The False Chevalier Part 36

"It is impossible for me, as a man of honour, to sign such a paper," he said to himself. After walking up and down in his parlours, therefore, he wrote a reply.

The story of the Chevalier's life will help us to understand him in the matter.

He had, in his youth, under the French _regime_, won distinction as a Canadian officer by many important services, and was ent.i.tled by written promises of the Government of France, to money rewards alone of nearly a hundred thousand livres. On the fall of the colony, however, when the Canadian officers proceeded to the home country, they found a cold shoulder turned upon them in the departments of Versailles, so ready to waste immense sums for those in power and to ignore the barest dues of merit. Among the rest, de Lery, his bosom burning with the distress of his family in Paris, paced the corridors of the Colonial Office for nearly two years. Monsieur Accaron, the cold and procrastinative ex-Jesuit deputy of the First Minister, would reply--

"I agree with you, sir, that these services are very distinguished; still, Canada being no longer ours, it is to be admitted they have all been useless."

"Monsieur," the soldier would return, "I have never understood that the misfortunes of the brave lessen their rights."

"Well, well, if you will but wait----"

"I shall be enchanted to wait, and I beg of you to inform me of the means of doing so. I have in Paris my wife and four children, and the twenty louis to which his Majesty has reduced my allowance would not support us in the most favoured province of France."

After making such fruitless attempts, he said boldly to them one day--

"I will return to Canada and try my fortune under a different Crown."

"Do not so easily abandon hope," remarked Accaron coolly.

De Lery, for reply, went to the British Amba.s.sador, told him he had heard high reports of the British nation and offered to become a subject of the English King. In due time a man of so much sense and spirit was received by George III. with satisfaction, as the first of the Canadian gentry to enter his service, and as the Chevalier carried out his new allegiance with the strictest sincerity, time only added to his esteem and he became the favourite Councillor of Governor Dorchester.

The same principles of honour, dignity, and good sense marked his feeling in the present difficulty with young Lecour. The reply ran: that the terms of the proposed letter were a surprise to him, that he was anxious to serve his young friend and especially to place in his hands the means of rectifying any injury done to him by unfortunate remarks or rumours, but that it was impossible to grant the letter requested, and he offered the following subst.i.tute:--

"AT QUEBEC, _the 3rd October, 1788_.

"MONSIEUR,--It is with great pleasure that I consent to testify in your favour against the injurious rumours concerning you which some persons have a.s.sumed to base upon my authority and that of my family. After conversing about your papers and yourself with Judge Panet and other persons of position, I am, equally with them, of opinion that you have proven the falsity of the said rumours, and that you are not the person to whom they relate, your father being of great possessions in the country about St. Elphege, and of repute throughout the whole Province as an honourable man.

"J. G. C. DE LeRY."

Germain tore the answer into pieces in a pa.s.sion. "Not the person to whom they relate!" he cried, "Who am I then, and what shelter would this precious epistle give me against the son?" Stepping to his escritoir he wrote back the following fiery note:---

"_To Monsieur de Lery, Chevalier of St. Louis, at Quebec._

"MONSIEUR,--After having employed all honourable means to induce you to grant me that satisfaction which you owe to me, I hereby notify you that you can avoid dishonour only by one of two alternatives: either by signing the letter sent you by me, unaltered in any particular; or by being present this day at four of the clock at the place called Port St. Louis, to render account on the spot of the reports which you have been purposely spreading against my honour, and to accord to me in your person the satisfaction they deserve. I shall expect your answer at once upon your reading this, and if by mid-day I have not received it, I shall prove to you my exact.i.tude to my word.--I am, sir (if you accept either proposal), your servant with all my heart,

"LECOUR DE LINCY."

While he was hotly engaged in penning this letter to the father, the incidents of his duels with the son Louis crowded before him--the counsels of his friends, the choosing of the weapons, the deadly tension of the combat, the look of furious contempt in his adversary's eyes. It was only after he had sent off Madame's man-of-all-work with it that the incongruousness of challenging so old a man struck him.

The Chevalier, on receiving the challenge, perceived at once the gravity of his own situation. The code of the time demanded his acceptance. He knew that, however a duel might be laughed at by boasters, the sober truth was that it brought a man face to face with death, and that the present cause of quarrel was not worth any such sacrifice. In short the thing seemed to him foolish and unreasonable.

No time was to be lost. He had therefore recourse for advice to his boon companion Panet, who p.r.o.nounced it a bad business.

"Really," he said, moving nervously, "you must recognise, my dear de Lery, that men of our stiffness and weight can have no chance pitted against a young fellow from the fencing schools of Versailles. He has a wrist as limber as a fish no doubt. Try to end the affair some way."

De Lery, annoyed and disappointed that the judge did not rise to the occasion, and thrown back on his own resources, went to Lord Dorchester himself, requesting his mediation.

The Governor read over the letters which had pa.s.sed, especially that sent by LeCour for signature.

"Tut, what a young fool. Tell LaNaudiere there to send for him," he exclaimed.

So in about half an hour Germain appeared.

Guessing the state of the matter, he began by complaining of his wrongs on the part of the de Lerys. He was listened to to the end by Dorchester, who then, with the greatest politeness, but firmly, pointed out the impossibility of any man of honour signing the proposed confession.

"Do you both agree, gentlemen, to leave the form of the letter with me?"

Germain could not do otherwise.

The Governor sat down at a writing-desk, laid the epistle before him, and produced the following:--

"MONSIEUR,--It is with great pleasure that I consent to testify in your favour against certain injurious rumours affecting your reputation and family name, which have been circulated by unauthorised persons in the name of my household. You have clearly proven to me that the rumours in question are calumnies without any foundation, and I am sincerely affected concerning the pain they have given you."

Dorchester read what he had written.

"There is my award," he p.r.o.nounced. "It is, in my opinion, all that one gentleman ought to demand of another. Do you consider it fair each of you?"

Each declared it satisfactory.

"Then sign it, Mr. de Lery," said the Governor promptly. De Lery signed it.

Dorchester gave it to Germain.

"Are you satisfied?" he asked.

"Perfectly, your Excellency."

Germain thrust the letter in his breast and bowed himself out. On sober thought he preferred it to his own. The same evening he sailed for Europe. But not before he had secured the signature of the Bishop of Quebec to a copy of his birth-certificate, altered according to the judge's order procured at Montreal.

Onward, onward, he impatiently counted the leagues of the sea by day. A ravis.h.i.+ngly fair face beckoned in his dreams by night.

CHAPTER x.x.xVIII

THE RECORD

On New Year's morning de Lotbiniere was crossing the great courtyard of the Louvre, when he heard the voice of Louis de Lery calling him. The Bodyguard was hurrying forward with a curl of disgust on his lip, and holding out an open letter.

The Marquis, stopping, took it with a glance of inquiry.

"More of the beast!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Louis.

The letter was one from Madame de Lery, relating with a woman's indignation the proceedings of Germain during his first visit to Quebec.

"_Mon Dieu!_ how disgusting," Louis exclaimed.