"St. Gris!" Henry cried, looking on the body with a shudder, "you have killed him, Grand Master! It was true, was it?"

"Yes, sire," I answered. "But he is not dead, I think." And going to the window I whistled for Maignan, who in a minute came to us. He was not very willing to touch the man, but I bade him lay him on the bed and loosen his clothes and throw water on his face; and presently M. Fauchet began to recover.

I stepped a little aside that he might not see me, and accordingly the first person on whom his eyes lighted was the King, who had laid aside his hat and cloak, and taken the terrified and weeping child on his lap. M. Fauchet stared at him awhile before he recognised him; but at last the trembling man knew him, and tottering to his feet, threw himself on his knees, looking years older than when I had last seen him in the street.

"Sire," he said faintly, "I will make restitution."

Henry looked at him gravely, and nodded. "It is well," he said. "You are fortunate, M. Fauchet; for had this come to my ears in any other way I could not have spared you. You will render your accounts and papers to M. de Sully to-morrow, and according as you are frank with him you will be treated."

Fauchet thanked him with abject tears, and the King rose and prepared to leave. But at the door a thought struck him, and he turned. "How long have you done this?" he said, indicating the room by a gesture, and speaking in a gentler tone.

"Three years, sire," the wretched man answered.

"And how much have you distributed?"

"Fifteen hundred crowns, sire."

The King cast an indescribable look at me, wherein amusement, scorn, and astonishment were all blended. "St. Gris! man!" he said, shrugging his shoulders and drawing in his breath sharply, "you think God is as easily duped as the King! I wish I could think so."

He did not speak again until we were half-way back to the Louvre; when he opened his mouth to announce his intention of rewarding me with a tithe of the money recovered. It was duly paid to me, and I bought with it part of the outlying lands of Villebon—those, I mean, which extend towards Chartres. The rest of the money, notwithstanding all my efforts, was wasted here and there, Pimentel winning thirty crowns of the King that year. But the discovery led to others of a similar character, and eventually set me on the track of a greater offender, M. l'Argentier, whom I brought to justice a few months later.



IX.

THE MAID OF HONOUR.

In accordance with my custom I gave an entertainment on the last day of this year to the King and Queen; who came to the Arsenal with a numerous train, and found the diversions I had provided so much to their taste that they did not leave until I was half dead with fatigue, and like to be killed with complaisance. Though this was not the most splendid entertainment I gave that year, it had the good fortune to please; and in a different and less agreeable fashion is recalled to my memory by a peculiar chain of events, whereof the first link came under my eyes during its progress.

I have mentioned in an earlier part of these memoirs, a Portuguese adventurer who, about this time, gained large sums from the Court at play, and more than once compelled the King to have recourse to me. I had the worst opinion of this man, and did not scruple to express it on several occasions; and this the more, as his presumption fell little short of his knavery, while he treated those whom he robbed with as much arrogance as if to play with him were an honour. Holding this view of him, I was far from pleased when I discovered that the King had brought him to my house; but the feeling, though sufficiently strong, sank to nothing beside the indignation and disgust which I experienced when, the company having fallen to cards after supper, I found that the Queen had sat down with him to primero.

It did not lessen my annoyance, that I had, after my usual fashion, furnished the Queen with a purse for her sport; and in this way found myself reduced to stand by and see my good money pass into the clutches of this knave. Under the circumstances, and in my own house, I could do nothing; nevertheless, the table at which they sat possessed so strong a fascination for me that I several times caught myself staring at it more closely than was polite; and as to disgust at the unseemliness of such companionship was added vexation at my own loss, I might have gone farther towards betraying my feelings if a casual glance aside had not disclosed to me the fact that I did not stand alone in my dissatisfaction; but that, frivolous as the majority of the courtiers were, there was one at least among those present who viewed this particular game with distaste.

This person stood near the door, and fancying himself secured from observation, either by his position or his insignificance, was glowering on the pair in a manner that at another time must have cost him a rebuke. As it was, I found something friendly, as well as curious, in his fixed frown; and ignorant of his name, though I knew him by sight, wondered both who he was and what was the cause of his preoccupation.

On the one point I had no difficulty in satisfying myself. Boisrueil, who presently passed, told me that his name was Vallon; that he belonged to a poor but old family in the Cotentin, and that he had been only three months at court.

"Making his fortune, I suppose?" I said grimly. "He games?"

"No, your excellency."

"Is in debt?"

"Not to my knowledge."

"To whom does he pay his court, then?"

"To the King."

"And the Queen?"

"Not particularly—as far as I know, at least. But if you wish to know more, M. le Duc," Boisrueil continued, "I will—"

"No, no," I said peevishly. The Queen had just handed her last rouleau across the table, and was still playing. "Go, man, about your business; I don't want to spend the evening gossiping with you."

He went, and I dismissed the young fellow from my mind; only to find him five minutes later at my elbow. To youth and good looks he added a modest bearing that did not fail to enhance them and commend him to me; the majority of the young sparks of the day being wiser than their fathers. But I confess that I was not prepared for the stammering embarrassment with which he addressed me—nor, indeed, to be addressed by him at all.

"M. de Sully," he said, in a tone of emotion, "I beg you to pardon me. I am in great trouble, and I think that perhaps, stranger as I am, you may condescend to do me a service."

So many men appeal to a minister with some such formula on their lips, and at times with a calculated timidity, that at the first blush of his request I was inclined to bid him come to me at the proper time; and to remove to another part of the room. But curiosity, playing the part of his advocate, found so much that was candid in his manner that I hesitated. "What is it?" I said stiffly.

"A very slight, if a very unusual, one," he muttered. "M. le Duc, I only want you to—"

"To?" for he stopped and seemed unable to go on.

"To supplement the present you have given to the Queen with this," he blurted out, his face pale with emotion; and he stealthily held out to me a green silk purse, through the meshes of which I saw the glint of gold. "M. de Sully," he continued, observing my hasty movement, "do not be offended! I know that you have done all that hospitality required. But I see that the Queen has already lost your gift, and that—"

"She is playing on credit?"

"Yes, Monsieur."

He said it simply, and as he spoke, he again pressed on me the purse. I took and weighed it, and calculated at a guess that it held fifty crowns. The sum astonished me. "Why, man," I said, "you are not mad enough to be in love with her Majesty?"

"No!" he cried, vehemently, yet with a gleam of humour in his eye. "I swear that it is not so. If you will do me this favour—"

It was a mad impulse that took me, but I nodded, and resolving to make good the money out of my own pocket should the case, when all was clear, seem to demand it, I went straight from him, and, crossing the floor, laid the purse near her Majesty's hand, with a polite word of regret that fortune had used her so ill, and a hope that this might be the means of recruiting her forces.

It would not have surprised me had she shown some signs of consciousness, and perhaps betrayed that she recognised the purse. But she contented herself with thanking me prettily, and almost before I had done speaking had her slender fingers among the coins. Turning, I found that Vallon had disappeared; so that all came to a sudden stop; and with the one and the other, I retired completely puzzled, and less able than before to make even a guess at the secret of the young man's generosity.

However, the King summoning me to him, there, for the time, was an end of the matter: and between fatigue and the duties of my position, I did not give a second thought to it that evening. Next morning, too, I was taken up with the gifts which it was my privilege as Master of the Mint to present to the King on New Year's Day, and which consisted this year of medals of gold, silver, and copper, bearing inscriptions of my own composition, together with small bags of new coins for the King, the Queen, and their attendants.

These I always made it a point to offer before the King rose; nor was this year an exception, for I found his Majesty still in bed, the Queen occupying a couch in the same chamber. But whereas it generally fell to me to arouse them from sleep, and be the first to offer those compliments which befitted the day, I found them on this occasion fully roused, the King lazily toying with his watch, the Queen talking fast and angrily, and at the edge of the carpet beside her bed Mademoiselle D'Oyley in deep disgrace. The Queen, indeed, was so taken up with scolding her that she had forgotten what day it was; and even after my entrance, continued to rate the poor girl so fiercely that I thought her present violence little less unseemly than her condescension of the night before.

Perhaps some trace of this feeling appeared in my countenance; for, presently, the King, who seldom failed to read my thoughts, tried to check her in a good-natured fashion. "Come, my dear," he said; "let that trembling mouse go. And do you hear what our good friend Sully has brought you? I'll be bound—"

"How your Majesty talks!" the Queen answered, pettishly. "As if a few paltry coins could make up for my jar! I'll be bound, for my part, that this idle wench was romping and playing with—"

"Come, come; you have made her cry enough!" the King interrupted—and, indeed, the girl was sobbing so passionately that a man could not listen without pain. "Let her go, I say, and do you attend to Sully. You have forgotten that it is New Year's Day—"

"A jar of majolica," the Queen cried, Utterly disregarding him, "worth your body and soul, you little slut!"

"Pooh! pooh!" the King said.

"Do you think that I brought it from Florence, all the way in my own—"

"Nightcap," the King muttered. "There, there, sweetheart," he continued, aloud, "let the girl go!"

"Of course! She is a girl," the Queen cried, with a sneer. "That is enough for you!"

"Well, madam, she is not the only one in the room," I ventured.

"Oh, of course, you are the King's echo!"

"Run away, little one," Henry said, winking to me to be silent.

"And consider yourself lucky," the Queen cried, venomously. "You ought to be whipped; and if I had you in my country, I would have you whipped for all your airs! San Giacomo, if you cross me, I will see to it!"

This was a parting thrust; for the girl, catching at the King's permission, had turned and was hurrying in a passion of tears to the door. Still, the Queen had not done. Mademoiselle had broken a jar; and there were other misdemeanours which her Majesty continued to expound. But in the end I had my say, and presented the medals, which were accepted by the King with his usual kindness, and by the Queen, when her feelings had found expression, with sufficient complaisance. Both were good enough to compliment me on my entertainment; but observing that the Queen quickly buried herself again in her pillows and was inclined to be peevish, I cut short my attendance on the plea of fatigue, and left them at liberty to receive the very numerous company who on this day pay their court.

Of these, the greater number came on afterwards, to wait on me; so that for some hours the large hall at the Arsenal was thronged with my friends, or those who called themselves by that name. But towards noon the stream began to fail; and when I sat down to dinner at that hour, I had reason to suppose that I should be left at peace. I had not more than begun my meal, however, when I was called from table by a messenger from the Queen.

"What is it?" I said, when I had gone to him. Had he come from the King, I could have understood it more easily.

"Her Majesty desires to know, your excellency, whether you have seen anything of Mademoiselle D'Oyley."

"I?"

"Yes, M. le Duc."

"No, certainly not. How should I?" I replied.

"And she is not here?" the man persisted.

"No!" I answered, angrily. "God bless the Queen, I know nothing of her. I am sitting at meat, and—"

The man interrupted me with protestations of regret, and, hastening to express himself thoroughly satisfied, retired with a crestfallen air. I wondered what the message meant, and what had come over the Queen, and whither the girl had gone. But as I made it a rule throughout my term of office to avoid, as far as possible, all participation in bed-chamber intrigues, I wasted little time on the matter, but returning to my dinner, took up the conversation where I had left it. Before I rose, however, La Trape came to me and again interrupted me. He announced that a messenger from his Majesty was waiting in the hall.

I went out, thinking it very probable that Henry had sent me a present; though it was his more usual custom on this day to honour me with a visit, and declare his generous intentions by word of mouth, when we had both retired to my library and the door was closed. Still, on one or two occasions he had sent me a horse from his stables, a brace of Indian fowl, a melon or the like, as a foretaste; and this I supposed to be the errand on which the man had come.

His first words disabused me. "May it please your excellency," he said, very civilly, "the King desires to be remembered to you as usual, and would learn whether you know anything of Mademoiselle D'Oyley."

"Of whom?" I cried, astonished.

"Of Mademoiselle D'Oyley, her Majesty's maid of honour."

"Not I, i'faith!" I said, drily. "I am no squire of dames, to say nothing of maids!"

"But his Majesty—"

"If he has sent that message," I replied, "has yet something to learn—that I do not interest myself in maids of honour or such frailties."

The man smiled. "I do not think," he began, "that it was his Majesty—"

"Sent the message?" I said. "No, but the Queen, I suppose."

On this he gave me to understand, in the sly, secretive manner such men affect, that it was so. I asked him then what all this ferment was about. "Has Mademoiselle D'Oyley disappeared?" I said, peevishly.

"Yes, your excellency. She was with the Queen at eight o'clock. At noon her Majesty desired her services, and she was not to be found."

"What?" I exclaimed. "A maid of honour is missing for three hours in the morning, and there is all this travelling! Why, in my young days, three nights might have—"

But discerning that he was little more than a youth, and could not; restrain a smile, I broke off discreetly, and contented myself with asking if there was reason to suppose that there was more than appeared in the girl's absence.

"Her Majesty thinks so," he answered.

"Well, in any case, I know nothing about it," I replied. "I am not hiding her. You may tell his Majesty that, with my service. Or I will write it."

He answered me, eagerly, that that was not necessary, and that the King had desired merely a word from me; and with that and many other expressions of regret, he went away and left me at leisure to go to the riding-school, where at this time of the year it was my wont to see the young men practise those manly arts, which, so far as I can judge, are at a lower ebb in these modern days of quips and quodlibets than in the stirring times of my youth. Then, thank God, it was held more necessary for a page to know his seven points of horsemanship than how to tie a ribbon, or prank a gown, or read a primer.

But the first day of this year was destined to be a day of vexation. I had scarcely entered the school, when M. de Varennes was announced. Instead of going to meet him I bade them bring him to me, and, on seeing him, bade him welcome to the sports. "Though," I said, politely overlooking his past history and his origin, "we did better in our times; yet the young fellows should be encouraged."

"Very true," he answered, suavely. "And I wish I could stay with you. But it was not for pleasure I came. The King sent me. He desires to know—"

"What?" I said.

"If you know anything of Mademoiselle D'Oyley. Between ourselves, M. le Duc—"

I looked at him in amazement. "Why," I said, "what on earth has the girl done now?"

"Disappeared," he answered.

"But she had done that before."

"Yes," he said, "and the King had your message. But—"

"But what?" I said sternly.

"He thought that you might wish to supplement it for his private use."

"To supplement it?"

"Yes. The truth is," Varennes continued, looking at me doubtfully, "the King has information which leads him to suppose that she may be here."

"She may be anywhere," I answered in a tone that closed his mouth, "but she is not here. And you may tell the King so from me!"

Though he had begun life as a cook, few could be more arrogant than Varennes on occasion; but he possessed the valuable knack of knowing with whom he could presume, and never attempted to impose on me. Apologising with the easy grace of a man who had risen in life by pleasing, he sat with me awhile, recalling old days and feats, and then left, giving me to understand that I might depend on him to disabuse the King's mind.

As a fact, Henry visited me that evening without raising the subject; nor had I any reason to complain of his generosity, albeit he took care to exact from the Superintendent of the Finances more than he gave his servant, and for one gift to Peter got two Pauls satisfied. To obtain the money he needed in the most commodious manner, I spent the greater part of two days in accounts, and had not yet settled the warrants to my liking, when La Trape coming in with candles on the second evening disturbed my secretaries. The men yawned discreetly; and reflecting that we had had a long day I dismissed them, and stayed myself only for the purpose of securing one or two papers of a private nature. Then I bade La Trape light me to my closet.

Instead, he stood and craved leave to speak to me. "About what, sirrah?" I said.

"I have received an offer, your excellency," he answered with a crafty look.

"What! To leave my service?" I exclaimed, in surprise.

"No, your excellency," he answered. "To do a service for another—M. Pimentel. The Portuguese gentleman stopped me in the street to-day, and offered me fifty crowns."

"To do what?" I asked.

"To tell him where the young lady with Madame lies; and lend him the key of the garden gate to-night."

I stared at the fellow. "The young lady with Madame?" I said.

He returned my look with a stupidity which I knew was assumed. "Yes, your excellency. The young lady who came this morning," he said.

Then I knew that I had been betrayed, and had given my enemies such a handle as they would not be slow to seize; and I stood in the middle of the room in the utmost grief and consternation. At last, "Stay here," I said to the man, as soon as I could speak. "Do not move from the spot where you stand until I come back!"

It was my almost invariable custom to be announced when I visited my wife's closet; but I had no mind now for such formalities, and swiftly passing two or three scared servants on the stairs, I made straight for her room, tapped and entered. Abrupt as were my movements, however, someone had contrived to warn her; for though two of her women sat working on stools near her, I heard a hasty foot flying, and caught the last flutter of a skirt as it disappeared through a second door. My wife rose from her seat, and looked at me guiltily.

"Madame," I said, "send these women away. Now," I continued when they had gone, "who was that with you?" She looked away dumbly.

"You do well not to try to deceive me, Madame," I continued severely. "It was Mademoiselle D'Oyley."

She muttered, not daring to meet my eye, that it was.

"Who has absented herself from the Queen's service," I answered bitterly, "and chosen to hide herself here of all places! Madame," I continued, with a severity which the sense of my false position amply justified, "are you aware that you have made me dishonour myself? That you have made me lie; not once, but three times? That you have made me deceive my master?"

She cried out at that, being frightened, that "she had meant no harm; that the girl coming to her in great grief and trouble—"

"Because the Queen had scolded her for breaking a china jar!" I said, contemptuously.

"No, Monsieur; her trouble was of quite another kind," my wife answered with more spirit than I had expected.

"Pshaw!" I exclaimed.

"It is plain that you do not yet understand the case," Madame persisted, facing me with trembling hardihood. "Mademoiselle D'Oyley has been persecuted for some time by the suit of a man for whom I know you, Monsieur, have no respect: a man whom no Frenchwoman of family should be forced to marry."

"Who is it?" I said curtly.

"M. Pimentel."

"Ah! And the Queen?"

"Has made his suit her own. Doubtless her Majesty," Madame de Sully continued with grimness, "who plays with him so much, is under obligations to him, and has her reasons. The King, too, is on his side, so that Mademoiselle—"

"Who has another lover, I suppose?" I said harshly.

My wife looked at me in trepidation. "It may be so, Monsieur," she said hesitating.

"It is so, Madame; and you know it," I answered in the same tone. "M. Vallon is the man."

"Oh!" she exclaimed with a gesture of alarm. "You know!"

"I know, Madame," I replied, with vigour, "that to please this love-sick girl you have placed me in a position of the utmost difficulty; that you have jeopardised the confidence which my master, whom I have never willingly deceived, places in me; and that out of all this I see only one way of escape, and that is by a full and frank confession, which you must make to the Queen."

"Oh, Monsieur," she said faintly.

"The girl, of course, must be immediately given up."

My wife began to sob at that, as women will; but I had too keen a sense of the difficulties into which she had plunged me by her deceit, to pity her over much. And, doubtless, I should have continued in the resolution I had formed, and which appeared to hold out the only hope of avoiding the malice of those enemies whom every man in power possesses—and none can afford to despise—if La Trape's words, when he betrayed the secret to me, had not recurred to my mind and suggested other reflections.

Doubtless, Mademoiselle had been watched into my house, and my ill-wishers would take the earliest opportunity of bringing the lie home to me. My wife's confession, under such circumstances, would have but a simple air, and believed by some would be ridiculed by more. It might, and probably would, save my credit with the King; but it would not exalt me in others' eyes, or increase my reputation as a manager. If there were any other way—and so reflecting, I thought of La Trape and his story.

Still I was half way to the door when I paused, and turned. My wife was still weeping. "It is no good crying over spilled milk, Madame," I said severely. "If the girl were not a fool, she would have gone to the Ursulines. The abbess has a stiff neck, and is as big a simpleton to boot as you are. It is only a step, too, from here to the Ursulines, if she had had the sense to go on."

My wife lifted her head, and looked at me eagerly; but I avoided her gaze and went out without more, and downstairs to my study, where I found La Trape awaiting me. "Go to Madame la Duchesse," I said to him. "When you have done what she needs, come to me in my closet."

He obeyed, and after an interval of about half an hour, during which I had time to mature my plan, presented himself again before me. "Pimentel had a notion that the young lady was here then?" I said carelessly.

"Yes, your excellency."

"Some of his people fancied that they saw her enter, perhaps?"

"Yes, your excellency."

"They were mistaken, of course?"

"Of course," he answered, dutifully.

"Or she may have come to the door and gone again?" I suggested.

"Possibly, your excellency."

"Gone on without being seen, I mean?"

"If she went in the direction of the Rue St. Marcel," he answered stolidly, "she would not be seen."

The convent of the Ursulines is in the Rue St. Marcel. I knew, therefore, that Madame had had the sense to act on my hint; and after reflecting a moment I continued, "So Pimentel wished to know where she was lodged?"

"That, and to have the key, your excellency."

"To-night?"

"Yes, your excellency."

"Well, you are at liberty to accept the offer," I answered carelessly. "It will not clash with my service." And then, as he stood staring in astonishment, striving to read the riddle, I continued, "By the way, are the rooms in the little Garden Pavilion aired? They may be needed next week; see that one of the women sleeps there to-night; a woman you can depend on."

"Ah, Monsieur!"

He said no more, but I saw that he understood; and bidding him be careful in following my instructions, I dismissed him. The line I had determined to take was attended by many uncertainties, however; and more than once I repented that I had not followed my first; instinct, and avowed the truth. A hundred things might fall out to frustrate my scheme and place me in a false position; from which—since the confidence of his sovereign is the breath of a minister, and as easily destroyed as a woman's reputation—I might find it impossible to extricate myself with credit.

I slept, therefore, but ill that night; and in conjunctures apparently more serious have felt less trepidation. But experience has long ago taught me that trifles, not great events, unseat the statesman, and that of all intrigues those which revolve round a woman are the most dangerous. I rose early, therefore, and repaired to Court before my usual hour, it being the essence of my plan to attack, instead of waiting to be attacked. Doubtless my early appearance was taken to corroborate the rumour that I had made a false step, and was in difficulties; for scarcely had I crossed the threshold of the ante-chamber before the attitude of the courtiers caught my attention. Some who twenty-four hours earlier would have been only too glad to meet my eye and obtain a word of recognition, appeared to be absorbed in conversation. Others, less transparent or better inclined to me, greeted me with unnatural effusion. One who bore a grudge against me, but had never before dared to do more than grin, now scowled openly; while a second, perhaps the most foolish of all, came to me with advice, drew me with insistency into a niche near the door, and adjured me to be cautious.

"You are too bold," he said; "and that way your enemies find their opening. Do not go to the King now. He is incensed against you. But we all know that he loves you; wait, therefore, my friend, until he has had his day's hunting—he is just now booting himself and see him when he has ridden off his annoyance."

"And when my friends, my dear Marquis, have had time to poison his mind against me? No, no," I answered, wondering much whether he were as simple as he looked.

"But the Queen is with him now," he persisted, seizing the lappel of my coat to stay me, "and she will be sure to put in a word against you."

"Therefore," I answered drily, "I had better see his Majesty before the one word becomes two."

"Be persuaded," he entreated me. "See him now, and nothing but ill will come of it."

"Nothing but ill for some," I retorted, looking so keenly at him that his visage fell. And with that he let me go, and with a smile I passed through the door. The rumour had not yet gained such substance that the crowd had lost all respect for me; it rolled back, and I passed through it towards the end of the chamber, where the King was stooping to draw on one of his boots. The Queen stood not far from him, gazing into the fire with an air of ill-temper which the circle, serious and silent, seemed to reflect, I looked everywhere for the Portuguese, but he was not to be seen.

For a moment the King affected to be unaware of my presence, and even turned his shoulder to me; but I observed that he reddened, and fidgeted nervously with the boot which he was drawing on. Nothing daunted, therefore, I waited until he perforce discovered me, and was obliged to greet me. "You are early this morning," he said, at last, with a grudging air.

"For the best of reasons, sire," I answered hardily. "I am ill placed at home, and come to you for justice."

"What is it?" he said churlishly and unwillingly.

I was about to answer, when the Queen interposed with a sneer. "I think that I can tell you, sire," she said. "M. de Sully is old enough to know the adage, 'Bite before you are bitten.'"

"Madame," I said, respectfully but with firmness. "I know this only, that my house was last night the scene of a gross outrage; and by all I can learn it was perpetrated by one who is under your Majesty's protection."

"His name?" she said, with a haughty gesture.

"M. Pimentel."

The Queen began to smile. "What was this gross outrage?" she asked drily.

"In the course of last night he broke into my house with a gang of wretches, and bore off one of the inmates."

The Queen's smile grew broader; the King began to grin. Some of the circle, watching them closely, ventured to smile also. "Come, my friend," Henry said, almost with good humour, "this is all very well. But this inmate of yours—was a very recent one."

"Was, in fact, I suppose, the rebellious little wench of whom you knew nothing yesterday!" the Queen cried harshly, and with an air of open triumph. "There can be no stealing of stolen goods, sir; and if M. Pimentel, who had at least as much right as you to the girl—and more, for I am her guardian—has carried her off, you have small ground to complain."

"But, Madame," I said, with an air of bewilderment, "I really do not—it must be my fault, but I do not understand."

Two or three sniggered, seeing me apparently checkmated and at the end of my resources. And the King laughed out with kindly malice. "Come, Grand Master," he said, "I think that you do. However, if Pimentel has carried off the damsel, there, it seems to me, is an end of the matter."

"But, sire," I answered, looking sternly round the grinning circle, "am I mad, or is there some mystery here? I assured your Majesty yesterday that Mademoiselle D'Oyley was not in my house. I say the same to-day. She is not; your officers may search every room and closet. And for the woman whom M. Pimentel has carried off, she is no more Mademoiselle D'Oyley than I am; she is one of my wife's waiting-maids. If you doubt me," I continued, "you have only to send and ask. Ask the Portuguese himself."

The King stared at me. "Nonsense!" he said, sharply. "If Pimentel has carried off anyone, it must be Mademoiselle D'Oyley."

"But it is not, sire," I answered with persistence. "He has broken into my house, and abducted my servant. For Mademoiselle, she is not there to be stolen."

"Let some one go for Pimentel," the King said curtly.

But the Portuguese, as it happened, was at the door even then, and being called, had no alternative but to come forward. His face and mien as he entered and reluctantly showed himself were more than enough to dissipate any doubts which the courtiers had hitherto entertained; the former being as gloomy and downcast as the latter was timid and cringing. It is true he made some attempt at first, and for a time, to face the matter out; stammering and stuttering, and looking piteously to the Queen for help. But he could not long delay the crisis, nor deny that the person he had so cunningly abducted was one of my waiting-women; and the moment that this confession was made his case was at an end, the statement being received with so universal a peal of laughter, the King leading, as at one and the same time discomfited him, and must have persuaded any indifferent listener that all, from the first, had been in the secret.

After that he would have spent himself in vain, had he contended that Mademoiselle D'Oyley was at my house; and so clear was this that he made no second attempt to do so, but at once admitting that his people had made a mistake, he proffered me a handsome apology, and desired the King to speak to me in his behalf.

This I, on my side, was pleased to take in good part; and having let him off easily with a mild rebuke, turned from him to the Queen, and informed her with much respect that I had learned at length where Mademoiselle D'Oyley had taken refuge.

"Where, sir?" she asked, eyeing me suspiciously and with no little disfavour.

"At the Ursulines, Madame," I answered,

She winced, for she had already quarrelled with the abbess without advantage. And there for the moment the matter ended. At a later period I took care to confess all to the King, and he did not fail to laugh heartily at the clever manner in which I had outwitted Pimentel. But this was not until the Portuguese had left the country and gone to Italy, the affair between him and Mademoiselle D'Oyley (which resolved itself into a contest between the Queen and the Ursulines) having come to a close under circumstances which it may be my duty to relate in another place.



X.

FARMING THE TAXES.

In the summer of the year 1608, determining to take up my abode, when not in Paris, at Villebon, where I had lately enlarged my property, I went thither from Rouen with my wife, to superintend the building and mark out certain plantations which I projected. As the heat that month was great, and the dust of the train annoying, I made each stage in the evening and on horseback, leaving my wife to proceed at her leisure. In this way I was able, by taking rough paths, to do in two or three hours a distance which her coaches had scarcely covered in the day; but on the third evening, intending to make a short cut by a ford on the Vaucouleurs, I found, to my chagrin, the advantage on the other side, the ford, when I reached it at sunset, proving impracticable. As there was every prospect, however, that the water would fall within a few hours, I determined not to retrace my steps; but to wait where I was until morning, and complete my journey to Houdan in the early hours.

There was a poor inn near the ford, a mere hovel of wood on a brick foundation, yet with two storeys. I made my way to this with Maignan and La Trape, who formed, with two grooms, my only attendance; but on coming near the house, and looking about with a curious eye, I remarked something which fixed my attention, and, for the moment, brought me to a halt. This was the spectacle of three horses, of fair quality, feeding in a field of growing corn, which was the only enclosure near the inn. They were trampling and spoiling more than they ate; and, supposing that they had strayed into the place, and the house showing no signs of life, I bade my grooms fetch them out. The sun was about setting, and I stood a moment watching the long shadows of the men as they plodded through the corn, and the attitudes of the horses as, with heads raised, they looked doubtfully at the newcomers.

Suddenly a man came round the corner of the house, and seeing us, and what my men were doing, began to gesticulate violently, but without sound. The grooms saw him too, and stood; and he ran up to my stirrup, his face flushed and sullen.

"Do you want to see us all ruined?" he muttered. And he begged me to call my men out of the corn.

"You are more likely to be ruined that way," I answered, looking down at him. "Why, man, is it the custom in your country to turn horses into the half-ripe corn?"

He shook his fist stealthily. "God forbid!" he said. "But the devil is within doors, and we must do his bidding."

"Ah!" I replied, my curiosity aroused "I should like to see him."

The boor shaded his eyes, and looked at me sulkily from under his matted and tangled hair. "You are not of his company?" he said with suspicion.

"I hope not," I answered, smiling at his simplicity. "But your corn is your own. I will call the men out." On which I made a sign to them to return. "Now," I said, as I walked my horse slowly towards the house, while he tramped along beside me, "who is within?"

"M. Gringuet," he said, with another stealthy gesture.

"Ah!" I said, "I am afraid that I am no wiser."

"The tax-gatherer."

"Oh! And those are his horses?" He nodded.

"Still, I do not see why they are in the corn?"

"I have no hay."

"But there is grass."

"Ay," the inn-keeper answered bitterly.

"And he said that I might eat it. It was not good enough for his horses. They must have hay or corn; and if I had none, so much the worse for me."

Full of indignation, I made in my mind a note of M. Gringuet's name; but at the moment I said no more, and we proceeded to the house, the exterior of which, though meagre, and even miserable, gave me an impression of neatness. From the inside, however, a hoarse, continuous noise was issuing, which resolved itself as we crossed the threshold into a man's voice. The speaker was out of sight, in an upper room to which a ladder gave access, but his oaths, complaints, and imprecations almost shook the house. A middle-aged woman, scantily dressed, was busy on the hearth; but perhaps that which, next to the perpetual scolding that was going on above, most took my attention was a great lump of salt that stood on the table at the woman's elbow, and seemed to be evidence of greater luxury—for the GABELLE had not at that time been reduced—than I could easily associate with the place.

The roaring and blustering continuing upstairs, I stood a moment in sheer astonishment. "Is that M. Gringuet?" I said at last.

The inn-keeper nodded sullenly, while his wife stared at me. "But what; is the matter with him?" I said.

"The gout. But for that he would have been gone these two days to collect at Le Mesnil."

"Ah!" I answered, beginning to understand. "And the salt is for a bath for his feet, is it?"

The woman nodded.

"Well," I said, as Maignan came in with my saddlebags and laid them on the floor, "he will swear still louder when he gets the bill, I should think."

"Bill?" the housewife answered bitterly, looking up again from her pots. "A tax-gatherer's bill? Go to the dead man and ask for the price of his coffin; or to the babe for a nurse-fee! You will get paid as soon. A tax-gatherer's bill? Be thankful if he does not take the dish with the sop!"

She spoke plainly; yet I found a clearer proof of the slavery in which the man held them in the perfect indifference with which they regarded my arrival—though a guest with two servants must have been a rarity in such a place—and the listless way in which they set about attending to my wants. Keenly remembering that not long before this my enemies had striven to prejudice me in the King's eyes by alleging that, though I filled his coffers, I was grinding the poor into the dust—and even, by my exactions, provoking a rebellion I was in no mood to look with an indulgent eye on those who furnished such calumnies with a show of reason. But it has never been my wont to act hastily; and while I stood in the middle of the kitchen, debating whether I should order the servants to fling the fellow out, and bid him appear before me at Villebon, or should instead have him brought up there and then, the man's coarse voice, which had never ceased to growl and snarl above us, rose on a sudden still louder. Something fell on the floor over our heads and rolled across it; and immediately a young girl, barefoot and short-skirted, scrambled hurriedly and blindly down the ladder and landed among us.

She was sobbing, and a little blood was flowing from a cut in her lip; and she trembled all over. At sight of the blood and her tears the woman seemed to be transported. Snatching up a saucepan, she sprang towards the ladder with a gesture of rage, and in a moment would have ascended if her husband had not followed and dragged her back. The girl also, as soon as she could speak, added her entreaties to his, while Maignan and La Trape looked sharply at me, as if they expected a signal.

All this while, the bully above continued his maledictions. "Send that slut back to me!" he roared. "Do you think that I am going to be left alone in this hole? Send her back, or—" and he added half-a-dozen oaths of a kind to make an honest man's blood boil. In the midst of this, however, and while the woman was still contending with her husband, he suddenly stopped and shrieked in anguish, crying out for the salt-bath.

But the woman, whom her husband had only half-pacified, shook her fist at the ceiling with a laugh of defiance. "Shriek; ay, you may shriek, you wretch!" she cried. "You must be waited on by my girl, must you—no older face will do for you—and you beat her? Your horses must eat corn, must they, while we eat grass? And we buy salt for you, and wheaten bread for you, and are beggars for you! For you, you thieving wretch, who tax the poor and let the rich go free; who—"

"Silence, woman!" her husband cried, cutting her short, with a pale face. "Hush, hush; he will hear you!"

But the woman was too far gone in rage to obey. "What! and is it not true?" she answered, her eyes glittering. "Will he not to-morrow go to Le Mesnil and squeeze the poor? Ay, and will not Lescauts the corn-dealer, and Philippon the silk-merchant, come to him with bribes, and go free? And de Fonvelle and de Curtin—they with a DE, forsooth!—plead their nobility, and grease his hands, and go free? Ay, and—"

"Silence, woman!" the man said again, looking apprehensively at me, and from me to my attendants, who were grinning broadly. "You do not know that this gentleman is not—"

"A tax-gatherer?" I said, smiling. "No. But how long has your friend upstairs been here?"

"Two days, Monsieur," she answered, wiping the perspiration from her brow, and speaking more quietly. "He is talking of sending on a deputy to Le Mesnil; but Heaven send he may recover, and go from here himself!"

"Well," I answered, "at any rate, we have had enough of this noise. My servant shall go up and tell him that there is a gentleman here who cannot put up with a disturbance. Maignan," I continued, "see the man, and tell him that the inn is not his private house, and that he must groan more softly; but do not mention my name. And let him have his brine bath, or there will be no peace for anyone."

Maignan and La Trape, who knew me, and had counted on a very different order, stared at me, wondering at my easiness and complaisance; for there is a species of tyranny, unassociated with rank, that even the coarsest view with indignation. But the woman's statement, which, despite its wildness and her excitement, I saw no reason to doubt, had suggested to me a scheme of punishment more refined; and which might, at one and the same time, be of profit to the King's treasury and a lesson to Gringuet. To carry it through I had to submit to some inconvenience, and particularly to a night passed under the same roof with the rogue; but as the news that a traveller of consequence was come had the effect, aided by a few sharp words from Maignan, of lowering his tone, and forcing him to keep within bounds, I was able to endure this and overlook the occasional outbursts of spleen which his disease and pampered temper still drew from him.

His two men, who had been absent on an errand at the time of my arrival, presently returned, and were doubtless surprised to find a second company in possession. They tried my attendants with a number of questions, but without success; while I, by listening while I had my supper, learned more of their master's habits and intentions than they supposed. They suspected nothing, and at day-break we left them; and, the water having duly fallen in the night, we crossed the river without mishap, and for a league pursued our proper road. Then I halted, and despatching the two grooms to Houdan with a letter for my wife, I took, myself, the road to Le Mesnil, which lies about three leagues to the west.

At a little inn, a league short of Le Mesnil, I stopped, and instructing my two attendants in the parts they were to play, prepared, with the help of the seals, which never left Maignan's custody, the papers necessary to enable me to enact the role of Gringuet's deputy. Though I had been two or three times to Villebon, I had never been within two leagues of Le Mesnil, and had no reason to suppose that I should be recognised; but to lessen the probability of this I put on a plain suit belonging to Maignan, with a black-hilted sword, and no ornaments. I furthermore waited to enter the town until evening, so that my presence, being reported, might be taken for granted before I was seen.

In a larger place my scheme must have miscarried, but in this little town on the hill, looking over the plain of vineyards and cornfields, with inn, market-house, and church in the square, and on the fourth side the open battlements, whence the towers of Chartres could be seen on a clear day, I looked to have to do only with small men, and saw no reason why it should fail.

Accordingly, riding up to the inn about sunset, I called, with an air, for the landlord. There were half-a-dozen loungers seated in a row on a bench before the door, and one of these went in to fetch him. When the host came out, with his apron twisted round his waist, I asked him if he had a room.

"Yes," he said, shading his eyes to look at me, "I have."

"Very well," I answered pompously, considering that I had just such an audience as I desired—by which I mean one that, without being too critical, would spread the news. "I am M. Gringuet's deputy, and I am here with authority to collect and remit, receive and give receipts for, his Majesty's taxes, tolls, and dues, now, or to be, due and owing. Therefore, my friend, I will trouble you to show me to my room."

I thought that this announcement would impress him as much as I desired; but, to my surprise, he only stared at me. "Eh!" he exclaimed at last, in a faltering tone, "M. Gringuet's deputy?"

"Yes," I said, dismounting somewhat impatiently; "he is ill with the gout and cannot come."

"And you—are his deputy?"

"I have said so."

Still he did not move to do my bidding, but continued to rub his bald head and stare at me as if I fascinated him. "Well, I am—I mean—I think we are full," he stammered at last, with his eyes like saucers.

I replied, with some impatience, that he had just said that he had a room; adding, that if I was not in it and comfortably settled before five minutes were up I would know the reason. I thought that this would settle the matter, whatever maggot had got into the man's head; and, in a way, it did so, for he begged my pardon hastily, and made way for me to enter, calling, at the same time, to a lad who was standing by, to attend to the horses. But when we were inside the door, instead of showing me through the kitchen to my room, he muttered something, and hurried away; leaving me to wonder what was amiss with him, and why the loungers outside, who had listened with all their ears to our conversation, had come in after us as far as they dared, and were regarding us with an odd mixture of suspicion and amusement.

The landlord remained long away, and seemed, from sounds that came to my ears, to be talking with someone in a distant room. At length, however, he returned, bearing a candle and followed by a serving-man. I asked him roughly why he had been so long, and began to rate him; but he took the words out of my mouth by his humility, and going before me through the kitchen—where his wife and two or three maids who were about the fire stopped to look at us, with the basting spoons in their hands—he opened a door which led again into the outer air.

"It is across the yard," he said apologetically, as he went before, and opening a second door, stood aside for us to enter. "But it is a good room, and, if you please, a fire shall be lighted. The shutters are closed," he continued, as we passed him, Maignan and La Trape carrying my baggage, "but they shall be opened. Hallo! Pierre! Pierre, there! Open these shut—"

On the word his voice rose—and broke; and in a moment the door, through which we had all passed unsuspecting, fell to with a crash behind us. Before we could move we heard the bars drop across it. A little before, La Trape had taken a candle from someone's hand to light me the better; and therefore we were not in darkness. But the light this gave only served to impress on us what the falling bars and the rising sound of voices outside had already told us—that we were outwitted! We were prisoners.

The room in which we stood, looking foolishly at one another, was a great barn-like chamber, with small windows high in the unplaistered walls. A long board set on trestles, and two or three stools placed round it—on the occasion, perhaps, of some recent festivity—had for a moment deceived us, and played the landlord's game.

In the first shock of the discovery, hearing the bars drop home, we stood gaping, and wondering what it meant. Then Maignan, with an oath, sprang to the door and tried it—fruitlessly.

I joined him more at my leisure, and raising my voice, asked angrily what this folly meant. "Open the door there! Do you hear, landlord?" I cried.

No one moved, though Maignan continued to rattle the door furiously.

"Do you hear?" I repeated, between anger and amazement at the fix in which we had placed ourselves. "Open!"

But, although the murmur of voices outside the door grew louder, no one answered, and I had time to take in the full absurdity of the position; to measure the height; of the windows with my eye and plumb the dark shadows under the rafters, where the feebler rays of our candle lost themselves; to appreciate, in a word, the extent of our predicament. Maignan was furious, La Trape vicious, while my own equanimity scarcely supported me against the thought that we should probably be where we were until the arrival of my people, whom I had directed my wife to send to Le Mesnil at noon next day. Their coming would free us, indeed, but at the cost of ridicule and laughter. Never was man worse placed.

Wincing at the thought, I bade Maignan be silent; and, drumming on the door myself, I called for the landlord. Someone who had been giving directions in a tone of great, consequence ceased speaking, and came close to the door. After listening a moment, he struck it with his hand.

"Silence, rogues!" he cried. "Do you hear? Silence there, unless you want your ears nailed to the post."

"Fool!" I answered. "Open the door instantly! Are you all mad here, that you shut up the King's servants in this way?"

"The King's servants!" he cried, jeering at us. "Where are they?"

"Here!" I answered, swallowing my rage as well as I might. "I am M. Gringuet's deputy, and if you do not this instant—"

"M. Gringuet's deputy! Ho! ho!" he said. "Why, you fool, M. Gringuet's deputy arrived two hours before you. You must get up a little earlier another time. They are poor tricksters who are too late for the fair. And now be silent, and it may save you a stripe or two to-morrow."

There are situations in which even the greatest find it hard to maintain their dignity, and this was one. I looked at Maignan and La Trape, and they at me, and by the light of the lanthorn which the latter held I saw that they were smiling, doubtless at the dilemma in which we had innocently placed ourselves. But I found nothing to laugh at in the position; since the people outside might at any moment leave us where we were to fast until morning; and, after a moment's reflection, I called out to know who the speaker on the other side was.

"I am M. de Fonvelle," he answered.

"Well, M. de Fonvelle," I replied, "I advise you to have a care what you do. I am M. Gringuet's deputy. The other man is an impostor."

He laughed.

"He has no papers," I cried.

"Oh, yes, he has!" he answered, mocking me. "M. Curtin has seen them, my fine fellow, and he is not one to pay money without warrant."

At this several laughed, and a quavering voice chimed in with "Oh, yes, he has papers! I have seen them. Still, in a case—"

"There!" M. Fonvelle cried, drowning the other's words. "Now are you satisfied—you in there?"

But M. Curtin had not done. "He has papers," he piped again in his thin voice.

"Still, M. de Fonvelle, it is well to be cautious, and—"

"Tut, tut! it is all right."

"He has papers, but he has no authority!" I shouted.

"He has seals," Fonvelle answered. "It is all right."

"It is all wrong!" I retorted. "Wrong, I say! Go to your man, and you will find him gone—gone with your money, M. Curtin."

Two or three laughed, but I heard the sound of feet hurrying away, and I guessed that Curtin had retired to satisfy himself. Nevertheless, the moment which followed was an anxious one, since, if my random shot missed, I knew that I should find myself in a worse position than before. But judging—from the fact that the deputy had not confronted us himself—that he was an impostor, to whom Gringuet's illness had suggested the scheme on which I had myself hit, I hoped for the best; and, to be sure, in a moment an outcry arose in the house and quickly spread. Of those at the door, some cried to their fellows to hearken, while others hastened off to see. Yet still a little time elapsed, during which I burned with impatience; and then the crowd came trampling back, all wrangling and speaking at once.

At the door the chattering ceased, and, a hand being laid on the bar, in a moment the door was thrown open, and I walked out with what dignity I might. Outside, the scene which met my eyes might have been, under other circumstances, diverting. Before me stood the landlord of the inn, bowing with a light in each hand, as if the more he bent his backbone the more he must propitiate me; while a fat, middle-aged man at his elbow, whom I took to be Fonvelle, smiled feebly at me with a chapfallen expression. A little aside, Curtin, a shrivelled old fellow, was wringing his hands over his loss; and behind and round these, peeping over their shoulders and staring under their arms, clustered a curious crowd of busybodies, who, between amusement at the joke and awe of the great men, had much ado to control their merriment.

The host began to mutter apologies, but I cut him short. "I will talk to you to-morrow!" I said, in a voice which made him shake in his shoes. "Now give me supper, lights, and a room—and hurry. For you, M. Fonvelle, you are an ass! And for the gentleman there, who has filled the rogue's purse, he will do well another time to pay the King his dues!"

With that I left the two—Fonvelle purple with indignation, and Curtin with eyes and mouth agape and tears stayed—and followed my host to his best room, Maignan and La Trape attending me with very grim faces. Here the landlord would have repeated his apologies, but my thoughts beginning to revert to the purpose which had brought me hither, I affected to be offended, that, by keeping all at a distance, I might the more easily preserve my character.

I succeeded so well that, though half the town, through which the news of my adventure had spread, as fire spreads in tinder, were assembled outside the inn until a late hour, no one was admitted to see me; and when I made my appearance next morning in the market-place and took my seat, with my two attendants, at a table by the corn-measures, this reserve had so far impressed the people that the smiles which greeted me scarcely exceeded those which commonly welcome a tax-collector. Some had paid, and, foreseeing the necessity of paying again, found little that was diverting in the jest. Others thought it no laughing matter to pay once; and a few had come as ill out of the adventure as I had. Under these circumstances, we quickly settled to work, no one entertaining the slightest suspicion; and La Trape, who could accommodate himself to anything, playing the part of clerk, I was presently receiving money and hearing excuses; the minute acquaintance with the routine of the finances, which I had made it my business to acquire, rendering the work easy to me.

We had not been long engaged, however, when Fonvelle put in an appearance, and elbowing the peasants aside, begged to speak with me apart. I rose and stepped back with him two or three paces; on which he winked at me in a very knowing fashion, "I am M. de Fonvelle," he said. And he winked again.

"Ah!" I said.

"My name is not in your list."

"I find it there," I replied, raising a hand to my ear.

"Tut, tut! you do not understand," he muttered. "Has not Gringuet told you?"

"What?" I said, pretending to be a little deaf.

"Has not—"

I shook my head.

"Has not Gringuet told you?" he repeated, reddening with anger; and this time speaking, on compulsion, so loudly that the peasants could hear him.

I answered him in the same tone. "Yes," I said roundly. "He has told me; of course, that every year you give him two hundred livres to omit your name."

He glanced behind him with an oath. "Man, are you mad?" he gasped, his jaw falling. "They will hear you."

"Yes," I said loudly, "I mean them to hear me."

I do not know what he thought of this—perhaps that I was mad—but he staggered back from me, and looked wildly round. Finding everyone laughing, he looked again at me, but still failed to understand; on which, with another oath, he turned on his heel, and forcing his way through the grinning crowd, was out of sight in a moment.

I was about to return to my seat, when a pursy, pale-faced man, with small eyes and a heavy jowl, whom I had before noticed, pushed his way through the line, and came to me. Though his neighbours were all laughing he was sober, and in a moment I understood why.

"I am very deaf," he said in a whisper. "My name, Monsieur, is Philippon. I am a—"

I made a sign to him that I could not hear.

"I am the silk merchant," he continued pretty audibly, but with a suspicious glance behind him. "Probably you have—"

Again I signed to him that I could not hear.

"You have heard of me?"

"From M. Gringuet?" I said very loudly.

"Yes," he answered in a similar tone; for, aware that deaf persons cannot hear their own voices and are seldom able to judge how loudly they are speaking, I had led him to this. "And I suppose that you will do as he did?"

"How?" I asked. "In what way?"

He touched his pocket with a stealthy gesture, unseen by the people behind him.

Again I made a sign as if I could not hear.

"Take the usual little gift?" he said, finding himself compelled to speak.

"I cannot hear a word," I bellowed. By this time the crowd were shaking with laughter.

"Accept the usual gift?" he said, his fat, pale face perspiring, and his little pig's eyes regarding me balefully.

"And let you pay one quarter?" I said.

"Yes," he answered.

But this, and the simplicity with which he said it, drew so loud a roar of laughter from the crowd as penetrated even to his dulled senses. Turning abruptly, as if a bee had stung him, he found the place convulsed with merriment; and perceiving, in an instant, that I had played upon him, though he could not understand how or why, he glared about him a moment, muttered something which I could not catch, and staggered away with the gait of a drunken man.

After this, it was useless to suppose that I could amuse myself with others. The crowd, which had never dreamed of such a tax-collector, and could scarcely believe either eyes or ears, hesitated to come forward even to pay; and I was considering what I should do next, when a commotion in one corner of the square drew my eyes to that quarter. I looked and saw at first only Curtin. Then, the crowd dividing and making way for him, I perceived that he had the real Gringuet with him—Gringuet, who rode through the market with an air of grim majesty, with one foot in a huge slipper and eyes glaring with ill-temper.

Doubtless Curtin, going to him on the chance of hearing something of the rogue who had cheated him, had apprised the tax-collector of the whole matter; for on seeing me in my chair of state, he merely grinned in a vicious way, and cried to the nearest not to let me escape. "We have lost one rogue, but we will hang the other," he said. And while the townsfolk stood dumbfounded round us, he slipped with a groan from his horse, and bade his two servants seize me.

"And do you," he called to the host, "see that you help, my man! You have harboured him, and you shall pay for it if he escapes."

With that he hopped a step nearer; and then, not dreaming of resistance, sank with another groan—for his foot was immensely swollen by the journey—into the chair from which I had risen.

A glance showed me that, if I would not be drawn into an unseemly brawl, I must act; and meeting Maignan's eager eye fixed upon my face, I nodded. In a second he seized the unsuspecting Gringuet by the neck, snatched him up from the chair, and flung him half-a-dozen paces away. "Lie there," he cried, "you insolent rascal! Who told you to sit before your betters?"

The violence of the action, and Maignan's heat, were such that the nearest drew back affrighted; and even Gringuet's servants recoiled, while the market people gasped with astonishment. But I knew that the respite would last a moment only, and I stood forward. "Arrest that man," I said, pointing to the collector, who was grovelling on the ground, nursing his foot and shrieking foul threats at us.

In a second my two men stood over him. "In the King's name," La Trape cried; "let no man interfere."

"Raise him up," I continued, "and set him before me; and Curtin also, and Fonvelle, and Philippon; and Lescaut, the corn-dealer, if he is here."

I spoke boldly, but I felt some misgiving. So mighty, however, is the habit of command, that the crowd, far from resisting, thrust forward the men I named. Still, I could not count on this obedience, and it was with pleasure that I saw at this moment, as I looked over the heads of the crowd, a body of horsemen entering the square. They halted an instant, looking at the unusual concourse; while the townsfolk, interrupted in the middle of the drama, knew not which way to stare. Then Boisrueil, seeing me, and that I was holding some sort of court, spurred his horse through the press, and saluted me.

"Let half-a-dozen of your varlets dismount and guard these men," I said; "and do you, you rogue," I continued, addressing Gringuet, "answer me, and tell me the truth. How much does each of these knaves give you to cheat the King, and your master? Curtin first. How much does he give you?"

"My lord," he answered, pale and shaking, yet with a mutinous gleam in his eyes, "I have a right to know first before whom I stand."

"Enough," I thundered, "that it is before one who has the right to question you! answer me, villain, and be quick. What is the sum of Curtin's bribe?"

He stood white and mute.

"Fonvelle's?"

Still he stood silent, glaring with the devil in his eyes; while the other men whimpered and protested their innocence, and the crowd stared as if they could never see enough.

"Philippon's?"

"I take no bribes," he muttered.

"Lescaut's?"

"Not a denier."

"Liar!" I exclaimed. "Liar, who devour widows' houses and poor men's corn! Who grind the weak and say it is the King; and let the rich go free. Answer me, and answer the truth. How much do these men give you?"

"Nothing," he said defiantly.

"Very well," I answered; "then I will have the list. It is in your shoe."

"I have no list," he said, beginning to tremble.

"It is in your shoe," I repeated, pointing to his gouty foot. "Maignan, off with his shoe, and look in it."

Disregarding his shrieks of pain, they tore it off and looked in it. There was no list.

"Off with his stocking," I said roundly.

"It is there."

He flung himself down at that, cursing and protesting by turns. But I remembered the trampled corn, and the girl's bleeding face, and I was inexorable. The stocking was drawn off, not too tenderly, and turned inside out. Still no list was found.

"He has it," I persisted. "We have tried the shoe and we have tried the stocking, now we must try the foot. Fetch a stirrup-leather, and do you hold him, and let one of the grooms give him a dozen on that foot."

But at that he gave way; he flung himself on his knees, screaming for mercy.

"The list!" I said,

"I have no list! I have none!" he wailed.

"Then give it me out of your head. Curtin, how much?"

He glanced at the man I named, and shivered, and for a moment was silent. But one of the grooms approaching with the stirrup-leather, he found his voice. "Forty crowns," he muttered.

"Fonvelle?"

"The same."

I made him confess also the sums which he had received from Lescaut and Philippon, and then the names of seven others who had been in the habit of bribing him. Satisfied that he had so far told the truth, I bade him put on his stocking and shoe. "And now," I said to Boisrueil, when this was done, "take him to the whipping-post there, and tie him up; and see that each man of the eleven gives him a stripe for every crown with which he has bribed him—and good ones, or I will have them tied up in his place. Do you hear, you rascals?" I continued to the trembling culprits. "Off, and do your duty, or I will have your backs bare."

But the wretch, as cowardly as he had been cruel, flung himself down and crawled, sobbing and crying, to my feet. I had no mercy, however. "Take him away," I said, "It is such men as these give kings a bad name. Take him away, and see you flay him well."

He sprang up then, forgetting his gout, and made a frantic attempt to escape. But in a moment he was overcome, hauled away, and tied up; and though I did not wait to see the sentence carried out, but entered the inn, the shrill screams he uttered under the punishment reached me, even there, and satisfied me that Fonvelle and his fellows were not; holding their hands.

It is a sad reflection, however, that for one such sinner brought to justice ten, who commit the same crimes, go free, and flourishing on iniquity, bring the King's service, and his officers, into evil repute.



XI.

THE CAT AND THE KING.

It was in the spring of the year 1609 that at the King's instance I had a suite of apartments fitted up for him at the Arsenal, that he might visit me, whenever it pleased him, without putting my family to inconvenience; in another place will be found an account of the six thousand crowns a year which he was so obliging as to allow me for this purpose. He honoured me by using these rooms, which consisted of a hall, a chamber, a wardrobe, and a closet, two or three times in the course of that year, availing himself of my attendants and cook; and the free opportunities of consulting me on the Great Undertaking, which this plan afforded, led me to hope that notwithstanding the envy of my detractors, he would continue to adopt it. That he did not do so, nor ever visited me after the close of that year, was due not so much to the lamentable event, soon to be related, which within a few months deprived France of her greatest sovereign, as to a strange matter that attended his last stay with me. I have since had cause to think that this did not receive at the time as much attention as it deserved; and have even imagined that had I groped a little deeper into the mystery I might have found a clue to the future as well as the past, and averted one more, and the last, danger from my beloved master. But Providence would not have it so; a slight indisposition under which I was suffering at the time rendered me less able, both in mind and body; the result being that Henry, who was always averse to the publication of these ominous episodes, and held that being known they bred the like in mischievous minds, had his way, the case ending in no more than the punishment of a careless rascal.

On the occasion of this last visit—the third, I think, that he paid me—the King, who had been staying at Chantilly, came to me from Lusarche, where he lay the intervening night. My coaches went to meet him at the gates a little before noon, but he did not immediately arrive, and being at leisure and having assured myself that the dinner of twelve covers, which he had directed to be ready, was in course of preparation, I went with my wife to inspect his rooms and satisfy myself that everything was in order.

They were in charge of La Trape, a man of address and intelligence, whom I have had cause to mention more than once in the course of these memoirs. He met me at the door and conducted us through the rooms with an air of satisfaction; nor could I find the slightest fault, until my wife, looking about her with a woman's eye for minute things, paused by the bed in the chamber, and directed my attention to something on the floor.

She stooped over it. "What is this?" she asked. "Has something been—"

"Upset here?" I said, looking also. There was a little pool of white liquid on the floor beside the bed.

La Trape uttered an exclamation of annoyance, and explained that he had not seen it before; that it had not been there five minutes earlier; and that he did not know how it came to be there now.

"What is it?" I said, looking about for some pitcher that might; have overflowed; but finding none. "Is it milk?"

"I don't know, your excellency," he answered. "But it shall be removed at once."

"See that it is," I said. "Are the boughs in the fire-place fresh?" For the weather was still warm and we had not lit a fire.

"Yes, your excellency; quite fresh."

"Well, see to that, and remove it," I said, pointing to the mess. "It looks ill."

And with that the matter passed from my mind; the more completely as I heard at that moment the sound of the King's approach, and went into the court-yard to receive him. He brought with him Roquelaure, de Vic, Erard the engineer, and some others, but none whom he did not know that I should be glad to receive. He dined well, and after dinner amused himself with seeing the young men ride at the ring, and even rode a course himself with his usual skill; that being, if I remember rightly, the last occasion on which I ever saw him take a lance. Before supper he walked for a time in the hall, with Sillery, for whom he had sent; and after supper, pronouncing himself tired, he dismissed all, and retired with me to his chamber. Here we had some talk on a subject that I greatly dreaded—I mean his infatuation for Madame de Conde; but about eleven o'clock he yawned, and, after thanking me for a reception which he said was quite to his mind, he bade me go to bed.

I was half way to the door when he called me back. "Why, Grand Master," he said, pointing to the little table by the head of the bed on which his night drinks stood, "you might be going to drown me. Do you expect me to drink all these in the night?"

"I think that there is only your posset, sire," I said, "and the lemon-water which you generally drink."

"And two or three other things?"

"Perhaps they have given your majesty some of the Arbois wine that you were good enough to—"

"Tut-tut!" he said, lifting the cover of one of the cups. "This is not wine. It may be a milk-posset."

"Yes, sire; very likely," I said drowsily.

"But it is not!" he answered, when he had smelled it. "It is plain milk! Come, my friend," he continued, looking drolly at me, "have you turned leech, or I babe is arms that you put such strong liquors before me? However, to show you that I have some childish tastes left, and am not so depraved as you have been trying to make me out for the last hour—I will drink your health in it. It would serve you right if I made you pledge me in the same liquor!"

The cup was at his lips when I sprang forward and, heedless of ceremony, caught his arm. "Pardon, sire!" I cried, in sudden agitation. "If that is milk, I gave no order that it should be placed here; and I know nothing of its origin. I beg that you will not drink it, until I have made some inquiry."

"They have all been tasted?" he asked, still holding the cup in his hand with the lid raised, but looking at it gravely.

"They should have been!" I answered. "But La Trape, whom I made answerable for that, is outside. I will go and question him. If you will wait, sire, a moment—"

"No," Henry said. "Have him here."

I gave the order to the pages who were waiting outside, and in a moment La Trape appeared, looking startled and uncomfortable. Naturally, his first glance was given to the King, who had taken his seat on the edge of the bed, but still held the cup in his hand. After asking the King's permission, I said, "What drinks did you place on the table, here, sirrah?"

He looked more uncomfortable at this, but he answered boldly enough that he had served a posset, some lemon water, and some milk.

"But orders were given only for the lemon-water and the posset," I said.

"True, your excellency," he answered. "But when I went to the pantry hatch, to see the under-butler carry up the tray, I found that the milk was on the tray; and I supposed that you had given another order."

"Possibly Madame de Sully," the King said, looking at me, "gave the order to add it?"

"She would not presume to do so, sire," I answered, sternly. "Nor do I in the least understand the matter. But at one thing we can easily arrive. You tasted all of these, man?"

La Trape said he had.

"You drank a quantity, a substantial quantity of each—according to the orders given to you? I persisted.

"Yes, your excellency."

But I caught a guilty look in his eyes, and in a gust of rage I cried out that he lied. "The truth!" I thundered, in a terrible voice. "The truth, you villain; you did not taste all?"

"I did, your excellency; as God is above, I did!" he answered. But he had grown pale, and he looked at the King in a terrified way.

"You did?"

"Yes!"

Yet I did not believe him, and I was about to give him the lie again, when the King intervened. "Quite so," he said to La Trape with a smile. "You drank, my good fellow, of the posset and the lemon water, and you tasted the milk, but you did not drink of it. Is not that the whole truth?"

"Yes, sire," he whimpered, breaking down. "But I—I gave some to a cat."

"And the cat is no worse?"

"No, sire."

"There, Grand Master," the King said, turning to me, "that is the truth, I think. What do you say to it?"

"That the rest is simple," I answered, grimly. "He did not drink it before; but he will drink it now, sire."

The King, sitting on the bed, laughed and looked at La Trape; as if his good-nature almost led him to interpose. But after a moment's hesitation he thought better of it, and handed me the cup. "Very well," he said; "he is your man. Have your way with him. After all, he should have drunk it."

"He shall drink it now, or be broken on the wheel!" I said. "Do you hear, you?" I continued, turning to him in a white heat of rage at the thought of his negligence, and the price it might have cost me. "Take it, and beware that you do not drop or spill it. For I swear that that shall not save you!"

He took the cup with a pale face, and hands that shook so much that he needed both to support the vessel. He hesitated, too, so long that, had I not possessed the best of reasons for believing in his fidelity, I should have suspected him of more than negligence. The shadow of his tall figure seemed to waver on the tapestry behind him; and with a little imagination I might have thought that the lights in the room had sunk. The soft whispering of the pages outside could be heard, and a stifled laugh; but inside there was not a sound. He carried the cup to his lips; then he lowered it again.

I took a step forward.

He recoiled a pace, his face ghastly. "Patience, excellency," he said, hoarsely. "I shall drink it. But I want to speak first."

"Speak!" the King answered.

"If there is death in it, I take God to witness that I know nothing, and knew nothing! There is some witch's work here it is not the first time that I have come across this devil's milk to-day! But I take God to witness I know nothing! Now it is here I will drink it, and—"

He did not finish the sentence, but drawing a deep breath raised the cup to his lips. I saw the apple in his throat rise and fall with the effort he made to swallow, but he drank so slowly that it seemed to me that he would never drain the cap. Nor did he, for when he had swallowed, as far as I could judge from the tilting of the cup, about half of the milk, Henry rose suddenly and, seizing it, took it from him with his own hand.

"That will do," the King said. "Do you feel ill?"

La Trape drew a trembling hand across his brow, on which the sweat stood in beads; but instead of answering he remained silent, gazing fixedly before him. We waited and watched, and at length, when I should think three minutes had elapsed, he changed his position for one of greater ease, and I saw his face relax. The unnatural pallor faded, and the open lips closed. A minute later he spoke. "I feel nothing, sire," he said.

The King looked at me drolly. "Then take five minutes more," he said. "Go, and stare at Judith there, cutting off the head of Holofernes"—for that was the story of the tapestry—"and come when I call you."

La Trape went to the other end of the chamber. "Well," the King said, inviting me by a sign to sit down beside him, "is it a comedy or a tragedy, my friend? Or, tell me, what was it he meant when he said that about the other milk?"

I explained, the matter seeming so trivial now that I came to tell it—though it; had doubtless contributed much to La Trape's fright—that I had to apologize.

"Still it is odd," the King said. "These drinks were not here, at that time, of course?"

"No, sire; they have been brought up within the hour."

"Well, your butler must explain it." And with that he raised his voice and called La Trape back; who came, looking red and sheepish.

"Not dead yet?" the King said.

"No, sire."

"Nor ill?"

"No, sire."

"Then begone. Or, stay!" Henry continued. "Throw the rest of this stuff into the fire-place. It may be harmless, but I have no mind to drink it by mistake."

La Trape emptied the cup among the green boughs that filled the hearth, and hastened to withdraw. It seemed to be too late to make further inquiries that night; so after listening to two or three explanations which the King hazarded, but which had all too fanciful an air in my eyes, I took my leave and retired.

Whether, however, the scene had raised too violent a commotion in my mind, or I was already sickening for the illness I have mentioned, I found it impossible to sleep; and spent the greater part of the night in a fever of fears and forebodings. The responsibility which the King's presence cast upon me lay so heavily upon my waking mind that I could not lie; and long before the King's usual hour of rising I was at his door inquiring how he did. No one knew, for the page whose turn it was to sleep at his feet had not come out; but while I stood questioning, the King's voice was heard, bidding me enter. I went in, and found him sitting up with a haggard face, which told me, before he spoke, that he had slept little better than I had. The shutters were thrown wide open, and the cold morning light poured into the room with an effect rather sombre than bright; the huge figures on the tapestry looming huger from a drab and melancholy background, and the chamber presenting all those features of disorder that in a sleeping-room lie hid at night, only to show themselves in a more vivid shape in the morning.

The King sent his page out, and bade me sit by him. "I have had a bad night," he said, with a shudder. "Grand Master, I doubt that astrologer was right, and I shall never see Germany, nor carry out my designs."

Seeing the state in which he was, I could think of nothing better than to rally him, and even laugh at him. "You think so now, sire," I said. "It is the cold hour. By and by, when you have broken your fast, you will think differently."

"But, it may be, less correctly," he answered; and as he sat looking before him with gloomy eyes, he heaved a deep sigh. "My friend," he said, mournfully, "I want to live, and I am going to die."

"Of what?" I asked, gaily.

"I do not know; but I dreamed last night that a house fell on me in the Rue de la Ferronerie, and I cannot help thinking that I shall die in that way."

"Very well," I said. "It is well to know that."

He asked me peevishly what I meant.

"Only," I explained, "that, in that case, as your Majesty need never pass through that street, you have it in your hands to live for ever."

"Perhaps it may not happen there—in that very street," he answered.

"And perhaps it may not happen yet," I rejoined. And then, more seriously, "Come, sire," I continued, "why this sudden weakness? I have known you face death a hundred times."

"But not after such a dream as I had last night," he said, with a grimace—yet I could see that he was already comforted. "I thought that I was passing along that street in my coach, and on a sudden, between St. Innocent's church and the notary's—there is a notary's there?"

"Yes, sire," I said, somewhat surprised.

"I heard a great roar, and something struck me down, and I found myself pinned to the ground, in darkness, with my mouth full of dust, and an immense beam on my chest. I lay for a time in agony, fighting for breath, and then my brain seemed to burst in my head, and I awoke."

"I have had such a dream, sire," I said, drily.

"Last night?"

"No," I said, "not last night."

He saw what I meant, and laughed; and being by this time quite himself, left that and passed to discussing the strange affair of La Trape and the milk. "Have you found, as yet, who was good enough to supply it?" he asked.

"No, sire," I answered. "But I will see La Trape, and as soon as I have learned anything, your majesty shall know it."

"I suppose he is not far off now," he suggested. "Send for him. Ten to one he will have made inquiries, and it will amuse us."

I went to the door and, opening it a trifle, bade the page who waited send La Trape. He passed on the message to a crowd of sleepy attendants, and quickly, but not before I had gone back to the King's bedside, La Trape entered.

Having my eyes turned the other way, I did not at once remark anything. But the King did; and his look of astonishment, no less than the exclamation which accompanied it, arrested my attention. "St. Gris, man!" he cried. "What is the matter? Speak!"

La Trape, who had stopped just within the door, made an effort to do so, but no sound passed his lips; while his pallor and the fixed glare of his eyes filled me with the worst apprehensions. It was impossible to look at him and not share his fright, and I stepped forward and cried out to him to speak. "Answer the King, man," I said. "What is it?"

He made an effort, and with a ghastly grimace, "The cat is dead!" he said.

For a moment we were all silent. Then I looked at the King, and he at me, with gloomy meaning in our eyes. He was the first to speak. "The cat to whom you gave the milk?" he said.

"Yes, sire," La Trape answered, in a voice that seemed to come from his heart.

"But still, courage!" the King cried. "Courage, man! A dose that would kill a cat may not kill a man. Do you feel ill?"

"Oh, yes, sire," La Trape moaned.

"What do you feel?"

"I have a trembling in all my limbs, and ah—ah, my God, I am a dead man! I have a burning here—a pain like hot coals in my vitals!" And, leaning against the wall, the unfortunate man clasped his arms round his body and bent himself up and down in a paroxysm of suffering.

"A doctor! a doctor!" Henry cried, thrusting one leg out of bed. "Send for Du Laurens!" Then, as I went to the door to do so, "Can you be sick, man?" he asked. "Try!"

"No, no; it is impossible!"

"But try, try! when did this cat die?"

"It is outside," La Trape groaned. He could say no more.

I had opened the door by this time, and found the attendants, whom the man's cries had alarmed, in a cluster round it. Silencing them sternly, I bade one go for M. Du Laurens, the King's physician, while another brought me the cat that was dead.

The page who had spent the night in the King's chamber, fetched it. I told him to bring it in, and ordering the others to let the doctor pass when he arrived, I closed the door upon their curiosity, and went back to the King. He had left his bed and was standing near La Trape, endeavouring to hearten him; now telling him to tickle his throat with a feather, and now watching his sufferings in silence, with a face of gloom and despondency that sufficiently betrayed his reflections. At sight of the page, however, carrying the dead cat, he turned briskly, and we both examined the beast which, already rigid, with staring eyes and uncovered teeth, was not a sight to cheer anyone, much less the stricken man. La Trape, however, seemed to be scarcely aware of its presence. He had sunk upon a chest which stood against the wall, and, with his body strangely twisted, was muttering prayers, while he rocked himself to and fro unceasingly.

"It's stiff," the King said in a low voice. "It has been dead some hours."

"Since midnight," I muttered.

"Pardon, sire," the page, who was holding the cat, said; "I saw it after midnight. It was alive then."