Chapter 14

The two essays [Footnote: The twenty-first chapter of Du Maillot's _Hommes Illustres_; and the fifth of d'Avranches's _Ancêtres de la Révolution_. Löwe has an excellent digest of this data.] dealing with the man have scarcely touched his capabilities. His exploits in and about Paris and his Gascon doings, while important enough in the outcome, are but the gesticulations of a puppet: the historian's real concern is with the hands that manoeuvered above Cazaio; and whether or no Achille Cazaio organized the riots in Toulouse and Guienne and Béarn is a question with which, at this late day, there can be little profitable commerce.

One recommends this Cazaio rather to the spinners of romance: with his morality--a trifle buccaneerish on occasion--once discreetly palliated, history affords few heroes more instantly taking to the fancy....One casts a hankering eye toward this Cazaio's rumored parentage, his hopeless and life-long adoration of Claire de Puysange, his dealings with d'Argenson and King Louis le Bien-Aimé, the obscure and mischievous imbroglios in Spain, and finally his aggrandizement and his flame-lit death, as du Maillot, say, records these happenings: and one finds therein the outline of an impelling hero, and laments that our traffic must be with a stolid and less livelily tinted Bulmer. And with a sigh one passes on toward the labor prearranged....

To-night Cazaio's desires were astir, and consciousness of his own power was tempting him. He had never troubled Poictesme much: the Taunenfels were accessible on that side, and so long as he confined his depredations to the frontier, the Duc de Puysange merely shrugged and rendered his annual tribute; it was not a great sum, and the Duke preferred to pay it rather than forsake his international squabbles to quash a purely parochial nuisance like a bandit, who was, too, a kinsman....

Meanwhile Cazaio had grown stronger than de Puysange knew. It was a time of disaffection: the more violent here and there were beginning to assert that before hanging a superfluous peasant or two de Puysange ought to bore himself with inquiries concerning the abstract justice of the action. For everywhere the irrational lower classes were grumbling about the very miseries and maltreatments that had efficiently disposed of their fathers for centuries: they seemed not to respect tradition: already they were posting placards in the Paris boulevards,--"Shave the King for a monk, hang the Pompadour, and break Machault on the wheel,"--and already a boy of twelve, one Joseph Guillotin, was running about the streets of Saintes yonder. So the commoners flocked to Cazaio in the Taunenfels until, little by little, he had gathered an army about him.

And at Bellegarde, de Soyecourt had only a handful of men, Cazaio meditated to-night. And the woman was there,--the woman whose eyes were blue and incurious, whose face was always scornful.

In history they liken Achille Cazaio to Simon de Montfort, and the Gracchi, and other graspers at fruit as yet unripe; or, if the perfervid word of d'Avranches be accepted, you may regard him as "_le Saint-Jean de la Révolution glorieuse_." But I think you may with more wisdom regard him as a man of strong passions, any one of which, for the time being, possessed him utterly.

Now he struck his palm upon the table.

"I have never seen a woman one-half so beautiful, Dom Michel. I am more than ever in love with her."

"In that event," the Friar considered, "it is, of course, unfortunate she should have a brand-new husband. Husbands are often thought much of when they are a novelty."

"You bungled matters, you fat, mouse-hearted rascal. You could quite easily have killed him."

The Dominican spread out his hands, and afterward reached for the bottle. "Milanese armor!" said Dom Michel Frégose. [Footnote: The same ecclesiastic who more lately dubbed himself, with Maréchal de Richelieu's encouragement, l'Abbé de Trans, and was discreditably involved in the forgeries of Madame de St. Vincent.]

"Yet I am master of Poictesme," Cazaio thundered, "I have ten men to de Soyecourt's one. Am I, then, lightly to be thwarted?"

"Undoubtedly you could take Bellegarde--and the woman along with the castle,--if you decided they were worth the price of a little killing. I think they are not worth it, I strongly advise you to have up a wench from the village, to put out the light, and exercise your imagination."

Cazaio shook his head. "No, Dom Michel, you churchmen live too lewdly to understand the tyranny of love."

"--Besides, there is that trifling matter of your understanding with de Puysange,--and, besides, de Puysange will be here in two days."

Cazaio snapped his fingers. "He will arrive after the fair." Cazaio uncorked the ink-bottle with an august gesture.

"Write!" said Achille Cazaio.

VIII

As John Bulmer leisurely ascended from the village the birds were waking. Whether day were at hand or no was a matter of twittering debate overhead, but in the west the stars were paling one by one, like candles puffed out by the pretentious little wind that was bustling about the turquoise cupola of heaven; and eastward Bellegarde showed stark, as though scissored from a painting, against a sky of gray-and-rose. Here was a world of faint ambiguity. Here was the exquisite tension of dawn, curiously a-chime with John Bulmer's mood, for just now he found the universe too beautiful to put any actual faith in its existence. He had strayed into Faëry somehow--into Atlantis, or Avalon, or "a wood near Athens,"--into a land of opalescence and vapor and delicate color, that would vanish, bubble-like, at the discreet tap of Pawsey fetching in his shaving-water; meantime John Bulmer's memory snatched at each loveliness, jealously, as a pug snatches bits of sugar.

Beneath her window he paused and shifted his lute before him. Then he began to sing, exultant in the unreality of everything and of himself in particular.

Sang John Bulmer,

"Speed forth, my song, the sun's ambassador, Lest in the east night prove the conqueror, The day be slain, and darkness triumph,--for The sun is single, but her eyes are twain.

"And now the sunlight and the night contest A doubtful battle, and day bides at best Doubtful, until she waken. 'Tis attest The sun is single.

"But her eyes are twain,-- And should the light of all the world delay, And darkness prove victorious? Is it day Now that the sun alone is risen?

"Nay, The sun is single, but her eyes are twain,-- Twain firmaments that mock with heavenlier hue The heavens' less lordly and less gracious blue, And lit with sunlier sunlight through and through,

"The sun is single, but her eyes are twain, And of fair things this side of Paradise Fairest, of goodly things most goodly,"

He paused here and smote a resonant and louder chord. His voice ascended in dulcet supplication.

"Rise, And succor the benighted world that cries, _The sun is single, but her eyes are twain!_"

"Eh--? So it is you, is it?" Claire was peeping disdainfully from the window. Her throat was bare, and her dusky hair was a shade dishevelled, and in her meditative eyes he caught the flicker of her tardiest dream just as it vanished.

"It is I," John Bulmer confessed--"come to awaken you according to the ancient custom of Poictesme."

"I would much rather have had my sleep out," said she, resentfully. "In perfect frankness, I find you and your ancient customs a nuisance."

"You lack romance, my wife."

"Oh--?" She was a person of many cryptic exclamations, this bride of his. Presently she said: "Indeed, Monsieur Bulmer, I entreat you to leave Poictesme. I have informed Louis of everything, and he is rather furious."

John Bulmer said, "Do you comprehend why I have not already played the emigrant?"

After a little pause, she answered, "Yes."

"And for the same reason I can never leave you so long as this gross body is at my disposal. You are about to tell me that if I remain here I shall probably be hanged on account of what happened yesterday. There are grounds for my considering this outcome unlikely, but if I knew it to be inevitable--if I had but one hour's start of Jack Ketch,--I swear to you I would not budge."

"I am heartily sorry," she replied, "since if I had known you really cared for me--so much--I would never have married you. Oh, it is impossible!" the girl laughed, with a trace of worriment. "You had not laid eyes on me until a week ago yesterday!"

"My dear," John Bulmer answered, "I am perhaps inadequately acquainted with the etiquette of such matters, but I make bold to question if love is exclusively regulated by clock-ticks. Observe!" he said, with a sort of fury: "there is a mocking demon in me who twists my tongue into a jest even when I am most serious. I love you: and I dare not tell you so without a grin. Then when you laugh at me I, too, can laugh, and the whole transaction can be regarded as a parody. Oh, I am indeed a coward!"

"You are nothing of the sort! You proved that yesterday."

"Yesterday I shot an unsuspecting man, and afterward fenced with another--in a shirt of Milanese armor! Yes, I was astoundingly heroic yesterday, for the simple reason that all the while I knew myself to be as safe as though I were snug at home snoring under an eider-down quilt. Yet, to do me justice, I am a shade less afraid of physical danger than of ridicule."

She gave him a womanly answer. "You are not ridiculous, and to wear armor was very sensible of you."

"To the contrary, I am extremely ridiculous. For observe: I am an elderly man, quite old enough to be your father; I am fat--No, that is kind of you, but I am not of pleasing portliness, I am just unpardonably fat; and, I believe, I am not possessed of any fatal beauty of feature such as would by ordinary impel young women to pursue me with unsolicited affection: and being all this, I presume to love you. To me, at least, that appears ridiculous."

"Ah, do not laugh!" she said. "Do not laugh, Monsieur Bulmer!"

But John Bulmer persisted in that curious laughter. "Because," he presently stated, "the whole affair is so very diverting."

"Believe me," Claire began, "I am sorry that you care--so much. I--do not understand. I am sorry,--I am not sorry," the girl said, in a new tone, and you saw her transfigured; "I am glad! Do you comprehend?--I am glad!" And then she swiftly closed the window.

John Bulmer observed. "I am perhaps subject to hallucinations, for otherwise the fact had been previously noted by geographers that heaven is immediately adjacent to Poictesme."

IX

Presently the old flippancy came back to him, since an ancient custom is not lightly broken; and John Bulmer smiled sleepily and shook his head. "Here am I on my honeymoon, with my wife locked up in the château, and with me locked out of it. My position savors too much of George Dandin's to be quite acceptable. Let us set about rectifying matters."

He came to the great gate of the castle and found two sentries there. He thought this odd, but they recognized him as de Soyecourt's guest, and after a whispered consultation admitted him. In the courtyard a lackey took charge of Monsieur Bulmer, and he was conducted into the presence of the Marquis de Soyecourt. "What the devil!" thought John Bulmer, "is Bellegarde in a state of siege?"

The little Marquis sat beside the Duchesse de Puysange, to the rear of a long table with a crimson cover. Their attitudes smacked vaguely of the judicial, and before them stood, guarded by four attendants, a ragged and dissolute looking fellow whom the Marquis was languidly considering.

"My dear man," de Soyecourt was saying as John Bulmer came into the room "when you brought this extraordinary epistle to Bellegarde, you must have been perfectly aware that thereby you were forfeiting your life. Accordingly, I am compelled to deny your absurd claims to the immunity of a herald, just as I would decline to receive a herald from the cockroaches."

"That is cowardly," the man said. "I come as the representative of an honorable enemy who desires to warn you before he strikes."

"You come as the representative of vermin," de Soyecourt retorted, "and as such I receive you. You will therefore, permit me to wish you a pleasant journey into eternity. Why, holà, madame! here is that vagabond guest of ours returned to observation!" The Marquis rose and stepped forward, all abeam. "Mr. Bulmer, I can assure you that I was never more delighted to see anyone in my entire life."

"Pardon, monseigneur," one of the attendants here put in,--"but what shall we do with this Achon?"

The Marquis slightly turned his head, his hand still grasping John Bulmer's. "Why, hang him, of course," he said. "Did I forget to tell you? But yes, take him out, and have him confessed by Frère Joseph, and hang him at once." The four men removed their prisoner.

"You find us in the act of dispensing justice," the Marquis continued, "yet at Bellegarde we temper it with mercy, so that I shall ask no indiscreet questions concerning your absence of last night."

"But I, monsieur," said John Bulmer, "I, too, have come to demand justice."

"Tête-bleu, Mr. Bulmer! and what can I have the joy of doing for you in that respect?"

"You can restore to me my wife."

And now de Soyecourt cast a smile toward the Duchess, who appeared troubled. "Would you not have known this was an Englishman," he queried, "by the avowed desire for the society of his own wife? They are a mad race. And indeed, Mr. Bulmer, I would very gladly restore to you this hitherto unheard-of spouse if but I were blest with her acquaintance. As it is--" He waved his hand.

"I married her only yesterday," said John Bulmer, "and I have reason to believe that she is now within Bellegarde."

He saw the eyes of de Soyecourt slowly narrow. "Jacques," said the Marquis, "fetch me the pistol within that cabinet." The Marquis resumed his seat to the rear of the table, the weapon lying before him. "You may go now, Jacques; this gentleman and I are about to hold a little private conversation." Then, when the door had closed upon the lackey, de Soyecourt said, "Pray draw up a chair within just ten feet of this table, monsieur, and oblige me with your wife's maiden name."

"She was formerly known," John Bulmer answered, "as Mademoiselle Claire de Puysange."

The Duchess spoke for the first time. "Oh, the poor man! Monsieur de Soyecourt, he is evidently insane."

"I do not know about that," the Marquis said, fretfully, "but in any event I hope that no more people will come to Bellegarde upon missions which, compel me to have them hanged. First there was this Achon, and now you, Mr. Bulmer, come to annoy me.--Listen, monsieur," he went on, presently: "last evening Mademoiselle de Puysange announced to the Duchess and me that her impending match with the Duke of Ormskirk must necessarily be broken off, as she was already married. She had, she stated, encountered you and a clergyman yonder the forest, where, on the spur of the moment, you two had espoused each other; and was quite unable to inform us what had become of you after the ceremony. You can conceive that, as a sensible man, I did not credit a word of her story. But now, as I understand it, you corroborate this moonstruck narrative?"

John Bulmer bowed his head. "I have that honor, monsieur."

De Soyecourt sounded the gong beside him. "In that event, it is uncommonly convenient to have you in hand. Your return, to Bellegarde I regard as opportune, even though I am compelled to attribute it to insanity; personally, I disapprove of this match with Milor Ormskirk, but as Gaston is bent upon it, you will understand that in reason my only course is to make Claire a widow as soon as may be possible."

"It is intended, then," John Bulmer queried, "that I am to follow Achon?"

"I can but trust," said the Marquis, politely, "that your course of life has qualified you for a superior flight, since Achon's departing, I apprehend, is not unakin to a descent."

"No!" the Duchess cried, suddenly; "Monsieur de Soyecourt, can you not see the man is out of his senses? Let Claire be sent for. There is some mistake."

De Soyecourt shrugged. "Yen know that I can refuse you nothing. Jacques," he called, to the appearing lackey, "request Mademoiselle de Puysange to honor us, if it be convenient, with her presence. Nay, I pray you, do not rise, Mr. Bulmer; I am of a nervous disposition, startled by the least movement, and my finger, as you may note, is immediately upon the trigger."

So they sat thus, John Bulmer beginning to feel rather foolish as time wore on, though actually it was not a long while before Claire had appeared in the doorway and had paused there. You saw a great wave of color flood her countenance, then swiftly ebb. John Bulmer observed, with a thrill, that she made no sound, but simply waited, composed and alert, to find out how much de Soyecourt knew before she spoke.

The little Marquis said, "Claire, this gentleman informs us that you married him yesterday."

Tranquilly she inspected her claimant. "I did not see Monsieur Bulmer at all yesterday, so far as I remember. Why, surely, Louis, you did not take my nonsense of last night in earnest?" she demanded, and gave a mellow ripple of laughter. "Yes, you actually believed it; you actually believed that I walked into the forest and married the first man I met there, and that this is he. As it happens I did not; so please let Monsieur Bulmer go at once, and put away that absurd pistol--at once, Louis, do you hear?"

The Duchess shook her head. "She is lying, Monsieur de Soyecourt, and undoubtedly this is the man."

John Bulmer went to the girl and took her hand. "You are trying to save me, I know. But need I warn you that the reward of Ananias was never a synonym for felicity?"

"Jean Bulmer! Jean Bulmer!" the girl asked, and her voice was tender; "why did you return to Bellegarde, Jean Bulmer?"

"I came," he answered, "for the absurd reason that I cannot live without you."

They stood thus for a while, both her hands clasped in his, "I believe you," she said at last, "even though I do not understand at all, Jean Bulmer." And then she wheeled upon the Marquis, "Yes, yes!" Claire said; "the man is my husband. And I will not have him harmed. Do you comprehend?--you shall not touch him, because you are not fit to touch him, Louis, and also because I do not wish it."

De Soyecourt looked toward the Duchess as if for advice. "It is a nuisance, but evidently she cannot marry Milor Ormskirk so long as Mr. Bulmer is alive. I suppose it would be better to hang him out-of-hand?"

"Monsieur de Puysange would prefer it, I imagine," said the Duchess; "nevertheless, it appears a great pity."

"In nature," the Marquis assented, "we deplore the loss of Mr. Bulmer's company. Yet as matters stand--"

"But they are in love with each other," the Duchess pointed out, with a sorry little laugh. "Can you not see that, my friend?"

"Hein?" said the Marquis; "why, then, it is doubly important that Mr. Bulmer be hanged as soon as possible." He reached for the gong, but Claire had begun to speak.

"I am not at all in love with him! You are of a profound imbecility, Hélène. I think he is a detestable person, because he always looks at you as if he saw something extremely ridiculous, but was too polite to notice it. He is invariably making me suspect I have a smut on my nose. But in spite of that, I consider him a very pleasant old gentleman, and I will not have him hanged!" With which ultimatum she stamped her foot.

"Yes, madame," said the Marquis, critically; "after all, she is in love with him. That is unfortunate, is it not, for Milor Ormskirk,--and even for Achille Cazaio," he added, with a shrug.

"I fail to see," a dignified young lady stated, "what Cazaio, at least, has to do with your galimatias."

"Simply that I received this morning a letter demanding you be surrendered to Cazaio," de Soyecourt answered as he sounded the gong. "Otherwise, our amiable friend of the Taunenfels announces he will attack Bellegarde. I, of course, hanged his herald and despatched messengers to Gaston, whom I look for to-morrow. If Gaston indeed arrive to-morrow morning, Mr. Bulmer, I shall relinquish you to him; in other circumstances will be laid upon me the deplorable necessity of summoning a Protestant minister from Manneville, and, after your spiritual affairs are put in order, of hanging you--suppose we say at noon?"

"The hour suits me," said John Bulmer, "as well as another. But no better. And I warn you it will not suit the Duke of Ormskirk, either, whose relative--whose very near relative--" He posed for the astounding revelation.

But little de Soyecourt had drawn closer to him. "Mr. Bulmer, I have somehow omitted to mention that two years ago I was at Aix-la-Chapelle, when the treaty was in progress, and there saw your great kinsman. I cut no particular figure at the convocation, and it is unlikely he recalls my features; but I remember his quite clearly."

"Indeed?" said John Bulmer, courteously; "it appears, then, that monsieur is a physiognomist?"

"You flatter me," the Marquis returned. "My skill in that science enabled me to deduce only the veriest truisms--such as that the man who for fifteen years had beaten France, had hoodwinked France, would in France be not oversafe could we conceive him fool enough to hazard a trip into this country."

"Especially alone?" said John Bulmer.

"Especially," the Marquis assented, "if he came alone. But, ma foi! I am discourteous. You were about to say--?"

"That a comic subject declines to be set forth in tragic verse," John Bulmer answered, "and afterward to inquire the way to my dungeon."

X

But John Bulmer escaped a dungeon after all; for at parting de Soyecourt graciously offered to accept Mr. Bulmer's parole, which he gave willingly enough, and thereby obtained the liberty of a tiny enclosed garden, whence a stairway led to his new apartment on the second floor of what had been known as the Constable's Tower, since du Guesclin held it for six weeks against Sir Robert Knollys. This was a part of the ancient fortress in which, they say, Poictesme's most famous hero, Dom Manuel, dwelt and performed such wonders, a long while before Bellegarde was remodeled by Duke Florian.

The garden, gravel-pathed, was a trim place, all green and white. It contained four poplars, and in the center was a fountain, where three Nereids contended with a brawny Triton for the possession of a turtle whose nostrils spurted water. A circle of attendant turtles, half-submerged, shot inferior jets from their gaping mouths. It was an odd, and not unhandsome piece, [Footnote: Designed by Simon Guillain. This fountain is still to be seen at Bellegarde, though the exuberancy of Revolutionary patriotism has bereft the Triton of his head and of the lifted arm.] and John Bulmer inspected it with appreciation, and then the garden, and having found all things satisfactory, sat down and chuckled sleepily and waited.

"De Soyecourt has been aware of my identity throughout the entire week! Faith, then, I am a greater fool than even I suspected, since this fop of the boulevards has been able to trick me so long. He has some card up his sleeve, too, has our good Marquis--Eh, well! Gaston comes to-morrow, and thenceforward all is plain sailing. Meantime I conjecture that the poor captive will presently have visitors."

He had dinner first, though, and at this meal gave an excellent account of himself. Shortly afterward, as he sat over his coffee, little de Soyecourt unlocked the high and narrow gate which constituted the one entrance to the garden, and sauntered forward, dapper and smiling.