and which can be of no use to me, while it may injure you seriously.
Take it, tear it up, destroy it. I have done my duty; you may do what
you choose."
"Ah! yours is indeed a noble heart, Ascanio!" cried the duchess, acting
in obedience to one of those generous impulses which are sometimes found
in the most corrupt hearts.
"Some one comes, madame! take care!" cried Ascanio.
"True," said the duchess.
At the sound of approaching footsteps she hastily thrust the paper into
the flame of the lamp, which consumed it in an instant. The duchess did
not let it drop until the flame had almost scorched her fingers, when
the letter, three fourths consumed, drifted slowly downward: when it
reached the floor it was entirely reduced to ashes, but the duchess was
not content until she had placed her foot upon them.
At that moment the provost appeared in the doorway.
"I was told that you were here, madame," he said, looking uneasily from
the duchess to Ascanio, "and I hastened to descend and place myself at
your service. Is there aught in which I, or they who are under my
orders, can be of any use to you?"
"No, messire," she replied, unable to conceal the feeling of intense joy
which overflowed from her heart upon her face. "No, but I am none the
less obliged to you for your readiness and your good will; I came simply
to question this young man whom you arrested, and to ascertain if he is
really as guilty as he was said to be."
"And what is your conclusion?" queried the provost, in a tone to which
he could not refrain from imparting a slight tinge of irony.
"That Ascanio is less guilty than I thought. I beg you, therefore,
messire, to show him every consideration in your power. The poor child
is in wretched quarters. Could you not give him a better room?"
"We will look to it to-morrow, madame, for you know that your wishes are
commands to me. Have you any other commands, and do you wish to continue
your examination?"
"No, messire," was the reply, "I know all that I wished to know."
With that the duchess left the dungeon, darting at Ascanio a parting
glance of mingled gratitude and passion.
The provost followed her and the door closed behind them.
"Pardieu!" muttered Jacques Aubry, who had not lost a word of the
conversation between the duchess and Ascanio. "Pardieu! it was time."
It had been Marmagne's first thought on recovering consciousness to send
word to the duchess that he had received a wound which might well prove
to be mortal, and that before he breathed his last he desired to impart
to her a secret of the deepest moment. Upon receipt of that message the
duchess hastened to his side. Marmagne then informed her that he had
been attacked and wounded by a certain student named Jacques Aubry, who
was endeavoring to gain admission to the Châtelet in order to get
speech of Ascanio and carry to Cellini a letter that was in Ascanio's
possession.
The duchess needed to hear no more, and, bitterly cursing the passion
which had led her once more to overstep the limits of her ordinary
prudence, she hurried to the Châtelet although it was two o'clock in
the morning, demanded to be shown to Ascanio's cell, and there enacted
the scene we have described, which had ended in accordance with her
wishes so far as she knew, although Ascanio was not altogether deceived.
As Jacques Aubry said, it was high time.
But only half of his task was accomplished, and the most difficult part
remained to do. He had the letter which had come so near being destroyed
forever; but in order that it should have its full effect it must be in
Cellini's hands, not in Jacques Aubry's.
Now Jacques Aubry was a prisoner, very much a prisoner, and he had
learned from his predecessor that it was no easy matter to get out of
the Châtelet, once one was safely lodged therein. He was therefore, we
might say, in much the same plight as the rooster who found the pearl,
greatly perplexed as to the use to be made of his treasure.
To attempt to escape by resorting to violence would be utterly vain. He
might with his dagger kill the keeper who brought his food, and take his
keys and his clothes; but not only was that extreme method repugnant to
the student's kindly disposition,--it did not afford sufficiently strong
hopes of success. There were ten chances to one that he would be
recognized, searched, relieved of his precious letter, and thrust back
into his cell.
To attempt to escape by cunning was even less hopeful. The dungeon was
eight or ten feet underground, there were huge iron bars across the
air-hole through which the one faint ray of light filtered into his
cell. It would take months to loosen one of those bars, and, suppose one
of them to be removed, where would the fugitive then find himself?--in
some courtyard with insurmountable walls, where he would inevitably be
found the next morning?
Bribery was his only remaining resource; but, as a consequence of the
sentence pronounced by the lieutenant criminal, whereby Gervaise was
awarded twenty Paris sous for the loss of her honor, the prisoner's
whole fortune was reduced to ten Paris sous, a sum utterly inadequate to
tempt the lowest jailer of the vilest prison, and which could not
decently be offered to the turnkey of a royal fortress.
Jacques Aubry was therefore, we are forced to confess, in the direst
perplexity.
From time to time it seemed as if a hopeful idea passed through his
mind; but it was evident that it was likely to entail serious
consequences, for each time that it returned, with the persistence
characteristic of hopeful ideas, Aubry's face grew perceptibly darker,
and he heaved deep sighs, which proved that the poor fellow was
undergoing an internal conflict of the most violent description.
This conflict was so violent and so prolonged that Aubry did not once
think of sleep the whole night long: he passed the time in striding to
and fro, in sitting down and standing up. It was the first time that he
had ever kept vigil all night for purposes of reflection; his previous
experiences in that line had been on convivial occasions only.
At daybreak the struggle seemed to have ended in the complete triumph of
one of the opposing forces, for Jacques heaved a more heart-breaking
sigh than any he had yet achieved, and threw himself upon his bed like
a man completely crushed.
His head had hardly touched the pillow when he heard steps on the
staircase, the key grated in the lock, the door turned upon its hinges,
and two officers of the law appeared in the doorway; they were the
lieutenant criminal and his clerk.
The annoyance of the visit was tempered by the student's gratification
in recognizing two old acquaintances.
"Aha! my fine fellow," said the magistrate, recognizing Aubry, "so it's
you, is it, and you succeeded after all in getting into the Châtelet?
_Tudieu_! what a rake you are! You seduce young women and run young
noblemen through the body! But beware! a nobleman's life is more
expensive than a grisette's honor, and you'll not be quit of this affair
for twenty Paris sous!"
Alarming as the worthy magistrate's words undoubtedly were, the tone in
which he uttered them reassured the prisoner to some extent. This
jovial-faced individual, into whose hands he had had the good luck to
fall, was such a good fellow to all appearance that it was impossible to
think of him in connection with anything deadly. To be sure it was not
the same with his clerk, who nodded his head approvingly at each word
that fell from his principal's lips. It was the second time that Jacques
Aubry had seen the two men side by side, and, deeply engrossed as he was
by his own precarious situation, he could not forbear some internal
reflections upon the whimsical chance which had coupled together two
beings so utterly opposed to each other in character and feature.
The examination began. Jacques Aubry made no attempt at concealment. He
declared that, having recognized the Vicomte de Marmagne as a man who
had on several occasions betrayed his confidence, he seized his page's
sword and challenged him; that Marmagne had accepted the challenge, and
that after exchanging a few thrusts the viscount fell. More than that he
did not know.
"You know no more than that! you know no more than that!" muttered the
judge. "Faith, I should say that was quite enough, and your
affair's as clear as day, especially as the Vicomte de Marmagne is one
of Madame d'Etampes's great favorites. So it seems that she has
complained of you to the higher powers, my boy."
"The devil!" exclaimed the scholar, beginning to feel decidedly ill at
ease. "Tell me, Monsieur le Juge, is the affair so bad as you say?"
"Worse! my dear friend, worse! I am not in the habit of frightening
those who come before me; but I give you warning of this, so that if you
have any arrangements to make--"
"Arrangements to make!" cried the student. "Tell me, Monsieur le
Lieutenant Criminel, for God's sake! do you think my life's in danger?"
"Certainly it is, certainly. What! you attack a nobleman in the street,
you force him to fight, you run a sword through him, and then you ask if
your life's in danger! Yes, my dear friend, yes,--in very great danger."
"But such affairs happen every day, and I don't see that the guilty ones
are prosecuted."
"True, among gentlemen, my young friend. Oh! when it pleases two
gentlemen to cut each other's throats, it's a privilege of their rank,
and the king has nothing to say; but if the common people take it into
their head some fine day to fight with gentlemen, as they are twenty
times as numerous, there would soon be no more gentlemen, which would be
a great pity."
"How many days do you think my trial will last?"
"Five or six, in all likelihood."
"What!" cried the student, "five or six days! No more than that?"
"Why should it? The facts are clear enough; a man dies, you confess that
you killed him, and justice is satisfied. However," added the judge,
assuming a still more benevolent expression, "if two or three days more
would be agreeable to you--"
"Very agreeable."
"Oh well! we will spin out the report, and gain time in that way. You
are a good fellow at heart, and I shall be delighted to do something for
you."
"Thanks," said the student.
"And now," said the judge, rising, "have you any further request to
make?"
"I would like to see a priest: is it impossible?"
"No; it is your right."
"In that case, Monsieur le Juge, ask them to send one to me."
"I will do your errand. No ill will, my young friend."
"Good lack! on the contrary, I am deeply grateful."
"Master Student," said the clerk in an undertone, stepping to Aubrey's
side, "would you be willing to do me a favor?"
"Gladly," said Aubrey; "what might it be?"
"It may be that you have friends or relatives to whom you intend to
bequeath all your possessions?"
"Friends? I have but one, and he's a prisoner like myself. Relatives? I
have only cousins, and very distant cousins at that. So, say on, Master
Clerk, say on."
"Monsieur, I am a poor man, father of a family, with five children."
"What then?"
"I have never had any opportunities in my position, which I fill, as you
can testify, with scrupulous probity. All my confrères are promoted
over my head."
"Why is that?"
"Why? Ah! why? I will tell you."
"Do so."
"Because they are lucky."
"Aha!"
"And why are they lucky?"
"That's what I would ask you, Master Clerk."
"And that's what I am about to tell you, Master Student."
"I shall be very glad to know."
"They are lucky,"--here the clerk lowered his voice a half-tone
more,--"they are lucky because they have the rope a man was hanged with
in their pocket: do you understand?"
"No."
"You're rather dull. You will make a will, eh?"
"A will! why should I?"
"Dame! so that there may be no contest among your heirs. Very good!
write in your will that you authorize Marc-Boniface Grimoineau, cleric
to Monsieur le Lieutenant Criminel, to claim from the executioner a hit
of the rope you are hanged by."
"Ah!" said Aubry, in a choking voice. "Yes, now I understand."
"And you will grant my request?"
"To be sure!"
"Young man, remember what you have promised me. Many have made the same
promise, but some have died intestate, others have written my name,
Marc-Boniface Grimoineau so badly that there was a chance for cavilling;
and others still, who were guilty, monsieur, on my word of honor very
guilty, have been acquitted, and gone off elsewhere to be hanged; so
that I was really in despair when you fell in my way."
"Very well, Master Cleric, very well; if I am hanged, you shall have
what you want, never fear."
"Oh, you will be, monsieur, you will he, don't you doubt it!"
"Well, Grimoineau," said the judge.
"Here I am, monsieur, here I am. So it's a bargain, Master Student?"
"It's a bargain."
"On your word of honor?"
"On my word!"
"I think that I shall get it at last," muttered the clerk as he
withdrew. "I will go home and tell my wife and children the good news."
He left the cell on the heels of the lieutenant criminal, who was
grumbling good-humoredly at having to wait so long.
XVII
WHEREIN IT IS PROVED THAT TRUE FRIENDSHIP IS
CAPABLE OF CARRYING DEVOTION TO THE MARRYING POINT
Aubry, once more alone, was soon more deeply absorbed in thought than
before; and the reader will agree that there was ample food for thought
in his conversation with the lieutenant criminal. We hasten to say,
however, that one who could have read his thoughts would have found that
the situation of Ascanio and Colombe, depending as it did upon the
letter in his possession, occupied the first place, and that before
thinking of himself, a thing which he proposed to do in good time, he
deliberated as to what was to be done for them.
He had been meditating thus for half an hour more or less, when the door
of his cell opened once more, and the turnkey appeared on the threshold.
"Are you the man who sent for a priest?" he growled.
"To be sure I am," said Jacques.
"Deuce take me, if I know what they all want with a damned monk,"
muttered the turnkey; "but what I do know is that they can't leave a
poor man in peace for five minutes. Come in, come in, father," he
continued, standing aside to allow the priest to pass, "and be quick
about it."
With that he closed the door, still grumbling, and left the new comer
alone with the prisoner.
"Was it you who sent for me, my son?" the priest asked.
"Yes, father," replied the student.
"Do you wish to confess?"
"No, not just that: I wish to talk with you concerning a simple case of
conscience."
"Say on, my son," said the priest, seating himself upon the stool, "and
if any feeble light that I can give you will help you--"
"It was to ask your advice that I ventured to send for you."
"I am listening."
"Father," said Aubry, "I am a great sinner."
"Alas!" said the priest; "happy is the man who acknowledges it."
"But that is not all; not only am I a great sinner myself, as I said,
but I have led others into sin."
"Is there any way of undoing the harm you have done?"
"I think so, father, I think so. She whom I dragged with me into the pit
was an innocent young girl."
"You seduced her, did you?"
"Seduced; yes, father, that is the word."
"And you wish to atone for your sin?"
"That at least is my intention."
"There is but one way to do it."
"I know it well, and that is why I have been undecided so long: if there
were two ways I would have chosen the other."
"You wish to marry her?"
"One moment, no! I will not lie: no, father, I do not wish to do it, but
I am resigned."
"A warmer, more devoted feeling would be much better."
"What would you have, father? There are people who are born to marry,
and others to remain single. Celibacy was my vocation, and nothing less
than my present situation, I swear--"
"Very well, my son, the sooner the better, as you may repent of your
virtuous intentions."
"What will be the earliest possible moment?" Aubry asked.
"Dame!" said the priest, "as it is a marriage _in extremis_, there will
be no difficulty about the necessary dispensations, and I think that by
day after to-morrow--"
"Day after to-morrow let it be," said the student with a sigh.
"But the young woman?"
"What of her?"
"Will she consent?"
"To what?"
"To the marriage."
"Pardieu! will she consent? That she will, with thanks. Such
propositions aren't made to her every day."
"Then there is no obstacle?"
"None."
"Your parents?"
"Absent."
"And hers?"
"Unknown."
"Her name?"
"Gervaise-Perrette Popinot."
"Do you wish me to tell her of your purpose?"
"If you will kindly take that trouble, father, I shall be truly
grateful."
"She shall be informed this very day."
"Tell me, father, tell me, could you possibly hand her a letter?"
"No, my son: we who are admitted to minister to the prisoners have sworn
to deliver no message for them to any person until after their death.
When that time comes, I will do whatever you choose."
"Thanks, it would be useless; marriage it must be, then," muttered
Aubry.
"You have nothing else to say to me?"
"Nothing, except that, if you doubt the truth of what I say, and if she
makes any objection to granting my request, you will find in the office
of the lieutenant criminal a complaint lodged by said Gervaise-Perrette
Popinot, which will prove that what I have said is the exact truth."
"Rely upon me to smooth away all obstacles," replied the priest, who
realized that Jacques's proposed action was not prompted by enthusiasm
for the marriage, but that he was yielding to necessity; "and two days
hence--"
"Two days hence--"
"You will have restored, her honor to the woman whose honor you took
from her."
"Alas!" muttered the student with a deep sigh.
"Ah, my son!" said the priest, "the more a sacrifice costs you, the
greater pleasure it affords to God."
"By Mahomet's belly!" cried Jacques; "in that case God should be very
grateful to me! go, father, go!"
Indeed, Jacques had had to overcome very bitter opposition in his own
mind before arriving at such a resolution. As he had told Gervaise, he
had inherited his antipathy to the marriage tie from his father, and
nothing less than his friendship for Ascanio, and the thought that it
was he who had caused his ruin, together with the incentive afforded by
the noblest examples of self-sacrificing devotion to be found in
history,--nothing less than all of this was necessary to bring him to
the pitch of abnegation at which he had now arrived.
But, the reader may ask, where lies the connection between the marriage
of Gervaise and Aubry, and the happiness of Ascanio and Colombe, and how
did Aubry expect to save his friend by marrying his mistress? To such a
question I can only answer that the reader lacks penetration; to which
the reader may retort, to be sure, that it is not his business to have
that quality. In that case, I beg him to take the trouble to read the
end of this chapter, which he might have passed over had he been endowed
with a more subtle intellect.
When the priest had gone, Aubry, recognizing the impossibility of
drawing back, seemed to become more tranquil. It is characteristic of
resolutions, even the most momentous, to bring tranquillity in their
wake: the mind which has wrestled with its perplexity is at rest; the
heart which has fought against its sorrow is, as it were, benumbed.
Jacques remained passive in his cell, until, having heard sounds in that
occupied by Ascanio, which he supposed to be caused by the entrance of
the jailer with his breakfast, he concluded that they would surely be
left in peace for a few hours. He waited some little time after the
noise had ceased, then crawled into his underground gallery, passed
through it, and raised the mat with his head.
Ascanio's cell was plunged in most intense darkness.
Aubry called his friend's name in a low tone, but there was no reply.
The cell was untenanted.
Aubry's first feeling was one of joy. Ascanio was free, and if Ascanio
was free there was no need for him to--But almost immediately he
remembered what was said the night before about providing him with
better quarters. It was plain that the suggestion of Madame d'Etampes
had been heeded, and the sounds he heard were caused by his friend's
being moved.
Aubry's hope was as dazzling, therefore, but as evanescent, as a flash
of lightning. He let the mat fall and crawled backward into his cell.
Every source of consolation was taken from him, even the presence of the
friend for whom he had sacrificed himself.
He had no resource left but reflection. But he had already reflected so
long, and his reflections had led to such a disastrous result, that he
preferred to sleep.
He threw himself upon his bed, and as he was very much in arrears in the
matter of sleep, it was not long before he was entirely unconscious of
his surroundings, notwithstanding the perturbed condition of his mind.
He dreamed that he was condemned to death and hanged; but through the
deviltry of the hangman, the rope was badly greased, and his neck was
not broken. He was buried in due form, none the less, and in his dream
was beginning to gnaw his arms, as men buried alive always do, when the
clerk, determined to have his bit of rope, came to secure it, opened the
coffin in which he was immured, and restored his life and liberty.
Alas! it was only a dream, and when the student awoke his life was still
in great danger, and his liberty altogether non-existent.
The evening, the night, and the next day passed away, and brought him no
other visitor than his jailer. He tried to ask him a few questions, but
could not extract a word from him.
In the middle of the second night, as Jacques was in the midst of his
first sleep, he was awakened with a start by the grinding of his door
upon its hinges. However soundly a prisoner may be sleeping, the sound
of an opening door always awakens him.
The student sat up in bed.
"Up with you, and dress yourself," said the jailer's harsh voice; and
Aubry could see by the light of the torch he held, the halberds of two
of the provost's guards behind him.
The second branch of his order was unnecessary; as the student's bed was
entirely unprovided with bedclothes, he had lain down completely
dressed.
"Where do you propose to take me, pray?" demanded Jacques, still asleep
with one eye.
"You are very inquisitive," said the jailer.
"But I would like to know."
"Come, come; no arguing, but follow me."
Resistance was useless, so the prisoner obeyed.
The jailer walked first, then came Aubry, and the two guards brought up
the rear of the procession.
Jacques looked around with an inquietude which he did not seek to
conceal. He feared a nocturnal execution; but one thing comforted him,
he saw no priest or hangman.
After a few moments he found himself in the first room to which he was
taken at the time of his coming to the prison; but instead of escorting
him to the outer door, which he hoped for an instant that they would do,
so prone to illusions does misfortune render one, his guide opened a
door at one corner of the room and entered an inner corridor leading to
a courtyard.
The prisoner's first thought on entering the courtyard, where he felt
the fresh air and saw the starlit sky, was to fill his lungs, and lay in
a stock of oxygen, not knowing when he might have another opportunity.
The next moment he noticed the ogive windows of a fourteenth century
chapel on the other side of the yard, and began to suspect what was in
the wind.
The truth-telling instinct of the historian compels us to state that at
the thought his strength wellnigh failed him.
However, the memory of Ascanio and Colombe, and the grandeur of the
self-sacrifice about to be consummated, sustained him in his distress.
He walked with a firm step toward the chapel, and when he stood in the
doorway everything was explained.
The priest stood by the altar; in the choir a woman was waiting; the
woman was Gervaise.
Half-way up the choir he met the governor of the Châtelet.
"You desired to make reparation, before your death, to the young woman
whose honor you stole from her: your request was no more than just and
it is granted."
A cloud passed over the student's eyes; but he put his hand over Madame
d'Etampes's letter, and his courage returned.
"Oh, my poor Jacques!" cried Gervaise, throwing herself into the
student's arms: "oh, who could have dreamed that this hour which I have
so longed for would strike under such circumstances!"
"What wouldst thou have, my dear Gervaise?" cried the student, receiving
her upon his breast. "God knows those whom he should punish and those
whom he should reward: we must submit to God's will."