Part 18

But scarcely had the first note sounded, than, as if by unanimous consent, the whole company hastened towards the door. It might have been supposed that the chateau was on fire, for the guests did not withdraw, they actually fled. An hour previously, the Marquis de Courtornieu and the Duke de Sairmeuse had been overwhelmed with the most obsequious homage and adulation. But now there was not one in all the assembly daring enough to take them openly by the hand. Just when they both believed themselves all-powerful they were rudely precipitated from their lordly eminence. Indeed disgrace, and perhaps punishment, were to be their portion. Heroic to the last, however, the abandoned bride endeavoured to stay the tide of retreating guests. Standing near the door, and with her most bewitching smile upon her lips, Blanche spared neither flattering words nor entreaties in her efforts to retain the deserters. The attempt was vain; and, in point of fact, many were not sorry of this opportunity to repay the young Marchioness de Sairmeuse for all her past disdain and criticism. Soon, of all the guests, there only remained one old gentleman who, on account of his gout, had deemed it prudent not to mingle with the crowd. He bowed as he passed before Blanche, and could not even restrain a blush, for he rightly considered that this swift flight was a cruel insult for the abandoned bride. Still, what could he do alone? Under the circumstances, his presence would prove irksome, and so he departed like the others.

Blanche was now alone, and there was no longer any necessity for constraint. There were no more curious witnesses to enjoy her sufferings and comment upon them. With a furious gesture she tore her bridal veil and wreath of orange flowers from her head, and trampled them under foot. “Extinguish the lights everywhere!” she cried to a servant passing by, stamping her foot angrily, and speaking as imperiously as if she had been in her father’s house, and not at Sairmeuse. The lacquey obeyed her, and then, with flashing eyes and dishevelled hair, she hastened to the little drawing-room at the end of the hall. Several servants stood round the marquis, who was lying back in his chair with a swollen, purple face, as if he had been stricken with apoplexy.

“All the blood in his body has flown to his head,” remarked the duke, with a shrug of his shoulders. His grace was furious. He scarcely knew whom he was most angry with--with Martial or the Marquis de Courtornieu. The former, by his public confession, had certainly imperilled, if not ruined, their political future. But, on the other hand, the Marquis de Courtornieu had cast on the Sairmeuses the odium of an act of treason revolting to any honourable heart. The duke was watching the clustering servants with a contracted brow when his daughter-in-law entered the room. She paused before him, and angrily exclaimed: “Why did you remain here while I was left alone to endure such humiliation. Ah! if I had been a man! All our guests have fled, monsieur--all of them!”

M. de Sairmeuse sprang up. “Ah, well! what if they have. Let them go to the devil!” Among all the invited ones who had just left his house, there was not one whom his grace really regretted--not one whom he regarded as an equal. In giving a marriage feast for his son, he had invited all the petty nobility and gentry of the neighbourhood. They had come--very well! They had fled--_bon voyage_! If the duke cared at all for their desertion, it was only because it presaged with terrible eloquence the disgrace that was to come. Still he tried to deceive himself. “They will come back again, madame,” said he; “you will see them return, humble and repentant! But where can Martial be?”

Blanche’s eyes flashed, but she made no reply.

“Did he go away with the son of that rascal, Lacheneur?”

“I believe so.”

“It won’t be long before he returns----”

“Who can say?”

M. de Sairmeuse struck the mantlepiece with his clenched fist. “My God!” he exclaimed, “this is an overwhelming misfortune.” The young wife believed that he was anxious and angry on her account. But she was mistaken: for his grace was only thinking of his disappointed ambition. Whatever he might pretend, the duke secretly admitted his son’s intellectual superiority and genius for intrigue, and he was now extremely anxious to consult him. “He has wrought this evil,” he murmured: “it is for him to repair it! And he is capable of doing so if he chooses.” Then, aloud, he resumed: “Martial must be found--he must be found----”

With an angry gesture Blanche interrupted him. “You must look for Marie-Anne Lacheneur if you wish to find my husband,” said she.

The duke was of the same opinion, but he dared not admit it. “Anger leads you astray, marchioness,” said he.

“I know what I say,” was the curt response.

“No, believe me, Martial will soon make his appearance. If he went away, he will soon return. The servants shall go for him at once, or I will go for him myself----”

The duke left the room with a muttered oath, and Blanche approached her father, who still seemed to be unconscious. She seized his arm and shook it roughly, peremptorily exclaiming, “Father, father!” This voice, which had so often made the Marquis de Courtornieu tremble, proved more efficacious than eau de Cologne. “I wish to speak with you,” added Blanche: “do you hear me?”

The marquis dared not disobey; he slowly opened his eyes and raised himself from his recumbent position. “Ah! how I suffer!” he groaned, “how I suffer!”

His daughter glanced at him scornfully, and then in a tone of bitter irony remarked: “Do you think that I’m in paradise?”

“Speak,” sighed the marquis. “What do you wish to say?”

The bride turned haughtily to the servants and imperiously ordered them to leave the room. When they had done so and she had locked the door: “Let us speak of Martial,” she began.

At the sound of his son-in-law’s name the marquis bounded from his chair with clenched fists. “Ah, the wretch!” he exclaimed.

“Martial is my husband, father.”

“And you! after what he has done--you dare to defend him?”

“I don’t defend him; but I don’t wish him to be murdered.” At that moment the news of Martial’s death would have given the Marquis de Courtornieu infinite satisfaction. “You heard, father,” continued Blanche, “that young D’Escorval appointed a meeting for to-morrow, at mid-day, at La Reche. I know Martial; he has been insulted, and will go there. Will he encounter a loyal adversary? No. He will find a band of assassins. You alone can prevent him from being murdered.”

“I--and how?”

“By sending some soldiers to La Reche, with orders to conceal themselves in the grove--with orders to arrest these murderers at the proper moment.”

The marquis gravely shook his head. “If I do that,” said he, “Martial is quite capable----”

“Of anything!--yes, I know it. But what does it matter to you, since I am willing to assume the responsibility?”

M. de Courtornieu looked at his daughter inquisitively, and if she had been less excited as she insisted on the necessity of sending instructions to Montaignac at once, she would have discerned a gleam of malice in his eye. The marquis was thinking that this would afford him an ample revenge, since he could easily bring dishonour on Martial, who had shown so little regard for the honour of others. “Very well; then, since you will have it so, it shall be done,” he said, with feigned reluctance.

His daughter hastily procured ink and pens, and then with trembling hands he prepared a series of minute instructions for the commander at Montaignac. Blanche herself gave the letter to a servant, with directions to start at once; and it was not until she had seen him set off at a gallop that she went to her own apartment, that luxurious bridal chamber which Martial had so sumptuously adorned. But now its splendour only aggravated the misery of the deserted wife, for that she was deserted she did not for a moment doubt. She felt sure that her husband would not return, and had no faith whatever in the promises of the Duke de Sairmeuse, who at that moment was searching through the neighbourhood with a party of servants. Where could the truant be? With Marie-Anne most assuredly--and at the thought a wild desire to wreak vengeance on her rival took possession of Blanche’s heart. She did not sleep that night, she did not even undress, but when morning came she exchanged her snowy bridal robe for a black dress, and wandered through the grounds like a restless spirit. Most of the day, however, she spent shut up in her room, refusing to allow either the duke or her father to enter.

At about eight o’clock in the evening tidings came from Martial. A servant brought two letters; one sent by the young marquis to his father, and the other to his wife. For a moment Blanche hesitated to open the one addressed to her. It would determine her destiny, and she felt afraid. At last, however, she broke the seal and read: “Madame--Between you and me all is ended; reconciliation is impossible. From this moment you are free. I esteem you enough to hope that you will respect the name of Sairmeuse, from which I cannot relieve you. You will agree with me, I am sure, in thinking a quiet separation preferable to the scandal of legal proceedings. My lawyer will pay you an allowance befitting the wife of a man whose income amounts to five hundred thousand francs. MARTIAL DE SAIRMEUSE.”

Blanche staggered beneath the terrible blow. She was indeed deserted--and deserted, as she supposed, for another. “Ah!” she exclaimed, “that creature! that creature! I will kill her!”

While Blanche was measuring the extent of her misfortune his grace the Duke de Sairmeuse raved and swore. After a fruitless search for his son he returned to the chateau, and began a continuous tramp to and fro in the great hall. On the morrow he scarcely ate, and was well nigh sinking from weariness when his son’s letter was handed him. It was very brief. Martial did not vouchsafe any explanation; he did not even mention the conjugal separation he had determined on, but merely wrote: “I cannot return to Sairmeuse, and yet it is of the utmost importance that I should see you. You will, I trust, approve the resolution I have taken when I explain the reasons that have guided me in adopting it. Come to Montaignac, then, the sooner the better. I am waiting for you.”

Had he listened to the prompting of his own impatience, his grace would have started at once. But he could not abandon the Marquis de Courtornieu and his son’s wife in this abrupt fashion. He must at least see them, speak to them, and warn them of his intended departure. He attempted to do this in vain. Blanche had shut herself up in her own apartments, and remained deaf to all entreaties for admittance. Her father had been put to bed, and the physician who had been summoned to attend him, declared that the marquis was well nigh at death’s door. The duke was therefore obliged to resign himself to the prospect of another night of suspense, which was almost intolerable to such a nature as his. “However,” thought he, “to-morrow, after breakfast, I will find some pretext to escape, without telling them I am going to see Martial.”

He was spared this trouble, for on the following morning at about nine o’clock, while he was dressing, a servant came to inform him that M. de Courtornieu and his daughter were waiting to speak with him in the drawing-room. Much surprised, he hastened downstairs. As he entered the room, the marquis, who was seated in an arm-chair, rose to his feet leaning for support on Aunt Medea’s shoulder; while Blanche, who was as pale as if every drop of blood had been drawn from her veins--stepped swiftly forward: “We are going, Monsieur le Duc,” she said, coldly, “and we wish to bid you farewell.”

“What! you are going? Will you not----”

The young bride interrupted him with a mournful gesture, and drew Martial’s letter from her bosom. “Will you do me the favour to peruse this?” she said, handing the missive to his grace.

The duke glanced over the short epistle, and his astonishment was so intense that he could not even find an oath. “Incomprehensible!” he faltered; “incomprehensible!”

“Incomprehensible, indeed,” repeated the young wife sadly, but without bitterness. “I was married yesterday; to-day I am deserted. It would have been more generous to have reflected the evening before and not the next day. Tell Martial, however, that I forgive him for having destroyed my life, for having made me the most unhappy of women. I also forgive him for the supreme insult of speaking to me of his fortune. I trust he may be happy. Farewell, Monsieur le Duc, we shall never meet again. Farewell!”

With these words she took her father’s arm, and they were about to retire, when M. de Sairmeuse hastily threw himself between them and the door. “You shall not go away like this!” he exclaimed. “I will not suffer it. Wait at least until I have seen Martial. Perhaps he is not so guilty as you suppose----”

“Enough!” interrupted the marquis; “enough! This is one of those outrages which can never be repaired. May your conscience forgive you, as I myself forgive you. Farewell!”

This was said with such a conventional air of benevolence, and with such entire harmony of intonation and gesture that M. de Sairmeuse was perfectly bewildered. With a dazed air he watched the marquis and his daughter depart, and they had been gone some moments before he recovered himself sufficiently to exclaim: “The old hypocrite! does he believe me to be his dupe?” His dupe! M. de Sairmeuse was so far from being his dupe, that his next thought was: “What’s going to follow this farce? If he says he forgives us, that means that he has some crushing blow in store for us.” This idea soon ripening into conviction made his grace feel apprehensive, for he did not quite see how he would cope successfully with the perfidious marquis. “But Martial is a match for him!” he at last exclaimed. “Yes I must see Martial at once.”

So great was his anxiety that he lent a helping hand in harnessing the horses he had ordered, and when the vehicle was ready, he announced his determination to drive himself. As he urged the horses furiously onward, he tried to reflect, but the most contradictory ideas were seething in his brain and he lost all power of looking at the situation calmly. He burst into Martial’s room like a bombshell. “I certainly think you must have gone mad, marquis,” he exclaimed. “That is the only valid excuse you can offer.”

But Martial, who had been expecting the visit, had fully prepared himself for some such remark. “Never, on the contrary, have I felt more calm and composed in mind,” he replied, “than I am now. Allow me to ask you one question. Was it you who sent the gendarmes to the meeting which Maurice d’Escorval appointed?”

“Marquis!”

“Very well! Then it was another act of infamy to be scored against the Marquis de Courtornieu.”

The duke made no reply. In spite of all his faults and vices, this haughty nobleman retained those characteristics of the old French aristocracy--fidelity to his word and undoubted valour. He thought it perfectly natural, even necessary, that Martial should fight with Maurice; and he considered it a contemptible proceeding to send armed soldiers to seize an honest and confiding opponent.

“This is the second time,” resumed Martial, “that this scoundrel has tried to dishonour our name; and if I am to convince people of the truth of this assertion, I must break off all connection with him and his daughter. I have done so, and I don’t regret it, for I only married her out of deference to your wishes, and because it seemed necessary for me to marry, and because all women, excepting one, who can never be mine, are alike to me.”

Such utterances were scarcely calculated to re-assure the duke. “This sentiment is very noble, no doubt,” said he; “but it has none the less ruined the political prospects of our house.”

An almost imperceptible smile curved Martial’s lips. “I believe, on the contrary, I have saved them,” replied he. “It is useless for us to attempt to deceive ourselves; this affair of the insurrection has been abominable, and you ought to bless the opportunity this quarrel gives you to free yourself from all responsibility in it. You must go to Paris at once, and see the Duke de Richelieu--nay, the king himself, and with a little address, you can throw all the odium on the Marquis de Courtornieu, and retain for yourself only the prestige of the valuable services you have rendered.”

The duke’s face brightened. “Zounds, marquis!” he exclaimed; “that is a good idea! In the future I shall be infinitely less afraid of Courtornieu.”

Martial remained thoughtful. “It is not the Marquis de Courtornieu that I fear,” he murmured, “but his daughter--my wife.”

XXVIII.

In the country, news flies from mouth to mouth with inconceivable rapidity, and, strange as it may seem, the scene at the Chateau de Sairmeuse was known of at Father Poignot’s farm-house that same night. After Maurice, Jean Lacheneur, and Bavois left the farm, promising to recross the frontier as quickly as possible the Abbe Midon decided not to acquaint M. d’Escorval either with his son’s return, or Marie-Anne’s presence in the house. The baron’s condition was so critical that the merest trifle might turn the scale. At about ten o’clock he fell asleep, and the abbe and Madame d’Escorval then went downstairs to talk with Marie-Anne. They were sitting together when Poignot’s eldest son came home in a state of great excitement. He had gone out after supper with some of his acquaintances to admire the splendours of the Sairmeuse _fete_, and he now came rushing back to relate the strange events of the evening to his father’s guests. “It is inconceivable!” murmured the abbe when the lad had finished his narrative. The worthy ecclesiastic fully understood that these strange events would probably render their situation more perilous than ever. “I cannot understand,” added he, “how Maurice could commit such an act of folly after what I had just said to him. The baron has no worse enemy than his own son.”

In the course of the following day the inmates of the farm heard of the meeting at La Reche; a peasant who had witnessed the preliminaries of the duel from a distance being able to give them the fullest details. He had seen the two adversaries take their places, and had then perceived the soldiers hasten to the spot. After a brief parley with the young Marquis de Sairmeuse, they had started off in pursuit of Maurice, Jean, and Bavois, fortunately, however, without overtaking them; for this peasant had met the same troopers again five hours later, when they were harassed and furious; the officer in command declaring that their failure was due to Martial, who had detained them. That same day, moreover, Father Poignot informed the abbe that the Duke de Sairmeuse and the Marquis de Courtornieu were at variance. Their quarrel was the talk of the district. The marquis had returned home with his daughter, and the duke had gone to Montaignac. The abbe’s anxiety on receiving this intelligence was so intense that, strive as he might, he could not conceal it from the Baron d’Escorval. “You have heard some bad news, my friend,” said the latter.

“Nothing, absolutely nothing.”

“Some new danger threatens us.”

“None, none at all.”

But the priest’s protestations did not convince the wounded man. “Oh, don’t deny it!” he exclaimed. “On the night before last, when you came into my room after I woke up, you were paler than death, and my wife had certainly been crying. What does all this mean?” As a rule, when the cure did not wish to reply to his patient’s questions, it sufficed to tell him that conversation and excitement would retard his recovery; but this time the baron was not so docile. “It will be very easy for you to restore my peace of mind,” he continued. “Confess now, you are afraid they may discover my retreat. This fear is torturing me also. Very well, swear to me that you will not let them take me alive, and then my mind will be at rest.”

“I can’t take such an oath as that,” said the cure, turning pale.

“And why not?” insisted M. d’Escorval. “If I am recaptured, what will happen? They will nurse me, and then, as soon as I can stand on my feet, they will shoot me down again. Would it be a crime to save me from such suffering? You are my best friend; swear you will render me this supreme service. Would you have me curse you for saving my life?”

The abbe offered no verbal reply; but his eye, voluntarily or involuntarily, turned with a peculiar expression to the medicine chest standing upon the table near by. Did he wish to be understood as saying: “I will do nothing myself, but you will find a poison there?”

At all events M. d’Escorval understood him so; and it was in a tone of gratitude that he murmured: “Thanks!” He breathed more freely now that he felt he was master of his life, and from that hour his condition, so long desperate, began steadily to improve.

Day after day passed by, and yet the abbe’s gloomy apprehensions were not realised. Instead of fomenting reprisals, the scandal at the Chateau de Sairmeuse, and the imprudent temerity of which Maurice and Jean Lacheneur had been guilty, seemed actually to have frightened the authorities into increased indulgence; and it might have been reasonably supposed that they quite had forgotten, and wished every one else to forget, all about Lacheneur’s conspiracy, and the slaughter which had followed it. The inmates of the farm soon learnt that Maurice and his friend the corporal had succeeded in reaching Piedmont; though nothing was heard of Jean Lacheneur, who had probably remained in France. However, his safety was scarcely to be feared for, as he was not upon the proscribed list. Later on it was rumoured that the Marquis de Courtornieu was ill, and that Blanche his daughter did not leave his bedside; and then just afterwards Father Poignot returning from an excursion to Montaignac, reported that the Duke de Sairmeuse had lately passed a week in Paris, and that he was now on his way home with one more decoration--a convincing proof that he was still in the enjoyment of royal favour. What was of more importance was, that his grace had succeeded in obtaining an order for the release of all the conspirators still detained in prison. It was impossible to doubt this news which the Montaignac papers formally chronicled on the following day. The abbe attributed this sudden and happy change of prospects to the quarrel between the duke and the Marquis de Courtornieu, and such indeed was the universal opinion in the neighbourhood. Even the retired officers remarked: “The duke is decidedly better than he was supposed to be; if he was so severe, it is only because he was influenced by his colleague the odious provost marshal.”