Chapter 12

"I must e'en give him the chance. If he do repent them, it were churlish to deny him the opportunity to tell me so. If he still maintain them, it were cowardly to shrink from hearing it. No, whatever Monsieur replies, I must go tell him I repent."

I came forward to kiss his hand, I was so pleased.

"Oh, you look very smiling over it," he cried. "Think you I like sneaking back home again like a whipped hound to his kennel?"

"But," I protested, indignant, "monsieur is not a whipped hound."

"Well, a prodigal son, as Lucas named me yesterday. It is the same thing."

"I have heard M. l'Abbé read the story of the prodigal son," I said. "And he was a vaurien, if you like--no more monsieur's sort than Lucas himself. But it says that when his father saw him coming a long way off, he ran out to meet him and fell on his neck."

M. Étienne looked not altogether convinced.

"Well, however it turns out, it must be gone through with. It is only decent to go to Monsieur. But even at that, I think I should not go if it were not for mademoiselle."

"You will beg his aid, monsieur?"

"I will beg his advice at least. For how you and I are to carry off mademoiselle under Mayenne's hand--well, I confess for the nonce that beats me."

"We must do it, monsieur," I cried.

"Aye, and we will! Come, Félix, you may put your knife in my dish. We must eat and be off. The meats have got cold and the wine warm, but never mind."

I did not mind, but was indeed thankful to get any dinner at all. Once resolved on the move, he was in a fever to be off; it was not long before we were in the streets, bound for the Hôtel St. Quentin. He said no more of Monsieur as we walked, but plied me with questions about Mlle. de Montluc--not only as to every word she said, but as to every turn of her head and flicker of her eyelids; and he called me a dull oaf when I could not answer. But as we entered the Quartier Marais he fell silent, more Friday-faced than ever his lady looked. He had his fair allowance of pride, this M. Étienne; he found his own words no palatable meal.

However, when we came within a dozen paces of the gate he dropped, as one drops a cloak, all signs of gloom or discomposure, and approached the entrance with the easy swagger of the gay young gallant who had lived there. As if returning from a morning stroll he called to the sentry:

"Holà, squinting Charlot! Open now!"

"Morbleu, M. le Comte!" the fellow exclaimed, running to draw the bolts. "Well, this is a sight for sore eyes, anyway."

M. Étienne laughed out in pleasure. It put heart into him, I could see, that his first greeting should be thus friendly.

"Vigo didn't know what had become of you, monsieur," Chariot volunteered. "The old man wasn't in the best of tempers last night, after Lucas got away and you gave us the slip, too. He called us all blockheads and cursed idiots. Things were lively for a time, nom d'un chien!"

"Eh bien, I am found," M. Étienne returned. "In time we'll get Lucas, too. Is Monsieur back?"

"No, M. Étienne, not yet."

I think he was half sorry, half glad.

"Where's Vigo?" he demanded.

"Somewhere about. I'll find him for monsieur."

"No, stay at your post. I'll find him."

He went straight across the court and in at the door he had sworn never again to darken. Humility and repentance might have brought him there, but it was the hand of mademoiselle drew him over the threshold without a falter.

Alone in the hall was my little friend Marcel, throwing dice against himself to while the time away. He sprang up at sight of us, agleam with excitement.

"Well, Marcel," my master said, "and where is M. l'Écuyer?"

"I think in the stables, monsieur."

"Bid him come to me in the small cabinet."

He turned with accustomed feet into the room at the end of the hall where Vigo kept the rolls of the guard. I, knowing it to be my duty to keep close at hand lest I be wanted, followed. Soon Marcel came flying back to say Vigo was on his way. M. Étienne thanked him, and he hung about, longing to pump me, and, in my lord's presence, not quite daring, till I took him by the shoulders and turned him out. I hate curiosity.

M. Étienne stood behind the table, looking his haughtiest. He was unsure of a welcome from the contumacious Vigo; I read in his eyes a stern determination to set this insolent servant in his place.

The big man entered, saluted, came straight over to his young lord's side, no whit hesitating, and said, as heartily as if there had never been a hard word between them:

"M. Étienne, I had liefer see you stand here than the king himself."

M. Étienne displayed the funniest face of bafflement. He had been prepared to lash rudeness or sullenness, to accept, de haut en bas, shamed contrition. But this easy cordiality took the wind out of his sails. He stared, and then flushed, and then laughed. And then he held out his hand, saying simply:

"Thank you, Vigo."

Vigo bent over to kiss it in cheerful ignorance of how that hand had itched to box his ears.

"What became of you last night, M. Étienne?" he inquired.

"I was hunting Lucas. When does Monsieur return, Vigo?"

"He thought he might be back to-day. But he could not tell."

"Have you sent to tell him about me?" he asked, colouring.

"No, I couldn't do that," Vigo said. "You see, it is quite on the cards that the Spanish gang may come hither to clean us out. I want every man I have if they do."

"I understand that," M. Étienne said, "but--"

"So long as you are innocent a day or two matters not," Vigo pronounced. "He will presently turn up here or send word that he will not return till the king comes in. But since you are impatient, M. le Comte, you can go to him at St. Denis. If _he_ can get through the gates _you_ can."

"Aye, but I have business in Paris. I mean to join King Henry, Vigo. There's glory going begging out there at St. Denis. It would like me well to bear away my share. But--"

He broke off, to begin again abruptly:

"Ah, Vigo, that still tongue of yours! You knew, then, that there was more cause of trouble between my father and me than the pistoles?"

"I knew he suspected you of a kindness for the League, monsieur. But you are cured of that."

"There you are wrong. For I never had it, and I am not cured of it. If I hung around the Hôtel de Lorraine, it was not for politics; it was for petticoats."

Vigo made no answer, but the corners of his grim mouth twitched.

"That's no news, either? Well, then, since you know so much, you may as well know more. Step up, Félix, and tell your tale."

I did as I was bid, M. Étienne now and then taking the words out of my mouth in his eagerness, Vigo listening to us both with grave attention. I had for the second time in my career the pleasure of startling him out of his iron composure when I told him the true name and condition of Lucas. But at the end of the adventure all the comment he made was:

"A fool for luck."

"Well," said M. Étienne, impatiently, "is that all you have to say? What are we to do about it?"

"Do? Why, nothing."

"Nothing?" he cried, with his hand on his sword. "Nothing? And let that scoundrel have her?"

"That is M. de Mayenne's affair," Vigo said. "We can't help it."

"I will help it!" M. Étienne declared. "Mordieu! Am I to let that traitor, that spy, that soul of dirt, marry Mlle. de Montluc?"

"What Mayenne wishes he'll have," Vigo said. "Some day you will surely get a chance to fight Lucas, monsieur."

"And meantime he is to enjoy her?"

"It is a pity," Vigo admitted. "But there is Mayenne. Can we storm the Hôtel de Lorraine? No one can drink up the sea."

"One could if he wanted to as much as I want mademoiselle," my lord declared.

But Vigo shook his head.

"Monsieur," he said gravely, "monsieur, you have a great chance. You have a sword and a good cause to draw it in. What more should a man ask in the world than that? Your father has been without it these three years, and for want of it he has eaten his heart out. You have been without it, and you have got yourself into all sorts of mischief. But now all that is coming straight. King Henry is turning Catholic, so that a man may follow him without offence to God. He is a good fellow and a first-rate general. He's just out there, at St. Denis. There's your place, M. Étienne."

"Not to-day, Vigo."

"Yes, M. Étienne, to-day. Be advised, monsieur," Vigo said with his steady persistence. "There is nothing to gain by staying here to drink up the sea. Mayenne will no more give your lady to you now than he would give her to Félix. And you can no more carry her off than could Félix. Mayenne will have you killed and flung into the Seine, as easy as eat breakfast."

"And you bid me grudge my life? Strange counsel from you, Vigo."

"No, monsieur, but I bid you not throw it away. We all hope to die afield, but we have a preference how and where. If you fell fighting for Navarre, I should be sorry; Monsieur would grieve deep. But we should say it was well; we grudged not your life to the country and the king. While, if you fall in this fool affair--"

"I fall for my lady," M. Étienne finished. "The bravest captain of them all does no better than that."

"M. Étienne, she is no wife for you. You cannot get her. And if you could 'twere pity. She is a Ligueuse, and you from now on are a staunch Kingsman. Give her up, monsieur. You have had this maggot in your brain this four years. Once for all, get it out. Go to St. Denis; take your troop among Biron's horse. That is the place for you. You will marry a maid of honour and die a marshal of France."

M. Étienne laid his arm around Vigo's shoulder with a smile.

"Good old Vigo! Vigo, tell me this; if you saw a marshal's baton waiting you in the field, and at home your dearest friend were alone and in peril, would you go off after glory?"

"Aye, if 'twas a hopeless business to stay, certes I would go."

"Oh, tell that in Bedlam!" M. Étienne cried. "You would do nothing of the sort. Was it to win glory you stayed three years in that hole, St. Quentin?"

"I had no choice, monsieur. My master was there."

"And my mistress is here! You may save your breath, Vigo; I know what I shall do. The eloquence of monk Christin wouldn't change me."

"What is your purpose, M. Étienne?" Vigo asked.

Indeed, there was a vagueness about his scheme as revealed to us.

"It is quite simple. I purpose to get speech with mademoiselle if I can contrive it, and I think I can. I purpose to smuggle her out of the Hôtel de Lorraine--such feats have been accomplished before and may be again. Then I shall bring her here and hold her against all comers."

"No," Vigo said, "no, monsieur. You may not do that."

"Ventre bleu, Vigo!" his young lord cried.

"No," said Vigo. "I can't have her here, and Mayenne's army after her."

"Coward!" shouted M. Étienne.

I thought Vigo would take us both by the scruff of our necks and throw us out of the place. But he answered undisturbed:

"No, that is not the reason, monsieur. If M. le Duc told me to hold this house against the armies of France and Spain, I'd hold it till the last man of us was dead. But I am here in his absence to guard his hôtel, his moneys, and his papers. I don't call it guarding to throw a firebrand among them. Bringing Mayenne's niece here would be worse than that."

"Monsieur would never hesitate! Monsieur is no chicken-heart!" M. Étienne cried. "If he were here, he'd say, 'We'll defend the lady if every stone in this house is pulled from its fellow!'"

A twinkle came into Vigo's eyes.

"I think that is likely true," he said. "Monsieur opposed the marriage as long as Mayenne desired it; but now that Mayenne forbids it, stealing the demoiselle is another pair of sleeves."

"Well, then," cried M. Étienne, all good humour in a moment, "what more do you want? We'll divert ourselves pouring pitch out of the windows on Mayenne's ruffians."

"No, M. Étienne, it can't be done. If M. le Duc were here and gave the command to receive her, that would be one thing. No one would obey with a readier heart than I. Mordieu, monsieur, I have no objection to succouring a damsel in distress; I have been in the business before now."

"Then why not now? Death of my life, Vigo! When I know, and you know, Monsieur would approve."

"I don't know it, monsieur," Vigo said. "I only think it. And I cannot move by my own guesswork. I am in charge of the house till Monsieur returns. I purpose to do nothing to jeopard it. But I interfere in no way with your liberty to proceed as you please."

"I should think not, forsooth!" M. Étienne blazed out furiously.

"I could," rejoined Vigo, with his maddening tranquillity. "I could order the guard--and they would obey--to lock you up in your chamber. I believe Monsieur would thank me for it. But I don't do it. I leave you free to act as it likes you."

My lord was white with ire.

"Who is master here, you or I?"

"Neither of us, M. le Comte. But Monsieur, leaving, put the keys in my hand, and I am head of the house till he returns. You are very angry, M. Étienne, but my shoulders are broad enough to bear it. Your madness will get no countenance from me."

"Hang you for an obstinate pig!" M. Étienne cried.

Vigo said no more. He had made plain his position; he had naught to add or retract. Yeux-gris's face cleared. After all, there was no use being angry with Vigo; one might as well make fists at the flow of the Seine.

"Very well." M. Étienne swallowed his wrath. "It is understood that I get no aid from you. Then I have nobody in the world with me save Félix here. But for all that I'll win my lady!"

XVIII

_To the Bastille._

But Vigo proved better than his word. If he would give us no countenance, he gave freely good broad gold pieces. He himself suggested M. Étienne's need of the sinews of war, not in the least embarrassed or offended because he knew M. le Comte to be angry with him. He was no feather ruffled, serene in the consciousness that he was absolutely in the right. His position was impregnable; neither persuasion, ridicule, nor abuse moved him one whit. He had but a single purpose in life; he was born to forward the interests of the Duke of St. Quentin. He would forward them, if need were, over our bleeding corpses.

On top of all his disobedience and disrespect he was most amiable to M. Étienne, treating him with a calm assumption of friendliness that would have maddened a saint. Yet it was not hypocrisy; he liked his young lord, as we all did. He would not let him imperil Monsieur, but aside from that he wished him every good fortune in the world.

M. Étienne argued no more. He was wroth and sore over Vigo's attitude, but he said little. He accepted the advance of money--"Of course Monsieur would say, What coin is his is yours," Vigo explained--and despatched me to settle his score at the Three Lanterns.

I set out on my errand rather down in the mouth. We had accomplished nothing by our return to the hôtel. Nay, rather had we lost, for we were both of us, I thought, disheartened by the cold water flung on our ambitions. I took the liberty of doubting whether perfect loyalty to Monsieur included thwarting and disobeying his heir. It was all very well for Monsieur to spoil Vigo and let him speak his mind as became not his station, for Vigo never disobeyed _him_, but stood by him in all things. But I imagined that, were M. Étienne master, Vigo, for all his years of service, would be packed off the premises in short order.

I walked along in a brown study, wondering how M. Étienne did purpose to rescue mademoiselle. His scheme, so far as vouchsafed to me, was somewhat in the air. I could only hope he had more in his mind than he had let me know. It seemed to me a pity not to be doing something in the matter, and though I had no particular liking for Hôtel de Lorraine hospitality, I had very willingly been bound thither at this moment to try to get a letter to mademoiselle. But he would not send me.

"No," he had said, "it won't do. Think of something better, Félix."

But I could not, and so was taking my dull way to the inn of the Trois Lanternes.

The city wore a sleepy afternoon look. It was very hot, and few cared to be stirring. I saw nothing worth my notice until, only a stone's throw from the Three Lanterns, I came upon a big black coach standing at the door of a rival auberge, L'Oie d'Or. It aroused my interest at once, for a travelling-coach was a rare sight in the beleaguered city. As my master had said, this was not a time of pleasure-trips to Paris. I readily imagined that the owner of this chariot came on weighty business indeed. He might be an ambassador from Spain, a legate from Rome.

I paused by the group of street urchins who were stroking the horses and clambering on the back of the coach, to wonder whether it would be worth while to wait and see the dignitary come out. I was just going to ask the coachman a question or two concerning his journey, when he began to snap his whip about the bare legs of the little whelps. The street was so narrow that he could hardly chastise them without danger to me, so it seemed best to saunter off. The screaming urchins stopped just out of the reach of his lash and set to pelting mud at him with a right good will, but I was too old for that game. I reflected that I was charged with business for my master, and that it was nothing to me what envoys might come to Mayenne. I went on into the Three Lanterns.

The cabaret was absolutely deserted; one might have walked all about and carried off what he pleased, as from the sleeping palace in the tale. "This is a pretty way to keep an inn," I thought. "Where have all the lazy rascals got to?" Then I heard a confused murmur of voices and shuffle of feet from the back, and I went through into the passage where the staircase was.

Here were gathered, in a huddle, like scared sheep, some dozen of the serving-folk, men and maids, the lasses most of them in tears, the men looking scarce less terrified. Their gaze was fixed on the closed door of Maître Menard's little counting-room, whence issued the shrill cry:

"Spare me, noble gentlemen! Spare a poor innkeeper! I swear I know nothing of his whereabouts."

As my footsteps sounded on the threshold, one and all spun round to look at me in fresh dread.

"Mon dieu, it is his lackey!" a chambermaid cried. In the next second a little wiry dame, her eyes blazing with fury, darted out of the group and seized me by the arm with a grip of her nails that made me think a panther had got me.

"So here you are," she screamed. I declare I thought she was going to bite me. "Oh-h-h, you and your fine master, that come here and devour our substance and never pay one sou, but bring ruin to the house! Now, go you straight in there and let them squeeze your throat awhile, and see how you like it yourself!"

She swept me across the passage like a whirlwind, opened the door, shoved me in, and banged it after me before I could collect my senses.

The room was small; it was very well filled up by a bureau, a strong box, a table, two chairs, three soldiers, one innkeeper, and myself.

The bureau stood by the window, with Maître Menard's account-books on it. Opposite was the table, with a captain of dragoons on it. Of his two men, one took the middle of the room, amusing himself with the windpipe of Maître Menard; the other was posted at the door. I was shot out of Mme. Menard's grasp into his, and I found his the gentler of the two.

"I say I know not where he went," Maître Menard was gasping, black in the face from the dragoon's attentions. "He did not tell--I have no notion. Ah--" The breath failed him utterly, but his eyes, bloodshot and bulging, rolled toward me.

"What now?" the captain cried, springing to his feet. "Who are you?"

He wore under his breastplate what I took to be the uniform of the city guards. I had seen the like on the officer of the gate the night I entered Paris. He was a young man of a decidedly bourgeois appearance, as if he were not much, outside of his uniform.

"My name is Félix Broux," I said. "I came to pay a bill--"

"His servant," Maître Menard contrived to murmur, the dragoon allowing him a breath.

"Oh, you are the Comte de Mar's servant, are you? Where have you left your master?"

"What do you want of him?" I asked in turn.

"Never you mind. I want him."

"But Mayenne said he should not be touched," I cried. "The Duke of Mayenne said himself he should not be touched."

"I know nothing about that," he returned, a trifle more civilly than he had spoken. "I have naught to do with the Duke of Mayenne. If he is friends with your master, M. de Mar may not stay behind bars very long. But I have the governor's warrant for his arrest."

"On what charge?"

"A trifle. Merely murder."

"_Murder?_"

"Yes, the murder of a lackey, one Pontou."

"But that is ridiculous!" I cried. "M. le Comte did not--"

I came to a halt, not knowing what to say. "Lucas--Paul de Lorraine killed him," was on the tip of my tongue, but I choked it down. To fling wild accusations against a great man's man were no wisdom. By accident I had given the officer the impression that we were friends of Mayenne. I should do ill to imperil the delusion. "M. le Comte--" I began again, and again stopped. I meant to say that monsieur had never left the inn last night; he could have had no hand in the crime. Then I bethought me that I had better not know the hour of the murder. "M. le Comte is a very grand gentleman; he would not murder a lackey," I got out at last.

"You can tell that to the judges," the captain rejoined.

At this I felt ice sliding down my spine. To be arrested as a witness was the last thing I desired.

"I know nothing whatever about it," I cried. "He seemed to me a very fine gentleman. But you can't always tell about these nobles. The Comte de Mar, I've only known him twenty-four hours. Until he engaged me as lackey, yesterday afternoon, I had never laid eyes on him. I know not what he has been about. He engaged me yesterday to carry a message for him to the Hôtel St. Quentin. I came into Paris but night before last, and put up at the Amour de Dieu in the Rue Coupejarrets. Yesterday he employed me to run his errands, and last night brought me here with him. But I had never seen him till this time yesterday. I know nothing about him save that he seemed a very free-handed, easy master."

To a nice ear I might have seemed a little too voluble, but the captain only laughed at my patent fright.

"Oh, you need not look so whey-faced; I have no warrant for your arrest. I dare say you are as great a rogue as he, but the order says nothing about you. Don't swoon away; you are in no peril."

I was stung to be thought such a craven, but I pocketed the insult, and merely answered:

"I assure you, monsieur, I know naught of the matter." Yesterday I would have blurted out to him the whole truth; decidedly my experiences were teaching me something.

"Come now, I can't fool about here all day," he said impatiently. "Tell me where that precious master of yours is now. And be quicker about it than this old mule."

Maître Menard, then, had told them nothing--staunch old loyalist. He knew perfectly that M. le Comte had gone home, and they had throttled him, and yet he had not told. Well, he should not lose by it.

"Monsieur is about the streets somewhere. On my life, I know not where. But I know he will be back here to supper."

"Oh, you don't know, don't you? Then perhaps Gaspard can quicken your memory."