"Vigo," he said, without a change of countenance, "get Félix a rapier,
which he can use prettily enough. I cannot take him out to-night
unarmed."
Vigo hesitated a moment, saluted, and went.
"Monsieur," I cried out, "you meant all the time to take me!"
He gazed down on my heated visage and laughed and laughed.
"Félix," he gasped, "you had your sport over there at the inn. But I
have seen nothing this summer as funny as _your_ face."
Vigo came back with a sword and baldric for me, and a horse-pistol
besides, but M. Étienne would not let me have it.
"Circumstances are such, Vigo, that I want no noisy weapons."
The equery regarded him with a troubled countenance.
"I wish I knew, monsieur, whether I do right to let you go."
"We will not discuss that, an it please you."
"I do not, monsieur. I have no right to curtail M. le Comte's liberties.
But I let you go with a heavy heart."
He looked after us with foreboding eyes as we went out of the great
gate, alone, with not so much as a linkboy. But if his heart was heavy,
our hearts were light. We paced along as merrily as though to a feast.
M. Étienne hung his lute over his neck and strummed it; and whenever we
passed under a window whence leaned a pretty head, he sang snatches of
love-songs. We were alone in the dark streets of a hostile city, bound
for the house of a mighty foe; and one of us was wounded and one a tyro.
Yet we laughed as we went; for there was Lucas languishing in prison,
and here were we, free as air, steering our course for mademoiselle's
window. One of us was in love, and the other wore a sword for the first
time, and all the power of Mayenne daunted us not.
We came at length within bow-shot of the Hôtel de Lorraine, where M.
Étienne was willing to abate somewhat his swagger. We left the Rue St.
Antoine, creeping around behind the house through a narrow and twisting
alley--it was pitch-black, but he knew the way well--into a little
street dim-lighted from the windows of the houses upon it. It was only a
few rods long, running from the open square in front of the hôtel to the
network of unpaved alleys behind. On the farther side stood a row of
high-gabled houses, their doors opening directly on the pavement; on
this side was but one big pile, the Hôtel de Lorraine. The wall was
broken by few windows, most of them dark; this was not the gay side of
the house. The overhanging turret on the low second story, under which
M. Étienne halted, was as dark as the rest, nor, though the casement was
open wide, could we tell whether any one was in the room. We could hear
nothing but the breeze crackling in the silken curtains.
"Take your station at the corner there," he bade, "and shout if they
seem to be coming for us. But I think we shall not be molested. My
fingers are so stiff they will hardly recognize my hand on the strings."
I went to my post, and he began singing, scarce loud enough for any but
his lady above to mark him:
_Fairest blossom ever grew
Once she loosened from her breast.
This I say, her eyes are blue.
From her breast the rose she drew,
Dole for me, her servant blest,
Fairest blossom ever grew._
The music paused, and I turned from my watch of the shadowy figures
crossing the square, in instant alarm lest something was wrong. But
whatever startled him ceased, for in a moment he went on again, and as
he sang his voice rang fuller:
_Of my love the guerdon true,
'Tis my bosom's only guest.
This I say, her eyes are blue.
Still to me 'tis bright of hue
As when first my kisses prest
Fairest blossom ever grew.
Sweeter than when gathered new
'Twas the sign her love confest.
This I say, her eyes are blue._
He stopped again and stood gazing up into the window, but whether he saw
something or heard something I could not tell. Apparently he was not
sure himself, for presently, a little tremulous, he added the four
verses:
_Askest thou of me a clue
To that lady I love best?
Fairest blossom ever grew!
This I say, her eyes are blue._
He doffed his hat, pushing back the hair from his brow, and waited,
eager, hopeful. There was a little stir in the room that one thought was
not the wind.
I had come unconsciously half-way up the street to him in the ardour of
my interest; but now I was startled back to my duty by the sound of men
running round the corner behind me. One glance was enough; two abreast,
swords in hand, they were charging us. I ran before them, drawing blade
as I went and shouting to M. Étienne. But even as I called an answering
shout came from the alley; two men of the Spanish guards shot out of the
darkness and at us.
M. Étienne, with his extraordinary quickness, had got the lute off his
neck, and now, for want of a better use of it, flung it at the head of
his nearest assailant, who received it full in the face, stopped,
hesitated a moment, and ran back the way he had come. But three foes
remained, with the whole Hôtel de Lorraine behind them.
We put our backs to the wall and set to. The remaining Spaniard engaged
me; M. Étienne, protected somewhat in the embrasure of a doorway, held
at bay with his good left arm a pair of attackers. These were in the
dress of gentlemen, and wore masks as if their cheeks blushed (well they
might) for the deeds of their hands.
A broad window in the Hôtel de Lorraine was flung open; a man leaned far
out with a torch. The bright glare in our faces bewildered our
gloom-accustomed eyes; I could not see what I was about, and rammed my
point against my Spaniard's hilt, snapping my blade.
The sudden impact sent him stumbling back a pace, and M. Étienne, who,
with the quick eye of the born fencer, saw everything, cried to me,
"Here!"
I darted back into the doorway beside him. His two assailants finding
that they gained nothing by their joint attack, but rather hampered each
other, one dropped back to watch his comrade, the cleverer swordsman.
This was decidedly a man of talent, but he was shorter in the arm than
my master and had the disadvantage of standing on the ground, whereas M.
Étienne was up one step. He could not force home any of his
shrewd-planned thrusts; nor could he drive M. Étienne out of his coign
to where in the open the two could make short work of him. The rapiers
clashed and parted and twisted about each other and flew apart again;
and then before I could see who was touched the attacker fell to his
knees, with M. Étienne's sword in his breast.
M. Étienne wrenched the blade out; the wounded man sank backward, his
mask-string breaking. He was the one whom I had thought him--François de
Brie.
M. Étienne was ready for the second gentleman, but neither he nor the
soldier attacked. The torch-bearer in the window, with a shout, waved
his arm toward the square. A mob of armed men hurled itself around the
corner, a pikeman with lowered point in the van.
This was not combat; it was butchery. M. Étienne, with a little moan,
lifted his eyes for the first time from his assailant to the turret
window. In the same instant I felt the door behind us give. Throwing my
whole weight upon it, I seized M. Étienne and pulled him over the
threshold. Some one inside slammed the door to, just as the Spaniard
hurled himself against it.