ROGER EGREMONT HAS A LITTLE ADVENTURE IN A GARDEN AT NEERWINDEN AND
BECOMES A MAJOR IN THE FINEST BRIGADE IN THE WORLD.
A WARM July night in 1693--a full moon illuminating a flat, wooded
country, with cottages and hamlets flecking the meadows, and villages
nestling upon the slight ascents. It is a prosperous-seeming country
and well peopled at all times. Now it is like a beehive, with something
like eighty thousand men moving over it, and sixty thousand are
preparing to contest their way, when they shall have reached a pretty
spot, on the prettiest little river in the Low Countries--Landen. It
will run with blood to-morrow.
It is almost midnight, the hour when the peasants usually are snoring
hard after their day’s work. But on this hot July night no one sleeps,
although the windows of the houses are kept dark; the people do not
care to reveal to the soldiers the nearness of a house.
The movement is remarkably quiet for such vast numbers of men. The
cavalry have clanked and thundered on ahead; the artillery can still be
heard lumbering heavily in the advance, but the roads are good, and the
flat country makes few echoes. Along the highroad, march steadily many
regiments of infantry. It is easy marching, but they have been at it
for long hours. The soldiers of the French army were allowed to sing
and joke--nay, even to dance--on the march, when there was likely to be
fighting at the end of it. But the time for this was past. They could
not reach their bivouac before one in the morning, at least, and their
minds were on--what think you? Whether they would know the secrets of
the other world before another moon should rise? Not at all. It was how
much time would they be allowed to sleep before the beat of the drum
next morning, and whether their share of those vast quantities of bread
which had been baked that week would come up in time.
Lieutenant-General the Duke of Berwick, tired of riding, had dismounted
for a few minutes, and leading his horse, walked by the side of an
officer, also dismounted and leading his horse. They were among friends
and comrades; the marching troops were that celebrated Irish Brigade,
which held Irish, English, and Scotch in its ranks, and always gave its
enemies trouble when encountered.
Captain Roger Egremont was the other dismounted officer, and he was
saying,--
“It wrings my heart to think that to-morrow we shall give many of our
own countrymen a mortal breakfast.”
“True enough, and I feel for the humble soldiers, misguided by those
who should show them the right. For the officers, men who fight for a
usurper, death should be their portion,” replied Berwick. “I hope we
shall not be caught napping, as we were at Steinkerque. Do you know, it
is the fashion at Paris now, to dress à la Steinkerque--cravats hanging
loose, coats half-buttoned, perukes awry.”
“I went into that fight with nothing on but my breeches and shirt.
I had a hat, but I lost it in the _mêlée_, and my shirt was torn
straight across the back, and a private soldier stripped a dead man
of a coat to cover my nakedness,” said Roger Egremont; on the day of
Steinkerque he had won his captaincy.
Berwick, who had a voice in singing like the croak of a frog with the
quinsy, began to hum below his breath Captain Ogilvie’s song,--
“The soldier returns from the wars,
The sailor recrosses the sea,
But I--I return no more, my dear,
I return no more.”
“I don’t know what brought that song to mind--I have not thought of it
since we made that famous journey to Orlamunde, when you sang it to us
sometimes--always prefacing, ‘You should have heard my cousin Richard
sing.’ I would like to hear something from that unfortunate Princess.”
“I should like to hear that her villain of a husband was dead--or that
she was.”
It was the first time Berwick had heard Roger Egremont mention Michelle
since the April morning that they had left Monplaisir behind them.
Neither said anything more; and presently Berwick, remounting, rode
off. Roger continued to trudge by the side of his men.
It was for him as if no more women existed in the world. He made a
firm resolve, and held to it surprisingly well, to think as little on
Michelle as possible. Any other way, madness lay. It was as if all
his illusions had been shattered at once. He saw himself as he truly
was,--not a gentleman of fortune, temporarily out of his estate, but
as a gentleman adventurer, most unlikely ever to have an estate. He
secretly despaired of the restoration of the King, although keeping
a bold front. He went his way, calm, not very smiling, but quite
unruffled; did his duty as a soldier, and wondered why God should treat
him so ill. For you will have known by this time that Roger Egremont
was a very human man, and had all the common faults of humanity. One
thing he noted with sorrow; he had grown indifferent to life. What
mattered it, a few years more or less? He was reckoned extraordinarily
brave, and his coolness in danger was remarkable where all men were
cool in danger. But, in truth, Roger Egremont had no special objection
to quitting a world where he had got more kicks than ha’pence, so far.
He had written several times to Bess Lukens, and had got two
laboriously written letters from her. They were fairly well
spelled,--as well as those written by some of the ladies of the court,
both at St. Germains and Versailles, and had evidently been copied from
a rough draft. Bess was well and happy.
“Last Sunday [she wrote] Papa Mazet took me to sing in the apartments
of Madame Maintenon, before the French King. The poor man was near
wild. [Roger took this to refer to Papa Mazet, and not the French
King.] The King was extreame pleased, and said I should hear his
twenty-four violins which played while he ate his dinner, and I did.
There was a French lady there who also sang. She screached mighty
loud, but did not seem to mind her notes much. Mr. Richard is now
studying at Paris. He comes to see me on the one day in the month
when he is let out. He and I are the best of friends. Papa Mazet
heard that the Superior, as Mr. Richard calls him, had been axing
about my character, knowing that Mr. Richard came to see me. I
warrant you, Papa Mazet sent the Superior a message that put, not a
flea, but a wasp, in his ear. I see the old lady, Madame Beaumanoir,
a week ago, when I went out to see Madame Michot and spend Sunday
with her. The old lady stopped me on the terrace, spoke me mighty
fair, and said if I ever wanted help, to come to her. I thanked her,
and axed her about you, and told her Mr. Richard was now living in
Paris. She praised him monstrous high, but no more than he deserved,
even if he is going to be a popish priest and talk Latin all the
time, as I hear the popishers mostly do. They say the old lady did
not stay at Orlamunde a whole month, and when she got back her
friends had been near driven to chain her up, to keep her from going
to Marly-le-Roi and telling King Louis a bushel of things he did not
want to know. Pray let me hear good news from you, my dear, kind Mr.
Roger. From your faithful, loving friend,
BESS LUKENS.
N. B.--I write my name in general like you showed me--Elisa Luccheni.”
Roger had letters from Dicky as often as there was a good opportunity
from Paris. Dicky told him the news from England and from St.
Germains:--
“I go to see that honest creature, Bess Lukens, when I can. She sings
to my violin, and we talk about what we shall do when we go back to
England; not that I think she yearns to go as much as the rest of us.
She says she has no one she cares about in England.”
And then Dicky told him the same story about Madame de Beaumanoir’s
return.
Roger Egremont was indulging himself in thinking of these things as
he tramped along, still leading his tired horse. Mile after mile was
passed; before him an endless black line of marching men, an endless
black line behind him. As the clock tolled one in a village steeple the
order to halt came. The bivouac was in open field, and in half an hour
the men had eaten such provision as was made for them, and rolled in
their blankets were sleeping soundly. So slept Roger Egremont. One of
the compensations of the soldier’s life was that he could always eat
soldier’s fare with a relish, and slept like an infant. He remembered
those sleepless nights in Newgate, and was thankful he was spared that
horror.
At four o’clock in the morning he was up and shaving--for he
had privately promised himself never to be caught again as at
Steinkerque--and he put a fresh white cockade in his hat. At half-past
four, when the men were munching their breakfasts, and the soft, sweet
dawn of a July morning overspread the land, Roger caught sight of a
brilliant group of general officers riding along that silvery brook of
Landen, which was to be of a dreadful color before night. He recognized
the commanding-general,--that gay, ugly, dissolute, brave old Maréchal
de Luxembourg,--who sent so many standards to Paris that he was called
“_le tapissier de Notre Dame_;” who, when he heard that William of
Orange had spoken of him coarsely, as “that old hunchback,” retorted
by saying, “What does he know about it? he never saw my back;” and who
ended his merry old life so piously and composedly that the stern and
scrupulous Père Bourdaloue said: “I should not wish to live like the
Maréchal de Luxembourg, but I should wish to die like him.”
And then the sound of fife and drum and bugle rent the blue air; great
bodies of men assumed form and shape and motion, and the Irish brigade,
led by Lieutenant-General the Duke of Berwick, plunged into the crystal
stream, and rushed over woods and fields and briery thickets, toward
the village of Neerwinden,--rushed, as they ever did, to glory or the
grave.
The Irish brigade wore red coats, by order of their King, James Stuart,
and they longed to be at arm’s-length with other grim red-coats, who
filled the trenches that encompassed the village, swarmed in the houses
and gardens, and whose cannon bristled on every coign of vantage. These
red-coats owned William of Orange for their King. They had Germans,
many thousands of them, on their side; but the men of the Irish brigade
counted themselves cheated and swindled and chicaned when they had only
to fight the Germans and the Dutch. And there were Frenchmen fighting
in line with the Irish brigade. But those Whig red-coats reckoned not
with them; they were not the Irish brigade. So those fellow-countrymen
rushed together with the greatest longing, saying in their hearts, “My
brother, how art thou?” and then stabbing that brother if the brother
did not succeed in stabbing first.
On one side of these eager men who followed Berwick as he showed them
the way toward their enemies, was the brigade of Rubantel, on the other
that of Montchevreuil,--French, both,--but the centre brigade never
saw them after the brook was crossed. Up the wooded incline rushed
the Irish brigade and the foot-guards; through brake and thicket they
dashed, the tall figure of the Duke of Berwick on his powerful bay
charger ever in the van. On they plunge to Neerwinden, but in their
impetuous charge they have far outstripped their supports on the right
and the left. Roger Egremont, on foot, at the head of his company,
tumbling out a squad of gunners from a trench, turned to see a blazing
line of red-coats falling upon the Irish brigade on all sides. Rubantel
and Montchevreuil are not in sight, but a thunder of guns, and a
ceaseless rattle and crash of musketry, off amid the woods and ravines
that lie between the river and the village, show where they are. They
have been stopped for a time by great masses of English, Dutch, and
Germans,--horse, foot, and artillery,--but are holding their own so
stubbornly that Dutch William says, between his clenched teeth,--
“This insolent nation!”
And that merry old hunchbacked warrior, the Maréchal de Luxembourg,
who has always beaten William of Orange whenever they have been
matched, sits perched on his horse, watching the struggle from a hill,
and holding in his hand ten regiments of horse ready to support “the
insolent nation” when they really want it.
But meanwhile the English are closing in upon Berwick’s incomparable
brigade. Roger sees, just before him, a little walled-in garden on
the outskirts of the village, with a stout oaken door at the back. He
re-forms his men, and making a rush for the garden, a soldier climbs
nimbly over the wall, unbars the gate, and Roger and his men scamper
in, just in time to lock and bar the gate behind them. The wall is
high and spiked, and opposite the oaken door is an open iron-work gate
looking on to the street, where can be seen men fighting furiously,
English and French in confusion, riderless horses plunging, and no one
clearly understanding what has happened, or what he has to do, only to
fight, to fight, to fight.
Roger Egremont, wiping the blood from his sword, glances about him,
prepared to defend himself at the first assault made upon him, which
will be in half a minute. The iron gate is secured like the oaken
door, and sharpshooters are posted there, with their muskets carefully
adjusted at the openings in the grille. But every man in the company
of Egremont is a sharpshooter for that time. And in the middle of the
mossy garden is a charming little summer-house, covered with rich red
roses in full bloom. They will be redder next year, for they will be
watered with blood.
“My lads,” cries Roger, “we are safe as in a fortress here; we may sit
down and laugh, for all the harm those rascal Whigs can do us. See,
we have a summer-house to lie down and rest ourselves in when we get
tired of picking ’em off through the gate and over the top of the wall.
See, yonder high house, without a loophole in the wall, protects us on
that side. We sha’n’t see any more fun to-day, I am fearing;” of which
speech part was true and part was a lie,--they being in very imminent
danger every moment. Nevertheless, the men, some of whom were from
Devonshire, huzzaed loudly.
The huzza was interrupted by a yell from the outside, and the long
rolling of the English drums. A torrent of red-coats poured into the
narrow street, moving steadily forward like fate. Roger at the same
moment saw Berwick, on his great bay horse, appear as if out of the
ground, and at the same moment with a shout the English soldiers
recognized him. Roger saw him tear the white cockade from his hat, dig
the spurs into his horse, and leaping a low wall in his path, make off
at full speed.
“He is safe, at all events,” cried Roger. This, too, was a lie, for he
caught a perfect view of Berwick, as dashing on, he rode straight into
the arms of his uncle, Brigadier Churchill, was unhorsed, tall man and
tall horse going down together, and when they rose, Berwick was winded
and staggering, and the uncle held the nephew by the collar--all of
which Roger saw.
Meanwhile, the red-coats in the garden have their hands full. They are
plainly seen through the grille, and the English foot-soldiers try
every means to dislodge them. The Whigs try climbing the wall--their
opponents within the garden shouting to them menacingly,--
“Come on, ye toads, and have at ye!”
And then pitching the wounded back to be trampled upon by others, the
red-coats rush at the iron gate and try to tear it down; but they only
leave a rampart of their bodies still further to protect those inside.
The battle rages all around them,--in the village, in the fields
behind, in the plain beyond,--but the company of Egremont is besieged
in the walled garden. There is no artillery at hand to dislodge them;
it is man to man, fusil to fusil, countryman to countryman, the scarlet
coat to the scarlet coat. It is hard work, but the men complain of
nothing but want of drink.
“Never mind, my lads,” says Roger, smiling, “the other fellows are
as thirsty as we, and they are not so comfortable as we, safe in a
pleasant garden on this broiling day, with a cool summer-house to rest
in when we are tired; nor as easy in their minds, for we live or die as
becomes honest men.”
Hours pass, the roar of battle never ceasing, and the steady thunder of
eighty great guns concentrated upon the French centre knowing no pause
or rest. The company of Egremont had been holding its own since eight
o’clock in the morning. The tide has surged back and forth, but never
has it receded far enough to let them escape, or advanced near enough
to overwhelm them. Some poor fellows lie stark on the mossy ground; a
dozen wounded men are stretched in the little summer-house,--they want
nothing but victory and water.
Roger Egremont, with a great gash over his forehead, his head tied up
in a handkerchief, with his white cockade pinned to it, has borrowed
a fusil from a soldier and is taking a shot through the iron gate
at the men struggling in the village street. His red coat is torn
open,--it is cruelly hot, and he has worked hard since daylight,--and
his white shirt has some bloodstains on it. Opposite is a tall stone
house for which both sides have fought desperately, the French being
in possession. Suddenly, through the uproar comes the sharp blare of a
fife playing “Les Folies en Espagne.”
“That’s a French tune, my lads,” shouts Roger; and then comes a rush
of white cockades and the splendid uniforms, now bedraggled, of the
household troops of Louis le Grand; and presently that frightful
thunder of the English, Dutch, and German batteries which had never
ceased its dreadful clangor since noon, began to falter, and when at
last the iron gate was opened and the company of Egremont marched out
in good order with their bayonets screwed into their muskets, and found
the other scarlet coats retreating grimly, and in a manner not to be
hurried, the field of Neerwinden was won. The Maréchal de Luxembourg
had seen the back of William of Orange that day, but had not shown his
own.
Terrible were the losses of the Irish brigade, and Berwick was a
prisoner. It was known that after the battle he had marched with the
English foot as far as Sichen, being treated with great affection
by his uncle, the Brigadier Churchill, who declared to him that his
other uncle, the Duke of Marlborough, took much pride in so promising
a nephew. Nor were the Whig red-coats a whit behind in respect for so
gallant an enemy. Nevertheless, as soon as he fell into the hands of
his half-sister’s husband, William of Orange, it was given out that he
was to be shut up in the Tower of London, and tried as a prisoner of
state, instead of being paroled as a prisoner of war--and that meant
a trip to Tyburn, with the block and the headsman awaiting him. The
news was very disquieting to the whole French nation, and infuriating
to the great brigade which felt itself honored in having had him for
a commander. The Maréchal de Luxembourg, however, bade everybody to
be easy about Lieutenant-General the Duke of Berwick. The Maréchal
held the winning card. Among the prisoners taken by him was the Duke
of Ormond. Whatever befell one Duke should befall the other. This
intimation, when conveyed in due time to William of Orange, acted like
a charm. Berwick was paroled within a week.
It was now August. The Maréchal de Luxembourg had fixed his
headquarters at the gay little town of Nivelle, which was the gayer for
that reason, and at Nivelle Berwick reported himself.
On the evening of his arrival he sought out Roger Egremont. Roger was
found, sitting in his tent, studying maps by the light of a candle
stuck in a bottle. He was delighted to see Berwick again.
“I had meant to go to see you as soon as the high mightinesses were
disposed of,” cried Roger, as they gripped each other’s hands.
“I have seen other high mightinesses,” said Berwick. “I have seen my
half-sister’s husband, the Prince of Orange. I will say of him that
although I shall have no cause to bless his memory, I cannot deny him
the faculties of a great man, nor, if he were not a usurper, of a
great king. Our encounter after Neerwinden was not unlike the one you
had at Egremont. The Prince, when I was presented to him, paid me a
long compliment. This I returned by a low bow. He then regarded me
steadfastly for a space. I looked him in the eye. He put on his hat. I
put on mine. The interview ended.”
Roger laughed very heartily at this--he still had some laughter left in
him. It is only your mean-spirited rascal who cannot laugh. God leaves
laughter and tears as a solace to the honest people.
War, in those days, was full of gallantry, and the gay old Maréchal
de Luxembourg was never without the presence of ladies at his
headquarters, except when he was actually burning powder; and the
ladies of the neighboring towns and châteaux had reason to remember the
merry old gentleman gratefully. While he was doing all he could to send
their husbands, fathers, and brothers into another world, he was eager
to make this one pleasant to these fair ones. Some stern moralists,
Berwick among them, rather complained of the Maréchal’s habit of
turning his camp into a resort for the ladies.
Nivelle, during those August days, was certainly gay enough. Roger
Egremont heard much of it, and saw many pretty women fluttering about,
in coaches, on horseback, on pillions; but women no longer interested
him. He had begun to study very seriously the great game of war,
and had little thought for anything else. He did not even read as
ravenously as he once had done, and one night, passing an abandoned
campfire, he threw into it his little volume of Ronsard’s poems. He did
it deliberately; he had tried once or twice before to burn the little
book up, but his resolution had failed him at the last moment. The
book, however, nestling close to his breast, spoke always of Michelle;
it called her name softly to him, in the quiet moments before he was
sinking to sleep, and made him dream of her. It talked to him of her as
he went his way those summer days, in the pleasant Low Country, and as
it would not be silenced he burned it up.
The fighting was over for the season in September. Armies in those
days killed many men,--nearly twelve thousand dead men marked the day
of Neerwinden,--and they could not keep this up the year round. In
the winter most of the officers took turns in getting leave to visit
Paris. Not so Roger Egremont. He was in a condition generally esteemed
happy,--the place where he was, was the place where he most desired to
be.
In the spring of 1694, more fighting; in the summer, more fighting
still,--in Flanders, in Italy, on the Rhine, on the coasts of
France,--everywhere arms resounded. In the winter all was peace,
and the gallants fled to Paris. This year of 1694, Roger Egremont,
conscious that he was growing to be a mere campaigner, that books and
women, to whom every gentleman should be devoted, had lost their charm
for him, determined to go to St. Germains for a while. He longed to see
Dicky. He was willing to see Bess Lukens, whom he truly believed to be
his best friend, but he was just as happy without seeing her. Bess felt
something for him which he could not return. Roger Egremont, however,
would not admit this openly, even to himself, being of a chivalrous
nature, but he showed his instinctive knowledge of it by a certain
discomfort he always felt in Bess’s presence.
He arrived at St. Germains in December, and remained a month. He went
straight toward his old lodging at the inn of Michot, and as he passed
through the orchard, coming to it from the river way, on a pleasant
winter day, who should come running toward him but Bess Lukens! He
had not seen her for two years, and was forced to see that she had
improved in certain ways. There could be no improvement in her beauty
or dress. She had ever a natural taste to set off her looks to the best
advantage. However she had gained propriety of manner; she was more
like a lady. But, alas! nothing could make Bess Lukens a lady. She was
as unaffectedly glad to see Roger as ever, and the joy that sent the
blood into her clear skin and filled her red-brown eyes with rapture
was the same. Her voice, however, was softened, her manner gentler.
When she ran toward him under the bare trees of the orchard, he would
have been quite justified, by the manners of the day, in giving this
handsome lass a rousing smack on the cheek. Instead, he kissed her hand
as if she had been a court lady, which ought to have pleased Bess, but
did not.
“And I need not ask you how you are, dear Bess. I see for myself
happiness and prosperity writ in your face,” he said to her warmly.
“I have prospered truly,” replied Bess, “and I have come to St.
Germains now to sing in the chapel for the good Queen. Whenever I have
the honor to sing before any great French people, I come out to St.
Germains and take my place in the chapel choir, to sing for my own King
and Queen; and I tell you, as should not, Roger, that the singers all
leave me the solo parts. But you are changed--and yet--”
“Improved?” asked Roger, smiling.
“No; I cannot think anything an improvement on the first friend I ever
had,--the first gentleman who ever spoke a decent word to me. You have
become a soldier, though.”
“Yes; I am now Major Egremont. One or two more campaigns, and I shall
be a lieutenant-colonel.”
“And have you seen Mr. Dicky?”
“Not yet. I am but just come. I slept last night at Verneuil.”
“You should see him--a personable lad. And why should I call him a lad?
he is every day of three-and-twenty, and will soon be ordained a popish
priest. He has it in his head to go back to England, and you ought to
dissuade him; indeed you should, Roger, because you know that means
death.”
“Not I, Bess. My cousin Dicky is a man, and to dissuade a man from his
duty because he may have to die for it, is no way of mine.”
Bess remained silent--she had no true idea of _noblesse oblige_. Poor
Bess was not a lady,--the blood of the Lukens family did not run in the
channels of the Egremonts. She thought Roger a little hard-hearted.
“Anyway,” she cried aggressively, “he is far too good for a popish
priest, and a great deal too handsome.”
“Take care, my dear,” responded Roger, laughing, “I may yet be a popish
priest myself. Remember Monsieur La Trappe, who was a soldier.”
“There’s no danger for _you_,” coolly said Bess. And then they were at
the inn door, and Madame Michot came forth, bustling, to meet them; and
lame Jacques, who admired Bess as a star far above him, limped forward,
and they were all very glad to see each other once more.
Madame Michot could give Roger his old garret for a month. As for the
inn itself, it was like its old self only in the winter, when some of
the former patrons came back. Some of them would never come back, but
slept in Flemish ground, or their bones were bleaching in the passes
of the Spanish mountains, or they whitened the plains of Italy, or they
took their rest on the banks of the Rhine.
The common room, however, was decently full that evening when Roger
ordered his supper. Many of those present he had served with. They had
talk of campaigns, past and future, good news from England, where the
recent death of Mary of Orange had seriously weakened her husband’s
position. The Duke of Berwick was at St. Germains for the winter, where
it was reported that he sought favor in the lovely eyes of Honora de
Burgh, widow of the brave Sarsfield, killed at Neerwinden, and daughter
of Lord Clanricarde. He was in high favor at Marly-le-Roi, and was
one of the twenty great nobles whom the Dauphin invited to Choisy
to plant trees, to hunt, and to enjoy life as great nobles should.
The little Prince of Wales charmed everybody. When he met a private
soldier, he always pulled out his little purse and gave what he had
in it, “to drink the health of the King, my father.” And the little
Princess Louisa, “La Consolatrice,” as her fond father called her, was
then nearly three years old, and was an angel. William and Mary had
no children; all of the Princess Anne’s were dead or dying, so the
exiles told each other, believing the hand of God to be upon Goneril
and Regan, while the Queen whom those daughters had displaced had two
beautiful infants, so lovely that the greatest queen and empress in the
world might envy her those cherubs. This was the talk Roger Egremont
heard that night in the common room,--most of it highly agreeable to
him. After the usual nightcap of punch and the King’s health had been
drunk, and the house was quiet for the night, Roger looked out of
the window he knew so well, down upon that familiar scene. A bright
December moon illuminated the glorious terrace, the black pile of the
old château, the river flowing icy cold through the wintry meadows.
It was all very sad to him,--the place was haunted. He wished he had
remained at winter quarters in Brabant.
Next day was Sunday, and he went to mass in the chapel. He saw the
King, broken and aged, but a King still, enter; the Queen, a queen
always; and the two tiny children, the little Prince of Wales gravely
leading “La Consolatrice” by the hand. Roger’s heart swelled when he
saw these two infants--they were so beautiful.
The organ pealed out, and voices rose in the anthem. Roger tried to
keep his mind fixed on holy things, but he easily distinguished, above
the golden tones of the organ and the melody of the other voices, Bess
Lukens’s glorious soprano. It was one of those rich and radiant voices,
full of color and religious passion. One knew that the singer was young
and glowing with life and fire. Roger glanced upward at her. She was
standing up to sing, her hood and mantle thrown back. He saw in her
face that great and beautiful change which was taking place in her.
She was singing, “I have loved righteousness and hated iniquity.” It
was true; and because she had honestly hated iniquity she had passed
through it unscathed, and had come from the continual sight of it in a
common gaol, to a life of innocence and peace, among honest people like
herself.
After mass, Roger attended the King’s levee. It was very full, for the
chances of James’s restoration seemed brilliant. The little town was
crowded, and what gave great joy to Roger Egremont was that they were
chiefly new faces,--persons who thought they saw the rising, once more,
of the Jacobite star. Already human nature was asserting itself at St.
Germains in quarrels over the coming flesh-pots. Lord Middleton led a
party called the Compounders, who wanted a general amnesty; while Lord
Melfort led the non-Compounders, who proposed to distribute punishments
as well as rewards. The King, with whom Mary of Orange had once been
a favorite child, whose impenitent death distressed him greatly, yet
sternly refused to have his shabby court wear mourning for her, or to
take any outward notice of the death of this despoiler of her father
and brother. The King, however, prayed long and often for the soul of
his undutiful child.
The château, like all the rest of St. Germains, was haunted to Roger
Egremont. He sincerely hoped he should not meet Madame de Beaumanoir
that day, and looked about him anxiously on entering the grand saloon.
To his relief, she was not there.
In his turn, he made his obeisance to the King and Queen, sitting, not
in state, but as the father and mother of a large family. The King
greeted him kindly.
“I hear you have earned promotion, Mr. Egremont.”
“Thanks, your Majesty, to the good offices of the Duke of Berwick,
who sees to it that no man, however humble, goes without his reward,”
replied Roger. The ablest courtier in the world could not have turned a
speech better to please the King’s ear, or the Queen’s either for that
matter, as she looked chiefly to the half-brother of her child, for
that child’s restoration to his father’s throne.
“I should like to see you privately to-morrow morning, that I may know
particularly of all my former gentlemen-at-arms,” said the poor King.
Then the Queen spoke--her sweet and thrilling voice, with her
beautiful black eyes, being her great charm. “The Duke of Berwick has
told us much of you, Mr. Egremont. I hope that you will never go so far
away from us that we cannot get you on short notice.”
“I hope so, too, your Majesty; and when your Majesties are returned to
England, no one will be a more assiduous courtier than myself.”
Then the little Prince of Wales, walking up fearlessly, without asking
permission of his governor, Lord Middleton, twisted his little hand in
Roger’s sword-belt, and said, “I know your name. It is Roger Egremont,
for the Duke of Berwick told me a story about your fighting for the
King, my father, in a garden. Tell me all about it now.”
“If your Royal Highness’s governor will permit,” replied Roger,
gravely; and Lord Middleton nodding his head, the little fellow led
Roger off to a window-seat, and planting himself between his new
friend’s knees, asked all about the battle of Neerwinden, and showed so
much intelligence for a little lad that Roger was charmed.
When the levee was dismissed and Roger was rising to go, there passed
before him a vision of delicate loveliness which waked him for a moment
from that indifference to women which had long possessed him. It was
Honora de Burgh, her widow’s robe showing off her pure complexion, her
eyes so wonderfully bright and clear; they reminded him of another pair
of eyes he had often seen at St. Germains, and never without a thrill.
Some one whispered the name of the Irish beauty, and Roger knew it was
the woman that Berwick was said to admire so profoundly. Roger looked
at her more attentively still. He noticed that she seemed but a frail
flower,--the color on her cheek, the light in her eyes was too vivid;
the painful thought suddenly occurred to him that she was not destined
to outlive her youth. Sad, sad, prescience!
The town was so full of English, Irish, and Scotch that Roger could
not pass along the narrow streets without running into his own country
people. All were sanguine of being in their native land within three
months. William of Orange had not been a kind or a faithful husband,
but yet he grieved much at the death of his wife, and his health was
said to be breaking. He was credited at St. Germains with having twenty
different diseases, each certain of a fatal ending in a short space of
time--the wish being father to the thought.
Roger, after meeting and greeting many acquaintances and friends,
returned to the inn. He much desired to see Dicky, and also Berwick.
Judging from what he had heard concerning Sarsfield’s beautiful young
widow, he had but little doubt that St. Germains was the place to
seek Berwick, and not all the blandishments of the French King and
Monseigneur combined could keep him long away. But Dicky must be sought
in Paris. Bess Lukens, he found, was to return that afternoon, and so
he determined to go in the stage-coach with her,--a huge, rumbling
vehicle which ran daily at that time between St. Germains and Paris.
At five o’clock they were to start. It was a dull winter afternoon,
and the journey promised to be cold and disagreeable. But Roger was
glad to get away from St. Germains, and delighted at the prospect of
seeing Dicky. He walked with Bess to the street corner where they were
to meet the stage. He noticed, as he had done every moment since he
had seen her, how great was her improvement in language, in manners,
in all externals. But she was the same Bess after all,--warm-hearted,
generous, full of courage and quite capable of vindictiveness. A
gallant on the seat beside her venturing some impertinent glances at
her, Bess turned, coolly surveyed him, and then remarked out aloud, as
if talking to herself,
“Of all the monkeys I ever saw, this is the worst. The very dogs in
Paris will bark at us if we carry him all the way.”
And this gay gentleman, like others, began by admiring Bess’s blooming
beauty, and ended by cursing her saucy tongue.
It was long after dark before they rolled into Paris, and Roger
escorted Bess to her own door. The Mazets were delighted to see him,
and nothing would do but he must stay to supper. As soon as he accepted
their invitation, Bess disappeared into the kitchen. While Papa Mazet
was telling with pride of the triumphs of his pet pupil, and his
battles on her account with the Abbé d’Albret, who now had charge
of the King’s Opera, the song-bird was standing over the _batterie
de cuisine_ in the kitchen, preparing a delicious supper, which she
presently served with her own hands. After it was over, and it was time
for Roger to seek a lodging, he rose to go, thanking Papa Mazet and the
old sister for their kindness to his friend. Bess went with him to the
door, and held a candle in her hand to light him down the dark street.
He heard her sweet, clear voice calling after him, “Good-night, Mr.
Roger, and good sleep to you!”
Next day, at an appointed hour, he went to see Dicky at the seminary.
They hugged each other as they had done when they were boys, and then
spent the afternoon together in the garden of the monastery,--a quaint
old place, shut off and screened, in perfect solitude, although in the
heart of the great city.
It amazed Roger that Dicky should have changed so little. He seemed
exactly like the apple-cheeked boy he had loved and patronized and
bullied and hectored over at Egremont in those days, so long, long
past. Yet, as Bess Lukens said, Dicky was all of three-and-twenty, and
that he was no longer a boy was proved by what he told Roger.
“You must know, Roger,” he said, “that the Superior may let me be
ordained before my ten years of study are over. In truth, old boy, I
think the Superior knows that I shall never be as learned as most of
the men in the Society of Jesus, and that I shall never be more than
respectable at books. It is action that will suit me best. And there
have come to us many letters and messages from our scattered flocks
in England, praying for priests to come to them; and in the present
persecution it is useless for any of the Society to go there except an
Englishman who can maintain his disguise. So I have urgently prayed the
Superior to let me be ordained and go to my native country. I think
my precious fiddle will supply me with a disguise. Think, Roger, how
delightful it must be to walk through green England, doing one’s duty,
and taking one’s pleasure in the fresh fields and the pleasant country
lanes, and basking in God’s sun all the while.”
“And playing the fiddle,” assented Roger. “Dick, man, I will not
dissuade you. If ’tis your duty to go, it shall not be said that I, the
head of our house--such a poor, broken house it is!--shall keep you
back. No more would you keep me back from leading the forlorn hope, if
I were accorded that honor. You stand a good chance of escape--for not
eight years’ residence in France has altered the Devonshire tongue of
you.”
“And the poor people about Egremont, most of them, are non-jurors
anyway, and much as many of them hate my religion, they love the name
of Egremont too well to betray me. So if you hear of me going to
England, be not too anxious about me. I have a thousand chances of
escape.”
Then Dicky had a whole batch of news about Egremont, to which Roger
listened thirstily. Hugo Stein was in high favor with the Whig
government, who found his knowledge of languages useful in matters
requiring a trusty agent on the continent. He was now known as Sir Hugo
Egremont, William of Orange having made him a baronet on the last royal
birthday. He was much on the seas, between England and the continent.
Possibly he did not find England a very agreeable residence; he was
in no great favor in Devonshire. The estate did not suffer by these
absences. Hugo was as thrifty as any Flemish weaver, and was always
increasing his store. He had added several hundred acres of land to
Egremont, but, wishing to dispose of some which was of the original
estate but not in the entail, he had been infuriated to find that he
was not considered competent to make a title. True, the gentleman,
who had been very anxious to buy this same land in Roger’s time, was
a Jacobite, and as such, might very well doubt the legality of the
bestowal of estates which William of Orange so liberally indulged in,
yet his reasons were plausible. The “parliament men,” as William of
Orange angrily called them, were perpetually meddling with these grants
of estates, and some very prudent Whigs were not satisfied with such
titles as the new incumbents could give. Sir Hugo had made desperate
efforts after this to sell this land, at any sort of a price,--rightly
considering that his whole estate was in jeopardy, if he could not
alienate an acre,--but he had been totally unsuccessful, and was
furiously chagrined thereby.
All this delighted Roger beyond measure, and he indulged himself in
calling his half-brother a thief, rogue, rascal, scoundrel, liar, and
traitor, and enjoyed it very much.
Then he had to tell Dicky in detail all he had done and seen and heard
since last they met, although Dicky had had a pretty full account of it
in Roger’s letters.
The short winter afternoon was closing when they parted. Roger’s spirit
was always calmed and cheered by Dicky. Here was indeed a single-minded
man,--a man who craved not riches, nor glory, nor slothful ease, but
who earnestly desired to help his fellow-creatures; a man free from
vanity,--Dicky Egremont modestly and humbly owned that he was not a
man of books in an order where learning was held in vast esteem,--and
who, knowing his own limitations, was the stronger thereby. When Dicky
Egremont became Father Egremont, so Roger thought, he would never be a
great teacher in the schools of Louvain and Clermont, or St. Omer’s, or
Paris, but he would be found ever with the poor and the ignorant and
the timid. He was so devoid of fear that he always had his wits about
him, so Roger remembered, and therefore, great as would be his danger
in venturing into England, yet he would have every chance for his life
which coolness and resource could give.
On the Monday Roger returned to St. Germains, Berwick had come from
Choisy, where he had been in attendance on Monseigneur, and had
already been twice to the inn of Michot to see him. As soon as Roger
had seen Merrylegs, who was leading the life of a gentleman in the inn
stables, he set off for the château, by way of the terrace. It was
quite full of people, and he was stopped every few steps to speak to
some one. Presently he saw the Queen approaching with several ladies
and gentlemen in attendance. He recognized at once Honora de Burgh,
in her black hood and gown, looking as fragile and beautiful as an
anemone. And by her side was the tall figure of Berwick--the Pike, he
was still called. Roger was passing the Queen with a low reverence,
when she stopped him and spoke graciously; and then Berwick, grasping
his hand, introduced him to Sarsfield’s beautiful young widow.
“The Duke of Berwick has told me much of you, Major Egremont,” she
said,--and her voice was exquisitely sweet, but something in that
voice, those eyes which smiled as did her lips, had a foreboding; she
looked, as indeed she was, too frail for earth.
She was most gracious to Roger then, and in the evening at the palace.
And that night, when Berwick went back with Roger to the inn, the story
came out; Berwick, blushing like a girl, told that he was to marry the
beautiful young widow in the spring. And he did not, as men commonly
do, ask Roger when he meant to do likewise; he had great knowledge of
the human heart; he knew that Roger Egremont had once loved, and his
love had proved unfortunate. Roger grasped Berwick’s hand, and wished
him joy from the very bottom of a faithful heart, and said, with truth,
that any man might love that sweet and gracious and lovely flower of a
woman, Madame Sarsfield. Berwick asked Roger his plans, and in reply
got that Roger had a month’s leave, but thought he would rejoin his
regiment in Brabant long before it was out. He had paid his duty to
the King; he had seen the only three persons in the world who cared
to see him,--his cousin Richard Egremont, his old friend Bess Lukens,
and Berwick himself. As for his cousins of the Sandhills, he sincerely
hoped he would never clap eyes on any one of them again,--either the
gambling, dissolute Edward or the sanctimonious Anthony. As for Madame
de Beaumanoir,--at this he halted; the old lady had been so uniformly
friendly to him that he felt an ingrate in saying he did not wish to
see her, and was glad to hear she was not at St. Germains.
“Tut, man,” cried Berwick with the enthusiasm of a man in love, “you
have vapors, like women. You will be asking for an extension of leave
within two more days!--that I warrant.”
Nevertheless, before the end of the week, Roger, on Merrylegs, was
trotting soberly back to Brabant. He reckoned himself fortunate in one
way. No one had mentioned to him the name of the Princess of Orlamunde.
He was as certain that she was a miserable woman as he was that he
himself was a living man; but he could not bear to have her misery
spoken of to him.