I followed her at some distance, resolved to find an opportunity for a seemingly accidental meeting. I supposed that she was going to visit some of the shops,—perhaps for the Queen-mother, perhaps for herself.

She led me on and on, until I began to wonder what could be her destination. She avoided the streets of fine shops, such as were patronized by the court, skirted market-places, and continued, in a general easterly direction, until she had crossed both the Rue St. Denis and the Rue St. Martin. At last, turning out of the Rue St. Antoine, she reached, by a little street lined with bakeries, a quiet square before a small church, of which I never even learned the name. She and the stout woman dismounted, and entered the church, leaving her male attendants outside with the horse.

"Oho," I mused, stopping at the door of a pastry-cook's at the place where the little street joined the square; "she chooses an obscure place for her devotions. Evidently she prefers to mingle solitude with them, so I must not disturb her."

I decided, therefore, to wait at the pastry-cook's till she should come out, and then to encounter her as if by chance. I would have, at least, a word in payment for having come so far afoot.

The pastry-cook must have been convinced of two things before Mlle. d'Arency came out of church: first, that his fortune was made if this new customer, myself, should only continue to patronize him; second, that there existed, at least, one human stomach able to withstand unlimited quantities of his wares.

I stood back in the shop, devouring one doughy invention after another, with my ear alert for the sound of her horse's hoofs on the stones. At last it occurred to me that she might have left the square by some other street. I made for the door of the shop to look. As I did so, a man rapidly passed the shop, going from the square towards the Rue St. Antoine. Was not that figure known to me? I hastened to the street. My first glance was towards the church. There stood her horse, and her three attendants were walking up and down in the sunlight. Then I looked after the man; I thought that the figure looked like that of De Noyard.

He disappeared into the Rue St. Antoine, having given me no opportunity to see his face. I would have followed, to make sure, roused into an intolerable jealousy at the idea of a secret meeting between Mlle. d'Arency and him, but that I now heard the full melodious voice of the lady herself. Looking around, I saw her on the steps of the church, with her middle-aged companion. At that instant her eyes met mine.

I advanced, with an exaggerated bow, sweeping the stones of the street with the plumes of my hat.

"So it is true!" I said, making no effort to control my agitation, and restraining my voice only that the lackeys might not hear; "you love that man!"

She looked at me steadily for a moment, and then said, "Do you mean M. de Noyard?"

"Ah, you admit it!"

"I admit nothing. But if I did love him, what right would you have to call me to account?"

"The right of a man who adores you, mademoiselle."

"That is no right at all. A man's right concerning a woman must be derived from her own actions. But come inside the church, monsieur."

She made a gesture to her attendants, and reentered the church. I followed her. We stood together before the font in the dim light.

"And now," she continued, facing me, "suppose I grant that I have so acted as to give you a right to question me; what then? Is it my fault that you have followed me this morning? Is it, then, any more my fault that I have been followed, also, by M. de Noyard?"

"But he must have been here before you."

"What does that prove? A score of people in the Louvre knew yesterday that I was coming to this church to-day."

"But so deserted a church,—so out of the way! Who would come here from the Louvre but for a tryst?"

She smiled, indulgently. "Can a thing have no cause except the obvious one?" she said. "I visit this church once every month, because, obscure though it be, it is associated with certain events in the history of my ancestors."

"But," I went on, though beginning to feel relieved, "if M. de Noyard was thrusting his presence on you, why did he leave before you did?"

"Probably because he knew that I would not leave the church while he remained to press his company upon me outside."

The low tones that we had to use, on account of our surroundings, gave our conversation an air of confidence and secrecy that was delicious to me; and now her voice fell even lower, when she added:

"I take the pains to explain these things to you, monsieur, because I do not wish you to think that I have intrigues;" and she regarded me fixedly with her large gray eyes, which in the dimness of the place were darker and more lustrous than usual.

Delightfully thrilled at this, I made to take her hand and stoop to kiss it, but stopped for a last doubt.

"Mademoiselle," I said, "I think you only the most adorable woman in the world. But there is one thing which has cost me many a sleepless hour, many a jealous surmise. If I could be reassured as to the nature of your errand that night when I first saw you—"

"Oh!" she laughed, "I was coming from an astrologer's."

"But you were not coming from the direction of Ruggieri's house."

"There are many astrologers in Paris, besides Ruggieri. Although the Queen-mother relies implicitly on him, one may sometimes get a more pleasing prediction from another; or, another may be clear on a point on which he is vague."

"But the hour—"

"I took the time when I was not on duty, and he kept me late. It was for a friend that I visited the astrologer,—a friend who was required in the palace all that evening. The astrologer had to be consulted that night, as my friend wished to be guided in a course that she would have to take the next morning. Now, Monsieur Curiosity, are you satisfied?"

This time I took her hand and pressed my lips upon it.

She was silent for a moment, noting the look of admiration on my face. Then, quickly, and in little more than a whisper, she said:

"I have answered your questions, though not admitting your right to ask them. Would you know how to gain that right?"

"Tell me!" I said, my heart beating rapidly with elation.

"Challenge M. de Noyard, and kill him!"

I stared in astonishment.

"Now you may know whether or not I love him," she added.

"But, mademoiselle,—why—"

"Ah, that is the one thing about which I must always refuse to be questioned! I ask you this service. Will you grant it?"

"If he has given you offence," I said, "certainly I will seek him at once."

"Not a word of me is to be said between you! He must not know that I have spoken to you."

"But a man is not to be killed without reason."

"A pretext is easily invented."

"Certainly,—a pretext to hide the cause of a quarrel from the world. But the real cause ought to be known to both antagonists."

"I shall not discuss what ought or ought not to be. I ask you, will you fight this man and try to kill him? I request nothing unusual,—men are killed every day in duels. You are a good swordsman; Bussy d'Amboise himself has said so. Come! will you do this?" She looked up at me with a slight frown of repressed petulance.

"If you will assure me that he has affronted you, and permit me to let him know, privately, the cause of my quarrel."

"Oh!" she exclaimed, with irritation, "must a lady give a hundred reasons when she requests a service of a gentleman?"

"One sufficient reason, when it is a service like this."

"Well, I shall give none. I desire his death,—few gentlemen would ask a further reason."

"I had not thought you so cruel, mademoiselle, as to desire the death of any man."

"God forbid that I should desire the death of any other man! So, monsieur, I must understand that you refuse to serve me in this?"

Her contemptuous look made me sigh. "Can you not see, mademoiselle, that to resolve deliberately and secretly on a man's death, and with premeditation to create a pretext for a challenge, is little better than assassination?"

"A fine excuse to avoid risking your life!"

Again I had to endure a look of profound scorn from her.

"Mademoiselle," I replied, patiently, "I would that you might see how ready I am to fight when an affront is given me or some one needs a defender."

"Oh!" she said, with an ironical smile. "Then to show yourself a lion against De Noyard, you require only that he shall affront you, or that some one shall need a defender against him! Suppose that I should ever be in such need?"

"You know that in your defence I would fight an army."

Her smile now lost its irony, and she assumed a look of conciliation, which I was both surprised and rejoiced to behold.

"Well, monsieur, it is pleasant to know that, if you will not take the offensive for me, you will, at least, act readily on the defensive if the occasion comes."

Much relieved at the turn the conversation had taken, I now undertook to continue it to my advantage. After some bantering, maintained with gaiety on her part, she said that she must return to the Louvre. Then, as she would not have me accompany her in the streets, I begged her to appoint another meeting. She evaded my petition at first, but, when I took her hand and refused to release it until she should grant my request, she said, after a little submissive shrug of her shoulders:

"Very well. Follow me, at a distance, from this church, and observe a house before which I shall stop for a moment as if to adjust my cloak. It is a house that has been taken by a friend of mine, one of the Queen-mother's ladies. I shall be there tomorrow afternoon."

"Alas! To-morrow I shall be on duty till six in the evening."

"Then come at seven. Knock three times on the street door." And with that she slipped her hand from mine, and hastened lightly out of the church. I stood alone by the font, delighted and bewildered. There was so much to mystify me that I did not even search my mind for explanations. I thought my happiness about to be attained, and left it for the future to explain,—as it did!



CHAPTER IV.

HOW LA TOURNOIRE WAS ENLIGHTENED IN THE DARK

It was already dark when I started, on the evening appointed, for the house indicated by Mlle. d'Arency. I went without attendance, as was my custom, relying on my sword, my alertness of eye, and my nimbleness of foot. I had engaged a lackey, for whose honesty De Rilly had vouched, but he was now absent on a journey to La Tournoire, whither I had sent him with a message to my old steward. I have often wondered at the good fortune which preserved me from being waylaid, by thieving rascals, on my peregrinations, by night, through Paris streets. About this very time several gentlemen, who went well attended, were set upon and robbed almost within sight of the quarters of the provost's watch; and some of these lost their lives as well as the goods upon their persons. Yet I went fearlessly, and was never even threatened with attack.

On the way to the house, I reviewed, for the hundredth time, the conversation in the church. There were different conjectures to be made. Mlle. d'Arency may have made that surprising request merely to convince me that she did not love De Noyard, and intending, subsequently, to withdraw it; or it may have sprung from a caprice, a desire to ascertain how far I was at her bidding,—women have, thoughtlessly, set men such tasks from mere vanity, lacking the sympathy to feel how precious to its owner is any human life other than their own;—or she may have had some substantial reason to desire his death, something to gain by it, something to lose through his continuing to live. Perhaps she had encouraged his love and had given him a promise from which his death would be the means of release easiest to her,—for women will, sometimes, to secure the smallest immunity for themselves, allow the greatest calamities to others. This arises less from an active cruelty than from a lack of imagination, an inability to suppose themselves in the places of others. I soon felt the uselessness of searching, in my own mind, for the motive of Mlle. d'Arency's desire, or pretence of desire, for the death of De Noyard. What had passed between them I could not guess. So, after the manner of youth, I gave up the question, satisfied with knowing that I had before me an interview with a charming woman, and willing to wait for disclosures until events should offer them.

The street in which the house was situated was entirely dark and deserted when I stepped into it. The house was wider than its neighbors, and each of its upper stories had two chambers overlooking the street. At the window of one of these chambers, on the second story, a light shone. It was the only light visible in any of the houses, all of which frowned down menacingly; and hence it was like a beacon, a promise of cheer and warmth in the midst of this black, cold Paris.

I knocked three times on the street door, as she had directed me. Presently the wicket at the side of the door was opened, and a light was held up to it, that my face might be seen by a pair of eyes that peered out through the aperture. A moment later the bolts of the door were drawn, and I was let in by the possessor of the eyes. This was the elderly woman who always attended Mlle. d'Arency when the latter was abroad from the palace. She had invariably shown complete indifference to me, not appearing aware of my existence, and this time she said only:

"This way, monsieur."

Protecting the flame of her lamp with her hand, she led me forward to a narrow staircase and we ascended, stopping at a landing on which opened the second story chamber whose street window had shone with light. She gave three knocks at the door of this chamber. At the last knock, her lamp went out.

"Curse the wind!" she muttered.

So I stood with her, on the landing, in darkness, expecting the door in front of me to open, immediately, and admit me to the lighted chamber.

Suddenly I heard a piercing scream from within the chamber. It was the voice of Mlle. d'Arency.

"Help! Help!" she cried. "My God, he will kill me!"

This was followed by one long series of screams, and I could hear her running about the chamber as though she were fleeing from a pursuer.

I stood for an instant, startled.

"Good God!" cried the old woman at my elbow. "An assassin! Her enemies have planned it! Monsieur, save her life!"

And the dame began pounding on the door, as if to break into the room to assist her mistress.

I needed no more than this example. Discovering that the door was locked on the inside, and assuming that Mlle. d'Arency, in the flight which she maintained around the room, could not get an opportunity to draw the bolt, I threw my weight forward, and sent the door flying open on its hinges.

To my astonishment, the chamber was in complete darkness. Mlle. d'Arency had doubtless knocked the light over in her movements around the room.

She was still screaming at the top of her voice, and running from one side to another. The whiteness of the robe she wore made it possible to descry her in the absence of light.

I stood for a second, just inside the threshold, and drew my sword. At first, I could not see by whom or what she was threatened; but I heard heavy footsteps, as of some one following her in her wild course about the place. Then I made out, vaguely, the figure of a man.

"Fear not, mademoiselle!" I cried.

"Oh, monsieur!" she screamed. "Save me! Save my life!"

I thrust my sword at the figure of the man. An ejaculation of pain told me that it touched flesh. A second later, I heard a sword slide from its scabbard, and felt the wind of a wild thrust in my direction.

At this moment, Mlle d'Arency appeared between me and the street window of the room. There was enough light from the sky to enable her head and shoulders to stand out darkly against the space of the window. Her head was moving with the violent coming and going of her breath, and her shoulders were drawn up in an attitude of the greatest fright. Is it any wonder that I did not stop to ascertain who or what her assailant might be, or how he had come there? I could make out only that the man in the darkness was a large and heavy one, and wielded a swift blade. All other thoughts were lost in the immediate necessity of dealing with him. The extreme terror that she showed gave me a sense of his being a formidable antagonist; the prompt response that he had given to my own thrust showed that he was not to be quelled by a mere command. In fine, there was nothing to do but fight him as best I could in the blackness; and I was glad for so early an opportunity to show Mlle. d'Arency how ready I was to do battle for her when I found her threatened with danger.

From the absence of any sound or other demonstration, except what was made by Mlle. d'Arency and the man and myself, I knew that we three were the only ones in the room. The elderly woman had not entered with me,—a fact whose strangeness, in view of the great desire she had first evinced to reach her mistress's side, did not occur to me until afterward.

I made another thrust at the man, but, despite the darkness, he parried it with his sword; and a quick backward step was all that saved me from his prompt reply. Angered at having to give ground in the presence of the lady, I now attacked in turn, somewhat recklessly, but with such good luck as to drive him back almost to the window. Mlle. d'Arency gave another terrified scream when he came near her, and she ran past me towards the door of the apartment. Both my antagonist and myself were now beginning to have a clearer impression of each other's outlines, and there was sharp sword-work between us by the window. As we stood there, breathing rapidly with our exertion and excitement, I heard the door close through which I had entered. I knew from this that Mlle. d'Arency had left the chamber, and I was glad that she was out of danger. It was natural that she should close the door, instinct impelling her to put any possible barrier between her assailant and herself.

The man and myself were alone together to maintain the fight which, having once entered, and being roused to the mood of contest, I had no thought of discontinuing now that Mlle. d'Arency was out of immediate danger. It had reached a place at which it could be terminated only by the disarming, the death, or the disabling of one of us.

I gradually acquired the power of knowing all my opponent's movements, despite the darkness. I supposed that he was equipped with dagger as well as with sword, but as he made no move to draw the shorter weapon, I did not have recourse to mine. Though I would not take an advantage over him, even in the circumstances, yet I was not willing to be at a disadvantage. Therefore, as he was not encumbered with cloak or mantle, I employed a breathing moment to tear off my own cloak and throw it aside, not choosing to use it on my left arm as a shield unless he had been similarly guarded.

So we lunged and parried in the darkness, making no sound but by our heavy breathing and an occasional ejaculation and the tramping of our feet, the knocking of our bodies against unseen pieces of furniture, and the clashing of our blades when they met. Each of us fenced cautiously at times, and at times took chances recklessly.

Finally, in falling back, he came to a sudden stop against a table, and the collision disturbed for an instant his control over his body. In that instant I felt a soft resistance encounter my sword and yield to it. At once, with a feeling of revulsion, I drew my sword out of the casing that his flesh had provided, and stood back. Something wet and warm sprinkled my face. The man gave a low moan and staggered sideways over towards the window. Then he plunged forward on his face. I stooped beside him and turned him over on his back, wetting my gloves with the blood that gushed from his wound and soaked his doublet. At that moment a splash of moonlight appeared on the floor, taking the shape of the window. His head and shoulders lay in this illumined space. I sprang back in horror, crying out his name:

"De Noyard! My God, it is you!"

"Yes, monsieur," he gasped, "it is De Noyard. I have been trapped. I ought to have suspected."

"But I do not understand, monsieur. Surely you could not have attacked Mlle, d'Arency?"

"Attacked her! I came here by her appointment!"

"But her cry for help?"

"It took me by complete surprise. There was a knock on the door—"

"Yes,—mine. I, too, came by her appointment!"

"Mademoiselle instantly put out the light and began to scream. I thought that the knock frightened her; then that she was mad. I followed to calm her. You entered; you know the rest."

"But what does it mean?"

"Can you not see?" he said, with growing faintness. "We have been tricked,—I, by her pretense of love and by this appointment, to my death; you, by a similar appointment and her screams, to make yourself my slayer. I ought to have known! she belongs to Catherine, to the Queen-mother. Alas, monsieur! easily fooled is he who loves a woman!"

Then I remembered what De Rilly had told me,—that De Noyard's counsels to the Duke of Guise were an obstacle to Catherine's design of conciliating that powerful leader, who aspired to the throne on which her son was seated.

"No, no, monsieur!" I cried, unwilling to admit Mlle. d'Arency capable of such a trick, or myself capable of being so duped. "It cannot be that; if they had desired your death, they would have hired assassins to waylay you."

Yet I knew that he was right. The strange request that Mlle. d'Arency had made of me in the church was now explained.

A kind of smile appeared, for a moment, on De Noyard's face, struggling with his expression of weakness and pain.

"Who would go to the expense of hiring assassins," he said, "when honest gentlemen can be tricked into doing the work for nothing? Moreover, when you hire assassins, you take the risk of their selling your secret to the enemy. They are apt to leave traces, too, and the secret instigator of a deed may defeat its object by being found out."

"Then I have to thank God that you are not dead. You will recover, monsieur."

"I fear not, my son. I do not know how much blood I lose at every word I speak. Parbleu! you have the art of making a mighty hole with that toy of yours, monsieur!"

This man, so grave and severe in the usual affairs of life, could take on a tone of pleasantry while enduring pain and facing death.

"Monsieur," I cried, in great distress, "you must not die. I will save you. I shall go for a surgeon. Oh, my God, monsieur, tell me what to do to save your life!"

"You will find my lackeys, two of them, at the cabaret at the next corner. It is closed, but knock hard and call for Jacques. Send him to me, and the other for a surgeon."

De Noyard was manifestly growing weaker, and he spoke with great difficulty. Not daring to trust to any knowledge of my own as to immediate or temporary treatment of his wound, I made the greatest haste to follow his directions. I ran out of the chamber, down the stairs, and out to the street, finding the doors neither locked nor barred, and meeting no human being. Mlle. d'Arency and her companion had silently disappeared.

I went, in my excitement, first to the wrong corner. Then, discovering my blunder, I retraced my steps, and at last secured admittance to the place where De Noyard's valets tarried.

To the man who opened the door, I said, "Are you Jacques, the serving-man of Monsieur de Noyard?"

"I am nobody's serving man," was the reply, in a tone of indignation; but a second man who had come to the door spoke up, "I am Jacques."

"Hallo, Monsieur de la Tournoire," came a voice from a group of men seated at a table. "Come and join us, and show my friends how you fellows of the French Guards can drink!"

It was De Rilly, very merry with wine.

"I cannot, De Rilly," I replied, stepping into the place. "I have very important business elsewhere." Then I turned to Jacques and said, quietly, "Go, at once, to your master, and send your comrade for a surgeon to follow you there. Do you know the house in which he is?"

The servant made no answer, but turned pale. "Come!" he said to another servant, who had joined him from an obscure corner of the place. The two immediately lighted torches and left, from which fact I inferred that Jacques knew where to find his master.

"What is all this mystery?" cried De Rilly, jovially, rising and coming over to me, while the man who had opened the door, and who was evidently the host, closed it and moved away. "Come, warm yourself with a bottle! Why, my friend, you are as white as a ghost, and you look as if you had been perspiring blood!"

"I must go, at once, De Rilly. It is a serious matter."

"Then hang me if I don't come, too!" he said, suddenly sobered, and he grasped his cloak and sword. "That is, unless I should be de trop."

"Come. I thank you," I said; and we left the place together.

"Whose blood is it?" asked De Rilly, as we hurried along the narrow street, back to the house.

"That of M. de Noyard."

"What? A duel?"

"A kind of duel,—a strange mistake!

"The devil! Won't the Queen-mother give thanks! And won't the Duke of Guise be angry!"

"M. de Noyard is not dead yet. His wound may not be fatal."

I led the way into the house and up the steps to the apartment. It was now lighted up by the torch which Jacques had brought. De Noyard was still lying in the position in which he had been when I left him. The servant stood beside him, looking down at his face, and holding the torch so as to light up the features.

"How do you feel now, monsieur?" I asked, hastening forward.

There was no answer. The servant raised his eyes to me, and said, in a tone of unnatural calmness, "Do you not see that he is dead, M. de la Tournoire?"

Horror-stricken, I knelt beside the body. The heart no longer beat; the face was still,—the eyes stared between unquivering lids, in the light of the torch.

"Oh, my God! I have killed him!" I murmured.

"Come away. You can do nothing here," said De Rilly, quietly. He caught me by the shoulder, and led me out of the room.

"Let us leave this neighborhood as soon as possible," he said, as we descended the stairs. "It is most unfortunate that the valet knows your name. He heard me speak it at the tavern, and he will certainly recall also that I hailed you as one of the French Guards."

"Why is that unfortunate?" I asked, still deprived of thought by the horror of having killed so honorable a gentleman, who had not harmed me.

"Because he can let the Duke of Guise know exactly on whom to seek vengeance for the death of De Noyard."

"The Duke of Guise will seek vengeance?" I asked, mechanically, as we emerged from that fatal house, and turned our backs upon it.

"Assuredly. He will demand your immediate punishment. You must bespeak the King's pardon as soon as possible. That is necessary, to protect oneself, when one has killed one's antagonist in a duel. The edicts still forbid duels, and one may be made to pay for a victory with one's life, if the victim's friends demand the enforcement of the law,—as in this case the Duke of Guise surely will demand."

"M. de Quelus can, doubtless, get me the King's pardon," I said, turning my mind from the past to the future, from regret to apprehension. The necessity of considering my situation prevented me from contemplating, at that time, the perfidy of Mlle. d'Arency, the blindness with which I had let myself be deceived, or the tragic and humiliating termination of my great love affair.

"If M. de Quelus is with you, you are safe from the authorities. You will then have only to guard against assassination at the hands of Guise's followers."

"I shall go to M. de Quelus early in the morning," I said.

"By all means. And you will not go near your lodgings until you have assured your safety against arrest. You must reach the King before the Duke can see him; for the Duke will not fail to hint that, in killing De Noyard, you were the instrument of the King or of the Queen-mother. To disprove that, the King would have to promise the Duke to give you over to the authorities. And now that I think of it, you must make yourself safe before the Queen-mother learns of this affair, for she will advise the King to act in such a way that the Duke cannot accuse him of protecting you. My friend, it suddenly occurs to me that you have got into a rather deep hole!"

"De Rilly," I asked, with great concern, "do you think that I was the instrument of Catherine de Medici in this?"

"Certainly not!" was the emphatic answer. "The fight was about a woman, was it not?"

"A woman was the cause of it," I answered, with a heavy sigh. "But how do you know?"

"To tell the truth," he said, "many people have been amused to see you make soft eyes at a certain lady, and to see De Noyard do likewise. Neither young men like you, nor older men like him, can conceal these things."

Thus I saw that even De Rilly did not suspect the real truth, and this showed me how deep was the design of which I had been the tool. Everybody would lay the quarrel to rivalry in love. The presence of so manifest a cause would prevent people from hitting on the truth. Mlle. d'Arency had trusted to my youth, agility, and supposed skill to give me the victory in that fight in the dark; and then to circumstances to disclose who had done the deed. "It was De Noyard's jealous rival," everybody would say. Having found a sufficient motive, no one would take the trouble to seek the real source,—to trace the affair to the instigation of Catherine de Medici. The alert mind of De Rilly, it is true, divining the equally keen mind of the Duke of Guise, had predicted that Guise might pretend a belief in such instigation, and so force the King to avenge De Noyard, in self-vindication. Mlle. d'Arency well knew that I would not incriminate a woman, even a perfidious one, and counted also on my natural unwillingness to reveal myself as the dupe that I had been. Moreover, it would not be possible for me to tell the truth in such a way that it would appear probable. And what would I gain by telling the truth? The fact would remain that I was the slayer of De Noyard, and, by accusing the instigators, I would but compel them to demonstrate non-complicity; which they could do only by clamoring for my punishment. And how could I prove that things were not exactly as they had appeared,—that the woman's screams were not genuine: that she was not actually threatened by De Noyard? Clearly as I saw the truth, clearly as De Noyard had seen it in his last moments, it could never be established by evidence.

With bitter self-condemnation, and profound rancor against the woman whose tool I had been, I realized what an excellent instrument she had found for her purpose of ridding her mistress of an obstacle.

It was not certain that the King, himself, had been privy to his mother's design of causing De Noyard's death. In such matters she often acted without consulting him. Therefore, when De Quelus should present my case to him as merely that of a duel over a love affair, Henri would perhaps give me his assurances of safety, at once, and would hold himself bound in honor to stand by them. All depended on securing these before Catherine or the Duke of Guise should have an opportunity to influence him to another course.

I felt, as I walked along with De Rilly, that, if I should obtain immunity from the punishment prescribed by edict, I could rely on myself for protection against any private revenge that the Duke of Guise might plan.

De Rilly took me to a lodging in the Rue de L'Autruche, not far from my own, which was in the Rue St. Honore. Letting myself be commanded entirely by him, I went to bed, but not to sleep. I was anxious for morning to come, that I might be off to the Louvre. I lay speculating on the chances of my seeing De Quelus, and of his undertaking to obtain the King's protection for me. Though appalled at what I had done, I had no wish to die,—the youth in me cried for life; and the more I desired life, the more fearful I became of failing to get De Quelus's intercession.

I grew many years older in that night. In a single flash, I had beheld things hitherto unknown to me: the perfidy of which a woman was capable, the falseness of that self-confidence and vanity which may delude a man into thinking himself the conqueror of a woman's heart, the danger of going, carelessly, on in a suspicious matter without looking forward to possible consequences. I saw the folly of thoughtlessness, of blind self-confidence, of reckless trust in the honesty of others and the luck of oneself. I had learned the necessity of caution, of foresight, of suspicion; and perhaps I should have to pay for the lesson with my life.

Turning on the bed, watching the window for the dawn, giving in my mind a hundred different forms to the account with which I should make De Quelus acquainted with the matter, I passed the most of that night. At last, I fell asleep, and dreamt that I had told De Quelus my story, and he had brought me the King's pardon; again, that I was engaged in futile efforts to approach him; again, that De Noyard had come to life. When De Rilly awoke me, it was broad daylight.

I dressed, and so timed my movements as to reach the Louvre at the hour when De Quelus would be about to officiate at the King's rising. De Rilly left me at the gate, wishing me good fortune. He had to go to oversee the labors of some grooms in the King's stables. One of the guards of the gate sent De Quelus my message. I stood, in great suspense, awaiting the answer, fearing at every moment to see the Duke of Guise ride into the Place du Louvre on his way to crave an interview with the King.

At last a page came across the court with orders that I be admitted, and I was soon waiting in a gallery outside the apartments of the chamberlains. After a time that seemed very long, De Quelus came out to me, with a look of inquiry on his face.

Ignoring the speech I had prepared for the occasion, I broke abruptly into the matter.

"M. de Quelus," I said, "last night, in a sudden quarrel which arose out of a mistake, I was so unfortunate as to kill M. de Noyard. It was neither a duel nor a murder,—each of us seemed justified in attacking the other."

De Quelus did not seem displeased to hear of De Noyard's death.

"What evidence is there against you?" he asked.

"That of M. de Noyard's servant, to whom I acknowledged that I had killed his master. Other evidence may come up. What I have come to beg is your intercession with the King—"

"I understand," he said, without much interest. "I shall bring up the matter before the King leaves his bed."

"When may I expect to know?" I asked, not knowing whether to be reassured or alarmed at his indifference.

"Wait outside the King's apartments. I am going there now," he replied.

I followed him, saw him pass into the King's suite, and had another season of waiting. This was the longest and the most trying. I stood, now tapping the floor with my foot, now watching the halberdiers at the curtained door, while they glanced indifferently at me. Various officers of the court, whose duty or privilege it was to attend the King's rising, passed in, none heeding me or guessing that I waited there for the word on which my life depended. I examined the tapestry over and over again, noticing, particularly, the redoubtable expression of a horseman with lance in rest, and wondering how he had ever emerged from the tower behind him, of which the gateway was half his size.

A page came out of the doorway through which De Quelus had disappeared. Did he bring word to me? No. He glanced at me casually, and passed on, leaving the gallery at the other end. Presently he returned, preceding Marguerite, the Queen of Navarre, whom he had gone to summon.

"More trouble in the royal family," I said to myself. The King must have scented another plot, to have summoned his sister before the time for the petite levee. I feared that this would hinder his consideration of my case.

Suddenly a tall figure, wearing a doublet of cloth of silver, gray velvet breeches, gray mantle, and gray silk stockings, strode rapidly through the gallery, and curtly commanded the usher to announce him. While awaiting the usher's return, he stood still, stroking now his light mustaches, and now his fine, curly blonde beard, which was little more than delicate down on his chin. As his glance roved over the gallery it fell for a moment on me, but he did not know me, and his splendid blue eyes turned quickly away. His face had a pride, a nobility, a subtlety that I never saw united in another. He was four inches more than six feet high, slender, and of perfect proportion, erect, commanding, and in the flower of youth. How I admired him, though my heart sank at the sight of him; for I knew he had come to demand my death! It was the Duke of Guise. Presently the curtains parted, he passed in, and they fell behind him.

And now my heart beat like a hammer on an anvil. Had De Quelus forgotten me?

Again the curtains parted. Marguerite came out, but this time entirely alone. As soon as she had passed the halberdiers, her eyes fell on me, but she gave no sign of recognition. When she came near me, she said, in a low tone, audible to me alone, and without seeming to be aware of my presence:

"Follow me. Make no sign,—your life depends on it!"

She passed on, and turned out of the gallery towards her own apartments. For a moment I stood motionless; then, with a kind of instinctive sense of what ought to be done, for all thought seemed paralyzed within me, I made as if to return to the chamberlains' apartments, from which I had come. Reaching the place where Marguerite's corridor turned off, I pretended for an instant to be at a loss which way to go; then I turned in the direction taken by Marguerite. If the halberdiers, at the entrance to the King's apartments, saw me do this, they could but think I had made a mistake, and it was not their duty to come after me. Should I seek to intrude whither I had no right of entrance, I should encounter guards to hinder me.

Marguerite had waited for me in the corridor, out of sight of the halberdiers.

"Quickly, monsieur!" she said, and glided rapidly on. She led me boldly to her own apartments and through two or three chambers, passing, on the way, guards, pages, and ladies in waiting, before whom I had the wit to assume the mien of one who was about to do some service for her, and had come to receive instructions. So my entrance seemed to pass as nothing remarkable. At last we entered a cabinet, where I was alone with her. She opened the door of a small closet.

"Monsieur," she said, "conceal yourself in this closet until I return. I am going to be present at the petite levee of the King. Do not stir, for they will soon be searching the palace, with orders for your arrest. Had you not come after me, at once, two of the Scotch Guards would have found you where you waited. I slipped out while they were listening to the orders that my mother added to the King's."

I fell on my knee, within the closet.

"Madame," I said, trembling with gratitude, "you are more than a queen. You are an angel of goodness."

"No; I am merely a woman who does not forget an obligation. I have heard, from one of my maids, who heard it from a friend of yours, how you knocked a too inquisitive person into the moat beneath my window. I had to burn the rope that was used that night, but I have since procured another, which may have to be put to a similar purpose!"

And, with a smile, she shut the closet door upon me.



CHAPTER V.

HOW LA TOURNOIRE ESCAPED FROM PARIS

I heard the key turn in the lock, and the Queen of Navarre leave the cabinet. She took the key with her, so that a tiny beam of light came through the keyhole, giving my dark hiding-place its only illumination.

I felt complete confidence both in Marguerite's show of willingness to save me, and in her ability to do so. All I could do was to wait, and leave my future in her hands.

After a long time, I heard steps in the cabinet outside the closet door, the beam of light from the keyhole was cut off, the key turned again, the door opened, and Marguerite again stood before me.

"Monsieur," she said, "that we may talk without danger, remain in the closet. I will leave the door slightly ajar, thus, and will sit here, near it, with my 'Book of Hours,' as if reading aloud to myself. Should any one come, I can lock your door again and hide the key. Hark! be silent, monsieur!"

And as she spoke, she shut the door, locked it, drew out the key, and sat down. I listened to learn what had caused this act of precaution.

"Madame," I heard some one say, "M. de l'Archant desires, by order of the King, to search your apartments for a man who is to be arrested, and who is thought to have secreted himself somewhere in the palace."

"Let him enter." said Marguerite. My heart stood still. Then I heard her say, in a tone of pleasantry:

"What, M. le Capitain, is there another St. Bartholomew, that people choose my apartments for refuge?"

"This time it is not certain that the fugitive is here," replied Captain de l'Archant, of the bodyguard. "He is known to have been in the palace this morning, and no one answering his description has been seen to leave by any of the gates. It was, indeed, a most sudden and mysterious disappearance; and it is thought that he has run to cover in some chamber or other. We are looking everywhere."

"Who is the man?" asked Marguerite, in a tone of indifference.

"M. de la Tournoire, of the French Guards."

"Very well. Look where you please. If he came into my apartments, he must have done so while I attended the petite levee of the King; otherwise I should have seen him. What are you looking at? The door of that closet? He could not have gone there without my knowledge. One of the maids locked it the other day, and the key has disappeared." Whereupon, she tried the door, herself, as if in proof of her assertion.

"Then he cannot be there," said De L'Archant, deceived by her manner; and he took his leave.

For some minutes I heard nothing but the monotonous voice of Marguerite as she read aloud to herself from her "Book of Hours."

Then she opened my door again. Through the tiny crack I saw a part of her head.

"Monsieur," she said to me, keeping her eyes upon the book, and retaining the same changeless tone of one reading aloud, "you see that you are safe, for the present. No one in the palace, save one of my maids, is aware that I know you or have reason to take the slightest interest in you. Your entrance to my apartments was made so naturally and openly that it left no impression on those who saw you come in. I have since sent every one of those persons on some errand, so that all who might happen to remember your coming here will suppose that you left during their absence. It was well that I brought you here; had I merely told you to leave the palace, immediately, you would not have known exactly how matters stood, and you would have been arrested at your lodgings, or on your way to your place of duty. By this time, orders have gone to the city gates to prevent your leaving Paris. Before noon, not only the body-guard, the Provost of the palace, and the French and Scotch Guards will be on the lookout for you, but also the gendarmes of the Provost of Paris. That is why we must be careful, and why stealth must be used in conveying you out of Paris."

"They make a very important personage of me," I said, in a low tone.

"Hush! When you speak imitate my tone, exactly, and be silent the instant I cough. Too many people are not to be trusted. That you may understand me, you must know precisely how matters stand. This morning my mother went to see the King in his chamber before he had risen. They discussed a matter which required my presence, and I was sent for. After we had finished our family council, my mother and I remained for a few words, in private, with each other. While we were talking, M. de Quelus came in and spoke for a while to the King. I heard the King reply, 'Certainly, as he preserved you to me, my friend.' De Quelus was about to leave the King's chamber, when the Duke of Guise was announced. De Quelus waited, out of curiosity, I suppose. M. de Guise was admitted. He immediately told the King that one of his gentlemen, M. de Noyard, had been killed by the Sieur de la Tournoire, one of the French Guards. I became interested, for I remembered your name as that of the gentleman who, according to my maid, had stopped the spy from whom I had had so much to fear. I recalled, also, that you had the esteem of my brother's faithful Bussy d'Amboise. My mother immediately expressed the greatest horror at De Noyard's death, with the greatest sympathy for M. de Guise; and she urged the King to make an example of you."

I remembered, with a deep sigh, what De Rilly had told me,—that Catherine, to prevent the Duke of Guise from laying the death of De Noyard to her, would do her utmost to bring me to punishment.

"The King looked at De Quelus," continued Marguerite. "That gentleman, seeing how things were, and, knowing that the King now wishes to seem friendly to the Duke, promptly said, 'This is fortunate. La Tournoire is now waiting for me in the red gallery; I suppose he wishes to beg my intercession. His presumption will be properly punished when the guards arrest him there.'"

I turned sick, at this revelation of treachery. This was the gentleman who owed his life to me, and, in the first outburst of gratitude, had promised to obtain for me a captaincy!

"The King," Marguerite went on, "at once ordered two of the Scotch Guards to arrest you. All this time, I had been standing at the window, looking out, as if paying no attention. My mother stopped the guards to give them some additional direction. No one was watching me. I passed carelessly out, and you know what followed. At the petite levee, I learned what was thought of your disappearance,—that you had seen the Duke of Guise enter the King's apartments, had guessed his purpose, and had precipitately fled."

I did not dare tell his sister what I thought of a King who would, without hesitation or question, offer up one of his guards as a sacrifice to appease that King's greatest enemy.

"And now, monsieur," said Marguerite, still seeming to read from her book, "the King and the Queen, my mother, will make every effort to have you captured, lest it be thought that they are secretly protecting the slayer of M. de Noyard. To convince you that you may rely on me, thoroughly, I will confess that it is not solely gratitude for your service the other night that induces me to help you,—although my gratitude was great. I had seen the spy rise out of the moat and all night I was in deadly fear that he had reached the guard-house and prevented my brother's flight, or, at least, betrayed me. When I became convinced that he had not done so, I thanked Heaven for the unknown cause that had hindered him. So you may imagine, when my maid told me that a friend of her lover's was that unknown cause, how I felt towards that friend."

"Madame," I said, with emotion, "I ought to be content to die, having had the happiness of eliciting your gratitude!"

"But I am not content that you should die, for I wish you to serve me once more, this time as a messenger to my brother, the Duke of Anjou, who is at Angers; to M. Bussy d'Amboise, who is with him; and to my husband, the King of Navarre, who is at Nerac, in Gascony. Thus it is to my own interest to procure your safe escape from Paris. And if you reach Nerac, monsieur, you cannot do better than to stay there. The King of Navarre will give you some post more worthy of you than that of a mere soldier, which you hold here."

"I enlisted in the French Guards," I hastened to explain, "because I was unknown, and a Huguenot, and could expect no higher beginning."

"For the very reason that you are a Huguenot, you can expect a great deal from the King of Navarre. His kingdom is little more than a toy kingdom, it is true, and his court is but the distant echo of the court of France, but believe me, monsieur,"—and here Marguerite's voice indicated a profound conviction,—"there is a future before my husband, the King of Navarre! They do not know him. Moreover, Paris will never be a safe place for you as long as the Duke of Guise lives. He does not forget!"

I knew that Marguerite had excellent means of knowing the Duke of Guise, and I did not dispute her assertion. Moreover, I was now quite willing to go from the city wherein I was to have achieved such great things. My self-conceit had been shaken a little.

"But if every exit is watched, how can I leave Paris?" I asked.

"The exits were watched to prevent the going of my brother Anjou," said Marguerite, "but he went. He crossed the Seine with his chamberlain, Simier, and his valet, Cange, and went to the Abbey of St. Genevieve, of which the gardens are bounded by the city wall. The Abbot Foulon was secretly with us. M. Bussy had returned to Paris, and was waiting at the Abbey for Monsieur. They left Paris by way of the Abbey garden. The Abbot is a cautious soul, and to protect himself, in case of discovery, he had M. Bussy tie him to a chair, and after Monsieur and Bussy had joined their gentlemen, outside, and galloped off toward Angers, the Abbot came to the Louvre, and informed the King of Monsieur's escape. Now I suppose we shall have to make use of the same ingenious Foulon."

"You know what is best, madame," I said.

"But the Abbot of Saint Genevieve would not do for you, or even for me, what he would do for my brother Anjou. If he knew who you were, he might gladly seize an opportunity to offset, by giving you up, the suspicion that he had a hand in my brother's escape."

"But if there is a suspicion of that, will they not watch the Abbey now, on my account?"

"No; for you are not of my brother's party, and the Abbot would have no reason for aiding you. The question is how to make him serve us in this. I must now think and act, monsieur, and I shall have to lock you up again."

She rose and did so, and again I was left to meditate. It is astonishing how unconcerned I had come to feel, how reliant on the ingenuity of this charming princess with the small head, the high, broad forehead, the burning, black eyes the curly blonde hair, the quizzically discrete expression of face.

After some hours, during which I learned, again, the value of patience, the door was opened, and Marguerite thrust in some bread and cold meat, which she had brought with her own hand. I took it in silence, and stooped to kiss the hand, but it was too soon withdrawn, and the door locked again.

When the door next opened, Marguerite stood before it with a candle in her hand. I therefore knew that it was night. In her other hand, she held four letters, three of them already sealed, the fourth open.

"I have made all arrangements," she said, quickly. "This letter is to the Abbot Foulon. Read it."

She handed it to me, and held the candle for me while I read:

This gentleman bears private letters to Monsieur. As he was about to depart with them, I learned that the King had been informed of his intended mission, and had given orders for his arrest at the gate. I call upon you to aid him to leave Paris, as you aided my brother Anjou. His arrest would result in a disclosure of how that matter was conducted.

MARGUERITE.

I smiled, when I had finished reading the letter.

"That letter will frighten Brother Foulon into immediate action," said Marguerite, "and he will be compelled to destroy it, as it incriminates him. Take these others. You will first go to Angers, and deliver this to the Duke of Anjou, this to M. de Bussy. Then proceed to Gascony with this, for the King of Navarre."

"And I am to start?"

"To-night. I shall let you down into the moat, as Monsieur was let down. You cannot cross the bridges of the Seine, lest you be stopped by guards at the entrances; therefore I have employed, in this matter, the same boy who served me the other night. Go immediately from the moat to that part of the quay which lies east of the Hotel de Bourbon. You will find him waiting there in a boat. He will take you across the river to the Quay of the Augustines, and from there you will go alone to the Abbey. When Foulon knows that you come in my name, he will at once admit you. I am sorry that there is not time to have a horse waiting for you outside the fortifications."

"Alas, I must leave my own horse in Paris! I must go forth as a deserter from the Guards!"

"It is better than going to the executioner," said Marguerite, gaily. "For the last time, monsieur, become a bird in a cage. I am about to retire. As soon as all my people are dismissed, and the palace is asleep, I shall come for you."

The door closed again upon my prison of a day. I placed the letters within my doublet, and looked to the fastening of my clothes, as a man who prepares for a race or contest. I straightened myself up in my place of concealment, and stood ready to attempt my flight from this Paris of which the King had made a cage to hold me.

More waiting, and then came Marguerite, this time without a candle. She stood in the darkness, in a white robe de nuit, like a ghost.

"Now, monsieur," she whispered.

I stepped forth without a word, and followed her through the cabinet into a chamber which also dark. Three of Marguerite's maids stood there, in silence, one near the door, the other two at the window. One of the latter held a stout stick, to the middle of which was fastened a rope, which dangled down to the floor and lay there in irregular coils. I saw this by the little light that came through the window from the clouded night sky.

Marguerite took the stick and held it across the window. It was longer than the width of the window, and hence its ends overlapped the chamber walls on either side.

"Are you ready, monsieur?" asked Marguerite, in a whisper.

"Ready, madame."

Still holding the stick in position with one hand, she opened the window with the other, and looked out. She then drew in her head, and passed the loose end of the rope out of the window. Then she looked at me, and stood a little at one side, that I might have room to pass.

Summoning a bold heart, I mounted the window-ledge, got on my knees with my face towards the chamber, caught the rope in both hands, lowered my head, and kissed one of the hands of the Queen of Navarre; then, resting my weight on my elbows, dropped my legs out of the window. Two more movements took my body after them, and presently I saw before me only the wall of the Louvre, and was descending the rope, hand after hand, the weight of my body keeping the stick above in position.

When I was half-way down, I looked up. The wall of the palace seemed now to lean over upon me, and now to draw back from me. Marguerite was gazing down at me.

At last, looking down, I saw the earth near, and dropped. I cast another glance upward. Marguerite was just drawing in her head, and immediately the rope's end flew out of my reach.

"There's no going back the way I came!" I said, to myself, and strode along the moat to find a place where I could most easily climb out of it. Such a place I found, and I was soon in the street, alone, near where I had been wont to watch under the window of Mlle. d'Arency. I took a last look at the window of Marguerite's chamber. It was closed, and the rope had disappeared. My safety was no longer in the hands of the Queen of Navarre. She had pointed out the way for me, and had brought me thus far; henceforth, I had to rely on myself.

I shivered in the cold. I had left my large cloak beside the dead body of M. de Noyard the previous night, and had worn to the Louvre, in the morning, only a light mantle by way of outer covering.

"Blessings on the night for being so dark, and maledictions on it for being so cold!" I muttered, as I turned towards the river.

I had reached the Hotel de Bourbon, when I heard, behind me, the sound of footsteps in accord. I looked back. It was a body of several armed men, two of them bearing torches.

Were they gendarmes of the watch, or were they guards of the King? What were they doing on my track, and had they seen me?

Probably they had not seen me, for they did not increase their gait, although they came steadily towards me. The torches, which illuminated everything near them, served to blind them to what was at a distance from them.

Fortunately, I had reached the end of the street, and so I turned eastward and proceeded along the quay, high walls on one side of me, the river on the other. It had been impossible for Marguerite to indicate to me the exact place at which the boat was to be in waiting. I did not think it best, therefore, to go to the edge of the quay and look for the boat while the soldiers were in the vicinity. They might come upon the quay at the moment of my embarking, and in that event, they would certainly investigate. So I walked on along the quay.

Presently I knew, by the sound of their steps, that they, too, had reached the quay, and that they had turned in the direction that I had taken. I was still out of the range of their torchlight.

"How far will I be made to walk by these meddlesome archers?" I asked myself, annoyed at this interruption, and considering it an incident of ill omen. I looked ahead, to see whither my walking would lead me.

I saw another body of gendarmes, likewise lighted by torches, just emerging from a street's end, some distance in front of me. They turned and came towards me.

I stopped, feeling for an instant as if all my blood, all power of motion, had left me. "Great God!" I thought, "I am caught between two rows of teeth."

I must wait no longer to seek the boat. Would God grant that it might be near, that I might reach it before either troop should see me?

I ran to the edge of the quay and looked over into the river. Of all the boats that lay at rest there, not one in sight was unmoored, not one contained a boatman!

The two bodies of men were approaching each other. In a few seconds the two areas of torchlight would merge together. On one side were walls, frowning and impenetrable; on the other was the river.

I took off my sword and dagger, on account of their weight, and dropped them with their sheathes into the river. I started to undo the fastening of my mantle, but the knot held; my fingers became clumsy, and time pressed. So I gave up that attempt, threw away my hat, let myself over the edge of the quay, and slid quietly into the icy water. I immediately dived, and presently came to the surface at some distance from the shore. I then swam for the middle of the river. God knows what powers within me awoke to my necessity. I endured the cold, and found strength to swim in spite of the clothes that impeded my movements and added immensely to my weight.

Without looking back, I could tell, presently, from the talking on the quay that the two detachments of gendarmes had met and were standing still. Had either one descried me, there would have been loud or hurried words, but there were none. After a while, during which I continued to swim, the voices ceased, and I looked back. Two torches remained on the quay. The others were moving away, along the river. I then made a guess, which afterward was confirmed as truth. The boy sent by Marguerite had been discovered in his boat, had been taken to the guard-house, and had given such answers as led to the suspicion that he was waiting to aid the flight of some one. The captain of the Guard, thinking so to catch the person for whom the boatman waited, had sent two bodies of men out, one to occupy the spot near which the boy had been found, the other to patrol the river bank in search of questionable persons. I had arrived on the quay in the interval between the boy's capture and the arrival of the guards.

My first intention was to reach the left bank and proceed to the Abbey of St. Genevieve. But it occurred to me that, although a boat could not pass down the river, out of Paris, at night, because of the chain stretched across the river from the Tour du Coin to the Tour de Nesle, yet a swimmer might pass under or over that chain and then make, through the faubourg outside the walls, for the open country. Neither Marguerite nor I had thought of this way of leaving Paris, because of the seeming impossibility of a man's surviving a swim through the icy Seine, and a flight in wet clothes through the February night. Moreover, there was the necessity of leaving my sword behind, and the danger of being seen by the men on guard at the towers on either side of the river. But now that necessity had driven me into the river, I chose this shorter route to freedom, and swam with the current of the Seine. In front of me lay a dark mass upon the water in the middle of the river. This was the barge moored there to support the chain which stretched, from either side, across the surface of the water, up the bank and to the Tour de Nesle on the left side, and to the Tour du Coin on the right. I might pass either to the right or to the left of this barge. Naturally, I chose to avoid the side nearest the bank from which I had just fled, and to take the left side, which lay in the shadow of the frowning Tour de Nesle.

By swimming close to the left bank of the river, I might pass the boundary without diving under the chain, for the chain ascended obliquely from the water to the tower, leaving a small part of the river's surface entirely free. But this part was at the very foot of the tower, and if I tried passage there I should probably attract the attention of the guard. I was just looking ahead, to choose a spot midway between the barge and the left bank, when suddenly the blackness went from the face of things, a pale yellow light took its place, and I knew that the moon had come from behind the clouds. A moment later, I heard a cry from the right bank of the river, and knew that I was discovered. The shout came from the soldiers whom I had so narrowly eluded.

I knew that it was a race for life now. The soldiers would know that any man swimming the Seine on a February night was a man whom they ought to stop. I did not look back,—the one thing to do was to pass the Tour de Nesle before the guards there should be put on the alert by the cries from the right bank. So on I swam, urging every muscle to its utmost.

Presently came the crack of an arquebus, and spattering sounds behind me told me where the shot had struck the water. I turned to swim upon my left side, and so I got a glimpse of the quay that I had left. By the hurried movement of torches, I saw that the body that had gone to patrol the river bank was returning to rejoin the other force. Of the latter, several men were unmooring and manning a large boat. I turned on my back to have a look at the sky. I saw that very soon a heavy mass of black cloud would obscure the moon. At once I turned, and made towards the left bank, as if not intending to pass the chain. I could hear the men in the boat speaking rapidly at this, as if commenting on my change of course. Again looking back, I saw that the boat had pushed off, and was making towards that point on the left bank for which I seemed to be aiming. And now I had something else to claim my attention: the sound of voices came from the Tour de Nesle. I cast a glance thither. A troop of the watch was out at last, having taken the alarm from the movements on the right bank. This troop from the Tour de Nesle was moving towards the place for which I seemed to be making; hence it was giving its attention solely to that part of the left bank which was inside the fortifications. I felt a thrill of exultation. The moon passed under the clouds. I changed my course, and struck out for the chain. The light of the torches did not reach me. Both the boat from the right bank and the watch from the Tour de Nesle continued to move towards the same point. I approached the chain, took a long breath, dived, felt the stifling embrace of the waters for a season, rose to the surface, breathed the air of heaven again, and cast a look behind. The chain stretched between me and the distant boat and torches. I was out of Paris.

I swam on, past the mouth of the Paris moat, and then made for the left bank. Exhaustion seized me as I laid hold of the earth, but I had strength to clamber up. I fell into a sitting posture and rested my tired arms and legs. What pains of cold and heat I felt I cannot describe. Presently, with returning breath, came the strength to walk,—a strength of which I would have to avail myself, not only that I might put distance between myself and Paris, but also to keep my wet clothes from freezing. I rose and started.

Choosing not to follow the left bank of the Seine, which was unknown territory to me, I turned southeastward, in the hope of finding the road by which I had entered Paris. To reach this, I had but to traverse the Faubourg St. Germaine, along the line of the wall of Paris. I had already gone some distance along the outer edge of the moat, with the sleeping faubourg on my right, when I heard, behind me, the sound of men treading a bridge. I looked back. The bridge was that which crossed the moat from the Tour de Nesle.

Had the guards at last discovered my way of eluding pursuit, and was I now being sought outside the walls? It appeared so, for, after crossing the moat, the troop divided into two bodies, one of which went toward the left bank below the chain, where I had landed, while the other came along the moat after me. I began to run. The moon came out again.

"Look! he is there!" cried one of my pursuers. I heard their footsteps on the frozen earth,—they, too, were running. But I had the advantage in one respect: I had no weapons to impede me. The coming out of the moon did not throw me into despair; it only increased my determination to make good the escape I had carried so far. Though nature, herself, became the ally of the King of France and the Duke of Guise against me, I would elude them. I was filled with hate and resolution.

Suddenly, as I ran, it occurred to me that I was a fool to keep so near the fortifications, for, at any of the gates, guards might emerge, alarmed by the shouts of my pursuers; and even as I thought this, I looked ahead and saw a number of halberdiers coming from the Porte St. Germaine. My situation was now as it had been on the quay, with this disadvantage, that I was seen by my enemies, and this advantage, that I had a way of retreat open on my right; and I turned and sped along a street of the Faubourg St. Germaine, towards the country.

It matters not how many pursue you, if you can run faster and longer than the best of them all. Gradually, as I went, panting and plunging, onward, heedless of every obstacle, I increased the distance between me and the cries behind. Soon I was out of the faubourg, but I did not stop. I do not know what ground I went over, save that I went southward, or what village I presently went through, save that it was silent and asleep. I came upon a good road, at last, and followed it, still running, though a pain in my side warned me that soon I must halt. All my hunters had abandoned the chase now but one. Every time I half turned for a backward look, I saw this one coming after me. He had dropped his weapons, and so had enabled himself to keep up the chase. Not being weakened by a previous swim in the Seine, he was in better form than I, and I knew that he would catch me in time. And what then? He was a large fellow, but since the struggle must come, I would better let it come ere I should be utterly exhausted. So I pretended to stagger and lurch forward, and presently came to my knees and then prone upon the ground. With a grunt of triumph, the man rushed up to me, caught me by the collar of my doublet, and raised me from the ground. Hanging limp, and apparently senseless, I put him quite off his guard.

"Stand up!" he cried. "Stomach of the Pope! Have I come so far only to take a dead man back?"

While he was trying to make me stand, I suddenly gathered all my energy into my right arm and gave him a quick blow in the pit of the stomach. With a fearful howl, he let me go and fell upon his knees. A blow in the face then made him drop as limp as I had pretended to be; and I resumed my flight, this time at a more leisurely pace.

And now all my physical powers seemed to be leaving me. Pains racked my head, and I seemed at one time to freeze and burn all over, at another time to freeze in one part and burn in another. I ached in my muscles, my bones, my stomach. At every step, I felt that it was vastly difficult to take another, that it would be ineffably sweet to sink down upon the earth and rest. Yet I knew that one taste of that sweetness meant death, and I was determined not to lose a life that had been saved from so great peril by so great effort. Despite all the soldiers at their command, the King of France and the Duke of Guise should not have their will with me. At last,—I know not how far from Paris,—I came to an inn. There were still a few crowns in my pocket. Forgetting the danger from which I had fled, not thinking that it might overtake me here, feeling only the need of immediate shelter and rest, I pounded on the door until I got admittance. I have never had any but the vaguest recollection of my installation at that inn, so near to insensibility I was when I fell against its door. I have a dim memory of having exchanged a few words with a sleepy, stolid host; of being glad of the darkness of the night, for it prevented him from noticing my wet, frozen, begrimed, bedraggled, half-dead condition; of my bargaining for the sole occupancy of a room; of his leading me up a winding stairway to a chamber; of my plunging from the threshold to the bed as soon as the door was opened. I slept for several hours. When I awoke, it was about noon, and I was very hungry and thirsty. My clothes had dried upon me, and I essayed to put them into a fairly presentable condition. I found within my doublet the four letters, which had been first soaked and then stiffened. The now useless one addressed to the Abbot Foulon, I destroyed; then I went down to the kitchen, and saw, with relief, that it was empty. I ate and drank hurriedly but ravenously. Again the fear of capture, the impulse to put Paris further and further behind, awoke in me. I bought a peasant's cap from the landlord, telling him that the wind had blown my hat into the river the previous night, and set forth. It was my intention to walk to La Tournoire, that my money might last. Afoot I could the better turn from the road and conceal myself in woods or fields, at any intimation of pursuit. At La Tournoire, I would newly equip myself with clothes, weapons, horse, and money; and thence I would ride to Angers, and finally away, southward, to Nerac.

It was a fine, sunlit day when I stepped from the inn to take the road going southward. I had not gone four steps when I heard horses coming from the north. I sought the shelter of a shed at the side of the inn. There was a crack between two boards of this shed, through which I could look. The horses came into sight, ten of them. The riders were brown-faced men, all armed with swords and pistols, and most of them having arquebusses slung over their backs. Their leader was a large, broad, black-bearded man, with a very ugly red face, deeply scarred on the forehead, and with fierce black eyes. He and his men rode up to the inn, beat on the door, and, when the host came, ordered each a stirrup-cup. When the landlord brought the wine, the leader asked him some questions in a low tone. The landlord answered stupidly, shaking his head, and the horsemen turned to resume their journey. Just as they did so, there rode up, from the south, a merry-looking young cavalier followed by two mounted servants. This newcomer gaily hailed the ill-looking leader of the troop from the north with the words:

"Ah, M. Barbemouche, whither bound, with your back towards Paris?"

"For Anjou, M. de Berquin," growled the leader.

"What!" said the other, with a grin. "Have you left the Duke of Guise to take service with the Duke of Anjou?"

"No, M. le Vicomte," said the leader. "It is neither for nor against the Duke of Anjou that we go into his province. It is to catch a rascal who may be now on the way to hide on his estate there, and whom my master, the Duke of Guise, would like to see back in Paris."

"Indeed? Who is it that has given the Duke of Guise so great a desire for his company?"

"The Sieur de la Tournoire," replied Barbemouche. "Have you met him on the road?"

"I have never heard of him, before," said the young cavalier, indifferently; and he rode on northward, while Barbemouche and his men silently took the opposite direction.

He had never heard of me, as he said, nor I of him; yet he was to know much of me at a time to come, was the Vicomte de Berquin; and so was Barbemouche, the scowling man who was now riding towards Anjou in search of me.



CHAPTER VI.

HOW HE FLED SOUTHWARD

When one is pursued, one's best course is to pursue the pursuer. So, when M. Barbemouche and his troop of Guisards had gone some distance down the road, I came forth from the shed and followed them, afoot, keeping well to the roadside, ready to vanish, should any of them turn back. It was evident that Barbemouche had little or no hope of catching me on the road. His plan was to surprise me at my chateau, or to lie there in wait for me. He had not shown any persistence in questioning the landlord. The latter, through laziness or sheer stupidity, or a fear of incurring blame for having sheltered a fugitive, had not given him any information that might lead him to suspect that the man he was seeking was so near. So I could follow, in comparative safety, into Anjou.

Their horses constantly increased the distance between the Guise man-hunters and me, their desired prey. In a few hours they were out of sight. Thus they would arrive at La Tournoire long before I could. Not finding me there, they would probably put the servants under restraint, and wait in ambush for me. Several days of such waiting, I said to myself, would exhaust their patience; thereupon, they would give up the hope of my seeking refuge at La Tournoire, and would return to their master. My best course, therefore, would be to take my time on the road, to be on the alert on coming near La Tournoire, and to lie in hiding until I should be assured of their departure. In order to consume as much time as I could, and to wear out the enemy's patience without putting my own to the test, I decided to go first to Angers, deliver Marguerite's letters to Monsieur and Bussy d'Amboise, and then make for La Tournoire. Therefore, when, after a few days of walking, I came to LeMans, I did not turn southward, towards La Tournoire, but followed the Sarthe southwestward to Angers.

On this journey, I skirted Rambouillet, Anneau, and the other towns in my way, and avoided large inns, for fear of coming up with the Guise party. I made my money serve, too, by purchasing cheaply the hospitality of farmers and woodmen. My youth had withstood well the experiences attending my escape from Paris, and enabled me to fare on the coarse food of the peasantry. There was plenty of healthy blood in my veins to keep me warm. Outside of my doublet, my shoulders had no covering but the light mantle, of which I was now glad that I had been unable to rid myself in my swim down the Seine. People who saw me, with my rumpled clothes and shapeless ruff and peasant's cap, probably took me for a younger son who had endured hard fortune.

Such was my condition when I reached Angers and presented myself at the gate of the chateau wherein the Duke of Anjou had taken residence. There were many soldiers in and about the town, and horsemen were arriving and departing. I might not easily have obtained audience of the Duke, had not Bussy d'Amboise ridden up at the head of a small troop of horse, while I was waiting at the gate. I called out his name, and he recognized me, showing surprise at my appearance. I gave him his letter, and he had me conducted to the Duke, who was striding up and down the hall of the chateau. His mind was evidently preoccupied, perhaps already with fears as to the outcome of his rebellious step, and he did not look at me when he took the letter. His face brightened, though, when he saw the inscription in Marguerite's handwriting, and he went, immediately, to a window to read the letter. Bussy d'Amboise, who had dismounted and come in with me, now beckoned me to follow him, and when we were outside, he offered to supply me with a horse, money and arms, proposing that I enter the service of the Duke of Anjou. But I told him that I was bound for Gascony, and when he still offered me some equipment, I protested that I would refurnish myself at my own chateau; so he let me go my way. I could see that he was in haste to break the seal of Marguerite's letter.

I had gone two leagues or more northward from Angers, and was about to turn eastward toward La Tournoire, when I saw a long and brilliant cortege approaching from the direction of Paris. Several men-at-arms were at the head, then came a magnificent litter, then a number of mounted ladies and gentlemen, followed by a host of lackeys, a number of mules with baggage, and another body of soldiers. This procession was winding down the opposite hillside. The head of it was already crossing the bridge over a stream that coursed through the valley toward the Sarthe. Slowly it came along the yellow road, the soldiers and gentlemen holding themselves erect on their reined-in horses, the ladies chatting or laughing, and looking about the country, the wind stirring the plumes and trappings, the sunlight sparkling on the armor and halberds of the guards, the sword-hilts of the gentlemen, the jewels and rich stuffs which shone in the attire of the riders. There were velvet cloaks and gowns; satin and silk doublets, breeches, and hose; there were cloth of gold and cloth of silver. Here and there the cavalcade passed clumps of trees that lined the road, and it was then like pictures you have seen in tapestry.

Concealment had lately become an instinctive act with me, and I now sought refuge in the midst of some evergreen bushes, at a little distance from the road, from which I could view the cavalcade as it passed. On it came, the riders throwing back their shoulders as they filled their lungs with the bracing country air. The day was a mild one for the time of year, and the curtains of the litter were open. Inside sat a number of ladies. With a start, I recognized two of the faces. One was Mlle. d'Arency's; the other was the Queen-mother's. Mlle. d'Arency was narrating something, with a derisive smile, to Catherine, who listened with the slightest expression of amusement on her serene face.

Catherine was going to try to persuade her son, the Duke of Anjou, to give up his insurrectionary designs and return to the court of his brother. I guessed this much, as I lay hidden in the bushes, and I heartily wished her failure. As for Mlle. d'Arency, I have no words for the bitterness of my thoughts regarding her. I grated my teeth together as I recalled how even circumstance itself had aided her. She could have had no assurance that in the combat planned by her I should kill De Noyard, or that he would not kill me, and yet what she had desired had occurred. When the troop had passed, I arose and started for La Tournoire. It seemed to me that a sufficient number of days had now passed to tire the patience of Barbemouche, and that I might now visit my chateau for the short time necessary.

Nevertheless, it was with great caution that I approached the neighborhood in which all my life, until my departure for Paris, had been passed. At each bend of the road, I stopped and listened before going on. When I entered a piece of woods, I searched, with my eyes, each side of the road ahead, for a possible ambush. When I approached the top of a hill, it was with my ears on the alert for the sound of horsemen or of human feet, and, when I reached the crest, I found some spot where, lying on my stomach or crouching behind underbrush, I could survey the lowland ahead. And so, meeting no indication of peril, treading familiar and beloved ground, I at last reached the hill-top from which I would have my long-expected view of La Tournoire. It was just sunset; with beating heart, I hastened forward, risking something in my eagerness to look again upon the home of my fathers. I gazed down, ready to feast my eyes on the dear old tower, the peaceful garden, the—

And I saw only a smouldering pile of ruins, not one stone of my chateau left upon another, save a part of the stables, before which, heeding the desolation no more than crows are repelled by the sight of a dead body, sat M. Barbemouche and two of his men throwing dice. Only one tree was left in the garden, and from one of its limbs hung the body of a man, through which a sword was thrust. By the white hair of the head, I knew the body was that of old Michel.

So this was the beginning of the revenge of the Duke of Guise upon a poor gentleman for having eluded him; thus he demonstrated that a follower of his might not be slain with impunity. And the Duke must have had the assurance of the King that this deed would be upheld; nay, probably the King, in his design of currying favor with his powerful subject, had previously sanctioned this act, or even suggested it, that the Duke might have no ground for suspecting him of protecting me.

Grief at the sight of the home of my youth, the house of my ancestors, laid low, gave way to rage at the powerful ones to whom that sight was due,—the Duke who despoiled me, the King who had not protected me, the Queen as whose unknowing tool I had made myself liable to this outrage. As I stood on that hill-top, in the dusk, and looked down on the ruins of my chateau, I declared myself, until death, the enemy to that Queen, that Duke, and that King,—most of all to that King; for, having saved the life of his favorite, having taken humble service in his Guards, and having received from him a hinted promise of advancement, I had the right to expect from him a protection such as he gave every day to worthless brawlers.

At nightfall, I went to the hovel of a woodman, on whose fidelity I knew I could depend. At my call, he opened the door of his little hut, and received me with surprise and joy. With him was a peasant named Frolichard.

"Then you are alive, monsieur?" cried the woodman, closing the door after me, and making for me a seat on his rude bed.

"As you see," I replied. "I have come to pass the night in your hut. To-morrow I shall be off for the south."

"Alas, you have seen what they have done! I knew nothing of it until Michel was dead, and the servants came fleeing through the woods. They have gone, I know not where, and the tenants, too. All but Frolichard. As yet, the soldiers have not found this hut."

By questioning him, I learned that M. Barbemouche had denounced me as a heretic and a traitor (I could see how my desertion from the French Guards might be taken as implying intended rebellion and treason), and had told Michel that my possessions were confiscated. What authority he pretended to have, I could not learn. It was probably in wrath at not finding me that he had caused the destruction of my chateau, to make sure that it might not in any circumstances shelter me again.

I well knew that, whatever my rights might be, my safety lay far from La Tournoire; and so did my means of retaliation.

"If I had but a horse and a sword left!" I said.

"There is a horse which I have been using, in my shed," replied the forester; "and I made one of the servants leave here the swords that he was carrying away in his flight. Moreover, he had filled a bag with crowns from Michel's strong box. So you need not leave entirely unprovided."

I thanked the faithful fellow as he brought forth the swords and the little bag of gold pieces from under his bed, and then I lay down to sleep. The peasant Frolichard was already dozing in a corner by the fire.

I was awakened suddenly by a shake of the shoulder. The woodman stood by the bed, with every sign of alarm on his face.

"Monsieur," he whispered, "I fear you would best eat and begone. That cursed rascal, Frolichard, left while I was asleep. I am sure that the devil has been too much for him. He has probably gone to tell the soldiers that you are here. Eat, monsieur!"

I sprang up, and saw that the forester had already prepared some porridge for me.

"It is nearly dawn," he added, as I looked around I swallowed a few mouthfuls of the porridge, and chose the better one of the swords. Then I took up the little bag of golden crowns, and went out to mount horse. The animal that the woodman held for me was a sorry one, the ugliest and oldest of my stable.

Yet I rode blithely through the woods, happy to have again a horse under me, and a sword at my side. I knew that the forester could take care of himself as long as there should remain woods to hunt in or streams to fish in.

When I reached, the road it was daylight. I made for the hill-top, and stopped for a last look at my fields. I did not have to hesitate as to my course. In my doublet was Marguerite's letter, to be borne to the King of Navarre. Yet there was another reason why I should not attach myself to the Duke of Anjou, although he was already in rebellion against the King: the look on his face, when I saw him at Angers, had convinced me that he would not hold out. Should Catherine not win him back to allegiance, his own weakness would. I would place my hopes in the future of Henri of Navarre. Nothing could, as yet, be predicted with assurance concerning this Prince, who, being the head of the house of Bourbon, which constituted the younger branch of the Royalty of France, was the highest, by blood, of the really Huguenot leaders. Some, however, whispered that there was more in him than appeared in his amours and his adventures of the chase.

I was just about to turn my horse's head towards the south, when a man came out of my half-ruined stable and looked up at me. Instantly he called to some one in the stable, and two or three other soldiers came out. I recognized the burly form of one of these as that of Barbemouche. Another figure, a limp and cringing one, was that of Frolichard the peasant. Barbemouche gave some orders, and two or three brought horses out of the stable. I knew what all this meant.

I turned my horse, and galloped off towards the south. In a few moments I heard the footfalls of galloping horses behind me. Again I was the object of a chase.

When I had gone some distance, I looked back and saw my hunters coming, ten of them, down the hillside behind me. But the morning was bracing, and my horse had more life in him than at first sight appeared. I put another hill behind me, but in time my followers appeared at its crest. Now they gained on me, now I seemed to leave them further behind. All day this race continued. I bore directly southward, and hence passed far east of Angers. I soon made up my mind that M. Barbemouche was a man of persistence. I did not stop anywhere for food or drink. Neither did M. Barbemouche. I crossed the Loire at Saumur. So did he.