_My young lord settles scores with two foes at once._
Occupied in wrangling with the grooms over the merits of our several
stables, with the soldiers over politics and the armies, I awaited in a
shady corner of the court the conclusion of formalities. I had just
declared that King Henry would be in Paris within a week, and was on the
point of getting my crown cracked for it, when, as if for the very
purpose--save the mark!--of rescuing me, entered from the street Lucas.
He approached rapidly, eyes straight in front of him, heeding us no
whit; but all the loungers turned to stare at him. Even then he paid no
heed, passing us without a glance. But the tall d'Auvray bespoke him.
"M. de Lorraine! Any news?"
He started and turned to us in half-absent surprise, as if he had not
known of our presence nor, indeed, quite realized it now. He was both
pale and rumpled, like one who has not closed an eye all night.
"Any news here?" he made Norman answer.
"No, monsieur, unless his Grace has information. We have heard nothing."
"And the woman?"
"Sticks to it mademoiselle told her never a word."
Lucas stood still, his eyes travelling dully over the group of us, as if
he expected somewhere to find help. At the same time he was not in the
least thinking of us. He looked straight at me for a full minute before
he awoke to my identity.
"You!"
"Yes, M. de Lorraine," I said, with all the respectfulness I could
muster, which may not have been much. Considering our parting, I was
ready for any violence. But after the first moment of startlement he
regarded me in a singularly lack-lustre way, while he inquired without
apparent resentment how I came there.
"With M. le Duc de St. Quentin," I grinned at him. "We and M. de Mayenne
are friends now."
I could not rouse him even to curiosity, it seemed. But he turned
abruptly to the men with more life than he had yet shown.
"You've not told this fellow?"
"We understand our orders, monsieur," d'Auvray answered, a bit huffed.
Now this was eminently the place for me to hold my tongue, but of course
I could not.
"They had no need to tell me, M. de Lorraine. I know quite well what the
trouble is. I know rather more about it than you do yourself."
He confronted me now with all the fire I could ask.
"What mean you, whelp?"
"I mean mademoiselle. What else should I mean?"
"What do you know?"
"Everything."
"Her whereabouts?"
"Her whereabouts."
He had his hand to his knife by this. I abated somewhat of my drawl to
say, still airily:
"Go ask M. de St. Quentin. He's here. He'll be so glad to see you."
"Here?"
"Certes. He's closeted now with M. de Mayenne. They're thicker than
brothers. Go see for yourself, M.--Lucas."
"Where is mademoiselle?"
"Safe. She's to marry the Comte de Mar to-morrow."
He stared at me for one moment, weighing whether this could be true;
then without further parley he shot into the house.
"Is that true?" d'Auvray demanded.
Their tongues loosened now, they flooded me with questions concerning
mademoiselle, which I answered warily as I could, heartily repenting me
by this of baiting Lucas. No good could come of it. He might even turn
Mayenne from his bargain, upset all our triumph. I hardly heard what the
soldiers said to me; I was almost nervous enough, wild enough, to dash
up-stairs after him. But that was no help. I stayed where I was, fevered
with anxiety.
At the end of five minutes he came out of the house again, and, without
a glance at us, went straight through the gate with the step and air of
a man who knows what he is about. I was no easier in my mind though I
saw him gone.
Soon on his steps came a lackey to order M. de St. Quentin's horses and
two musketeers to mount and ride with him. On reaching the door with the
nags, I discovered I was not to be of the party; our second steed must
carry gear of mademoiselle's and her handwoman, a hard-faced peasant,
silent as a stone. Though the men quizzed her, asking if she were glad
to get to her mistress again, whether she had known all this time the
lady's whereabouts, she answered no single word, but busied herself
seeing the horse loaded to her notion. Presently, in the guidance of
Pierre, Monsieur appeared.
"You stay, Félix, and go to the Bastille for your master. Then you will
wait at the St. Denis gate for Vigo, with horses."
"Is all right, Monsieur?" I had to ask, as I held his stirrup. "Is all
right? Lucas--"
His face had been a little clouded as he came down the stairs, and now
it darkened more, but he answered:
"Quite right, Achates. M. de Mayenne stands to his word. Lucas availed
nothing."
He stood a moment frowning, then his countenance cleared up.
"My faith! I have enough to gladden me without fretting that Lucas is
alive. Fare you well, Félix. You are like to reach St. Denis as soon as
I. My son's horse will not lag."
He sprang to the saddle with a smiling salute to his guardians, and the
little train clattered off.
Pierre came to my elbow with an open paper--the order signed and sealed
for M. de Mar's release.
"Here, my young cockerel, you and d'Auvray are to take this to the
Bastille, and it will be strange if your master does not walk free
again. His Grace bids you tell M. de Mar he remembers Wednesday night,
underground."
"And I remember Tuesday night in the council-room, Pierre," I was
beginning, but he cut me short. Even now that I was in favour, he risked
no mention of his disobedience. He packed me off with d'Auvray on the
instant; I had no chance to ask him whether he suspected us yesterday.
Sometimes I have thought he did, but I am bound to say he gave us no
look to show it.
D'Auvray and I walked straight across Paris to the many-towered
Bastille. It seemed a little way. Before the potent name of Mayenne bars
flew open; a sentry on guard in the court led us into a small room all
stone, floor, walls, ceiling, where sat at the table some high official,
perhaps the governor of the prison himself. He was an old campaigner,
grizzled and weather-beaten, his right sleeve hanging empty. An
interesting figure, no doubt, but I paid him scant attention, for at his
side stood Lucas.
"I come on M. de Mayenne's business," he was expostulating, vehement,
yet civil. "I suppose he did not think it necessary to write the order,
since you know me."
"The regulations, M. de Lorraine--" The officer broke off to demand of
our escort, "Well, what now?"
I went straight up to him, not waiting permission, and held out my
paper.
"An order, if it please you, monsieur, for the Comte de Mar's release."
Lucas's hand went out to snatch and crumple it; then his clenched fist
dropped to his side. It seemed as if his eyes would blacken the paper
with their fire.
"Just that--the requisition for M. de Mar's release," the officer told
him, looking up from it. "All perfectly regular and in order. In five
minutes, M. de Lorraine, the Comte de Mar shall be before you. You may
have all the conversation you wish."
Lucas's face was as blank as the wall.
"I am a soldier, and a soldier's orders must be obeyed," the officer
went on to explain, evidently not caring to offend the general's nephew.
"Without the written order I could not admit your brother of Guise. But
now you can have all the conversation you desire with M. de Mar."
Lucas's face did not change, save to scowl at the very name of his
brother Guise. He said curtly, "No, I must get back to his Grace," and,
barely bowing, went from the room.
"Now, I don't make that out," the keeper muttered in his beard. That
Lucas should be in one moment cured of his urgent need of seeing the
Comte de Mar was too much for him, but no riddle to me. I knew he had
come to stab M. Étienne in his cell. It was his last chance, and he had
missed it. I feared him no longer, for I believed in Mayenne's faith. My
master once released, Lucas could not hurt him.
What was as much to the point, the officer had no doubt of Mayenne's
good faith. He went with his paper into an inner room, where we caught
sight, through the door, of big books with a clerk or two behind them,
and in a moment appeared again with a key.
"Since the young gentleman's a count, I'll do turnkey's office myself,"
he said, his grim old battlement of a face smiling.
This was our day; from Mayenne down, everybody went out of his way to
pleasure us. I was suddenly emboldened by his manner.
"Monsieur, perhaps it is preposterous to ask, but might I go with you?"
He looked at me a moment, surprised.
"Well, after all, why not? You too, Sir Musketeer, an you like."
So the three of us, he and d'Auvray and I, went to rescue the Comte de
Mar.
We passed through corridor after corridor, row after row of heavy-barred
doors. The deeper we penetrated the mighty pile, the fonder I grew of my
friend Mayenne, by whose complaisance none of these doors would shut on
me. We climbed at last a steep turret stair winding about a huge fir
trunk, lighted by slits of windows in the four-foot wall, and at the
top turned down a dark passage to a door at the end, the bolts of which,
invisible to me in the gloom, the veteran drew back with familiar hand.
The cell was small, with one high window through which I could see
naught but the sky. For all furniture it contained a pallet, a stool, a
bench that might serve as table. M. Étienne stood at the window, his arm
crooked around the iron bars, gazing out over the roofs of Paris.
He wheeled about at the door's creaking.
"I go to trial, monsieur?" he asked quickly, not seeing me behind the
keeper.
"No, M. le Comte. The charge is cancelled. I come to set you free."