HERVE'S DEMENTIA.
No sooner had Herve closed the street door upon his mother than he
slowly re-ascended the stairs to the upper chamber, saying to himself:
"It will take my mother an hour to reach La Catelle's house; at least as
long to return; father will not be home until midnight; I have two full
hours to myself. They shall be turned to profit."
Pressing with a convulsive hand against his heart the scapulary
containing Tezel's letter of absolution, Herve entered the room in which
Hena was left alone.
From the threshold Herve saw his sister on her knees. Astonished at her
posture, he stepped towards her and asked:
"Hena, what are you doing?"
"I was praying to God that He may guard mother, and restore our friend
to health," answered the young girl, rising; and she proceeded with a
sigh: "My heart feels heavy. May no misfortune threaten us."
Saying this, the confiding girl sat down to her embroidery. Her brother
took a seat beside her on a stool. After a few seconds he broke the
silence:
"Hena, do you remember that about three months ago I suddenly changed
towards you?"
Not a little surprised at these opening words, the young girl answered:
"Why recall those evil days, brother? Thank heaven, they are over; they
will not return."
"Do you remember," Herve proceeded without noticing his sister's words,
"do you remember that, so far from returning, I repelled your caresses?"
"I do not wish to remember that, Herve; I do not think of it now."
"Hena, the reason was I had made a strange discovery in my heart--I
loved you!"
The young girl dropped her needle, turned suddenly towards her brother,
and, fixing upon him her astonished eyes, looked at him for a moment in
silence. Thereupon, smiling, and in accents of tender reproach, she
said:
"How! Were you so long making the discovery that you loved me? And did
the discovery seem to you--strange?"
"Yes," answered Herve, ignoring the childlike reproach implied in his
sister's words; "yes, the discovery was slow--yes, it seemed to me
strange. Long did I struggle against that sentiment; my nights were
passed sleepless."
"You slept no more because you loved me? That's odd!"
"Because I loved you--"
"Come, Herve, it is not handsome to joke about so painful a subject. Do
you forget the sorrow that fell on us all when, all of a sudden, we saw
you become so somber, so silent, and almost to seem indifferent to us?
Our dear little Odelin, who departed since then to Milan with Master
Raimbaud, was probably less saddened by the thought of leaving us, than
by your coolness for us all."
"Remorse gave me neither peace, nor rest. Alas, I say correctly,
remorse."
"Remorse?" repeated the young girl stupefied. "I do not understand you."
"The tortures of my soul, coupled with a vague instinct of hope, drove
me to the feet of a holy man. He listened to me at the confessional. He
unrolled before my eyes the inexhaustible resources of the faith. Well,
my remorse vanished; peace re-entered my heart. Now, Hena, I love you
without remorse and without internal struggles. I love you in security."
"Well, if that is the game, I shall proceed with my embroidery," said
the young girl; and picking up her needle, she resumed her work, adding
in a playful tone: "Seeing that the Seigneur Herve loves me without
remorse and in security, all is said--although, for my part, I do not
fathom those big words 'struggles' and 'tortures' with regard to the
return of the affection of the Seigneur Herve for a sister who loves him
as much as she is beloved." But speedily dropping the spirit of banter
and sadly raising her eyes to her brother's, she continued: "Here, my
friend, I must quit jesting. You have long suffered. You seemed whelmed
with a secret sorrow. Come, what was the cause? I am still in the dark
thereon. Acquaint me with it."
"The cause was love for you, Hena!"
"Still at it? Come, Herve, I am but a very ignorant girl, beside you who
know Latin. But when you say that the cause of your secret sorrow was
your attachment for me--"
"I said love, Hena--"
"Love, attachment, tenderness--is it not all one?"
"You spoke to me day before yesterday of Brother St. Ernest-Martyr."
"I did. And only a short time ago I was talking about him with mother--"
Suddenly breaking off, Hena exclaimed: "Good God! Dear, good mother!
When I think of her being all alone at this hour on the street, without
anyone to protect her!"
"Be not alarmed. Our mother runs no danger whatever."
"May heaven hear you, Herve!"
"Let us return to Brother St. Ernest-Martyr, of whom you were just
before speaking with mother. Do you love the monk in the same manner
that you love me?"
"Can the two things be compared? I have spent my life beside you; you
are my brother--on the other hand, I have seen that poor monk but five
or six times, and then for a minute only."
"You love him--do not lie!"
"My God! In what a tone you speak, Herve. I have nothing to conceal."
"Do you love that monk?"
"Certainly--just as one loves all that is good and just. I know the
generous actions of Brother St. Ernest-Martyr. You, yourself, only a
few days ago, told me a very touching deed done by him."
"Do you constantly think of the monk?"
"Constantly, no. But this very evening I was saying to mother that I was
astonished I thought so frequently of him."
"Hena, suppose our parents thought of marrying you, and that the young
monk, instead of being a clergyman, was free, could become your husband
and loved you--would you wed him?"
"What a crazy supposition!"
"Let us suppose all I have said--that he is not a monk and loves you; if
our parents gave their consent to the marriage, would you accept that
man for your husband?"
"Dear brother, you are putting questions to me--"
"You would wed him with joy," Herve broke in with hollow voice, fixing
upon his sister a jealous and enraged eye that escaped her, seeing the
embroidery on which she was engaged helped her conceal the embarrassment
that the singular interrogatory to which she was being subjected threw
her into. Nevertheless, the girl's natural frankness regained the upper
hand, and without raising her eyes to her brother, Hena answered:
"Why should I not consent to wed an honorable man, if our parents
approved the marriage?"
"Accordingly, you love the monk! Yes, you love him passionately! The
thought of him obsesses you. Your grief and the sorrow that day before
yesterday you felt when he was carried wounded into the house, the tears
I surprised in your eyes--all these are so many symptoms of your love
for him!"
"Herve, I know not why, but your words alarm me, they disconcert me,
they freeze my heart, they make me feel like weeping. I did not feel
that way this evening when I conversed with mother about Brother St.
Ernest-Martyr. Besides, your face looks gloomy, almost enraged."
"I hate that monk to death!"
"My God! What has he done to you?"
"What has he done to me?" repeated Herve. "You love him! That is his
crime!"
"Brother!" cried Hena, rising from her work to throw herself on the neck
of her brother and holding him in a tight embrace. "Utter not such
words! You make me wretched!"
Convulsed with despair, Herve pressed his sister passionately to his
breast and covered her forehead and hair with kisses, while Hena,
innocently responding to his caresses, whispered with gentle emotion:
"Good brother, you are no longer angry, are you? If you only knew my
alarm at seeing you look so wicked!"
A heavy knock resounded at the street door, followed immediately by the
sonorous and merry voice of the Franc-Taupin singing his favorite song:
"A Franc-Taupin had an ash-tree bow,
All eaten with worms, and all knotted its cord;
_Derideron, vignette on vignon!! Derideron!_"
A tremor ran through Herve. Quickly recalling himself, he ran to the
casement, opened it, and leaning forward, cried out: "Good evening,
uncle!"
"Dear nephew, I am back from St. Denis. I did not wish to return to
Paris without telling you all good-day!"
"Oh, dear uncle, a great misfortune has happened! La Catelle is dying.
She sent for mother, who left at once. I could not accompany her, being
obliged to remain here with Hena in father's absence. We feel uneasy at
the thought that mother may have to come back all alone on this dark
night."
"All alone! By the bowels of St. Quenet, of what earthly use am I, if
not to protect my sister!" replied Josephin. "I shall start on a run to
La Catelle's, and see your mother home. Be not uneasy, my lad. When I
return I shall embrace you and your sister, if you are not yet in bed."
The Franc-Taupin hastened away. Herve shut the window, and returned in a
state of great excitement to Hena, who inquired:
"Why did you induce uncle to go to-night after mother? She is to stay
all night at La Catelle's. Why do you not answer me? Why is your face so
lowering? My God! What ails you? Brother, brother, do not look upon me
with such eyes! I am trembling all over."
"Hena, I love you--I love you carnally!"
"I--do not comprehend--what--you say. I do not understand your words.
You now frighten me. Your eyes are bloodshot."
"The kind of love you feel for that monk--that love I feel for you! I
love you with a passionate desire."
"Herve, you are out of your mind. You do not know what you say!"
"I must possess you!"
"Good God, am I also going crazy? Do my eyes--do my ears deceive me?"
"Hena--you are beautiful! Sister, I adore you--"
"Do not touch me! Mercy! Herve, brother, you are demented! Recognize
me--it is I--Hena--your own sister--it is I who am here before you--on
my knees."
"Come, come into my arms!"
"Help! Help! Mother! Father!"
"Mother is far away--father also. We are alone--in the dark--and I have
received absolution! You shall be mine, will ye nil ye!"
The monster, intent upon accomplishing his felony in obscurity, knocked
down the lamp with his fist, threw himself upon Hena, and gripped her in
his arms. The girl slipped away from him, reached the staircase that led
to the lower floor, and bounded down. Herve rushed after her, and seized
her as she was about to clear the lowest steps. The distracted child
called for help. Holding her with one hand, her brother tried to gag her
with the other, lest her cries be heard by the neighbors. Suddenly the
street door was thrown open, flooding the room with moonlight, and
disclosing Bridget on the threshold. Thunderstruck, the mother perceived
her daughter struggling in the arms of her brother, and still, though in
a smothered voice, crying: "Help! Help!" The wretch, now rendered
furious at the danger of his victim's escaping him, and dizzy with the
vertigo of crime, did not at first recognize Bridget. He flung Hena
behind him, and seizing a heavy iron coal-rake from the fireplace, was
about to use it for a club, not even recoiling before murder in order to
free himself from an importunate witness. Already the dangerous weapon
was raised when, by the light of the moon, the incestuous lad discovered
the features of his mother.
"Save yourself, mother," cried Hena between her sobs; "he is gone crazy;
he will kill you. Only your timely help saved me from his violent
assault."
"Infamous boy!" cried the mother. "That, then, was your purpose in
removing me from the house. God willed that half way to La Catelle's I
met her brother-in-law--"
"Be gone!" thundered back Herve, a prey to uncontrollable delirium; and
raising the iron coal-rake which he had lowered under the first impulse
of surprise at the sight of his mother, he staggered towards Bridget
yelling: "Be gone!"
"Matricide! Dare you raise that iron bar against me--your mother?"
"All my crimes are absolved in advance! Incest--parricide--all are
absolved! Be gone, or I kill you!"
Hardly were these appalling words uttered, when the sound of numerous
and rapidly approaching steps penetrated into the apartment through the
door that Bridget had left open. Almost immediately a troop of
patrolling archers, under the command of a sergeant-at-arms, and led by
a man in a black frock with the cowl drawn over his head, halted and
drew themselves up before the house of Christian. The Franc-Taupin had
met them a short distance from the Exchange Bridge. A few words,
exchanged among the soldiers, notified him of the errand they were on.
Alarmed at what he overheard, he had quickly retraced his steps and
followed them at a distance. The sergeant in command stepped in at the
very moment that Herve uttered the last menace to his mother.
"Does Christian Lebrenn dwell here?" asked the soldier. "Answer
quickly."
Ready to sink distracted, Bridget was not at first able to articulate a
word. Hena gathered strength to rise from the floor where Herve had
flung her, and ran to Bridget, into whose arms she threw herself. Herve
dropped at his feet the iron implement he had armed himself with, and
remained motionless, savage of mien, his arms crossed over his breast.
The man whose face was hidden by the cowl of his black frock--that man
was John Lefevre, the disciple of Ignatius Loyola--whispered a few words
in the ear of the sergeant. The latter again addressed Bridget, now in
still more peremptory tones:
"Is this the dwelling of Christian Lebrenn, a typesetter by trade?"
"Yes," answered Bridget, and greatly alarmed by the visit of the
soldiers, she added: "My husband is not at home. He will not be back
until late."
"You are the wife of Christian Lebrenn?" resumed the sergeant, and
pointing to Hena and then to Herve: "That young girl and that young man
are your children, are they not? By order of Monsieur John Morin, the
Criminal Lieutenant, I am commissioned to arrest Christian Lebrenn, a
printer, his wife, his son and his daughter as being charged with
heresy, and to take them to a safe place."
"My husband is not at home!" cried Bridget, her first thought being to
the safety of Christian, although herself stupefied with fear at the
threatened arrest. That instant, and standing a few steps behind the
archers, the Franc-Taupin, taller by a head than the armed troop before
him, caught the eyes of Bridget. With a sign he warned her to keep
silent. He then bent his long body in two, and vanished.
"Do you want to make us believe your husband is not at home?" resumed
the sergeant. "We shall search the house." Then turning to his men:
"Bind the hands of that young man, of the young girl and of the woman,
and keep guard over the prisoners."
John Lefevre, his face still concealed under the cowl of his frock,
could not be recognized by Bridget. He knew the inmates of the house, at
whose hearth he had often sat as a friend. He motioned to the sergeant
to follow him, and taking a lanthorn from the hand of one of the
archers, mounted the stairs, entered the chamber of the married couple,
and pointing with his finger to a cabinet in which Christian kept his
valuables, said to him:
"The papers in question must be in there, in a little casket of black
wood."
The key stood in the lock of the cabinet. The sergeant opened the two
doors. From one of the shelves he took down a casket of considerable
proportions.
"That is the one," said John Lefevre. "Give it to me. I shall place it
in the hands of Monsieur the Criminal Lieutenant."
"That Christian must be hiding somewhere," remarked the sergeant,
looking under the bed, and behind the curtains.
"It is almost certain," answered John Lefevre. "He rarely goes out at
night. There is all the greater reason to expect to find him in at this
hour, seeing he spent part of last night out of the house."
"Why did they not try to arrest him during the day at the printing
office of Monsieur Estienne?" the sergeant inquired while keeping up his
search. "He could not have been missed there."
"As to that, my friend, I shall say, in the first place, that, due to
the untoward absence of Monsieur the Criminal Lieutenant, who was
summoned early this morning to Cardinal Duprat's palace, our order of
arrest could not be delivered until too late in the evening. In the
second place, you know as well as I that the artisans of Monsieur
Estienne are infected with heresy; they are armed; and might have
attempted to resist the arrest of their companion. No doubt the archers
would have prevailed in the end. But Christian might have made his
escape during the struggle, whereas the chances were a thousand to one
he could be taken by surprise at his house, in the dark, along with his
family."
"And yet he still escapes us," observed the sergeant, after some fresh
searches. Noticing the door of Hena's chamber, he entered and rummaged
that room also, with no better results, and said: "Nothing in this
direction either."
"Come, let us investigate the garret. Give me the lanthorn, and follow
me. If he is not there either, then we must renounce his capture for
to-night. Fortunately we got the woman and the children--besides this,"
added the Jesuit, tapping upon the casket under his arm. "We shall find
Christian, sure enough."
Saying this, John Lefevre opened the panel leading to the nook where
stood the ladder to the attic; he climbed it, followed by the sergeant,
arrived in the garret which had served as refuge to the unknown, noticed
the mattress, some crumbs of bread and the remains of some fruit, pens
and an inkhorn on a stool, and, scattered over the floor, fragments of
paper covered with a fine and close handwriting.
"Somebody was hiding here, and spent some time, too!" exclaimed the
sergeant excitedly. "This mattress, these pens, indicate the presence of
a stranger of studious habits;" and running to the dormer window that
opened upon the river, he mused: "Can Christian have made his escape by
this issue?"
While the archer renewed his search, vainly rummaging every nook and
corner of the garret, John Lefevre carefully collected the bits of paper
that were strewn over the floor, assorted them, and kneeling down beside
the stool, on which he placed the lanthorn, examined the manuscript
intently. Suddenly a tremor ran over his frame, and turning to the
sergeant he said:
"There is every reason to believe that Christian Lebrenn is not in the
house. I think I can guess the reason of his absence. Nevertheless,
before quitting the place we must search the bedroom of his two sons. It
is in the rear of the ground floor room. Let us hurry. Your expedition
is not yet ended. We shall probably have to leave Paris to-night, and
carry our investigation further."
"Leave Paris, reverend Father?"
"Yes, perhaps. But I shall first have to notify the Criminal Lieutenant.
What a discovery! To be able at one blow to crush the nest of
vipers!--_ad majorem Dei gloriam!_"[34]
John Lefevre and the sergeant re-descended to the ground floor. After a
few whispered words to the soldier, the Jesuit departed, carrying with
him the casket in which the chronicles of the Lebrenn family were
locked.
The chamber occupied by Herve was ransacked as vainly as had been the
other apartments of the house. During these operations Bridget had
striven to allay the fright of her daughter. Herve, somber and sullen,
his hands bound like his mother's and sister's, remained oblivious to
what was happening around him. Giving up the capture of Christian, the
sergeant returned to his prisoners and announced to Bridget that he was
to carry both her and her children away with him. The poor woman
implored him to take pity on her daughter who was hardly able to keep
her feet. The sergeant answered harshly, that if the young heretic was
unable to walk she would be stripped and dragged naked over the streets.
Finally, addressing his archers, he concluded:
"Three of you are to remain in this house. When Christian raps to be let
in you will open the door, and seize his person."
Bridget could not repress a moan of anguish at hearing the order.
Christian, she reflected, was fatedly bound to fall into the trap, as he
would return home unsuspecting. The three archers locked themselves up
on the ground floor. The others, led by their chief, left the house,
and, taking Bridget and her two children with them, marched away to lead
them to prison.
"For mercy's sake," said the unhappy mother to the sergeant, "untie my
hands that I may give my daughter the support of my arm. She is so
feeble that it will be impossible for her to follow us."
"That's unnecessary," answered the sergeant. "On the other side of the
bridge you will be separated. You are not to go to the same prison as
your daughter."
"Good God! Where do you mean to take her to?"
"To the Augustinian Convent. You are to go to the Chatelet. Come, move
on, move quickly."
Herve, who had until then remained sullenly impassive, said impatiently
to the sergeant:
"If I am to be taken to a convent, I demand to go to the Cordeliers."
"The Criminal Lieutenant is to decide upon that," replied the sergeant.
After a short wait, the archers took up their march. Alas! How shall the
pain and desolation of Hena and her mother be described at learning they
were not to be allowed even the consolation of suffering this latest
trial in each other's company? Nevertheless, a ray of hope lighted
Bridget's heart. Her last words with the sergeant had been exchanged
near the cross that stood in the middle of the bridge, and close to
which the archers were passing at the time. Christian's wife saw the
Franc-Taupin on his knees at the foot of the crucifix, gesticulating
wildly, raising his head and crying out like a frantic devotee:
"Lord! Lord! _Thy eye has seen everything. Thy ear has heard
everything_; there is nothing hidden from Thee. Have pity upon me,
miserable sinner, that I am! Thanks to Thee _he will be saved_. I hope
so! In the name of the most Holy Trinity."
"There is a good Catholic who will not fail to be saved," said the
sergeant, making the sign of the cross and looking at the kneeling
figure of the Franc-Taupin, who furiously smote his chest without
intermission, while the archers redoubled their pace and marched away,
dragging their prisoners behind them.
"God be blessed!" said Bridget to herself, understanding the information
that Josephin meant to convey. "My brother has seen everything and heard
everything. He will remain in the neighborhood of the house. He expects
to save Christian from the danger that threatens him. He will inform
Christian that his daughter has been taken to the Augustinian Convent
and I to the Chatelet prison."
Such indeed was the purpose of the Franc-Taupin. When the archers had
disappeared he drew near to Christian's house and contemplated it sadly
and silently by the light of the moon. Accidentally his eyes fell upon a
scapulary that had dropped near the threshold. He recognized it, having
more than once seen it hanging on the breast of Herve. The strings of
the relic had snapped during the struggle of Hena with her brother, and
the bag being thus detached from Herve's neck it had slipped down
between his shirt and his jacket, and dropped to the ground. The
Franc-Taupin picked up the relic, and opened it mechanically. Finding
therein the letter of absolution, he ran his eye hurriedly over the
latter, and at once replaced it in the scapulary.