THE REFUGEES
A TALE OF TWO CONTINENTS
A. CONAN DOYLE
CONTENTS.
PART I.
IN THE OLD WORLD.
Chapter
I. THE MAN FROM AMERICA.
II. A MONARCH IN DESHABILLE
III. THE HOLDING OF THE DOOR
IV. THE FATHER OF HIS PEOPLE
V. CHILDREN OF BELIAL
VI. A HOUSE OF STRIFE
VII. THE NEW WORLD AND THE OLD
VIII. THE RISING SUN
IX. LE ROI S'AMUSE
X. AN ECLIPSE AT VERSAILLES
XI. THE SUN REAPPEARS
XII. THE KING RECEIVES
XIII. THE KING HAS IDEAS
XIV. THE LAST CARD
XV. THE MIDNIGHT MISSION
XVI. "WHEN THE DEVIL DRIVES"
XVII. THE DUNGEON OF PORTILLAC
XVIII. A NIGHT OF SURPRISES
XIX. IN THE KING'S CABINET
XX. THE TWO FRANCOISES
XXI. THE MAN IN THE CALECHE
XXII. THE SCAFFOLD OF PORTILLAC
XXIII. THE FALL OF THE CATINATS
PART II.
IN THE NEW WORLD.
Chapter
XXIV. THE START OF THE "GOLDEN ROD"
XXV. A BOAT OF THE DEAD
XXVI. THE LAST PORT
XXVII. A DWINDLING ISLAND
XXVIII. IN THE POOL OF QUEBEC
XXIX. THE VOICE AT THE PORT-HOLE
XXX. THE INLAND WATERS
XXXI. THE HAIRLESS MAN
XXXII. THE LORD OF SAINTE MARIE
XXXIII. THE SLAYING OF BROWN MOOSE
XXXIV. THE MEN OF BLOOD
XXXV. THE TAPPING OF DEATH
XXXVI. THE TAKING OF THE STOCKADE
XXXVII. THE COMING OF THE FRIAR
XXXVIII. THE DINING-HALL OF SAINTE MARIE
XXXIX. THE TWO SWIMMERS
XL. THE END
NOTE ON THE HUEGENOTS AND THEIR DISPERSION
NOTE ON THE FUTURE OF LOUIS, MADAME DE MAINTENON, AND MADAME DE MONTESPAN
CHAPTER I.
THE MAN FROM AMERICA.
It was the sort of window which was common in Paris about the end of the
seventeenth century. It was high, mullioned, with a broad transom
across the centre, and above the middle of the transom a tiny coat of
arms--three caltrops gules upon a field argent--let into the
diamond-paned glass. Outside there projected a stout iron rod, from
which hung a gilded miniature of a bale of wool which swung and squeaked
with every puff of wind. Beyond that again were the houses of the other
side, high, narrow, and prim, slashed with diagonal wood-work in front,
and topped with a bristle of sharp gables and corner turrets. Between
were the cobble-stones of the Rue St. Martin and the clatter of
innumerable feet.
Inside, the window was furnished with a broad bancal of brown stamped
Spanish leather, where the family might recline and have an eye from
behind the curtains on all that was going forward in the busy world
beneath them. Two of them sat there now, a man and a woman, but their
backs were turned to the spectacle, and their faces to the large and
richly furnished room. From time to time they stole a glance at each
other, and their eyes told that they needed no other sight to make them
happy.
Nor was it to be wondered at, for they were a well-favoured pair.
She was very young, twenty at the most, with a face which was pale,
indeed, and yet of a brilliant pallor, which was so clear and fresh, and
carried with it such a suggestion of purity and innocence, that one
would not wish its maiden grace to be marred by an intrusion of colour.
Her features were delicate and sweet, and her blue-black hair and long
dark eyelashes formed a piquant contrast to her dreamy gray eyes and her
ivory skin. In her whole expression there was something quiet and
subdued, which was accentuated by her simple dress of black taffeta, and
by the little jet brooch and bracelet which were her sole ornaments.
Such was Adele Catinat, the only daughter of the famous Huguenot
cloth-merchant.
But if her dress was sombre, it was atoned for by the magnificence of
her companion. He was a man who might have been ten years her senior,
with a keen soldier face, small well-marked features, a carefully
trimmed black moustache, and a dark hazel eye which might harden to
command a man, or soften to supplicate a woman, and be successful at
either. His coat was of sky-blue, slashed across with silver braidings,
and with broad silver shoulder-straps on either side. A vest of white
calamanca peeped out from beneath it, and knee-breeches of the same
disappeared into high polished boots with gilt spurs upon the heels.
A silver-hilted rapier and a plumed cap lying upon a settle beside him
completed a costume which was a badge of honour to the wearer, for any
Frenchman would have recognised it as being that of an officer in the
famous Blue Guard of Louis the Fourteenth. A trim, dashing soldier he
looked, with his curling black hair and well-poised head. Such he had
proved himself before now in the field, too, until the name of Amory de
Catinat had become conspicuous among the thousands of the valiant lesser
_noblesse_ who had flocked into the service of the king.
They were first cousins, these two, and there was just sufficient
resemblance in the clear-cut features to recall the relationship.
De Catinat was sprung from a noble Huguenot family, but having lost his
parents early he had joined the army, and had worked his way without
influence and against all odds to his present position. His father's
younger brother, however, finding every path to fortune barred to him
through the persecution to which men of his faith were already
subjected, had dropped the "de" which implied his noble descent, and he
had taken to trade in the city of Paris, with such success that he was
now one of the richest and most prominent citizens of the town. It was
under his roof that the guardsman now sat, and it was his only daughter
whose white hand he held in his own.
"Tell me, Adele," said he, "why do you look troubled?"
"I am not troubled, Amory,"
"Come, there is just one little line between those curving brows. Ah, I
can read you, you see, as a shepherd reads the sky."
"It is nothing, Amory, but--"
"But what?"
"You leave me this evening."
"But only to return to-morrow."
"And must you really, really go to-night?"
"It would be as much as my commission is worth to be absent. Why, I am
on duty to-morrow morning outside the king's bedroom! After chapel-time
Major de Brissac will take my place, and then I am free once more."
"Ah, Amory, when you talk of the king and the court and the grand
ladies, you fill me with wonder."
"And why with wonder?"
"To think that you who live amid such splendour should stoop to the
humble room of a mercer."
"Ah, but what does the room contain?"
"There is the greatest wonder of all. That you who pass your days amid
such people, so beautiful, so witty, should think me worthy of your
love, me, who am such a quiet little mouse, all alone in this great
house, so shy and so backward! It is wonderful!"
"Every man has his own taste," said her cousin, stroking the tiny hand.
"It is with women as with flowers. Some may prefer the great brilliant
sunflower, or the rose, which is so bright and large that it must ever
catch the eye. But give me the little violet which hides among the
mosses, and yet is so sweet to look upon, and sheds its fragrance round
it. But still that line upon your brow, dearest."
"I was wishing that father would return."
"And why? Are you so lonely, then?"
Her pale face lit up with a quick smile. "I shall not be lonely until
to-night. But I am always uneasy when he is away. One hears so much
now of the persecution of our poor brethren."
"Tut! my uncle can defy them."
"He has gone to the provost of the Mercer Guild about this notice of the
quartering of the dragoons."
"Ah, you have not told me of that."
"Here it is." She rose and took up a slip of blue paper with a red seal
dangling from it which lay upon the table. His strong, black brows
knitted together as he glanced at it.
"Take notice," it ran, "that you, Theophile Catinat, cloth-mercer of
the Rue St. Martin, are hereby required to give shelter and rations to
twenty men of the Languedoc Blue Dragoons under Captain Dalbert, until
such time as you receive a further notice. [Signed] De Beaupre
(Commissioner of the King)."
De Catinat knew well how this method of annoying Huguenots had been
practised all over France, but he had flattered himself that his own
position at court would have insured his kinsman from such an outrage.
He threw the paper down with an exclamation of anger.
"When do they come?"
"Father said to-night."
"Then they shall not be here long. To-morrow I shall have an order to
remove them. But the sun has sunk behind St. Martin's Church, and I
should already be upon my way."
"No, no; you must not go yet."
"I would that I could give you into your father's charge first, for I
fear to leave you alone when these troopers may come. And yet no excuse
will avail me if I am not at Versailles. But see, a horseman has
stopped before the door. He is not in uniform. Perhaps he is a
messenger from your father."
The girl ran eagerly to the window, and peered out, with her hand
resting upon her cousin's silver-corded shoulder.
"Ah!" she cried, "I had forgotten. It is the man from America.
Father said that he would come to-day."
"The man from America!" repeated the soldier, in a tone of surprise, and
they both craned their necks from the window. The horseman, a sturdy,
broad-shouldered young man, clean-shaven and crop-haired, turned his
long, swarthy face and his bold features in their direction as he ran
his eyes over the front of the house. He had a soft-brimmed gray hat
of a shape which was strange to Parisian eyes, but his sombre clothes
and high boots were such as any citizen might have worn. Yet his
general appearance was so unusual that a group of townsfolk had already
assembled round him, staring with open mouth at his horse and himself.
A battered gun with an extremely long barrel was fastened by the stock
to his stirrup, while the muzzle stuck up into the air behind him.
At each holster was a large dangling black bag, and a gaily coloured
red-slashed blanket was rolled up at the back of his saddle. His horse,
a strong-limbed dapple-gray, all shiny with sweat above, and all caked
with mud beneath, bent its fore knees as it stood, as though it were
overspent. The rider, however, having satisfied himself as to the
house, sprang lightly out of his saddle, and disengaging his gun, his
blanket, and his bags, pushed his way unconcernedly through the gaping
crowd and knocked loudly at the door.
"Who is he, then?" asked De Catinat. "A Canadian? I am almost one
myself. I had as many friends on one side of the sea as on the other.
Perchance I know him. There are not so many white faces yonder, and in
two years there was scarce one from the Saguenay to Nipissing that I had
not seen."
"Nay, he is from the English provinces, Amory. But he speaks our
tongue. His mother was of our blood."
"And his name?"
"Is Amos--Amos--ah, those names! Yes, Green, that was it--Amos Green.
His father and mine have done much trade together, and now his son, who,
as I understand, has lived ever in the woods, is sent here to see
something of men and cities. Ah, my God! what can have happened now?"
A sudden chorus of screams and cries had broken out from the passage
beneath, with the shouting of a man and the sound of rushing steps.
In an instant De Catinat was half-way down the stairs, and was staring
in amazement at the scene in the hall beneath.
Two maids stood, screaming at the pitch of their lungs, at either side.
In the centre the aged man-servant Pierre, a stern old Calvinist, whose
dignity had never before been shaken, was spinning round, waving his
arms, and roaring so that he might have been heard at the Louvre.
Attached to the gray worsted stocking which covered his fleshless calf
was a fluffy black hairy ball, with one little red eye glancing up, and
the gleam of two white teeth where it held its grip. At the shrieks,
the young stranger, who had gone out to his horse, came rushing back,
and plucking the creature off, he slapped it twice across the snout, and
plunged it head-foremost back into the leather bag from which it had
emerged.
"It is nothing," said he, speaking in excellent French; "it is only a
bear."
"Ah, my God!" cried Pierre, wiping the drops from his brow. "Ah, it has
aged me five years! I was at the door, bowing to monsieur, and in a
moment it had me from behind."
"It was my fault for leaving the bag loose. The creature was but pupped
the day we left New York, six weeks come Tuesday. Do I speak with my
father's friend, Monsieur Catinat?"
"No, monsieur," said the guardsman, from the staircase. "My uncle is
out, but I am Captain de Catinat, at your service, and here is
Mademoiselle Catinat, who is your hostess."
The stranger ascended the stair, and paid his greetings to them both
with the air of a man who was as shy as a wild deer, and yet who had
steeled himself to carry a thing through. He walked with them to the
sitting-room, and then in an instant was gone again, and they heard his
feet thudding upon the stairs. Presently he was back, with a lovely
glossy skin in his hands. "The bear is for your father, mademoiselle,"
said he. "This little skin I have brought from America for you. It is
but a trifle, and yet it may serve to make a pair of mocassins or a
pouch."
Adele gave a cry of delight as her hands sank into the depths of its
softness. She might well admire it, for no king in the world could have
had a finer skin. "Ah, it is beautiful, monsieur," she cried; "and what
creature is it? and where did it come from?"
"It is a black fox. I shot it myself last fall up near the Iroquois
villages at Lake Oneida."
She pressed it to her cheek, her white face showing up like marble
against its absolute blackness. "I am sorry my father is not here to
welcome you, monsieur," she said; "but I do so very heartily in his
place. Your room is above. Pierre will show you to it, if you wish."
"My room? For what?"
"Why, monsieur, to sleep in!"
"And must I sleep in a room?"
De Catinat laughed at the gloomy face of the American.
"You shall not sleep there if you do not wish," said he.
The other brightened at once and stepped across to the further window,
which looked down upon the court-yard. "Ah," he cried. "There is a
beech-tree there, mademoiselle, and if I might take my blanket out
yonder, I should like it better than any room. In winter, indeed, one
must do it, but in summer I am smothered with a ceiling pressing down
upon me."
"You are not from a town then?" said De Catinat.
"My father lives in New York--two doors from the house of Peter
Stuyvesant, of whom you must have heard. He is a very hardy man, and he
can do it, but I--even a few days of Albany or of Schenectady are enough
for me. My life has been in the woods."
"I am sure my father would wish you to sleep where you like and to do
what you like, as long as it makes you happy."
"I thank you, mademoiselle. Then I shall take my things out there, and
I shall groom my horse."
"Nay, there is Pierre."
"I am used to doing it myself."
"Then I will come with you," said De Catinat, "for I would have a word
with you. Until to-morrow, then, Adele, farewell!"
"Until to-morrow, Amory."
The two young men passed downstairs together, and the guardsman followed
the American out into the yard.
"You have had a long journey," he said.
"Yes; from Rouen."
"Are you tired?"
"No; I am seldom tired."
"Remain with the lady, then, until her father comes back."
"Why do you say that?"
"Because I have to go, and she might need a protector."
The stranger said nothing, but he nodded, and throwing off his black
coat, set to work vigorously rubbing down his travel-stained horse.