In Kings' Byways Part 13

The King shook his head, and smiling, clapped the veteran on the shoulder. "Not so," he said. "The man is no traitor: I say it. And you have never met with a longer head than Henry's."

"Never," a.s.sented La Noue bluntly, "save when there is a woman in it!"

The curtain falls. The men have lived and are dead. La Noue, the Huguenot Bayard, now exists only in a dusty memoir and a page of Motley.

Madame de Montpensier is forgotten; all of her, save her golden scissors. Mayenne, D'Aumale, a verse preserves their names. Only Henry--the "good King," as generations of French peasants called him--remains a living figure: his strength and weakness, his sins and virtues, as well known, as thoroughly appreciated by thousands now as in the days of his life.

It follows that we cannot hope to learn much of the fortunes of people so insignificant--save for that moment when the fate of a nation hung on their breath--as the Portails and Toussaints. We do know that Felix proved worthy. For though the attack on Paris which was planned at Toussaint's house, failed, it did not fail through treachery. And we know that Felix married Madeline, and that Adrian won Marie: but no more. Unless certain Portails now living in various parts of the world, whose ancestors left France at the time of the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, are their descendants. And certainly it is curious that in these families it is not rare to find the eldest son bearing the name of Henry, and the second of Felix.

THE KING'S STRATAGEM

In the days when Henry the Fourth of France was as yet King of Navarre only, and in that little kingdom of hills and woods which occupies the south-western corner of the larger country, was with difficulty supporting the Huguenot cause against the French court and the Catholic League--in the days when every little moated town, from the Dordogne to the Pyrenees, was a bone of contention between the young king and the crafty queen-mother, Catherine de Medicis, a conference between these warring personages took place in the picturesque town of La Reole. And great was the fame of it.

La Reole still rises grey, time-worn, and half-ruined on a lofty cliff above the broad green waters of the Garonne, forty odd miles from Bordeaux. It is a small place now, but in the days of which we are speaking it was important, strongly fortified, and guarded by a castle which looked down on some hundreds of red-tiled roofs, rising in terraces from the river. As the meeting-place of the two sovereigns it was for the time as gay as Paris itself. Catherine had brought with her a bevy of fair maids of honour, and trusted more perhaps in the effect of their charms than in her own diplomacy. But the peaceful appearance of the town was as delusive as the smooth bosom of the Gironde; for even while every other house in its streets rang with music and silvery laughter, each party was ready to fly to arms at a word if it saw that any advantage could be gained thereby.

On an evening shortly before the end of the conference two men were seated at play in a room, the deep-embrasured window of which looked down from a considerable height upon the river. The hour was late; below them the town lay silent. Outside, the moonlight fell bright and pure on sleeping fields, on vineyards, and dark far-spreading woods. Within the room a silver lamp suspended from the ceiling threw light upon the table, but left the farther parts of the chamber in shadow. The walls were hung with faded tapestry, and on a low bedstead in one corner lay a handsome cloak, a sword, and one of the clumsy pistols of the period.

Across a high-backed chair lay another cloak and sword, and on the window seat, beside a pair of saddle-bags, were strewn half a dozen trifles such as soldiers carried from camp to camp--a silver comfit-box, a jewelled dagger, a mask, a velvet cap.

The faces of the players, as they bent over the cards, were in shadow.

One--a slight, dark man of middle height, with a weak chin--and a mouth that would have equally betrayed its weakness had it not been shaded by a dark moustache--seemed, from the occasional oaths which he let drop, to be losing heavily. Yet his opponent, a stouter and darker man, with a sword-cut across his left temple, and the swaggering air that has at all times marked the professional soldier, showed no signs of triumph or elation. On the contrary, though he kept silence, or spoke only a formal word or two, there was a gleam of anxiety and suppressed excitement in his eyes; and more than once he looked keenly at his companion, as if to judge of his feelings or to learn whether the time had come for some experiment which he meditated. But for this, an observer looking in through the window would have taken the two for that common conjunction--the hawk and the pigeon.

At last the younger player threw down his cards with an exclamation.

"You have the luck of the evil one," he said, bitterly. "How much is that?"

"Two thousand crowns," the other replied without emotion. "You will play no more?"

"No! I wish to heaven I had never played at all!" was the answer. As he spoke the loser rose, and moving to the window stood looking out. For a few moments the elder man remained in his seat, gazing furtively at him; at length he too rose, and, stepping softly to his companion, he touched him on the shoulder. "Your pardon a moment, M. le Vicomte," he said.

"Am I right in concluding that the loss of this sum will inconvenience you?"

"A thousand fiends!" the young gamester exclaimed, turning on him wrathfully. "Is there any man whom the loss of two thousand crowns would not inconvenience? As for me----"

"For you," the other continued smoothly, filling up the pause, "shall I be wrong in supposing that it means something like ruin?"

"Well, sir, and if it does?" the young man retorted; and he drew himself up, his cheek a shade paler with pa.s.sion. "Depend upon it you shall be paid. Do not be afraid of that!"

"Gently, gently, my friend," the winner answered, his patience in strong contrast to the other's violence. "I had no intention of insulting you, believe me. Those who play with the Vicomte de Noirterre are not wont to doubt his honour. I spoke only in your own interest. It has occurred to me, Vicomte, that the matter may be arranged at less cost to yourself."

"How?" was the curt question.

"May I speak freely?" The Vicomte shrugged his shoulders, and the other, taking silence for consent, proceeded: "You, Vicomte, are governor of Lusigny for the King of Navarre; I, of Creance, for the King of France.

Our towns lie but three leagues apart. Could I by any chance, say on one of these fine nights, make myself master of Lusigny, it would be worth more than two thousand crowns to me. Do you understand?"

"No," the young man answered slowly, "I do not."

"Think over what I have said, then," was the brief answer.

For a full minute there was silence in the room. The Vicomte gazed from the window with knitted brows and compressed lips, while his companion, seated near at hand, leant back in his chair, with an air of affected carefulness. Outside, the rattle of arms and hum of voices told that the watch were pa.s.sing through the street. The church bell rang one o'clock.

Suddenly the Vicomte burst into a forced laugh, and, turning, took up his cloak and sword. "The trap was well laid, M. le Capitaine," he said almost jovially; "but I am still sober enough to take care of myself--and of Lusigny. I wish you good night. You shall have your money, do not fear."

"Still, I am afraid it will cost you dearly," the Captain answered, as he rose and moved towards the door to open it for his guest. And then, when his hand was already on the latch, he paused. "My lord," he said, "what do you say to this, then? I will stake the two thousand crowns you have lost to me, and another thousand to boot--against your town. Oh, no one can hear us. If you win you go off a free man with my thousand. If you lose, you put me in possession--one of these fine nights. Now, that is an offer. What do you say to it? A single game to decide."

The younger man's face reddened. He turned; his eyes sought the table and the cards; he stood irresolute. The temptation came at an unfortunate moment; a moment when the excitement of play had given way to depression, and he saw nothing outside the door, on the latch of which his hand was laid, but the bleak reality of ruin. The temptation to return, the thought that by a single hand he might set himself right with the world, was too much for him. Slowly--he came back to the table.

"Confound you!" he said pa.s.sionately. "I think you are the devil himself!"

"Don't talk child's talk!" the other answered coldly, drawing back as his victim advanced. "If you do not like the offer you need not take it."

But the young man was a born gambler, and his fingers had already closed on the cards. Picking them up idly he dropped them once, twice, thrice on the table, his eyes gleaming with the play-fever. "If I win?" he said doubtfully. "What then? Let us have it quite clearly."

"You carry away a thousand crowns," the Captain answered quietly. "If you lose you contrive to leave one of the gates of Lusigny open for me before next full moon. That is all."

"And what if I lose, and do not pay the forfeit?" the Vicomte asked, laughing weakly.

"I trust to your honour," the Captain answered. And, strange as it may seem, he knew his man. The young n.o.ble of the day might betray his cause and his trust, but the debt of honour incurred at play was binding on him.

"Well," said the Vicomte, with a deep breath, "I agree. Who is to deal?"

"As you will," the Captain replied, masking under an appearance of indifference the excitement which darkened his cheek, and caused the pulse in the old wound on his face to beat furiously.

"Then do you deal," said the Vicomte.

"With your permission," the Captain a.s.sented. And gathering the cards he dealt them with a practised hand, and pushed his opponent's six across to him.

The young man took up the hand and, as he sorted it, and looked from it to his companion's face, he repressed a groan with difficulty. The moonlight s.h.i.+ning through the cas.e.m.e.nt fell in silvery sheen on a few feet of the floor. With the light something of the silence and coolness of the night entered also, and appealed to him. For a few seconds he hesitated. He made even as if he would have replaced the hand on the table. But he had gone too far to retrace his steps with honour. It was too late, and with a muttered word, which his dry lips refused to articulate, he played the first card.

He took that trick and the next: they were secure.

"And now," said the Captain, who knew well where the pinch came. "What next?"

The Vicomte compressed his lips. Two courses were open to him. By adopting one he could almost for certain win one more trick: by the other he might just possibly win two tricks. He was a gamester; he adopted the latter course. In half a minute it was over. He had lost!

The winner nodded gravely. "The luck is with me still," he said, keeping his eyes on the table that the light of triumph which had leapt into them might not be seen. "When do you go back to your command, Vicomte?"

The unhappy man sat, as one stunned, his eyes on the painted cards which had cost him so dearly. "The day after to-morrow," he muttered at last, striving to collect himself.

"Then shall we say--the following evening?" the Captain asked courteously.

The young man s.h.i.+vered. "As you will," he muttered.

"We quite understand one another," continued the winner, eyeing his man watchfully, and speaking with more urgency. "I may depend on you, M. le Vicomte, I presume--to keep your word?"

"The Noirterres have never been wanting to their word," the young n.o.bleman answered stung into pa.s.sing pa.s.sion. "If I live I will put Lusigny into your hands, M. le Capitaine. Afterwards I will do my best to recover it--in another way."

"I shall be most happy to meet you in that way," replied the Captain, bowing lightly. And in one more minute, the door of his lodging had closed on the other; and he was alone--alone with his triumph, his ambition, his hopes for the future--alone with the greatness to which his capture of Lusigny was to be the first step. He would enjoy that greatness not a whit the less because fortune had hitherto dealt out to him more blows than caresses, and he was still at forty, after a score of years of roughest service, the governor of a paltry country town.