Ten Years Later
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He afterwards preserved so profound a silence, that Cropole was almost offended, so much did he prefer people who were good company.
This gentleman had risen early the morning of the day on which this history begins, and had placed himself at the window of his salon, seated upon the ledge, and leaning upon the rail of the balcony, gazing sadly but persistently on both sides of the street, watching, no doubt, for the arrival of the traveler he had mentioned to the host.
In this way he had seen the little cortege of Monsieur return from hunting, then had again partaken of the profound tranquillity of the street, absorbed in his own expectations.
All at once the movement of the crowd going to the meadows, couriers setting out, washers of pavement, purveyors of the royal household, gabbling, scampering shopboys, chariots in motion, hair-dressers on the run, and pages toiling along, this tumult and bustle had surprised him, but without losing any of that impassible and supreme majesty which gives to the eagle and the lion that serene and contemptuous glance amidst the hurrahs and shouts of hunters or the curious.
Soon the cries of the victims slaughtered in the poultry-yard, the hasty steps of Madame Cropole up that little wooden staircase, so narrow and so echoing, the bounding pace of Pittrino, who only that morning was smoking at the door with all the phlegm of a Dutchman; all this communicated something like surprise and agitation to the traveler.
As he was rising to make inquiries, the door of his chamber opened. The unknown concluded they were about to introduce the impatiently expected traveler, and made three precipitate steps to meet him.
But, instead of the person he expected, it was Master Cropole who appeared, and behind him, in the half-dark staircase, the pleasant face of Madame Cropole, rendered trivial by curiosity. She only gave one furtive glance at the handsome gentleman, and disappeared.
Cropole advanced, cap in hand, rather bent than bowing.
A gesture of the unknown interrogated him, without a word being pronounced.
"Monsieur," said Cropole, "I come to ask how – what ought I to say: your lordship, monsieur le comte, or monsieur le marquis?"
"Say monsieur, and speak quickly," replied the unknown, with that haughty accent which admits of neither discussion nor reply.
"I came, then, to inquire how monsieur had passed the night, and if monsieur intended to keep this apartment?"
"Yes."
"Monsieur, something has happened upon which we could not reckon."
"What?"
"His majesty Louis XIV. will enter our city to-day and will remain here one day, perhaps two."
Great astonishment was painted on the countenance of the unknown.
"The King of France coming to Blois?"
"He is on the road, monsieur."
"Then there is the stronger reason for my remaining," said the unknown.
"Very well; but will monsieur keep all the apartments?"
"I do not understand you. Why should I require less to-day than yesterday?"
"Because, monsieur, your lordship will permit me to say, yesterday I did not think proper, when you chose your lodging, to fix any price that might have made your lordship believe that I prejudged your resources; whilst to-day – "
The unknown colored; the idea at once struck him that he was supposed to be poor, and was being insulted.
"Whilst to-day," replied he, coldly, "you do prejudge."
"Monsieur, I am a well-meaning man, thank God! and simple hotelier as I am, there is in me the blood of a gentleman. My father was a servant and officer of the late Marechal d'Ancre. God rest his soul!"
"I do not contest that point with you; I only wish to know, and that quickly, to what your questions tend?"
"You are too reasonable, monsieur, not to comprehend that our city is small, that the court is about to invade it, that the houses will be overflowing with inhabitants, and that lodgings will consequently obtain considerable prices."
Again the unknown colored. "Name your terms," said he.
"I name them with scruple, monsieur, because I seek an honest gain, and that I wish to carry on my business without being uncivil or extravagant in my demands. Now the room you occupy is considerable, and you are alone."
"That is my business."
"Oh! certainly. I do not mean to turn monsieur out."
The blood rushed to the temples of the unknown; he darted at poor Cropole, the descendant of one of the officers of the Marechal d'Ancre, a glance that would have crushed him down to beneath that famous chimney-slab, if Cropole had not been nailed to the spot by the question of his own proper interests.
"Do you desire me to go?" said he. "Explain yourself – but quickly."
"Monsieur, monsieur, you do not understand me. It is very critical – I know – that which I am doing. I express myself badly, or perhaps, as monsieur is a foreigner, which I perceive by his accent – "
In fact, the unknown spoke with that impetuosity which is the principal character of English accentuation, even among men who speak the French language with the neatest purity.
"As monsieur is a foreigner, I say, it is perhaps he who does not catch my exact meaning. I wish for monsieur to give up one or two of the apartments he occupies, which would diminish his expenses and ease my conscience. Indeed, it is hard to increase unreasonably the price of the chambers, when one has had the honor to let them at a reasonable price."
"How much does the hire amount to since yesterday?"
"Monsieur, to one louis, with refreshments and the charge for the horse."
"Very well, and that of to-day?"
"Ah! there is the difficulty. This is the day of the king's arrival; if the court comes to sleep here, the charge of the day is reckoned. From that it results that three chambers, at two louis each, makes six louis. Two louis, monsieur, are not much; but six louis make a great deal."
The unknown, from red, as we have seen him, became very pale.
He drew from his pocket, with heroic bravery, a purse embroidered with a coat-of-arms, which he carefully concealed in the hollow of his hand. This purse was of a thinness, a flabbiness, a hollowness, which did not escape the eye of Cropole.
The unknown emptied the purse into his hand. It contained three double louis, which amounted to the six louis demanded by the host.
But it was seven that Cropole had required.
He looked, therefore, at the unknown, as much as to say, "And then?"
"There remains one louis, does there not, master hotelier?"
"Yes, monsieur, but – "
The unknown plunged his hand into the pocket of his haut-de-chausses, and emptied it. It contained a small pocket-book, a gold key, and some silver. With this change he made up a louis.
"Thank you, monsieur," said Cropole. "It now only remains for me to ask whether monsieur intends to occupy his apartments to-morrow, in which case I will reserve them for him; whereas, if monsieur does not mean to do so, I will promise them to some of the king's people who are coming."
"That is but right," said the unknown, after a long silence, "but as I have no more money, as you have seen, and as I yet must retain the apartments, you must either sell this diamond in the city, or hold it in pledge."
Cropole looked at the diamond so long, that the unknown said, hastily:
"I prefer your selling it, monsieur; for it is worth three hundred pistoles. A Jew – are there any Jews in Blois? – would give you two hundred or a hundred and fifty for it – take whatever may be offered for it, if it be no more than the price of your lodging. Begone!"
"Oh! monsieur," replied Cropole, ashamed of the sudden inferiority which the unknown reflected upon him by this noble and disinterested confidence, as well as by the unalterable patience opposed to so many suspicions and evasions. "Oh, monsieur, I hope people are not so dishonest at Blois as you seem to think, and that the diamond, being worth what you say – "
The unknown here again darted at Cropole one of his withering glances.
"I really do not understand diamonds, monsieur, I assure you," cried he.
"But the jewelers do: ask them," said the unknown. "Now I believe our accounts are settled, are they not, monsieur l'hote?"
"Yes, monsieur, and to my profound regret; for I fear I have offended monsieur."
"Not at all!" replied the unknown, with ineffable majesty.
"Or have appeared to be extortionate with a noble traveler. Consider, monsieur, the peculiarity of the case."
"Say no more about it, I desire; and leave me to myself."
Cropole bowed profoundly, and left the room with a stupefied air, which announced that he had a good heart, and felt genuine remorse.
The unknown himself shut the door after him, and when left alone, looked mournfully at the bottom of the purse, from which he had taken a small silken bag containing the diamond, his last resource.
He dwelt likewise upon the emptiness of his pockets, turned over the papers in his pocket-book, and convinced himself of the state of absolute destitution in which he was about to be plunged.
He raised his eyes towards heaven, with a sublime emotion of despairing calmness, brushed off with his hand some drops of sweat which trickled over his noble brow, and then cast down upon the earth a look which just before had been impressed with almost divine majesty.
That the storm had passed far from him, perhaps he had prayed in the bottom of his soul.
He drew near to the window, resumed his place in the balcony, and remained there, motionless, annihilated, dead, till the moment when, the heavens beginning to darken, the first flambeaux traversed the enlivened street, and gave the signal for illumination to all the windows of the city.
CHAPTER 7. Parry
Whilst the unknown was viewing these lights with interest, and lending an ear to the various noises, Master Cropole entered his apartment, followed by two attendants, who laid the cloth for his meal.
The stranger did not pay them the least attention; but Cropole approaching him respectfully, whispered "Monsieur, the diamond has been valued."
"Ah!" said the traveler. "Well?"
"Well, monsieur, the jeweler of S. A. R. gives two hundred and eighty pistoles for it."
"Have you them?"
"I thought it best to take them, monsieur; nevertheless, I made it a condition of the bargain, that if monsieur wished to keep his diamond, it should be held till monsieur was again in funds."
"Oh, no, not at all; I told you to sell it."
"Then I have obeyed, or nearly so, since, without having definitely sold it, I have touched the money."
"Pay yourself," added the unknown.
"I will do so, monsieur, since you so positively require it."
A sad smile passed over the lips of the gentleman.
"Place the money on that trunk," said he, turning round and pointing to the piece of furniture.
Cropole deposited a tolerably large bag as directed, after having taken from it the amount of his reckoning.
"Now," said he, "I hope monsieur will not give me the pain of not taking any supper. Dinner has already been refused; this is affronting to the house of les Medici. Look, monsieur, the supper is on the table, and I venture to say that it is not a bad one."
The unknown asked for a glass of wine, broke off a morsel of bread, and did not stir from the window whilst he ate and drank.
Shortly after was heard a loud flourish of trumpets; cries arose in the distance, a confused buzzing filled the lower part of the city, and the first distinct sound that struck the ears of the stranger was the tramp of advancing horses.
"The king! the king!" repeated a noisy and eager crowd.
"The king!" cried Cropole, abandoning his guest and his ideas of delicacy, to satisfy his curiosity.
With Cropole were mingled, and jostled, on the staircase, Madame Cropole, Pittrino, and the waiters and scullions.
The cortege advanced slowly, lighted by a thousand flambeaux, in the streets and from the windows.
After a company of musketeers, a closely ranked troop of gentlemen, came the litter of monsieur le cardinal, drawn like a carriage by four black horses. The pages and people of the cardinal marched behind.
Next came the carriage of the queen-mother, with her maids of honor at the doors, her gentlemen on horseback at both sides.
The king then appeared, mounted upon a splendid horse of Saxon breed, with a flowing mane. The young prince exhibited, when bowing to some windows from which issued the most animated acclamations, a noble and handsome countenance, illumined by the flambeaux of his pages.
By the side of the king, though a little in the rear, the Prince de Conde, M. Dangeau, and twenty other courtiers, followed by their people and their baggage, closed this veritably triumphant march. The pomp was of a military character.
Some of the courtiers – the elder ones, for instance – wore traveling dresses; but all the rest were clothed in warlike panoply. Many wore the gorges and buff coat of the times of Henry IV. and Louis XIII.
When the king passed before him, the unknown, who had leant forward over the balcony to obtain a better view, and who had concealed his face by leaning on his arm, felt his heart swell and overflow with a bitter jealousy.
The noise of the trumpets excited him – the popular acclamations deafened him: for a moment he allowed his reason to be absorbed in this flood of lights, tumult and brilliant images.
"He is a king!" murmured he, in an accent of despair.
Then, before he had recovered from his sombre reverie all the noise, all the splendor, had passed away. At the angle of the street there remained nothing beneath the stranger but a few hoarse, discordant voices, shouting at intervals, "Vive le Roi!"
There remained likewise the six candles held by the inhabitants of the hostelry des Medici; that is to say, two for Cropole, two for Pittrino, and one for each scullion. Cropole never ceased repeating, "How good-looking the king is! How strongly he resembles his illustrious father!"
"A handsome likeness!" said Pittrino.
"And what a lofty carriage he has!" added Madame Cropole, already in promiscuous commentary with her neighbors of both sexes.
Cropole was feeding their gossip with his own personal remarks, without observing that an old man on foot, but leading a small Irish horse by the bridle, was endeavoring to penetrate the crowd of men and women which blocked up the entrance to the Medici. But at that moment the voice of the stranger was heard from the window.
"Make way, monsieur l'hotelier, to the entrance of your house!"
Cropole turned around, and, on seeing the old man, cleared a passage for him.
The window was instantly closed.
Pittrino pointed out the way to the newly-arrived guest, who entered without uttering a word.
The stranger waited for him on the landing; he opened his arms to the old man and led him to a seat.
"Oh, no, no, my lord!" said he. "Sit down in your presence? – never!"
"Parry," cried the gentleman, "I beg you will; you come from England – you come so far. Ah! it is not for your age to undergo the fatigues my service requires. Rest yourself."
"I have my reply to give your lordship, in the first place."
"Parry, I conjure you to tell me nothing; for if your news had been good, you would not have begun in such a manner; you go about, which proves that the news is bad."
"My lord," said the old man, "do not hasten to alarm yourself, all is not lost, I hope. You must employ energy, but more particularly resignation."
"Parry," said the young man, "I have reached this place through a thousand snares and after a thousand difficulties; can you doubt my energy? I have meditated this journey ten years, in spite of all counsels and all obstacles – have you faith in my perseverance? I have this evening sold the last of my father's diamonds; for I had nothing wherewith to pay for my lodging and my host was about to turn me out."
Parry made a gesture of indignation, to which the young man replied by a pressure of the hand and a smile.
"I have still two hundred and seventy-four pistoles left, and I feel myself rich. I do not despair, Parry; have you faith in my resignation?"
The old man raised his trembling hands towards heaven.
"Let me know," said the stranger, – "disguise nothing from me – what has happened?"
"My recital will be short, my lord, but in the name of Heaven do not tremble so."
"It is impatience, Parry. Come, what did the general say to you?"
"At first the general would not receive me."
"He took you for a spy?"
"Yes, my lord, but I wrote him a letter."
"Well?"
"He read it, and received me, my lord."
"Did that letter thoroughly explain my position and my views?"
"Oh, yes!" said Parry, with a sad smile; "it painted your very thoughts faithfully."
"Well – then, Parry?"
"Then the general sent me back the letter by an aide-de-camp, informing me that if I were found the next day within the circumscription of his command, he would have me arrested."
"Arrested!" murmured the young man. "What! arrest you, my most faithful servant?"
"Yes, my lord."
"And notwithstanding you had signed the name Parry?"
"To all my letters, my lord; and the aide-de-camp had known me at St. James's and at Whitehall, too," added the old man with a sigh.
The young man leaned forward, thoughtful and sad.
"Ay, that's what he did before his people," said he, endeavoring to cheat himself with hopes. "But, privately – between you and him – what did he do? Answer!"
"Alas! my lord, he sent to me four cavaliers, who gave me the horse with which you just now saw me come back. These cavaliers conducted me, in great haste, to the little port of Tenby, threw me, rather than embarked me, into a fishing-boat, about to sail for Brittany, and here I am."
"Oh!" sighed the young man, clasping his neck convulsively with his hand, and with a sob. "Parry, is that all? – is that all?"
"Yes, my lord; that is all."
After this brief reply ensued a long interval of silence, broken only by the convulsive beating of the heel of the young man on the floor.
The old man endeavored to change the conversation; it was leading to thoughts much too sinister.
"My lord," said he, "what is the meaning of all the noise which preceded me? What are these people crying 'Vive le Roi!' for? What king do they mean? and what are all these lights for?"
"Ah! Parry," replied the young man ironically, "don't you know that this is the King of France visiting his good city of Blois? All those trumpets are his, all those gilded housings are his, all those gentlemen wear swords that are his. His mother precedes him in a carriage magnificently encrusted with silver and gold. Happy mother! His minister heaps up millions, and conducts him to a rich bride. Then all these people rejoice, they love their king, they hail him with their acclamations, and they cry, 'Vive le Roi! Vive le Roi!'"
"Well, well, my lord," said Parry, more uneasy at the turn the conversation had taken than at the other.
"You know," resumed the unknown, "that my mother and my sister, whilst all this is going on in honor of the King of France, have neither money nor bread; you know that I myself shall be poor and degraded within a fortnight, when all Europe will become acquainted with what you have told me. Parry, are there not examples in which a man of my condition should himself – "
"My lord, in the name of Heaven – "
"You are right, Parry, I am a coward, and if I do nothing for myself, what will God do? No, no, I have two arms, Parry, and I have a sword." And he struck his arm violently with his hand and took down his sword, which hung against the wall.
"What are you going to do, my lord?"
"What am I going to do, Parry? What every one in my family does. My mother lives on public charity, my sister begs for my mother; I have, somewhere or other, brothers who equally beg for themselves; and I, the eldest, will go and do as all the rest do – I will go and ask charity!"
And at these words, which he finished sharply with a nervous and terrible laugh, the young man girded on his sword, took his hat from the trunk, fastened to his shoulder a black cloak, which he had worn during all his journey, and pressing the two hands of the old man, who watched his proceedings with a look of anxiety, —
"My good Parry," said he, "order a fire, drink, eat, sleep, and be happy; let us both be happy, my faithful friend, my only friend. We are rich, as rich as kings!"
He struck the bag of pistoles with his clenched hand as he spoke, and it fell heavily to the ground. He resumed that dismal laugh that had so alarmed Parry; and whilst the whole household was screaming, singing, and preparing to install the travelers who had been preceded by their lackeys, he glided out by the principal entrance into the street, where the old man, who had gone to the window, lost sight of him in a moment.
CHAPTER 8. What his Majesty King Louis XIV. was at the Age of Twenty-Two
It has been seen, by the account we have endeavored to give of it, that the entree of King Louis XIV. into the city of Blois had been noisy and brilliant his young majesty had therefore appeared perfectly satisfied with it.
On arriving beneath the porch of the Castle of the States, the king met, surrounded by his guards and gentlemen, with S. A. R. the duke, Gaston of Orleans, whose physiognomy, naturally rather majestic, had borrowed on this solemn occasion a fresh luster and a fresh dignity. On her part, Madame, dressed in her robes of ceremony, awaited, in the interior balcony, the entrance of her nephew. All the windows of the old castle, so deserted and dismal on ordinary days, were resplendent with ladies and lights.
It was then to the sound of drums, trumpets, and vivats, that the young king crossed the threshold of that castle in which, seventy-two years before, Henry III. had called in the aid of assassination and treachery to keep upon his head and in his house a crown which was already slipping from his brow, to fall into another family.
All eyes, after having admired the young king, so handsome and so agreeable, sought for that other king of France, much otherwise king than the former, and so old, so pale, so bent, that people called him the Cardinal Mazarin.
Louis was at this time endowed with all the natural gifts which make the perfect gentleman; his eye was brilliant, mild, and of a clear azure blue. But the most skillful physiognomists, those divers into the soul, on fixing their looks upon it, if it had been possible for a subject to sustain the glance of the king, – the most skillful physiognomists, we say, would never have been able to fathom the depths of that abyss of mildness. It was with the eyes of the king as with the immense depths of the azure heavens, or with those more terrific, and almost as sublime, which the Mediterranean reveals under the keels of its ships in a clear summer day, a gigantic mirror in which heaven delights to reflect sometimes its stars, sometimes its storms.
The king was short of stature – he was scarcely five feet two inches: but his youth made up for this defect, set off likewise by great nobleness in all his movements, and by considerable address in all bodily exercises.
Certes, he was already quite a king, and it was a great thing to be a king in that period of traditional devotedness and respect; but as, up to that time, he had been but seldom and always poorly shown to the people, as they to whom he was shown saw him by the side of his mother, a tall woman, and monsieur le cardinal, a man of commanding presence, many found him so little of a king as to say, —
"Why, the king is not so tall as monsieur le cardinal!"
Whatever may be thought of these physical observations, which were principally made in the capital, the young king was welcomed as a god by the inhabitants of Blois, and almost like a king by his uncle and aunt, Monsieur and Madame, the inhabitants of the castle.
It must, however, be allowed, that when he saw, in the hall of reception, chairs of equal height placed for himself, his mother, the cardinal, and his uncle and aunt, a disposition artfully concealed by the semicircular form of the assembly, Louis XIV. became red with anger, and looked around him to ascertain by the countenances of those that were present, if this humiliation had been prepared for him. But as he saw nothing upon the impassible visage of the cardinal, nothing on that of his mother, nothing on those of the assembly, he resigned himself, and sat down, taking care to be seated before anybody else.