LOUISE GAUTHIER FALLS INTO THE HANDS OF LACHAUSSÉE
Whilst the good gossipers of Paris, on the morning after the arrest
of Exili at the Pont Notre Dame, were everywhere discussing the events
of the preceding evening, the principal actors in the scene were quiet
enough. On board the boat-mill everything was tranquil. The morning
sun was high up, sparkling upon the river, and glistening in the lofty
casements, indenting the tall, sloping roofs of the houses adjoining
the Seine. The quays were again filled with busy crowds; the buzz and
bustle of the foot passengers and the rumbling of ignoble morning
vehicles--for the aristocratic quarters still slumbered--once more
fell on the ear; and the mountebanks and charlatans of the Pont Neuf
and Carrefour du Châtelet were arriving with their stalls and
apparatus to prepare for another day’s speculation upon the credulity
of their customers.
Benoit Mousel was the first of the three inmates of the mill that was
stirring, and he blessed himself as the clock of the Tour d’Horloge
read him a lesson upon his sluggishness. But he had been late in bed.
The Garde Bourgeois had remained some little time after the prisoner
had been taken; and even when they went, taking their dead comrades
with them, the excitement and alarm of the Languedocian and his wife
were too great to allow them to think of retiring to rest. Nor could
Benoit persuade himself, in spite of some comforting assurances from
the guard, that he was altogether exculpated from the suspicion of
being an accomplice of Exili. In the stormy night that followed, even
until morning, there was not a tile or fragment blown down from the
tottering houses on the Pont Notre Dame, upon the roof of the mill,
which did not cause him to start and tremble, with the belief that a
fresh party of the watch were coming to arrest him. Even his usual
narcotic, the clicking of the water-wheel, failed to lull him,
although aided by the gentle sway of the boat as it rocked in the
current, and his couch of empty sacks never before appeared so
uncomfortable.
His wife had shared her bed with her young guest, and was scarcely
less watchful and terrified than her husband; for Bathilde had not
been very long in Paris, and never cared to leave their little
floating tenement but to go to the market, or on Sunday when she
donned her best costume of Languedoc, and accompanied Benoit to some
of the resorts of the holiday-keepers beyond the walls; so that the
wild manners of the time and city were comparatively little known to
her. Louise was the only one of the party who slept throughout the
night. Worn, broken down, crushed in heart and spirits, she had almost
mechanically allowed Bathilde to officiate as her serving-woman; and a
faint smile which passed occasionally over her sad features was the
only token by which the good-tempered _paysanne_ knew that her
assistance was appreciated.
‘_Pardieu!_’ said Benoit, as they assembled to their morning repast;
‘I like the sun a little better than the night; how the clouds growled
at the angry wind! And how the wind chafed the lighters against the
piles of the bridge! Did you ever hear such a devil’s squeaking as
they made? Ugh!’
Benoit shuddered at the mere recollection of the sounds that had
rendered the night so fearful, and then directly afterwards attacked
the large log of bread, and one of a store of small cheeses, in a
manner that showed his mental disquietude had not in any way affected
his appetite.
‘Did you hear the rain, Benoit?’ asked Bathilde.
‘One must have had sorry ears not to have done so,’ he replied. ‘I
only dozed once; and then I dreamt I was tied to a stake in the Place
de Grêve, with a painted paper cap on my head, and the executioner
was lighting the faggots, when down came the rain and washed us all
away. Just then the storm awoke me.’
And he drowned the recalled terror in a horn of wine, poured out from
the rude earthen jug on the table.
‘You have eaten nothing, _petite_,’ said Bathilde, as she took the
hand of Louise in her own and pressed it kindly. ‘I am afraid you do
not like our city food.’
‘Indeed you are mistaken,’ returned Louise: ‘it is most excellent. But
I cannot eat. And yet,’ she added sadly, ‘I have tasted nothing for
two days.’
‘It’s a bad thing, sweetheart, not to eat,’ said Benoit, by way of
commentary on his own proceedings. ‘When I was courting Bathilde, if I
had not eaten and drank a great deal I should have died. Love is a
terrible thing for the appetite.’
‘We have no honey here, nor oil, like we have at Béziers,’ said
Bathilde.
‘Ay! Béziers!’ continued Benoit, with a fond reminiscence. ‘How I
used to eat the mulberries there! You know the mulberries at Béziers,
Ma’amselle Louise? And the old image of Pierre Pepesuc, that we used
to dress up once a year.’
‘And I made ribbons for his hat,’ said Bathilde; ‘because he kept the
town by himself, against the English, in the Rue Françoise.’
‘And the orchards on the bank of the Orb, and the vineyards, and the
farms all along the river,’ continued Benoit, warming up as he called
to mind the principal features of his beautiful Languedoc.
But it produced no corresponding animation in the pale face of Louise.
On the contrary, she bent down her head; and they saw the tears
falling, although she was evidently endeavouring to conceal her
anguish from her hospitable entertainers.
‘I shall never see Languedoc again,’ she said sorrowfully, at length.
‘Oh yes you will, _ma belle_!’ said Benoit cheeringly; ‘and so we
shall all. When autumn arrives, and Jacques Mito will come and mind
the mill, we will all start together. I can get a mule who will go the
whole way, with easy stages.’
‘And we have been promised a _patache_,’ observed Bathilde.
‘Ay--a _patache_. Mass! did you ever travel by a _patache_? They send
you up to the sky every round the wheels make. ’Tis a fine method of
seeing the country.’
Bathilde laughed at her husband’s explanation of the uncomfortable
conveyance. But it was evident that the mention of Languedoc only
brought back tearful recollections to Louise Gauthier. She shuddered,
as the image of some bitter scene was called up by the allusion, and
remained silent.
The day wore on. Several persons--neighbours from the bridge, and
street acquaintances of Benoit--came in the course of the morning to
gossip about the events of which the boat-mill had been the principal
scene of action. Bathilde went to market on the quays, and while she
was gone Louise busied herself in setting to rights the humble
appointments of their ark. The good-hearted Languedocian himself
appeared very little at ease with himself respecting the disposal of
his time, and he was constantly speculating upon the chance of ever
recovering a small sum of money due to him from Exili for lodging and
services. He had discarded his motley habit, which hung in a
woe-begone and half-ludicrous fashion against the wall; and was now
attired in the simple costume of a _banlieue_ peasant.
Twilight was again coming, and the little party were once more
reassembled, whilst Bathilde was telling all sorts of wonderful
stories of the marvels she had seen on the quays and _carrefours_,
when a fresh visitor arrived at the boat-mill. He came alone in a
small boat, similar to the one Sainte-Croix had used the preceding
evening, and without announcing himself, entered the apartment with an
easy, half-impudent air, which proved that he was on excellent terms
with himself. Benoit and his wife received him with great respect,
being somewhat overcome by his appearance; for he was gaily dressed,
and assumed the air of a grand seigneur. Their visitor was in the
little room lately occupied by Exili, which the kind-hearted couple
had begged she would call her own so long as she chose to remain with
them.
‘_Salut!_ good people,’ said the stranger on entering. ‘Do not let me
incommode you. Is this the mill in which the poisoner Exili was
captured last evening?’
‘Y-e-s, monsieur,’ gasped Benoit, in very frightened accents, whilst
he added inwardly, ‘It is all up with me! I shall be broken or burnt
on the Grêve after all!’
There could be no doubt about it in his mind. The visitor was
evidently charged with a commission to arrest him as one of the
Italian’s accomplices. Even Bathilde’s fresh, rosy cheeks paled;
chiefly, however, from beholding her husband’s terror.
‘My husband had nothing in the world to do with him, beyond watching
his fires and selling his love spells,’ said Bathilde eagerly. ‘He had
not, indeed, monsieur. Maître Picard, the _chapelier_ of the Rue St.
Jacques, will give him his good word.’
‘He is one of the Garde Bourgeois of St. Marcel,’ said Benoit.
‘And kept the keys of the Port Bordelle before King Louis knocked it
down,’ added his wife rapidly.
‘And his wife owns half the mulberries at Béziers,’ ejaculated
Benoit. ‘I worked for her father, monsieur: he would come up to speak
for me; but he has been dead ten years.’
‘My honest couple,’ said the visitor; ‘you appear to be giving
yourselves a great deal of unnecessary discomfort. I have very little
business with either of you.’
Benoit drew a good long breath of relief, and now for the first time
hastened to get a seat for the stranger.
‘Have you any one staying in the mill with you,’ inquired the
new-comer.
‘M. Exili was our only lodger,’ said Benoit, not choosing to speak of
the girl.
‘But there is a young woman here, I think,’ continued the other. ‘The
same that was present at the capture last evening.’
‘Merciful Virgin! she is not a poisoner!’ exclaimed Benoit, who began
to misgive everything and everybody.
‘Reassure yourself,’ replied the other; ‘she certainly is not, if the
person be the same. Her name is----’
‘Louise Gauthier?’ replied Benoit, as the stranger hesitated.
‘That is right. Will you tell her some one wishes to see her upon
business of importance.’
Bathilde ran towards the chamber to summon the young girl. She
appeared immediately; but as soon as she saw who it was required her
attendance, she shrank back, with an expression of alarm and dislike,
as she exclaimed--
‘M. Lachaussée here!’
‘Yes, Ma’amselle Louise,’ returned Sainte-Croix’s confidant, as he
rose from his seat. ‘You do not give me a very hearty welcome. Come
here.’
He advanced towards her; but Louise uttered a slight cry, and retired
in the direction of her chamber, appealing to Benoit for protection.
The miller immediately seized a partisan, which had been left behind
in the tumult of the preceding night, and put himself before the door.
‘Look you, monsieur,’ he said; ‘I heard your name from her lips last
night, under no very pleasant circumstances. I think you hold some
situation at the Gobelins.’
‘Well?’ returned Lachaussée coolly. ‘Well, my good fellow?’
‘Well!’ continued Benoit; ‘it is not well, and I am not a good
fellow,--at least, I would rather not be, according to your opinion of
one. Now take this hint, and don’t be too pressing in your
attentions.’
‘Pshaw! you are a fool!’
‘Without doubt,’ said Benoit; ‘or rather I _was_. Yesterday it was
part of my profession; to-day I am a bourgeois, if I please to call
myself so. But fool or not, you shall not annoy that poor girl.’
‘When you have come to the end of your heroics, perhaps you will let
me speak,’ said Lachaussée. ‘Mademoiselle Gauthier,’ he continued,
addressing himself to Louise, ‘you had a hurried interview here last
evening with M. de Sainte-Croix. I am the bearer of a message from
him.’
‘An apology, I hope, for his brutality,’ again interrupted Benoit,
gaining fresh courage every minute. And he was going on with an
invective, when an appealing look from Louise restrained him, and he
contented himself by performing feats of revenge in imagination,
flourishing his halbert about to the great terror of Bathilde, who had
never seen her husband so furious.
‘I know nothing of that to which this person alludes,’ continued
Lachaussée to Louise. ‘M. de Sainte-Croix desires to see you,
mademoiselle.’
‘To see me!’ exclaimed Louise in a tremor of excitement, not unmixed
with joy. ‘Oh, M. Lachaussée! you are not trifling with me? Is this
really true?’
‘You may convince yourself within a quarter of an hour,’ replied the
other. ‘I have a carriage waiting at the foot of the bridge. Possibly
you may conceive the reason of my mission; of that I know nothing.’
‘Do you think that I ought to go?’ asked Louise timidly of her honest
host. ‘And you will not say it is unkind, leaving you at this short
notice? Oh! if you knew how I have prayed to see him but once more--to
speak to him again, if it were but to exchange a single word, and then
bid him farewell for ever.’
‘Unkind, sweetheart?’ said Benoit, laying his rough hand upon her
shoulder. ‘It would be greater unkindness in us to keep you here. Go,
by all means; and recollect this is still your home if you have need
of one. I will not even say good-bye. Shall I go with you?’
‘There is no occasion for that,’ said Lachaussée. ‘There are two
valets with the coach, who will see mademoiselle safely back again,
should she return. And here is something M. de Sainte-Croix desired me
to offer to you for your care of her.’
He placed a purse in Benoit’s hand as he spoke. The Languedocian
looked at it for a few seconds, peeping into its contents like a bird;
and then he shook his head saying--
‘A fiftieth part of this sum would more than repay us for what we have
done. No, no--I would rather you had given me a few sous--though I did
not want anything. Keep it for us, Mademoiselle Louise, until you come
back.’
This was Benoit’s rough method of making over the money to his late
guest. Louise took it, for she did not wish to annoy him by returning
it.
And then--hoping, doubting, trembling--she embraced Bathilde, and
accompanied Lachaussée to the water platform of the mill. Benoit
lighted her into the boat, and then remained waving his torch in
adieu, until they touched the landing-place of the Quai du Châtelet.
And then, with a hasty adieu to his wife, he jumped into his own light
craft, and followed the direction the others had taken.