The Works of Honore de Balzac Part 96

"Then the devil haunts me!" said the goldsmith, lamentably.

Under any other circ.u.mstances the King would have laughed at his treasurer's exclamation; but he stood thinking and gazing at Maitre Cornelius with the scrutiny familiar to men of genius and authority, as if he could see into the man's brain. The Fleming, in fact, was terrified, thinking he had offended his formidable master.

"Angel or devil, I will have the malefactor!" the King suddenly exclaimed.

"If you are robbed this night, I will know by whom to-morrow. Call up that old ape, your sister," he added.

Cornelius almost hesitated to leave the King alone in the room that contained his treasure; however, he went, coerced by the strength of the bitter smile that curled Louis' faded lips. And in spite of his confidence, he soon returned, followed by the old woman.

"Have you any flour?" asked the King.

"To be sure! we have laid in our store for the winter," said she.

"Well, then, bring it here," said the King.

"And what would you be doing with our flour, Sire?" cried she in alarm, and not in the least awed by the presence of majesty, like all persons possessed by a ruling pa.s.sion.

"You old fool, will you do as our gracious liege bids you?" cried Cornelius. "Does the King want your flour?"

"This is what I buy fine flour for," muttered she, on the stairs. "Oh, my good flour!"

She turned back to say to the King:

"Is it your royal whim, my lord, to examine my flour?"

But at last she returned with one of the linen bags, which from time immemorial have been used in Touraine for carrying provisions to or from market--walnuts, fruit, or corn. This sack was half full of flour. The housewife opened it, and timidly showed it to the King, looking at him with the swift stolen glances by which old maids, as it would seem, hope to cast venom on a man.

"It is worth six sous the measure," said she.

"What matter!" replied the King. "Sprinkle it on the floor, and above all strew it very evenly, as if there had been a light fall of snow."

The old woman did not understand. The order dismayed her more than the end of the world could have done.

"My flour, my liege--on the floor--why----"

Maitre Cornelius, who had an inkling, though a vague one, of the King's idea, s.n.a.t.c.hed the bag, and sprinkled the flour gently on the boards. The old woman shuddered, and held out her hand for the bag; as soon as her brother restored it to her, she vanished with a deep sigh.

Cornelius took a feather broom and began spreading the flour with it over the floor till it lay like a sheet of snow, walking backwards towards the door, followed by the King, who seemed greatly amused by the proceedings.

When they were at the threshold, Louis XI. said to his gossip:

"Are there two keys to the lock?"

"No, Sire."

The King examined the structure of the door, which was strengthened by large iron plates and bars. All the parts of this armor centered round a lock with a secret, of which Cornelius alone had the key. After investigating it thoroughly, Louis sent for Tristan, and bid him to set a watch with the utmost secrecy that night, some in the mulberry-trees on the quay, and on the parapets of the neighboring houses; but first to collect all his men to escort him back to Le Plessis, so as to make it appear that he, the King, was not supping with Maitre Cornelius. Then he desired the miser to be so particular in closing every window, that not a glimmer of light could pierce through, and to order a light meal, so as not to give a hint that His Majesty was sleeping there that night.

The King set out in state by the d.y.k.e road and returned privily, with only two attendants, by the rampart gate to the house of his friend the miser.

Everything was so well arranged that all the townsfolk and courtiers supposed that the King had chosen to go back to the chateau, and would sup with the treasurer on the morrow. The miser's sister confirmed this notion by buying some green sauce from the best maker, whose shop was close to the _quarroir aux herbes_, since called the carroir de Beaune, in honor of a splendid white marble fountain which the unfortunate Semblancay (Jacques de Beaune) sent for from Italy to adorn the capital of his province.

At about eight in the evening, when the King was at supper with his leech, Cornelius and the captain of the Scottish Guard, talking gayly and forgetting that he was Louis XI. and ill, and almost dying, perfect silence reigned outside, and the pa.s.sers-by, nay, even a thief, might have supposed the dwelling to be uninhabited.

"I hope," said the King, laughing, "that my gossip may be robbed this night, to satisfy my curiosity. And see to it, gentlemen, that no one leaves his chamber to-morrow morning without my orders, under pain of serious punishment."

Thereupon they all went to bed.

Next morning Louis XI. was the first to leave his room, and he made his way towards Cornelius' treasure-room. He was not a little surprised to detect the prints of a large foot on the stairs and in the pa.s.sages of the house.

Carefully avoiding these precious marks, he went to the door of the miser's closet and found it locked, with no traces of violence. He examined the direction of the footprints, but as they gradually grew fainter and at last left no mark, it was impossible to discover how the robber had escaped.

"Ah ha! gossip," cried the King to Cornelius, "you have been robbed, that is very certain!"

At these words the old Fleming came out, a prey to evident horror. Louis XI. led him to look at the footprints on the boards, and while examining them once more, the King, having by chance observed the miser's slippers, recognized the shape of the sole of which so many copies were stamped on the flooring. He said not a word, and suppressed a laugh, remembering how many innocent men had been hanged.

Cornelius hurried into his strong room. The King, bidding him make a fresh footprint by the side of those already visible, convinced him that the thief was none other than himself.

"The pearl necklace is missing!" cried Cornelius. "There is witchcraft in this. I have not left my room."

"We will find out about that at once," said the King, puzzled by the goldsmith's evident good faith.

He called the men of the watch into his room and asked them:

"Marry now, what did you see in the night?"

"Ah, Sire! a magical sight!" replied the lieutenant. "Your Majesty's treasurer stealing downstairs close to the wall, and so nimbly that at first we took him for a spectre."

"I!" cried Cornelius, who then stood silent and motionless as a paralyzed creature.

"You may go, all of you," said Louis, addressing the bowmen, "and tell Monsieur Conyngham, Coyctier, Bridore, and Tristan that they may get out of bed and come here. You have incurred pain of death," said Louis, coldly, to the miser, who, happily, did not hear him, "for you have at least ten on your soul!"

The King laughed, a grim, noiseless laugh, and paused.

"But be easy," he went on, as he noticed the strange pallor that overspread the old man's face; "you are better to bleed than to kill. And in consideration of a handsome fine, paid into my coffers, you may escape the clutches of justice; but if you do not build at least a chapel to the Virgin, you are in jeopardy of finding warm and anxious work before you for all eternity."

"Twelve hundred and thirty and eighty-eight thousand crowns make thirteen hundred and seventeen thousand crowns," replied Cornelius, mechanically, absorbed in calculations. "Thirteen hundred and seventeen thousand crowns misappropriated!"

"He must have buried them in some hidden spot," said the King, who was beginning to think the sum a royal prize. "This is the lodestone that has always attracted him hither--he smelt his gold."

Hereupon Coyctier came in. Noticing the treasurer's att.i.tude, he watched him keenly while the King was relating the adventure.

"My lord," replied the physician, "there is nothing supernatural in the business. Our friend here has the peculiarity of walking in his sleep. This is the third case I have met with of this singular malady. If you should be pleased to witness its effects, you might see this old man walking without danger on the parapet of the roof any night when he should be seized by it.

In the two men I have already studied, I discovered a curious connection between the instincts of this nocturnal vitality and their business or occupations by day."

"Ah, Maitre Coyctier, you are indeed most learned!"

"Am I not your physician?" retorted the leech, insolently.

On this reply Louis XI. made a little movement which was a familiar trick with him when he had hit on a good idea--a gesture of hastily pus.h.i.+ng his cap up.