'Sac now he's o'er the floods sae gray,
And Lord Maxwell has ta'en his good-night.'
LORD MAXWELL'S _Good-night_.
Madame La Comtesse de Bourke was by no means a helpless fine lady. She
had several times accompanied her husband on his expeditions, and had
only not gone with him to Madrid because he did not expect to be long
absent, and she sorely rued the separation.
She was very busy in her own room, superintending the packing, and
assisting in it, when her own clever fingers were more effective than
those of her maids. She was in her _robe de chambre_, a dark blue
wrapper, embroidered with white, and put on more neatly than was always
the case with French ladies in _deshabille_. The hoop, long stiff stays,
rich brocade robe, and fabric of powdered hair were equally unsuitable to
ease or exertion, and consequently were seldom assumed till late in the
day, when the toilette was often made in public.
So Madame de Bourke's hair was simply rolled out of her way, and she
appeared in her true colours, as a little brisk, bonny woman, with no
actual beauty, but very expressive light gray eyes, furnished with
intensely long black lashes, and a sweet, mobile, lively countenance.
Estelle was trying to amuse little Jacques, and prevent him from trotting
between the boxes, putting all sorts of undesirable goods into them; and
Ulysse had collected his toys, and was pleading earnestly that a headless
wooden horse and a kite, twice as tall as himself, of Lanty's
manufacture, might go with them.
He was told that another _cerf-volant_ should be made for him at the
journey's end; but was only partially consoled, and his mother was fain
to compound for a box of woolly lambs. Estelle winked away a tear when
her doll was rejected, a wooden, highly painted lady, bedizened in
brocade, and so dear to her soul that it was hard to be told that she was
too old for such toys, and that the Swedes would be shocked to see the
Ambassador's daughter embracing a doll. She had, however, to preserve
her character of a reasonable child, and tried to derive consolation from
the permission to bestow 'Mademoiselle' upon the _concierge's_ little
sick daughter, who would be sure to cherish her duly.
'But, oh mamma, I pray you to let me take my book!'
'Assuredly, my child. Let us see! What? Telemaque? Not "Prince
Percinet and Princess Gracieuse?"'
'I am tired of them, mamma.'
'Nor Madame d'Aulnoy's Fairy Tales?'
'Oh no, thank you, mamma; I love nothing so well as Telemaque.'
'Thou art a droll child!' said her mother.
'Ah, but we are going to be like Telemaque.'
'Heaven forfend!' said the poor lady.
'Yes, dear mamma, I am glad you are going with us instead of staying at
home to weave and unweave webs. If Penelope had been like you, she would
have gone!'
'Take care, is not Jacques acting Penelope?' said Madame de Bourke,
unable to help smiling at her little daughter's glib mythology, while
going to the rescue of the embroidery silks, in which her youngest son
was entangling himself.
At that moment there was a knock at the door, and a message was brought
that the Countess of Nithsdale begged the favour of a few minutes'
conversation in private with Madame. The Scottish title fared better on
the lips of La Jeunesse than it would have done on those of his
predecessor. There was considerable intimacy among all the Jacobite
exiles in and about Paris; and Winifred, Countess of Nithsdale, though
living a very quiet and secluded life, was held in high estimation among
all who recollected the act of wifely heroism by which she had rescued
her husband from the block.
Madame de Bourke bade the maids carry off the little Jacques, and Ulysse
followed; but Estelle, who had often listened with rapt attention to the
story of the escape, and longed to feast her eyes on the heroine,
remained in her corner, usefully employed in disentangling the
embroilment of silks, and with the illustrations to her beloved Telemaque
as a resource in case the conversation should be tedious. Children who
have hundreds of picture-books to rustle through can little guess how
their predecessors could once dream over one.
Estelle made her low reverence unnoticed, and watched with eager eyes as
the slight figure entered, clad in the stately costume that was regarded
as proper respect to her hostess; but the long loose sacque of blue silk
was faded, the _feuille-morte_ velvet petticoat frayed, the lace on the
neck and sleeves washed and mended; there were no jewels on the sleeves,
though the long gloves fitted exquisitely, no gems in the buckles of the
high-heeled shoes, and the only ornament in the carefully rolled and
powdered hair, a white rose. Her face was thin and worn, with pleasant
brown eyes. Estelle could not think her as beautiful as Calypso
inconsolable for Ulysses, or Antiope receiving the boar's a head. 'I
know she is better than either,' thought the little maid; 'but I wish she
was more like Minerva.'
The Countesses met with the lowest of curtseys, and apologies on the one
side for intrusion, on the other for _deshabille_, so they concluded with
an embrace really affectionate, though consideration for powder made it
necessarily somewhat theatrical in appearance.
These were the stiffest of days, just before formality had become
unbearable, and the reaction of simplicity had set in; and Estelle had
undone two desperate knots in the green and yellow silks before the
preliminary compliments were over, and Lady Nithsdale arrived at the
point.
'Madame is about to rejoin _Monsieur son Mari_.'
'I am about to have that happiness.'
'That is the reason I have been bold enough to derange her.'
'Do not mention it. It is always a delight to see _Madame la Comtesse_.'
'Ah! what will Madame say when she hears that it is to ask a great favour
of her.'
'Madame may reckon on me for whatever she would command.'
'If you can grant it--oh! Madame,' cried the Scottish Countess,
beginning to drop her formality in her eagerness, 'we shall be for ever
beholden to you, and you will make a wounded heart to sing, besides
perhaps saving a noble young spirit.'
'Madame makes me impatient to hear what she would have of me,' said the
French Countess, becoming a little on her guard, as the wife of a
diplomatist, recollecting, too, that peace with George I. might mean war
with the Jacobites.
'I know not whether a young kinsman of my Lord's has ever been presented
to Madame. His name is Arthur Maxwell Hope; but we call him usually by
his Christian name.'
'A tall, dark, handsome youth, almost like a Spaniard, or a picture by
Vandyke? It seems to me that I have seen him with M. le Comte.' (Madame
de Bourke could not venture on such a word as Nithsdale.)
'Madame is right. The mother of the boy is a Maxwell, a cousin not far
removed from my Lord, but he could not hinder her from being given in
marriage as second wife to Sir David Hope, already an old man. He was
good to her, but when he died, the sons by the first wife were harsh and
unkind to her and to her son, of whom they had always been jealous. The
eldest was a creature of my Lord Stair, and altogether a Whig; indeed, he
now holds an office at the Court of the Elector of Hanover, and has been
created one of _his_ peers. (The scorn with which the gentle Winifred
uttered those words was worth seeing, and the other noble lady gave a
little derisive laugh.) 'These half-brothers declared that Lady Hope was
nurturing the young Arthur in Toryism and disaffection, and they made it
a plea for separating him from her, and sending him to an old minister,
who kept a school, and who was very severe and even cruel to the poor
boy. But I am wearying Madame.'
'Oh no, I listen with the deepest interest.'
'Finally, when the King was expected in Scotland, and men's minds were
full of anger and bitterness, as well as hope and spirit, the boy--he was
then only fourteen years of age--boasted of his grandfather's having
fought at Killiecrankie, and used language which the tutor pronounced
treasonable. He was punished and confined to his room; but in the night
he made his escape and joined the royal army. My husband was grieved to
see him, told him he had no right to political opinions, and tried to
send him home in time to make his peace before all was lost. Alas! no.
The little fellow did, indeed, pass out safely from Preston, but only to
join my Lord Mar. He was among the gentlemen who embarked at Banff; and
when my Lord, by Heaven's mercy, had escaped from the Tower of London,
and we arrived at Paris, almost the first person we saw was little
Arthur, whom we thought to have been safe at home. We have kept him with
us, and I contrived to let his mother know that he is living, for she had
mourned him as among the slain.'
'Poor mother.'
'You may well pity her, Madame. She writes to me that if Arthur had
returned at once from Preston, as my Lord advised, all would have been
passed over as a schoolboy frolic; and, indeed, he has never been
attainted; but there is nothing that his eldest brother, Lord Burnside as
they call him, dreads so much as that it should be known that one of his
family was engaged in the campaign, or that he is keeping such ill
company as we are. Therefore, at her request, we have never called him
Hope, but let him go by our name of Maxwell, which is his by baptism; and
now she tells me that if he could make his way to Scotland, not as if
coming from Paris or Bar-le-Duc, but merely as if travelling on the
Continent, his brother would consent to his return.'
'Would she be willing that he should live under the usurper?'
'Madame, to tell you the truth,' said Lady Nithsdale, 'the Lady Hope is
not one to heed the question of usurpers, so long as her son is safe and
a good lad. Nay, for my part, we all lived peaceably and happily enough
under Queen Anne; and by all I hear, so they still do at home under the
Elector of Hanover.'
'The Regent has acknowledged him,' put in the French lady.
'Well,' said the poor exile, 'I know my Lord felt that it was his duty to
obey the summons of his lawful sovereign, and that, as he said when he
took up arms, one can only do one's duty and take the consequences; but
oh! when I look at the misery and desolation that has come of it, when I
think of the wives not so happy as I am, when I see my dear Lord wearing
out his life in banishment, and think of our dear home and our poor
people, I am tempted to wonder whether it were indeed a duty, or whether
there were any right to call on brave men without a more steadfast
purpose not to abandon them!'
'It would have been very different if the Duke of Berwick had led the
way,' observed Madame de Bourke. 'Then my husband would have gone, but,
being French subjects, honour stayed both him and the Duke as long as the
Regent made no move.' The good lady, of course, thought that the Marshal
Duke and her own Count must secure victory; but Lady Nithsdale was intent
on her own branch of the subject, and did not pursue 'what might have
been.'
'After all,' she said, 'poor Arthur, at fourteen, could have no true
political convictions. He merely fled because he was harshly treated,
heard his grandfather branded as a traitor, and had an enthusiasm for my
husband, who had been kind to him. It was a mere boy's escapade, and if
he had returned home when my Lord bade him, it would only have been
remembered as such. He knows it now, and I frankly tell you, Madame,
that what he has seen of our exiled court has not increased his ardour in
the cause.'
'Alas, no,' said Madame de Bourke. 'If the Chevalier de St. George were
other than he is, it would be easier to act in his behalf.'
'And you agree with me, Madame,' continued the visitor, 'that nothing can
be worse or more hopeless for a youth than the life to which we are
constrained here, with our whole shadow of hope in intrigue; and for our
men, no occupation worthy of their sex. We women are not so ill off,
with our children and domestic affairs; but it breaks my heart to see
brave gentlemen's lives thus wasted. We have done our best for Arthur.
He has studied with one of our good clergy, and my Lord himself has
taught him to fence; but we cannot treat him any longer as a boy, and I
know not what is to be his future, unless we can return him to his own
country.'
'Our army,' suggested Madame de Bourke.
'Ah! but he is Protestant.'
'A heretic!' exclaimed the lady, drawing herself up. 'But--'
'Oh, do not refuse me on that account. He is a good lad, and has lived
enough among Catholics to keep his opinions in the background. But you
understand that it is another reason for wishing to convey him, if not to
Scotland, to some land like Sweden or Prussia, where his faith would not
be a bar to his promotion.'
'What is it you would have me do?' said Madame de Bourke, more coldly.
'If Madame would permit him to be included in her passport, as about to
join the Ambassador's suite, and thus conduct him to Sweden; Lady Hope
would find means to communicate with him from thence, the poor young man
would be saved from a ruined career, and the heart of the widow and
mother would bless you for ever.
Madame de Bourke was touched, but she was a prudent woman, and paused to
ask whether the youth had shown any tendency to run into temptation, from
which Lady Nithsdale wished to remove him.
'Oh no,' she answered; 'he was a perfectly good docile lad, though high-
spirited, submissive to the Earl, and a kind playfellow to her little
girls; it was his very excellence that made it so unfortunate that he
should thus be stranded in early youth in consequence of one boyish
folly.'
The Countess began to yield. She thought he might go as secretary to her
Lord, and she owned that if he was a brave young man, he would be an
addition to her little escort, which only numbered two men besides her
brother-in-law, the Abbe, who was of almost as little account as his
young nephew. 'But I should warn you, Madame,' added Madame de Bourke,
'that it may be a very dangerous journey. I own to you, though I would
not tell my poor mother, that my heart fails me when I think of it, and
were it not for the express commands of their father, I would not risk my
poor children on it.'
'I do not think you will find Sweden otherwise than a cheerful and
pleasant abode,' said Lady Nithsdale.
'Ah! if we were only in Sweden, or with my husband, all would be well!'
replied the other lady; 'but we have to pass through the mountains, and
the Catalans are always ill-affected to us French.'
'Nay; but you are a party of women, and belong to an ambassador!' was the
answer.
'What do those robbers care for that? We are all the better prey for
them! I have heard histories of Spanish cruelty and lawlessness that
would make you shudder! You cannot guess at the dreadful presentiments
that have haunted me ever since I had my husband's letter.'
'There is danger everywhere, dear friend,' said Lady Nithsdale kindly;
'but God finds a way for us through all.'
'Ah! you have experienced it,' said Madame de Bourke. 'Let us proceed to
the affairs. I only thought I should tell you the truth.'
Lady Nithsdale answered for the courage of her _protege_, and it was
further determined that he should be presented to her that evening by the
Earl, at the farewell reception which Madame de Varennes was to hold on
her daughter's behalf, when it could be determined in what capacity he
should be named in the passport.
Estelle, who had been listening with all her ears, and trying to find a
character in Fenelon's romance to be represented by Arthur Hope, now
further heard it explained that the party were to go southward to meet
her father at one of the Mediterranean ports, as the English Government
were so suspicious of Jacobites that he did not venture on taking the
direct route by sea, but meant to travel through Germany. Madame de
Bourke expected to meet her brother at Avignon, and to obtain his advice
as to her further route.
Estelle heard this with great satisfaction. 'We shall go to the
Mediterranean Sea and be in danger,' she said to herself, unfolding the
map at the beginning of her Telemaque; 'that is quite right! Perhaps we
shall see Calypso's island.'
She begged hard to be allowed to sit up that evening to see the hero of
the escape from the Tower of London, as well as the travelling companion
destined for her, and she prevailed, for mamma pronounced that she had
been very sage and reasonable all day, and the grandmamma, who was so
soon to part with her, could refuse her nothing. So she was full
dressed, with hair curled, and permitted to stand by the tall high-backed
chair where the old lady sat to receive her visitors.
The Marquise de Varennes was a small withered woman, with keen eyes, and
a sort of sparkle of manner, and power of setting people at ease, that
made her the more charming the older she grew. An experienced eye could
detect that she retained the costume of the prime of Louis XIV., when
headdresses were less high than that which her daughter was obliged to
wear. For the two last mortal hours of that busy day had poor Madame de
Bourke been compelled to sit under the hands of the hairdresser, who was
building up, with paste and powder and the like, an original conception
of his, namely, a northern landscape, with snow-laden trees, drifts of
snow, diamond icicles, and even a cottage beside an ice-bound stream. She
could ill spare the time, and longed to be excused; but the artist had
begged so hard to be allowed to carry out his brilliant and unique idea,
this last time of attending on Madame l'Ambassadrice, that there was no
resisting him, and perhaps her strange forebodings made her less willing
to inflict a disappointment on the poor man. It would have been strange
to contrast the fabric of vanity building up outside her head, with the
melancholy bodings within it, as she sat motionless under the
hairdresser's fingers; but at the end she roused herself to smile
gratefully, and give the admiration that was felt to be due to the
monstrosity that crowned her. Forbearance and Christian patience may be
exercised even on a toilette a la Louis XV. Long practice enabled her to
walk about, seat herself, rise and curtsey without detriment to the
edifice, or bestowing the powder either on her neighbours or on the
richly-flowered white brocade she wore; while she received the
compliments, one after another, of ladies in even more gorgeous array,
and gentlemen in velvet coats, adorned with gold lace, cravats of
exquisite fabric, and diamond shoe buckles.
Phelim Burke, otherwise l'Abbe de St. Eudoce, stood near her. He was a
thin, yellow, and freckled youth, with sandy hair and typical Irish
features, but without their drollery, and his face was what might have
been expected in a half-starved, half-clad gossoon in a cabin, rather
than surmounting a silken _soutane_ in a Parisian salon; but he had a
pleasant smile when kindly addressed by his friends.
Presently Lady Nithsdale drew near, accompanied by a tall, grave
gentleman, and bringing with them a still taller youth, with the stiffest
of backs and the longest of legs, who, when presented, made a bow
apparently from the end of his spine, like Estelle's lamented
Dutch-jointed doll when made to sit down. Moreover, he was more shabbily
dressed than any other gentleman present, with a general outgrown look
about his coat, and darns in his silk stockings; and though they were
made by the hand of a Countess, that did not add to their elegance. And
as he stood as stiff as a ramrod or as a sentinel, Estelle's good
breeding was all called into play, and her mother's heart quailed as she
said to herself, 'A great raw Scot! What can be done with him?
Lord Nithsdale spoke for him, thinking he had better go as secretary, and
showing some handwriting of good quality. 'Did he know any languages?'
'French, English, Latin, and some Greek.' 'And, Madame,' added Lord
Nithsdale, 'not only is his French much better than mine, as you would
hear if the boy durst open his mouth, but our broad Scotch is so like
Swedish that he will almost be an interpreter there.'
However hopeless Madame de Bourke felt, she smiled and professed herself
rejoiced to hear it, and it was further decided that Arthur Maxwell Hope,
aged eighteen, Scot by birth, should be mentioned among those of the
Ambassador's household for whom she demanded passports. Her position
rendered this no matter of difficulty, and it was wiser to give the full
truth to the home authorities; but as it was desirable that it should not
be reported to the English Government that Lord Burnside's brother was in
the suite of the Jacobite Comte de Bourke, he was only to be known to the
public by his first name, which was not much harder to French lips than
Maxwell or Hope.
'Tall and black and awkward,' said Estelle, describing him to her
brother. 'I shall not like him--I shall call him Phalante instead of
Arthur.'
'Arthur,' said Ulysse; 'King Arthur was turned into a crow!'
'Well, this Arthur is like a crow--a great black skinny crow with torn
feathers.'