring prow and the sad gurgle of the speeding wake; the weird canvas shadows rearing heavenward; and above all, that silence which engulfs all human noises simply by its immensity! More than one stout heart grew doubtful and troubled under the weight of this mystery.

Even the Iroquois Indian, born without fear, stoic, indifferent to physical pain, even he wrapped his blanket closer about his head, held his pipe pendent in nerveless fingers, and softly chanted an appeal to the Okies of his forebears, forgetting the G.o.d of the black-robed fathers in his fear of never again seeing the peaceful hills and valleys of Onondaga or tasting the sweet waters of familiar springs.

For here was evil water, of which no man might drink to quench his thirst; there were no firebrands to throw into the face of the North Wind; there was no trail, to follow or to retrace. O for his mat by the fire in the Long House, with the young braves and old warriors sprawling around, recounting the victories of the hunt!

Only the seamen and the priests went about unconcerned, untroubled, tranquil, the one knowing his sea and the other his G.o.d. There was something rea.s.suring in the serenity of the black ca.s.socks as they went hither and thither, offering physical and spiritual a.s.sistance. They inspired the timid and the fearful, many of whom still believed that the world had its falling-off place. And seasickness overcame many.

With some incert.i.tude the Vicomte d'Halluys watched the Jesuits. After all, he mused, it was something to be a priest, if only to possess this calm. He himself had no liking for this voyage, since the woman he loved was on the way to Spain. Whenever Brother Jacques pa.s.sed under the ship's lanterns, the vicomte stared keenly. What was there in this handsome priest that stirred his antagonism? For the present there seemed to be no solution. Eh, well, all this was a strange whim of fate. Fortune had as many faces as Notre Dame has gargoyles. To bring the Comte d'Herouville, himself, and the Chevalier du Cevennes together on a voyage of hazard! He looked around to discover the whereabouts of the count. He saw him leaning against a mast, his face calm, his manner easy.

"There is danger in that calm; I must walk with care. My faith! but the Chevalier will have his hands full one of these days."

Ma.s.s was celebrated, and a strange, rude picture was presented to those eyes accustomed to the interior of lofty cathedrals: the smoky lanterns, the squat ceiling, the tawdry woodwork, the kneeling figures involuntarily jostling one another to the rolling of the ship, the resonant voice of Father Chaumonot, the frequent glitter of a breast-plate, a sword-hilt, or a helmet.

The Chevalier knelt, not because he was in sympathy with Chaumonot's Latin, but because he desired not to be conspicuous. G.o.d was not in his heart save in a shadowy way; rather an infinite weariness, a sense of drifting blindly, a knowledge of a vague and futile grasping at the end of things. And winding in and out of all he heard was that mysterious voice asking: "Whither bound?" Aye, whither bound, indeed!

Visions of golden days flitted across his mind's eye, s.n.a.t.c.hes of his youth; the pomp and glory of court as he first saw it; the gallant epoch of the Fronde; the warm sunshine of forgotten summers; and the woman he loved! . . . The Chevalier was conscious of a pain of stupendous weight bearing down upon his eyes. Waves of dizziness, accompanied by flashes of fire, pa.s.sed to and fro through his aching head. His tongue was thick and his lips were cracked with fever. It seemed but a moment gone that he had been shaking with the cold. He found himself fighting what he supposed to be an attack of seasickness, but this was not the malady which was seizing him in its pitiless grasp.

Chaumonot's voice rose and fell. Why had the marquis given this man a thousand livres? What evil purpose lay behind it? The marquis gave to the Church? He was surprised to find himself struggling against a wild desire to laugh. Sometimes the voice sounded like thunder in his ears; anon, it was so far away that he could hear only the echo of it.

Presently the ma.s.s came to an end. The worshipers rose by twos and threes. But the Chevalier remained kneeling. The next roll of the ship toppled him forward upon his face, where he lay motionless.

Several sprang to his aid, the vicomte and Victor being first.

Together they lifted the Chevalier to his feet, but his knees doubled up. He was unconscious.

"Paul?" cried Victor in alarm. "He is seasick?" turning anxiously toward the vicomte.

"This is not seasickness; more likely a reaction. Here comes Lieutenant Nicot, who has some fame as a leech. He will tell us what the trouble is."

A hasty examination disclosed that the Chevalier was in the first stages of brain fever, and he was at once conveyed to his berthroom.