"'C'est dans la ville de Rouen, Ils ont fait un pate si grand, Ils ont fait un pate si grand, Qu'ils ont trouve un homme dedans!'"

Maitre Guillot would fain have been nearer, to share in the shouting and clapping of hands which followed the saying of grace by the good Cure of St. Foye, and to see how vigorously knives were handled, and how chins wagged in the delightful task of levelling down mountains of meat, while Gascon wine and Norman cider flowed from ever-replenished flagons.

The Bourgeois and his son, with many of his chief guests, honored for a time the merry feast out-of-doors, and were almost inundated by the flowing cups drunk to the health and happiness of the Bourgeois and of Pierre Philibert.

Maitre Guillot Gobet returned to his kitchen, where he stirred up his cooks and scullions on all sides, to make up for the loss of his Easter pies on the grand tables in the hall. He capered among them like a marionette, directing here, scolding there, laughing, joking, or with uplifted hands and stamping feet despairing of his underlings' cooking a dinner fit for the fete of Pierre Philibert.

Maitre Guilot was a little, fat, red-nosed fellow, with twinkling black eyes, and a mouth irascible as that of a cake-baker of Lerna. His heart was of the right paste, however, and full as a butter-boat of the sweet sauce of good nature, which he was ready to pour over the heads of all his fellows who quietly submitted to his dictation. But woe to man or maid servant who delayed or disputed his royal orders! An Indian typhoon instantly blew. At such a time even Dame Rochelle would gather her petticoats round her and hurry out of the storm, which always subsided quickly in proportion to the violence of its rage.

Maitre Guillot knew what he was about, however. He did not use, he said, to wipe his nose with a herring! and on that day he was going to cook a dinner fit for the Pope after Lent, or even for the Reverend Father De Berey himself, who was the truest gourmet and the best trencherman in New France.

Maitre Guillot honored his master, but in his secret soul he did not think his taste quite worthy of his cook! But he worshipped Father De Berey, and gloried in the infallible judgment and correct taste of cookery possessed by the jolly Recollet. The single approbation of Father De Berey was worth more than the praise of a world full of ordinary eating mortals, who smacked their lips and said things were good, but who knew no more than one of the Cent Suisses why things were good, or could appreciate the talents of an artiste of the cordon bleu.

Maitre Guillot's Easter pie had been a splendid success. "It was worthy," he said, "to be placed as a crown on top of the new Cathedral of St. Marie, and receive the consecration of the Bishop."

Lest the composition of it should be forgotten, Maitre Guillot had, with the solemnity of a deacon intoning the Litany, ravished the ear of Jules Painchaud, his future son-in-law, as he taught him the secrets of its confection.

With his white cap set rakishly on one side of his head and arms akimbo, Maitre Guillot gave Jules the famous recipe:

"Inside of circular walls of pastry an inch thick, and so rich as easily to be pulled down, and roomy enough within for the Court of King Pepin, lay first a thick stratum of mince-meat of two savory hams of Westphalia, and if you cannot get them, of two hams of our habitans."

"Of our habitans!" ejaculated Jules, with an air of consternation.

"Precisely! don't interrupt me!" Maitre Guillot grew red about the gills in an instant. Jules was silenced. "I have said it!" cried he; "two hams of our habitans! what have you to say against it—stock fish, eh?"

"Oh, nothing, sir," replied Jules, with humility, "only I thought—" Poor Jules would have consented to eat his thought rather than fall out with the father of his Susette.

"You thought!" Maitre Guillot's face was a study for Hogarth, who alone could have painted the alto tone of voice as it proceeded from his round O of a mouth. "Susette shall remain upon my hands an old maid for the term of her natural life if you dispute the confection of Easter pie!"

"Now listen, Jules," continued he, at once mollified by the contrite, submissive air of his future son-in-law: "Upon the foundation of the mince-meat of two hams of Westphalia,—or, if you cannot get them, of two hams of our habitans,—place scientifically the nicely-cut pieces of a fat turkey, leaving his head to stick out of the upper crust, in evidence that Master Dindon lies buried there! Add two fat capons, two plump partridges, two pigeons, and the back and thighs of a brace of juicy hares. Fill up the whole with beaten eggs, and the rich contents will resemble, as a poet might say, 'fossils of the rock in golden yolks embedded and enjellied!' Season as you would a saint. Cover with a slab of pastry. Bake it as you would cook an angel, and not singe a feather. Then let it cool, and eat it! And then, Jules, as the Reverend Father de Berey always says after grace over an Easter pie, 'Dominus vobiscum!'"



CHAPTER XXI. SIC ITUR AD ASTRA.

The old hall of Belmont had been decorated for many a feast since the times of its founder, the Intendant Talon; but it had never contained a nobler company of fair women and brave men, the pick and choice of their race, than to-day met round the hospitable and splendid table of the Bourgeois Philibert in honor of the fete of his gallant son.

Dinner was duly and decorously despatched. The social fashion of New France was not for the ladies to withdraw when the wine followed the feast, but to remain seated with the gentlemen, purifying the conversation, and by their presence restraining the coarseness which was the almost universal vice of the age.

A troop of nimble servitors carried off the carved dishes and fragments of the splendid patisseries of Maitre Guillot, in such a state of demolition as satisfied the critical eye of the chief cook that the efforts of his genius had been very successful. He inspected the dishes through his spectacles. He knew, by what was left, the ability of the guests to discriminate what they had eaten and to do justice to his skill. He considered himself a sort of pervading divinity, whose culinary ideas passing with his cookery into the bodies of the guests enabled them, on retiring from the feast, to carry away as part of themselves some of the fine essence of Maitre Gobet himself.

At the head of his table, peeling oranges and slicing pineapples for the ladies in his vicinity, sat the Bourgeois himself, laughing, jesting, and telling anecdotes with a geniality that was contagious. "'The gods are merry sometimes,' says Homer, 'and their laughter shakes Olympus!'" was the classical remark of Father de Berey, at the other end of the table. Jupiter did not laugh with less loss of dignity than the Bourgeois.

Few of the guests did not remember to the end of their lives the majestic and happy countenance of the Bourgeois on this memorable day.

At his right hand sat Amelie de Repentigny and the Count de la Galissoniere. The Governor, charmed with the beauty and agreeableness of the young chatelaine, had led her in to dinner, and devoted himself to her and the Lady de Tilly with the perfection of gallantry of a gentleman of the politest court in Europe. On his left sat the radiant, dark-eyed Hortense de Beauharnais. With a gay assumption of independence Hortense had taken the arm of La Corne St. Luc, and declared she would eat no dinner unless he would be her cavalier and sit beside her! The gallant old soldier surrendered at discretion. He laughingly consented to be her captive, he said, for he had no power and no desire but to obey. Hortense was proud of her conquest. She seated herself by his side with an air of triumph and mock gravity, tapping him with her fan whenever she detected his eye roving round the table, compassionating, she affirmed, her rivals, who had failed where she had won in securing the youngest, the handsomest, and most gallant of all the gentlemen at Belmont.

"Not so fast, Hortense!" exclaimed the gay Chevalier; "you have captured me by mistake! The tall Swede—he is your man! The other ladies all know that, and are anxious to get me out of your toils, so that you may be free to ensnare the philosopher!"

"But you don't wish to get away from me! I am your garland, Chevalier, and you shall wear me to-day. As for the tall Swede, he has no idea of a fair flower of our sex except to wear it in his button-hole,—this way!" added she, pulling a rose out of a vase and archly adorning the Chevalier's vest with it.

"All pretence and jealousy, mademoiselle. The tall Swede knows how to take down your pride and bring you to a proper sense of your false conceit of the beauty and wit of the ladies of New France."

Hortense gave two or three tosses of defiance to express her emphatic dissent from his opinions.

"I wish Herr Kalm would lend me his philosophic scales, to weigh your sex like lambs in market," continued La Corne St. Luc; "but I fear I am too old, Hortense, to measure women except by the fathom, which is the measure of a man."

"And the measure of a man is the measure of an angel too scriptum est, Chevalier!" replied she. Hortense had ten merry meanings in her eye, and looked as if bidding him select which he chose. "The learned Swede's philosophy is lost upon me," continued she, "he can neither weigh by sample nor measure by fathom the girls of New France!" She tapped him on the arm. "Listen to me, chevalier," said she, "you are neglecting me already for sake of Cecile Tourangeau!" La Corne was exchanging some gay badinage with a graceful, pretty young lady on the other side of the table, whose snowy forehead, if you examined it closely, was marked with a red scar, in figure of a cross, which, although powdered and partially concealed by a frizz of her thick blonde hair, was sufficiently distinct to those who looked for it; and many did so, as they whispered to each other the story of how she got it.

Le Gardeur de Repentigny sat by Cecile, talking in a very sociable manner, which was also commented on. His conversation seemed to be very attractive to the young lady, who was visibly delighted with the attentions of her handsome gallant.

At this moment a burst of instruments from the musicians, who occupied a gallery at the end of the hall, announced a vocal response to the toast of the King's health, proposed by the Bourgeois. "Prepare yourself for the chorus, Chevalier," exclaimed Hortense. "Father de Berey is going to lead the royal anthem!"

"Vive le Roi!" replied La Corne. "No finer voice ever sang Mass, or chanted 'God Save the King!' I like to hear the royal anthem from the lips of a churchman rolling it out ore rotundo, like one of the Psalms of David. Our first duty is to love God,—our next to honor the King! and New France will never fail in either!" Loyalty was ingrained in every fibre of La Corne St. Luc.

"Never, Chevalier. Law and Gospel rule together, or fall together! But we must rise," replied Hortense, springing up.

The whole company rose simultaneously. The rich, mellow voice of the Rev. Father de Berey, round and full as the organ of Ste. Marie, commenced the royal anthem composed by Lulli in honor of Louis Quatorze, upon an occasion of his visit to the famous Convent of St. Cyr, in company with Madame de Maintenon.

The song composed by Madame Brinon was afterwards translated into English, and words and music became, by a singular transposition, the national hymn of the English nation.

"God Save the King!" is no longer heard in France. It was buried with the people's loyalty, fathoms deep under the ruins of the monarchy. But it flourishes still with pristine vigor in New France, that olive branch grafted on the stately tree of the British Empire. The broad chest and flexile lips of Father de Berey rang out the grand old song in tones that filled the stately old hall:

"'Grand Dieu! Sauvez le Roi! Grand Dieu! Sauvez le Roi! Sauvez le Roi! Que toujours glorieux. Louis Victorieux, Voye ses ennemis Toujours soumis!'"

The company all joined in the chorus, the gentlemen raising their cups, the ladies waving their handkerchiefs, and male and female blending in a storm of applause that made the old walls ring with joy. Songs and speeches followed in quick succession, cutting as with a golden blade the hours of the dessert into quinzaines of varied pleasures.

The custom of the times had reduced speechmaking after dinner to a minimum. The ladies, as Father de Berey wittily remarked, preferred private confession to public preaching; and long speeches, without inlets for reply, were the eighth mortal sin which no lady would forgive.

The Bourgeois, however, felt it incumbent upon himself to express his deep thanks for the honor done his house on this auspicious occasion. And he remarked that the doors of Belmont, so long closed by reason of the absence of Pierre, would hereafter be ever open to welcome all his friends. He had that day made a gift of Belmont, with all its belongings, to Pierre, and he hoped,—the Bourgeois smiled as he said this, but he would not look in a quarter where his words struck home,—he hoped that some one of Quebec's fair daughters would assist Pierre in the menage of his home and enable him to do honor to his housekeeping.

Immense was the applause that followed the short, pithy speech of the Bourgeois. The ladies blushed and praised, the gentlemen cheered and enjoyed in anticipation the renewal of the old hospitalities of Belmont.

"The skies are raining plum cakes!" exclaimed the Chevalier La Corne to his lively companion. "Joy's golden drops are only distilled in the alembic of woman's heart! What think you, Hortense? Which of Quebec's fair daughters will be willing to share Belmont with Pierre?"

"Oh, any of them would!" replied she. "But why did the Bourgeois restrict his choice to the ladies of Quebec, when he knew I came from the Three Rivers?"

"Oh, he was afraid of you, Hortense; you would make Belmont too good for this world! What say you, Father de Berry? Do you ever walk on the cape?"

The friar, in a merry mood, had been edging close to Hortense. "I love, of all things, to air my gray gown on the cape of a breezy afternoon," replied the jovial Recollet, "when the fashionables are all out, and every lady is putting her best foot foremost. It is then I feel sure that Horace is the next best thing to the Homilies:

"'Teretesque suras laudo, et integer ego!'"

The Chevalier La Corne pinched the shrugging shoulder of Hortense as he remarked, "Don't confess to Father de Berey that you promenade on the cape! But I hope Pierre Philibert will soon make his choice! We are impatient to visit him and give old Provencal the butler a run every day through those dark crypts of his, where lie entombed the choicest vintages of sunny France."

The Chevalier said this waggishly, for the benefit of old Provencal, who stood behind his chair looking half alarmed at the threatened raid upon his well-filled cellars.

"But if Pierre should not commit matrimony," replied Hortense, "what will become of him? and especially what will become of us?"

"We will drink his wine all the same, good fellow that he is! But Pierre had as lief commit suicide as not commit matrimony; and who would not? Look here, Pierre Philibert," continued the old soldier, addressing him, with good-humored freedom. "Matrimony is clearly your duty, Pierre; but I need not tell you so: it is written on your face plain as the way between Peronne and St. Quintin,—a good, honest way as ever was trod by shoe leather, and as old as Chinon in Touraine! Try it soon, my boy. Quebec is a sack full of pearls!" Hortense pulled him mischievously by the coat, so he caught her hand and held it fast in his, while he proceeded: "You put your hand in the sack and take out the first that offers. It will be worth a Jew's ransom! If you are lucky to find the fairest, trust me it will be the identical pearl of great price for which the merchant went and sold all that he had and bought it. Is not that Gospel, Father de Berey? I think I have heard something like that preached from the pulpit of the Recollets?"

"Matter of brimborion, Chevalier! not to be questioned by laymen! Words of wisdom for my poor brothers of St. Francis, who, after renouncing the world, like to know that they have renounced something worth having! But not to preach a sermon on your parable, Chevalier, I will promise Colonel Philibert that when he has found the pearl of great price,"—Father de Berey, who knew a world of secrets, glanced archly at Amelie as he said this,—"the bells of our monastery shall ring out such a merry peal as they have not rung since fat Brother Le Gros broke his wind, and short Brother Bref stretched himself out half a yard pulling the bell ropes on the wedding of the Dauphin."

Great merriment followed the speech of Father de Berey. Hortense rallied the Chevalier, a good old widower, upon himself not travelling the plain way between Peronne and St. Quintin, and jestingly offered herself to travel with him, like a couple of gypsies carrying their budget of happiness pick-a-back through the world.

"Better than that!" La Corne exclaimed. Hortense was worthy to ride on the baggage-wagons in his next campaign! Would she go? She gave him her hand. "I expect nothing else!" said she. "I am a soldier's daughter, and expect to live a soldier's wife, and die a soldier's widow. But a truce to jest. It is harder to be witty than wise," continued she. "What is the matter with Cousin Le Gardeur?" Her eyes were fixed upon him as he read a note just handed to him by a servant. He crushed it in his hand with a flash of anger, and made a motion as if about to tear it, but did not. He placed it in his bosom. But the hilarity of his countenance was gone.

There was another person at the table whose quick eye, drawn by sisterly affection, saw Le Gardeur's movement before even Hortense. Amelie was impatient to leave her seat and go beside him, but she could not at the moment leave the lively circle around her. She at once conjectured that the note was from Angelique des Meloises. After drinking deeply two or three times Le Gardeur arose, and with a faint excuse that did not impose on his partner left the table. Amelie rose quickly also, excusing herself to the Bourgeois, and joined her brother in the park, where the cool night air blew fresh and inviting for a walk.

Pretty Cecile Touraugeau had caught a glimpse of the handwriting as she sat by the side of Le Gardeur, and guessed correctly whence it had come and why her partner so suddenly left the table.

She was out of humor; the red mark upon her forehead grew redder as she pouted in visible discontent. But the great world moves on, carrying alternate storms and sunshine upon its surface. The company rose from the table—some to the ball-room, some to the park and conservatories. Cecile's was a happy disposition, easily consoled for her sorrows. Every trace of her displeasure was banished and almost forgotten from the moment the gay, handsome Jumonville de Villiers invited her out to the grand balcony, where, he said, the rarest pastime was going on.

And rare pastime it was! A group of laughing but half-serious girls were gathered round Doctor Gauthier, urging him to tell their fortunes by consulting the stars, which to-night shone out with unusual brilliancy.

At that period, as at the present, and in every age of the world, the female sex, like the Jews of old, asks signs, while the Greeks—that is, the men—seek wisdom.

The time never was, and never will be, when a woman will cease to be curious,—when her imagination will not forecast the decrees of fate in regard to the culminating event of her life and her whole nature—marriage. It was in vain Doctor Gauthier protested his inability to read the stars without his celestial eye-glasses.

The ladies would not accept his excuses: he knew the heavens by heart, they said, and could read the stars of destiny as easily as the Bishop his breviary.

In truth the worthy doctor was not only a believer but an adept in astrology. He had favored his friends with not a few horoscopes and nativities, when pressed to do so. His good nature was of the substance of butter: any one that liked could spread it over their bread. Many good men are eaten up in that way by greedy friends.

Hortense de Beauharnais urged the Doctor so merrily and so perseveringly, promising to marry him herself if the stars said so, that he laughingly gave way, but declared he would tell Hortense's fortune first, which deserved to be good enough to make her fulfil her promise just made.

She was resigned, she said, and would accept any fate from the rank of a queen to a cell among the old maids of St. Cyr! The girls of Quebec hung all their hopes on the stars, bright and particular ones especially. They were too loving to live single, and too proud to live poor. But she was one who would not wait for ships to land that never came, and plums to drop into her mouth that never ripened. Hortense would be ruled by the stars, and wise Doctor Gauthier should to-night declare her fate.

They all laughed at this free talk of Hortense. Not a few of the ladies shrugged their shoulders and looked askance at each other, but many present wished they had courage to speak like her to Doctor Gauthier.

"Well, I see there is nothing else for it but to submit to my ruling star, and that is you, Hortense!" cried the Doctor; "so please stand up before me while I take an inventory of your looks as a preliminary to telling your fortune."

Hortense placed herself instantly before him. "It is one of the privileges of our dry study," remarked he, as he looked admiringly on the tall, charming figure and frank countenance of the girl before him.

"The querent," said he gravely, "is tall, straight, slender, arms long, hands and feet of the smallest, hair just short of blackness, piercing, roving eyes, dark as night and full of fire, sight quick, and temperament alive with energy, wit, and sense."

"Oh, tell my fortune, not my character! I shall shame of energy, wit, and sense, if I hear such flattery, Doctor!" exclaimed she, shaking herself like a young eagle preparing to fly.

"We shall see what comes of it, Hortense!" replied he gravely, as with his gold-headed cane he slowly quartered the heavens like an ancient augur, and noted the planets in their houses. The doctor was quite serious, and even Hortense, catching his looks, stood very silent as he studied the celestial aspects,

"Carrying through ether in perpetual round Decrees and resolutions of the Gods."

"The Lord of the ascendant," said he, "is with the Lord of the seventh in the tenth house. The querent, therefore, shall marry the man made for her, but not the man of her youthful hope and her first love.

"The stars are true," continued he, speaking to himself rather than to her. "Jupiter in the seventh house denotes rank and dignity by marriage, and Mars in sextile foretells successful wars. It is wonderful, Hortense! The blood of Beauharnais shall sit on thrones more than one; it shall rule France, Italy, and Flanders, but not New France, for Saturn in quintile looks darkly upon the twins who rule America!"

"Come, Jumonville," exclaimed Hortense, "congratulate Claude on the greatness awaiting the house of Beauharnais, and condole with me that I am to see none of it myself! I do not care for kings and queens in the third generation, but I do care for happy fortune in the present for those I know and love! Come, Jumonville, have your fortune told now, to keep me in countenance. If the Doctor hits the truth for you I shall believe in him for myself."

"That is a good idea, Hortense," replied Jumonville; "I long ago hung my hat on the stars—let the Doctor try if he can find it."

The Doctor, in great good humor, surveyed the dark, handsome face and lithe, athletic figure of Jumonville de Villiers. He again raised his cane with the gravity of a Roman pontifex, marking off his templum in the heavens. Suddenly he stopped. He repeated more carefully his survey, and then turned his earnest eyes upon the young soldier.

"You see ill-fortune for me, Doctor!" exclaimed Jumonville, with bright, unflinching eyes, as he would look on danger of any kind.

"The Hyleg, or giver of life, is afflicted by Mars in the eighth house, and Saturn is in evil aspect in the ascendant!" said the Doctor slowly.

"That sounds warlike, and means fighting I suppose, Doctor. It is a brave fortune for a soldier. Go on!" Jumonville was in earnest now.

"The pars fortunae," continued the Doctor, gazing upward, "rejoices in a benign aspect with Venus. Fame, true love, and immortality will be yours, Jumonville de Villiers; but you will die young under the flag of your country and for sake of your King! You will not marry, but all the maids and matrons of New France will lament your fate with tears, and from your death shall spring up the salvation of your native land—how, I see not; but decretum est, Jumonville, ask me no more!"

A thrill like a stream of electricity passed through the company. Their mirth was extinguished, for none could wholly free their minds from the superstition of their age. The good Doctor sat down, and wiped his moistened eye-glasses. He would tell no more to-night, he said. He had really gone too far, making jest of earnest and earnest of jest, and begged pardon of Jumonville for complying with his humor.

The young soldier laughed merrily. "If fame, immortality, and true love are to be mine, what care I for death? It will be worth giving up life for, to have the tears of the maids and matrons of New France to lament your fate. What could the most ambitious soldier desire more?"

The words of Jumonville struck a kindred chord in the bosom of Hortense de Beauharnais. They were stamped upon her heart forever. A few years after this prediction, Jumonville de Villiers lay slain under a flag of truce on the bank of the Monongahela, and of all the maids and matrons of New France who wept over his fate, none shed more and bitterer tears than his fair betrothed bride, Hortense de Beauharnais.

The prediction of the Sieur Gauthier was repeated and retold as a strangely true tale; it passed into the traditions of the people, and lingered in their memory generations after the festival of Belmont was utterly forgotten.

When the great revolt took place in the English Colonies, the death of the gallant Jumonville de Villiers was neither forgotten nor forgiven by New France. Congress appealed in vain for union and help from Canadians. Washington's proclamations were trodden under foot, and his troops driven back or captured. If Canada was lost to France partly through the death of Jumonville, it may also be said that his blood helped to save it to England. The ways of Providence are so mysterious in working out the problems of national existence that the life or death of a single individual may turn the scales of destiny over half a continent.

But all these events lay as yet darkly in the womb of the future. The gallant Jumonville who fell, and his brother Coulon who took his "noble revenge" upon Washington by sparing his life, were to-day the gayest of the gay throng who had assembled to do honor to Pierre Philibert.

While this group of merry guests, half in jest, half in earnest, were trying to discover in the stars the "far-reaching concords" that moulded the life of each, Amelie led her brother away from the busy grounds near the mansion, and took a quiet path that led into the great park which they entered.

A cool salt-water breeze, following the flood tide that was coming up the broad St. Lawrence, swept their faces as Amelie walked by the side of Le Gardeur, talking in her quiet way of things familiar, and of home interests until she saw the fever of his blood abate and his thoughts return into calmer channels. Her gentle craft subdued his impetuous mood—if craft it might be called—for more wisely cunning than all craft is the prompting of true affection, where reason responds like instinct to the wants of the heart.

They sat down upon a garden seat overlooking the great valley. None of the guests had sauntered out so far, but Amelie's heart was full; she had much to say, and wished no interruption.

"I am glad to sit in this pretty spot, Amelie," said he, at last, for he had listened in silence to the sweet, low voice of his sister as she kept up her half sad, half glad monologue, because she saw it pleased him. It brought him into a mood in which she might venture to talk of the matter that pressed sorely upon her heart.

"A little while ago, I feared I might offend you, Le Gardeur," said she, taking his hand tenderly in hers, "if I spoke all I wished. I never did offend you that I remember, brother, did I?"

"Never, my incomparable sister; you never did, and never could. Say what you will, ask me what you like; but I fear I am unworthy of your affection, sister."

"You are not unworthy; God gave you as my only brother, you will never be unworthy in my eyes. But it touches me to the quick to suspect others may think lightly of you, Le Gardeur."

He flinched, for his pride was touched, but he knew Amelie was right. "It was weakness in me," said he, "I confess it, sister. To pour wine upon my vexation in hope to cure it, is to feed a fire with oil. To throw fire into a powder magazine were wisdom compared with my folly, Amelie: I was angry at the message I got at such a time. Angelique des Meloises has no mercy upon her lovers!"

"Oh, my prophetic heart! I thought as much! It was Angelique, then, sent you the letter you read at table?"

"Yes, who else could have moved me so? The time was ill-chosen, but I suspect, hating the Bourgeois as she does, Angelique intended to call me from Pierre's fete. I shall obey her now, but tonight she shall obey me, decide to make or mar me, one way or other! You may read the letter, Amelie, if you will."

"I care not to read it, brother; I know Angelique too well not to fear her influence over you. Her craft and boldness were always a terror to her companions. But you will not leave Pierre's fete tonight?" added she, half imploringly; for she felt keenly the discourtesy to Pierre Philibert.

"I must do even that, sister! Were Angelique as faulty as she is fair, I should only love her the more for her faults, and make them my own. Were she to come to me like Herodias with the Baptist's head in a charger, I should outdo Herod in keeping my pledge to her."

Amelie uttered a low, moaning cry. "O my dear infatuated brother, it is not in nature for a De Repentigny to love irrationally like that! What maddening philtre have you drank, to intoxicate you with a woman who uses you so imperiously? But you will not go, Le Gardeur!" added she, clinging to his arm. "You are safe so long as you are with your sister,—you will be safe no longer if you go to the Maison des Meloises tonight!"

"Go I must and shall, Amelie! I have drank the maddening philtre,—I know that, Amelie, and would not take an antidote if I had one! The world has no antidote to cure me. I have no wish to be cured of love for Angelique, and in fine I cannot be, so let me go and receive the rod for coming to Belmont and the reward for leaving it at her summons!" He affected a tone of levity, but Amelie's ear easily detected the false ring of it.

"Dearest brother!" said she, "are you sure Angelique returns, or is capable of returning, love like yours? She is like the rest of us, weak and fickle, merely human, and not at all the divinity a man in his fancy worships when in love with a woman." It was in vain, however, for Amelie to try to persuade her brother of that.

"What care I, Amelie, so long as Angelique is not weak and fickle to me?" answered he; "but she will think her tardy lover is both weak and fickle unless I put in a speedy appearance at the Maison des Meloises!" He rose up as if to depart, still holding his sister by the hand.

Amelie's tears flowed silently in the darkness. She was not willing to plant a seed of distrust in the bosom of her brother, yet she remembered bitterly and indignantly what Angelique had said of her intentions towards the Intendant. Was she using Le Gardeur as a foil to set off her attractions in the eyes of Bigot?

"Brother!" said Amelie, "I am a woman, and comprehend my sex better than you. I know Angelique's far-reaching ambition and crafty ways. Are you sure, not in outward persuasion but in inward conviction, that she loves you as a woman should love the man she means to marry?"

Le Gardeur felt her words like a silver probe that searched his heart. With all his unbounded devotion, he knew Angelique too well not to feel a pang of distrust sometimes, as she showered her coquetries upon every side of her. It was the overabundance of her love, he said, but he thought it often fell like the dew round Gideon's fleece, refreshing all the earth about it, but leaving the fleece dry. "Amelie!" said he, "you try me hard, and tempt me too, my sister, but it is useless. Angelique may be false as Cressida to other men, she will not be false to me! She has sworn it, with her hand in mine, before the altar of Notre Dame. I would go down to perdition with her in my arms rather than be a crowned king with all the world of women to choose from and not get her."

Amelie shuddered at his vehemence, but she knew how useless was expostulation. She wisely refrained, deeming it her duty, like a good sister, to make the best of what she could not hinder. Some jasmines overhung the seat; she plucked a handful, and gave them to him as they rose to return to the house.

"Take them with you, Le Gardeur," said she, giving him the flowers, which she tied into a wreath; "they will remind Angelique that she has a powerful rival in your sister's love."

He took them as they walked slowly back. "Would she were like you, Amelie, in all things!" said he. "I will put some of your flowers in her hair to-night for your sake, sister."

"And for her own! May they be for you both an augury of good! Mind and return home, Le Gardeur, after your visit. I shall sit up to await your arrival, to congratulate you;" and, after a pause, she added, "or to console you, brother!"

"Oh, no fear, sister!" replied he, cheeringly. "Angelique is true as steel to me. You shall call her my betrothed tomorrow! Good-by! And now go dance with all delight till morning." He kissed her and departed for the city, leaving her in the ball-room by the side of the Lady de Tilly.

Amelie related to her aunt the result of her conversation with Le Gardeur, and the cause of his leaving the fete so abruptly. The Lady de Tilly listened with surprise and distress. "To think," said she, "of Le Gardeur asking that terrible girl to marry him! My only hope is, she will refuse him. And if it be as I hear, I think she will!"

"It would be the ruin of Le Gardeur if she did, aunt! You cannot think how determined he is on this marriage."

"It would be his ruin if she accepted him!" replied the Lady de Tilly. "With any other woman Le Gardeur might have a fair chance of happiness; but none with her! More than one of her lovers lies in a bloody grave by reason of her coquetries. She has ruined every man whom she has flattered into loving her. She is without affection. Her thoughts are covered with a veil of deceit impenetrable. She would sacrifice the whole world to her vanity. I fear, Amelie, she will sacrifice Le Gardeur as ruthlessly as the most worthless of her admirers."

"We can only hope for the best, aunt; and I do think Angelique loves Le Gardeur as she never loved any other."

They were presently rejoined by Pierre Philibert. The Lady de Tilly and Amelie apologized for Le Gardeur's departure,—he had been compelled to go to the city on an affair of urgency, and had left them to make his excuses. Pierre Philibert was not without a shrewd perception of the state of affairs. He pitied Le Gardeur, and excused him, speaking most kindly of him in a way that touched the heart of Amelie. The ball went on with unflagging spirit and enjoyment. The old walls fairly vibrated with the music and dancing of the gay company.

The music, like the tide in the great river that night, reached its flood only after the small hours had set in. Amelie had given her hand to Pierre for one or two dances, and many a friendly, many a half envious guess was made as to the probable Chatelaine of Belmont.



CHAPTER XXII. SO GLOZED THE TEMPTER.

The lamps burned brightly in the boudoir of Angelique des Meloises on the night of the fete of Pierre Philibert. Masses of fresh flowers filled the antique Sevres vases, sending delicious odors through the apartment, which was furnished in a style of almost royal splendor. Upon the white hearth a few billets of wood blazed cheerfully, for, after a hot day, as was not uncommon in New France, a cool salt-water breeze came up the great river, bringing reminders of cold sea-washed rocks and snowy crevices still lingering upon the mountainous shores of the St. Lawrence.

Angelique sat idly watching the wreaths of smoke as they rose in shapes fantastic as her own thoughts.

By that subtle instinct which is a sixth sense in woman, she knew that Le Gardeur de Repentigny would visit her to-night and renew his offer of marriage. She meant to retain his love and evade his proposals, and she never for a moment doubted her ability to accomplish her ends. Men's hearts had hitherto been but potter's clay in her hands, and she had no misgivings now; but she felt that the love of Le Gardeur was a thing she could not tread on without a shock to herself like the counter-stroke of a torpedo to the naked foot of an Indian who rashly steps upon it as it basks in a sunny pool.

She was agitated beyond her wont, for she loved Le Gardeur with a strange, selfish passion, for her own sake, not for his,—a sort of love not uncommon with either sex. She had the frankness to be half ashamed of it, for she knew the wrong she was doing to one of the most noble and faithful hearts in the world. But the arrival of the Intendant had unsettled every good resolution she had once made to marry Le Gardeur de Repentigny and become a reputable matron in society. Her ambitious fantasies dimmed every perception of duty to her own heart as well as his; and she had worked herself into that unenviable frame of mind which possesses a woman who cannot resolve either to consent or deny, to accept her lover or to let him go.

The solitude of her apartment became insupportable to her. She sprang up, opened the window, and sat down in the balcony outside, trying to find composure by looking down into the dark, still street. The voices of two men engaged in eager conversation reached her ear. They sat upon the broad steps of the house, so that every word they spoke reached her ear, although she could scarcely distinguish them in the darkness. These were no other than Max Grimeau and Blind Bartemy, the brace of beggars whose post was at the gate of the Basse Ville. They seemed to be comparing the amount of alms each had received during the day, and were arranging for a supper at some obscure haunt they frequented in the purlieus of the lower town, when another figure came up, short, dapper, and carrying a knapsack, as Angelique could detect by the glimmer of a lantern that hung on a rope stretched across the street. He was greeted warmly by the old mendicants.

"Sure as my old musket it is Master Pothier, and nobody else!" exclaimed Max Grimeau rising, and giving the newcomer a hearty embrace. "Don't you see, Bartemy? He has been foraging among the fat wives of the south shore. What a cheek he blows—red as a peony, and fat as a Dutch Burgomaster!" Max had seen plenty of the world when he marched under Marshal de Belleisle, so he was at no loss for apt comparisons.

"Yes!" replied Blind Bartemy, holding out his hand to be shaken. "I see by your voice, Master Pothier, that you have not said grace over bare bones during your absence. But where have you been this long time?"

"Oh, fleecing the King's subjects to the best of my poor ability in the law! and without half the success of you and Max here, who toll the gate of the Basse Ville more easily than the Intendant gets in the King's taxes!"

"Why not?" replied Bartemy, with a pious twist of his neck, and an upward cast of his blank orbs. "It is pour l'amour de Dieu! We beggars save more souls than the Cure; for we are always exhorting men to charity. I think we ought to be part of Holy Church as well as the Gray Friars."

"And so we are part of Holy Church, Bartemy!" interrupted Max Grimeau. "When the good Bishop washed twelve pair of our dirty feet on Maunday Thursday in the Cathedral, I felt like an Apostle—I did! My feet were just ready for benediction; for see! they had never been washed, that I remember of, since I marched to the relief of Prague! But you should have been out to Belmont to-day, Master Pothier! There was the grandest Easter pie ever made in New France! You might have carried on a lawsuit inside of it, and lived off the estate for a year—I ate a bushel of it. I did!"

"Oh, the cursed luck is every day mine!" replied Master Pothier, clapping his hands upon his stomach. "I would not have missed that Easter pie—no, not to draw the Pope's will! But, as it is laid down in the Coutume d' Orleans (Tit. 17), the absent lose the usufruct of their rights; vide, also, Pothier des Successions—I lost my share of the pie of Belmont!"

"Well, never mind, Master Pothier," replied Max. "Don't grieve; you shall go with us to-night to the Fleur-de-Lis in the Sault au Matelot. Bartemy and I have bespoken an eel pie and a gallon of humming cider of Normandy. We shall all be jolly as the marguilliers of Ste. Roche, after tithing the parish!"

"Have with you, then! I am free now: I have just delivered a letter to the Intendant from a lady at Beaumanoir, and got a crown for it. I will lay it on top of your eel pie, Max!"

Angelique, from being simply amused at the conversation of the old beggars, became in an instant all eyes and ears at the words of Master Pothier.

"Had you ever the fortune to see that lady at Beaumanoir?" asked Max, with more curiosity than was to be expected of one in his position.

"No; the letter was handed me by Dame Tremblay, with a cup of wine. But the Intendant gave me a crown when he read it. I never saw the Chevalier Bigot in better humor! That letter touched both his purse and his feelings. But how did you ever come to hear of the Lady of Beaumanoir?"

"Oh, Bartemy and I hear everything at the gate of the Basse Ville! My Lord Bishop and Father Glapion of the Jesuits met in the gate one day and spoke of her, each asking the other if he knew who she was—when up rode the Intendant; and the Bishop made free, as Bishops will, you know, to question him whether he kept a lady at the Chateau.

"'A round dozen of them, my Lord Bishop!' replied Bigot, laughing. La! It takes the Intendant to talk down a Bishop! He bade my Lord not to trouble himself, the lady was under his tutelle! which I comprehended as little, as little—"

"As you do your Nominy Dominy!" replied Pothier. "Don't be angry, Max, if I infer that the Intendant quoted Pigean (Tit. 2, 27): 'Le Tuteur est comptable de sa gestion.'"

"I don't care what the pigeons have to say to it—that is what the Intendant said!" replied Max, hotly, "and THAT, for your law grimoire, Master Pothier!" Max snapped his fingers like the lock of his musket at Prague, to indicate what he meant by THAT!

"Oh, inepte loquens! you don't understand either law or Latin, Max!" exclaimed Pothier, shaking his ragged wig with an air of pity.

"I understand begging; and that is getting without cheating, and much more to the purpose," replied Max, hotly. "Look you, Master Pothier! you are learned as three curates; but I can get more money in the gate of the Basse Ville by simply standing still and crying out Pour l'amour de Dieu! than you with your budget of law lingo-jingo, running up and down the country until the dogs eat off the calves of your legs, as they say in the Nivernois."

"Well, never mind what they say in the Nivernois about the calves of my legs! Bon coq ne fut jamais gras!—a game-cock is never fat—and that is Master Pothier dit Robin. Lean as are my calves, they will carry away as much of your eel pie to-night as those of the stoutest carter in Quebec!"

"And the pie is baked by this time; so let us be jogging!" interrupted Bartemy, rising. "Now give me your arm, Max! and with Master Pothier's on the other side, I shall walk to the Fleur-de-Lis straight as a steeple."

The glorious prospect of supper made all three merry as crickets on a warm hearth, as they jogged over the pavement in their clouted shoes, little suspecting they had left a flame of anger in the breast of Angelique des Meloises, kindled by the few words of Pothier respecting the lady of Beaumanoir.

Angelique recalled with bitterness that the rude bearer of the note had observed something that had touched the heart and opened the purse of the Intendant. What was it? Was Bigot playing a game with Angelique des Meloises? Woe to him and the lady of Beaumanoir if he was! As she sat musing over it a knock was heard on the door of her boudoir. She left the balcony and reentered her room, where a neat, comely girl in a servant's dress was waiting to speak to her.

The girl was not known to Angelique. But courtesying very low, she informed her that she was Fanchon Dodier, a cousin of Lizette's. She had been in service at the Chateau of Beaumanoir, but had just left it. "There is no living under Dame Tremblay," said she, "if she suspect a maid servant of flirting ever so little with M. Froumois, the handsome valet of the Intendant! She imagined that I did; and such a life as she has led me, my Lady! So I came to the city to ask advice of cousin Lizette, and seek a new place. I am sure Dame Tremblay need not be so hard upon the maids. She is always boasting of her own triumphs when she was the Charming Josephine."

"And Lizette referred you to me?" asked Angelique, too occupied just now to mind the gossip about Dame Tremblay, which another time she would have enjoyed immensely. She eyed the girl with intense curiosity; for might she not tell her something of the secret over which she was eating her heart out?

"Yes, my Lady! Lizette referred me to you, and told me to be very circumspect indeed about what I said touching the Intendant, but simply to ask if you would take me into your service. Lizette need not have warned me about the Intendant; for I never reveal secrets of my masters or mistresses, never! never, my Lady!"

"You are more cunning than you look, nevertheless," thought Angelique, "whatever scruple you may have about secrets." "Fanchon," said she, "I will make one condition with you: I will take you into my service if you will tell me whether you ever saw the Lady of Beaumanoir."

Angelique's notions of honor, clear enough in theory, never prevented her sacrificing them without compunction to gain an object or learn a secret that interested her.

"I will willingly tell you all I know, my Lady. I have seen her once; none of the servants are supposed to know she is in the Chateau, but of course all do." Fanchon stood with her two hands in the pockets of her apron, as ready to talk as the pretty grisette who directed Lawrence Sterne to the Opera Comique.

"Of course!" remarked Angelique, "a secret like that could never be kept in the Chateau of Beaumanoir! Now tell me, Fanchon, what is she like?" Angelique sat up eagerly and brushed back the hair from her ear with a rapid stroke of her hand as she questioned the girl. There was a look in her eyes that made Fanchon a little afraid, and brought out more truth than she intended to impart.

"I saw her this morning, my Lady, as she knelt in her oratory: the half-open door tempted me to look, in spite of the orders of Dame Tremblay."

"Ah! you saw her this morning!" repeated Angelique impetuously; "how does she appear? Is she better in looks than when she first came to the Chateau, or worse? She ought to be worse, much worse!"

"I do not know, my Lady, but, as I said, I looked in the door, although forbid to do so. Half-open doors are so tempting, and one cannot shut one's eyes! Even a keyhole is hard to resist when you long to know what is on the other side of it—I always found it so!"

"I dare say you did! But how does she look?" broke in Angelique, impatiently stamping her dainty foot on the floor.

"Oh, so pale, my Lady! but her face is the loveliest I ever saw,—almost," added she, with an after-thought; "but so sad! she looks like the twin sister of the blessed Madonna in the Seminary chapel, my Lady."

"Was she at her devotions, Fanchon?"

"I think not, my Lady: she was reading a letter which she had just received from the Intendant."

Angelique's eyes were now ablaze. She conjectured at once that Caroline was corresponding with Bigot, and that the letter brought to the Intendant by Master Pothier was in reply to one from him. "But how do you know the letter she was reading was from the Intendant? It could not be!" Angelique's eyebrows contracted angrily, and a dark shadow passed over her face. She said "It could not be," but she felt it could be, and was.

"Oh, but it was from the Intendant, my Lady! I heard her repeat his name and pray God to bless Francois Bigot for his kind words. That is the Intendant's name, is it not, my Lady?"

"To be sure it is! I should not have doubted you, Fanchon! but could you gather the purport of that letter? Speak truly, Fanchon, and I will reward you splendidly. What think you it was about?"

"I did more than gather the purport of it, my Lady: I have got the letter itself!" Angelique sprang up eagerly, as if to embrace Fanchon. "I happened, in my eagerness, to jar the door; the lady, imagining some one was coming, rose suddenly and left the room. In her haste she dropped the letter on the floor. I picked it up; I thought no harm, as I was determined to leave Dame Tremblay to-day. Would my Lady like to read the letter?"

Angelique fairly sprang at the offer. "You have got the letter, Fanchon? Let me see it instantly! How considerate of you to bring it! I will give you this ring for that letter!" She pulled a ring off her finger, and seizing Fanchon's hand, put it on hers. Fanchon was enchanted; she admired the ring, as she turned it round and round her finger.

"I am infinitely obliged, my Lady, for your gift. It is worth a million such letters," said she.

"The letter outweighs a million rings," replied Angelique as she tore it open violently and sat down to read.

The first word struck her like a stone:

"DEAR CAROLINE:"—it was written in the bold hand of the Intendant, which Angelique knew very well—"You have suffered too much for my sake, but I am neither unfeeling nor ungrateful. I have news for you! Your father has gone to France in search of you! No one suspects you to be here. Remain patiently where you are at present, and in the utmost secrecy, or there will be a storm which may upset us both. Try to be happy, and let not the sweetest eyes that were ever seen grow dim with needless regrets. Better and brighter days will surely come. Meanwhile, pray! pray, my Caroline! it will do you good, and perhaps make me more worthy of the love which I know is wholly mine.

"Adieu, FRANCOIS."

Angelique devoured rather than read the letter. She had no sooner perused it than she tore it up in a paroxysm of fury, scattering its pieces like snowflakes over the floor, and stamping on them with her firm foot as if she would tread them into annihilation.

Fanchon was not unaccustomed to exhibitions of feminine wrath; but she was fairly frightened at the terrible rage that shook Angelique from head to foot.

"Fanchon! did you read that letter?" demanded she, turning suddenly upon the trembling maid. The girl saw her mistress's cheeks twitch with passion, and her hands clench as if she would strike her if she answered yes.

Shrinking with fear, Fanchon replied faintly, "No, my Lady; I cannot read."

"And you have allowed no other person to read it?"

"No, my Lady; I was afraid to show the letter to any one; you know I ought not to have taken it!"

"Was no inquiry made about it?" Angelique laid her hand upon the girl's shoulder, who trembled from head to foot.

"Yes, my Lady; Dame Tremblay turned the Chateau upside down, looking for it; but I dared not tell her I had it!"

"I think you speak truth, Fanchon!" replied Angelique, getting somewhat over her passion; but her bosom still heaved, like the ocean after a storm. "And now mind what I say!"—her hand pressed heavily on the girl's shoulder, while she gave her a look that seemed to freeze the very marrow in her bones. "You know a secret about the Lady of Beaumanoir, Fanchon, and one about me too! If you ever speak of either to man or woman, or even to yourself, I will cut the tongue out of your mouth and nail it to that door-post! Mind my words, Fanchon! I never fail to do what I threaten."

"Oh, only do not look so at me, my Lady!" replied poor Fanchon, perspiring with fear. "I am sure I never shall speak of it. I swear by our Blessed Lady of Ste. Foye! I will never breathe to mortal that I gave you that letter."

"That will do!" replied Angelique, throwing herself down in her great chair. "And now you may go to Lizette; she will attend to you. But REMEMBER!"

The frightened girl did not wait for another command to go. Angelique held up her finger, which to Fanchon looked terrible as a poniard. She hurried down to the servants' hall with a secret held fast between her teeth for once in her life; and she trembled at the very thought of ever letting it escape.

Angelique sat with her hands on her temples, staring upon the fire that flared and flickered in the deep fireplace. She had seen a wild, wicked vision there once before. It came again, as things evil never fail to come again at our bidding. Good may delay, but evil never waits. The red fire turned itself into shapes of lurid dens and caverns, changing from horror to horror until her creative fancy formed them into the secret chamber of Beaumanoir with its one fair, solitary inmate, her rival for the hand of the Intendant,—her fortunate rival, if she might believe the letter brought to her so strangely. Angelique looked fiercely at the fragments of it lying upon the carpet, and wished she had not destroyed it; but every word of it was stamped upon her memory, as if branded with a hot iron.

"I see it all, now!" exclaimed she—"Bigot's falseness, and her shameless effrontery in seeking him in his very house. But it shall not be!" Angelique's voice was like the cry of a wounded panther tearing at the arrow which has pierced his flank. "Is Angelique des Meloises to be humiliated by that woman? Never! But my bright dreams will have no fulfilment so long as she lives at Beaumanoir,—so long as she lives anywhere!"

She sat still for a while, gazing into the fire; and the secret chamber of Beaumanoir again formed itself before her vision. She sprang up, touched by the hand of her good angel perhaps, and for the last time. "Satan whispered it again in my ear!" cried she. "Ste. Marie! I am not so wicked as that! Last night the thought came to me in the dark—I shook it off at dawn of day. To-night it comes again,—and I let it touch me like a lover, and I neither withdraw my hand nor tremble! To-morrow it will return for the last time and stay with me,—and I shall let it sleep on my pillow! The babe of sin will have been born and waxed to a full demon, and I shall yield myself up to his embraces! O Bigot, Bigot! what have you not done? C'est la faute a vous! C'est la faute a vous!" She repeated this exclamation several times, as if by accusing Bigot she excused her own evil imaginings and cast the blame of them upon him. She seemed drawn down into a vortex from which there was no escape. She gave herself up to its drift in a sort of passionate abandonment. The death or the banishment of Caroline were the only alternatives she could contemplate. "'The sweetest eyes that were ever seen'—Bigot's foolish words!" thought she; "and the influence of those eyes must be killed if Angelique des Meloises is ever to mount the lofty chariot of her ambition."

"Other women," she thought bitterly, "would abandon greatness for love, and in the arms of a faithful lover like Le Gardeur find a compensation for the slights of the Intendant!"

But Angelique was not like other women: she was born to conquer men—not to yield to them. The steps of a throne glittered in her wild fancy, and she would not lose the game of her life because she had missed the first throw. Bigot was false to her, but he was still worth the winning, for all the reasons which made her first listen to him. She had no love for him—not a spark! But his name, his rank, his wealth, his influence at Court, and a future career of glory there—these things she had regarded as her own by right of her beauty and skill in ruling men. "No rival shall ever boast she has conquered Angelique des Meloises!" cried she, clenching her hands. And thus it was in this crisis of her fate the love of Le Gardeur was blown like a feather before the breath of her passionate selfishness. The weights of gold pulled her down to the nadir. Angelique's final resolution was irrevocably taken before her eager, hopeful lover appeared in answer to her summons recalling him from the festival of Belmont.



CHAPTER XXIII. SEALS OF LOVE, BUT SEALED IN VAIN.

She sat waiting Le Gardeur's arrival, and the thought of him began to assert its influence as the antidote of the poisonous stuff she had taken into her imagination. His presence so handsome, his manner so kind, his love so undoubted, carried her into a region of intense satisfaction. Angelique never thought so honestly well of herself as when recounting the marks of affection bestowed upon her by Le Gardeur de Repentigny. "His love is a treasure for any woman to possess, and he has given it all to me!" said she to herself. "There are women who value themselves wholly by the value placed upon them by others; but I value others by the measure of myself. I love Le Gardeur; and what I love I do not mean to lose!" added she, with an inconsequence that fitted ill with her resolution regarding the Intendant. But Angelique was one who reconciled to herself all professions, however opposite or however incongruous.

A hasty knock at the door of the mansion, followed by the quick, well-known step up the broad stair, brought Le Gardeur into her presence. He looked flushed and disordered as he took her eagerly-extended hand and pressed it to his lips.

Her whole aspect underwent a transformation in the presence of her lover. She was unfeignedly glad to see him. Without letting go his hand she led him to the sofa, and sat down by him. Other men had the semblance of her graciousness, and a perfect imitation it was too; but he alone had the reality of her affection.

"O Le Gardeur!" exclaimed she, looking him through and through, and detecting no flaw in his honest admiration, "can you forgive me for asking you to come and see me to-night? and for absolutely no reason—none in the world, Le Gardeur, but that I longed to see you! I was jealous of Belmont for drawing you away from the Maison des Meloises to-night!"

"And what better reason could I have in the world than that you were longing to see me, Angelique? I think I should leave the gate of Heaven itself if you called me back, darling! Your presence for a minute is more to me than hours of festivity at Belmont, or the company of any other woman in the world."

Angelique was not insensible to the devotion of Le Gardeur. Her feelings were touched, and never slow in finding an interpretation for them she raised his hand quickly to her lips and kissed it. "I had no motive in sending for you but to see you, Le Gardeur!" said she; "will that content you? If it won't—"

"This shall," replied he, kissing her cheek—which she was far from averting or resenting.

"That is so like you, Le Gardeur!" replied she,—"to take before it is given!" She stopped—"What was I going to say?" added she. "It was given, and my contentment is perfect to have you here by my side!" If her thoughts reverted at this moment to the Intendant it was with a feeling of repulsion, and as she looked fondly on the face of Le Gardeur she could not help contrasting his handsome looks with the hard, swarthy features of Bigot.

"I wish my contentment were perfect, Angelique; but it is in your power to make it so—will you? Why keep me forever on the threshold of my happiness, or of my despair, whichever you shall decree? I have spoken to Amelie tonight of you!"

"O do not press me, Le Gardeur!" exclaimed she, violently agitated, anxious to evade the question she saw burning on his lips, and distrustful of her own power to refuse; "not now! not to-night! Another day you shall know how much I love you, Le Gardeur! Why will not men content themselves with knowing we love them, without stripping our favors of all grace by making them duties, and in the end destroying our love by marrying us?" A flash of her natural archness came over her face as she said this.

"That would not be your case or mine, Angelique," replied he, somewhat puzzled at her strange speech. But she rose up suddenly without replying, and walked to a buffet, where stood a silver salver full of refreshments. "I suppose you have feasted so magnificently at Belmont that you will not care for my humble hospitalities," said she, offering him a cup of rare wine, a recent gift of the Intendant,—which she did not mention, however. "You have not told me a word yet of the grand party at Belmont. Pierre Philibert has been highly honored by the Honnetes Gens I am sure!"

"And merits all the honor he receives! Why were you not there too, Angelique? Pierre would have been delighted," replied he, ever ready to defend Pierre Philibert.

"And I too! but I feared to be disloyal to the Fripponne!" said she, half mockingly. "I am a partner in the Grand Company you know, Le Gardeur! But I confess Pierre Philibert is the handsomest man—except one—in New France. I own to THAT. I thought to pique Amelie one day by telling her so, but on the contrary I pleased her beyond measure! She agreed without excepting even the one!"

"Amelie told me your good opinions of Pierre, and I thanked you for it!" said he, taking her hand. "And now, darling, since you cannot with wine, words, or winsomeness divert me from my purpose in making you declare what you think of me also, let me tell you I have promised Amelie to bring her your answer to-night!"

The eyes of Le Gardeur shone with a light of loyal affection. Angelique saw there was no escaping a declaration. She sat irresolute and trembling, with one hand resting on his arm and the other held up deprecatingly. It was a piece of acting she had rehearsed to herself for this foreseen occasion. But her tongue, usually so nimble and free, faltered for once in the rush of emotions that well-nigh overpowered her. To become the honored wife of Le Gardeur de Repentigny, the sister of the beauteous Amelie, the niece of the noble Lady de Tilly, was a piece of fortune to have satisfied, until recently, both her heart and her ambition. But now Angelique was the dupe of dreams and fancies. The Royal Intendant was at her feet. France and its courtly splendors and court intrigues opened vistas of grandeur to her aspiring and unscrupulous ambition. She could not forego them, and would not! She knew that, all the time her heart was melting beneath the passionate eyes of Le Gardeur.

"I have spoken to Amelie, and promised to take her your answer to-night," said he, in a tone that thrilled every fibre of her better nature. "She is ready to embrace you as her sister. Will you be my wife, Angelique?"

Angelique sat silent; she dared not look up at him. If she had, she knew her hard resolution would melt. She felt his gaze upon her without seeing it. She grew pale and tried to answer no, but could not; and she would not answer yes.

The vision she had so wickedly revelled in flashed again upon her at this supreme moment. She saw, in a panorama of a few seconds, the gilded halls of Versailles pass before her, and with the vision came the old temptation.

"Angelique!" repeated he, in a tone full of passionate entreaty, "will you be my wife, loved as no woman ever was,—loved as alone Le Gardeur de Repentigny can love you?"

She knew that. As she weakened under his pleading and grasped both his hands tight in hers, she strove to frame a reply which should say yes while it meant no; and say no which he should interpret yes.

"All New France will honor you as the Chatelaine de Repentigny! There will be none higher, as there will be none fairer, than my bride!" Poor Le Gardeur! He had a dim suspicion that Angelique was looking to France as a fitting theatre for her beauty and talents.

She still sat mute, and grew paler every moment. Words formed themselves upon her lips, but she feared to say them, so terrible was the earnestness of this man's love, and no less vivid the consciousness of her own. Her face assumed the hardness of marble, pale as Parian and as rigid; a trembling of her white lips showed the strife going on within her; she covered her eyes with her hand, that he might not see the tears she felt quivering under the full lids, but she remained mute.

"Angelique!" exclaimed he, divining her unexpressed refusal; "why do you turn away from me? You surely do not reject me? But I am mad to think it! Speak, darling! one word, one sign, one look from those dear eyes, in consent to be the wife of Le Gardeur, will bring life's happiness to us both!" He took her hand, and drew it gently from her eyes and kissed it, but she still averted her gaze from him; she could not look at him, but the words dropped slowly and feebly from her lips in response to his appeal:

"I love you, Le Gardeur, but I will not marry you!" said she. She could not utter more, but her hand grasped his with a fierce pressure, as if wanting to hold him fast in the very moment of refusal.

He started back, as if touched by fire. "You love me, but will not marry me! Angelique, what mystery is this? But you are only trying me! A thousand thanks for your love; the other is but a jest,—a good jest, which I will laugh at!" And Le Gardeur tried to laugh, but it was a sad failure, for he saw she did not join in his effort at merriment, but looked pale and trembling, as if ready to faint.

She laid her hands upon his heavily and sadly. He felt her refusal in the very touch. It was like cold lead. "Do not laugh, Le Gardeur, I cannot laugh over it; this is no jest, but mortal earnest! What I say I mean! I love you, Le Gardeur, but I will not marry you!"

She drew her hands away, as if to mark the emphasis she could not speak. He felt it like the drawing of his heartstrings.

She turned her eyes full upon him now, as if to look whether love of her was extinguished in him by her refusal. "I love you, Le Gardeur—you know I do! But I will not—I cannot—marry you now!" repeated she.

"Now!" he caught at the straw like a drowning swimmer in a whirlpool. "Now? I said not now but when you please, Angelique! You are worth a man's waiting his life for!"

"No, Le Gardeur!" she replied, "I am not worth your waiting for; it cannot be, as I once hoped it might be; but love you I do and ever shall!" and the false, fair woman kissed him fatuously. "I love you, Le Gardeur, but I will not marry you!"

"You do not surely mean it, Angelique!" exclaimed he; "you will not give me death instead of life? You cannot be so false to your own heart, so cruel to mine? See, Angelique! My saintly sister Amelie believed in your love, and sent these flowers to place in your hair when you had consented to be my wife,—her sister; you will not refuse them, Angelique?"

He raised his hand to place the garland upon her head, but Angelique turned quickly, and they fell at her feet. "Amelie's gifts are not for me, Le Gardeur—I do not merit them! I confess my fault: I am, I know, false to my own heart, and cruel to yours. Despise me,—kill me for it if you will, Le Gardeur! better you did kill me, perhaps! but I cannot lie to you as I can to other men! Ask me not to change my resolution, for I neither can nor will." She spoke with impassioned energy, as if fortifying her refusal by the reiteration of it.

"It is past comprehension!" was all he could say, bewildered at her words thus dislocated from all their natural sequence of association. "Love me and not marry me!—that means she will marry another!" thought he, with a jealous pang. "Tell me, Angelique," continued he, after several moments of puzzled silence, "is there some inscrutable reason that makes you keep my love and reject my hand?"

"No reason, Le Gardeur! It is mad unreason,—I feel that,—but it is no less true. I love you, but I will not marry you." She spoke with more resolution now. The first plunge was over, and with it her fear and trembling as she sat on the brink.

The iteration drove him beside himself. He seized her hands, and exclaimed with vehemence,—"There is a man—a rival—a more fortunate lover—behind all this, Angelique des Meloises! It is not yourself that speaks, but one that prompts you. You have given your love to another, and discarded me! Is it not so?"

"I have neither discarded you, nor loved another," Angelique equivocated. She played her soul away at this moment with the mental reservation that she had not yet done what she had resolved to do upon the first opportunity—accept the hand of the Intendant Bigot.

"It is well for that other man, if there be one!" Le Gardeur rose and walked angrily across the room two or three times. Angelique was playing a game of chess with Satan for her soul, and felt that she was losing it.

"There was a Sphinx in olden times," said he, "that propounded a riddle, and he who failed to solve it had to die. Your riddle will be the death of me, for I cannot solve it, Angelique!"

"Do not try to solve it, dear Le Gardeur! Remember that when her riddle was solved the Sphinx threw herself into the sea. I doubt that may be my fate! But you are still my friend, Le Gardeur!" added she, seating herself again by his side, in her old fond, coquettish manner. "See these flowers of Amelie's, which I did not place in my hair; I treasure them in my bosom!" She gathered them up as she spoke, kissed them, and placed them in her bosom.

"You are still my friend, Le Gardeur?" Her eyes turned upon him with the old look she could so well assume.

"I am more than a thousand friends, Angelique!" replied he; "but I shall curse myself that I can remain so and see you the wife of another."

The very thought drove him to frenzy. He dashed her hand away and sprang up towards the door, but turned suddenly round. "That curse was not for you, Angelique!" said he, pale and agitated; "it was for myself, for ever believing in the empty love you professed for me. Good-by! Be happy! As for me, the light goes out of my life, Angelique, from this day forth."

"Oh, stop! stop, Le Gardeur! do not leave me so!" She rose and endeavored to restrain him, but he broke from her, and without adieu or further parley rushed out bareheaded into the street. She ran to the balcony to call him back, and leaning far over it, cried out, "Le Gardeur! Le Gardeur!" That voice would have called him from the dead could he have heard it, but he was already lost in the darkness. A few rapid steps resounded on the distant pavement, and Le Gardeur de Repentigny was lost to her forever!

She waited long on the balcony, looking over it for a chance of hearing his returning steps, but none came. It was the last impulse of her love to save her, but it was useless. "Oh, God!" she exclaimed in a voice of mortal agony, "he is gone forever—my Le Gardeur! my one true lover, rejected by my own madness, and for what?" She thought "For what!" and in a storm of passion, tearing her golden hair over her face, and beating her breast in her rage, she exclaimed,—"I am wicked, unutterably bad, worse and more despicable than the vilest creature that crouches under the bushes on the Batture! How dared I, unwomanly that I am, reject the hand I worship for sake of a hand I should loathe in the very act of accepting it? The slave that is sold in the market is better than I, for she has no choice, while I sell myself to a man whom I already hate, for he is already false to me! The wages of a harlot were more honestly earned than the splendor for which I barter soul and body to this Intendant!"

The passionate girl threw herself upon the floor, nor heeded the blood that oozed from her head, bruised on the hard wood. Her mind was torn by a thousand wild fancies. Sometimes she resolved to go out like the Rose of Sharon and seek her beloved in the city and throw herself at his feet, making him a royal gift of all he claimed of her.

She little knew her own wilful heart. She had seen the world bow to every caprice of hers, but she never had one principle to guide her, except her own pleasure. She was now like a goddess of earth, fallen in an effort to reconcile impossibilities in human hearts, and became the sport of the powers of wickedness.

She lay upon the floor senseless, her hands in a violent clasp. Her glorious hair, torn and disordered, lay over her like the royal robe of a queen stricken from her throne and lying dead upon the floor of her palace.

It was long after midnight, in the cold hours of the morning, when she woke from her swoon. She raised herself feebly upon her elbow, and looked dazedly up at the cold, unfeeling stars that go on shining through the ages, making no sign of sympathy with human griefs. Perseus had risen to his meridian, and Algol, her natal star, alternately darkened and brightened as if it were the scene of some fierce conflict of the powers of light and darkness, like that going on in her own soul.

Her face was stained with hard clots of blood as she rose, cramped and chilled to the bone. The night air had blown coldly upon her through the open lattice; but she would not summon her maid to her assistance. Without undressing she threw herself upon a couch, and utterly worn out by the agitation she had undergone, slept far into the day.



CHAPTER XXIV. THE HURRIED QUESTION OF DESPAIR.

Le Gardeur plunged headlong down the silent street, neither knowing nor caring whither. Half mad with grief, half with resentment, he vented curses upon himself, upon Angelique, upon the world, and looked upon Providence itself as in league with the evil powers to thwart his happiness,—not seeing that his happiness in the love of a woman like Angelique was a house built on sand, which the first storm of life would sweep away.

"Holla! Le Gardeur de Repentigny! Is that you?" exclaimed a voice in the night. "What lucky wind blows you out at this hour?" Le Gardeur stopped and recognized the Chevalier de Pean. "Where are you going in such a desperate hurry?"

"To the devil!" replied Le Gardeur, withdrawing his hand from De Pean's, who had seized it with an amazing show of friendship. "It is the only road left open to me, and I am going to march down it like a garde du corps of Satan! Do not hold me, De Pean! Let go my arm! I am going to the devil, I tell you!"

"Why, Le Gardeur," was the reply, "that is a broad and well-travelled road—the king's highway, in fact. I am going upon it myself, as fast and merrily as any man in New France."

"Well, go on it then! March either before or after me, only don't go with me, De Pean; I am taking the shortest cuts to get to the end of it, and want no one with me." Le Gardeur walked doggedly on; but De Pean would not be shaken off. He suspected what had happened.

"The shortest cut I know is by the Taverne de Menut, where I am going now," said he, "and I should like your company, Le Gardeur! Our set are having a gala night of it, and must be musical as the frogs of Beauport by this hour! Come along!" De Pean again took his arm. He was not repelled this time.

"I don't care where I go, De Pean!" replied he, forgetting his dislike to this man, and submitting to his guidance,—the Taverne de Menut was just the place for him to rush into and drown his disappointment in wine. The two moved on in silence for a few minutes.

"Why, what ails you, Le Gardeur?" asked his companion, as they walked on arm in arm. "Has fortune frowned upon the cards, or your mistress proved a fickle jade like all her sex?"

His words were irritating enough to Le Gardeur. "Look you, De Pean," said he, stopping, "I shall quarrel with you if you repeat such remarks. But you mean no mischief I dare say, although I would not swear it!" Le Gardeur looked savage.

De Pean saw it would not be safe to rub that sore again. "Forgive me, Le Gardeur!" said he, with an air of sympathy well assumed. "I meant no harm. But you are suspicious of your friends to-night as a Turk of his harem."

"I have reason to be! And as for friends, I find only such friends as you, De Pean! And I begin to think the world has no better!" The clock of the Recollets struck the hour as they passed under the shadow of its wall. The brothers of St. Francis slept quietly on their peaceful pillows, like sea birds who find in a rocky nook a refuge from the ocean storms. "Do you think the Recollets are happy, De Pean?" asked he, turning abruptly to his companion.

"Happy as oysters at high water, who are never crossed in love, except of their dinner! But that is neither your luck nor mine, Le Gardeur!" De Pean was itching to draw from his companion something with reference to what had passed with Angelique.

"Well, I would rather be an oyster than a man, and rather be dead than either!" was the reply of Le Gardeur. "How soon, think you, will brandy kill a man, De Pean?" asked he abruptly, after a pause of silence.

"It will never kill you, Le Gardeur, if you take it neat at Master Menut's. It will restore you to life, vigor, and independence of man and woman. I take mine there when I am hipped as you are, Le Gardeur. It is a specific for every kind of ill-fortune,—I warrant it will cure and never kill you."

They crossed the Place d'Armes. Nothing in sight was moving except the sentries who paced slowly like shadows up and down the great gateway of the Castle of St. Louis.

"It is still and solemn as a church-yard here," remarked De Pean; "all the life of the place is down at Menut's! I like the small hours," added he as the chime of the Recollets ceased. "They are easily counted, and pass quickly, asleep or awake. Two o'clock in the morning is the meridian of the day for a man who has wit to wait for it at Menut's!—these small hours are all that are worth reckoning in a man's life!"

Without consenting to accompany De Pean, Le Gardeur suffered himself to be led by him. He knew the company that awaited him there—the wildest and most dissolute gallants of the city and garrison were usually assembled there at this hour.

The famous old hostelry was kept by Master Menut, a burly Breton who prided himself on keeping everything full and plenty about his house—tables full, tankards full, guests full, and himself very full. The house was to-night lit up with unusual brilliance, and was full of company—Cadet, Varin, Mercier, and a crowd of the friends and associates of the Grand Company. Gambling, drinking, and conversing in the loudest strain on such topics as interested their class, were the amusements of the night. The vilest thoughts, uttered in the low argot of Paris, were much affected by them. They felt a pleasure in this sort of protest against the extreme refinement of society, just as the collegians of Oxford, trained beyond their natural capacity in morals, love to fall into slang and, like Prince Hal, talk to every tinker in his own tongue.

De Pean and Le Gardeur were welcomed with open arms at the Taverne de Menut. A dozen brimming glasses were offered them on every side. De Pean drank moderately. "I have to win back my losses of last night," said he, "and must keep my head clear." Le Gardeur, however, refused nothing that was offered him. He drank with all, and drank every description of liquor. He was speedily led up into a large, well-furnished room, where tables were crowded with gentlemen playing cards and dice for piles of paper money, which was tossed from hand to hand with the greatest nonchalance as the game ended and was renewed.

Le Gardeur plunged headlong into the flood of dissipation. He played, drank, talked argot, and cast off every shred of reserve. He doubled his stakes, and threw his dice reckless and careless whether he lost or won. His voice overbore that of the stoutest of the revellers. He embraced De Pean as his friend, who returned his compliments by declaring Le Gardeur de Repentigny to be the king of good fellows, who had the "strongest head to carry wine and the stoutest heart to defy dull care of any man in Quebec."

De Pean watched with malign satisfaction the progress of Le Gardeur's intoxication. If he seemed to flag, he challenged him afresh to drink to better fortune; and when he lost the stakes, to drink again to spite ill luck.

But let a veil be dropped over the wild doings of the Taverne de Menut. Le Gardeur lay insensible at last upon the floor, where he would have remained had not some of the servants of the inn who knew him lifted him up compassionately and placed him upon a couch, where he lay, breathing heavily like one dying. His eyes were fixed; his mouth, where the kisses of his sister still lingered, was partly opened, and his hands were clenched, rigid as a statue's.

"He is ours now!" said De Pean to Cadet. "He will not again put his head under the wing of the Philiberts!"

The two men looked at him, and laughed brutally.

"A fair lady whom you know, Cadet, has given him liberty to drink himself to death, and he will do it."

"Who is that? Angelique?" asked Cadet.

"Of course; who else? and Le Gardeur won't be the first or last man she has put under stone sheets," replied De Pean, with a shrug of his shoulders.

"Gloria patri filioque!" exclaimed Cadet, mockingly; "the Honnetes Gens will lose their trump card. How did you get him away from Belmont, De Pean?"

"Oh, it was not I! Angelique des Meloises set the trap and whistled the call that brought him," replied De Pean.

"Like her, the incomparable witch!" exclaimed Cadet with a hearty laugh. "She would lure the very devil to play her tricks instead of his own. She would beat Satan at his best game to ruin a man."

"It would be all the same, Cadet, I fancy—Satan or she! But where is Bigot? I expected him here."

"Oh, he is in a tantrum to-night, and would not come. That piece of his at Beaumanoir is a thorn in his flesh, and a snow-ball on his spirits. She is taming him. By St. Cocufin! Bigot loves that woman!"

"I told you that before, Cadet. I saw it a month ago, and was sure of it on that night when he would not bring her up to show her to us."

"Such a fool, De Pean, to care for any woman! What will Bigot do with her, think you?"

"How should I know? Send her adrift some fine day I suppose, down the Riviere du Loup. He will, if he is a sensible man. He dare not marry any woman without license from La Pompadour, you know. The jolly fish-woman holds a tight rein over her favorites. Bigot may keep as many women as Solomon—the more the merrier; but woe befall him if he marries without La Pompadour's consent! They say she herself dotes on Bigot,—that is the reason." De Pean really believed that was the reason; and certainly there was reason for suspecting it.