A week, a fortnight, a month; what are they in the long, long,
boundless lapse of time? A point--a mere point on which the eye of
memory hardly rests in the look-back of a lifetime, unless some of
those marking facts which stamp particular periods indelibly upon the
heart have given it a durable significance. Yet, even in so brief a
space, how much may be done. Circumscribe it as you will--make it a
single hour--tie down the passing of that hour to one particular spot;
and in that hour, and on that spot, deeds may be written on eternity
affecting the whole earth at the time, affecting the whole human race
forever. No man can ever overestimate the value of the actions of an
hour.
Within the period of Jean Charost's sickness and recovery, up to the
time when he fully regained his consciousness, events had been going
on around him which greatly influenced, not only his fate, but the
fate of mighty nations. The operation, indeed, was not immediate; but
it was direct and clear; and we must pause for a moment in the more
domestic history which we are giving, to dwell upon occurrences of
general importance, without a knowledge of which our tale could hardly
be understood.
In confusion and dismay, accompanied by few attendants, and in a
somewhat stealthy manner, John of Burgundy fled from Paris, after
making his strange and daring confession of the murder of his near
kinsman, and the brother of his king.
When informed of the avowal, the Duke of Bourbon, his uncle, and many
other members of the king's council, expressed high displeasure that
the Duke of Berri and the King of Sicily had suffered him to quit the
door of the council-chamber, except as a prisoner; and perhaps those
two princes themselves saw the error they had committed. Had they
acted boldly and decidedly upon the mere sense of justice and right,
France would have been spared many a bloody hour, a disastrous defeat,
and a long subjugation. But when the time of repentance came,
repentance was too late. The Duke of Burgundy was gone, and the tools
of his revenge, though he had boldly named them, had followed their
lord.
All had gone, as criminals flying from justice, and such was their
terror and apprehension of pursuit, that they threw down spiked balls
in the snow behind them as they went, to lame the horses of those who
might follow. In the course of his flight, however, the Duke of
Burgundy recovered in part his courage and a sense of his dignity. His
situation was still perilous indeed; for he had raised enmity and
indignation against him in the hearts of all the princes of the blood
royal, and of many of the noblest men in France. Nay more, he had
alienated the most sincere and the most honorable of his own
followers, while the king himself, just recovered from one of his
lamentable fits of insanity, was moved by every feeling of affection,
and by the sense of justice and of honor, to punish the shameless
murderer of his brother.
No preparation of any importance had been made to meet this peril; and
the Duke of Burgundy was saved alone by the hesitating counsels of old
and timid men, who still procrastinated till is was too late to act.
In the mean time, the murderer determined upon his course. He not only
avowed, but attempted to justify the act upon motives so wild, so
irrational, so destitute of every real and substantial foundation,
that they could not deceive a child, and no one even pretended to be
deceived. He accused his unhappy victim of crimes that Louis of
Orleans never dreamed of--of aiming at the crown--of practicing upon
the health and striking at the life of the king, his brother, by
magical arts and devices. He did all, in short, to calumniate his
memory, and to represent his assassination as an act necessary to the
safety of the crown and the country. At the same time, he sent
messengers to his good citizens of Flanders, to his vassals of Artois,
to all his near relations, to all whom he could persuade or could
command, to demand immediate aid and assistance against the vengeful
sword which he fancied might pursue him, and he soon found himself at
the head of a force with which he might set the power of his king at
defiance. Lille, Ghent, Amiens, bristled with armed men, and John of
Burgundy soon felt that the murder of his cousin had put the destinies
of France into his hands.
While this was taking place in the north and west, a different scene
was being enacted in Paris; a scene which, if the popular heart was
not the basest thing that ever God created, the popular mind the
lightest and most unreasonable, should have roused the whole citizens
to grief for him whom they had lost, to indignation against his daring
murderer. The Duchess of Orleans, accompanied by her youngest son,
entered Paris as a mourner, and threw herself at the feet of her
brother and her king, praying for simple justice. The will of the
murdered prince was opened; and, though his faults were many and
glaring, that paper showed, the frank and generous character of the
man, and was refutation enough of the vile calumnies circulated
against him. So firm and strong had been his confidence, so full and
clear his intention of maintaining in every respect the agreement of
pacification lately signed between himself and the Duke of Burgundy,
that he left the guardianship of his children to the very man who had
so treacherously caused his assassination. None of his friends, none
who had ever served him, were forgotten, and the tenacity of his
affection was shown by his remembering many whom he had not seen for
years. It was not wonderful, then, that those who knew and loved him
clung to his memory with strong attachment, and with a reverence which
some of his acts might not altogether warrant. It would not have been
wonderful if the generous closing of his life had taught the populace
of Paris to forget his faults and to revere his character. But the
herd of all great cities is but as a pack of hounds, to be cried on by
the voice of the huntsman against any prey that is in view; and the
herd of Paris is more reckless in its fierceness than any other on all
the earth.
Fortune was with the Duke of Burgundy, and alas! boldness, decision,
and skill likewise. He held a conference with the Duke of Berri, and
the King of Sicily in his own city of Amiens, swarming with his armed
men. He placed over the door of the humble house in which he lodged
two lances crossed, the one armed with its steel head, the other
unarmed, ungarlanded--a significant indication that he was ready for
peace or war. The reproaches of the princes he repelled with
insolence, and treated their counsels and remonstrances with contempt.
Instead of coming to Paris and submitting himself humbly to the king,
as they advised, he marched to St. Denis with a large force, and then,
after a day's hesitation, entered the capital, armed cap-à-pie, amid
the acclamations of the populace.
The Hôtel d'Artois, already a place of considerable strength, received
additional fortifications, and all the houses round about it were
filled with his armed men; but especial care was taken that the
soldiery should commit no excess upon the citizens, and though he
bearded his king upon the throne, and overawed the royal council, with
the true art of a demagogue he was humble and courteous toward the
lowest citizens, flattered those whom he despised, and eagerly sought
to make converts to his party in every class of society, partly by
corruption, and partly by terror. Wherever he went the people followed
at his heels, shouting his name, and vociferating, "Noël, noël!" and
gradually the unhappy king, oppressed by his own vassal, though adored
by his people, fell back into that lamentable state from which he had
but lately recovered.
Such was the state of Paris when Jean Charost raised his head, and
gazed around the room in which he was lying. His sight was somewhat
dim, his brain was somewhat dizzy; feeble he felt as infancy; but yet
it was a pleasure to him to feel himself in that little room again, to
fancy himself moving in plain mediocrity, to believe that his
experience of courtly life was all a dream. What a satire upon all
those objects which form so many men's vain aspirations!
When he had gazed at the window, and at the door, and at all the
little objects that were scattered directly before his eyes, he turned
feebly to look at things nearer to him. He thought he heard a sigh
close to his bedside; but a plain curtain was drawn round the head of
the bed, and he could only see from behind it part of a woman's black
robe falling in large folds over the knee.
The little rustle that he made in turning seemed to attract the
attention of the watcher. The curtain was gently drawn back, and he
beheld his mother's face gazing at him earnestly. Oh, it was a
pleasant sight; and he smiled upon her with the love that a son can
only feel for a mother.
"My son--my dear son," she cried; "you are better. Oh yes, you are
better?" And, darting to the door, she called to him who had just gone
out, "Messire Jacques, Messire Jacques. He is awake now; and he knows
me!"
"Gently, gently, dear lady," said Jacques C[oe]ur, returning to the
room. "We must have great quiet, and all will go well."
The widow sat down and wept, and the good merchant placed himself by
the young man's side, looked down upon him with a fatherly smile, and
pressed his fingers on the wrist, saying, "Ay, the Syrian drug has
done marvels. Canst thou speak, my son?"
Jean Charost replied in a voice much stronger than might have been
expected; but Jacques C[oe]ur fell into a fit of thought even while he
spoke, which lasted some two or three minutes, and the young man was
turning toward his mother again, when the good merchant murmured, as
if speaking to himself, "I know not well how to act--there are dangers
every way. Listen to me, my son, but with perfect calmness, and let me
have an answer from your own lips, which I can send to the great man
whose messenger waits below. Two days ago we heard that the Duke of
Burgundy had caused inquiries to be made concerning you, as where you
were to be found, and when you had left the Hôtel d'Orleans. To-day he
has sent a gentleman to inquire if you will take service with him. He
offers you the post of second squire of his body, and promises
knighthood on the first occasion. What do you answer, Jean?"
Jean Charost thought for a moment, and then laid his hand upon his
brow; but at length he said, "'Twere better to tell him that I am too
ill to answer, or even to think, but that I will either wait upon him
or send him my reply in a few days."
"Wisely decided," said Jacques C[oe]ur, rising. "That answer will do
right well;" and, quitting the room, he left the door open behind him,
so that the young man could hear him deliver the message word for
word, merely prefacing it by saying, "He sends his humble duty to his
highness, and begs to say--"
A rough voice, in a somewhat haughty tone, replied, "Is he so very
ill, then, sir merchant? His highness is determined to know in all
cases who is for him and who is against him. I trust you tell me true,
therefore."
"You can go up, fair sir, and see," replied Jacques C[oe]ur; "but I
must beg you not to disturb him with any talk."
The other voice made no reply, but the moment after Jean Charost could
hear a heavy step coming up the stairs, and a good-looking man, of a
somewhat heavy countenance, completely armed, but with his beaver up,
appeared in the doorway. He merely looked in, however, and the pale
countenance and emaciated frame of the young gentleman seemed to
remove his doubts at once.
"That will do," he said. "I can now tell what I have seen. The duke
will expect an answer in a few days. If he dies, let him know, for
there are plenty eager for the post, I can tell you."
Thus saying, he turned away and closed the door; and Madame De Brecy
exclaimed, "God forbid that you should die, my son, or serve that bad
man either."
"So say I too," replied Jean Charost. "I know not why you should feel
so regarding him, dear mother, but I can not divest my mind of a
suspicion that he countenanced, if he did not prompt, the death of the
Duke of Orleans."
"Do you not know that he has avowed it?" exclaimed Madame De Brecy;
but her son's face turned so deadly pale, even to the very lips, that
Jacques C[oe]ur interposed, saying gently, "Beware--beware, dear lady.
He can not bear any such tidings now. He will soon be well enough to
hear all."
His judgment proved right. From that moment every hour gave Jean
Charost some additional strength; and that very day, before nightfall,
he heard much that imported him greatly to know. He now learned that
the Duchess of Orleans, after a brief visit to the capital to demand
justice upon the murderers of her husband, had judged it prudent to
retire to Blois, and to withdraw all the retainers of the late duke.
Jean Charost, being in no situation to bear so long a journey, she had
commended him especially to the care of Jacques C[oe]ur, who had
ridden in haste to Paris on the news of assassination. He now learned,
also, that one of the last acts of the duke had been to leave him a
pension of three hundred crowns--then a large sum--charged upon the
county of Vertus, and that a packet addressed to him, sealed with the
duke's private signet, and marked, "To be read by his own eye alone,"
had been found among the papers at the château of Beauté.
He would have fain heard more, and prolonged the conversation upon
subjects so interesting to him, but Jacques C[oe]ur wisely refused to
gratify him, and contrived to dole out his information piece by piece,
avoiding, as far as possible, all that could excite or agitate him. A
pleasant interlude, toward the fall of evening, was afforded by the
arrival of Martin Grille, whose joy at seeing his young master roused
from a stupor which he had fancied would only end in death was
touching in itself, although it assumed somewhat ludicrous forms. He
capered about the room as if he had been bit by a tarantula, and in
the midst of his dancing he fell upon his knees, and thanked God and
the blessed Virgin for the miraculous cure of his young lord, which he
attributed entirely to his having vowed a wax candle of three pounds'
weight to burn in the Lady Chapel of the Nôtre Dame in case of Jean
Charost's recovery. It seems that since the arrival of Madame de Brecy
in Paris, she and Martin Grille had equally divided the task of
sitting up all night with her son; and well had the faithful valet
performed his duty, for, without an effort, or any knowledge on his
part, Jean Charost had won the enthusiastic love and respect of one
who had entered his service with a high contempt for his want of
experience, and perhaps some intention of making the best of a good
place.
Well has it been said that force of character is the most powerful of
moral engines, for it works silently, and even without the
consciousness of those who are subject to its influence, upon all that
approaches it. How often is it that we see a man of no particular
brilliance of thought, of manner, or of expression, come into the
midst of turbulent and unruly spirits, and bend them like osiers to
his will. Some people will have it that it is the clearness with which
his thoughts are expressed, or the clearness with which they are
conceived, the definiteness of his directions, the promptness of his
decisions, which gives him this power; but if we look closely, we
shall find that it is force of character--a quality of the mind which
men feel in others rather than perceive, and which they yield to often
without knowing why.
The following morning rose like a wayward child, dull and sobbing; but
Jean Charost woke refreshed and reinvigorated, after a long, calm
night of sweet and natural sleep. His mother was again by his bedside,
and she took a pleasure in telling him how carefully Martin Grille had
preserved all his little treasures in the Hôtel d'Orleans, at a time
when the assassination of the duke had thrown all the better members
of the household into dismay and confusion, and left the house itself,
for a considerable time, at the mercy of the knaves and scoundrels
that are never wanting in a large establishment.
She was interrupted in her details by the entrance of the very person
of whom she spoke, and at the same time loud cries and shouts and
hurras rose up from the street, inducing Jean Charost to inquire if
the king were passing along.
"No, fair sir," answered Martin Grille. "It is the king's king. But,
on my life, my lord of Burgundy does not much fear rusting his armor,
or he would not ride through the streets on such a day as this."
"Does he go armed, then?" asked Jean Charost.
"From head to foot," answered his mother; and Martin Grille added, "He
is seldom without four or five hundred men-at-arms with him. Such a
sight was never seen in Paris. But I must go my ways, and get the news
of the day, for these are times when every man should know whatever
his neighbor is doing."
"I fear your intelligence must stop somewhat short of that," said Jean
Charost.
"I shall get all the intelligence I want," replied the valet, with a
sapient nod of the head. "I have a singing bird in the court cage that
always sings me truly;" and away he went in search of news.
During his absence, a consultation was held between Madame De Brecy,
her son, and Jacques C[oe]ur as to what was to be done in regard to
the message of the Duke of Burgundy. "We have only put off the evil
day," said Jacques C[oe]ur, "and some reply must soon be given."
"My reply can be but one," answered Jean Charost; "that I will never
serve a murderer; still less serve the murderer of my dear lord."
Madame De Brecy looked uneasy, and the face of Jacques C[oe]ur was
very grave.
"You surely would not have me do so, my dear mother?" said the young
gentleman, raising himself on his arm, and gazing in her face. "You
could not wish me, my good and honorable friend?"
"No, Jean, no," answered Jacques C[oe]ur; "but yet such a reply is
perilous; and before it is made, we must be beyond the reach of the
strong arm that rules all things in this capital. You have had a
taste, my son, of what great men will dare do to those who venture to
oppose them, even in their most unjust commands. Depend upon it, the
Duke of Burgundy will not scruple at acts which the king's council
themselves would not venture to authorize. Why he should wish to
engage you in his service I can not tell; but that he does so
earnestly is evident, and refusal will be very dangerous, even in the
mildest form."
"Some fanciful connection between my fate and his was told him one
night by an astrologer," said Jean Charost. "That is the only motive
he can have."
"Perhaps so," replied Jacques C[oe]ur, thoughtfully; and then he
added, the moment after, "and yet I do not know. His highness is not
one to be influenced in his conduct by any visionary things; they may
have weight with him in thought, but not in action. If he had been
told that his death would follow the poor duke's as a natural
consequence, he would have killed him notwithstanding. He must have
seen something in you, my young friend, that he likes--that he thinks
will suit some of his purposes."
"He has seen little of me that should so prepossess him," answered the
young gentleman; "he has seen me peremptorily refuse to obey his own
commands, and obstinately deny the council the information they
wanted, even though they tried to wring it out by torture."
"Probably the very cause," answered Jacques C[oe]ur; "he loves men of
resolution. But let us return to the subject, my young friend. Your
answer must be somewhat softened. We must say that you are still too
ill to engage in any service; that you must have some months for
repose, and that then you will willingly obey any of his highness's
just commands."
"Never, never!" answered Jean Charost, warmly; "I will never palter
with my faith and duty toward the dead. If ever I can couch a lance
against this duke's breast, I will aim it well, and the memory of my
master will steady my arm; but serve him I will never, nor even lead
him to expect it."
Jacques C[oe]ur and Madame De Brecy looked at each other in silence;
but they urged him no more; and the only question in their minds now
was, what course they could take not to suffer the young man's safety
to be periled in consequence of a resolution which they dared not
disapprove.
In the midst of their consultation Martin Grille returned, evidently
burdened with intelligence, and that not of a very pleasant character.
"What is to be done, I know not," he said, with much trepidation; "I
can not, and I will not leave you, sir, whatever may come of it."
"What is the matter, Martin?" asked Jacques C[oe]ur. "Be calm, be calm
young man, and tell us plainly, whatever be the evil."
"Listen, then, listen," said Martin Grille, lowering his voice almost
to a whisper. "An order is given out secretly to seize every Orleanist
now remaining in Paris in his bed this night at twelve of the clock.
It is true; it is true, beyond all doubt. I had it from my cousin
Petit Jean, who got it from his father, old Caboche, now the Duke of
Burgundy's right-hand man in Paris."
"Then we must go at once," said Jacques C[oe]ur "Whatever be the risk,
we must try if you can bear the motion of a litter, Jean."
"But all the gates are closed except two," said Martin Grille, "and
they suffer no one to go out without a pass. News has got abroad of
all this. The queen went yesterday to Melun. The King of Sicily, the
Duke of Berri, the Duke of Britanny have fled this morning. The Duke
of Bourbon has been long gone, and the Burgundians are resolved that
no more shall escape."
Jacques C[oe]ur gazed sternly down upon the floor, and Madame De Brecy
wrung her hands in despair.
"Go, my friend, go," said Jean Charost; "you are not marked out as an
Orleanist. Take my mother with you. God may protect me even here. If
not, his will be done."
"Stay," cried Martin Grille, "stay! I have thought of a way, perhaps.
Many of these Burgundian nobles are poor. Can not you lend one of them
a thousand crowns, Monsieur Jacques, and get a pass for yourself and
your family. He will be glad enough to give it, to see a creditor's
back turned, especially when he knows he can keep him at arm's length
as long as he will. I am sure my young lord will repay you."
"Repay me!" exclaimed Jacques C[oe]ur, indignantly; "but your hint is
a good one. I will act upon it, but not exactly as you propose. Some
of them owe me enough already to wish me well out of Paris. Tell all
my people to get ready for instant departure; and look for a litter
that will hold two. I will away at once, and see what can be done."
"Have plenty of men with you, Messire Jacques," said Martin Grille,
eagerly; "men that can fight, for there are Burgundian bands
patrolling all round the city. I am not good at fighting, and my young
lord is as bad as I am now."
"We must take our chance," said Jacques C[oe]ur, and quitted the room.