CHAPTER LIV

FRIENDS IN NEED

“What a sky! what weather! what a look-out! what an apartment, and what chocolate!” exclaimed Madame de Montmirail to her maid, in an accent of intense Parisian disgust; while the latter prepared her mistress to go abroad and encounter in the streets of London the atmosphere of a really tolerably fine day for England at the time of year. “Quick, Justine! do not distress yourself about costume. My visits this morning are of business rather than ceremony. And what matters it now? Yet, after all, I suppose a woman never likes to look her worst, especially when she is growing old.”

Justine made no answer. The ready disclaimer which would indeed have been no flattery died upon her lips; for Justine also felt aggrieved in many ways by this untoward expedition to the English capital. In the first place, having spent but one night in Paris, she had been compelled to leave it at the very period when its attractions were coming into bloom: in the next, she had encountered, while crossing the Channel, such a fresh breeze, as she was pleased to term, “_un vent de Polichinelle!_” and which upset her digestive process for a week; in the third, though disdaining to occupy a hostile territory with her war material disorganised, she was painfully conscious of looking her worst; while, lastly, she had no opportunity for resetting the blunted edge of her attractions, because in the whole household below-stairs could be discovered but one of the opposite sex, sixty years old, and obviously given, body and soul, to that mistress who cheers while she inebriates.

So Justine bustled about discontentedly, and her expressive French face, usually so pleasant and lively, now looked dull, and bilious, and cross.

She brightened up a little, nevertheless, when a chair stopped at the door, and a visitor was announced. The street, though off the Strand, then a fashionable locality, was yet tolerably quiet and retired.

It cheered Justine’s spirits to bring up a gentleman’s name for admission; and she almost recovered her good-humour when she learned he was a countryman of her own.

The Marquise, sipping chocolate and dressed to go out, received her visitor more than cordially. She had been restless at Chateau-la-Fierté, restless in Paris, restless through her whole journey, and was now restless in London. But restlessness is borne the easier when we have some one to share it with; and this young man had reason to be gratified with the welcome accorded him by so celebrated a beauty as Madame de Montmirail.

She might almost have been his mother, it is true; but all his life he had accustomed himself to think of her as the brilliant Marquise with whom everybody of any pretence to distinction was avowedly in love, and without looking much at her face, or affecting her society, he accepted the situation too. What would you have? It was _de rigueur_. He declared himself her adorer just as he wore a Steinkirk cravat, and took snuff, though he hated it, from a diamond snuff-box.

The Marquise could not help people making fools of themselves, she said; and perhaps did not wish to help it. She too had dreamed her dream, and all was over. The sovereignty of beauty can at no time be disagreeable, least of all when the bloom begins to fade, and the empire grows day by day more precarious. If young Chateau-Guerrand chose to be as absurd as his uncle, let him singe his wings, or his wig, or any part of his attire he pleased. She was not going to put her lamp out because the cockchafer is a blunderer, and the moth a suicide.

He was a good-looking young gentleman enough, and in Justine’s opinion seemed only the more attractive from the air of thorough coxcombry with which his whole deportment, person, and conversation were imbued. He had quarrelled with his uncle, the Prince-Marshal, on the score of that relative’s undutiful conduct. The veteran had paid the young soldier’s debts twice, and lo! the third time he remonstrated. His nephew, under pretext of an old wound disabling the sword-arm, obtained permission to retire from the army, thinking thus to annoy his uncle, and accepted an appointment as _attaché_ to the French embassy at the Court of St. James’s, for which he was specially unfitted both by nature and education.

“You arrived, madame, but yesterday,” said he, bowing over the hand extended to him, with an affectation of extreme devotion. “I learned it this morning, and behold I fly here on the instant, to place myself, my chief, and all the resources of my country, at the disposition of madame.”

“Of course,” she answered, smiling; “but in the meantime, understand me, I neither want yourself, however charming, nor your chief, however discreet, nor the resources of your country and mine, however powerful. I am here on private affairs, and till they are concluded I shall have no leisure to enter society. What I ask of your devotion now is, to sit down in that chair, and tell me the news, while I finish my chocolate in peace.”

He obeyed delighted—evidently, she was rejoiced to meet him here, so unexpectedly, and could not conceal her gratification. He was treated like an intimate friend, an established favourite—Justine had retired. The Marquise loitered over her chocolate. She looked well, wonderfully handsome for her age, and she had never appeared so kind. “Ah, rogue!” thought this enviable youth, apostrophising the person he most admired in the world, “must it always be so? mothers and daughters, maids, wives, and widows.—No escape, _parbleu_, and no mercy. What is it about you, my boy, that thus prostrates every creature in a petticoat before the feet of Casimir de Chateau-Guerrand? Is it looks, is it manners, is it intellect? Faith, I think it must be a happy mixture of them all!”

“Well!” said the Marquise with one of her victorious glances, “I am not very patient, you know that of old. Quick! out with the news, you who have the knack of telling it so well.”

He glanced in an opposite mirror, and looked as fascinating as he could.

“It goes no further, madame, of course; and indeed I would trust you with my head, as I have long since trusted you with my heart.” An impatient gesture of his listener somewhat discomfited him, but he proceeded, nevertheless, in a tone of ineffable self-satisfaction.

“We are behind the scenes, you know, we diplomatists, and see the players before the wigs are adjusted or the paint laid on. Such actors! madame, and oh! such actresses! the old Court is a comedy to which no one pays attention. The young Court is a farce played with a tragic solemnity. Even Mrs. Bellenden has thrown up her part. There is no gooseberry bush now behind which the heir-apparent fills his basket. Some say that none is necessary, but Mrs. Howard still dresses the Princess, and―”

“Spare me your green-room scandal,” interrupted the Marquise. “Surely I have heard enough of it in my time. At Fontainebleau, at Versailles, at Marly. I am sick to death of all the gossips and slanders that gallop up and down the backstairs of a palace. Talk politics to me, for heaven’s sake, or don’t talk at all!”

“I know not what you call politics, madame,” answered the unabashed attaché, “if the Prince’s likings and vagaries are not to be included in the term. What say you to a plot, a conspiracy, more, a Jacobite rising? In the north of course! that established stronghold of legitimacy. Do I interest you now?”

He did indeed, and though she strove hard not to betray her feelings, no observer, less preoccupied with the reflection of his own beloved image in the looking-glass, could have failed to remark the gleam of her dark eyes, her rising colour, and quick-drawn breath. Though she recovered herself with habitual self-command, there was still a slight tremor in her voice, while she repeated as unconcernedly as she could—

“In the north, you say? Ah! it is a long distance from the capital. Your department is very likely misinformed, or has itself dressed up a goblin to frighten idle children like yourself, monsieur, into paying more attention to their lessons.”

But Casimir, who laid great stress on his own diplomatic importance, vehemently repudiated such an assumption.

“Goblin, indeed!” he cried, indignantly. “It is a goblin that will be found to have body and bones, and blood too, I fear, unless I am much misinformed and mistaken. We have nothing to do with it of course, but I can tell you, madame, that we have information of the time, the locality, the numbers, the persons implicated. I believe if you put me to it, I could even furnish you with the names of the accused.”

She bowed carelessly. “A few graziers, I suppose, and cattle-drivers,” she observed, “with a Scottish house-breaker, and a drunken squire or two for leaders. It is scarcely worth the trouble to ask any more questions.”

“Far graver than that, madame,” he answered, determined not to be put down. “Some of the best names in the north, as I am informed, are already compromised beyond power to retreat. I could tell them over from memory, but my tongue fails to pronounce the barbarous syllables. Would you like to have them in black and white?”

“Not this morning, monsieur,” she answered with a shrug of the shoulders. “Do you think I came to London in order to mix myself up in an unsuccessful rebellion? I, who have private affairs of my own that require all my attention. You might as well suppose I had followed yourself across the Channel because I could not exist apart from Casimir de Chateau-Guerrand! Frankly, I am glad to see you too. Very glad,” she added, stretching her white hand to the young man, with another of her bewitching smiles. “But I must hunt you away now. Positively I must; I ought to have sold an estate, and touched the purchase-money by this time. I am a thorough woman of business, monsieur, I would have you know; which does not prevent my loving amusement at the right season, like other people.”

He took his hat to depart, feeling perhaps, for the first time, that there were women in the world to whom even he dare not aspire, and that it was provoking such should be the best worth winning. The Marquise had not yet lost the knack of playing a game from which she had never risen a loser but once, and indeed if her weapons were a little less bright, her skill of fence was better than ever. Few women have thoroughly learned the art of man-taming till they are past their prime, and even then, perhaps the influence that subdued his fellows, is powerless alone on him whom most they wish to capture.

Admiration from young Chateau-Guerrand gratified the Marquise as some stray woodcock in a bag of a hundred head, gratifies a sportsman. It hardly even stimulated her vanity. She wanted him though, like the woodcock for ulterior purposes, and shot him, therefore, so to speak, gracefully, neatly, and in proper form.

“I should fear to commit an indiscretion by remaining one moment longer, madame,” said he, “but—but—” and he looked longingly, though with less than his accustomed assurance, in the beautiful eyes that met his own so kindly.

“But—but—” she interposed laughing, “you may come again to-morrow at the same time; I shall be alone. And, Casimir, I have some talent for curiosity, bring with you that list you spoke of—at least if no one else has seen it. A scandal, you know, is like a rose, if I may not gather it fresh from the stalk, I had rather not wear it at all!”

“Honour,” said he, kissing the hand she extended to him, and in high glee tripped downstairs to regain his chair in the street.

Satisfied with the implied promise, Madame de Montmirail looked wistfully at a clock on the chimneypiece and pondered.

“Twenty-four hours gained on that young man’s gossiping tongue at least. To-morrow night I might be there—the horses are good in this country. I have it! When I near the place I must make use of their diligence. I shall overtake more than one. I cannot appear too quickly. I shall have a famous laugh at Malletort, to be sure, if my information is earlier than his—and at any rate, I shall embrace my darling Cerise, and see her husband—my son-in-law now—my son-in-law! How strange it seems! Well, business first and pleasure afterwards.”

“Justine!”

“Madame!” replied Justine, re-entering with a colour in her cheek and a few particles of soot, such as constitute an essential part of a London atmosphere, on her dainty forehead, denoting that she had been leaning out at window to look down the street.

“Madame called, I think. Can I do anything more for madame before she goes out?”

Much to Justine’s astonishment, she was directed to pack certain articles of wearing apparel without delay. These were to be ready in two hours’ time. Was madame going again to voyage? That was no business of Justine’s. Was Pierre not to accompany Madame? nor Alphonse? nor even old Busson? If any of these were wanted, madame would herself let them know. And when was madame coming back? Shortly; Justine should learn in a day or two. So, without further parley, madame entered her chair and proceeded to that business which she imagined was the sole cause of her journey to London.

After some hesitation, and a few tiresome interviews with her intendant, the Marquise had lately decided on selling her estates in the West Indies, stipulating only, for the sake of Célandine, that Bartoletti should be retained as overseer at _Cash-a-crou_. The locality, indeed, had but few agreeable associations connected with it. Months of wearisome exile, concluded by a night of bloodshed and horror, had not endeared Montmirail West in the eyes of its European owner.

It is not now necessary to state that Madame de Montmirail was a lady of considerable enterprise, and especially affected all matters connected with business or speculation. In an hour she made up her mind that London was the best market for her property, and in twenty-four she was in her carriage, on the road to England. Much to her intendant’s admiration, she also expressed her decided intention of managing the whole negotiations herself. The quiet old Frenchman gratefully appreciated an independence of spirit that saved him long journeys, heavy responsibilities, and one or two of his mistress’s sharpest rebukes.

To effect her sale, the preliminaries of which had been already arranged by letter, the Marquise had to proceed as far as St. Margaret’s Hill in the borough of Southwark. Her chairmen, after so long a trot, felt themselves doubtless entitled to refreshment, and took advantage of her protracted interview with the broker whom she visited, to adjourn to a neighbouring tavern for the purpose of recruiting their strength. The beer was so good that, returning past the old Admiralty Office, her leading bearer was compelled to sit down between the poles of his chair, taking off his hat, and proceeding to wipe his brows in a manner extremely ludicrous to the bystanders, and equally provoking to the inmate, who desired to be carried home. His yokefellow, instead of reproving him, burst into a drunken laugh, and the Marquise inside, though half-amused, was yet at the same time provoked to find herself placed in a thoroughly false position by so absurd a casualty.

She let down the window and expostulated, but with no result, except to collect a crowd, who expressed their sympathy with the usual good taste and kind feeling of a metropolitan mob. Madame de Montmirail’s appearance denoted she was a highborn lady, and her accent proclaimed her a foreigner. The combination was irresistible; presently coarse jests and brutal laughter rose to hootings of derision, accompanied by ominous cries—“Down with the Pretender! No Popery! Who heated the warming-pan?” and such catchwords of political rancour and ill-will.

Ere long an apple or two began to fly, then a rotten egg, and the body of a dead cat, followed by a brickbat, while the less drunken chairman had his hat knocked over his eyes. That which began in horse-play was fast growing to a riot, and the Marquise might have found herself roughly handled if it had not been for an irruption of seamen from a neighbouring tavern, who were whiling away their time by drinking strong liquors during the examination of their papers at the Admiralty Office, adjoining. Though not above half a dozen in number, they were soon “alongside the wreck,” as they called it, making a lane through the crowd by the summary process of knocking down everybody who opposed them, but before they had time to give “three cheers for the lady,” their leader, a sedate and weatherworn tar, who had never abandoned his pipe during the heat of the action, dropped it short from between his lips, and stood aghast before the chair window, rolling his hat in his hands, speechless and spell-bound with amazement.

The Marquise recognised him at once.

“It is Smoke-Jack! and welcome!” she exclaimed. “I should know you amongst a thousand! Indeed, I scarcely wanted your assistance more the night you saved us at _Cash-a-crou_. Ah! I have not forgotten the men of ‘The Bashful Maid,’ nor how to speak to them. _Come, bear a hand, my hearty!_ Is it not so?”

The little nautical slang spoken in her broken English, acted like a charm. Not a man but would have fought for her to the death, or drank her health till all was blue!

They cheered lustily now, they crowded round in enthusiastic admiration, and the youngest of the party, with a forethought beyond all praise, rushed back to the tavern he had quitted, for a jorum of hot punch, in case the lady should feel faint after her accident.

Smoke-Jack’s stoicism was for once put to flight.

“Say the word, marm!” exclaimed the old seaman, “and we’ll pull the street down. Who began it?” he added, looking round and doubling his great round fists. “Who began it?—that’s all I want to know. Ain’t nobody to be started for this here game? Ain’t nobody to get his allowance? I’ll give it him, hot and hot!”

With difficulty Smoke-Jack was persuaded that no benefit would accrue to the Marquise from his doing immediate battle with the bystanders, consisting by this time of a few women and street-urchins, for most of the able-bodied rioters had slunk away before the threatening faces of the seamen. He had to content himself, therefore, with administering sundry kicks and cuffs to the chairmen, both of whom were too drunk to proceed, and with carrying the Marquise home, in person, assisted by a certain elderly boatswain’s mate, on whom he seemed to place some reliance, while the rest of the sailors sought their favourite resort once more, to drink success and a pleasant voyage to the lady, in the money with which she had liberally rewarded them.

“It is droll!” thought Madame de Montmirail, as she felt the chair jerk and sway to the unaccustomed action of its maritime bearers. “Droll enough to be thus carried through the streets of London by the British navy! and droller than all, that I should have met Smoke-Jack at a time like the present. This accident may prove extremely useful in the end. Doubtless, he is still devoted to his old captain. Everybody seems devoted to that man. Can I wonder at my little Cerise? And Sir George may be none the worse of a faithful follower in days like these. I will ask him, at any rate, and it is not often when I ask anything that I am refused!”

So when the chair halted at last before Madame de Montmirail’s door, she dismissed the boatswain’s mate delighted, with many kind words and a couple of broad pieces, while Smoke-Jack, no less delighted, found himself ushered into the sitting-room upstairs, even before he had time to look round and take his bearings.

The Marquise prided herself on knowledge of mankind, and offered him refreshment on the spot.

“Will you have grog?” she said. “It is bad for you sailors to talk with the mouth dry.”

Smoke-Jack, again, prided himself on his manners, and declined strenuously. Neither would he be prevailed upon to sit down, but balanced his person on either leg alternately, holding his hat with both hands before the pit of his stomach.

“Smoke-Jack,” said the Marquise, “I know you of old; brave, discreet, and trustworthy. I am bound on a journey in which there is some little danger, and much necessity for caution; have you the time and the inclination to accompany me?”

His impulse was to follow her to the end of the world, but he mistrusted these sirens precisely because it _was_ always his impulse so to follow them.

“Is it for a spell, marm?” he asked; “or for a long cruise? If I might make so free, marm, I’d like to be told the name of the skipper and the tonnage of the craft!”

“I start in an hour for the north,” she continued, neither understanding nor heeding his proviso. “I am going into the neighbourhood of your old captain, Sir George Hamilton.”

“Captain George!” exclaimed the seaman, with difficulty restraining himself from shying his hat to the ceiling, and looking sheepishly conscious, he had almost committed this tempting solecism. “What! _our_ Captain George? I’m not much of a talking chap, marm; I haven’t got the time, but if that’s the port you’re bound for, I’ll sail round the world with you, if we beat against a headwind the whole voyage through!”

With such sentiments the preliminaries were easily adjusted, and it was arranged that Smoke-Jack should accompany the Marquise on her journey with no more delay than would be required to purchase him landsman’s attire. He entered into the scheme with thorough good-will, though expressing, and doubtless feeling, some little disappointment when he learned that Justine, of whom he had caught a glimpse on the stairs, was not to be of the party.

Avowedly a woman-hater, he had, of course, a _real_ weakness for the softer sex, and with all his deference to the Marquise, would have found much delight in the society of her waiting-maid. Such specimens as Justine he considered his especial study, and believed that of all men he best understood their qualities, and was most conversant with “the trim on ’em.”