IN SNUFF-COLORED CLOTHES
I was much on the road between Paris and Chambord for the next month.
It was true that Francezka and Gaston had declined with thanks to
visit Chambord that year on account of returning to Capello, but they
very cordially invited Count Saxe to be their guest some time during
the summer, and Count Saxe, of course, included Captain Babache. About
that time we knew for a certainty that Marshal Belle-Isle would take
an army of observation across the Rhine in August, and my master would
be given command of the vanguard. So it was arranged that on our way
to Fort Louis, where the crossing was to be made, we should make a
detour and visit Francezka and Gaston at Capello.
It was in April that one afternoon, being at leisure, and my master
being of the king's party at Choisy, I was minded to go to the Hotel
Kirkpatrick. Madame Riano was there then, and I wished to pay her my
respects.
I was shown into the garden where, in the very same sweet, retired
spot where I had first seen Francezka, Madame Riano and Francezka were
sitting. I was invited by a lackey to join them. As I passed through
the rooms I saw old Peter, who came forward and spoke to me, as he
always did, and I was glad to see the honest old soul. I asked him if
he was pleased at the prospect of seeing Capello soon.
"More than I can say, Monsieur; my Lisa is there, and she is longing
to see her poor old uncle again. Yes, Monsieur, glad shall I be to see
Capello again. I was born and reared close by--" He stopped; I knew
that he meant Castle Haret.
In the garden sat Madame Riano and Francezka. Madame Riano had on her
head a great hat with a thousand black plumes on it, and she clutched
her huge fan menacingly at my approach, although I must say she had
ever treated me with condescension. I think she reserved her fire for
great guns, like Count Saxe and the pope.
Francezka looked cheerful and even gay. She was by no means steady in
that sad condition of mind in which I had found her the night of the
rout. But it seemed to me an evil sign to find her always brightening
at the prospect of a change, showing thereby that nothing suited her.
I remember she wore a pale flowered silk, with sleeves that fell back
from her elbow, and she, too, had a hat on, but it might have been
worn by one of Watteau's shepherdesses. Both the ladies gave me kindly
greeting. Madame Riano began to ask me something about Chambord.
"I suppose Count Saxe will have forty or fifty of his ladies there
this bout," remarked this terrible old Scotch woman.
I replied respectfully that I did not understand her allusion.
"Fudge!" she cried; "you are an infant, forsooth! You know less about
Maurice of Saxe than any man in Paris, I warrant."
Francezka's laughing arch glance showed me that I could expect no help
in that quarter, so I prepared to defend myself.
"Madame, you are quite right," I replied. "I do know less than any man
on this planet about Count Saxe and the ladies."
"You would not be the better for such information," tartly responded
Madame Riano. "He will run after anything in petticoats, a milliner's
apprentice or the queen's sister, it is all one to that Maurice of
Saxe."
"Madame," said I, rising, "I perceive there is a dampness in this
garden. I do not look like a delicate flower, but I am and I feel
myself obliged to leave."
"Sit down," answered Madame Riano; "you are an honest fellow, and I'll
not mention Saxe again except to say that he is the wildest,
craftiest, boldest roue--"
I was going, but Francezka, looking warningly at Madame Riano, said to
me, with something softly trenchant in her voice:
"Remain, Babache."
At that moment I looked up and saw Gaston Cheverny walking across the
grass in company with Jacques Haret.
If the devil himself had appeared he would not have created greater
consternation than Jacques Haret at that moment. Madame Riano sat bolt
upright, brought her fan to the charge, so to speak, and glared at
Jacques Haret. She knew the story of Lisa. Francezka's face grew
scarlet with wrath; she had never thought it worth while to forbid
Jacques Haret her presence, never dreaming he would dare to face her.
Had he been alone, or with any one but Gaston, I feel sure she would
have ordered him from her presence, but to do that when he came by
Gaston's invitation and in his company was more than even Francezka
was prepared for. Gaston, I thought, looked a little embarrassed,
though not fully conscious of the gross affront he was putting on
Francezka in bringing Jacques Haret there. It occurred to me there was
some compulsion about it. As for Jacques Haret, there was a laughing
devil in his eye, which showed that he thoroughly enjoyed the
situation. He was dressed from top to toe in Gaston's clothes--a suit
of snuff-colored clothes and a purple waistcoat, which I had often
seen Gaston wear.
"I found this gentleman sunning himself in the court of the Palais
Royal," said Gaston pleasantly, "and not having met him since my
return, I brought him home that we may talk at our leisure and recall
the old days when he was a lad at Castle Haret and a playmate of mine
and my brother's. We have already had a long conversation and some
good wine in my study."
It was the first time since Gaston's return that I had heard him
mention Regnard's name. Francezka gave Jacques Haret a cold bow. I do
not think Madame Riano would have hesitated to order him out of the
garden, but she never could resist the charm of battle. Jacques Haret
was worthy of her steel in a wordy war, and the temptation was too
great for this militant lady. There was here a commingling of tragedy
and comedy such as I had seldom seen. I took it that poor old Peter
had not seen Jacques Haret during the time he had spent in Gaston's
rooms. Madame Riano opened the action by saying sternly:
"What are you doing here, Jacques Haret?"
"Come to pay my respects to your ladyship," was Jacques Haret's
undaunted reply. "Think you, Madame, that I could remain long in Paris
and fail to pay you my devoirs?"
Madame Riano, giving no attention to this speech, scrutinized Jacques
Haret, and then said abruptly:
"How comes it that you are so well dressed? I know those clothes are
not your own, for I know all about your way of life, Jacques Haret."
Gaston Cheverny looked a little uncomfortable at this. For all of
Madame Riano's sharpness, she had not recognized the clothes as
belonging to Gaston. Jacques Haret, however, replied with a grin:
"I borrowed them, Madame, when I was last in Brabant from your
old friend, the Bishop of Louvain. The old gentleman kept this
costume for occasions when he goes to Brussels _incog._ and
plays Harun-al-Rashid."
Madame Riano chose to be highly offended at this levity.
"How dare you, Jacques Haret, say such things about a man of God!"
"A man of God do you call him, Madame? Who was it, I should be glad to
know, that sent word to the bishop unless he stopped preaching
directly at a certain lady she would tweak his ears for him the next
time she met him?"
This staggered Madame Riano, for she had once actually sent such a
message to the bishop, who had the prudence to desist from his
fulminations against her. But like a crafty general, Madame Riano was
able to collect her scattered forces, after an onslaught, and still
make trouble for her adversary.
"I do not know to what you allude, and I should still like to know
where you got those clothes."
"Madame," began Gaston, in great confusion, but Jacques Haret was not
a whit confused and took the words out of Gaston's mouth:
"From the wardrobe of Gaston Cheverny just half an hour ago."
Madame Riano looked a trifle abashed, but rallied when Jacques Haret
said impudently, taking out meanwhile a snuff-box of Gaston's,
"And I put on all my finer feelings with these clothes. I have become
a gentleman once more; but if you object to them--the clothes, I
mean--I will take them off, every rag of them, here on the spot. The
prospect doesn't alarm you, does it? You, Madame, a representative of
the Kirkpatricks, ought not to be frightened by a little thing like
that."
Francezka had sat still, trying to master her indignation at Jacques
Haret's presumption. But that was no restraint on him. He began, in a
pleasant tone of old acquaintanceship, to Gaston:
"I suppose, Gaston, you and Madame Cheverny travel often to
Versailles?"
"Not very often," replied Gaston, recovering something of ease now
that the conversation had turned away from the unlucky clothes.
"Madame Cheverny has danced in several ballets before the king, and
has been to the masquerades, but neither of us is made to be a
hanger-on of courts."
"Good for you," replied Jacques Haret. "I knew something of the folly
of that in my childhood. My father was a born hanger-on of courts, as
you express it. Some wag declared that my father's epitaph ought to
be: 'Here lies one who was born a man and died a courtier.' Your old
Peter can tell you some stories of how my father chased after kings."
This mention of Peter disgusted us all, and was an indignity that
Francezka could not stand. She rose, and casting back at Jacques Haret
one of those looks which, on the stage, had thrilled all who saw her,
she walked like an insulted queen across the green sward toward the
house. Madame Riano followed, for once disdainfully silent. Jacques
Haret looked about him with the most innocent air in the world.
"Now, what have I done to offend the ladies?" he asked.
"I don't think you are exactly a favorite with _these_ ladies,"
replied Gaston, smiling.
I listened in wonderment. Was it possible that Francezka had not told
Gaston the story of Lisa? For he acted as if he knew nothing of it.
However, I had my views about Jacques Haret's presence there, so I
rose, too, and bade Gaston a ceremonious adieu, and said nothing at
all to Jacques Haret. It did not discompose him in the least, and
again taking out his snuff-box, Gaston Cheverny's snuff-box, he began
to hum _Sur le pont d'Avignon_. That air seemed to be a favorite of
his. I had gone about half way across the garden, and it being large,
I was out of sight and sound of Gaston and Jacques Haret, when I heard
Gaston at my heels, calling "Hold!" I stopped and he joined me, with
an expression both of amusement and annoyance on his face.
"I am in a damnably awkward place, Babache," he said. "Of course, we
all know about Jacques Haret, but the fellow has been permitted in all
the houses where the Harets have been received for generations. You
remember well, after that expedition to Courland, he stayed some time
at the Manoir Cheverny and went to the chateau of Capello whenever he
liked. So, meeting him to-day, as I say, in the gardens of the Palais
Royal, and bringing him home with me--in fact, asking him to come and
sup with us, for his entertainment always pays for his supper, you
perceived the reception he got from my lady Francezka and Madame
Riano. Now, what am I to do?"
"You forget," I replied, "that in those days when Jacques Haret stayed
with you at the Manoir Cheverny, and with your brother Regnard at
Castle Haret, it was before that scoundrelly business with poor Lisa,
old Peter's niece."
"That is true," he answered reflectively. "It was a very atrocious
thing, as you say, but it is a common enough story. The girl was a
village girl; little more than a peasant."
I own I was full of disgust when Gaston Cheverny spoke thus. How
different was this from the high-souled, chivalric Gaston Cheverny
whom I had known, and who treated all women with the consideration of
a Bayard! I said, however, coldly enough:
"Perhaps you have forgotten that old Peter shared his wages with that
villain of a Jacques Haret--his wages, think of that! And in his own
poor house sheltered the fellow. I must say that seldom if ever in my
life have I known such treachery as Jacques Haret's."
I walked on, but Gaston kept step with me along the graveled paths,
through the bright flower beds and under the green arbors of the
garden. His face had changed completely. All amusement had vanished,
and in its place was an expression of perplexity, and even fear. At
last he stopped me under an arbor already covered with the young green
leaves of a climbing rose.
"Babache," he said, "I am pledged to have Jacques Haret sup with me;
that is the truth. You have great influence over Francezka. Will you
not endeavor to reconcile Francezka to me for receiving him?"
"No," I replied; "I have not lived so long without learning to keep
from meddling with affairs between husband and wife. But who cares for
offending Jacques Haret? I gave him a sound beating myself not a
fortnight ago in the gardens of the Luxembourg."
We were standing still in the arbor, and the mellow afternoon light
showed me every line in Gaston Cheverny's comely face. Nothing that he
had yet said or done had made me feel so like a stranger to him--to
Gaston Cheverny, with whom I had lived in the closest intimacy for
seven years--as his attitude on the subject of this rascally Jacques
Haret. I could but study his countenance, which was always vivid and
full of expression. The thought flashed into my mind that Jacques
Haret possessed some hold over Gaston Cheverny; perhaps some secret of
those lost years. Jacques Haret at Paris had known in advance of the
very day and hour of Gaston's return to Brabant. This thought troubled
me.
Gaston remained, looking down reflectively, and considering Jacques
Haret with far more seriousness than I had ever seen any one consider
him before.
"One thing is certain," I said; "Jacques Haret would forego supping
with the king's majesty himself for a supper as good and a couple of
crowns. I will say this of that rogue and thief of other men's
honor--I never saw that human being who was so little awed by names
and titles as Jacques Haret." Which was true, showing what virtues may
yet subsist in a rascal.
Gaston Cheverny's face changed as if by magic.
"Why did I not think of that before!" he cried. "My dear Babache, it
is not for nothing that Count Maurice of Saxe has you at his elbow day
and night. That ugly head of yours contains useful ideas. A thousand
thanks to you; I will this minute put your advice to proof."
He turned and walked back to where Jacques Haret was. I went away,
leaving my respects for the ladies. I thought Francezka would rather
not see me after the painful episode in the garden. And I made not the
slightest doubt that the money for the supper and a couple of crowns
thrown in would buy Jacques Haret off, as I had said, from supping
with all the kings in Christendom.