THE HALL OF THE CHEVALIERS
The report of the capture of the Black Seigneur spread from Mount to
town; from rock to shore. Pilgrims repeated, peasants circulated it;
many credited; a few disbelieved. Like shadows had his comrades and
the escaped prisoners vanished, leaving no trace, save one--an
over-turned car and severed rope at the foot of the _poulain_, without
the fortifications. And flocking to that point, of greater interest
now than shrine or sanctuary, the pilgrims gazed around; down the
rocks; up the almost perpendicular planking to what looked like a mere
pigeon-hole in the side of the cliff. Then ominous grumblings escaped
them; some shook their fists at the black wall; others scoffed at
distant sounds of priestly hallelujahs. Had the soldiers that day
appeared in the town or on the beach, serious trouble would have
ensued. For the time, however, they remained discreetly housed, while
supplies for pilgrims' needs were, by the commandant's orders, so
curtailed, many of the indigent multitude, urged by pinched stomachs,
began, ere night, to wend their way from strand to shore. But as they
left the vicinity of the Mount, they turned last looks of hatred toward
the rock.
His Excellency, the Governor, wasted no time considering the humor of
the masses; their resentment, or displeasure, signified nothing; his
own complacency left little room for speculation on that score. He was
undeniably satisfied; even the escape of the prisoners and the loss of
the soldiers at the guard-house, or in the wheel-room, was overshadowed
by the single capture. This contentment, however, he kept to himself;
instigated a rigorous inquiry, and prepared to punish certain
offenders. But the principal of these he could not reach; when
released from the iron cage, the hunchback, knowing he would be called
upon to answer for his part in the night's work, had made the best use
of his short legs to place a long distance between himself and the
Mount.
The sentinel that allowed the Black Seigneur to pass through the
entrance near the barracks; the watchman encountered on the stairway,
and the soldier that had been overpowered in the stable, his Excellency
could, however, lay hands on, and promptly ordered into custody to
await his official attention. For this last culprit, the
commandant--mindful, perhaps, of bolstering his own
position--interceded; pointing out that the man had to get the gag from
his mouth and give the alarm; also, that the mountebank's appearance
and acting had been calculated to deceive even one of the Governor's
discernment. Which remark his Excellency had received with
sphinx-like, and not altogether reassuring, gravity; had reserved his
verdict, and continued, after his own fashion, to collect the details
of the affair.
This searching process should have led him almost at once to his
daughter--a puzzling figure in the maze of events; but the Governor
exhibited no haste in approaching that important witness. Only when he
had marshaled his other testimony and put it in order did the scope of
his sifting extend to the girl. And then had his manner been strictly
judicial: maintaining an imperturbable mask, he professed not to notice
the pallor of her face, the unnatural brightness of her glance.
"When you sent for the mountebank to come to your apartments, did you
know who he was?" the Governor had asked.
"No."
"When did you find out?"
"When you entered the room."
"Why did you not give the alarm then?"
"Because," she hesitated; her face changed, "he would have killed you,
I think--if I had!"
"Was that solicitude for me the only reason?"
"Why, what other could there be?"
"What other truly? And after he left with the commandant--why did you
not, then, inform me?"
"You remember you had something important, from the King, to consider!"
hastily.
"More important than this?"
"He was going to be locked up," was the best reply she could make.
"And in the morning set free!"
She did not answer.
"And yet, you gave the word that enabled us to capture him at the
wheel-house! How, by the way, came you there--in the wheel-house?"
"I saw him from the abbot's bridge; heard him tell the watchman he had
a message to deliver at your palace, and followed."
"Again feeling solicitude for me?"
"I did not know--he would dare much; and what does it matter now?"
almost wildly. "You have captured him, shut him up somewhere in some
terrible, deep dungeon, where--"
"He is safe? True; that is the main consideration."
Thereafter had the subject of the Black Seigneur been dropped between
them; the pilgrimage over, the Mount resumed its normal aspect, but
only for a little while! One day about a week later, a bright cortege
whose appearance was in marked contrast to that of the beggarly
multitude, late visitors to the rock, came riding down the road through
the forest to the sea; at the verge of the sands, stopped for a first
distant impression of the rock.
"Noble monument, I salute you!" Smiling, debonair, the Marquis de
Beauvillers removed his hat.
"And the noble mistress thereof?" suggested one of his train.
"She, of course!" he said, still surveying a scene different from that
final memory he had carried away with him. Then had the rock reared
itself in all the glamour of a sunny day; now was the sky overcast,
while through a sullen mist the Mount loomed like a shadow itself.
"A cold place for our gay Elise!" One or two who viewed the sight for
the first time looked disappointed; even the Marquis appeared for the
instant more sober; but immediately regained his lively demeanor.
"Wait until you have seen it at its best," he retorted carelessly, and
set the pace across the sands.
Midway, where once on the sands the men of Brittany had engaged in
fierce conflict the ancient abbot's forces, were the new-comers met by
an imposing guard; escorted with due honor through the gates, and up
the narrow street of the town.
As he climbed the winding highway, my lord, the Marquis, bestowed
approving nod and smile this way and that; it may be that he already
felt a nearer affiliation with these people; for his glance, gracious,
condescending in passing, was that of a man armed with the knowledge
that he, kinsman of the King, might some day be called upon to govern
here. But to these advances, the townspeople responded ill, and the
young noble's brow went delicately up, as if a little amused! _Mon
dieu!_ did not unfriendly eyes peer from every lurking place around the
royal palaces and pleasure grounds near Paris; and had they not
encountered them all the way to the sea? People were the same
everywhere; must be treated like bad children, and, with relays of
troops from the capital to the sea, from the strand to the Mount's high
top, one could afford to smile at their petty humors. Above all, when
one had more momentous matter for consideration! And my lord lifted
his head higher, toward a rampart, where some one had once bid him _au
revoir_, and where he might yet in fancy see a fluttering ribbon wave a
bright adieu!
But to-day my lady, the Princess of the Rock, was not there; waited
above, with her father, to receive him--then--in the great Hall of the
Chevaliers. Until that morning she had not known of the coming of the
Marquis, an impatient suitor, following the courier and the perfumed
missive acquainting her with the noble's near approach. Certainly had
she shown surprise; but whether she was pleased or not, his Excellency
could not tell.
He was still uncertain; standing, near the raised gallery, in the
ancient _salle des chevaliers_, from time to time regarded her
furtively! Often had she looked from one of the round windows,
commanding a view of the shore and the sands; many times turned away.
At first sight of the company on the beach, the Governor had seen the
girl's face alter and noted the involuntary start she had given.
Whereupon, moving toward one of the giant fireplaces, had he sought for
the sake of diplomacy and the end in view, to turn their conversation
into a channel that should have interested her; spoke of plans to be
made; preparations for festivities and merrymaking commensurate with
the circumstances. But to these suggestions of gaieties, the prelude
to a stately ceremony, had she hardly listened; paused absently before
the blazing logs; once or twice seemed about to say something and
stopped.
She was silent now, a slender figure beneath that great canopy of stone
designed for the shelter of a score of knights; nervously twining and
intertwining her fingers, she looked out at the shadows moving between
the columns, playing around the bases, or melting in the vaulting.
"They should be almost here now," observed his Excellency, again
seeking to break that spell of constraint, when suddenly she stepped to
him.
"_Mon pere_," her voice sounded strained, unnatural, "it was you who
wanted this marriage?"
"Yes," he had answered in some surprise; "yes."
"And I have not opposed you--the King--"
"Opposed? No! Of course not!"
"Then," more hurriedly, "must you do something in return for me! I do
not want my--the wedding festivities--marred by anything unpleasant!
Promise that nothing will happen to him, the Black Seigneur, until
after--"
"Impossible!" The sudden virulence her unexpected request awoke could
not be concealed.
"Very well!" Before the anger in his gaze, her own eyes flashed like
steel. "In that case, you can send the Marquis back! For I will not
see him--to-day, to-morrow or any time again!"
Long he looked at her; the white face; the tightly compressed lips; the
eyes that would not flinch! They reminded him of another's--were of
the same hue--so like, and yet so different! Unlike, in bespeaking a
will he could not break! What he said, matters not; his face wore an
ashy shade. She did not answer in words; but he felt, with strange
bitterness, a revulsion; she seemed almost suddenly to have become
hostile to him.
Gay voices sounded without; nearer; she walked to a door opposite the
entrance their visitors were approaching. An instant, and she would
have passed out, when the Governor spoke.
But the Marquis, stepping quickly in a few moments later, noted nothing
amiss between them. "Your Excellency!" With filial respect he greeted
the Governor. "My Lady!" Gaily, approvingly, his eye passed over her;
then in that hall dedicated to chivalry, a graceful figure, he sank to
his knee; raised a small cold hand, and pressed it to his lips.