"WE MUST SAVE HER TOGETHER"
But while Stephen La Mothe still hesitated Commines took action. He
recognized that sooner or later there must be a confronting. Ursula de
Vesc, however deeply implicated, was no patient Griselda to accept
judgment without a protest. Tacit admission would condemn the Dauphin
equally with herself, and she might be trusted to fight for the Dauphin
with every wile and subterfuge open to a desperate woman. In her
natural attitude of indignation she would certainly force a crisis.
The sooner the crisis came the better, and amongst those for whom that
was better Philip de Commines was not the least. With all his heart he
loathed the part he was compelled to play, even while determined to
play it to its ghastly end. But to some men, Commines amongst them,
the irrevocable brings a drugging of the sensibilities. When that
which must be done could not be undone he would be at peace.
The sooner the crisis came the better, too, for Stephen La Mothe, and
Commines' sympathies went out to him with an unwonted tenderness. The
lad's nerves were flayed raw, and for him also there could be no peace
until the inevitable end had come. But just what that end would be,
and how it was to be reached, Commines feared to discuss even with
himself.
But the first necessity was that Ursula de Vesc's complicity should be
brought home to her. Let that be done, and La Mothe's despair might
clear aside all difficulties, though, without doubt, the poor boy would
suffer. There is no such pain as when love dies in the full glory of
its strength. But then would come the ministrations of Time, the
healer. Mother Nature of the rough hand and tender heart would scar
the hurt, and little by little its agony would numb into a passive
submission.
It was a truth he had proved. Suzanne's death had been as the plucking
out of the very roots of life. In that first tremendous realization of
loss there had been no place left for even God Himself. But that had
passed. The All-Merciful has placed bounds on the tide of human
suffering: Thus far shalt thou go, and no further. The maimed roots of
life had budded afresh, and if no flower of love had shed its fragrance
to bless the days, there had been peace. So would it be with Stephen
La Mothe. But the Valley of Tribulation must first be crossed, and it
would be the mercy of kindness to shorten the passage, even though the
plunge into its shadows was the more swift. For that there must be
conviction, and for the conviction a confronting. Villon was right,
Ursula de Vesc and Jean Saxe should be set face to face within the hour.
"Monsieur Villon," he said with unaccustomed courtesy, "I agree with
you. Hugues is dead, the Dauphin too high above us, but Mademoiselle
de Vesc has the right to know the peril she stands in. Will you do us
all a kindness and bring Jean Saxe to the Château? Monsieur La Mothe
and I will----" he paused, searching for a word which would be
conclusive and yet without offence, "will summon Mademoiselle de Vesc."
"It is an outrage," said La Mothe stubbornly, "and I protest against
it, protest utterly."
"Stephen, try and understand," and Commines laid his hand upon the
younger man's shoulder with something more than the persuasive appeal
of the father who, to his sorrow, is at variance with the son of his
love. It was the gesture of the friend, the equal, the elder in
authority who might command but elects to reason. "Consider my
position a moment. By the King's command I stand in his place in
Amboise. If he were here----"
"God forbid!" said Villon. "The King is like heaven--dearly loved afar
off."
"But his justice is here----"
"And his mercy?"
"And his mercy," repeated Commines coldly, "the mercy that gave you
life when justice would have hung you as a rogue and a thief. Of all
men you are the last who should sneer at the King's mercy. And now
will you call Jean Saxe, or must I go myself?"
"As my friend La Mothe decides," answered Villon. "I advise it myself.
Give a lie a night's start and you will never catch it up."
"Stephen, son, be wise."
With a gesture of despair La Mothe would have turned away, but Commines
held him fast. His faith was unshaken, but the natural reaction from
the day's tense emotion had sapped its buoyancy, leaving it negative
and inert rather than positive and aggressive. The half-hour's
slackless concentration of nerve and muscle in the defence of the
stairway had drained him of strength and energy like the crisis of a
fever. For him Ursula de Vesc's curt No! stood against the world; but
Philip de Commines was the King's justice in Amboise, and against Jean
Saxe's accusation her denial would carry no weight--no weight at all.
But, though the gesture was one of helplessness, Villon chose to
construe it into consent.
"Good!" he said cordially, "it is best, much the best. In half an hour
I will bring Saxe to--let me see, the Hercules room, I think, Monsieur
d'Argenton? It is small, but large enough for the purpose, and as it
has only one door it can be easily guarded."
"No guards," said Commines harshly. "There must be no publicity."
Villon laughed unpleasantly. His shifting mood had, almost for the
first time in his life, felt kindly disposed towards Commines as he saw
his evident solicitude for La Mothe, but that was forgotten in the
contemptuous recall of a past he held should no longer rise against
him. What the King forgave the King's minister should forget. The
thrust had wounded his vanity, and now, as he saw his opening, he
promptly thrust back in return.
"You are the King's justice in Amboise and would have no man know it!
That is true modesty, Monsieur d'Argenton! No, don't fear, there will
be no publicity. Monsieur La Mothe, he calls you son; but friend is
more than kin, more than family, remember that Francois Villon says so."
Commines' answer was an upward shake of the head, a lifting of the
shoulders hardly perceptible in the darkness.
"It is the nature of curs to snarl," he said. "But his impertinence
grows insufferable and must be muzzled." Linking his arm into La
Mothe's he drew him slowly along the garden path. Both were
preoccupied by the same desire, to win the other to his own way of
thinking, but it was the more cautious elder who spoke first. He would
appeal to the very affection Villon had gibed at.
"Stephen, dear lad, with all my heart I grieve for you. Would to God
it were anything but this. Mademoiselle de Vesc has always opposed me,
but that is nothing; has always striven to thwart me, but for your sake
that could be forgotten; has always flouted and belittled me, but for
your sake that could be forgiven. You are as the son of my love, and
what is there that love will not forgive--will not forget? These weigh
nothing, nothing at all. In the face of this--this--tremendous crime
against the King, against all France, I count them nothing, less than
nothing. Dear lad, you must be brave. This worthless woman----"
"No, Uncle, no, not that, never that!" La Mothe's voice was as level
and quiet as Commines' own, and the elder knew thereby that his
difficulty was the greater. Quietness is always strong, always assured
of itself. "I do not believe Saxe speaks the truth."
"Saxe is the spark, and I told you I smelt smoke. Even Villon admits,
much against his will, that some one has approached Saxe."
"But not Hugues, and if that is untrue then all is untrue."
"No: there is no logic in that. Hugues or another, it matters little
who it was. It is the fact that damns, and Saxe is explicit. And how
can Villon be sure it was not Hugues?"
"Uncle, Uncle, you can't believe it, in your heart you can't believe
it. All these days you have seen her, so gracious, so gentle, so
womanly. It can't be true, it can't. There is some horrible mistake."
"Saxe is explicit, and Villon agrees with him," repeated Commines,
driving home the inexorable point. "Nor can I help myself; the King
has left me no alternative."
"Mademoiselle de Vesc has denied it to me, and I believe her."
"You believe her because you love her."
"No," answered La Mothe simply, "I believe her because I have faith in
her, but even though she were all Saxe says, and more, I would stand by
her because I love her."
Commines paused in his slow walk, slipped his hand from La Mothe's arm,
and they stood silent side by side. Then in his perplexity he moved a
few paces away, halted, turned again and faced La Mothe.
"Poor lad, and I have no alternative. The King and my duty alike allow
me none. Stephen, in self-defence I must be frank with you. It is my
firm belief that the King has evidence he cannot show openly----"
"And so a pretext will be enough? God in heaven! is that justice?"
"No, there must be something more than a pretext, something more than a
lie; but Saxe will be enough."
"It will be enough if Saxe's lies cannot be disproved?"
"If Saxe cannot be disproved," corrected Commines. "I cannot admit
that Saxe lies."
"And what then?"
Again Commines turned away. Humanity's Iron Age was as stern, as
selfish, as callous, as cruel as in the days of Attila the Hun.
Christianity, after its almost fifteen centuries, had no more than, as
it were, warmed it through with its gentle fires. There was as yet no
softening. It was true that some increasing flowers of civilization
obscured the brutality, some decorations of art glorified it, but
underneath the beauty and the art the native ruthlessness remained
unchanged. Might founded a throne upon the ruin of weaker nations,
cemented its strength with the blood of innocence, set the crown upon
its own head, and reigned in arrogant defiance of right or justice.
From the barbarous Muscovite in the north to the polished Spaniard in
the south the conditions scarcely varied. Everywhere there was the
same spirit. A Louis pushed wide the borders of France by theft and
the law of the stronger arm, a Ferdinand offered up his holocaust to
the greater glory of God, a Philip yet to come would steep the
Netherlands in blood to the very dikes that the same God might be
worshipped in violation of the worshipper's conscience, in England a
Crookback Richard had neither pity nor scruple when a crown was the
reward of ruthlessness and murder.
Nor in the high places of religion was there a nobler law. A Sixtus,
at that very moment, was letting loose the horrors of an unjust war
upon Florence and Ferrara in the name of the Prince of Peace, while the
sinister figure of Alexander Borgia sat upon the steps of the Papal
throne biding its time. If the meek inherited the earth, it was
commonly a territory six feet long and two in breadth. Everywhere the
ancient rule was still the modern plan: those took who had the power,
and those kept who could. There were exceptions, but exceptions were
rare. Even at the Round Table there was only one Galahad.
Commines did not differ greatly from his age, or he would have been no
fit minister for Louis. A tool is no longer a tool if it is not
obedient to the hand which guides it. Let it fail in the work set it
to do and it is cast aside into forgottenness or broken up as waste.
He had no liking, he had even a loathing, for the part allotted to him,
and he played it unwillingly; left to himself, he would not have played
it at all. Ursula de Vesc might have lived out her life in peace so
far as he was concerned; but Ursula de Vesc stood in his master's path,
and however distasteful it might be she must be swept aside, now that
Saxe made it possible so to do, and yet hold a semblance of justice.
Only through her could the Dauphin be reached, therefore Commines
steeled his nerves.
But to Stephen, partly for his own sake, and yet more for the memory of
the dear dead woman, his heart went out in a greater tenderness than
that of cold sympathy. Human love in the individual has been the salt
which has kept the body politic from utter rottenness. How to soften
the blow to Stephen was his thought as he paced slowly through the cool
darkness of the night: how to do more than that, how to link Stephen to
his own fortunes, which would surely rise after the successful
execution of this commission of tragedy. Slowly he paced into the
darkness, turned, and paced as slowly back again, to find Stephen
standing motionless where he had left him, his hands linked behind his
back, his shoulders squared, his face very sternly set.
"And if Jean Saxe's lies cannot be disproved? What follows then?"
"Stephen, we must save her together." He paused, but La Mothe made no
reply. What could he answer? To continue protesting her innocence
with nothing but his own word and hers to back the assertion was but
beating the air; to ask, How shall we save her? would, he thought,
tacitly admit her guilt. So there was silence until Commines went on
slowly and with an evident difficulty; he would need all his diplomacy,
he realized, all his powers of sophistry and persuasion if he was to
carry Stephen La Mothe with him along the path he proposed to follow.
"Let us face facts," he began, almost roughly. "Saxe will leave me no
alternative. No! say nothing, I know it all beforehand, and with all
my soul I wish this had not fallen to my lot. And yet, Stephen, it is
better I should be here than Tristan; Tristan has a rough way with
women. Poor lad, that hurts you, does it? Yes, I am better than
Tristan, even though Saxe leaves me no alternative. But we shall save
her together," and this time Stephen La Mothe, out of the horror of the
thought of Ursula de Vesc given over to the mercies of such a man as
Tristan, found it in his heart to ask, "How?" The answer came
promptly, but with grave deliberation.
"By the King's mercy."
"What mercy had the King on Molembrais? Will he be more merciful to a
woman?"
"Then by his gratitude. Stephen, for her sake we must win the King's
gratitude together."
"I do not understand."
"Behind the girl, but joined with her, stands----"
"The Dauphin? My God, Uncle, not that way."
La Mothe's voice was strange even to his own ears, so harsh and dry was
it, the voice of age rather than of youth, and, indeed, he felt as if
in this last hour he had suddenly grown so old that the world was a
weariness.
"There were three in this plot," answered Commines, unmoved from his
slow gravity, "Hugues, the Dauphin, and Mademoiselle de Vesc. Hugues
is dead, but two still remain."
"His own son, his own, his one son? No, no, it cannot be, it cannot."
"I grant that it is incredible, but Saxe leaves no loophole for doubt."
"I do not mean that. I meant it could not be that the King--I cannot
say it; his one son."
"He has no son but France. Do you remember what I told you that night
in my room? Better the one should suffer than the many. And now there
is a double reason, a double incentive to us both. Mademoiselle de
Vesc's life hangs upon it. Follow the chain of reasoning, and, for
God's sake, Stephen, follow closely. There is more than the life of a
girl in all this. Jean Saxe cannot be suppressed even if we dared
attempt it; Francois Villon, the King's jackal, who holds his life by a
thread, knows everything. Of all men he dares not keep silence, of all
men he would not keep silence if he dared, scum that he is. Within two
days the King will know all Saxe's accusations, and if we do not act
for ourselves another--Tristan or another--will come in our place. We
will have destroyed ourselves for nothing, and there will be no hope
for the girl, none. Can you not guess Tristan's methods with women?
But, Stephen, if we act, if we return to Valmy and say, 'Sire, we have
done our duty to the nation, with heavy hearts and in bitter sorrow we
have done it: even though we have laid love itself on the altar of
sacrifice, we have done it, give us this one life in return'--can the
King refuse? Remember, if it is not we it will be another, and if we
have no claim to ask, there will be no life given. Nor can we have any
claim but obedience. I see no other way, no other hope."
The touch upon his arm was half appeal, half admonition, wholly
friendly, but La Mothe winced as he shrank from it. There are times
when human sympathy is the very salvation of the reason and the one
comfort possible to the bruised spirit, but now the solitary instinct
of the sick animal was upon him and he longed to be alone. Some
sorrows are so personal they cannot be shared. Nor was it all sorrow.
There was the passion of a fierce resentment, the bitter protest of
helpless nature against a wanton and callous outrage.
As plainly as if Commines had said it in so many words he understood
that, sinless or sinning, Ursula de Vesc was to be sacrificed to some
state advantage; he understood, too, that neither Commines nor the King
cared greatly whether she was innocent or guilty, and that but for his
sake Commines would have given her hardly a second thought. Saxe lies!
What matter? The state must progress. Saxe lies! What matter?
Better one suffer than the many. Saxe lies! What matter? We will
save her together by the one way possible.
Did he remember that first night in Amboise? Had he ever forgotten?
Even in his plays of make-believe had he ever forgotten? The mind has
a way of laying aside the unpalatable in some pigeon-hole of memory; it
is out of sight, not forgotten. Yes, he remembered. Then it had been
obedience to the King, service to the man to whom he owed everything
and a duty to France. Now, more tremendous than all, Ursula de Vesc's
life was thrown suddenly into the scale. That was Commines' plain
statement. Nor was he conscious of any resentment against Commines.
If Jean Saxe held to his story Commines could have no alternative, and
if not Commines, it would be another, another less kindly.
No? His rebellion, the bitter upheaval of spirit, was against the
conspiracy of iron circumstances which hedged him round on every side,
a rebellion such as a man might feel who finds himself in silent
darkness bound hand and foot with grave-clothes, while his brain is
still quick and every nerve quivering with the passionate desire for
life. "I see no hope," said Commines, "no hope but the one way," and
Stephen La Mothe knew that one way was murder. Abruptly he turned upon
his heel.
"The half-hour must be almost up," he said; "let us go to her."