Half-an-hour later, when I quitted
the presence of the Queen, it was as one to whom the
world was opening afresh, and in that brief interval
I had felt and begun to understand the subtle intellect
of Catherine, of the existence of which few as yet
were aware.
In regard to the mission with which
I was entrusted I am pledged to preserve silence.
The people concerned in it are dead, and when I follow
them the secret will go with me. Let it suffice
for me to say that my task was such that a man of
honour could accept, and that if I failed the preservation
of my skin was my own affair, for help I would get
from none. Hidden in the inner pocket of my vest
was a dispatch to Montluc, the King’s lieutenant
in the South. In my hand I openly bore a letter,
sealed with the palle of the Medici, and addressed
in the Queen’s own writing to the King.
It was to be the means of my freeing the gates of
Paris if difficulty arose, and how it did so I shall
presently show.
I found my friends awaiting me, and Le Brusquet asked:
“Well, have you come forth a made man?”
“Monsieur, I will answer you
that,” I said with assumed gravity, “if
you will tell me who betrayed me to the Queen.”
I looked from one to the other, and they both laughed.
“Behold the traitor, then!”
And Le Brusquet pointed with his finger at me.
“I?”
“Yes, you! as if
you had called it from the housetops. Mon ami,
did ever hear of a bourgeois handling sword as you,
or bearing arms un coq d’or griffe de sable,
en champ d’azur? Those arms are on
your wine-cups if they exist still they
are on the hilt of the sword you lent me.”
“Morbleu!”
“But that is not all.
In the gay, red days, when Lorgnac here and I had
all the world before us, we were of the College of
Cambrai. It is true we entered as you left;
but we knew you, and when all Paris was full of your
name Lorgnac and I, and others whom you knew not, aped
the fall of your cloak, the droop of your plume, the
tilt of your sword. Those days are gone, and
until last night you, I thought, were gone with them.”
“Monsieur!”
“Listen! There is more
yet. I but told the Queen of the arms you bore.
She recognised them at once.”
“That is not strange; the Vidame d’Orrain
is in Paris!”
“True! But she remembered
your history every detail of it. It
was long ago, and many things have happened, and the
Seine there has rolled much water under its bridges
since then, but she had forgotten nothing. My
friend, they who say the Medicis ever forgets are fools blind
in their folly. And so, for the sake of last
night, and a little for the days that have gone, we
will see pretty things yet, God willing! Eh,
De Lorgnac?”
“I for one look forward to the
day when a brave man will come to his own,”
replied the other, and their kindness touched me to
the quick.
I am not one gifted with the power
of speech indeed, I hold that the greater
the tongue the smaller the heart but I found
words to thank these gallant gentlemen, and De Lorgnac
said:
“Monsieur, it is enough thanks
to hold us in your esteem, and we will say no more
about it. I have, however, some information that
may be useful. Your brother the Vidame
left Paris this evening for the South, it is said.
Thus one danger is at any rate removed from your path.”
It was something to know that Simon
was gone. I thanked De Lorgnac, and added:
“Now, messieurs, for my news.
I know not if I have come forth from that chamber” and
I pointed behind me “a made man or
not. This much I know, I am the bearer of a
letter, the delivery of which must not be delayed,
and I must leave Paris with the dawn, or before horse
or no horse.”
“The horses I said were my care,”
De Lorgnac said. And then turning to Le Brusquet:
“Await me on the steps that lead to the eastern
gallery; I am relieved in less than an hour.
We will then take monsieur here to my house, where
there are two horses in the stables at his disposal,
and the rest concerns himself.”
Le Brusquet and I went back as we
came, his constant companion, the ape, with us.
Passing through the open arch I have already mentioned
we halted on the steps that lead from the balcony to
the eastern wing, and here we awaited De Lorgnac.
For a little there was a silence.
Perhaps we were both impressed by the scene.
In front lay the river, a band of silver, with here
and there the twinkling, swaying lights of a crossing
boat upon it. All around was the great city,
and from the distance there came a murmuring hum of
voices, like waves lapping upon a far-off shore.
Around us, towering above and ringing us in with
its immense strength, rose the Louvre, its vast outlines
looking, if possible, larger and more gigantic in
the enchanted light.
After a space Le Brusquet began to
speak of the Vidame, my brother, and so we passed
the time in converse until De Lorgnac came. He
bade us haste if we wished to quit the Louvre ere
the pontlevis were raised, and hurrying after him
we made our way to the southern gate, the only one
open. As we went onwards the desolation that
marked the entrance to the Queen’s apartments
was no longer visible. Ever and again we were
stopped and challenged by sentries.
“Hein!” exclaimed
Le Brusquet, “the Scots archers keep good ward.”
“Quick! Hurry!”
was De Lorgnac’s answer. “There goes
the first signal for closing the gates!”
And as he spoke a clarion rang out
shrilly. We had reached the outer court by this,
and were hurrying for the bridge that led to the pontlevis
when we saw a tall man, his cuirass glittering like
silver in the moonlight, step out of the shadow and
signal to a trumpeter, who stood at his side.
“A moment, De Lorges.
Stay!” And Lorgnac ran up to him. “Faith!
but your time is punctual.”
Montgomery de Lorges laughed as he
laid a restraining hand on his trumpeter. “I
have more than half a mind to give the signal,”
he said. “There is a rare flagon of Arbois
in my apartment, and you would have been forced to
share it. Come, change your mind and stay.”
“Thanks; but I cannot.
We are bound to my house, where you are very welcome
if you care to come.”
“And leave my post? No, no!”
“Au revoir, then.”
“Au revoir.”
And we passed over the bridge.
Almost had we freed it when the trumpet sounded again,
and with a rattling of chains the huge pontlevis rose.
“Faith! ’twas a narrow
thing. Had we been but a minute later the Scot
would have barred all egress.” And Le Brusquet
looked back at the gate through which we had passed.
It lay on the other side of the pontlevis the
fosse between us and was of angular shape,
surmounted by a statue of Charles V. of France, and,
as De Lorgnac said, was already doomed to destruction
to make way for the improvements contemplated by the
King.
It was midnight now, and the streets
were almost deserted, though here and there were groups
of people collected together for mutual protection.
As time was short we decided to take the Rue St. Thomas
du Louvre despite its ill-paved and noisome condition.
Passing the fountain near the Marche des
Innocents we turned up by the St. Eustache into
the Tiquetonne, and thence Rue Tire Boudin was but
a short step. I need not say with what joy the
good Pierrebon received me, and after a light supper in
which, I fear, I did but scant justice to De Lorgnac’s
Joue I determined to snatch an hour
or so of rest before starting. Before doing
so, however, Lorgnac took me to see the horses.
They looked what he said they were good,
stout roadsters. I asked him his price, but,
as I expected from one of his generous nature, he
offered them to me as a gift. This I was determined
not to accept, and finally, after much persuasion,
he took forty crowns of the sun for the two.
This was barely their worth, but nothing would induce
him to accept a denier more.
The valise I had packed contained
the requisites for a journey, and having changed my
attire I decided to take such rest as I could get in
a chair until it was time to start. I seemed
to have barely closed my eyes when I was awakened
again by the touch of a hand on my shoulder.
It was Le Brusquet.
“Eh bien,” he said,
“but you sleep like an honest man! It has
gone three. The horses are ready, and De Lorgnac
and Pierrebon await you below. Come!”
So saying he led the way down.
We had to go to the stables, and in the yard were
the two horses ready saddled. Lorgnac was also
there, and to my surprise I saw that he too was mounted.
“I will see you to the gates,”
he explained as he caressed his horse, a magnificent
grey charger.
“And as for me,” said
Le Brusquet, “I will wish you good fortune here,
and a safe return, and the sword you lent me is in
secure keeping.”
And so we rode out in the grey darkness
of the morning through the solitary streets, where
there was never a sign of life except an occasional
dog, which homeless and friendless stared
wistfully after us as we went past. I had decided
to leave Paris by the Porte St. Michel, and this all
the more as the captain of the gate the
Vicomte de Crequy was a near relative of
De Lorgnac, and the passage through might, perhaps,
be made easier on this score. It was still dark
as we trotted down the Rue de la Harpe under the shadow
of the Sorbonne, having passed the Pont au Change
and the Pont St. Michel without difficulty, although
we expected some check there.
On our coming up to the Porte St.
Michel the guard challenged us, threatening to fire
with his arquebus if we did not halt. This we
were compelled to do, and a parley ensued. The
result was that the under-officer of the guard came
forth, with two or three of his men, and allowed us
to approach.
On our coming up, and on my explaining
that I desired to have the gates opened, he swore
as he surveyed us with the aid of a lantern that he
swung in our faces.
“Mordieu!” he said,
with a rough southern accent and a grim
old soldier he was “are you madmen,
or have you dropped from the clouds, not to know that
the gates are shut and will not be opened till sunrise?”
“That may be, monsieur,”
I replied; “but I have a letter to the King to
the King, mind you which he must get ere
he starts for the hunt.”
“He!” he said doubtfully.
“A letter to the King! You will have to
take it on wings, then. But from whom is this
letter?” he added suspiciously.
“That, monsieur, does not concern
you. The fact remains that I have this letter,
and it is you who will have to answer for its late
delivery, not I.”
“Then let me see it.”
I pulled out the letter and showed
it to him, without, however, letting it pass from
my hands. He cast the light of the lantern on
it, and looked this way and that at the seals and
at the address, muttering to himself the while.
“Devil take me! But I
never could read. Here! Can any one of
you read this?” And he turned to his men, but
they one and all shook their heads.
“I will read it for you if you
like,” said De Lorgnac as he pushed his horse
forwards.
“You!”
“Yes. I am Monsieur de Lorgnac, the lieutenant
of the Queen’s guard.”
The old soldier made a mock bow.
“And I,” he said, “am Agrippa Pavanes,
without a De, lieutenant of the Gate of St.
Michel; and your friend there is, I suppose, Monsieur
de Croquemort, lieutenant of Trouands.
And, as we all know each other now, I tell you plainly
you must hold patience by the tail as best you may
until the gates are opened. Letter or no letter,
I will not let you through.”
And so saying he would have turned away, but Lorgnac
said quietly:
“You will be good enough, monsieur,
to inform Monsieur de Crequy that I am here and desire
to see him at once.”
Agrippa Pavanes swung round and faced us, his hand
on his sword-hilt.
“I am in charge of this gate
at present, and I will act as I think best.
I may not be able to read or write, but if you do not
be off I will make a full stop on you with the point
of my sword,” he snarled.
Affairs were getting serious.
Nor do I know what might have happened, but at this
juncture a head appeared at a window in one of the
flanking towers of the gate, and an angry and a sleepy
voice asked what was the matter below.
“It is I, Crequy,” began
De Lorgnac, and the other exclaimed:
“You! What in the saints’
name brings you here, De Lorgnac, at this
hour of the night, or rather morning? Is it not
enough that I am banished here to keep watch over
this infernal gate? And now you ”
“Come, Crequy; this is a matter
of urgency. There is a letter here from the
Queen which must reach the King before the petit
couvert, and your lieutenant will not let the
messenger pass through the gates.”
“He is quite right! But
a letter from the Queen, did you say?”
“Yes; and to the King in person.
Come down, and see for yourself.”
“Not I; I am in my shirt, and
my health is delicate. Send up the letter.
Pavanes, do me the favour to bring it up.”
I handed the letter to Agrippa, who
took it up, with very much the surly air of a dog
walking away with a bone. A moment after he too
appeared at the window with his light, and Crequy examined
the letter and the seals.
“’Tis right, Pavanes,”
we heard him say; “’tis the Queen’s
own hand and seal. Let the messenger through.”
And leaning out of the window he repeated the same
to us.
De Lorgnac thanked him, regretting,
at the same time, the necessity he had of arousing
him; and Crequy swore back, in mock tones of injury,
that he would have a special cell built for disturbers
of his rest, and, wishing us the day, retired abruptly.
Agrippa carried out his orders with
an ill grace, and made no answer to my thanks; so,
bidding farewell to De Lorgnac, I put spurs to my horse,
and, followed by Pierrebon, rode out of Paris.