THE ABBE’S RETURN.--A SWORD, AND A SOLILOQUY.
THE next evening, when I was sitting alone in my room, the Abbe
Montreuil suddenly entered. “Ah, is it you? welcome!” cried I. The
priest held out his arms, and embraced me in the most paternal manner.
“It is your friend,” said he, “returned at last to bless and
congratulate you. Behold my success in your service,” and the Abbe
produced a long leather case richly inlaid with gold.
“Faith, Abbe,” said I, “am I to understand that this is a present for
your eldest pupil?”
“You are,” said Montreuil, opening the case, and producing a sword. The
light fell upon the hilt, and I drew back, dazzled with its lustre; it
was covered with stones, apparently of the most costly value. Attached
to the hilt was a label of purple velvet, on which, in letters of gold,
was inscribed, “To the son of Marshal Devereux, the soldier of France,
and the friend of Louis XIV.”
Before I recovered my surprise at this sight, the Abbe said: “It
was from the King’s own hand that I received this sword, and I have
authority to inform you that if ever you wield it in the service of
France it will be accompanied by a post worthy of your name.”
“The service of France!” I repeated; “why, at present that is the
service of an enemy.”
“An enemy only to a _part_ of England!” said the Abbe, emphatically;
“perhaps I have overtures to you from other monarchs, and the friendship
of the court of France may be synonymous with the friendship of the true
sovereign of England.”
There was no mistaking the purport of this speech, and even in the midst
of my gratified vanity I drew back alarmed.
The Abbe noted the changed expression of my countenance, and artfully
turned the subject to comments on the sword, on which I still gazed with
a lover’s ardour. Thence he veered to a description of the grace and
greatness of the royal donor: he dwelt at length upon the flattering
terms in which Louis had spoken of my father, and had inquired
concerning myself; he enumerated all the hopes that the illustrious
house into which my father had first married expressed for a speedy
introduction to his son; he lingered with an eloquence more savouring of
the court than of the cloister on the dazzling circle which surrounded
the French throne; and when my vanity, my curiosity, my love of
pleasure, my ambition, all that are most susceptible in young minds,
were fully aroused, he suddenly ceased, and wished me a good night.
“Stay,” said I; and looking at him more attentively than I had hitherto
done, I perceived a change in his external appearance which somewhat
startled and surprised me. Montreuil had always hitherto been remarkably
plain in his dress; but he was now richly attired, and by his side hung
a rapier, which had never adorned it before. Something in his aspect
seemed to suit the alteration in his garb: and whether it was that long
absence had effaced enough of the familiarity of his features to allow
me to be more alive than formerly to the real impression they were
calculated to produce, or whether a commune with kings and nobles had of
late dignified their old expression, as power was said to have clothed
the soldier-mien of Cromwell with a monarch’s bearing,--I do not affect
to decide; but I thought that, in his high brow and Roman features,
the compression of his lip, and his calm but haughty air, there was a
nobleness, which I acknowledged for the first time. “Stay, my father,”
said I, surveying him, “and tell me, if there be no irreverence in the
question, whether brocade and a sword are compatible with the laws of
the Order of Jesus?”
“Policy, Morton,” answered Montreuil, “often dispenses with custom; and
the declarations of the Institute provide, with their usual wisdom, for
worldly and temporary occasions. Even while the constitution ordains us
to discard habits repugnant to our professions of poverty, the following
exception is made: ‘Si in occurrenti aliqua occasione, vel necessitate,
quis vestibus melioribus, honestis tamen, indueretur.’”*
* “But should there chance any occasion or necessity, one may wear
better though still decorous garments.”
“There is now, then, some occasion for a more glittering display than
ordinary?” said I.
“There is, my pupil,” answered Montreuil; “and whenever you embrace the
offer of my friendship made to you more than two years ago,--whenever,
too, your ambition points to a lofty and sublime career,--whenever to
make and unmake kings, and in the noblest sphere to execute the will
of God, indemnifies you for a sacrifice of petty wishes and momentary
passions,--I will confide to you schemes worthy of your ancestors and
yourself.”
With this the priest departed. Left to myself, I revolved his hints, and
marvelled at the power he seemed to possess. “Closeted with kings,”
said I, soliloquizing,--“bearing their presents through armed men
and military espionage; speaking of empires and their overthrow as of
ordinary objects of ambition; and he himself a low-born and undignified
priest, of a poor though a wise order,--well, there is more in this than
I can fathom: but I will hesitate before I embark in his dangerous and
concealed intrigues; above all, I will look well ere I hazard my safe
heritage of these broad lands in the service of that House which is
reported to be ungrateful, and which is certainly exiled.”
After this prudent and notable resolution, I took up the sword,
re-examined it, kissed the hilt once and the blade twice, put it under
my pillow, sent for my valet, undressed, went to bed, fell asleep,
and dreamed that I was teaching the Marechal de Villars the thrust _en
seconde_.
But Fate, that arch-gossip, who, like her prototypes on earth, settles
all our affairs for us without our knowledge of the matter, had decreed
that my friendship with the Abbe Montreuil should be of very short
continuance, and that my adventures on earth should flow through a
different channel than, in all probability, they would have done under
his spiritual direction.