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The Knight of Malta

by Eugène Sue · English · Gutenberg #40075 · 654,507 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Knight of Malta

Author: Eugène Sue


        
Release date: June 24, 2012 [eBook #40075]
                Most recently updated: August 22, 2016

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/40075

Credits: Produced by David Widger


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE KNIGHT OF MALTA ***




Produced by David Widger





THE KNIGHT OF MALTA

By Eugene Sue

Illustrated

New York and Boston

H. M. Caldwell Company Publishers


Copyright, 1900


[Illustration: Frontispiece]


THE KNIGHT OF MALTA.




CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION.


The travellers who now sail along the picturesque coasts within the
district of the Bouches-du-Rhone--the peaceable inhabitants of shores
perfumed by the orange-trees of Hyères, or the curious tourists, whom
steamboats are continually transporting from Marseilles to Nice or to
Gênes--are perhaps ignorant of the fact that two hundred years ago,
under the flourishing administration of Cardinal Richelieu, the seashore
of Provence was, almost every day, plundered by Algerian pirates, or
other robbers from Barbary, whose audacity knew no bounds. Not only
did they capture all the merchant vessels leaving port,--although these
ships were armed for war,--but they landed under the cannon even of the
forts, and carried away with impunity the inhabitant whose dwellings
were not adequately armed and fortified.

These depredations increased to such a degree that in 1633 Cardinal
Richelieu instructed M. de Séguiran, one of the most eminent men
of that time, to visit the coast of Provence, for the purpose of
ascertaining the best means of protecting them from the invasion of
pirates.

We will quote a passage from the memoir of M. de Séguiran in order to
give to the reader an exact idea of the scenes which are to follow.

“There is,” says he, “in the town of La Ciotat, a sentry-box which
the consuls have had built on one of the points of the rock of Cape
l’Aigle, in which they keep a man, very expert in navigation, on guard
night and day, to watch for pirate vessels.

“Every evening, toward nightfall, the guard in the sentry-box of La
Ciotat kindles his fire, which is continued by all the other similar
sentry-boxes to the lighthouse of Bouc.

“This is a certain signal that there is not a corsair in the sea.

“If the said guard in the sentry-box has, on the contrary, recognised
one, he makes two fires, as do all the others from Antibes to the
lighthouse of Bouc, and this is accomplished in less than a half-hour of
time.

“The inhabitants of La Ciotat confess that commerce has been better
during the last few years. But as far as can be learned, it is ruined.

“The corsairs from Barbary in one year seized eighty vessels and put
about fifty of their best sailors in chains.”

As we have said, so great was the terror that these Barbary pirates
inspired dong the coast that every house was transformed into a
fortress.

“Continuing our way,” says M. de Séguiran, “we arrived at the
house of the lord of Boyer, gentleman of the king’s chamber, which
house we found in a state of defence, in case of a descent of the
corsairs,--having a terrace in front, facing the port, and on it
twelve pieces of cast iron, several pieces of less calibre, and two
swivel-guns, and in the said house four hundred pounds of powder, two
hundred balls, two pairs of armour, and twelve muskets and short pikes.

“At Bormez and at St. Tropez,” says M. de Séguiran, further
on, “commerce is so seriously injured that it cannot amount to ten
thousand pounds, which is a consequence not only of the poverty of the
inhabitants, but also of the invasions made by pirates, who enter their
ports almost every day, so that very often vessels are compelled to
touch port, in order that the men who man them may escape, or the
inhabitants of the place arm themselves.

“At Martignes, a community which has suffered great losses in the
persons of its inhabitants,--esteemed the best and most courageous
seamen on the Mediterranean,--many of them have been made slaves by the
corsairs of Algiers and Tunis, who practise their piracies more than
ever, in the sight of the forts and fortresses of that province.”

The reader can imagine the contempt of these Barbary pirates for the
forts on the coast, when he knows that the seashore was in such a
deplorable state of defence that M. de Séguiran says, in another
passage of his report to Cardinal Richelieu:

“The next day, January 24th, at seven o’clock in the morning, we
went to the fortified castle named Cassis, belonging to the Lord Bishop
of Marseilles, where we found that the entire garrison consisted of a
porter only, a servant of the said bishop, who showed us the place, and
where there were only two small pieces of ordnance, one of which had
been emptied.”

Later, the Archbishop of Bordeaux made the same remark in reference to
one of the strongest positions of Toulon.

“The first and most important of these forts,” says the warrior
prelate in his report, “is an old tower where there are two batteries,
in which fifty cannon and two hundred soldiers could be placed; there
are good cannon within, but all are dismounted, and no ammunition,
except what was sent by order of your Eminence [Cardinal Richelieu]
fifteen days ago. The commandant is a simple, good man, who has for
garrison only his wife and her servant, and, according to what he says,
he has not received a farthing in twenty years.”

Such was the state of things a few years before Cardinal Richelieu was
invested by Louis XIII. with the office of grand master in chief and
general superintendent of the navigation and commerce of France.

In studying attentively the aim, the progress, the methods, and results
of the government of Richelieu,--in comparing, in a word, the point
of departure of his administration with the imperious conclusion of
absolute centralisation toward which it always tended, and which he
attained so victoriously,--one is especially impressed by the character
of the navy, by the incredible confusion and multiplicity of powers
or rival rights which covered the seashore of the kingdom with their
inextricable network.

When the cardinal was entrusted with the maritime interests of France,
he could count but little upon the support of a weak, timid, restless,
and capricious king; besides, he felt that France was secretly agitated
by profound political and religious discords. Alone, opposing the
exorbitant pretensions represented by the most powerful houses of
France,--haughty and jealous guardians of the last traditions of feudal
independence,--it was essential that the will of Richelieu should be
indomitable, even obstinate, in order to crush beneath the level
of administrative unity interests so numerous, so tenacious, and so
rebellious! Such was, however, the work of this great minister.

There is no doubt that the ardent and sacred love of the general
good, the noble, instinctive perception of the needs and progress
of humanity,--those pure and serene aspirations of a DeWitt or a
Franklin,--would not have sufficed the cardinal in undertaking and
sustaining so fierce a struggle; perhaps, too, it was essential that he
should feel himself animated by an unbridled, insatiable ambition, in
order to cope with so many formidable antagonisms, to despise so many
outcries, to prevent or punish so many dangerous revolts by prison,
exile, or the scaffold, and at last achieve the end of gathering in his
dying and sovereign hand all the resources of the state.

It was by this means--we think so, at least--that the genius of
Richelieu, exalted by an unconquerable personality, succeeded in
consummating this admirable centralisation of conflicting powers,--the
constant aim and glorious end of his administration.

Unfortunately, he died at the time he was beginning to organise this
authority so valiantly conquered.

If France, at the time of the cardinal’s death, presented still upon
her surface the distinct evidences of a complete social overthrow, the
soil was at least beginning to be freed from the thousand parasitical
and devouring forces which had so long exhausted her strength.

So, one might say that almost always eminent men, although of diverse
genius, are born in time to achieve the great labours of governments.

To Richelieu, that resolute and indefatigable clearer of untilled
ground, succeeds Mazarin, who levelled the earth so profoundly
ploughed,--then Colbert, who sowed it, and made it fruitful.

The imperial will of Richelieu appeared under one of its most brilliant
aspects in the long struggle he was obliged to sustain, when he was
entrusted with the organisation of the navy.

Up to that time, the governor-generals of Provence had always challenged
the orders of the admiralty of France, styling themselves the “born
admirals” of the Levant.

As such, they pretended to the maritime authority of the province; a few
of these governors, such as the Counts of Tende and of Sommerives, and,
at the period of which we speak, the Duke of Guise, had received from
the king special letters which conferred upon them the title of admiral.
These concessions, drawn from the weakness of the monarch, far from
supporting the pretentions of the governor-generals, protested, on the
contrary, against their usurpation, since these titles proved clearly
that the command of sea and land ought to be separate.

Thus we see how divided and antagonistic were these rival powers, that
the cardinal, in performing the functions of his office as grand master
of navigation, wished imperiously to unite and centralise.

It can be seen by this rapid and cursory view, and by the extracts which
we have borrowed from the report of M. de Séguiran, that a frightful
disorder reigned in every department of power.

This disorder was the more increased by the perpetually recurring
conflicts of jurisdiction, either through the governors of the province,
or through the admiralties, or through the feudal claims of many
gentlemen whose estates commanded a forest or a river.

In a word, abandonment or disorganisation of fortified places, ruin of
commerce, robbery of the treasury, invasion of the seashore, terror of
populations retiring into the interior of the country, in the hope of
flying from the attacks of these Barbary pirates,--such was the
grievous picture presented by Provence at the period in which this story
opens,--a story of incredible facts which seem rather to belong to the
barbarity of the middle ages than to the seventeenth century.




CHAPTER II. MISTRAON

About the end of the month of June, 1633, three distinguished
travellers, arriving at Marseilles, established themselves in the best
inn of the city. Their dress and accent were foreign. It was soon
known that they were Muscovites, and although their attendants were
not numerous, they lived in magnificent style. The eldest of the three
travellers had called upon the Marshal of Vitry, Governor of Provence,
then residing in Marseilles, and the marshal had returned his visit, a
circumstance which greatly enhanced the dignity of the foreigners.

They employed their time in visiting the public build-ings, the port,
and the docks. The preceptor of the youngest of these travellers, with
the permission of the Marshal of Vitry, made careful inquiry of the
consuls concerning the productions and commerce of Provence, the
condition of the merchant service, its equipment and destination,
evidently anxious, for the benefit of his pupil, to make a comparison
between the growing navy of the North and the navy of one of the most
important provinces of France.

One day these Muscovites directed their journey toward Toulon.

The eldest of the three foreigners appeared to be fifty years old. His
countenance presented a singular union of pride and severity. He was
attired in black velvet; a long red beard covered his breast, and
his hair, of the same colour, mingled with a few silver locks, showed
beneath a Tartar cap trimmed with costly fur. His sea-green eyes, his
sallow complexion, his hooked nose, his heavy eyebrows, and his thin
lips gave him a hard and ironical expression.

He walked at some distance from his companions, and seldom spoke, and
when he did it was only to hurl at them some bitter sarcasm.

The age and appearance of the two other Muscovites presented a striking
contrast.

One, who seemed to be the preceptor of the younger, was about forty-five
years old. He was short and fat, almost to obesity, although he seemed
to have a vigorous constitution.

He wore a long robe of coarsely woven brown silk, after the manner of
the Orientals, and an Asiatic cap; a Persian dagger of rare workmanship
ornamented his girdle of orange-coloured silk. His fat, ruddy
face, covered with a thick brown beard, and his thick lips breathed
sensuality; his small, gray eyes sparkled with malice. Sometimes, in
a shrill voice, he gave vent to some jest of audacious cynicism,
frequently in Latin, and always borrowed from Petronius or Martial;
so that the other two travellers, with allusion to the taste of their
companion for the works of Petronius, had given him the name of one of
the heroes of this writer, and called him Trimalcyon.

The pupil of this singular preceptor seemed at the most to be only
twenty years of age. His person was of the ordinary size, but most
elegant; his dress, like that of the Muscovites of the age, was a happy
union of the fashions of the North and the East, arranged with perfect
taste. His long brown hair fell in natural curls from a black cap, flat
and without brim, set on one side and ornamented with a gold and purple
band; the two ends of this band, finely embroidered and fringed, fell
over the collar of a black woollen jacket, embossed with designs in
purple and gold, and fastened to the hips by a cashmere shawl; a second
jacket with loose sleeves, made of rich black Venetian fabric, and lined
with scarlet taffeta, reached a little below the knees; large, loose
Moorish trousers, hanging over red morocco buskins, completed the
picturesque attire.

An observer would have been embarrassed in assigning a certain character
to the countenance of this young man. His features were of perfect
regularity; a young, silky beard shaded his chin and lips; his large
eyes shone like black diamonds, under his straight brown eyebrows; the
dazzling enamel of his teeth scarcely equalled the deep carmine of his
lips; his complexion was of a soft brown pallor, and his slender figure
seemed to combine strength and elegance.

But this physiognomy, as charming as it was expressive and variable,
reflected in turn the different impressions which the two companions of
this young man made on his mind.

If Trimalcyon uttered some gross and licentious jest, the young man,
whom we will call Erebus, applauded it with a mocking, sneering smile,
or, perhaps, replied in words which surpassed the cynicism of his
preceptor.

If the nobleman, Pog, a silent and morose man, made a remark of unusual
bitterness, suddenly the nostrils of Erebus would dilate, his upper
lip curl disdainfully, and his whole face express the most contemptuous
sarcasm.

On the contrary, if Erebus did not come under these two fatal
influences, or an absurd boasting did not make him appear the advocate
of vice, his face would become sweet and serene,--an attractive dignity
beamed from his beautiful features; for cynicism and irony only passed
over his soul,--noble and pure instincts soon resumed their sway, as
a pure fountain regains its clearness when the disturbing element no
longer troubles its crystal waters. Such were these three distinguished
persons.

They were walking, as we have said, from Marseilles to Toulon.

Erebus, silent and thoughtful, walked a few steps in front of his
companions. The road plunged into the defiles of Ollioules, and hid
itself in the midst of these solitary rocks.

Erebus had just reached a small open space, where he could overlook a
great part of the route, which at this point was very steep and formed
a sort of elbow around the eminence upon which the young man stood.
Interrupted in his reverie by the sound of singing in the distance,
Erebus stopped to listen.

The voice came nearer and nearer.

It was a woman’s voice, with a resonance of wonderful power and
beauty.

The air and the words she sang expressed an unaffected melancholy. Soon,
at a sudden turn of the road, Erebus could see, without being seen, a
company of travellers; they quietly accommodated themselves to the step
of their saddle-horses, that climbed the steep road with difficulty.

If the coast of Provence was often desolated by pirates, the interior
of the country was as little safe, for the narrow passes of Ollioules,
solitudes almost impenetrable, had many times served as a refuge for
brigands. Erebus was not astonished to see the little caravan advance
with a sort of military circumspection.

The danger did not seem to be imminent, for the young girl continued to
sing, but the cavalier who led the march took the precaution to adjust
his musket on his left thigh, and at frequent intervals to test his
firearms, leaving behind him a little cloud of bluish smoke.

This man, a military figure in the full strength of manhood, wore an
old leather jerkin, a large gray cap, scarlet breeches, heavy boots, and
rode a small white horse; a hanger or hunting-knife was fastened to
his belt, and a tall black hound, with long hair and a leather collar
bristling with iron points, walked in front of his horse.

About thirty steps behind this forward sentinel came an old man and a
young girl.

The latter was mounted on an ambling nag, as black as jet, elegantly
caparisoned with a silk net and a blue velvet cloth; the silver mounting
of the bridle glittered in the rays of the setting sun; the reins,
scarcely held by the young girl, fell carelessly upon the neck of
the nag, whose gentle and regular step by no means interrupted the
harmonious measure of the beautiful traveller’s song.

She wore right royally the charming riding-habit so often reproduced by
painters in the reign of Louis XIII. On her head was a large black hat
with blue feathers, which fell backward on a wide collar of Flanders
lace; her close-fitting coat of pearl-gray taffeta, with large, square
basques, had a long skirt of the same material and colour, both skirt
and waist ornamented with delicate lace-work of sky-blue silk, whose
pale shade matched admirably the colour of the habit If one ever doubted
the fact that the Greek type had been preserved in all its purity
among a few of the families of Marseilles and lower Provence, since the
colonisation of the Phoenicians,--the rest of the population recalling
more the Arabian and Ligurian physiognomy,--the features of this young
girl would have presented a striking proof of the transmission of the
antique beauty in all its original perfection.

Nothing could be more agreeable, more delicate, or purer than the
exquisite lines of her lovely countenance; nothing more limpid than the
blue of her large eyes, fringed with long black lashes; nothing whiter
than the ivory of her queenly brow, around which played the light
chestnut curls that contrasted beautifully with the perfect arch of
eyebrows as black as jet, and soft as velvet; the proportions of her
well-rounded form resembled Hebe, or the Venus of Praxiteles, rather
than the Venus of Milo.

As she sang she yielded herself to the measured step of her steed, and
every movement of her charming and graceful body revealed new treasures
of beauty.

Her small, arched foot, encased in a boot of cordovan leather, laced
to the ankle, appeared from time to time beneath the ample folds of
her long skirt, while her hand, as small as that of a child, gloved in
embroidered chamois-skin, carelessly played with the switch by which she
urged the gait of her nag.

It would be difficult to picture the frankness which shone from the pure
brow of this young girl, the serenity of her large blue eyes, bright
with happiness and hope and youth, the unsophisticated sweetness of
her smile, and, above all, the look of solicitude and filial veneration
which she often directed toward the aged but robust father who
accompanied her.

The eager, hardy, and joyous air of this old gentleman contrasted not
a little with his white moustache, and the vinous colour of his cheeks
announced the fact that he was not indifferent to the seductions of the
generous wines of Provence.

A black cap with a red plume, a scarlet doublet trimmed with silver,
and mantle of the same, a shoulder-strap of richly embroidered silk,
supporting a long sword, and high boots of white sheepskin, with gilded
spurs, testified to the quality of Raimond V., Baron des Anbiez, chief
of one of the most ancient houses of Provence, and related or allied
to the most illustrious baronial houses of Castellane, Baux, Frans, and
Villeneuve.

The road which the little caravan followed was so narrow that it
permitted two horses to walk abreast with difficulty; a third person
rode a few steps behind the baron and his daughter. Two servants,
well-mounted and well-armed, closed the march.

This third person, a young man of about twenty-five years, tall and
well-made, with a handsome and amiable face, managed his horse with
grace and ease. He wore a green hunting-habit, trimmed with gold lace.

His face expressed an indescribable delight in the contemplation of
Mlle. Reine des Anbiez, who, without discontinuing her song, every now
and then turned to him with a charming glance, to which the Chevalier
Honorât de Berrol responded with all the ardour of an infatuated and
betrothed lover.

The baron listened to his daughter’s singing with joy and paternal
pride; his genial and venerable countenance beamed with happiness.

His contemplative felicity was, nevertheless, not a little disturbed
by the sudden jumps of his little horse, brought from the island of
Camargne,--a bay stallion with long mane and a long black tail, a wicked
eye and ferocious disposition, full of fire, and evidently possessed
with a desire to unhorse his master and regain his liberty in the
solitary swamps and wild heath where he was born.

Unfortunately for the designs of Mistraon,--named for the impetuous
northwest wind, on account of the rapidity of his gait and his bad
character,--the baron was an excellent horseman.

Although suffering from the consequences of a wound in the hip, received
in the civil war, Raimond V., seated on one of those ancient saddles
which in our day we call picket-saddles, answered these vicious caprices
of the untamable animal with sound blows of whip and spur. Mistraon,
with that patient and diabolical sagacity which horses carry to the
point of genius, after several vain attempts, stolidly waited a more
favourable occasion for dismounting his rider.

Reine des Anbiez continued to sing.

Like a child, she amused herself by waking the echoes in the gorges of
Ollioules, making by turn loud and soft modulations, which would have
put a nightingale to despair.

She had just made a most brilliant and musical arpeggio, when suddenly,
anticipating the echo, a male voice, sweet and melodious, repeated the
young girl’s song with incredible exactness.

For some moments these two charming voices, meeting by chance in a
marvellous union, were repeated by the many echoes of this profound
solitude.

Reine stopped singing, and blushed as she looked up at her father.

The baron, astonished, turned to Honorât de Berrol, and said, with
his habitual exclamation: “Manjour! chevalier, who in the devil is
imitating the voice of an angel?”

In the first moment of surprise the baron had unfortunately let the
reins fall on Mistraon’s neck.

For some time the deceitful animal kept his step with a gravity and
dignity worthy of a bishop’s mule, then in two vigorous bounds,
and before the baron had time to recover himself, he climbed up an
escarpment which shut in the road.

Unhappily, the horse had made such an effort in ascending this steep
acclivity, that he fell upon his head, the reins went over his ears, and
floated at random. All this happened in less time than is required to
write it.

The baron, an excellent master of horse, although not a little surprised
by the adventure of Mistraon, reseated himself in the saddle; his first
effort was to try to seize the reins,--he could not reach them. Then,
notwithstanding his courage, he shuddered with horror, as he saw himself
at the mercy of an unbridled horse that in his frenzy was trying to leap
the precipitous edge of a torrent bed.

This deep and wide gulf lay parallel with the road, and was separated
from it only by a space of fifty feet.

[Illustration: Seized the bloody bridle]

Seated in his saddle, and by reason of his wound unable to get out of it
before the horse could plunge into the abyss, the old man gave his last
thought to his God and his daughter,--made a vow of a weekly mass and an
annual pilgrimage to the Chapel of Notre Dame de la Garde, and prepared
to die.

From the height where he was standing, Erebus saw the danger of the
baron; he saw that he was separated from him by the deep bed of the
torrent, ten or twelve feet wide, toward which the horse was plunging.

With a movement more rapid than thought, and an almost desperate leap,
Erebus cleared the abyss, and rolled under the animal’s feet The baron
screamed with terror,--he believed his saviour would be carried over
into the golf, for, notwithstanding the pain and fright which this
violent jerk had given him, Mistraon was not able to arrest the
impetuosity of his spring, and dragged Erebus several steps.

The latter, endowed with extraordinary strength and admirable presence
of mind, had, as he fell, wound the reins around his wrists, while
the horse, overcome by the enormous weight which hung upon him, seated
himself on his haunches, having exhausted the impulse which instigated
such activity.

Scarcely ten steps separated the baron from the edge of the gulf, when
Erebus slowly raised himself, seized the bloody bridle-bit with one
hand, and with the other threw over the smoking neck of Mistraon the
reins which he offered to the old man.

All this transpired so rapidly that Reine des Anbiez and her betrothed,
climbing the escarpment, arrived near the baron without having suspected
the frightful danger he had just escaped.

Erebus, having replaced the reins in the old man’s hands, picked up
his cap, shook the dust from his clothes, and readjusted his hair, and,
save the unnatural flush upon his cheeks, nothing in his appearance
revealed the part he had taken in this event.

“My God, father, why did you climb this steep? What imprudence!”
 cried Reine, excited but not frightened, as she bounded lightly from her
nag, without seeing the unknown person standing on the other side of the
baron’s horse.

Then, seeing the pallor and emotion of the old man as he made a painful
descent from his horse, the young girl perceived the danger which had
threatened the baron, and throwing herself into his arms, she exclamed:

“Father, father, what has happened to you?” “Reine, my darling
child,” said the lord of Anbiez with a broken voice, embracing
his daughter with effusion. “Ah, how frightful death would have
been,--never to see you again!”

Reine withdrew herself suddenly from her father’s arms, put her two
hands on the old man’s shoulders, and looked at him with a bewildered
air.

“But for him,” said the baron, cordially pressing in his own hands
the hand of Erebus, who had stepped forward, gazing with admiration on
the beauty of Reine, “but for this young man, but for his courageous
sacrifice, I should have been dashed to pieces in this gulf.”

In a few words the old man told his daughter and Honorât de Berrol how
the stranger had saved him from certain death.

Many times during this recital the blue eyes of Reine met the black eyes
of Erebus; if she slowly turned her glance away to fix it on her father
with adoration, it was not because the manner of this young man was bold
or presumptuous; on the contrary, a tear moistened his eyes, and his
charming face expressed the most profound emotion. He contemplated this
pathetic scene with a sublime pride. When the old man opened his arms
to him with paternal affection, he threw himself into them with
inexpressible delight, pressed him many times to his heart, as if he
had been attracted to the old gentleman by a secret sympathy, as if this
young heart, still noble and generous, had anticipated the throbs of
another noble and generous heart.

Suddenly Trimalcyon and Pog, who, twenty steps distant, had witnessed
this scene from the height of the rock where they were resting, cried
out to their young companion some words in a foreign language.

Erebus started, the baron, his daughter, and Honorât de Berrol turned
their heads quickly.

Trimalcyon looked at the baron’s daughter with a sort of vulgar and
sneering admiration.

The strange physiognomy of these two men surprised the baron, while his
daughter and Honorât regarded them with an instinctive terror.

A skilful painter would have found wealth of material in this scene.
Imagine a profound solitude in the midst of tremendous rocks of reddish
granite, whose summit only was lighted by the last rays of the sun. On
the first plane, almost on the edge of the torrent bed, the baron
with his left arm around Reine, grasping in his right hand the hand of
Erebus, and fixing an anxious, surprised look on Pog and Trimalcyon.

These two, on the second plane, the other side of the golf, standing
up side by side, with their arms crossed, outlining a characteristic
silhouette upon the azure sky, distinctly perceptible across the ragged
edges of the rocks.

Lastly, a few steps from the baron, stood Honorât de Berrol, holding
his horse and Reine’s nag, and farther still the two servants, one of
whom was occupied in readjusting the harness of Mistraon.

At the first words of the strangers, the beautiful features of Erebus
expressed a sort of distressed impatience; he seemed to be undergoing
an inward struggle; his face, which awhile ago was radiant with
noble passions, gradually grew sombre, as if he were submitting to a
mysterious and irresistible influence.

But when Trimalcyon, in a shrill and bantering voice, again uttered a
few words, as he designated Reine by an insolent glance, when the lord
Pog had added a biting sarcasm in the same language, unintelligible
to the other actors in this scene, the features of Erebus completely
changed their expression.

With an almost disdainful gesture, he roughly repulsed the hand of the
old man, and fixed an impudent stare on Mlle, des Anbiez. This time the
girl blushed and dropped her eyes.

This sudden metamorphosis in the manners of the stranger was so striking
that the baron recoiled a step. Nevertheless, after a silence of a few
seconds, he said to Erebus, in a voice deeply moved:

“How shall I acknowledge, sir, the service you have just rendered
me?”

“Oh, sir,” added Reine, overcoming the peculiar emotion which the
last look on the part of Erebus had inspired, “how shall we ever be
able to prove our gratitude to you?”

“By giving me a kiss, and this pin as a remembrance of you,” replied
the impudent young man.

He had scarcely uttered these words, when his mouth touched Reine’s
virginal lips, and his bold hand tore away the little pin enamelled with
silver, which was fastened in the young girl’s waist.

After this double larceny, Erebus, with wonderful agility, again cleared
the gulf behind him, and rejoined his companions, with whom he soon
disappeared behind a mass of rocks.

Reine’s fright and emotion were so violent that she turned deathly pale,
her knees gave way, and she fell fainting in the arms of her father.

The next day after this scene, the three Muscovites took leave of the
marshal, Duke of Vitry, departed from Marseilles with their attendants,
and proceeded on their way to Languedoc.




CHAPTER III. THE WATCHMAN.

The gulf of La Ciotat, equally distant from Toulon and Marseilles, lies
in between the two capes of Alon and l’Aigle. The latter rises on the
west of the bay.

By order of the council of the town of La Ciotat, a sentry-box for the
use of a watchman had been erected on the summit of this promontory.
It was the duty of this man to watch for the coming of pirates from
Barbary, and to signal their approach by kindling a fire which could be
seen all along the coast.

The scene we are about to describe occurred at the foot of this
sentry-box about the middle of the month of December, 1633.

An impetuous northwest wind, the terrible _mistraon_ of Provence, was
blowing with fury. The sun, half-obscured by great masses of gray clouds,
was slowly sinking in the waves, whose immense dark green curve was
broken by a wide zone of reddish light, which diminished in proportion
as the black clouds extended over the horizon.

The summit of Cape l’Aigle, where the watchman’s box was situated,
commanded the entire circumference of the gulf; the last limestone
spurs of the whitish mountains of Sixfours, and Notre Dame de la Garde,
descending like an amphitheatre to the edge of the gulf, here joined
themselves to little cliffs formed of fine white sand, which, lifted up
by the south wind, invaded a part of the coast. A little farther, on the
declivity of a series of hills, shone the lights of several quicklime
ovens, whose black smoke increased the gloomy aspect of the sky. Almost
at the foot of the cape of l’Aigle, at the entrance of the bay, backed
up against the mountains, could be seen, as the crow flies, the island
Verte and the little town La Ciotat, belonging to the diocese of
Marseilles and the jurisdiction of Aix.

The town formed almost a trapezium, the base of which rested on the
port This port held a dozen small vessels, called polacres and caravels,
laden with wines and oil, waiting for favourable weather to return to
the coast of Italy. About thirty boats designed for sardine fishing,
called _essanguis_ by the inhabitants of Provence, were moored in a
little bay of the gulf, named the cove of La Fontaine. The belfries of
the churches and of the convent of the Ursulines were the only things
which broke the monotony of the dwellings, almost entirely covered with
tiles.

On the hillsides which commanded the town, fields of olive-trees could
be seen, several clusters of green oak and hillocks of vines, and at
the extreme horizon the pine-covered summits of the chain of Roquefort
mountains.

At the eastern limit of the bay of La Ciotat, between the points
Carbonières and Seques, the ancient Roman ruins, called Torrentum,
could be distinguished, and farther and farther toward the north several
windmills, thrown here and there upon the heights, served as seamarks to
the vessels which came to anchor in the gulf.

Outside, and west of the cape of L’Aigle, almost upon the edge of the
sea, rose a fortified mansion named Les Anbiez, of which we will speak
later.

The summit of the cape of L’Aigle formed a tableland fifty feet
in circumference. Almost everywhere was the same precipitous rock of
yellowish sandstone, variegated with brown; sea-broom, heather, and
clover crossed it here and there; the watchman’s sentry-box was
erected under the cover of two stunted oaks and a gigantic pine, which
had braved the fury of the tempests for two or three centuries.

When the wind was very violent, although the promontory was more than
three hundred feet above the level of the sea, one could hear the
muttering thunder of the surf, as the waves broke themselves against its
base.

The watchman’s box, solidly built of large blocks of stone, was
covered over with slabs taken from the same quarry, so that the massive
construction was able to resist the most violent winds.

The principal opening of this cabin looked toward the south, and from it
the horizon was completely in view.

Near the door was a wide and deep square kiln, made of iron grating
placed on layers of masonry. This kiln was kept filled with vine
branches and fagots of olive-wood, ready to produce a tall and brilliant
flame, which could be seen at a great distance. The furniture of this
cabin was very poor, with the exception of a carved ebony casket,
ornamented with the coat of arms and the cross of Malta, which treasure
contrasted singularly with the modest appearance of this little
habitation. A walnut chest contained a few marine books, quite eagerly
sought after by the learned of our day, among others “The Guide of
the Old Harbour Pilot” and “The Torch of the Sea.” From the rough
lime-plastered walls hung a cutlass, a battle-axe, and a wheel-lock
musket.

Two coarse, illuminated engravings, representing St. Elmo, the patron of
mariners, and the portrait of the grand master of the hospitable order
of St. John of Jerusalem, then existing, were nailed above the ebony
casket. To conclude the inventory of furniture, on the floor near the
fireplace, where a large log of olive wood was slowly burning, a rush
matting, covered over with an old Turkish carpet, formed a moderately
good bed, for the inhabitant of this isolated retreat was not wholly
indifferent to comfort.

The watchman on the cape of L’Aigle was attentively examining all the
points of the horizon, with the aid of a Galileo spy-glass, at that
time known by the name of long-view. The setting sun pierced the thick
curtain of clouds, and with its last rays gilded the red trunk of the
tall pine, the rough ridges of the little cabin walls, and the corners
of the brown rock upon which the watchman was leaning.

The calm, intelligent face of this man was now lighted with intense
interest.

His complexion, burned by the wind and tanned by the sun, was the colour
of brick, and here and there showed deep wrinkles. The hood of his
long-sleeved mantle, hiding his white hair, shaded his black eyes and
eyebrows; his long, gray moustache fell considerably below his lower
lip, where it mingled with a heavy beard, which covered the whole of his
chin.

A red and green woollen girdle fastened his sailor trousers around his
hips; straps supported his leather gaiters above his knees; a bag of
richly embroidered stuff, hanging from his belt by the side of a long
knife in its sheath, contained his tobacco, while his cachim-babaou, or
long Turkish pipe with an earthen bowl, lay against the outer wall of
his cabin.

For ten years Bernard Peyrou had been watchman on the cape of L’Aigle.
He had recently been elected assignee of the overseer fishers of La
Ciotat, who held their session every Sunday when there was matter for
consideration. The watchman had served as patron seaman on the galleys
of Malta for more than twenty years, never in all his navigations
having left the Commander Pierre des Anbiez, of the venerable nation of
Provence, and brother of Raimond V., Baron des Anbiez, who lived on the
coast in the fortified house of which we have spoken. On each of these
voyages to France the commander never failed to visit the watchman.
Their interviews lasted a long time, and it was observed that
the habitual melancholy of the commander increased after these
conversations.

Peyrou, a lifelong sufferer from serious wounds, and unfit for active
service on the sea, had been, at the recommendation of his old captain,
chosen watchman by the council of the town of La Ciotat. When on Sunday
he presided at the consultation of the overseers, an experienced sailor
supplied his place at the sentry-box. Naturally endowed with a sense of
right and justice, and living ten years in solitude, between the sky
and the sea, Peyrou had added much to his intelligence by meditation.
Already possessing the nautical and astronomical knowledge necessary to
an officer on a galley of the seventeenth century, he continued to learn
by a constant study of the great phenomena of nature always before his
eyes.

Thanks to his experience, and his habit of comparing cause and effect,
no one knew better than himself how to predict the beginning, the
duration, and the end of the storms which prevailed on the coast.

He announced the calm and the tempest, the disastrous hurricanes of
the _mistraon_, as the northwester was named in Provence, the gentle,
fruitful rains of the _miegion_, or south wind, and the violent tornado
of the _labechades_, or wind from the southwest; in fact, the form of
the clouds, the soft or brilliant azure of the sky, the various colours
of the sea, and all those vague, deep, and undefined noises which
occasionally spring up in the midst of the silence of the elements were
for him so many evident signs, from which he deduced the most infallible
conclusions.

Never a captain of a merchantman, never a cockswain of a bark, put to
sea without having consulted Master Peyrou.

Men ordinarily surround with a sort of superstitious reverence and halo
those who live apart from the rest of the world.

Peyrou was no exception to the rule.

As his predictions about the weather were almost invariably realised,
the inhabitants of La Ciotat and the environs soon persuaded themselves
that a man who knew so much of the things in the sky could not be
ignorant of the things on the earth.

Without passing exactly as a sorcerer, the hermit of the cape of
L’Aigle, consulted in so many important circumstances, became the
depositary of many secrets.

A dishonest man would have cruelly abused this power, but Peyrou took
advantage of it to encourage, sustain, and defend the good, and to
accuse, confound, and intimidate the wicked.

A practical philosopher, he felt that his opinion, his predictions, and
his threats would lose much if their authority was not supported by a
certain cabalistic display; hence, although he did so with reluctance,
he accompanied each opinion with a mysterious formula.

The excellent spy-glass was a marvellous aid to his power of divination.
Not only did he turn it to the horizon in order to discover the chebecs
and piratical vessels of Barbary, but he directed it to the little
town of La Ciotat,--on the houses, the fields, and the beach,--and thus
surprised many secrets and mysteries, and by this means increased the
reverence he inspired.

Peyrou, however, was altogether above the vulgar sorcerer by his entire
disinterestedness. Had he some honest poverty to befriend, he ordered
one of his wealthier clients to put a moderate offering in some secret
spot which he indicated; the poor client, informed by Peyrou, went to
the spot and found the mysterious alms.

Instigated by a blind zeal, the priests of the diocese of Marseilles
wished to criminate the mysterious life of Peyrou, but the surrounding
population immediately assumed such a menacing attitude, and the town
council bore such testimony to the excellence of the watchman’s
character, that he was permitted to live his solitary life in peace.

His only companion in this profound retreat was a female eagle which,
two years before, had come to lay her eggs in one of the hollows of the
inaccessible rocks which bordered the coast. The male bird had no doubt
been killed, as the watchman never saw him.

Peyrou gave food to the young eagles; by degrees the mother grew
accustomed to the sight of him, and the year after, she returned in
perfect confidence to lay in the nest which Peyrou had prepared for her
in a neighbouring rock.

Often the eagle perched on the branches of the tall pine which shaded
the watchman’s house, and sometimes walked with a heavy and awkward
step on the little platform.

Upon that day, Brilliant, for so the watchman had named the noble bird,
seduced him from his reverie. She tumbled down from the topmost branch
of the pine, and with half-open wings ran up to her friend with the
ungraceful, waddling gait of a bird, of prey. Her plumage, black and
brown on the wings, was ash-coloured and spotted with white on the body
and neck; her formidable talons, covered with thick and shining scales,
terminated in three claws and a sharp spur of smooth, black horn.

Brilliant looked up at the watchman, lifting high her flat, gray head,
where glittered two bold round eyes, whose iris dilated in a transparent
cornea, the colour of topaz.

Her beak, strong and bluish like burnished steel, disclosed, when it
opened, a slender tongue of pale red.

To attract the watchman’s attention, the eagle gently bit the end of
his shoe, made of fawn leather.

Peyrou stooped and caressed Brilliant, who ruffled her feathers and
uttered a discordant and broken cry.

But suddenly, hearing a step in the narrow foot-path which led to the
cabin, the eagle lifted herself, uttered a long barking cry, stretched
her powerful wings, hovered a moment over the colossal pine, and like
an arrow shot into space. Soon nothing could be seen but a black spot on
the deep blue sky.




CHAPTER IV. STEPHANETTE.

A young girl with light complexion, black eyes, white teeth, and a
bright and mischievous smile, appeared, and stopped a moment on the last
step of the stair of rocks which led to the house of the watchman.

She wore the graceful and picturesque costume of the girls of Provence:
a brown petticoat and red waist, with wide basques and tight sleeves.
Her little felt hat left visible the beautiful nape of her neck and long
tresses of black hair rolled under a scarlet silk net.

Orphan and foster-sister to Mlle. Reine des Anbiez, Stephanette served
her in the duties of a companion, and was treated more as a friend than
a servant.

Stephanette’s heart was good, true, and grateful, her conduct
irreproachable. Her only fault was a mischievous village coquetry, which
was the despair of the fishers and captains of small craft in the gulf
of La Ciotat, nor will we except from the number of these interesting
victims her betrothed, Captain Luquin Trinquetaille, captain of the
polacre, _Holy Terror to the Moors, by the Grace of God_,--a long
and significant appellation, inscribed at full length on the stern of
Captain Trinque-taille’s boat.

Gallantly armed with six swivel-guns, it was the business of the polacre
to escort vessels from La Ciotat which, forced by their commerce to
have free intercourse with the coasts of Italy, dreaded the attacks of
pirates.

Stephanette shared the veneration that the watchman on the cape of
l’Aigle inspired among the inhabitants of the neighbourhood. She
trembled as she approached him with downcast eyes.

“May God keep you, my child!” said Peyrou, affectionately, for he
loved her as he loved all who belonged to the family of his old captain,
the Commander des Anbiez.

“May St. Magnus and St. Elzear aid you, Master Peyrou!” replied
Stephanette, with her most beautiful curtsey.

“Thank you for your good wishes, Stephanette. How are monseigneur and
Mlle. Reine, your young and beautiful mistress? Has she recovered from
her fright of the other day?”

“Yes, Master Peyrou; mademoiselle is better, although she is
still quite pale. But was ever such a miscreant seen? To dare kiss
mademoiselle! and that, too, in the presence of monseigneur and her
betrothed! But people say these Muscovites are barbarians. They are more
savage and more of Antichrist than the Turks themselves, are they not,
Master Peyrou? They will be damned twice in a doubly hot fire.”

Without replying to Stephanette’s theological argument, the watchman
said to her: “Does not monseigneur resent this breach of good
manners?”

“He! Why, Master Peyrou, as true as Rosseline is a saint in Paradise,
the same day that monseigneur came so near falling into the chasm
of Ollioules, he supped as merrily as if he had just returned from a
patronal feast. Indeed, it is so,--and he drank two cups of Spanish wine
to the health of the young miscreant! And would you believe it, Master
Peyrou, he is never tired of boasting of the courage and agility of the
Muscovite! Yes, he said: ‘Manjour! instead of stealing the pin and
kiss like a thief, why did he not ask for them,--my daughter Reine would
have given him a kiss, and with a good heart too!’ And ever since that
day monseigneur is constantly saying, ‘Really, these Muscovites are
strange companions.’ But for all that, M. Honorât de Berrol turns
red with indignation whenever he hears this impudent fellow, who stole
a kiss from his betrothed, mentioned. And another strange thing, Master
Peyrou, is that monseigneur is not willing to get rid of that wicked
little horse, Mistraon, that has been the cause of all the mischief; he
rides it in preference to any other. Now say, Master Peyrou, don’t you
think that is tempting Providence?”

“Have these strangers departed from Marseilles?” asked the watchman,
without replying to Stephanette.

“Yes, Master Peyrou, they say they have taken the route to Languedoc,
after having made a visit to the Marshal of Vitry. They say, too, that
this wicked duke is quite worthy of being acquainted with such rascals.
Ah, if monseigneur had his way, the marshal would not be governor of
Provence very long. The baron cannot hear him mentioned without
flying into a passion,--such a passion! you have no idea of it, Master
Peyrou.” “Yes, my child, I have seen the baron, at the time of
the revolt of the Cascabeoux, act as his father did at the time of the
revolt of the Razats, under Henry III., and again at the time of the
rebellion of the Gascons against the Duke d’Epemon, under the last
reign. Yes, yes; I know that Raimond V. hates his enemies as much as he
loves his friends.”

“You are right, Master Peyrou, and monseigneur’s anger against the
governor has increased since this recorder of the admiralty of Toulon,
Master Isnard, who they say is so wicked, has been visiting the castles
of the diocese by order of his Eminence, the cardinal. Monseigneur says
these visits are an outrage upon the nobility, and that the Marshal of
Vitry is a scoundrel. Between us, I am of the same opinion, since he
protects shameless Muscovites who have the insolence to kiss young girls
when they are not expecting it.”

“My opinion is, Stephanette, that you are very severe upon young men
who kiss young girls,” said the old man with mock gravity, “which
proves that you are naturally ferocious,--but what do you want of me?”

“Master Peyrou,” said the girl, with an air of embarrassment, “I
want to know if the weather promises a good passage to Nice, and if one
could leave this port with safety.”

“You wish, then, to go to Nice, my child?”

“No, not I exactly, but a brave and honest sailor who--who--”

“Ah, I understand, I understand,” said the watchman, interrupting
Stephanette’s stammering; “you mean young Bernard, patron of the
tartan, the _Sacred Balm_.”

“No, no, Master Peyrou, I assure you I do not mean him,” said the
girl, turning as red as a cherry.

“Come, come, you need not blush like that,” and the watchman added,
in a lower tone: “Was the beautiful bouquet of green thyme, that he
tied three days ago to your window bar with rose coloured ribbon, to
your taste?”

“A bouquet of green thyme! What bouquet are you talking about, Master
Peyrou?”

The watchman held up a threatening finger to Stephanette and said:
“What! last Thursday, at daybreak, did not the patron Bernard carry a
bouquet to your window?”

“Wait,--let me see, Master Peyrou,” said the young girl, with an air
of recalling something to her memory; “was it then yesterday that, in
opening my casement, I found something like a bundle of dried herbs?”

“Stephanette, Stephanette! you cannot deceive the old watchman.
Listen; patron Bernard had hardly descended, when you came and untied
the rose coloured ribbon, and put the bouquet in a pretty terra-cotta
vase, and you have watered it every morning; yesterday was the only day
you neglected it, and it has withered--”

The young girl stared at the watchman in utter amazement. This
revelation seemed like sorcery.

The old man looked at her with a mischievous expression, and continued:

“So it is not the patron Bernard who is going to Nice?”

“No, Master Peyrou.” “Then it must be the pilot Terzarol.”

“The pilot Terzarol!” cried Stephanette, clasping her hands, “may
Our Lady help me, if I know anything about this pilot going to sea.”

“Well, well, my child, I was mistaken about Bernard, for it is true
that you have allowed his bouquet to wither, but I am not mistaken about
Terzarol, because yesterday, from the height of the castle turret, you
passed more than two hours looking at the bold pilot throwing nets.”
 “I, Master Peyrou, I?”

“Your very self, Stephanette, and at each cast of the net,
Terzarol waved his cap in triumph, and you waved your handkerchief in
congratulation; he ought to have made a good haul, so enthusiastically
did he labour,--you come then to ask me if Terzarol will have a good
voyage to Nice?”

This time Stephanette began to feel afraid, as she realised how much the
watchman knew.

“Ah, my faith, Master Peyrou, you know everything!” cried she,
innocently.

The old man smiled, shook his head, and replied in the words of the
Provencal proverb, “_Experienco passo scienco_,--experience passes
science.”

The poor child, fearing that the watchman’s marvellous discoveries
concerning her innocent coquetry might give him a bad opinion of her,
cried, with tears in her eyes, as she clasped her hands:

“Ah, Master Peyrou, I am an honest girl!”

“I know it, my child,” said the watchman, pressing her hand
affectionately. “I know that you are worthy of the protection and
affection which your noble and kind mistress shows you. It is only
girlish mischief and love of fun which tempts you to turn the heads of
these young men, and make poor Luquin Trinquetaille jealous, Luquin, who
loves you so much and so faithfully. But listen, Stephanette, you
know the proverb of the vinedressers in our valleys: _Paou vignose
ben tengudos_,--have few vines and cultivate them well. Instead of
scattering your coquetries, concentrate all your charms upon your
betrothed, who will prove a good and honest husband for you,--that would
be far better,--and then, you see, my child, these young men are quick,
inflammable, and courageous; self-love comes in, rivalry exasperates, a
combat follows, blood flows, and then--” “Ah, Master Peyrou, then
I should die of despair. All of this is folly. I was wrong, I admit, to
amuse myself with the admiring glances of Bernard and Terzarol, for I
love Luquin and he loves me; we are going to be married the same day as
Mlle, and M. Honorât de Berrol,--the baron desires it. Really, Master
Peyrou, you, who find out everything, ought to know that I think of
nobody but Luquin. It is about his voyage that I have come to consult
you. Master Talebard-Talebardon, consul of La Ciotat, is about to send
to Nice three tartans laden with merchandise. He has made a bargain with
Luquin to escort them; do you think, Master Peyrou, the passage will be
good? Can he put to sea with safety? Is there no pirate in sight? Oh, if
a corsair is in sight, or a storm threatens, he will not depart!”

“Oh, so, so, my child, do you think you have so much influence over this
bold artilleryman? You are mistaken, I think. What! keep him in port
when there is danger in going out? You might as well try to anchor a
ship with a thread from your distaff.”

“Oh, be quiet, Master Peyrou,” said Stephanette, regaining her
composure; “to keep Luquin near me, I need not tell him of winds or
tempests or of pirates. I will only tell him that I will give Bernard a
ribbon to put on his lance at the next tilting-match, or that I will
ask the pilot Terzarol for a good place at one of the windows of his
mother’s house, that I may go with Dulceline, the housekeeper at
Maison-Forte, to see the wrestling and leaping over the cross-bar in La
Ciotat; then, I swear to you, Master Peyrou, Luquin will not go out of
the gulf, not if the consul, Talebard-Talebardon, covered the deck of
his polacre with pieces of silver.”

“Ah, what a cunning gipsy you are!” said the old man, smiling. “I
would never have thought of such tricks. Alas, alas! _Buou viel fa rego
drecho_,--the old ox makes a straight furrow. But come, now, Stephanette,
make yourself easy; you need not rob your waist of a ribbon for Bernard
nor ask for a window at the Terzarol house: the wind blows from the
west, and if it does not change at sunset, and if Martin-Bouffo, the
deep grotto of roaring waters in the gulf, says nothing tomorrow at
daybreak Luquin will be able to go out of the gulf and sail for Nice
without fear; as to the passage, I will answer for that; as to the
pirates, I am going to give you a charm that is sure in its effect, if
not to confuse them entirely, at least to prevent their carrying off the
_Holy Terror to the Moors, by the Grace of God._”

“Ah, how thankful I will be, Master Peyrou!” said the young girl, as
she assisted him to rise, for he walked with considerable pain.

The old man went into his cabin, took a little bag covered with
cabalistic signs and gave it to Stephanette, instructing her to order
Luquin to conform scrupulously to the directions he would find in it.

“How good you are, Master Peyrou! How shall I reward--”

“By promising me, my child, henceforth to allow Bernard’s bouquets
to dry on the bars of your window,--then, believe me, there will be no
more of them, because a bouquet that is watered makes many others grow.
Ah! and you must promise me, too, not to encourage pilot Terzarol’s
fishing, because to please you he would destroy all the fish in the bay,
and he would finish by being called before the overseer fishers, and I
would be obliged to condemn him. By the way, how goes on the discussion
between monseigneur and the consuls, on the right of fishing in the
cove,--does Raimond V. still keep his seines there?”

“Yes, Master Peyrou, and he will not take them away; he says that the
right of fishing there belongs to him up to the rocks of Castrembaou,
and that he will not yield that right to anybody.”

“Listen, Stephanette: your mistress has her father’s ear; do you
persuade her to counsel him to arrange it amicably with the consuls:
that will be the best for all parties.”

“Yes, Master Peyrou, make yourself easy about it, I will mention it to
Mlle. Reine.”

“Very well, my child,--good-bye, and above all, no more coquetry,--do
you promise me that?”

“Yes, Master Peyrou, only--only--”

“Well, say it”

“Only, you see, Master Peyrou, I would not like to make Bernard and
Terzarol despair entirely,--not on my own account, Our Lady, no, but
on account of Luquin, because I must have some means of keeping him in
port, in case of great danger, you see, Master Peyrou,--and for that
purpose, jealousy is worth more than all the anchors of his ship.”

“That is right,” said the watchman, with a significant smile, “you
must think of Luquin above all things.”

The young girl dropped her eyes and smiled, then said: “Ah, I was
about to forget, Master Peyrou, to ask you if you thought that monsieur,
the commander, and the Reverend Father Elzear would arrive here for the
Christmas holidays, as the baron hopes. He is so anxious to see his two
brothers again--do you know that Christmas has been twice celebrated at
Maison-Forte without them?”

At the mention of the commander, the face of the watchman took on an
expression of profound melancholy.

“If God grants my most earnest prayers, my child, they will both come,
but, alas, Father Elzear has gone to redeem captives in Algiers, as a
worthy and courageous brother of mercy, and the faith of those Barbary
people is perfidious!”

“Yes, Master Peyrou, as Father Elzear learned by experience when he
was kept in the convict-prison among slaves for one year! At his age,
too, to suffer so much!”

“And without a murmur,--without losing his adorable saintliness--”

“Speaking of them, Master Peyrou, why is the commander’s galley,
instead of being white and gold like the gallant galleys of the king,
and of monseigneur, the Duke of Guise, always painted in black like a
coffin? Why are its sails and masts black? Really, nothing looks more
solemn, and his sailors and his soldiers, they look as hard and severe
as Spanish monks; and then the commander himself looks so sad. I never
saw a smile on his pale face but once, and that was when he arrived at
Maison-Forte and embraced monseigneur and my mistress. Yet, my God, what
a melancholy smile! Is it not strange, Master Peyrou, and all the more
so because Luquin told me, the other day, that when he was artilleryman
on board _La Guisarde_, the admiral’s galley, in the waters of the
Levant, many a time he has seen the commanders and captains of Malta at
Naples, and notwithstanding the severity of their order, they were as
merry as other officers.”

The watchman for some moments seemed as if he no longer heard the girl;
his head had fallen upon his breast, he was lost in profound meditation,
and when Stephanette bade him farewell, he responded only by an
affectionate gesture of the hand. Some time after the departure of the
young girl, he went into his cabin, opened the carved ebony box he found
there, sprung the secret lock of a double bottom, and took out of it a
little casket chased with silver; an embassed Maltese cross ornamented
its cover.

For a long time he gazed at this casket with sorrowful attention; the
sight of it seemed to awaken the most bitter memories. Then, assuring
himself that this mysterious trust was still intact, he shut the doors
of the ebony chest and, like a dreamer, returned to his seat at the door
of his cabin.




CHAPTER V. THE BETROTHED.


Stephanette left the watchman with a light heart She was just about to
quit the esplanade, when she saw, on the last steps of the stairway, the
tall figure of Captain Luquin Trinquetaille. With an imperative sign the
young girl ordered him to return by the way he had come.

The sailor showed an exemplary submission; he stopped, made a
right-about, with the quickness and precision of a German grenadier, and
gravely descended the steps he had just mounted.

Had the meeting been arranged by the lovers? We do not know, but certain
it was that Stephanette, preceded by her obedient adorer, descended
the narrow, winding flight of steps which conducted to the watchman’s
cabin, with the lightness of a gazelle.

Many times Luquin turned his head, to catch a sight of the neat
ankle and little foot, which cleared the rough rocks so nimbly, but
Stephanette, with a threatening gesture, and queen-like dignity,
arrested the curiosity of the ex-artilleryman, who was compelled to
accelerate his gait in obedience to the oft-repeated words:

“Go on, Luquin, go on!”

While the lovers are descending the escarpment of the cape of l’Aigle,
we will say a few words about Luquin Trinquetaille. He was a robust
fellow of thirty years, brown and sunburnt. He had a manly figure, a
frank, ingenuous manner, somewhat vain; he wore a costume which marked
both the soldier and the sailor,--a military coat, and Provencal
breeches, fastened around his waist by the belt which held his
broadsword.

The air was cold, and over his coat he wore a mantle, the seams of which
were braided in red and blue wool; the hood half covered his forehead,
and under it could be seen a forest of black curls.

When they had reached the foot of the mountain, Stephanette, in spite,
of her agility, felt the need of rest.

Luquin, delighted with an opportunity for conversation, carefully sought
a spot where she could be comfortably seated.

When he had found it, he gallantly took off his mantle and spread it out
on the rock, so that Stephanette could have a seat with a back; then,
crossing his hands on the head of his cane, and leaning his chin on his
hands, he contemplated Stephanette with a calm and happy adoration.

When she had recovered from the effects of her precipitous descent,
Stephanette turned to Luquin, and said, with the air of a spoiled child,
and a woman sure of her despotic domination:

“Why, Luquin, did you come to the watchman’s cabin for me, when I
told you to wait for me at the foot of the mountain?”

Luquin, preoccupied with admiration for Stephanette’s fine colour,
which the walk had imparted, did not reply.

“Did ever anybody see the like?” cried she, with an impatient stamp
of her little foot. “Do you hear what I say to you, Luquin?”

“No,” said the captain, coming out of his reflective mood; “all
that I know is that from Nice to Bayonne, from Bayonne to Calais, from
Calais to Hambourg, from Hambourg to--”

“Have you finished your European trip, Luquin?”

“Indeed, from one pole to the other there is not a prettier girl than
you, Stephanette.”

“What! Did you make such an extensive voyage to arrive at that
discovery, captain? I pity the privateers of the _Holy Terror to the
Moors, by the Grace of God_, if the voyages of this poor old polacre
have no better results!”

“Do not speak ill of my polacre, Stephanette; you will be glad to see
its blue and white pavilion when I return from Nice, and how you will
watch for my coming from the turret of Maison-Forte!”

Luquin’s conceitedness disgusted Stephanette; she replied, with an
ironical air:

“Well, well! I see that a watchman on the cape of L’Aigle is
altogether unnecessary. All the young girls who wait impatiently for the
return of Captain Trinque-taille, and all the jealous ones who watch
his departure with their eyes fixed on the sea, will be sufficient to
discover the pirates. There is nothing more to fear from corsairs.”

Luquin took on an air of modest triumph, and said:

“By St. Stephen, my patron, I am too sure of your love, and too happy
in it, Stephanette, to care if I am expected or regretted by other
girls; and although Rose, the daughter of the haberdasher in La
Ciotat,--who resembles the flower whose name she bears,--often tells
me--”

“My faith! Thank you for your confidences, Luquin,” said
Stephanette, with a jealous impatience she could not dissimulate. “If
I told you all that the patron Bernard or Master Terzarol said to me, it
would take till evening.”

Captain Luquin frowned when he heard the names of his rivals, and
exclaimed:

“Thunder of heaven! If I knew that those two rascals dared even to
look at your shoes as you pass, I would make a figurehead for my polacre
of one, and a weather-cock for my mast of the other! But no! They know
that Luquin Trinquetaille is your betrothed, and his name rhymes too
well with battle for them to want an issue with me.”

“Well, well, my fine bully!” replied Stephanette, recalling
the watchman’s advice, and fearing to excite the jealousy of the
inflammable captain; “if Bernard and Terzarol talk to me ever so long,
I shall reply that every one knows I am too much in love with the most
wicked devil in La Ciotat But wait,--see here what Master Peyrou gave me
for you. Read that, and do everything he orders. It is late; the sun
is setting, and it is getting cold. Let us go back to Maison-Forte;
mademoiselle will be anxious.”

The two lovers hastened on their way, and, as they walked, Trinquetaille
read the following instructions given by the watchman:

“Every morning at sunrise the captain will change the charge of his
cannon, and will put on the ball one of the red flies affixed to this
paper.

“After that, make a double cross on the ball with the thumb of the
left hand. From sunrise to sunset, cabin-boys must relieve each other on
the watch at the top of the mast; they will always look at the east and
the south, and every five minutes repeat ‘St Magnus.’

“Set the swords in order on the stem, three by three, point downward.

“Set the muskets on the right of the deck, three by three.

“On the day of departure, at the rising of the moon, carry on deck a
vase filled with oil; throw in it seven grains of salt, saying with each
grain ‘St Elmo and St Peter.’

“Leave the vase on deck until the moon goes down. At that moment
cover it over with a black veil, on which write in vermilion the word
‘Syrakoe.’ Every morning at sunrise, rub the arms and the locks of
the muskets with this oil.”

At this point, Captain Trinquetaille stopped and said to Stephanette:

“By St. Elmo, Master Peyrou is a sorcerer. Three months ago, if I had
had these flies of magic paper, my swivel-guns, instead of resting mute
on their pivots when I applied the match, would have replied sharply to
that Tunis chebec which surprised our convoy, and we did not see until
it was almost on us--”

“But, Luquin, do not your sentinels see at a distance?”

“No; and if, while they were watching, they had said ‘St. Magnus’
every five minutes, as Master Peyrou says in his sorcery, it is certain
the virtue of St. Magnus would have prevented the pirates’ approach
without being seen.”

“And would you have made use of this magic oil for the muskets,
Luquin?”

“Without doubt, the day that my guns would not go off, I would have
given all the oil which burns in the eternal lamp of the Chapel of Notre
Dame de la Garde, for one drop of this oil with the seven grains of
salt, and that formidable word ‘Syrakoe’ written on the cover.”

“Why so, Luquin?”

“My artillery was useless, and I wished to board the chebec with a
grand reinforcement of musket-shot, but as wicked fate would have it,
the arms were below, and the locks of the muskets were rusty; you see,
then, Stephanette, if we had arranged the arms on deck, three by three,
and had rubbed the musket locks with this magic oil of Syrakoe, we would
have been able to resist, and perhaps capture this pirate chebec instead
of flying before it, like a cloud of sparrows from a hawk!”

It is easy to see that, under these mysterious and cabalistic formulæ,
the watchman on the cape of L’Aigle gave the best practical advice,
and endeavoured to restore such nautical precautions and practices as
had, through negligence or want of care, fallen into disuse.

The red flies, placed every morning on the balls with a sign of the
cross, had no doubt a very negative virtue, but to perform this magical
operation, it was necessary to change the charge of the artillery, often
damaged by the water of the sea, which swept the deck, and thus the
powder was kept dry and the guns ready for use.

The counsel of the watchman, followed exactly, prevented serious
disaster, whether it pertained to the oil of Syrakoe, or the cries of
“St Magnus,” or the arms arranged three by three on the deck.

In looking steadily toward the east and the south, points of crossing
by the pirates, the sentinels of course could give warning of their
approach.

In invoking St. Magnus every five minutes, they would not run the risk
of sleeping at their posts.

In short, it was important to have always on deck arms in good condition
and readiness. The watchman accomplished this by ordering them to be
arranged in stacks of three, and carefully rubbed with oil, which would
preserve them from the inclemency of the weather.

In formulating his recommendations in cabalistic phrase, he assured the
execution of them.

After renewed praises of the watchman’s wisdom, Luquin and Stephanette
arrived at Maison-Forte. Notwithstanding her air of gaiety, the young
girl’s heart was deeply pained at the thought of her lover’s
departure the next morning. Tears flowed down her cheeks; she extended
her hand to Trinquetaille, and said, with a trembling voice:

“Good-bye, Luquin, every morning and evening I will pray God to keep
you from meeting these wicked pirates. Oh, why do you not abandon this
perilous calling, which gives me continual anxiety?”

“I will, when I have gained enough, so that Mlle.
Trinquetaille”--only the nobility had the title of madame--“need
not envy the richest citizen of La Ciotat.” “How can you talk so,
Luquin?” said the young girl, reproachfully, as she wiped the tears
from her eyes. “What matters finery and a little more comfort to me,
when you are risking your life every day?”

“Do not be distressed, Stephanette, the watchman’s advice shall not be
lost: with the help of St. Magnus, and the magic oil of Syrakoe, I
can defy all the pirates of the regency. But, good-bye, Stephanette,
good-bye, and think of Luquin.”

With these words, the worthy captain pressed Ste-phanette’s white
hands, and hurried away, lest he should betray the emotion which filled
his heart, as if it were a thing unworthy of him.

The young girl’s eyes followed her lover as long as possible, and at
nightfall she entered Maison-Forte, the home of Raimond V., Baron des
Anbiez.




CHAPTER VI. MAISON-FORTE

Maison-Forte, or Castle des Anbiez, stood upon the seashore. In the time
of storm, the waves beat upon the terrace or rampart which stood out
from the shore to protect the entrance into the port of La Ciotat, where
were anchored a few fishing-boats, and the pleasure tartan of Raimond
V., Baron des Anbiez.

The aspect of the castle presented nothing remarkable. Built in the
middle of the fifteenth century, its architecture, or rather its
construction, was massive. Two towers with pointed roof flanked the main
body of the dwelling exposed to the south, and commanding a view of the
sea. Its thick walls, built of sandstone and granite, were of reddish
gray colour, and were irregularly cut by a few windows, which resembled
loopholes for cannon.

The only framed windows of a gallery, which ran across the entire length
of the castle, on the first floor, were large and bowed.

Three of them opened upon a balcony ornamented with a beautiful grating
of hammered iron, in the middle of which was carved the baron’s coat of
arms. The same coat of arms showed upon the entablature of the principal
door.

A short flight of steps descended to the terrace.

The necessities of civil and religious war, at the end of the last
century, and the constant fear of pirates, had altered this terrace into
an armed and embattled rampart, parallel with the façade of the castle,
and joined to the foot of the turrets by two sides of a right angle.

A few old orange-trees with shining leaves testified to the ancient
character of this esplanade, once a smiling flower garden, but two
sentry-boxes for scouts, a few enclosures for cannon-balls, eight pieces
of ordnance, two of which were mounted, and a long, turning culverin
showed that Maison-Forte of the Baron des Anbiez was in a good state of
defence.

The position of this castle was the more important as the little bay
it commanded, as well as the Gulf of La Ciotat, offered the only place
where vessels could anchor; the rest of the coast presenting a line of
unapproachable rocks.

The façade of the Castle des Anbiez which looked north, and the
surrounding land, were very picturesque.

Irregular buildings, added to the principal edifice according to the
different requirements of successive proprietors, broke the monotony of
its lines.

The stables, dog-kennels, sheepfolds, commons, and lodgings for
labourers and farmers, formed the enclosure of an immense court, planted
with two rows of sycamores. This court was reached by a drawbridge over
a wide and deep ditch.

Every evening this bridge was removed, and a heavy door of oak, strongly
supported on the inside, put the little colony in safely for the night.

Every window of these buildings opened upon the court, with the
exception of a few dormer windows, solidly protected by iron grating,
which looked out upon the plain.

Maison-Forte counted about two hundred persons among its
dependents,--servants, farmers, labourers, and shepherds.

Among them were sixty men of from thirty to fifty years, accustomed to
the use of arms during the civil wars in which the impetuous baron had
taken part. Royalist and Catholic, Raimond V. had always mounted his
horse when it was necessary to defend the ancient rights and possessions
of Provence against governors or their deputies, for the kings of France
were not kings of Provence, but counts.

The intendants of justice or presidents of courts, whose office it
was to collect the taxes, and to announce to the assembled states the
assessment of voluntary gifts which Provence owed to the sovereign,
were almost always the first victims of these revolts against royal
authority, made with the cry of “Long live the king!”

Under such circumstances Raimond V. was among the first to rebel. In the
last rebellion of Cascaveoux,--so named from the word _cascavoeu_, the
Provençal for little bell, which the insurgents fastened to the end of
a leather strap, and rang as they cried, “Long live the king,”--none
sounded the battle-cry, and shook his bell more violently, or made his
dependents shake this signal of revolt, with more enthusiastic ardour
than Raimond V.

In that, the baron showed himself the worthy son of his father, Raimond
IV., one of the gentlemen most seriously compromised in the rebellion of
the Razats, which name originated from the fact that the Provençals had
been as spoiled of their possessions as if a razor had been employed.
This rebellion broke out under Henry III., in 1578, and was suppressed
with great difficulty by Marshal de Retz.

The baron looked with great impatience upon the growth of the power
of Cardinal Richelieu, at the expense of the royal authority, and the
disappearance of the sovereign beneath the shadow of the prime minister.

Similar movements of resistance manifested themselves in Languedoc and
in Provence, in favour of Gaston of Orleans, brother of Louis XIII.,
whom the royalist faction opposed to the cardinal.

There is no doubt that the baron would never have taken an active part
in these intrigues, but for the apprehension caused by the pirates along
the coast, but, compelled to concentrate his forces in order to defend
his house and estate, he declaimed violently against the cardinal,
especially since the latter had given the government of Provence to the
Marshal of Vitry.

These important functions had, up to that time, been filled by the
Duke of Guise, admiral of the Levant, who, to the great delight of the
Provençals, after many obstacles, had replaced the Duke d’Epernon.

“The young lion has devoured the old bear,” said Cæsar of
Nostradamus on this subject at the celebration of the nomination of the
young Lorraine prince for this important post.

When the Marshal of Vitry was promoted to the position of Governor of
Provence, the nobility gave vent to their indignation, because a member
of the house of Lorraine was not considered worthy of this dignity,
usually reserved for a prince of the blood.

When Louis Gallucio, marquis, was Duke of Vitry, it was remarked that
the Cardinal de Retz, without otherwise blaming him for having been one
of the murderers of the Marshal of Ancre, said simply of him: “He had
little sense, but he was bold to temerity, and the part he had in the
murder of the Marshal of Ancre gave him, in the eyes of the world, a
certain air of business and execution.” This speech gives us an idea
of the times and manners.

The Baron des Anbiez, notwithstanding his fondness for independence and
rebellion, was the best and most generous of men.

Adored by the peasants of his domain, and revered by the inhabitants of
the little town of La Ciotat, who always found him ready to direct their
troops and aid them with all his power to defend themselves from the
pirates, he exercised a powerful influence throughout the neighbourhood.

Finally, his vigorous opposition to several orders of the Marshal of
Vitry, which seemed to him to aim a blow at the rights of Provence, had
been highly and generally approved in the country.

When Stephanette returned to Maison-Forte, the sun was just setting. The
first care of the young girl was to go to Mlle. Reine des Anbiez. Reine
was accustomed to occupy a chamber situated on the first floor of one of
the turrets of the castle.

This room was round in shape, serving her as a cabinet for study, and
was furnished with great care and expense.

The baron, loving his daughter to idolatry, had devoted to the interior
arrangement of this room a considerable sum. The circular walls were
covered with rich Flemish tapestry of deep green, with designs of a
darker shade, enwrought with threads of gold.

Among other pieces of furniture was a walnut bookcase, curiously carved
in the style of the renaissance, and encrusted with Florentine mosaic.
A rich, thick Turkey carpet covered the floor. The spaces separating the
beams of the ceiling were of azure blue, studded with arabesques of gold
of delicate workmanship.

A silver lamp was suspended from the main girder by a chain of silver.
The form of these lamps, still used in some villages of Provence, was
very simple. They were made of a square of metal, the edges of which,
an inch in height, contained the oil, and formed a sort of beak at each
angle from which issued the wicks.

On a table with curved legs placed in the embrasure of the window lay a
lute, a theorbo, and some pieces of unfinished tapestry.

Two portraits, one of a woman, the other of a man, in the costume of the
reign of Henry III., were placed above this table, and lit up by oblique
rays through little windows in leaden frames, which were set in the long
and narrow casement.

To supply the want of a chimney a large copper coal-pan, curiously
carved, and supported by four massive claws, stood in a corner of the
room. It contained a bed of ashes and some embers, upon which were
smoking some sprigs of fragrant broom.

Reine des Anbiez wore a dress of heavy brown Tours silk, with a train,
and tight waist and sleeves; her cheeks were flushed, and her features
expressed not surprise only but fright.

She seized her waiting-woman by the hand, and conducted her to the
table, and said to her:

“Look!”

The object to which she called the attention of Stephanette was a little
vase of rock crystal.

From its long and slender neck issued an orange-coloured lily, with
an azure blue calyx, in which stood pistils of silvery whiteness. This
brilliant flower exhaled a delicious odour which resembled the mingled
perfume of vanilla, lemon, and jessamine.

“Oh, mademoiselle, what a beautiful flower! Is it a present from the
Chevalier de Berrol?”

At the mention of her betrothed’s name, Reine turned pale and red by
turns; then, without replying to Stephanette, she took up the vase with
a sort of fear, and showed her a beautifully enamelled figure which
she had discovered there, and the representation of a white dove with a
rose-coloured beak, and extended wings, holding in its purplish bronze
feet a branch of olive.

“Our Lady!” screamed Stephanette in fright. “It is the very
picture of the enamelled pin that young miscreant robbed you of in the
rocks of Ollioules, after he had saved monseigneur’s life.”

“But who brought this vase and flower here?” asked Reine.

“You do not know, mademoiselle?”

Reine turned pale and made a sign in the affirmative. “Holy Virgin,
this must be sorcery!” cried Stephanette, setting the vase back on the
table as if it had burned her hand.

Reine could scarcely control her emotion, but said to her:

“A little while ago, when I went out to see my father mount his horse,
I promenaded until nightfall in the great walk by the drawbridge, and
when I returned I found this flower on this table. My first thought,
like yours, was that Chevalier de Berrol had sent it or brought it,
although such a flower in this season would be a miracle; I asked if the
chevalier had arrived at Maison-Forte, and was told he had not; besides,
I had the key of this apartment with me.”

“Then, mademoiselle, it must be magic.”

“I do not know what to think. In examining the vase more attentively,
I see the enamelled likeness of the pin that--”

Reine could not say more.

Her face and form betrayed the violent emotion which the memory of that
strange day caused her, the day when the foreigner had dared approach
his lips to hers.

“We must consult the chaplain or the watchman, mademoiselle,”
 exclaimed Stephanette.

“No, no, be silent. Do not noise abroad this mystery which frightens
me in spite of myself. Let us examine this apartment well; perhaps we
may discover something.”

“But this flower, this vase, mademoiselle!”

As a reply, Reine threw the flower in the coal-pan.

It almost seemed that the poor flower turned itself in pain upon the
burning coals; the light hissing produced by the water which oozed out
from the stem, seemed like plaintive cries.

Soon it was in ashes.

Then Reine opened the window which looked upon the esplanade, and threw
out the crystal flagon. It broke with a noise upon the parapet, and its
fragments fell into the sea.

At this moment sounded heavy steps, and click of spurs upon the
flagstones of the staircase. The hoarse voice of Raimond V. called
joyously to his daughter to come and see--that demon of a Mistraon!

“Not a word of this to my father,” said Reine to Stephanette,
putting her finger on her lips.

And she descended to meet the good old gentleman.




CHAPTER VII. THE SUPPER.

Reine, hiding her emotion, joined her father. Raimond V. kissed his
daughter’s brow tenderly, then, taking her arm, descended the last
steps of the staircase which led from the tower. He wore an old green
military coat, braided with gold, somewhat tarnished, scarlet breeches,
great boots of sheepskin covered with mud, and long spurs of rusty iron.

He held his gray cap in his hand, and although the weather was quite
cold, the wrinkled and sunburnt brow of Raimond V. was covered with
sweat.

By the light of a torch, a valet, holding by the bridle the treacherous
and obstreperous Mistraon, whose flanks were foaming with perspiration,
could be seen in the court of the castle.

A great black hunting dog with long hair, and a little yellow and white
spaniel, were lying at the feet of the stallion from Camargne.

The dog was panting; his ears lying on his head, his mouth open and
filled with foam, his eyes half closed, and the feverish palpitation of
his sides, all announced that he had just run a rapid race. The sight of
Mistraon added to Reine’s annoyance by recalling the scene on the rocks.
But the baron, preoccupied by the success of the chase, had not the
penetration to discover the agitation of his daughter.

He detached a leather strap which held a large hare to the bow of his
saddle, and proudly presented the game to Reine, as he said:

“Would you believe it, Eclair,” and at the name the dog lifted his
fine intelligent head, “caught this hare in thirteen minutes on the
marshes of Savenol. It was old Genêt,” and at this name the little
spaniel lifted his head, “that put him on the track. Mistraon is so
fleet that I did not lose sight of Eclair from the time I began to climb
the hill of black stones. I made, I am sure, more than a league and a
half.”

“Oh, father, why will you ride this horse, after the frightful
experience you have had with him?”

“Manjour!” cried the old gentleman, with an air of mock gravity,
“never shall it be said that Raimond V. succumbed to one of the
indomitable sons of Camargne.”

“But, father--”

“But, my daughter, I yield no more on land than on sea, and I say
that, because I have just been visiting the seines that those rascals
in La Ciotat wish to prevent my laying beyond the rocks of Castrembaou.
Just now, too, I met the consul Talebard-Talebardon on his nag, and
he talked about it And he had the effrontery to threaten me with the
tribunal of overseers, of which the watchman is the assignee! Manjour,
I laughed so much, that this demon, Mistraon, took advantage of my
distraction and flew like an arrow.”

“More dangers, father; this horse will be the death of you!”

“Be easy, my child, although I have not such a vigorous fist as the
half savage young Muscovite who so adroitly arrested Mistraon on the
border of a precipice, the bridle and the spur and the whip know how to
reason with a vicious horse and his pranks. But permit me, my beautiful
lady of the castle, to offer you the foot of the animal that I have
captured.”

And the baron drew a knife from his pocket, cut off the right foot of
the hare, and gallantly presented it to his daughter, who accepted, not
without some repugnance, this trophy of the chase.

Mistraon was led back to the stable, but Eclair and Genêt, favourites
of the baron, followed him side by side, as, leaning on the arm of his
daughter, he made what he called his evening inspection, while waiting
for the hour of supper.

The women and young girls were spinning at the wheel, the men mending
their nets and cleaning implements of husbandry. Master Laramée,
the old sergeant of the company raised by the baron during the civil
troubles, and majordomo and commander of the castle garrison, exacted
that all of the baron’s tenants, who, in turn, performed the service
of sentinel on the terrace which bordered the sea, should be armed in
military style.

Others were engaged in decorating long lances, destined for jousts on
the water, or to be used in jumping the cross-bar, the usual Christmas
amusements, in the colours of the baron, red and yellow. Some, more
seriously occupied, prepared the seed for late sowing; some were
weaving, with great care, baskets out of rushes, to hold presents of
fruit, made at Christmas.

These occupations were enlivened by songs peculiar to the country,
sometimes accompanied by some marvellous legend, or terrible recital of
the cruelties of pirates.

In an upper hall filled with fruit, children and old men were busy in
examining long garlands of grapes, which hung from the rafters of the
ceiling, or packing in baskets sweet-smelling figs, dried upon layers of
straw.

Farther on was the laundry, where the washerwomen, under the supervision
of a gentlewoman, Dulceline, the housekeeper, were occupied in perfuming
the linen of the castle, by putting between its folds, whiter than snow,
the leaves of aromatic herbs.

Often the sharp voice of Dulceline rose above the songs of the
washerwomen, as she reprimanded some idlers.

By the side of the laundry was the pharmacy of the castle, where the
peasants of the neighbourhood found all their remedies. This pharmacy
belonged to the department of the baron’s chaplain, Abbé Mascarolus,
an old and excellent priest of angelic piety and rare simplicity.
The chaplain had an extensive acquaintance with medical men and their
attainments, and firmly believed in the strange pharmacy of that time.

In spite of the continual apprehension of a visit from the pirates, all
the inhabitants of Maison-Forte shared the traditional gaiety, so
to speak, which the approach of Christmas, the most joyous and most
important festival of the year, always brought to Provence.

Every evening before supper, the baron made, in company with his
daughter, what he called his inspection; that is, he went through
the whole theatre of the various occupations with which we have been
entertaining the reader, chatting familiarly with everybody, listening
to requests and complaints, often impatient and sometimes flying into
a passion and scolding, but always full of justice and kindness, and
so cordial in his good-humour that his bursts of irritation were soon
forgotten.

Raimond V. kept a large part of his domain in good condition. He sat up
a long time at night to talk with his principal shepherds, labourers,
farmers, and vinedressers, convinced of the wisdom of the two Provençal
proverbs, worthy of the watchman on the cape of l’Aigle: _Luci doou
mestre engraisso lou chivaou_,--the eye of the master fattens the horse.
_Bouen pastre, bouen ave_,--good shepherd, good flock.

The old gentleman usually completed his circuit by a visit to the
pharmacy, where he found Abbé Mascarolus, who gave him a sort of
hygienic statement of the health of the inhabitants of the domain Des
Anbiez.

To-day, he passed by the laundry, going directly to the pharmacy,
accompanied by Reine. Preparations for the Christmas holidays were going
on all through the castle, but the most important solemnity of all was
reserved for the care of the venerable Dulceline, who had entreated the
abbé to enlighten her with his counsels.

This was the cradle or crib, a sort of picture placed every Christmas
day in the most beautiful room of the habitation,--castle, cottage, or
mansion.

This picture represented the birth of the infant Jesus; there were the
stable, the ox, the ass, St Joseph, and the Virgin holding on her knees
the Saviour of the world.

Every family, poor or rich, deemed it absolutely requisite to have a
cradle as elegant as could be afforded, ornamented with garlands and
tinsel, and illuminated with a circle of candles.

As Raimond V. passed the laundry, he was surprised not to see Dulceline,
and asked where she was.

“Monseigneur,” said a young girl with black eyes and cheeks the
colour of a pomegranate, “Mile. Dulceline is in the chamber of the
philters, with the abbé and Thereson; she is at work on the cradle, and
forbids us to enter.”

“The devil!” said the baron, “the supper-bell has rung, and the
abbé must say grace for us.”

He advanced to the door; it was fastened on the inside; he knocked.

“Come, come, abbé, supper is ready, and I am as hungry as the
devil.”

“One moment, monseigneur,” said Dulceline, “we cannot open,--it is
a secret.”

“What, abbé, you have secrets with Dulceline?” said the old
gentleman, laughing.

“Ah, monseigneur, God save us! Thereson is with us,” screamed the
old lady, offended at the baron’s pleasantry. As she opened the door,
she presented a pale, wrinkled face, framed in a ruff and cap, worthy of
the pencil of Holbein.

The abbé, fifty years old, was dressed in a black robe and cap, which
fit his head closely and displayed his gentle face to advantage.

Thereson, as soon as the baron entered, hid the cradle under a cloth.
The baron approached, and was about to lift it, when Dulceline cried, in
a beseeching tone:

“Oh, monseigneur! permit us the pleasure of surprising you; rest
assured this will be the most beautiful cradle that has ever adorned the
great hall of Maison-Forte, and it ought to be, by Our Lady, since the
commander and Father Elzear are coming such a distance to assist at the
Christmas festivity.”

“Manjour! I shall be unhappy indeed if they do not come,” said the
baron: “two years have passed since my brothers have spent a night
or a day in our father’s house, and by St. Bernard, my patron, who
assists me, the Lord will grant us a reunion this time!”

“God will hear you, monseigneur, and I join my prayers to yours,”
 said the abbé. Then he added: “Monseigneur, did you have a successful
hunt?”

“Very good, abbé, see for yourself!” and the baron took the
hare’s foot that Reine held in her hand, and showed it to the abbé.

“If mademoiselle does not desire to keep this foot,” said the abbé,
“I will ask her for it, for my pharmacy, and will monseigneur tell me
if it is the right or the left foot of the animal?”

“And what are you going to do with it, abbé?”

“Monseigneur,” said the good Mascarolus, pointing to an open volume
on the table, “I have just received this book from Paris. It is the
journal of M. de Maucaunys, a very illustrious and learned man, and
I read here, page 317: ‘Recipe for the gout. Lay against the thigh,
between the trousers and the shirt, on the side affected, two paws of
a hare killed between Lady Day of September and Christmas, but with the
important restriction, that the hind left paw must be used if it is the
right arm which is ailing, and the right fore paw if it is the leg or
the left thigh which is ailing: on the instant the application is made,
the pain will cease.’”

“Stuff!” cried the baron, laughing with all his might. “This is a
wonderful discovery; now the poachers will claim to be apothecaries, and
they will catch hares only to cure the gout.”

The good abbé, quite embarrassed by the sarcasms of the baron,
continued to read to keep himself in countenance, and added: “I see,
baron, on page 177, wood-lice, given to dropsical nightingales, will
cure them entirely.”

Here the laughter of the good gentleman was more uproarious. Reine,
notwithstanding her preoccupation, could not repress a smile, and
finally laughed with her father.

The Abbé Mascarolus smiled softly, and bore these innocent railleries
with Christian resignation, and no longer tried to defend an empiricism
which, no doubt, may find analogies in medical books of the present day.

Raimond V. took leave of the pharmacy to find pleasure elsewhere, when
Laramée, majordomo and master of ceremonies, came to announce that
supper had been waiting a long time.

Laramée, the advance guard of the baron’s escort through the gorges
of Ollioules, had the physiognomy of a real pandour; his complexion
reddened by wine-drinking, his rough voice, his white and closely cut
hair, his long gray moustache, and his continual swearing, were by no
means to the taste of Dulceline.

She received the entrance of the majordomo into the sanctuary of the
abbé with a sort of muttered remonstrance, which at last changed
to sharp and loud complaint, when she saw that Laramée had the
indiscretion to approach the veil which covered the mysterious cradle
and try to lift it.

“Well, well, Laramée,” said the baron, “Manjour, do you claim
more privileges than your master, and insist upon seeing the wonders
that Dulceline is hiding from our eyes? Come, come, take this lamp and
light onr way.”

Then, turning to Mascarolus, Raimond V. said humorously: “Since,
according to your fine book, wood-lice will cure dropsy in nightingales,
you ought to try your remedy on this old scoundrel, who surely is
threatened with dropsy, for he is a veritable old bottle, swollen with
wine, ready to burst; as for the rest, like the nightingale, he will
sing at night,--and the devil knows what songs!”

“Yes, monseigneur, and with a voice loud enough to wake the whole
castle, and make the owls fly from the top of the old tower,” added
Dulceline.

“And just as true as I drank two glasses of Sauvechrétien wine this
morning, screech owls know the owls, Dulceline, my dear,” said the
majordomo with a jocose manner as he passed, lamp in hand, before the
superintendent of the laundry.

“Monseigneur,” cried she, “do you hear the insolence of Master
Laramée?”

“And you shall be avenged, my dear, for I will make him drink a pint
of water to your health. Come, come, go on, majordomo, the soup will get
cold.”

The baron, Reine, and the abbé left the pharmacy and descended the
stairs, and crossed the long and dark gallery which united the two wings
of Maison-Forte; they entered a large dining-room, brilliantly lighted
by a good fire of beech, olive roots, and fir-apples, which shed through
the whole room the odour of balsam.

The immense chimney, with a large stone mantel, and andirons of massive
iron, smoked a little, but by way of compensation, the windows latticed
with lead, and the heavy doors of oak were not hermetically sealed, and
the smoke found a way of escape through the numerous openings.

The north wind, entering these cracks, made a shrill whistle, which was
victoriously combatted by the merry crackling of the beech and olive
logs which burned in the fireplace.

The walls, simply plastered with lime, as well as the ceiling with its
great projecting girders of black oak, had no other ornament than the
skins of foxes and badgers and wolves, nailed at symmetrical distances
by the careful hand of the majordomo.

In the spaces between the skins hung fishing-lines, weapons of the
chase, whips, and spurs; and as curiosities, a Moorish bridle with its
two-edged bit and top-not of crimson silk.

On an oak dresser, with a beautifully bowed front, stood an ancient
and massive silver plate, whose richness contrasted singularly with the
almost savage rusticity of the hall.

Great bottles of white glass were filled with the generous wines of
Provence and Languedoc; smaller flagons contained Spanish wines, easily
and promptly brought from Barcelona by coasting ships.

A few rustic valets, attired in cassocks of brown serge, served the
table under the orders of the major-domo, the liveries with the colours
of the baron never leaving the wardrobe except on feast-days.

The oblong table placed near the fireside rested on a thick carpet of
Spanish broom or esparto. The rest of the hall was paved with flags of
sandstone.

At the head of the table was the armorial chair of Raimond V.; at
his right, the cover for his daughter, at his left, the cover for the
stranger,--a custom of touching hospitality.

Below this place was the cover for the chaplain.

The table was delicately and abundantly served.

Around an enormous tureen of soup, made of the excellent sea eels of La
Ciotat, and fragments of swordfish and sea dates, were fowls from the
Pyrenees, which surrounded a perfectly roasted goose; on the other side,
a saddle of lamb three months old, and the half of a kid one month old,
justified by their appetising odour the culinary proverb: _Cabri d’un
mes, agneou de tres_,--kid of one month, lamb of three; shell-fish of
all kinds, such as oysters and mussels, having above all the flavour
of the rock, as the Provençals say, filled the spaces left between
substantial viands.

Side-dishes strongly salted and spiced, such as shrimps, lobsters,
artichokes, celery, and tender fennel, formed a formidable reserve
which Raimond V. called to his aid, when his appetite showed signs of
exhaustion.

This profusion, which at first glance seemed so prodigal, was easily
explained by the abundant resources of the country, the customary
hospitality of the time, and the great number of persons a lord was
expected to entertain.

Grace being said by the worthy Abbé Mascarolus, the baron, his
daughter, and the chaplain sat down to the table, and Laramée took his
usual post behind the chair of his master.




CHAPTER VIII. THE LOVER

The baron was scarcely seated, when he said:

“What in the devil is the matter with my head? Is Honorât not going
to take supper with us?”

“He promised yesterday to do so,” said Reine.

“And do you allow your betrothed to break his word? What o’clock is
it, Laramée?”

“Monseigneur, I have just posted the two sentinels on the rampart.”

“That is to say it is eight o’clock, is it not, captain?” merrily
answered the baron to the majordomo, tending his glass.

“Yes, monseigneur, somewhat past eight.”

“Ah, that!” replied the old gentleman, replacing his glass on the
table, not without having emptied it. “I hope nothing has happened to
Honorat.”

“Father, why not send a messenger on horseback to Berrol at once?”
 said Reine, with keen interest.

“You are right, my child; at any rate, we would feel assured: there is
not much to fear, but at night the road through the morasses of Berrol
is not safe.”

“Whom shall I send for the chevalier, monseigneur?” said Laramée.

The baron was about to reply when the Chevalier de Berrol appeared,
preceded by a valet who carried a lamp.

“Where in the devil do you come from, my son?” said the Baron des
Anbiez, extending his hand to Honorat, whom he called son since he was
to marry his daughter. “Did you meet the fairies in the quagmires of
Berrol?”

“No, my father, I was at the house of Seigneur de Saint-Yves, and
then--” Suddenly he approached the young girl, and said, “Excuse me,
I pray, Reine, for being late.”

She extended her hand to him with charming grace, and said, with a
penetrating, almost serious tone:

“I am happy, very happy to see you, Honorât, for we were anxious.”

There was in these few words, and in the look which accompanied them,
such an expression of confidence, tenderness, and solicitude, that the
chevalier started with delight.

“Come, come, sit down to the table, and as you have made your peace
with Reine, tell us what detained you at the house of Seigneur de
Saint-Yves.”

The chevalier handed his sword and cap to Laramée, and taking a seat
by the side of the baron, replied: “The recorder of the admiralty of
Toulon, who is making a tour of the province, accompanied by a scribe
and two guards of the governor, has come by order of the latter to visit
the castle of Seigneur de Saint-Yves.”

“Manjour!” cried the impetuous baron, “I am sure that it concerns
some insolent command! This marshal, murderer of our favourites, never
means to give us another; and they say this recorder is the most arrant
knave that ever announced a decree.”

“Oh, father, control yourself,” said Reine.

“You are right; Vitry does not deserve a generous anger. But it is
hard, nevertheless, for the Provençal nobility to see such a man hold
functions which, heretofore, have always been given to princes of the
blood. But we live in strange times. Kings are asleep, cardinals reign,
and bishops wear the cuirass and the belt. Do you think that is very
canonical, abbé?”

The good Mascarolus never liked to give a decided opinion, and he
replied, humbly:

“Without doubt, monseigneur, the canons of Jean VIII. and the text
of St. Ambrose forbid prelates to bear arms; but on the other hand the
literal interpretation of the Council of Worms authorises them to do
so--with the Pope’s approbation--when they possess domains independent
of the Crown. Under Louis the Young, the Bishops of Paris went to
battle. Hinemar and Hervien, Archbishops of Reims, led their troops
under Charles the Bald, and under Charles the Simple; Tristan de
Salazar, Archbishop of Reims, thoroughly armed, mounted on a good
charger, a javelin in his hand--”

“Well, well, abbé,” interrupted the baron, “by the grace of the
cardinal, we shall grow accustomed to the sight of bishops equipped as
soldiers, with a helmet for mitre, a military coat as a stole, a lance
instead of a cross, and shedding blood in the place of sprinkling holy
water,--it is altogether proper. Some wine, Laramée! And you, Honorât,
finish your story.”

“The fact is,” said the chevalier, “the recorder Isnard, who they
say has no pity for poor people, came, in the company of lawyers, to
inform himself of the number of arms and quantity of ammunition that
Seigneur de Saint-Yves kept in his castle,--in short, to draw up an
account of it, according to the orders of the Marshal of Vitry.”

The baron had just emptied his glass gloriously. He still held it
between his thumb and the index finger of his right hand. When he
heard these words he remained motionless, looking at Honorât with a
bewildered expression, and wiping mechanically, with the back of his
left hand, his white moustache, which was soaked in wine.

The chevalier, without remarking the baron’s astonishment, continued:
“As the Seigneur de Saint-Yves hesitated to comply with the demand of
the recorder, who insisted almost with threats, saying that he acted by
order of the governor of the province, in the name of the cardinal, I
wished to interpose between them, and--”

“What! Saint-Yves did not nail these crows by the feet and hands to
the door of his manor, to serve as a scarecrow to the others!” cried
the baron, purple with indignation, and setting his glass on the table
so violently that it broke in pieces.

“Father!” said Reine, alarmed, as she saw the veins which furrowed
the baron’s bald forehead, swollen to bursting, “Father, what does
it matter to you? No doubt the Seigneur de Saint-Yves has acceded to the
governor’s demands.”

“He! obey such orders!” shouted Raimond V., “he! if he could be
guilty of such cowardice, and dared appear again at the next assembly of
the nobility of Aix, I would seize him by the collar, and chase him out
of the hall with blows of my sword-belt. What! a recorder must enter
our houses to take account of our arms, our powder, and our balls, as
a bailiff takes account of a merchant’s goods! Manjour! if it were the
express and signed order of the King of France, our count, I would reply
to such an order with good shots from musket and cannon.”

“But, sir,--” said Honorât.

“Visit our castles!” cried the baron, more and more exasperated.
“Ah, it is not enough to have placed at the head of the old nobility
of Provence a Vitry!--a hired assassin,--but this cardinal--may hell
confound him; pray for him, abbé, for he has devilish need of it--must
impose upon us the most humiliating obligations! Visit our houses,
forsooth! Ah, Vitry, you wish to know how we can fire our muskets and
cannon, and, by God’s death, come and lay siege to our castles and you
shall know!” Then turning with eagerness to Honorât, he asked: “But
what has Saint-Yves done?”

“Sir, at the time I left him, he was proposing to enter into an
agreement to draw up, himself, the inventory demanded, and send it
directly to the marshal.”

“Laramée,” said the baron, rising abruptly from the table, “have
Mistraon saddled, mount five or six of my men and arm them well, and get
ready yourself to follow me.”

“In the name of Heaven, father, what are you going to do?” cried
Reine, taking one of the baron’s hands in her own.

“Prevent that good man, Saint-Yves, committing a cowardice which would
dishonour the nobility of Provence. He is old and feeble, and he has
not many persons around him; he will suffer himself to be intimidated.
Laramée, my arms, and to horse, to horse!”

“This black night, over such bad roads--surely you will not dream of
it,” said Honorât, taking the other hand of the baron.

“Did you hear me, Laramée!” shouted Raimond V.

“But, sir,--” said Honorât.

“Eh, Manjour, my young master, I do what you ought to have done! At
your age, I would have thrown the recorder and his guards out of the
window. God’s death! the blood of your fathers does not run in the
veins of you young men! Laramée, my arms, and to horse!”

Honorât made no response to the baron’s reproaches. He looked at
Reine and shook his head to make her understand her father’s injustice
to his conduct.

The young girl understood the situation, and while Laramée was occupied
in taking down his master’s arms from one of the panoplies which
ornamented the dining-hall, she said:

“Laramée, have my nag saddled too; I will accompany monseigneur.”

“To the devil with such folly!” said the baron, shrugging his
shoulders.

“Folly or not, I intend to accompany you, father.”

“No, no, a hundred times no. You shall not go with me; such roads, and
at such an hour!”

“I will follow you, father. You know I am wilful and obstinate.”

“Certainly, as a goat, when you set your mind to it; but this time I
hope you will yield to me.”

“I am going down-stairs to prepare for my departure,” said Reine.
“Come, Honorât.”

“To the devil with such nonsense! She is capable of doing it as well
as saying it Ah, there it is, I have been too good; I have been too
indulgent to her; she abuses it!” cried the old gentleman, stamping
his foot with anger. Then taking a milder tone, he said: “Let us see,
Reine, my daughter, my dear daughter, be reasonable; just one dash of
a gallop, and I am with Saint-Yves in time to drive away these wretches
with blows of my whip, and I return.”

Reine made a step toward the door.

“But you may join me, Honorât; you are as unmoved as a worm.”

“Ah, father, do you forget that just now you stigmatised as cowardice
his firm and prudent conduct in this affair?”

“He, Honorât, my son, a coward? I would cut anybody in the face
who would dare say it If I said that, I was wrong,--it was anger that
carried me away. Honorât, my son--”

Raimond V. opened his arms to Honorât, who embraced him, and said:

“Believe, me, sir, do not undertake this journey. My God! you will see
these people only too soon.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“To-morrow morning, without doubt, they will be here,--not one house
of the nobility will be exempt from this measure.”

“They will be here to-morrow!” cried the baron, with an expression
of joy difficult to portray. “Ah, the recorder will be here to-morrow,
he who has condemned poor devils to the galleys for the crime of
smuggling. Ah, he will be here to-morrow! As God lives, it fills my
heart with joy. Laramée, do not have the horses saddled, no, no,
only to-morrow at daybreak prepare twenty good poles from hazel-trees,
because I hope we will break a good many; then arrange a seesaw above
the moat, and--but I will tell you to-night when I go to bed. Some wine,
Laramée, some wine; give me my father’s cup and Spanish wine, I must
drink with solemnity to such a piece of news; some wine of Xeres, I
tell you,--wine of Lamalgue to the devil! since the minions of the petty
tyrant of Provence will be here to-morrow, and we will be able to lash
them soundly with the straps that ought to be laid on Vitry.”

Having said this, the baron sat down again in his armchair; each one
took his place, to the great delight of the poor abbé, who, during this
scene, had not dared to utter a word.

The supper, interrupted by this incident, was finished with a certain
constraint.

Raimond V., preoccupied with the reception that he was preparing for the
agents, stopped every few moments to whisper something in Laramée’s
ear; it was easy to guess the subject of these secret conferences, by
the air of profound satisfaction with which the old soldier received the
instructions of his master.

Like all soldiers, Laramée cherished an instinctive hatred of men
of the law, and he did not dissimulate his joy at the thought of the
reception awaiting the recorder and his scribe the next day.

Reine and Honorât exchanged glances of distress; they knew the
obstinate and irascible temper of the baron, his taste for rebellion,
and aversion to Marshal of Vitry.

The young girl and her lover feared, not without reason, that the baron
might become involved in some serious difficulty. Recent and terrible
examples had proven that Richelieu desired to put an end to the
independence of the lords, and absorb their feudal privileges in the
power of the king.

Unfortunately, they could not dream of preventing Raimond V., when once
he determined upon any course of action, and his dependents were only
too willing to second his dangerous projects.

The good Abbé Mascarolus ventured to say a few words on
obedience,--that the lords owed it to themselves to set the example;
but a severe glance from the eye of the baron cut short the chaplain’s
moralising, and he dared not defend the marshal as he had defended the
warlike bishops.

Reine was not a little frightened at the baron’s extravagant bursts of
merriment and laughter, as he talked aside with Laramée.

When supper was over, according to the ancient and invariable usage of
hospitality, the baron took a lamp, and himself conducted Honorât de
Berrol to the chamber he was to occupy.

As upon previous occasions, the young man wished to spare the baron this
ceremonial, arguing that his position as a betrothed lover rendered
it unnecessary, but the old gentleman replied that not until after the
festivities of Christmas, when the marriage rite was to be celebrated,
could he be treated with less formality; until then, he must receive all
the attention due a gentleman who slept under his roof.

Reine entered her chamber, followed by Stephanette. Her apartment was
near that of her father, and listening she discovered to her great
regret that Laramée remained with him longer than was his habit, and
that the baron continued to make plans for the discomfiture of the
recorder and officers. At a late hour of the night, she heard the
majordomo order some of the baron’s servants to carry invitations.

Distressed by these indications, she dismissed Stephanette, and returned
to her chamber.

A new object of astonishment, almost of terror, awaited her there.




CHAPTER IX. THE PICTURE

After having shut the door which communicated with her father’s rooms.
Reine walked mechanically to the table standing in the embrasure of the
window. What was her astonishment to see on this table a little picture
encased in a frame of filigree, set with precious stones.

Her heart beat violently; she recalled the crystal vase, and a secret
presentiment told her that this picture had some mysterious connection
with the adventure among the rocks of Ollioules.

She approached it, trembling.

The perfection of this picture, painted on vellum, in imitation of
ancient manuscripts, was incredible.

It represented the scene in the gorges of Ollioules at the very moment
when the baron, embracing his daughter, had extended his hand to the
young stranger; at a distance on the rock, Pog and Trimalcyon, the
two foreign personages of whom we have spoken, appeared to command the
scene.

Although Reine had seen these two men but a moment, the likeness in
the picture was so striking that she recognised them. She shuddered
involuntarily at the sinister expression of Fog’s face, easily known
by his long red beard and the bitter smile which contracted his lips.

The features of the baron, as well as those of Reine, were rendered with
surprising fidelity and perfect art, although the faces were scarcely
larger than the nail of the little finger. They were drawn with a
delicacy which was marvellous.

Notwithstanding the inimitable skill displayed in this ravishing
picture, an odd, extravagant thing destroyed its harmony and effect.

The pose, person, and costume of Erebus--the strange young man--were
perfectly portrayed; but his head disappeared beneath a small cloud, in
the centre of which was represented the enamelled dove already portrayed
on the crystal vase.

This omission was strange, and perhaps cleverly calculated, inasmuch
as Reine, in spite of her fear and astonishment, could not help calling
memory to her aid in order to complete the portrait of the stranger.

She saw it in her own mind, instead of on the vellum which she held in
her hand.

There was, besides, on the part of the stranger, a sort of delicacy in
thus effacing his own features under a symbol which represented to his
mind the most precious memory of that day; or he may have adopted this
means to quiet the scruples of the young girl, should she decide to keep
the picture.

In order to comprehend the struggle between the desire to keep the
picture and the resolve to destroy it, which rose in the young girl’s
mind, we must say a few words about Reine’s love for Honorât de Berrol,
and her own sentiments after the adventure in the gorges of Ollioules.

Honorât de Berrol was an orphan and distant relative of Raimond V. He
had considerable fortune, his estates lying near those of the baron, and
community of interest as well as other ties bound the chevalier and the
old gentleman.

For two or three years Honorât came almost every day to Maison-Forte.
The chevalier was the impersonation of rectitude, sincerity, and honour.
His education, without being extraordinary, was superior to that of most
young men of his age.

He was actively occupied in the management of his estates; his order
and his economy were remarkable, although, when an opportunity presented
itself, he knew how to be generous.

His mind was not unusual, but he had plenty of good sense and reason,
and his character, naturally charming, could be firm and decided when
circumstances demanded it.

His predominating characteristic was a love of justice. Little given
to enthusiasm or exaggeration, and supremely happy in his position, he
looked forward to his marriage with the baron’s daughter with a pure
and serene joy.

There was no romantic aspect to this love. Before allowing himself to
fall in love with Reine, Honorât had frankly expressed his intentions
to the baron, and asked him to learn his daughter’s feelings.

The good gentleman, who never temporised or resorted to half-measures,
replied to Honorât that the alliance would be agreeable to him, and at
once told Reine of the chevalier’s proposal.

Reine was then sixteen years old; she was pleased with the appearance
and bearing of the Chevalier de Berrol, for the manners of most of the
country gentlemen who visited Maison-Forte suffered much by comparison
with those of her amiable relative.

Reine accepted the baron’s plans, and the baron wrote at length to his
brothers, the commander and Father Elzear, without whose advice he did
nothing, concerning the happy betrothal.

Their response was favourable to Honorât, and the marriage was fixed
for the Christmas celebration which would follow the young girl’s
eighteenth birthday.

Thus passed two years in the midst of sweet hopes and a pure, calm love.

Honorât, serious and gentle, began at once his part as mentor, and by
degrees acquired a great ascendancy over the mind of Reine.

Raimond V. loved his daughter so foolishly and idolatrously, that the
happy influence of Honorât saved her from her father’s weakness.

The girl had lost her mother when she was in the cradle, and had
been reared under the eyes of the baron by Stephanette’s mother, an
excellent woman, and, although happily endowed with good instincts, had
been permitted to indulge her caprice at will.

Her lively imagination exaggerated sympathy and antipathy, and she
often received the wise and reasonable suggestions of Honorât with
mischievous irony and even resentment.

Legend and romance were the mental food she craved, and often in thought
she pictured herself as the heroine of some strange adventure.
Honorât would dissipate these fantastic visions by a breath, and not
infrequently reproached Reine, with as much good-humour as gaiety, for
these vagabond imaginations.

But these little differences were soon forgotten. Reine would confess
her wrong-doing with adorable frankness, and the beautiful affection of
the two lovers seemed only to increase.

Unconsciously, Reine began to feel the influence of Honorât more
and more in her daily life, and instead of indulging herself in vague
reveries and foolish imaginations, occupied her mind with graver
thoughts. She recognised the nothingness of her former dreams, and
every step of this wise and happy way served to establish her love for
Chevalier de Berrol.

Her mind and character had undergone such a complete transformation
under the influence of Honorât, that her father, sometimes, when he had
gone beyond the limits of temperance, would say in jest that Reine was
becoming insupportably serious.

The sentiment of Reine for Honorât was by no means a passionate love,
nourished by difficulties and uncertainties, but a calm, sincere, and
reasonable affection, in which the young girl recognised, with a sort of
tender veneration, the superior reason of her betrothed.

Such were the sentiments of Mlle, des Anbiez when the fatal meeting in
the rocks of Ollioules took place.

The first time that she saw Erebus, placed her under the influence of a
profound sentiment of gratitude; he had just saved the baron’s life.

Reine, perhaps, might never have observed the surprising beauty of the
stranger, but for the startling circumstances by which he was presented
to her.

The fact that he had just delivered her father from a frightful danger
was the most powerful fascination that Erebus could offer.

No doubt the charm was broken when, after the few words uttered by his
companions, his countenance and manner changed, and he had the audacity
to press his lips to hers. The features of the stranger, that a moment
before possessed a beauty so pure, and an amiability so lovely, seemed
suddenly to disappear under the mask of an insolent libertine.

Since that day, Erebus appeared to her always under these two different
physiognomies.

Sometimes she tried to banish from her memory all thought of an
audacious stranger, who had insolently robbed her of what she would have
given to her father’s saviour with reluctance. Again, she would dream,
with a deep sentiment of gratitude, that her father owed his life to
this same stranger who at first seemed so courageous and so timid.

Unhappily for Reine’s repose of mind, Erebus united and justified, so
to speak, these two distinct natures, and in her thought she gave him
sometimes her admiration, and sometimes her contempt.

So she wavered between these two sentiments.

Thus the natural exaggeration of her character, rather suppressed than
destroyed, was excited by this singular adventure.

The unknown one seemed to her the genius of good and the genius of evil.

Involuntarily, her excitable mind tried to penetrate the secret of this
double power.

Reine herself was made aware of her morbid mental condition only by the
tender reproaches of Honorât, who accused her of distraction. For the
first time, then, Reine realised with horror the empire that the unknown
person had gained over her mind; she resolved to escape from it, but
the resistance with which she endeavoured to drive Erebus from her mind,
only made her think of him the more.

In her vexation she shed bitter tears, and sought refuge and diversion
in the calm and wise conversation of Honorât.

Nothing could make her forget the past. Notwithstanding his goodness and
kindness, her betrothed seemed to weary her, and even wound her.

She dared not open her heart to him. The baron, too, was the best of
fathers, yet absolutely incapable of comprehending the unaccountable
anguish of his daughter.

Concentrated by silence, and overexcited by solitude, a sentiment
mingled with curiosity, admiration, and almost hatred, began to take
deep root in the heart of Reine.

Many times she shuddered to see that the gravity of Honorât oppressed
her. In her thought she reproached him for having nothing in his career
that was adventurous or romantic.

She compared his peaceful and uniform life with the mystery which
surrounded the stranger.

Then, ashamed of such thoughts, she sought to fix her hopes upon
her approaching union with Honorât,--a union so sacred that, in the
fulfilment of its duties, every foolish dream and imagination would be
effaced.

Such was the state of Reine’s heart when, by an inexplicable mystery,
she found in the same day two objects, the sight of which redoubled her
anguish and excited every power of her imagination.

This stranger, or one of his agents, was then near her, though
invisible.

She could not suspect the servants within the walls of Maison-Forte of
being in collusion with the stranger. All of them were old servants,
grown gray in the service of Raimond V.

Reared, so to speak, by them, she was too well acquainted with their
life and morality to believe them capable of underhand manoeuvres. The
fact that the picture was placed on her praying-stool in her chamber,
disquieted her above all.

She was on the point of going to her father and telling him all, but an
instinctive love of the marvellous restrained her; she feared to break
the charm. Her romantic character found a sort of pleasure, mingled with
fear, in this mystery.

Inaccessible to superstition, of a firm and decided mind, and
recognising the fact that, after all, there was nothing really dangerous
in allowing this strange adventure to take its course, Reine reassured
herself, after searching her chamber and the connecting one very
carefully.

She took up the picture again, looked at it for some time, then, after
dreaming awhile, she threw it into the fire.

She followed the destruction of this little masterpiece with a
melancholy gaze.

By a strange chance the vellum, detached from the frame, caught first on
both sides.

Thus the figure of Erebus burned the last and was outlined a moment
on the burning embers,--then a light flame leaped upon it, and all
disappeared.

Reine remained a long time gazing in the fireplace, as though she still
saw there the picture which had been consumed.

The clock of Maison-Forte struck two in the morning; the young girl
returned to her senses, went to bed, and, for a long time, tried to fall
asleep.




CHAPTER X. THE RECORDER

The day after the occurrence of the events we have just related, a group
of several persons, some on foot, and others on horseback, skirted the
edge of the sea, and seemed to direct their course toward the Gulf of La
Ciotat.

The most important personage of this little caravan was a man of
considerable corpulence, with a solemn and formal countenance, wearing a
travelling-cloak over his habit of black velvet.

He had a chain of silver around his neck, and rode a little horse with
an ambling gait.

These personages were no other than Master Isnard, recorder of the
admiralty of Toulon, and his clerk or scribe, who, mounted on an old
white mule, carried behind enormous bags filled with bundles of papers,
and two large registers in their boxes of black shagreen.

The clerk was a little middle-aged man, with a pointed nose, a pointed
chin, high cheek-bones, and sharp eyes. This nose, this chin, and these
cheek-bones, and these eyes were very red, thanks to the very keen wind
from the north.

A valet, mounted on another mule, laden with wallets, and two
halberdiers, dressed in green and orange-coloured cassocks trimmed with
white lace, accompanied the recorder and his clerk.

It was evident that the two officers of justice did not enjoy an
unmarred serenity.

Master Isnard, especially, betrayed his bad humour, from time to time,
by imprecations upon the cold, the weather, the roads, and particularly
upon his mission.

The clerk responded to these complaints with a humble and pitiful air.

“On my oath!” cried the recorder, “here I am only two days on
my circuit, and it is far from promising anything agreeable. Hm! the
nobility takes this census of arms ordered by the Marshal of Vitry very
ill; they receive us in their castles like Turks--”

“And we are happy to be received at all, Master Isnard,” said the
clerk; “the lord of Signerol shut his door in our faces, and we were
obliged to draw up our report by the light of the moon. The lord of
Saint-Yves received us reluctantly.”

“And all these resistances, open or mute, to the orders of his
Eminence, the cardinal, will be duly recorded, clerk, and bad intentions
will be punished!”

“Fortunately, the reception given by the Baron des Anbiez will
indemnify us for these tribulations, Master Isnard. They say the old
lord is the best of men. His jovial nature is as well known throughout
the country as the austerity of his brother, the commander of the black
galley, or the charity of Father Elzear of the Order of Mercy, his other
brother--”

“Hm! Raimond V. does well to be hospitable,” growled the recorder;
“he is one of those old strife-stirrers, always ready to draw his
sword against any established power; but patience, clerk, good courage,
the reign of men of peace and justice has come, thank God! All these
arrogant disputants, with long rapiers and spurs, will keep as quiet in
their strong castles as wolves in their dens, or, on my oath, we will
rase their houses to the ground and sow salt on them. However,” added
Master Isnard, as if he wanted to give himself artificial courage, “we
are always sure of the support of the cardinal; just let them touch a
hair of our heads,--why, you see, clerk, that it would be the same as
pulling a hair out of the beard of his Eminence!”

“Which would be dreadfully injurious to the said Eminence, Master
Isnard, as they say he has a regular cat’s beard,--thin and sharp.”

“You are an ass!” said the recorder, shrugging his shoulders, and
giving his horse a thrust of the spur.

The clerk lowered his head, said no more, and blew through his fingers
by way of keeping in countenance.

The little caravan followed the road for some time along the beach, the
sea on the right, and interminable rocks on the left, when they were
joined by a traveller modestly seated on a donkey.

The tawny complexion of this man, with his overcoat of leather, his red
cap, from which escaped a forest of black hair, curled and standing
on end, and a little portable forge, fastened to one side of the
pack-saddle on the back of his donkey, proved him to be one of those
strolling Bohemians who go from farm to village, offering their services
to housekeepers as repairers of household utensils.

Notwithstanding the cold, the legs and feet of this man were naked. His
delicate and nervous limbs, and his expressive face, scarcely shaded by
a black and distinctly marked beard, presented the type peculiar to the
men of his race.

His donkey was quiet and tractable, and had neither bit nor bridle,--he
guided it by means of a stick which he held to the animal’s left eye,
if he wished to go to the right, and to the right eye if he wished him
to go to the left. As he approached the recorder and his attendants, the
Bohemian took the donkey by one of his long, pendent ears, and stopped
him suddenly.

“Can you tell me, sir,” said the Bohemian to the recorder,
respectfully, “if I am still far from La Ciotat?”

The recorder, thinking, doubtless, the man unworthy of a reply from him,
made a disdainful gesture, and said to his scribe:

“Answer him, clerk,” and rode on.

“The mouth is the mistress, the ear is the slave,” said the
Bohemian, bowing himself humbly before the clerk.

The clerk inflated his thin cheeks, assumed a haughty air, seated
himself on his mule with triumphant dignity, and said to the valet who
followed him, as he pointed to the Bohemian:

“Lackey, reply to him,” and passed on.

Little John, more compassionate, told the wanderer that he could follow
the caravan, as it was on its way to a place quite near the town of La
Ciotat.

The two halberdiers were a short distance in the rear, and, joining the
principal group, all continued to move forward on the beach. The sun
soon made its influence felt; although it was in the month of December,
its rays became so warm that Master Isnard felt the need of relieving
himself of his cloak. He tossed it to his clerk, saying:

“Are you sure, clerk, that you recognise the route to Maison-Forte,
the castle of Raimond V., Baron des Anbiez? For we are to stop first at
his dwelling. It is from that point that I will begin the census of arms
in this diocese. Eh, eh, clerk, the morning air and salt odour of the
beach gives me an appetite! They say the baron has the good cheer of an
abbé, and the hospitality of the good King René. So much the better,
on my oath! so much the better, clerk. Instead of putting up for fifteen
days at some paltry hostelry of La Ciotat, eh, eh! I will make my
winter quarters at Maison-Forte of Raimond V., and you will follow me,
clerk,” said the recorder, giving himself airs. “Instead of your
bacon with garlic and beans, and your codfish seasoned with oil for high
days, you will only have to choose between fowl, venison, and the best
fish of the gulf. Eh, eh! for a starved wretch like you, it is a rare
windfall, so, clerk, you can get a big mouthful--”

The poor scribe made no reply to these coarse pleasantries, by which he
felt humiliated, and only said to the recorder: “I recognise the road
easily, Master Isnard, because there is a post bearing the escutcheon of
Raimond V., and a milestone which marks the land belonging to the house
of Baux.”

“The lands of Baux!” cried the recorder, with indignation.
“Another one of the abuses that his Eminence will destroy, on my
oath! It is enough to make one insane to try to find his way out of-this
labyrinth of feudal privileges!” Then, passing from grave to gay, the
recorder added, with a loud laugh, “Eh, eh! it would be as difficult
a task as for you to distinguish the wine of Xeres from the wine of
Malaga, accustomed as you are to drink the second pressing of the grape
like a fish, and then taste a glass of Sauve-chrétien, to put a good
taste in your mouth.”

“And happy when this grape-water does not fail us, Master Isnard,”
 said the poor clerk, with a sigh.

“Eh, eh! then the river never fails, and asses can drink at their
ease,” replied the recorder, insolently.

His unhappy victim could only hang his head in silence, while the
recorder, proud of his triumph, put his hand above his eyes, hoping
to discover the roof of Maison-Forte des Anbiez, as his appetite was
growing clamorous.

The Bohemian, who rode behind the two talkers, had heard their
conversation.

Although his features were common, they showed much penetration and
intelligence. His little, piercing, changing black eyes constantly moved
from the recorder to the clerk with an expression by turns ironical
and compassionate. When Master Isnard had finished conversation by his
coarse witticism on asses, he contracted his eyebrows into a severe
frown, and seemed about to speak, but whether he feared the recorder, or
was afraid of saying too much, he remained silent.

“Tell me, clerk,” cried the recorder, stopping short before a post,
painted with a coat of arms, which marked a division of the road, “is
not this the route to Des Anbiez?”

“Yes, Master Isnard, but we must leave the shore. This is the road to
Maison-Forte; it is about two hundred steps from here; this rock hides
it from you,” answered the clerk, as he pointed to a sort of little
promontory which thrust itself into the sea, and thus interfered with a
view of the castle.

“Then, clerk, go on before,” said the recorder, checking his own
horse, and giving a blow of his switch to the scribe’s mule.

The clerk rode on in advance, and the little band ventured into a
precipitous road which wound its way across the rocks on the coast.

After a quarter of an hour’s travel, the road became level, and wooded
hills, vines, olive-trees, and sown fields succeeded the rocks. Master
Isnard at last saw, to his great joy, the imposing pile of Maison-Forte.
It stood out at the end of an immense avenue, planted with six rows of
beeches and sycamores, which conducted to the vast court of which we
have spoken.

“Eh, eh!” said the recorder, expanding his nostrils, “it is about
midday; it ought to be the dinner-hour of Raimond V., for these country
lords follow the old Provençal custom: they take four meals; every four
hours,--breakfast at eight o’clock, dine in the middle of the day,
lunch at four o’clock, and sup at eight.” “Indeed, then they must eat
nearly all day long,” said the clerk, with a sigh of envy, “for they
often sit three or four hours at table.”

“Eh, eh! you are licking your lean lips already, clerk; but do you not
see a thick smoke on the side of the kitchens?”

“Master Isnard, I do not know where the kitchens are,” said the
clerk. “I have never been inside Maison-Forte, but I do see a thick
smoke above the tower which looks toward the west.”

“And you do not detect the odour of fish-soup, or roast? On my oath,
in the house of Raimond V. it ought to be Christmas every day. Come,
can’t you scent something, man?”

The clerk held his nose in the air like a dog on the scent, and replied,
with a shake of the head: “Master, I scent nothing.”

When the recorder had arrived a few steps from the court of
Maison-Forte, he was astonished to see no one outside of this large
habitation, at an hour when domestic duties always require so much
commotion.

As we have said, the court formed a sort of parallelogram.

At the farther end of this parallelogram rose the main dwelling.

On each side could be seen its wings at right angles, and the buildings
occupied by persons in the employ of the castle.

On the first plane rose a high wall, pierced with loopholes for cannon,
in the middle of which opened a massive door. In front of this wall
stretched a wide and deep ditch, filled with water, which was crossed by
means of a movable bridge, built directly in front of the door.

The recorder and his retinue arrived at the entrance of the bridge,
where they found Master Laramée.

The majordomo, solemnly clothed in black, bore in his hand a white rod,
a distinctive mark of office.

The recorder descended from his horse with an important air, and,
turning to Laramée, said: “In the name of the king, and his Eminence,
the cardinal, I, Master Isnard, recorder, have come to take census
and catalogue of the arms and ammunition of war, retained here in
this castle of Maison-Forte, belonging to Sir Raimond V., Baron des
Anbiez.”

Then turning to his train, which the Bohemian had joined, he said:
“All of you follow me.”

Laramée made a profound bow, and with a sly expression of face said to
the recorder, as he indicated the road: “If you will follow me,
Master Recorder, I will show you our magazine of arms and artillery.”
 Encouraged by this reception, Master Isnard and his retinue crossed the
bridge, leaving their horses outside, tied to the parapet, according to
the instruction of the majordomo.

As they entered the court planted with trees, the recorder said to
Laramée: “Is your master at home? We are very hungry and very
thirsty, friend.”

The majordomo looked up at the recorder, lifted his cap, and replied:
“You condescend, sir; you call me friend; you honour me too much,
Master Recorder.”

“Oh, go on! I am as kind as a prince. If the baron is not at table,
conduct me first to him; if he is at table, conduct me to him all the
sooner.”

“Monseigneur has just been served, Master Recorder. I am going to open
the door of honour for you, as is proper.”

As he said these words, Laramée disappeared through a narrow passage.

The recorder, his clerk, his valet, the Bohemian, and the two
halberdiers remained in the court, staring at the great portal of the
castle, expecting every moment to see its massive doors open for their
reception. They did not see that two men had removed the bridge, beyond
the ditch, on the side of the fields, thus cutting off all retreat from
the men of the law.




CHAPTER XI. TAKING THE CENSUS

On the side of the court, as on the side of the sea, three windows of
the gallery, which extended the full length of the edifice, opened upon
a balcony which was over the principal door of the castle.

The recorder began to realise that it required much ceremony to
introduce him to the baron, when suddenly the windows were opened, and
ten or twelve gentlemen, in handsome hunting-suits, booted and spurred,
holding a glass in one hand and a napkin in the other, rushed out on the
balcony, shouting and laughing at the top of their voices.

At their head was Raimond V.

It was easy to see by the flushed cheeks of these joyous companions
that they had just arisen from the table, and had emptied more than one
bottle of Spanish wine.

The convivial friends of Raimond V. belonged to the nobility of the
neighbourhood, and were all known for their hatred of Marshal of Vitry,
and open or secret opposition to Cardinal Richelieu.

Honorât de Berrol and Reine, utterly powerless to dissuade the baron
from his dangerous projects, had retired into one of the apartments in
the tower.

The recorder began to think he was mistaken in counting on a favourable
reception from the baron; he even feared that he might be made the
victim of some infernal trick, as he saw the clamorous gaiety of the
guests of Maison-Forte, especially when he recognised among the number
the old lord of Signerol, who had rudely refused him entrance into his
castle.

However, he tried to put a good face on the matter, and followed by his
clerk, who was trembling in every limb, he advanced to the balcony with
his two halberdiers at his heels.

Addressing himself to Raimond V., who was leaning over the balcony
railing and looking contemptuously on the company below, he said:

“In the name of the king and his Eminence, the cardinal--”

“The cardinal to the devil! Let his infernal Eminence return to the
place he came from!” shouted several gentlemen, interrupting the
recorder’s speech.

“Beelzebub, at this moment, is making a red brass hat for his
Eminence,” said the lord of Signerol.

“The girdles of his Eminence ought to be good rope for hanging!”
 said another.

“Let the recorder have his say, gentlemen,” said the baron, turning
to his guests, “let him speak, my friends,--it is not by a single
note that you recognise the bird of the night. Come on, Manjour! speak,
recorder, speak, read out your scrawl!”

The clerk, completely demoralised, and doubtless meditating a retreat,
turned his head away from the door, and discovered with dismay that the
bridge had been withdrawn.

“Master Isnard,” whispered he, with broken voice, “we are caught
in a mouse-trap; they have carried away the bridge.”

Notwithstanding the self-possession he affected, the recorder looked
over his shoulder, and said, in a low voice: “Clerk, order the
halberdiers to approach without attracting attention.”

The clerk obeyed; the little band concentrated in the middle of the
court, with the exception of the Bohemian.

Standing at the foot of the balcony, he seemed to contemplate with
curiosity the gentlemen gathered there.

Master Isnard, anxious to accomplish his task, and seeing that he had
been mistaken in presuming upon the hospitality of Raimond V., read, not
without hesitation, the judicial summary.

“In the name of his Majesty, our sire, King of France and of Navarre,
and Count of Provence, and of his Eminence, the cardinal, I, Thomas
Isnard, recorder of the admiralty of Toulon, sent by the king’s
attorney to the seat of the said admiralty, make here in this
Maison-Forte the census and catalogue of the arms and ammunitions of war
therein enclosed, in order to draw up a statement, on which statement
his Excellence, the Marshal of Vitry, Governor of Provence, will decide
to the end that we may be advised as to what quantity of arms and
ammunition ought to be left in the said Maison-Forte; accordingly, I,
Thomas Isnard, recorder of the admiralty of Toulon, here present myself
in person to the said Raimond V., Baron des Anbiez, praying him of
necessity to obey the orders signified. Made at Maison-Forte des Anbiez,
dependent of the diocese of Marseilles, and the jurisdiction of Aix,
December 17,1632.” The old baron and his friends listened to the
recorder with perfect calmness, exchanging frequent glances of contempt.
When Master Isnard had concluded, Raimond V. leaned over the railing of
the balcony and replied:

“Worthy recorder, worthy deputy of the worthy Marshal of Vitry, and of
the worthy Cardinal Richelieu,--God save the king, our count, from his
Eminence,--we, Raimond V., Baron des Anbiez, and master of this poor
mansion, we authorise you to complete your mission. You see that door
there on the left, on which is nailed the sign-board, ‘Arms and
Artillery,’--open it, and perform the duties of your office.”

As he said these words the old gentleman and his guests sat with their
elbows on the balcony railing, as if they had prepared themselves for
the enjoyment of an interesting and unusual spectacle.

Master Isnard had followed with his eyes the gesture of the baron, which
indicated to him the mysterious magazine.

It was a door of medium size, on which could easily be read the newly
painted words, “Arms and Artillery.” This door was situated in the
middle of the left wing, which was largely made up of rooms for the
servants.

Without being able to account for his repugnance, the recorder looked at
the door of the magazine with suspicion, and said to Raimond V., with an
air almost arrogant:

“Send some one of your people to open that door!” The old
gentleman’s face became purple with anger; he was on the point of
flying into a passion, but restrained himself and replied:

“One of my people, Master Recorder? Alas, I do not have them any
longer. The good old man who received you is my only servant; the taxes
imposed by your worthy cardinal, and the tribute he exacts from us,
have reduced the Provençal nobility to beggary, as you see! You are
accompanied by two companions with halberds, and a fellow with a serge
mantle,”--here the clerk made a respectful bow,--“your own people
are more than enough to put your orders in execution.”

Then, seeing the Bohemian at the foot of the balcony, Raimond called to
him: “Eh, you man there with the red cap, who in the devil are you?
What are you doing there? Do you belong to this band?”

The wanderer approached the balcony, and said: “Monseigneur, I am a
poor travelling artisan, who lives by his work. I come from Bany. I was
on my way to La Ciotat, and I entered to see if I could get work at the
castle.”

“Manjour!” exclaimed the baron, “you are my guest; do not stay in
the court.”

At this remarkable invitation, the men of the law looked frightened, and
at the same instant the Bohemian, with a wonderful agility, climbed up
one of the granite pillars which supported the balcony, as quick as a
wildcat, and seated himself at the feet of the baron, outside of the
balustrade, on a little slab projecting from the balcony floor.

The ascension of the Bohemian was so rapid, and done so cleverly, that
it excited the admiration of the guests.

The baron, laughingly seizing one of his long black locks of hair,
said to him: “You climb too well to travel in the main road; it is my
opinion, fellow, that windows are your doors, and roofs serve you as
a place to promenade. Come in the house, boy; Laramée will give you
something to drink.”

With a light bound the Bohemian jumped over the railing of the balcony,
and entered the gallery, which served as dining-room on important
occasions, where he found the remains of the abundant dinner of which
the baron’s guests had just partaken.

The recorder remained in the court with his escort, not knowing upon
what course to resolve.

He looked at the unlucky door with a vague disquietude, while the old
gentleman and his friends betrayed some impatience as they waited for
the end of this scene.

Finally, Master Isnard, wishing to get out of an embarrassing position,
turned to the baron and said, with a solemn air:

“I call to witness the people who accompany me if anything unbecoming
happens to me, and you will answer, sir, for any dangerous and secret
ambuscade which could hurt the dignity of the law or of justice, or our
honourable person.”

“Eh, Manjour! what are you crowing about? Nobody here wishes to
interfere with your office; my arms and my artillery are there: enter,
examine, and count; the key is in the door!”

“Yes, yes, go in, the key is in the door,” repeated the chorus
of guests, with a sneer which seemed a sinister omen to the recorder.
Exasperated beyond measure, but keeping himself at a respectful distance
from the door, the recorder said to his scribe:

“Clerk, go and open this door; let us make an end of--”

“But, Master Isnard--”

“Obey, clerk, obey,” said the recorder, still drawing back.

The poor scribe showed the register which he held in one hand, and the
pen that he held in the other.

“My hands are not free. I must be ready to draw up an official report.
If some sorcery bursts out of that door, ought I not, on the very
instant, enter it upon my verbal process?”

These reasons appeared to make some impression on the recorder.

“Little John, open that door,” said he to the lackey.

“Oh, master, I dare not,” replied Little John, getting behind the
recorder.

“Do you hear me, you wretch?”

“Yes, sir, but I dare not; there is some sorcery there.”

“But, on my oath, if you--”

“If the salvation of my soul depended on it, sir, I would not open
it,” said Little John, in a resolute tone.

“Come, come!” said the recorder, overcome with vexation, as he
addressed the halberdiers, “it will be said, my brave fellows, that
you alone acted as men in this stupid affair! Open that door, and put an
end to this ridiculous scene.”

The two guards retreated a step, and one of them said:

“Listen, Master Isnard, we are here to give you assistance as far as
we are able, if any one rebels against your orders, but no one forbids
you to enter. The key is in the door; enter alone, if you wish to do
so.”

“What, an old pandour like you afraid!”

The halberdier shook his head, and said:

“Listen, Master Isnard, halberds and swords are worth nothing here;
what we need is a priest with his stole, and a holy water sprinkler in
his hand.”

“Michael is right, Master Isnard,” said the other guard; “it is my
opinion that we will have to do what was done to exorcise the dolphins
that infested the coast last year.”

“If that dog of a Bohemian had not run away like a coward,” said
the recorder, stamping his foot with rage, “he might have opened the
door.”

Then, happening to turn his head, the recorder discovered several men
and women standing at the windows of Maison-Forte; they were partially
hidden by the basement, but were looking curiously into the court.

More from self-esteem than courage, Master Isnard, seeing that he was
observed by so many persons, walked deliberately to the door, and put
his hand on the key.

At that moment his heart failed him.

He heard in the magazine a rumbling noise and extraordinary excitement,
which he had not detected before.

The sounds were harsh, with nothing human in them.

A magic charm seemed to fasten the recorder’s hand to the key in the
door.

“Come, recorder, my boy, go on! there you are! go on!” cried one of
the guests, clapping his hands.

“I wager he is as warm as if it were the month of August, although the
wind is blowing from the north,” said another.

“Give him time to invoke his patron and make a vow,” said a third.

“His patron is St. Coward,” said the lord of Signerol; “no doubt
he is making a vow never to brave another danger if he delivers him from
this one.”

Pushed to extremity by these jeers, and reflecting that, after all,
Raimond V. was not so cruel as to force him into real danger, the
recorder opened the door, and suddenly jumped back.

At that moment he was roughly overthrown by the onset of two Camargnan
bulls, that rushed from the stable, head downward, and uttering a
peculiar and stifled bellowing, for they were muzzled.

The two animals were not of very large size, but were full of vigour.

One was tawny, streaked with dark brown; the other was black as jet.

The first use they made of their liberty was to bound over the court,
paw the earth with their fore feet, and try to divest themselves of
their muzzles.

The appearance of the two bulls was greeted with hurrahs and bravos by
the guests of the baron.

“Eh, well, recorder, your inventory?” cried Raimond V., holding his
sides, and giving full vent to his hilarity. “Come, clerk, enter upon
your official report my bulls, Nicolin and Saturnin. Ah! you demand
the arms that I possess,--there they are. It is with the horns of these
fellows from Camargne that I defend myself. Eh, Man-jour! I see by
your fear that you recognise them as arms, serious and offensive. Come,
recorder, label Nicolin, and draw up Saturnin.”

“God’s death!” cried the lord of Signerol, “these bulls look as
if they would like to make an inventory of the clerk’s and recorder’s
breeches!”

“By Our Lady, in spite of his corpulence, the recorder made a leap
then that would do honour to a toreador!” “And the clerk,--how he
winds around the trees! He is equal to a frightened weasel!”

“Christmas! Christmas! Nicolin has a piece of his cloak!”

It is needless to say that these different exclamations described the
phases of the improvised race with which Raimond V. entertained his
friends.

The bulls were in hot pursuit of the recorder and his clerk, whom they
wished first to attack. The halberdiers and Little John had prudently
availed themselves of the protection of the wall.

Thanks to the trees planted in the court, the recorder and his clerk
were able for some time to escape the attacks of the bulls by running
from tree to tree.

But after awhile their strength was exhausted. Fear paralysed their
energies, and they were about to be trampled under foot by these
ferocious animals. Be it said to the praise of Raimond V. that,
notwithstanding the brutality of his savage pleasantry, he would have
been distressed beyond measure if a tragedy had ended this adventure.

Happily one of the halberdiers screamed:

“Master Isnard,--climb a tree,--quick, quick, before the bull gets
back.”

The corpulent recorder followed the halberdier’s counsel, and throwing
himself upon the trunk of a sycamore, he held on with knees, feet, and
hands, making unheard-of efforts in his clumsy ascent.

The baron and his guests, seeing that the man was no longer in real
danger, again began their jests and laughter. The clerk, more nimble
than the recorder, was now safely seated in the top of a sycamore.

“Master Bruin has come at last! Take care, beware!” cried Raimond,
laughing till the tears came in his eyes at the efforts of the recorder,
who was trying to straddle one of the largest branches of the tree he
had climbed with so much difficulty.

“If the recorder looks like an old bear climbing his pole,” said
another, “the clerk looks like an old, shivering monkey,--see his jaws
chatter.”

“Come, come, clerk, get to your task; where is your pen and your ink,
and your register? You are safe, now,--scribble your scrawl,” cried
the old lord of Signerol.

“Attention, attention, the tournament has begun!” cried one of the
guests. “It is Nicolin against a halberdier.”

“Largess, largess for Nicolin!”

Seeing the two men of the law safe from their horns, the bulls had
turned upon the halberdiers.

But one of the halberdiers, throwing himself against the wall, pricked
the animal so sharply in the nose and the shoulder, that the bull dared
not make another attack, and bounded off into the middle of the court.

Seeing the courage of the halberdier, the baron cried:

“Have no fear, my brave fellow, you shall have ten francs to drink his
health, and I will furnish the wine gratis.”

Then addressing the invisible Larmaée, the old gentleman ordered:
“Tell the shepherd to send his dogs, and drive these bulls back into
the stable. The dance of the recorder and the clerk has lasted long
enough.”

The baron had hardly finished speaking, when three shepherd dogs of
large size came out of a half-open door and ran straight after the
bulls. After a few flourishes, the animals ended the farce by galloping
into the stable, the magazine of arms and artillery of Maison-Forte, as
the treacherous sign-board had announced.

The recorder and his clerk, seeing themselves delivered from danger,
still did not dare descend from their impregnable position. In vain
Laramée, bearing two glasses of wine on a silver plate, came offering
the stirrup-cup from the baron, and telling them, what was true, that
the bridge had been replaced, and their horses and mules were waiting
for them outside.

“I go from here only that my clerk may draw up an official statement
of the grievous outrage by which the baron, your master, has rendered
himself amenable,” cried the recorder, almost breathless, wiping the
sweat from his brow, which literally ran with water, in spite of the
cold weather. “Perhaps you are reserving some other bad treatment for
us, but the governor, and if necessary the cardinal himself, will avenge
me, and on my oath, there shall not remain one stone on another of this
accursed house--may Satan confound it--”

Raimond V., holding in his hand a long hunting-whip, descended into
the court, gave the ten francs to the halberdier who had so bravely
combatted the bull, and went up to the tree from which the recorder was
fulminating his threats.

“What is that you say, you scoundrel?” said the baron, cracking his
whip.

“I say,” shouted the recorder, “I say that the marshal will not
leave this offence unpunished, and that on my arrival in Marseilles, I
will tell him all, I--”

“Eh, Manjour!” cried the baron, with another crack of the whip, “I
hope you will tell him all. I have received you in this way that you may
tell him, indeed, that he may learn in what light I hold his orders,”
 cried the old gentleman, unable to restrain his anger; “the Provençal
nobility has known how, in the last century, to drive from its province
the insolent Duke d’Epernon and his Gascons, as unworthy of governing
it, and shall we not drive away a Vitry, a wretched assassin, who acts
like an Italian bandit, who leaves our coasts without defence, who
obliges us to protect ourselves, and then comes to take away from us the
means of resisting the pirates! Get out of here, you rogue, and go to
draw up your scrawls elsewhere than in my house!”

“I will not get down!” cried the recorder.

“Do you want me to smoke you out of the tree like a badger in the
trunk of a willow?”

Believing Raimond V. capable of anything, Master Isnard slowly descended
the tree. His clerk, who had remained silent, imitated his example, and
reached the ground at the same time with his master.

“Stop!” said the baron, putting a few pieces of silver in the
scribe’s hand. “You can drink to the health of the king, our count.
All this is not your fault, clerk.” “I forbid you to accept one
coin!” cried the recorder. “You shall be obeyed, Master Isnard,”
 said the scribe. “These are two silver crowns, and not one coin,”
 and he pocketed the present.

“And I will add in my report, sir, that you tried to corrupt my
agents,” said the recorder.

“Out of here, out, out, you stinking beast!” cried the baron,
cracking his whip.

“You give people strange hospitality, Baron des Anbiez,” said the
recorder.

This reproach seemed to touch Raimond deeply; he said: “Manjour! all
the country knows that the lord and the peasant have found free refuge
and loyal hospitality in this house. But I am and will be without pity
for the petty tyrants of a tyrant cardinal. Out of here, I say, or I
will whip you like a bad dog!”

“It will sound well,” cried the recorder, purple with rage, and
walking backward toward the bridge, “It will sound well that you have
attempted the life of an officer of the king’s justice, and that you
have driven him away from your house with blows of the whip, instead
of allowing him to execute peaceably the orders of his Eminence, the
cardinal, and of the marshal.”

“Yes, yes, you can tell all that to your marshal, and you can add
that, if he comes here, although my beard is gray, I engage to prove to
him, sword in hand and dagger in fist, that he is nothing but a hired
assassin, and that his master, the cardinal,--God preserve the king from
him,--is only a sort of Christian pacha, a thousand times more a
despot than the Turk. You can tell him, too, to beware of pushing us to
extremes, because we can remember a noble prince, brother of a good
and noble king, blinded for the moment by this false priest, cousin of
Beelzebub. You can tell him, too, that the nobility of Provence, worn
out by so many outrages, would rather have for their sovereign Count
Gaston of Orleans, than the King of France, since at this time the King
of France is Richelieu.”

“Take care, baron,” whispered the lord of Signerol, “you are going
too far.”

“Eh, Manjour!” cried the impetuous baron, “my head can answer for
my words; but I have an arm, thank God, able to defend my head. Out of
here, you knave! Open your long ears well, and shut them well to keep
what you hear. As for our cannon and ammunition, you will see nothing of
them. We will renounce our arms when the dogs beg the wolves to cut off
their paws and pull out their teeth. Out of here, I say; and repeat my
words, and worse, too, if it seems good to you!”

The recorder, having reached the gate, rapidly crossed the bridge,
followed by his clerk and his guards, and as he mounted his horse,
hurled a thundering anathema at the house of the baron.

Raimond V., delighted with the success of his trick, entered with his
guests, and sat down to the table, as the hour of luncheon had just
arrived.

The end of the long day passed away in joy, in the midst of gay
conversation arising from this adventure.

From one of the windows of the castle, Honorât de Berrol had witnessed
this scene. Knowing the obstinacy of his future father-in-law, he had
not attempted remonstrance, but he could not repress his fear when he
thought of the imprudent words Raimond V. had uttered on the subject of
Gaston of Orleans.




CHAPTER XII. THE BOHEMIAN

Many days had elapsed since Master Isnard had been driven so
unceremoniously from Maison-Forte des Anbiez.

The conduct of the baron toward the deputy of the marshal, the Duke of
Vitry, had been generally approved by the nobility of the neighbourhood.

A very small number of gentlemen had submitted to the orders of the
governor.

Master Isnard, established in a hostelry of La Ciotat, had despatched a
messenger to Marseilles for the purpose of informing the marshal of the
lively resistance he had encountered upon the subject of the census of
arms.

The citizens generally ranged themselves on the side of the nobility and
the clergy, who defended Provençal rights and privileges.

The three estates--the holy clergy, the illustrious nobility, and the
Provençal republic and communities, as Cæsar de Nostradamus names them
in his history of Provence--sustained themselves against a common enemy,
which is to say, against any governor who attacked their privileges,
or, in the opinion of the Proven-çals, was unworthy of governing their
country.

Nevertheless, transient divisions occurred between the nobility and the
citizens when particular interests became involved.

Master Isnard had arrived in La Ciotat at a time when some feeling of
resentment against Raimond V. was being manifested.

One of the consuls of the town, Master Talebard-Talebardon, sustained in
the name of the citizens a lawsuit against the baron, upon the subject
of certain fishing-nets, which he claimed the lord of Anbiez had laid
without legal right in a bay outside his privilege, and thereby was
injuring the interests of the town.

Although the inhabitants of La Ciotat had, on many occasions, found aid
and support from the baron, although at the last descent of the pirates
he had, at the head of his own household servants, fought valiantly, and
almost saved the city, the gratitude of the citizens did not extend to
an absolute submission to the will of Raimond V.

The consul Talebard-Talebardon, a personal enemy of the baron, always
exaggerating the faults of this nobleman, had so envenomed the question,
that great disaffection was already being manifested among the citizens.

Arriving at this time, Master Isnard excited these dissensions, fanned
the fire, and spoke at length of his cruel reception at Maison-Forte.
Although he was not of the country, he succeeded in making the outrage
done him appear as a question between the nobility and the citizens.

The recorder induced the consuls to withdraw within the limits of their
dignity, and, instead of continuing the amicable negotiations already
initiated, to insist upon the baron’s appearance before the tribunal of
overseers.

This malevolent disposition once gaining ground, the malcontents did not
stop there. They forgot the real services that Raimond V. had rendered
to the city, his generous hospitality, the good that he was doing in the
neighbourhood, to remember that he was abusive, hotheaded, and always
ready to lift his rod.

They exaggerated the havoc made by his dogs in the chase; they spoke of
the brutal manner in which he had treated the citizens at the time
of their complaint concerning the fishing-nets; in short, after the
appearance of the recorder in La Ciotat, they began to speak of the
Baron des Anbiez as a veritable feudal tyrant.

While the storm was gathering on that side, the most perfect
tranquillity reigned in Maison-Forte.

Raimond V. drank and hunted in the finest style, going through his
domains almost every day, with an unequalled activity; he visited his
neighbours at their country-seats, in order to preserve, as he said, the
sacred fire, or, rather, the general opposition to the Marshal of
Vitry, demanding from each one his signature, appended to a supplication
addressed to the king.

In this manifesto, or public declaration, the Provençal nobility
formally demanded the recall of the marshal, reminding Louis XIII. that
his father, of glorious memory, the great Henri, had, under similar
circumstances, recalled the Duke d’Epernon, in order to redress the
just complaints of the country.

Finally, the nobility expressed, in this act, their respectful regrets
not to be able to submit to the orders of the cardinal, in renouncing
their right to arm their houses, inasmuch as their own safety required
that they should always be in a state of defence.

Redoubling his activity, the baron regained, as he said, the legs and
arms of twenty years, in this crusade against Marshal of Vitry.

Such was the moral aspect of Maison-Forte some days after the event of
which we have spoken.

We have not forgotten the Bohemian, who, arriving in the train of the
recorder, had, upon the baron’s invitation, scaled the balcony in so
agile and surprising a manner.

To make use of a particular and modern expression, the vagabond Bohemian
had become quite the fashion in the rustic and warlike habitation of
Raimond V.

In the first place, he had mended numerous household utensils with
remarkable skill.

Then Eclair, the favourite greyhound of the baron, put her paw out
of joint, whereupon the Bohemian went up on the mountain and gathered
certain herbs by the light of the moon, and carefully wrapped the sick
member in them, and the next day Eclair was able to stretch her legs on
the rosy heather of the baronial plains and valleys.

That was not all. Mistraon, the favourite horse of Raimond V., was
wounded in the frush of his foot by a sharp stone; by means of a thin
layer of iron deftly inserted in the slope of the shoe, the Bohemian
made a sort of Turkish horseshoe, which ever after preserved the invalid
foot of Mistraon from all injury.

The baron doted on the Bohemian. Dame Dulceline herself, notwithstanding
her holy horror of this unbeliever, who, never having been baptised,
could not bear the name of Christian, relented somewhat when the
unbeliever gave her marvellous recipes for colouring pieces of glass,
stuffing birds, and making excellent cordials.

The good Abbé Mascarolus was not less under the charm, thanks to some
pharmaceutic specifics of which the Bohemian had given him the secret.
The only regret of the worthy chaplain was to find the vagabond so
obstinate and shy upon the subject of his conversion.

Such was the serious side of the Bohemian’s qualifications. To that
he united the most versatile and agreeable accomplishments. He had in
a little cage two beautiful pigeons, which showed an almost superhuman
intelligence; his ass astonished the household of Maison-Forte by the
grace with which he walked on his hind legs; besides, the Bohemian
played with iron balls and daggers as well as the best juggler from
India; he was as good a marksman as the most accomplished carabineer;
and, finally, to conclude the enumeration of this vagabond’s wonderful
attractions, he sang charmingly, as he accompanied himself on a sort of
Moorish guitar with three strings.

It was doubtless to this talent that he owed the nickname of the
“Singer,” by which he was known among his comrades.

Stephanette was the first to inform her mistress of the new troubadour;
in fact, although he was rather ugly than handsome, the flexible and
expressive features of the Bohemian seemed almost charming when he sang
his soft and melancholy songs.

One must understand the calm, monotonous life of the inmates of
Maison-Forte, to comprehend the success of the Bohemian.

Reine, beset by the entreaties of Stephanette, finally consented to hear
him.

Honorât de Berrol, together with his betrothed, had made a visit to
Marseilles, without the knowledge of Raimond V., to learn the results of
the complaints entered by the recorder.

In case the baron had aught to fear from these complaints, Honorât
was immediately to inform Reine, and employ the influence of one of
her relatives, who was a friend of Marshal of Vitry, to subdue the
resentment raised by the imprudent conduct of the baron.

Reine hoped to find some distraction to her sad thoughts, by listening
to the songs of the Bohemian.

The image of the unknown hero haunted her more and more. The
fantastical, mysterious circumstances, which had so strangely excited
her memory, interested and frightened her at the same time; in the
meanwhile, desiring, or, rather, thinking to put an end to this romantic
adventure, she had, to the great joy of Honorât, fixed her marriage on
the day following the festivity of Christmas, and yet, the nearer the
day approached, the more she repented of her promise.

In the very depths of her heart she would ask herself with a vague fear
if she no longer loved her betrothed as in the past. But this question
remained unanswered; the young girl did not dare, so to speak, to listen
to the response made by her conscience.

Reine was seated in sad meditation in the little turret which served her
as a drawing-room, when Stephanette entered and said to her mistress:

“Mademoiselle, here is the Singer; he is in the passage, shall I ask
him to enter?”

“For what purpose?” said Reine, with indifference. “For what
purpose, mademoiselle? Why, to distract you from these witchcrafts
which torment you. What a pity this unbeliever is an unbeliever! Really,
mademoiselle, since he has left off his leather jerkin, and monseigneur
has made him a present of a scarlet doublet, he looks like a gendarme,
and more, too, he has a golden tongue, I answer for it. And I was
obliged, if you please, to give him the flame-coloured ribbon I always
wore around my head to fasten his collar, you see. Without that he would
not dare, so he said, to present himself before mademoiselle.”

“I see, my dear, that you have sacrificed yourself,” said Reine,
smiling in spite of herself. “I doubt if Luquin will congratulate
you very much on this disinterested devotion. But where is this brave
captain, and when will he return?”

“This evening or to-morrow morning, mademoiselle; the fishermen met
him near Trefus. He was obliged to lessen the speed of his tartan to
accommodate the large ships that he was escorting from Nice.”

“And do you think that he would like to have you give ribbons to this
strolling singer?”

“By Our Lady! whether he likes it or not does not matter to me. If it
is necessary to obtain some amusement for my dear mistress I would not
hesitate for a cheap piece of ribbon.”

“Ah, Stephanette, Stephanette! you are a real coquette. I have seen
the sharp black eyes of this vagabond looking into yours more than
once.”

“That shows, mademoiselle, that he approves of Lu-quin’s taste,
and my captain ought to feel flattered by it,” answered Stephanette,
smiling.

“You are wrong; you will make your betrothed angry,” replied Reine,
with a more serious expression.

“Ah, my dear mistress, cannot one love her betrothed faithfully and
tenderly, and amuse herself with the flatteries of a vagabond foreigner,
as you call him?”

Reine took this response, to which Stephanette had attached no
significance, as an allusion to her own thoughts.

She looked at her attendant sternly, and said, with an imperious air,
“Stephanette!”

The pretty, innocent face of the young girl suddenly assumed an
expression of such sadness as she raised her large eyes, in which a
tear glittered, full of a grieved surprise to her mistress, that Reine
extended her hand to her and said:

“Come, come, you are a foolish but a good and honest girl.”

Stephanette, smiling through her tears, kissed the hand of her mistress
with affectionate gratitude, and said, as she wiped her eyes with the
end of her slender fingers: “Shall I tell the Singer to come in,
mademoiselle?”

“Yes, go and tell him, since you wish it; let the sacrifice of your
flame-coloured ribbon do some good at least.”

Stephanette smiled with an mischievous air, went out, and returned
followed by the Bohemian.




CHAPTER XIII. THE GUZLÀ OF THE EMIR.

Notwithstanding the humility of his position, the Bohemian did not
appear to be much intimidated in the presence of Reine.

He saluted her with a sort of easy respect as he took a sharp and rapid
survey of the objects which surrounded her.

As Stephanette had remarked, the Singer’s exterior had greatly
improved; his slender and well-formed figure looked wonderfully well in
the scarlet doublet, the present from the baron; his collar was fastened
with the flame-coloured ribbon, a present from Stephanette; he wore wide
trousers of coarse white stuff; his dark blue gaiters, embroidered
with red wool, reached above his knees. His black hair enframed a thin,
sunburnt but intelligent face.

He held in his hand a kind of guitar with a neck of ebony expensively
inlaid with gold and mother-of-pearl; at its upper end the neck formed a
sort of palette, in the middle of which was a small, round plate chased
with gold, resembling the lid of a medallion.

We emphasise the costliness of this instrument because it seemed very
strange that a strolling Bohemian should be its possessor.

Stephanette herself was struck with it, and cried:

“Why, Singer, I never saw that beautiful guitar before!”

These words attracted the attention of Reine, and, as surprised as her
maid, she said to the Bohemian:

“Really, this is a very expensive instrument for a travelling
artisan.”

“I am poor, mademoiselle, sometimes I have wanted bread, but ah! I
would rather die of hunger than sell this guzla. My arms are weak, but
they would become as strong as brass to defend this guzla. They would
only take it from me after my death. It is my most precious treasure;
I hardly dare to play it. But the rose of Anbiez wishes to hear me; all
that I now desire is that my song may be worthy of the instrument and of
her who listens to me.”

The Bohemian spoke French quite purely, although he had something
guttural in his Arabian accent.

Reine exchanged a glance of surprise with her attendant, as she heard
this florid Oriental speech, which contrasted singularly with the
condition of the wanderer.

“But this guzla, as you call this instrument, how did you come to
possess it?”

The Bohemian shook his head sadly, and replied:

“That is a sad story, mademoiselle; there are more tears than smiles
in it.”

“Tell us,--tell us!” exclaimed Reine, deeply interested in the
romantic turn the incident had taken. “Relate to us how this guzla
came into your hands. You seem to be above your present condition.”

The Bohemian uttered a profound sigh, fixed a piercing look on Reine,
and struck a few chords which vibrated a long time under the arched roof
of the turret.

“But tell me the story of this guzla,” said Reine, with the
impatience of a young girl.

The wanderer, without replying, made a supplicating gesture. He began to
sing, accompanying himself with taste, or, rather, playing softly some
air of tender melancholy, while, with a sweet and grave tone, he recited
the following stanzas.

[Illustration: He began to sing ]

Although it lacked rhythm and rhyme, the language had a certain strange
charm; he rendered in a sort of recitative the words:

“Far is the country where I was born; the sands of the desert surround
it like an arid sea.

“I lived there with my mother: she was poor, she was old, she was
blind.

“I loved my mother, as the unhappy love those who love them.

“My mother was sad, sad, very sad, after she had lost her sight.

“I went into the valley to look for flowers.

“She tried to console herself for not seeing their smiling faces by
inhaling their perfume.

“The voice of a son is always sweet to the ear of a mother.

“I spoke to her; sometimes she smiled.

“But never to see! never to see! that filled her with sorrow.

“She sank by degrees into a mute despair.

“Before sinking into this despair, leaning on my arm, she went out;
she loved to go at set of sun and sit under the orange-trees in the
garden of the young and brave emir of our tribe.

“The gentle warmth of the sun revived my mother.

“She loved to listen to the murmur of the cascades, which seemed to
sing as they fell into the basin of marble.

“One day, when she lamented more bitterly than ever the loss of her
sight, she refused to go out.

“I prayed her; I wept; she was inflexible.

“Seated in the most solitary corner of our dwelling, her venerable head
wrapped in her black mantle, she remained motionless.

“She no longer desired to eat; she wished to die.

“For one long, for one long night, she refused everything.

“In vain I said: ‘My mother, my mother, like you also I shall die.’

“She remained silent and gloomy.

“I took her hand, her hand already frozen. I tried to warm it with my
breath: she wished to withdraw her hand.”

In saying these words, the voice of the Bohemian had such an expression
of sadness, and the sounds that he drew from his guzla were so
melancholy, that Reine and Stephanette silently exchanged glances
suffused with tears. The Bohemian continued without perceiving the
emotion he had excited:

“It was night.

“And yet a beautiful night Through the open window of our house one
saw the starlit sky; the moon covered the plain with silver; one heard
no noise.

“Yes, oh, yes! one heard the fevered breathing of my poor mother.

“Suddenly in the distance, far, very far, a light noise sounded.

“It was like the soft and gentle echo of a voice singing in the sky.

“Soon a gentle breeze, burdened with the perfume of the citron-tree,
wafted sounds more distinct.

“I was still holding the icy hand of my mother. I felt her tremble.

“This celestial voice approached--approached.

“The chords of a melodious instrument accompanied it, and gave it an
inexpressible charm.

“My mother started again; she raised her head; she listened. For the
first time in many hours she gave signs of life.

“As the enchanting sounds approached my mother seemed bom again.

“I felt her hand grow warm again; I felt her hand press mine.

“I heard her voice at last; her voice till then so mute.

“‘My child, these songs sink in my soul; they calm me! Tears, oh,
tears! Yes, tears at last! I had so much need to weep.’

“And I felt two burning tears fall on my brow.

“‘Oh, my mother, my mother!’ ‘Silence, my child, be silent!’
said she, putting one of her hands upon my mouth, and pointing to the
window with the other. ‘Listen to the voice! listen! there it is!
there it is!’”

Reine, deeply moved, pressed the hand of Stephanette as she shook her
head with a touching expression of pity.

The Bohemian continued:

“The moon of my country shines as the sun of this country.

“In its light slowly passed the young emir, mounted on Azib, his
beautiful white horse.

“Azib, gentle as a lamb, courageous as a lion, white as a swan.

“The emir let his reins fall on the neck of Azib. Happy, he sang of a
happy love, and accompanied himself on his guzla.

“His songs were not joyous: they were tender; they were melancholy.

“He passed, singing.

“‘Silence, child, silence!’ whispered my mother, pressing my hand
convulsively. ‘That voice divine does me so much good!’

“Hélas! by degrees the voice died away; the emir had passed; the
voice was gone; then one heard nothing more,--nothing more; not a sound.

“‘Ah, I fall back in the dreadful horror of my night,’ said my
mother. ‘This celestial music seemed to dissipate the darkness. Alas!
alas!’ and she wrung her hands in despair.

“Alas! all night she wept.

“The morrow her despair increased; her reason grew feeble. In her
delirium she called me a wicked son. She accused me of silencing this
voice. If she heard this voice no more, she must die.

“She was, indeed, going to die. For many hours she refused all
nourishment. What could I do? What could I do?

“The emir of our tribe was the most powerful of emirs.

“If he raised his djerid ten thousand cavaliers mounted horse.

“His palace was worthy of the sultan, his treasures immense. Alas! how
could I dare conceive the thought of saying to him, ‘Come, and by your
songs snatch an old and despairing woman from death?’

“And yet that I dared. My mother had perhaps but a few more hours to
live. I went to the palace.”

“And the emir?” cried Reine, deeply moved and interested, while
Stephanette, not less excited than her mistress, clasped her hands in
admiration.

The Bohemian gave the two young girls a glance of indescribable
sadness, and said, interrupting this kind of improvising, and laying his
instrument on his knees: “‘My mother was a woman,’ said the emir
to me, and he came.”

“He came!” exclaimed Reine, with enthusiasm. “Ah, the noble
heart!”

“Oh, yes, the most noble of noble hearts,” repeated the Bohemian,
with transport; “he deigned, he so grand, he so powerful, to come, for
five days, every evening into our poor dwelling. How shall I tell you
of his touching, almost filial kindness? Alas, if my mother had not been
stricken with a mortal disease, the songs of the emir would have saved
her, for the effect they produced on her was wonderful. But she died
at last without suffering, in a profound ecstasy. This guzla, it once
belonged to the emir; he gave it to me. Thanks to it the last moments of
my mother were peaceful,--poor mother!”

A tear glittered a moment in the black eye of the Bohemian; then, as
if he wished to drive away these painful memories, he took up his guzla
quickly and recited these other stanzas in a proud and excited voice, as
he made his sonorous instrument resound:

“The name of the emir is sacred in his tribe; let him but speak and we
will die.

“Not one is more brave; not one is more beautiful; not one is more
noble.

“He is hardly twenty years old, and his name is already the terror of
other tribes.

“His arm is delicate like that of a woman, but it is strong like that
of a warrior.

“His face is smiling, is beautiful like that of the spirit who appears
in the dreams of young girls; but it is sometimes terrible like that of
the god of battles.

“His voice charms and seduces like a magic philter, but sometimes it
bursts forth like a clarion.”

In his enthusiasm, the Bohemian approached Reine and said to her, as he
opened the medallion set into the neck of the guzla: “See! see if he
is not the most beautiful of mortals!”

The young girl looked at the portrait, and uttered a cry of surprise,
almost of terror. The portrait was that of the stranger in the rocks of
Ollioules, who had saved the life of her father!

At that moment the door of Reine’s drawing-room was opened, and she saw
before her Honorât de Berrol, followed by Captain Luquin Trinquetaille,
who had just arrived from Nice on the tartan, _The Holy Terror of the
Moors, by the Grace of God_.




CHAPTER XIV. JEALOUSY

When Honorât de Berrol entered Reine’s apartment, Stephanette wished
to retire so as to leave the two lovers alone.

She took one step toward the door, but Reine said to her, quickly, in a
voice full of emotion, “Remain.”

Then, scarcely able to control her feelings, she bowed her head and hid
her face in her hands.

Honorât, astonished beyond expression, did not know what to think.

The Bohemian had closed the medallion containing the portrait of Erebus,
and had placed it on the table.

The captain of the _Holy Terror to the Moors_ vainly tried to catch
Stephanette’s eye, but she seemed as anxious to avoid his glance.

Luquin Trinquetaille was the more sensible of her conduct inasmuch as he
recognised on the Bohemian’s collar the flame-coloured ribbon, which
was the exact counterpart of what Stephanette wore on her waist.

This observation on his part, together with several perfidious
insinuations made by Master Laramée, who had just been taking a glass
with Luquin, suddenly aroused the lover’s jealousy.

He looked at the Singer angrily, then, meeting Ste-phanette’s eyes
by chance, he executed a most complicated pantomime with his left hand,
which was meant to ask the young girl why the Singer had a ribbon like
the one hanging from her ruff.

As this pantomimic performance made it necessary for the worthy captain
to put his hand to his collar quite often, Stephanette whispered to him,
with the most innocent tone in the world, “Are you suffering from a
sore throat, M. Luquin?”

These words of the mischievous girl, while they excited the captain’s
anger, seemed also to arouse Honorât from the astonishment produced by
the strange reception of his betrothed.

He approached her, and said: “I am just from Marseilles, Reine, and
I must speak to you on some very serious things concerning your father.
Trinquetaille comes from La Ciotat and tells me that the affair of the
fishery is threatening; the citizens seem to be irritated. In order to
talk of all this we must be alone.”

At these words Reine raised her face bathed with tears, and with a sign
ordered Stephanette to go out The girl obeyed, casting a sad look at her
mistress.

Trinquetaille followed his betrothed with a very ungracious air, and the
Bohemian accompanied them.

“Reine, in the name of Heaven, what is the matter with you?” cried
Honorât, as soon as he was alone with Mlle, des Anbiez.

“Nothing,--nothing is the matter with me, my friend.”

“But you are weeping, your face is all tear-stained. What has
happened, pray?”

“Nothing, I tell you,--mere childishness. The Bohemian sang a romance
of his country for us; it was pathetic, and I allowed myself to be
affected by it. But do not let us talk of this nonsense; let us talk
of father. Is there any danger? Has his angry treatment of the recorder
irritated the marshal? And what does Luquin say about the fishery?
Honorât! Honorât! do answer me!”

“Listen to me, Reine; although those matters have assumed a grave, if
not a dangerous aspect, let me first speak of what is above everything
else,--my love for you.”

“Oh, Honorât! Honorât! what of my father?”

“Be calm, there is no immediate danger threatening the baron. The
marshal has despatched two of his men to make inquiries about the
facts.”

“But what does Luquin say about the fishery?”

“He comes to tell you that the consuls have returned the question with
your father on the right of fishery to the overseers; so you see, Reine,
that this news, although serious, has nothing threatening or alarming in
it, and--”

“How do you think the marshal will consider my father’s conduct?”
 said Reine, hurriedly, again interrupting Honorât.

Her lover looked at her with as much surprise as sorrow.

“My God, Reine, what does that signify? Are we not to be united in
a few days? at Christmas? Is it tiresome to you to hear me speak of my
love for you?”

Reine uttered a sigh, and looked down without replying.

“Listen, Reine,” cried Honorât, with bitterness; “for a month
now, there is something in you which is inexplicable; you are no longer
the same, you are distracted, preoccupied, taciturn; when I speak to you
of our approaching marriage, of our plans, of our future, you answer
me with constraint. Again I say, this is not natural. What have you to
reproach me for?”

“Nothing--oh, nothing, nothing, Honorât, you are the best, the
noblest of men!”

“But, indeed, only eight days ago, you yourself formally announced
to your father your desire that our marriage should take place at
Christmas, even if circumstances should prevent the attendance of your
uncles, the commander and Father Elzear!”

“That is true.”

“Well, then, have you changed your mind? Do you wish to postpone it?
You do not answer me. My God! what does that mean? Reine, Reine! Ah, I
am unhappy indeed!”

“My friend, do not despond so; have pity on me. Wait, I am foolish.
I am unworthy of your affection. I annoy you,--you are so good, so
noble!”

“But tell me what is the matter with you? What do you wish?”

“I do not know. I suffer--I--Wait, I tell you. I am foolish and
weak and very miserable, believe me.” She hid her face in her
hands. Honorât, at the height of astonishment, looked at her with an
expression of distress.

“Ah,” cried he, “if I were less acquainted with the purity of your
heart, if evidence even did not prevent the least suspicion, I would
believe that a rival had supplanted me in your affection. But no, no,
if that were true, I know your sincerity,--you would confess it to me
without a blush, because you are incapable of making an unworthy
choice. But then, what is it? A month ago, you loved me so much, so you
said,--what have I done in one month to deserve such punishment from
you? Ah, it is enough to make one insane!”

And Honorât de Berrol, a prey to violent grief, plunged almost into
despair, walked up and down the room in silence.

Reine, overwhelmed, did not dare utter a word. She was almost on the
point of confessing all to Honorât, but shame restrained her, and
besides, she could not distinctly understand her own impressions.

The recital by the Bohemian, the wonderful accident which had just
placed the portrait of the unknown before her eyes, increased the
curiosity and romantic interest that she felt concerning the stranger,
in spite of herself.

But was this sentiment love? Again, who was this man? The Bohemian
called him the emir of his tribe, but at Marseilles, he and his two
companions had passed for Muscovites; how could the truth be unveiled
among so many mysteries? And then, would she ever see him again? Was it
not idolatry? Was the pathetic incident related by the Bohemian true?

Lost in this chaos of confused thoughts, Reine could not find one word
to reply to Honorât.

What good could be accomplished by confessing this inexplicable secret?
If she had felt her affection for her betrothed diminish or change, with
her usual fidelity she would not have hesitated to have told him, but
she felt for him the same calm, gentle tenderness, the same confidence,
the same timid veneration.

If sometimes when he was leaving Maison-Forte, Honorât, encouraged by
Raimond V., would press his lips upon the young girl’s brow, she would
smile without giving the slightest evidence of annoyance.

Nothing in her manner betrayed a change in her attachment to Honorât,
and yet she saw the day of her marriage approach with distrust and even
distress.

Doubtless this want of confidence in Honorât was censurable, but
she divined with true feminine instinct the danger and uselessness of
telling her betrothed the strange restlessness of her heart.

Honorât appeared to be deeply grieved. Reine reproached herself for not
being able to utter a word to cheer him. Once she was about to obey
the inspiration of her compassion for him and tell him all in perfect
confidence, but his irritated manner arrested the words on her lips.

In his vain effort to discover the cause of the coldness and capricious
conduct of Reine, and suddenly struck by some vague memories, as he
recalled that, for a month past, the Seigneur de Signerol had been
visiting Maison-Forte more frequently than was his habit, Honorât
foolishly suspected this man to be the object of Reine’s preference.

This idea was all the more absurd, as the young girl, in talking with
her betrothed the day of the recorder’s adventure, had blamed the
Seigneur de Signerol in almost contemptuous terms, accusing him
of exciting the impetuous temper of her father. As for Seigneur de
Signerol, he had never had a conversation with Mile, des Anbiez.

Honorât, however, in his state of irritation and distress, welcomed any
suspicion which seemed to explain the strange attitude of Reine.

Once admitting this suspicion into his heart, he then became indignant
at the contemptuous manner in which she had spoken of this man, seeing
in her language nothing but the most perfidious dissimulation.

Then, Reine was doubly culpable in his eyes. Why did she not frankly
reject his hand, instead of keeping him in doubtful hope? Accepting this
false theory, Honorât de Berrol found only too many reasons to induce
him to ponder the caprices which he had observed in the conduct of Reine
for some time. He even went so far as to imagine that the Bohemian was
an emissary of M. de Signerol.

The recent agitation of his betrothed at the time he entered her
drawing-room confirmed him in this absurd opinion. Not being able to
hide this impression, he said to her, suddenly:

“Confess, mademoiselle, that it is at least rather strange that you
should receive a vagabond Bohemian in your apartment; it seems to
me that if he had only come to sing, you would not have been so
embarrassed, so excited when I entered here.”

Honorât, in his anger, made this remark at random, and as soon as the
words were uttered, felt ashamed of them. But what was his astonishment,
his vexation, his distress, to see Reine blush and cast down her eyes
without saying a word.

She was thinking of the portrait of the unknown hero, and the adventure
connected with him; she was ignorant of Honorât’s allusion.

The embarrassment of the young girl confirmed the chevalier in his
suspicions, and he exclaimed, with bitterness:

“Ah, Reine, never could I have believed you capable of forgetting
yourself so far as to compromise your dearest interests by trusting them
to such a contemptible creature!”

“What do you mean, Honorât? I do not understand you. This is the
first time I have ever heard you utter such words.”

“It is the first time that I have had the assurance that I was your
plaything!” cried he, unable to restrain his anger.

“Really, you do not mean what you say!”

“I mean, yes, I mean that now I can explain your hesitation, your
constraint, your embarrassment; but what I cannot explain, is that you
could have the cruelty to play this disgraceful rôle toward a man who
has devoted his entire life to you.”

“Why, Honorât, you are losing your senses! I do not deserve your
reproaches.”

“One of two things: either a month ago you thought of our marriage, or
you think no longer of it. If you think no longer of it, you have played
with the love of an honest man; if you still intend to fulfil it,
in spite of the love which you have now in your heart, why, it is
detestable!”

Although Honorat’s suspicions were absurd, Reine, struck by these words,
which offered some solution to the situation, kept silent.

Honorât interpreted this silence as a confession of her duplicity.

“You answer nothing,--you cannot answer! I was not mistaken then! This
Bohemian is the secret emissary of M. de Signerol.”

“Of M. de Signerol!” exclaimed Reine. “But you cannot think it
I have never addressed a word to that man except in the presence of my
father. Besides, you know very well the opinion that I have expressed
of him.” “The better to dissimulate this beautiful preference, no
doubt.”

“M. de Signerol! M. de Signerol! indeed, you are silly!”

“Let us discontinue this comedy, mademoiselle. My eyes have not left
you for a moment I observed your embarrassment, your blushes even, when
I spoke of the Bohemian to you. Let us discontinue this comedy, I tell
you!”

Either pride, distress, or vexation that she could not explain the cause
of her embarrassment, or the pain that she felt at the bitter words of
Honorât, incited Reine to hold up her head with dignity and say to
her betrothed: “You are right, Honorât, let us discontinue such a
discussion; it is little worthy of you or of me. Since you judge me
so unjustly, since upon the most foolish suspicions you base the most
dishonouring accusation, I give your promise back to you, and take back
mine.” “Ah! that was your intention, no doubt, mademoiselle. All
this has been necessary to force me to give you back your freedom. Ah,
well, let it be so! Let all the plans of happiness upon which I have
staked my whole life be forgotten; let the dearest wishes of your father
and your family be trampled under foot! You have enough influence over
the baron to make him yield to your designs. I assure you I will not in
any way oppose them.”

At this moment, they heard the spurred heels of Raimond V., who
precipitately entered, holding a paper in his hand.




CHAPTER XV. THE SUMMONS

Raimond V. was far too angry to notice the expression of sadness and
grief that was depicted on the countenances of the two betrothed.
Addressing Honorât, he said, in a loud voice:

“Manjour! do you know, forsooth, what Trinquetaille has just informed
me? Would you believe, my son, that the citizens of La Ciotat, those
vile swine that have fattened on my bounty and that I have saved from
the teeth of Barbary dogs, wish to summon me, to-morrow morning, before
the overseers of the port, on the matter of our fishery contest! And the

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