CHAPTER X.

FATHER LAMORMAIN.

Ferdinand of Habsburg, King of Austria by heirship, King of Hungary by default of a better, rather than by force of arms, was in the ears of the world Emperor of Rome. Considering that he neither owned nor governed a rood of land south of the Po, that the title signified the headship of the German-speaking states, and that he had been elected to the high office by his fellow princes, who were each and all supreme and independent rulers over their own territories, and each and all eligible for the same high office, the name seems something misplaced; but it is not convenient to enter here into a historical dissertation showing how it came to be so.

Several generations of Habsburgs in turn had been elected Emperor, and doubtless there was good enough reason. It was perhaps more easy not to be jealous of a family which had borne the office for a century or two, than of a new one, however deserving in other respects. And there was this in addition, that Austria and Hungary were the outer wall of all the German-speaking states against the Turk, and must in any case bear the first brunt of his activities. In that connection too, whatever dissensions might be rife, and there were always dissensions between German-speaking states, it is evident that there must be some organisation approaching to a mutual league against the Turk. Christians have always possessed the privilege of and the instinct for fighting amongst themselves, but a Christian, however black in his theology, is still fairer than an infidel, and the infidels for very shame had to be kept out of Christian German states at all costs. For one thing, they would have ruined the trade in spices.

So, as the Emperor resided at Vienna, he was very sure to exercise his authority and demand aids for his own army from the others in sufficient time to present a stout front to the Ottoman power, though on more than one occasion he was rather late in doing so. But if the Emperor, who alone could call out the quotas of men from all the states, had happened to have lived, say, at Mainz, half of the German lands might have been overrun before his army was collected. So on the whole the Habsburgs, having begun to perform and got used to the exalted functions of the Emperor of Rome, might, so the Electoral Princes seemed to think at election after election, just as well continue to exercise them, and to be the outer wall against the Paynim hosts.

Ferdinand was a good son of Rome. Brought up at the Jesuit seminary of Ingolstadt he had grown up strong in the faith, and had wasted no time, on coming to man's estate and the enjoyment of dominion as an elector, in purging his chief town of Gratz, and all the Habsburger land committed to his charge, of all pastors, Lutheran or Calvinist. He went to the root of the matter, and in all things deferred to his advisers, the Jesuits, who went further than the root, and to Maximilian of Bavaria, who had also imbibed the milk of the learning of Ingolstadt, and was if anything of a deeper shade of Jesuitry, if that were possible, than the Jesuits.

But as Ferdinand was a good son of Rome, that meant in his case son of the General of the Jesuits, the mysterious personality that even the Holy Father might bless or ban as he would, but never reduce to that exact degree of submission to his authority which is implied in any rank of the hierarchy below that of Pontiff.

Like a good father, the General of the Jesuits had no notion of allowing so intelligent and obedient a son to run wild after his own conceits. So he had wisely installed at the Court of Vienna Father Lamormain, one of the order, to keep a watchful eye upon the steps of Ferdinand.

Father Lamormain had that perfect confidence in Ferdinand which is built upon a perfect understanding of character, with this reservation, that he preferred to know everything that had happened at least a little while, even if it were but a day, an hour, or even less, before his august pupil, so that whereas the Emperor came to the subject ready to be actuated by surprise, alarm, soreness, vindictiveness, or any other human quality, Father Lamormain, who, if he ever felt these undesirable emotions, had got over them, and already bent his brilliant intellect to what was at issue, could at once gently and firmly insinuate a counsel carefully considered, a counsel which Ferdinand would presently make his own.

Father Lamormain had as usual heard the Emperor's confession and retired to his own suite of apartments. There he found awaiting him two brethren of the order, who asked and received his blessing. Their manners were as fine as Father Lamormain's. They exhibited just the shade of deference due from a gentleman, who is an officer, to another gentleman who is his superior officer.

The reverend Father and his visitors sat down. He did not toy with his correspondence, or his plans, or any other object. He sat reposeful in his chair and embraced both his guests at the same time in his pleasant smile, and his changes of bodily attitude were slight.

"And you say he is really on his way?"

"He cannot be many leagues away now!" said one.

"And his name is Nigel Charteris?" In his mouth it sounded like "Chartaire."

"A Catholic family of the south of Scotland!"

"Like this?" asking Father Lamormain, writing the name on his tablets and erasing it.

"Yes!"

"Ah! Very interesting! He is not a recent convert?"

"No, Father!" said the other one, catching his eye and smiling. "It is a pity even to seem to discourage a loyal son in the faith!" His tone conveyed a real regret.

"You were obliged to resort to some slight measure of force? I trust it was slight?"

The two exchanged glances and smiled in their fine ingenious way, showing their beautiful teeth.

"We did nothing to disable him or to deface his coinage!" said the first.

"But we certainly had to use effectual force!" said the other.

"He is a gentleman, handsome, and of good manners?"

"He is all three! And a veritable Scot for caution! And for a soldier quite free from the prevailing laxities."

"You make me quite solicitous to see him! And you found nothing?"

"Absolutely nothing! A few purely private papers, but no despatches!"

"It is curious all the same that Count Tilly should send merely verbal messages by the mouth of a captain of musketeers to the Emperor."

"It is not likely that he had entrusted the writings to any of his troopers!" said one of the visitors.

Father Lamormain thanked them for their good intentions and the pains they had been at, then dismissed them. There was no suggestion of blame for failure. Infinite patience was the rule and practice of the order,--infinite polishing of weapons. Subordinates are not polished by rancour. Blame roughens the edge of service more often than it sharpens. The Society of Jesuits, founded by an enthusiast who was almost a fanatic, eschewed fanaticism, and provided channels for its enthusiasm of such fine workmanship as ensured that that precious fluid should reach the precise spot that was to be watered. The best that could be found in birth, the best that could be nurtured of scholarship, the best exponents of the social arts that make men charming companions for their fellows, were enrolled in the ranks after years of youthful training. Implicit faith in their leaders, implicit obedience, became not so much a part of the rule of the order as a habit of the mind. No task was too rough or too delicate but that the order could somewhere place its finger on the man to execute it. And straightway he would rise and set about it. Truly the Society of Jesus was an inspired engine which possessed powers far exceeding the knowledge of its founder and inventor.

Being by himself, the Jesuit drew from a drawer a sheet of parchment which had evidently been folded and sealed. It was in cipher, but it may be held as certain that Father Lamormain possessed the keys of all the ciphers in use among the politicians of Europe; and this was of no surprising intricacy. His secretary had unravelled it in a few minutes. He rang for him. He was a man of middle age, having the look of a recluse and a priest rather than a man of affairs.

"This purports to be a copy of Count Tilly's despatch which the Emperor expects?"

"Yes, Father, or rather a short summary of it. It gives you, as you see, the numbers of all his troops and the disposition of them; indications of his next movements, and some other details."

"And it accords nearly with what we know from our own sources?"

"Yes, Father!"

"It was taken from a messenger who left Eger for the north?"

"Yes, Father! The messenger was unfortunately killed!"

Father Lamormain's lips moved in silence. He was offering up a prayer for this poor adversary's soul, for this poor fellow who had come unwittingly into contact with the engine invented by Ignatius Loyola, and been broken.

"It might have been a false document intended to deceive Gustavus and the Protestants," said the Father again meditatively. Then he placed the parchment on one side as if for further perusal and proceeded to read over and sign a number of letters his secretary had brought him.

The secretary having gathered up the papers, said--

"You were to have audience of the Archduchess Stephanie this morning!"

"Oh yes! I remember! The time is nearly due. See that no one enters in the interim."

Even as he spoke a servant called the secretary and he returned presently, ushering in with profound bows the Archduchess.

Father Lamormain had again spread out the supposed summary of Tilly's despatch before him in a good light. There was nothing else on his table but the inkstand to distract attention.

The Archduchess, who was young and tall and slender with wonderful dark eyes, knelt and kissed the holy father's hand.

As a good Catholic she was bound to reverence her father's confessor.

But Father Lamormain stood for more than that. He had held the same position when she was a mere poppet, marching about with an endless company of gouvernantes and ladies, in an absurd stiff brocade dress, which trailed on the ground just as theirs did, and her little neck surrounded by a ruff, a sweet monstrous epitome of queendom. There had been court functionaries in plenty, great officers of state then as now. But it was Father Lamormain who reigned supreme as the confidential counsellor of the family in all that pertained to the welfare of the house of Habsburg; so that every member of the family of the Emperor understood that Father Lamormain was a benevolent despot, who had always smoothed over all kinds of family troubles. Dimly too they understood that the Emperor himself, though a man by no means deficient in any particular quality of kingship, respected the Jesuit's advice on matters of state.

The Archduchess seated herself. The secretary had withdrawn.

"I should have craved audience of your Highness in your own apartments," said Father Lamormain with great gentleness, "but what I had to say was for your own ears, and I wished not to excite curiosity nor to gratify it."

The Archduchess inclined her head, and with just a perceptible pause said, "Your secretary?"

For answer Father Lamormain rose, opened the door by which she had entered, a thick door, over which fell a heavy curtain of leather, and pointed to a farther door, ten feet along the passage, beyond which was the room where the secretary worked.

She saw that they were indeed cut off from human earshot, for the room, in which they were, projected, at a considerable height, beyond the walls of the main building, and had nothing to right or left.

Her eyes seemed to sweep casually over the table and incidentally over the unsealed parchment, but with indifference. "Was that to be the subject of the interview?" she asked herself.

Apparently not.

"It behoves princes," said the priest, "to strengthen their families as well by alliances as by leagues and treaties, and especially by the marriages of their sons and daughters. And whereas the son of a prince, if he be a good son, will always be a stay and support to his father's kingdom, whomsoever he marry, a daughter may, by bringing him a stout son-in-law, who is also a prince, in a measure add that princedom and its power to her father's. Contrariwise she may, if she be ill-advised or rash in her own choice, out of waywardness bring trouble to the prince her father, and no measure of help to her husband, as was the case of the Princess Elizabeth of England when she married the Elector Palatine, the Pfalsgrave, whose dominion being but petty led him into dangerous enterprises to gain others, and being too far distant from his father-in-law, the King of England, was not afforded sufficient aid in the time of his undertakings to ensure success."

"A very wise homily, Father, and a most pertinent example!" the Archduchess observed. "And now the application?"

"Your Highness is of a ripe age for marriage!" said the priest gravely.

"And has been," she rejoined, "these several years, according to the custom of princes. My cousin of Spain was but sixteen when the King of England was agog for her to wed his son, who is now King Charles, and it was through no unwillingness of hers that the match fell through. But I have had the more years of freedom. I am in no mind to be tied to any beardless boy, and sit a-tapestry-sewing for the rest of my life."

The priest pursued his way without comment.

"The dangers that environ the empire make it necessary beyond the ordinary to knit our friends to it by every means in our power."

"The dangers would melt like the morning mist if the Emperor recalled Albrecht von Walstein," she said with great decision.

"It is for the Emperor to choose his captains," the priest rejoined gently. "He is a possible servant, not a friend of the Emperor. When I say 'knit our friends together,' I mean the princes, who are our peers in blood and of our faith."

The Archduchess was for a moment puzzled.

"Is it of France or Spain you speak, Father?" She said it wonderingly, because she knew of no princes of or nearly her own age in either kingdom.

"Of neither, your Highness, but of those houses that are equal with your own in the right to be elected to the empire."

"There are six electors! There are three archbishops--Mainz, Köln, Trier--two are Protestants, the Palatine, the Saxon,... you cannot mean the Wittelsbacher!" The disgust that she felt showed itself unmistakably.

"Who is a greater friend to the Habsburgs than Maximilian of Bavaria?" Father Lamormain dwelt almost affectionately on the syllables.

"Or a greater friend to your order?" the Archduchess asked.

This was a sharp thrust, and showed that the lady was well aware of the terms on which Maximilian and the Jesuits stood.

Father Lamormain made a little gentle deprecating shrug.

"Let me remind your Highness that, at the last election of the Roman Emperor, Maximilian held the election in his hand, but he exercised his own vote in favour of your father. Was this not proving himself a friend to whom any gratitude is due? And this was not the last or greatest of his services."

"Indeed?" said the Archduchess. "What were the other services?"

"Did he not defeat, nay crush, the Palatine on the white hills of Prague?"

"It was the work of General Pappenheim, was it not?"

"The merit was his! Again I say, Pappenheim was merely his captain. The Elector Maximilian found men and money for the campaign,--money which the Emperor owes him to this day."

"It has been sufficiently bruited about," the Archduchess commented. "There is something of the Jew about your Maximilian."

"He is a most noble worthy prince," said Father Lamormain, "and he is a widower!"

"It is time he was done with wiving. He must be sixty years old." She gave a little shiver of disgust.

"He is not so old as you think, your Highness, neither is his vigour of mind and body much abated, but it is not becoming of me to discourse of these things to your Highness. The Elector Maximilian desires to wed again, and to one of the Emperor's daughters...."

"And you wish me, the Archduchess Stephanie of Austria, to listen to a proposal of marriage with Maximilian of Bavaria, whose grandson were a more fitting match. Understand! I cannot and I will not. The Emperor may assert his will, if he has any, apart from your order. But as for me I will go into a nunnery, or marry a private gentleman, or turn Protestant."

"As to the first," said the priest, "you would thereby run the risk of losing your soul instead of saving it, for you would be doing it out of frowardness. As for the second, your pride would never brook the extinction that would follow it. _As for the third, your Highness, it is mooted that you have already strange leanings towards heretics if not heresy._"

The Archduchess flushed angrily. Her eyes flashed. Her whole face and form, as she rose to her feet, took on an aspect of terrible majesty.

"Enough, Father Lamormain! You trespass beyond your proper functions!"

"No!" said the priest humbly enough. "Your soul is dearer to me than my own. I can only pray that you do not jeopardise it."

As if unconsciously his eyes fell from her own, which he had met with calm benignity, to the papers on the table, and then he suddenly lifted them and met her glance again. Again came the rush of crimson to her cheeks, then pallor.

She turned, and, sweeping aside the leathern curtain, passed out of the chamber.