Chapter VI: Part 6

He had been averse to coming with Bois-Doré, knowing that he would be made to dine in the servants' quarters and would not see Lauriane before noon.

Lauriane, as well as her father, was acquainted with the tragic story of Bruno's disciple, and, following Bois-Doré's example, they ostentatiously treated him at La Motte-Seuilly as a musician simply, fearing to compromise him, although they really entertained for him the high esteem that he deserved.

Lucilio was the only one who had not thought of making a toilet for the occasion. He had no hope of attracting attention; indeed, he had no desire to draw any eye upon himself, knowing that the mysterious intercourse of minds was the most to which he could aspire.

So he approached the yew without useless timidity or pretended caution; and, relying upon the beauty and sincerity of what he had to say in music, he began to play, to the great displeasure and vexation of D'Alvimar.

Lauriane, too, was annoyed for a moment by the interruption, but she reproached herself when she read on the bagpiper's beautiful face an ingenuous purpose to gratify her.

"I do not know why it is," she thought, "that there seems to be on that face a sort of radiance of genuine affection and of a healthy conscience, which I do not find on the _other's_ face."

And she glanced once more at D'Alvimar, now thoroughly irritated, morose and overbearing, and felt something like a shiver of fear--perhaps of him, perhaps of herself.

Again, whether because she was very sensitive to music, or because her emotions were keyed up to a high pitch, she fancied that she could hear in her brain the words of the beautiful airs Lucilio was playing to her, and those imaginary words were:

"See the bright sun shining in the clear sky, and the swift streams receiving its rays on their changing surfaces!

"See the beautiful trees bent in black arches against the pale golden background of the meadows, and the meadows themselves, as cheery and bright as in the springtime, under the embroidery of the pink flowers of autumn; and the graceful swan, that seems to paddle rhythmically at your feet; and the migratory birds flying across yonder multicolored clouds.

"All these are the music that I sing to thee: youth, purity, faith, love and happiness.

"Listen not to the strange voice which thou dost not understand. It is soft but deceptive. It would extinguish the sun over your head; it would dry up the water under your feet; it would wither the flowers in the fields and shatter the wings of the birds among the clouds; it would cause cold, fear and death to descend upon thee, and would exhaust forever the source of the divine harmonies I sing to thee."

Lauriane no longer saw D'Alvimar. Lost in a delicious reverie, she did not see Lucilio. She was transported into the past, and, thinking of Charlotte d'Albret, she said to herself:

"No, no, I will never listen to the voice of the demon!--My friend," she said aloud, rising, when the musician stopped, "you have done me an immense amount of good, and I thank you. I have nothing to give you which can pay for the noble thoughts which you are able to suggest to us; that is why I beg you to accept these fragrant violets, which are the emblem of your modesty."

She had refused to give D'Alvimar the violets, and she ostentatiously gave them to the poor musician, before his face.

D'Alvimar smiled triumphantly, thinking that she meant to incite him by a challenge more stimulating than an avowal. But such was not Lauriane's thought, for, making a pretence of fastening the flowers in Lucilio's hat, she said to him under her breath:

"Master Giovellino, I ask you to be a father to me, and not to stir from my side until I tell you to."

Thanks to his keen Italian penetration, Lucilio grasped her meaning.

"Yes, yes, I understand, rely on me!" his expressive eyes replied.

And he seated himself on the huge roots of the yew, at a respectful distance, like a servant awaiting such orders as may be given him, but near enough to make it impossible for D'Alvimar to say a word which he did not hear.

D'Alvimar divined the whole plan. She was afraid of him; that was still better! He held the bagpiper in such utter contempt that he began anew to pay court to his hostess before him as if he were a log of wood.

But his dangerous magnetism lost all its virtue.

It seemed to Lauriane that the presence of a calm, virtuous man like Lucilio was an antidote. She would have blushed to display any vanity before him. She felt that his eyes were upon her, and that feeling was a protection. She saw that the Spaniard was piqued, and was gradually growing angry. She tried her strength by resisting him.

He wanted her to dismiss that interloper, and he told her so, designedly, in a tone loud enough to be overheard by him.

Lauriane flatly refused, saying that she desired more music.

Lucilio at once began to inflate his bagpipe.

D'Alvimar put his hand to his breast, drew a very sharp Spanish knife, and, having removed it from its sheath, began to play with it as if to keep himself in countenance; sometimes pretending to write with the point on the old yew, sometimes to hurl it at something as if to show his dexterity.

Lauriane did not understand his threat.

Lucilio was impassive, and yet he was too much of an Italian not to be familiar with the cold-blooded anger of a Spaniard, and with the possible destination of a stiletto apparently thrown at random.

Under any other circumstances he would have been anxious concerning his instrument, which D'Alvimar's eye seemed to be watching, as if for a chance to pierce it. But he was complying with Lauriane's wish; he was fighting in behalf of innocence, as Orpheus fought for love with his triumphant lyre; and he courageously attacked one of the Moorish airs which he had heard and written down the day before.

D'Alvimar felt that he was defied, and the fire of wrath that was smouldering within him began to burn him.

Being as dexterous as a Chinaman in throwing the knife, he determined to frighten the impertinent minstrel, and began to make the gleaming blade fly all around him, drawing nearer and nearer as he proceeded with his soft and plaintive song. Lauriane had walked away a few steps, and at that moment her back was turned to that horrible scene.

"I have defied tortures and death," said Giovellino to himself. "I will defy them again, and this Spaniard shall not have the pleasure of seeing me turn pale."

He turned his eyes in another direction and played as carefully and accurately as if he were at Bois-Doré's table.

Meanwhile D'Alvimar, moving hither and thither, amused himself by standing in front of him and aiming at him, as if he were tempted to take him for a target; and by virtue of one of those inexplicable fascinations which are as it were the punishment of cruel jests, he began really to feel that horrible temptation.

The cold perspiration stood out on his body and a film passed over his eyes.

Lucilio felt it rather than saw it; but he chose to risk everything rather than show a moment's fear in the face of the enemy of his native land, who likewise cast contempt upon his manly dignity.

XX

While this terrible game was in progress, a strange spectator was looking on within two steps of the heedless Lauriane; it was the young wolf brought up in the kennels, who had adopted the habits and manners of a dog, but not his instincts and nature. He fawned upon everybody but was attached to nobody.

Lying at Lucilio's feet, he had watched the Spaniard's cruel game with evident uneasiness, and, the dagger having fallen close beside him several times, he had risen and sought shelter behind the tree, thinking of nothing but his own safety.

However, as the game continued, the animal, who was just beginning to feel his teeth, showed them several times in silence, and, considering that he was attacked, felt for the first time in his life the instinct of hatred of man.

With his eye on fire, muscles tense, hair erect and quivering, he was concealed from D'Alvimar by the colossal trunk of the yew, where he watched for a favorable moment, and suddenly sprang out and tried to seize him by the throat.

He would have wounded him at least, if he had not strangled him, had he not been thrown back by a vigorous kick from Lucilio, which sent him rolling over and over along the ground.

The sudden interruption of the music, and the plaintive sound made by the bagpipe as the artist dropped it, caused Lauriane to turn hastily. Entirely ignorant of what was taking place, she ran up in time to see D'Alvimar, frantic with rage, disemboweling the beast with his knife.

He performed that act of reprisal with all the heat of revenge. It was easy to read on his pale face and in his bloodshot eye the profound and incomprehensible joy that he felt in having something to murder.

Thrice he buried the blade in the throbbing entrails, and at the sight of blood his lips contracted with an expression of voluptuous pleasure, while Lauriane, trembling from head to foot, pressed Lucilio's arms with both hands, saying in a low voice:

"Look! look! Cæsar Borgia! it is he in person!"

Lucilio, who had often seen at Rome the portrait painted by Raphael, was even better able to appreciate the resemblance, and nodded his head to indicate that he was deeply impressed by it.

"How now, monsieur?" said the young woman, deeply moved, to the triumphant Spaniard; "do you think that you are in the heart of the forest, and do you expect to make yourself agreeable to me by presenting me with the head or the claws of a creature that I have fed with my own hands, and that I was caressing before you a moment ago? For shame! you are not civil; and with that bloody knife in your hand, you look more like a butcher than a gentleman!"

Lauriane was angry; she had no other feeling now for the stranger than one of aversion.

He, as if emerging from a dream, apologized, saying that the wolf had tried to devour him; that such creatures were bad company in a house, and that he was very glad to have rescued _madame_ from an accident which might as well have happened to her as to him.

"Do you mean that he attacked you?" she said, and glanced at Lucilio, who nodded assent.--"Did he bite you?" she added; "where is the wound?"

And as D'Alvimar had not even a scratch, she was indignant that he had manifested fear of a beast that was so young and so far from dangerous.

"The word fear is not very fair to me," he replied in a sort of frenzy; "I did not suppose that it could be thrown at one who still holds the instrument of death in his hands."

"How proud you are of having killed that young wolf! A child could have done it, and it would have been pardonable in a child, but not in a man, who could easily have got rid of him with a blow of a whip. I tell you, messire, you were terribly frightened, and fright is the disease of those who love to shed blood."

"I see," said the Spaniard, suddenly downcast, "that I am in disgrace with you, and I recognize in this, as in everything else, the effect of my ill luck. It is so persistent that there have been many times when I have thought of yielding to it as victor in a battle in which I find naught save discomfort and discomfiture."

There was much truth in what D'Alvimar had said; and as, after he had instinctively wiped his dagger, he seemed to hesitate to replace it in its sheath, Lauriane, impressed by the sinister gleam in his eye, concluded that he was a little mad, as the result of some great misfortune, and inclined to take his own life.

"If I am to forgive you," she said, "I demand that you hand me the weapon of which you have just made such an unworthy use. I do not like that treacherous blade, which French gentlemen no longer carry, except when hunting. The sword is enough for a true knight, and one should take time for reflection before unsheathing it in a lady's presence. I should always be afraid of a man who conceals about his person a weapon so easy to handle and so prompt to kill; and as this one does not seem to be of great value, I ask you to sacrifice it to me, by way of reparation for the pain you have caused me."

D'Alvimar thought that in thus disarming him she intended to caress him. Nevertheless, it cost him a pang to part with so trusty a weapon, and he hesitated.

"I see," said Lauriane, "that it is a gift from some fair dame whom you are not at liberty to disobey."

"If you have any such thought as that," he retorted, "I will very quickly disabuse you of it."

And, kneeling on one knee, he handed her the poniard.

"It is well," she said, withdrawing her hand, which he tried to kiss. "I forgive you, as a guest whom I do not desire to humiliate; but that is all, I assure you; and as for this wretched blade, if I keep it, I do so not for love of you, but to prevent the evil that it might do."

They were then at the foot of the donjon, where they met the marquis and Monsieur de Beuvre, engaged in earnest conversation.

Lauriane was about to tell them what had happened, but her father did not give her time.

"Look you, my dearest daughter," he said, taking her hand and putting it through the marquis's arm; "our friend wishes to tell you a secret, and while he is telling it, I will do my best to entertain Monsieur de Villareal. You see," he added, addressing Monsieur de Bois-Doré, "I entrust my lamb to you without fear of your sharp teeth, and I say nothing to her to lower you in her estimation! Speak to her therefore as you choose. If you are burned, I wash my hands of it, it will be of your own seeking."

"I see," said Madame de Beuvre to the marquis, "that you have some request to make."

And as she supposed that it referred, as usual, to some hunting party on his estates, she added that, whatever it might be, she granted it beforehand.

"Beware, my child!" laughed Monsieur de Beuvre; "you don't know what you are pledging yourself to!"

"You do not frighten me," she replied; "he can speak quickly."

"Indeed! you think so! but you are sadly mistaken," rejoined Monsieur de Beuvre. "I will wager that his compliments will last more than an hour. So go, both of you, to some room where you will not be disturbed, and when you have said all you have to say, you can join us again."

The marquis was not disconcerted by this jesting. He had not reached the resolution to prefer his request without stifling some vivid apprehensions touching the marriage state, into which he had delayed entering for about forty years.

If he had decided at last, it was because he wished to make someone else rich and happy, and, having once adopted that idea, he considered it his duty not to allow himself to be turned aside from it.

No sooner had they reached the salon, therefore, than he offered his heart, his name and his fortune, after the style in vogue in _Astrée_, with the unbridled passion which knows nothing milder than horrible torments, sighs that rend the heart, terrors that cause a thousand deaths, hopes that take away the reason, etc.; and all this with such chaste and cold propriety that the most timid virtue could not take alarm.

When Lauriane realized that he was talking about marriage, she was as surprised as her father.

She knew that the marquis was capable of anything, and instead of laughing at him she felt sorry for him. She had a warm friendship for him, and respect for his goodness of heart and loyalty. She felt that the poor old man would lay himself open to interminable taunts, if she should set the example, and that the friendly and kindly raillery of which he had hitherto been the object, would become stinging and cruel.

"No," thought the judicious child, "it shall not be so, I will not suffer my old friend to be the laughing-stock of his servants.--My dear marquis," she said, exerting herself to speak after his style, "I have often reflected upon the possibility and the suitability of the plan which you propose to me. I had divined your noble and virtuous flame, and, if I have not reciprocated it, it is only because I am still so young that mischievous Cupid has paid no attention to me as yet. Allow me therefore to frolic yet a little while in the enchanted isle of Ignorance of Love; I can be in no haste to come forth, since I am happy in your friendship. Of all the men whom I know, you are the best and most lovable, and, when my heart speaks, it may well be that it will speak to me of you. But that is written in the book of destinies, and you must e'en give me time to question mine. If, by some fatality, it should be my destiny to be ungrateful to you, I would confess it honestly and sorrowfully, for it would be my loss and my shame; but your heart is so great and so kind that you would still be my brother and my friend despite my folly."

"That would I, I swear it!" cried Bois-Doré with ingenuous warmth.

"Very well, my loyal friend," continued Lauriane, "let us wait awhile. I ask you for a seven years' trial as the ancient custom is among knights without reproach; and do me the favor to allow this agreement to remain a secret between us two. Seven years hence, if my heart has remained insensible to love, you will renounce me; and in like manner, if I share your passion, I will tell you so without mystery. I swear to you likewise, that if, before the expiration of our agreement, I am moved, despite myself, by another's attentions, I will humbly and frankly make confession to you thereof. Of that there seems but little likelihood; yet do I seek to provide for everything, so earnestly do I desire to preserve at least your friendship, if I lose your love."

"I submit to all your conditions," replied the marquis, "and I pledge to you, adorable Lauriane, the faith of a gentleman and the fidelity of a perfect lover."

"I rely thereupon," she said, offering him her hand; "I know that you are a man of heart and an incomparable lover. And now, let us return to my father, and let me tell him of that which is agreed between us, so that our secret may be shared by him alone."

"I agree," said the marquis; "but shall we not exchange pledges?"

"What shall they be? I am willing; but let it not be a ring. Remember that, being a widow, I can wear no other ring than the gift of a second husband."

"Permit me to send you to-morrow a present worthy of you."

"No, no! that would mean admitting others to our confidence. Give me any trinket that you have about you. See, that little box of ivory and enamel that you have in your hand!"

"'Tis well! but what will you give me? I see you have the right understanding of this exchange. It must be something that we have upon us when we exchange promises."

Lauriane looked in her pockets and found there only her gloves, her handkerchief, her purse and Monsieur Sciarra's dagger. The purse came to her from her another: she gave him the dagger.

"Hide it carefully," she said, "and, so long as I allow you to keep it, hope. In like manner, if I come and ask you for it----"

"I will pierce my bosom with it!" cried the old Celadon.

"No! that is something that you will not do," said Lauriane, with the utmost seriousness, "for I should die of grief; and, moreover, you would break the promise you have given me to remain my friend whatever happens."

"That is true," said Bois-Doré, kneeling to receive the pledge. "I swear to you that I will not die, even as I swear that I will neither love nor glance at any other fair, so long as you shall not have torn from my heart the hope of winning yours."

XXI

They returned to the garden, where Monsieur de Beuvre greeted them with a bantering air. The grave and tranquil demeanor of Lauriane, the radiant and tender expression which the marquis could not dissemble, surprised him so that he could not refrain from questioning them, covertly though transparently, in D'Alvimar's presence.

But Lauriane replied that she and the marquis were in perfect accord, and D'Alvimar, unwilling to believe his ears, took that assertion for a bit of coquetry aimed at him.

Thereupon Monsieur de Beuvre's anxiety became very keen, and, leading his daughter aside, he asked her if she were speaking seriously, and if she were insane enough or ambitious enough to accept a spark born in the reign of Henri II.

Lauriane told him how she had postponed her reply and any definitive agreement for seven years.

After laughing as if he would burst, De Beuvre, when Lauriane urged him to keep her secret, had some difficulty in understanding his daughter's kindly delicacy.

He would have enjoyed making merry over the marquis's discomfiture, and he considered that to have laughed in his face would have been an excellent way to teach him a lesson.

"No, father," replied Lauriane; "on the contrary, it would have grieved him terribly, and nothing more. He is too old to correct his foibles, and I cannot see what we should gain by insulting so excellent a man, when it is easy for us to lull him to sleep in his reveries. Believe me, if coquetry is ever innocent in a woman, it is innocent when practised upon old men; indeed, it is often an act of kindness to allow them to enjoy their fantasy. Be assured that, if I should ever tell him that I am in love with some other man, he would be well pleased; whereas, if I had told him that I could never love him, he would very probably be ill at this moment, not so much because of my cruelty as of the cruelty of his old age, which I should have placed squarely before him without consideration or compassion."

Lauriane had some influence over her father. She procured his promise that he would abstain from teasing the marquis about his love-affair with her, and D'Alvimar, with all his penetration, suspected nothing of what had taken place between them.

It was really a kind action that Lauriane had performed; and, as there is an open account between us and Providence, she was rewarded for it at once by that invisible assistance which is the recompense, often immediate, of every generous impulse of our hearts.

Lauriane was a good deal of a child, but there was the making of a strong woman in her; and, even if she was capable, like every daughter of Eve, of yielding momentarily to a dangerous fascination, she was also capable of recovering herself and of finding a firm support in her conscience.

She passed the rest of the day, therefore, untouched by D'Alvimar's gallant hints; and it seemed to her that, by giving her dagger to the marquis as the pledge of a generous affection, she had rid herself of something that had disturbed her and burned her hands. She took pains not to be left alone with the Spaniard, and not to encourage any of the efforts he made to lead the conversation back to the delicate commonplaces of love.

Moreover, all private conversation was interrupted and the attention of the whole party diverted by a strange incident.

A young gypsy appeared and requested permission to entertain the illustrious company by his accomplishments; I believe that the rascal said "his genius."

He had no sooner made his appearance than D'Alvimar recognized the young vagabond who had served as interpreter between Monsieur D'Ars and the Moorish woman on the moor of Champillé, and who had declared that he was French by birth and that his name was La Flèche.

He was a young man of some twenty years, with a handsome face, although it already showed the ravages of debauchery. His eye was keen and insolent; his lips flat and treacherous; his speech conceited, impudent and satirical; he was short of stature, but well-formed, as active with his body as a pantomimist, and with his hands as a thief; intelligent in everything that is serviceable in evil-doing; stupid in respect to any useful work or any sound reasoning.

Like all of his profession, he possessed a few rags in addition to what he wore, and these he used as a costume in which to perform his tricks.

He made his appearance dressed in a sort of Genoese cloak lined with red; on his head one of those hats bristling with cocks' feathers, hats without name or shape or excuse for being; pretentious yet despairing ruins, whose gorgeous improbability Callot has immortalized in his Italian grotesques.

Short, slashed boots, one much too large, the other much too small for his foot, disclosed stockings once red, now faded to the hue of wine lees. An enormous scapulary covered the miscreant's breast, a safeguard against the charge of paganism and sorcery that was constantly hanging over his head. Lustreless light hair, of absurd length, fell over his lean face, aflame with red ochre, and an incipient moustache joined two patches of downy white hair planted under his smooth and glistening chin.

He began in a voice like a cracked trumpet:

"I beg this illustrious company to deign to excuse the assurance with which I venture to throw myself at the feet of its indulgence. In truth, does it befit a varlet of my sort, with his bristling face, his scarred doublet and hat, which have long been candidates for the post of scarecrow, to appear before a lady whose eyes put the sunlight to shame, and to utter a multiplicity of foolish things? She will tell me perhaps, that I must take heart, that I am not a peasant pack-saddler, nor a miserable spy, nor a servant to be beaten from morning till night, for it is said of servants that they are like walnut-trees, the more they are beaten the more they bear. She will tell me too that I am neither a sharper, nor a pickpocket, nor a coxcomb, nor a bully, nor an arrogant cur, nor a puppy, nor a giant-killer, nor a barbarian, nor a snail; that I am not an evil-looking fellow, despite a slightly vulgar countenance; but in the face of such qualities as those of the lady I see before me--it doesn't cripple a goddess to look at her,--and before an assemblage of noble lords who resemble a party of monarchs more than a cartload of calves at market, the bravest man in the world loses his bearings and becomes simply a gutter of ignorance, a sewer of stupidities, and the cesspool of all sorts of impudence."

Master La Flèche might have chattered on for two hours in this strain, with intolerable volubility, had they not interrupted him to ask him what he could do.

"Everything!" cried the good-for-naught. "I can dance on my feet, on my hands, on my head and on my back; on a rope, on a broomstick, on the point of a steeple or on the point of a lance; on eggs, on bottles, on a galloping horse, on a hoop, on a cask, and on running water, but this last only on condition that some one of the company will deign to be my vis-à-vis on stagnant water. I can sing and rhyme in thirty-seven languages and a half, provided that some one of the company will deign to answer me, without an error, in thirty-seven languages and a half. I can eat rats, hemp, swords, fire----"

"Enough, enough," said De Beuvre impatiently; "we know your catalogue: it is the same with all such braggarts as you. You claim to know everything, and you know but one thing, which is how to tell fortunes."

"To be quite frank," retorted La Flèche, "that is what I excel in, and if your radiant highnesses will write your names, I will draw to see with whom I shall begin; for destiny is an ill-tempered fellow who knows no distinction of rank or sex."

"Go on and draw; here is my token," said Monsieur De Beuvre, tossing him a piece of money. "Your turn, my child."

Lauriane tossed him a larger coin, the marquis a gold crown, Lucilio some copper, and D'Alvimar a pebble, saying:

"I see that you all give money to the conjurer, but in my opinion he deserves only to be stoned."

"Beware," said Lauriane, smiling, "he will predict only unpleasant things for you; everyone knows that, in the matter of horoscopes, you only get what you pay for."

"Do not think that; destiny is my master," said La Flèche, putting the money into a box, and suddenly affecting to speak simply and with a fatalistic air.

He turned his indescribable hat, which seemed to threaten heaven like an insolent castle tower, pulled it over his eyes like an extinguisher, made several wry faces, pronounced divers unmeaning words supposed to be cabalistic formulas, and, having turned his back in order to wipe off the coarse paint unseen, showed his face made pale by prophetic inspiration.

Then he traced upon the gravel the great _asphère_ of ignorant necromancers, with all the symbols of street-corner astrology; he placed a stone in the centre and threw the box at it, which broke and distributed the contents over the symbols drawn in the different compartments.

Thereupon D'Alvimar stooped to pick up his pebble.

"No, no!" cried the gypsy, darting into the circle with the agility of a monkey, and placing his foot on D'Alvimar's token, without effacing any of the signs that surrounded it; "no, messire, you cannot interfere with destiny. It is above you as it is above me!"

"Certainly not," said Lauriane, putting her little cane between D'Alvimar and La Flèche. "The magician is master in his magic circle, and by disarranging your destiny, you may disarrange ours too."

D'Alvimar submitted; but his face betrayed an extraordinary agitation which he instantly suppressed.

XXII

La Flèche began with the token nearest the central stone, which he called Sinai.

It was Lucilio's; the gypsy pretended to measure angles and make computations, then said in rhyming prose:

"Homme sans langue et de grand cœur,
Savoir de misere est vainqueur."[18]

"You see," whispered Bois-Doré to D'Alvimar, "the rascal has divined our musician's melancholy plight."

"That was not very difficult," rejoined D'Alvimar contemptuously. "For a quarter of an hour past the mute has been talking to you by signs."

"So you have no faith at all in divination?" replied Bois-Doré, while La Flèche continued his calculations with a preoccupied air, but with his ears open to all that was going on about him.

"Why, do you believe in it yourself, messire, I would ask?" said D'Alvimar, pretending to be surprised at the seriousness with which the marquis asked the question.

"I? Why--yes, more or less, like everybody else!"

"No one believes in this nonsense nowadays!"

"Oh! yes; I believe in it quite seriously," said Lauriane. "I beg you, sorcerer, if my destiny is unfavorable, either to leave me a little hope, or to find in your learning some means of averting it."

"Illustrious queen of hearts," replied La Flèche, "I obey your commands. You are threatened by a great danger; but if, during three days from the present moment,

'Vous ne donnez point votre cœur,
Du diable il sera le vainqueur."[19]

"Can you invent no other rhymes?" exclaimed D'Alvimar. "Your vocabulary is not rich!"

"Everyone is not rich who wishes to be, messire," rejoined the gypsy; "and yet there are those who wish it very earnestly, so earnestly that they do everything to obtain wealth, even at the risk of the axe and the halter!"

"Do you read such things in this gentleman's destiny?" said Lauriane, who had been deeply impressed by the conjurer's warning to herself, and now strove to turn the whole affair into a jest.

"Perhaps!" said Monsieur d'Alvimar carelessly; "one never knows what may happen."

"But one can find out!" cried La Flèche. "Come who wants to know?"

"No one," said the marquis, "no one, if there is anything unpleasant in store for any of us."

"Well, neighbor, you have faith, on my word!" said De Beuvre, who did not exactly believe in anything. "You are an excellent customer for any mountebank who chooses to fill your ears with idle tales!"

"As you please," rejoined Bois-Doré, "but I cannot help it. I have seen such surprising things! A score of times things that have been predicted have happened to me."

"How can you believe that an ignorant idiot like this fellow can look into the future, of which God alone knows the secrets?" said D'Alvimar.

"I do not believe in the knowledge of the operator himself," replied Bois-Doré, "except in so far as, by long practice, he knows how to compute numbers, and those numbers are to him like letters in a book whereof the peculiar quality of numbers composes words and phrases."

De Beuvre laughed at the marquis, and called upon the gypsy to tell all he knew.

D'Alvimar would have been glad of a different result of the discussion, for his incredulity was only feigned; he believed that the devil had a hand in all evil, and he determined inwardly to commend La Flèche to the attention of Monsieur Poulain, to be locked up and burned at the first opportunity. But he was none the less consumed, in spite of himself, with anxiety to open the book of his destiny, and he was strongly impelled, moreover, to assume the rôle of a man free from superstitions, before Madame de Beuvre.

La Flèche, being called upon to speak, since he had studied his chart sufficiently, indulged in some serious reflections. He was afraid of the Spaniard. He knew that he ran no risk with people who believed in nothing, for they are not the sort who denounce or accuse sorcerers; and he was too sharp not to understand that, when he tried to withdraw his token, D'Alvimar's object was to escape the revelations which he pretended to despise.

He adopted the course to which he was accustomed to resort when he had to do with people who were inclined to become over-excited--he began to make meaningless remarks to everybody.

He hoped that D'Alvimar would retire, and that he could make some pleasant prediction for the others, for which they would pay handsomely; for in the three days that he had been wandering about the neighborhood, prowling everywhere, listening at doors, or pretending not to understand French to induce people to talk in his presence, he had learned many things; and he knew one fact about D'Alvimar which that gentleman would have been very glad to bury in profound oblivion.

But D'Alvimar, tranquillized by the trivial nature of the predictions, did not retire; La Flèche had ceased to entertain any of the party, and was on the point of making a fiasco, after great preparations to reap a fine harvest.

They were about to dismiss him. He drew himself up.

"Illustrious noble lords," he said, "I am not a sorcerer, I swear it by the image of my patron saint which I wear upon my breast; I protest against any compact with the devil. I practise only white magic, permitted by the ecclesiastical authorities; but----"

"Well, if you are not pledged to the devil, go to the devil!" laughed Monsieur de Beuvre; "you bore us!"

"Very good," said La Flèche insolently; "you want black magic, and you shall have it, at your own risk and peril! but I will have nothing to do with it, I wash my hands of it!"

He turned at once to a basket which he had brought with him, and in which they supposed that he kept some juggling apparatus or some strange beast, and took from it a little girl of eight or ten years, who seemed to be no more than four or five, she was so small and slender; and, with all the rest, dark-skinned, with a tangled mass of hair; a veritable imp, dressed all in red, who began, while he held her in his arms, by striking him again and again, pulling his hair, and tearing his face with her nails.

They thought at first that this frantic resistance was part of the performance, until they saw the blood flowing in a stream down the gypsy's nose.

He paid little heed to it, but said, as he wiped his face with his sleeve:

"That is nothing; the princess was asleep in her basket, and she is always cross when she wakes."

Then he added in Spanish, speaking to the child in an undertone.

"Never fear! you shall dance for this to-night!"

The child, whom he had deposited on the stone of Sinai, cowered like a monkey and glared about her with the eyes of a wild cat.

In her emaciated ugliness there were such strongly marked indications of suffering and of fierce temper, of unhappiness and of hatred, that she was almost beautiful, and indubitably terrifying.

It made Lauriane's heart ache to see the extreme emaciation of the wretched creature, who was almost naked under the gaudy, but filthy rags she wore. She shuddered as she thought of the probable fate of that child, driven to frenzy doubtless by the tyranny and the blows of a vile mountebank; and she walked away a few steps, leaning on the arm of her good Celadon, Bois-Doré, who, although he did not say so, felt almost as distressed as she.

But De Beuvre was of tougher fibre, and he urged La Flèche to make the evil spirit speak.

"Come, my lovely Pilar," said La Flèche, accompanying each word with a gesture big with threats, which were readily intelligible to his victim; "come, queen of the elves and hobgoblins, you must speak. Pick up that coin which is nearest you."

Pilar sat motionless for a long time, pretending to be asleep; she was shivering with fever.

"Come, come, gallows-bird, tow for the stake!" continued La Flèche, "pick up that gold piece, and I will tell you where Mario, your beloved Mario, is."

"What's that!" said the marquis, turning back; "what does he say about Mario?"

"Who is Mario?" asked Lauriane.

"Silence!" cried De Beuvre; "the devil speaks, and you are interested, neighbor!"

The child spoke thus in French, in a shrill voice and with a strongly marked accent:

"Celui de qui depend ce gage,
S'il veut ecouter le presage
Et se bien garer de l'amour--[20]

"I have said enough, I won't say any more," she added in Spanish.

She had forgotten her lesson. Neither prayers nor threats availed to refresh her memory; but she did not admit that she had been coached; she was already a sorceress and proud of her profession. She knew the magic chart much better than La Flèche, and she loved to prophesy. By trying to teach her poetry, which she called another kind of magic, La Flèche had irritated her, and the feeling that she should not succeed had wounded her self-esteem.

She shook her head, bristling with hair as black as ink, stamped her foot and gave way to a paroxysm of pythoness-like rage.

"Good! good!" cried La Flèche, determined to make use of her, in one way or another. "Now it is coming! the devil is entering her body, she will speak in a moment!"

"Yes," said the child in Spanish, darting madly into the circle, "and I know it all better than you, better than all the others. Come! come! come! I know; question me!"

"Let us speak French," said La Flèche. "What will happen to the noble lord whose token I hold?"

It was the marquis's.

"Joy and consolation!" said the child.

"Very good! but in what form?"

"Vengeance!"

"I, vengeance?" said Bois-Doré. "That is not my disposition."

"No, surely not," said Lauriane, glancing involuntarily at D'Alvimar. "The devil must have mistaken the token."

"No! I am not mistaken," replied the elf.

"Really?" said La Flèche. "If you are quite sure, speak, she-devil! So you think that this noble lord here present has some insult to avenge?"

"In blood!" replied Pilar, with the energy of a tragic actress.

"Alas!" said the marquis to Lauriane under his breath, "that is only too true, I doubt not! My poor brother, you know!" And he added, aloud: "I wish to question this little soothsayer myself."

"Do so, monseigneur," said La Flèche. "Listen, black fly! and speak truly to a gentleman who is of much more consequence than you!"

Thereupon, the marquis, turning to Pilar, questioned her gently:

"Tell me, my poor little girl, what I have lost?"

"_A son_!" she replied.

"Don't laugh, neighbor," said the marquis to De Beuvre, "she tells the truth. He was like a son to me!"

And to Pilar:

"When did I lose him?"

"Eleven years and five months since."

"And how many days?"

"Less five days."

"She is mistaken there," said the marquis to Lucilio; "for I heard from him after the time she mentions; but let us see if she can read the rest."

Again he turned to the child.

"How did I lose him?" he asked.

"By a violent death!" she replied; "but you will have consolation."

"When?"

"Within three months, three weeks or three days."

"What sort of consolation?"

"Three sorts: vengeance, wisdom, a family."

"A family? Am I to be married, pray?"

"No; you will be a father!"

"Really?" cried the marquis, undisturbed by Monsieur de Beuvre's hearty laughter. "When shall I be a father?"

"Within three months, three weeks or three days. I have told everything about you, and I want to rest."

The sitting was suspended with a deluge of jests showered by Monsieur de Beuvre on the marquis.

In order that the predicted advent of an heir should take place within three months, three weeks or three days, three women must have "received the order."

The poor marquis was so well aware of the contrary that all his faith in magic was destroyed.

He submitted to be made fun of, protesting his innocence, but not over desirous that they should believe it to be so absolute as it really was.

The child asked leave to prepare her conjurations for the last token.

It was D'Alvimar's pebble.

But in order that the reader may understand what follows, it is necessary that he should know what Pilar and her master, La Flèche, had agreed upon.

What La Flèche knew and wished to impart to Bois-Doré, he expected to have the child divulge when D'Alvimar was not present. The child, from caprice and vanity, refused to adhere to the agreement made between them. She insisted upon reciting her whole lesson, even though she had to suffer for it, and though La Flèche might lose his life or his liberty.

It may be that these perils, in which, as she well knew, she could involve him, sharpened her instincts of hate.

So she spoke as she chose, despite the warning gestures and grimaces of her master, who could say nothing to her in Spanish which D'Alvimar would not understand.

She picked up the stone, examined the signs that surrounded it, pretended to make a computation, and said in Spanish, threateningly and with appalling vehemence:

"Woe and disgrace to him whose token fell on the red star!"

"Bravo!" said D'Alvimar, with a nervous, forced laugh; "go on, filthy creature! Go on, go on, progeny of dogs, offscouring of the earth, tell us the decrees of heaven!"

Pilar, angered by these insults, became so wild that she terrified all who saw her, even La Flèche himself.

"Blood and murder!" she shrieked, jumping up and down with convulsive gestures; "murder and damnation! blood, blood, blood!"

"All this for me?" said D'Alvimar, unable to conceal his terror at that moment.

"For you! for you!" cried the frenzied creature, "and death and hell! soon, instantly, within three months, three weeks or three days! damned! damned! hell!"

"Enough! enough!" said Bois-Doré, who understood but little Spanish, but who saw that D'Alvimar was pale and on the verge of swooning; "this child is possessed of a bad devil, and it may be that it is sinful to listen to her."

"Yes, monsieur," rejoined D'Alvimar, "doubtless she is possessed of the devil, and her threats are vain and beneath contempt, for hell is powerless against the will of God; but if I were châtelain and dispenser of justice here, I would throw this brigand and this vile worm into prison, and I would hand them over to----"

"La la!" said Monsieur de Beuvre, "there is no reason for being so angry. I don't know what was said to you, but I am surprised that you ended by sneering at it. However, I agree that this mad young monkey's gusts of temper are a disgusting comedy, and I see that my daughter is disturbed by them. Come, knave," he said to La Flèche, "we have had enough. Keep the tokens, if all consent, and go and get yourself hanged elsewhere."

La Flèche had not awaited this permission to decamp. He was in great haste to elude the Spaniard's benevolent designs in respect to him.

Little Pilar was not at all disturbed. On the contrary, she picked up the gold and silver pieces which had served as tokens, and when she came to D'Alvimar's stone she threw it disdainfully at his feet. He was so angered that he would perhaps have treated her as he did the young wolf, had he still the weapon of which he had made such prompt and deadly use.

But when he involuntarily felt for it, he found nothing, and Lauriane, who was watching him, congratulated herself upon having disarmed him. He met her eyes and made haste to smile; then he tried to change the conversation, and Bois-Doré asked Lucilio for an air on the bagpipe to dispel the unpleasant effect of this episode, while La Flèche, carrying his great basket on his head and his instruments of magic under his arm, and dragging along with the other hand the little sybil, still quivering from head to foot, hastily passed the drawbridge and portcullis.

"Now will you give me something to eat?" she said, when they were in the open country.

"No, you did your work too badly."

"I am hungry."

"So much the better!"

"I am hungry, I can't walk any more."

"Into your cage you go, then!"

And he put her in the basket, despite her resistance, and ran away with her at full speed.

The unfortunate creature's shrieks died away without echo in the vast plain.

"Mario! Mario!" she wailed in a voice broken by sobs; "I want to see Mario. Villain! assassin! You promised that I should see Mario, who used to give me things to eat and play with me, and his mother, who kept me from being beaten! Mercedes! Mario! come to help me! Kill him! he is hurting me, he is shaking me, he is killing me, he is starving me to death! Damnation on him! death and blood and murder! The lash, the stake, the wheel, hell itself for the wicked!"

[Footnote 18:
Man without tongue and of great heart,
Learning has triumphed over misery.]

[Footnote 19:
You do not give your heart away,
It will triumph over the devil.]

[Footnote 20:
He from whom this token comes.
If he but heed to the presage
And hold aloof from love--]

XXIII

While the gypsy fled toward the north, the marquis, with D'Alvimar and Lucilio, rode in the opposite direction toward Briantes.

He was most anxious to tell his faithful Adamas of what he regarded as a happy issue of his enterprise; and, although he thought that he owed it to his love to indulge in a few stifled sighs of anxiety or impatience, he was by no means ill-pleased, taking everything into consideration, to have seven years before him in which to adopt a new matrimonial resolution.

D'Alvimar was in a very bad humor, not only because of the predictions which had stirred his bile and disturbed his brain, but also because of the tranquil manner in which Madame de Beuvre had taken leave of him, while she had given both her little hands to the marquis, as she gayly promised him a visit on the second day following.

"Can it be possible," he thought, "that she has accepted that old man's gold pieces, and that I am supplanted by a rival of seventy?"

He was exceedingly desirous to question his host, to poke fun at him, to quarrel with him. But it was impossible to enter into conversation with Bois-Doré on that subject. The marquis bore himself with an air of discreet and modest triumph, which caused him to outdo himself in courteous attentions to his guest.

D'Alvimar was able to avenge himself for his discomfiture in no other way than by doing his best to splash Master Jovelin, who rode behind the marquis.

When they reached the château, as the supper hour had not arrived, he walked to the rectory to consult with Monsieur Poulain.

"Well, monsieur," said the trusty Adamas, as he removed his master's boots--in his capacity of _homme de chambre_ he almost never left the château of Briantes--"well, monsieur, must we think about preparing the betrothal banquet?"

"To be sure, my friend. We must think about it at once."

"Really, monsieur? Well, I was sure of it, and I am so pleased that I don't know where I am. Just fancy, monsieur, that that red hackney whom you call Bellinde, and who would be better named Tisiphone----"

"Fie! fie, Adamas! You know that I do not like to hear one of the sex spoken of in a slighting manner. What new trouble is there between you?"

"Pardon me, my noble master, but the trouble is that that ill-tempered creature listens at doors, and that she knows of the step monsieur has taken to-day. Only a little while ago she was laughing about it like a cackling hen with that stupid housekeeper of the rector."

"How do you know that, Adamas?"

"I know it by magic, monsieur; but, at all events, I know it!"

"By magic? Since when have you been dabbling in the occult sciences?"

"I will tell you, monsieur. I have nothing to hide from you, but will you not deign to tell me first how you made your sentiments known to the peerless lady of your thoughts, and how she replied; for I am sure that nothing so eloquent was ever said under the heavens since the world was made, and I would like to be able to write as fast as Master Jovelin, so that I could put it on paper as monsieur repeats it to me."

"No, Adamas, no word of it shall ever issue from my mouth, sealed as it is by the oath of a loyal knight. I swore that I would not divulge the secret of my felicity. All that I can say to you, my friend, is to rejoice now with your master, and to hope with him in the future!"

"Then it is all arranged, is it, monsieur, and----"

Adamas was interrupted by a soft scratching, as of a cat, at the door.

"Ah!" he said, after he had looked out, "it is the child; he wants to bid you good-night.--Go away, my young friend, monseigneur will see you later; he is busy now."

"Yes, yes, Adamas, let him come again! I have something to say about children. Some very strange ideas on the subject of paternity came into my head yesterday. This freak is worthy of the lowest bourgeois! No! no! I am no longer the old bachelor who wanted to marry in hot haste, to have done with it. I am a young man, Adamas, yes, a young lover, a dandy, on my word, affectionately sentenced to prove his constancy by the test of time, to sigh and write poetry; in a word, to await, in the torments and ecstasies of hope, the good pleasure of my sovereign."

"If I understand rightly," said Adamas, "this jealous divinity mistrusts my master's fickle humor, and demands that he renounce all love-making!"