The road to Nancy from Paris ran through the old province of Champagne
until Lorraine was entered--Lorraine, which, since the peace of
Westphalia, had fallen under French rule.
Along this road the cavalcade led by La Truaumont progressed day by
day on its way towards Nancy, a hundred and fifty miles and more by
road from Paris. Between each morning and night the members of that
cavalcade rode on and accomplished some thirty miles at a slow pace so
as to spare their horses as much as possible, while halting in the
evenings at old inns where, though they gave no name, their appearance
and their manners proclaimed that they were persons, or at least that
one of them was, of high importance.
For the Duchess, Jacquette and Humphrey took their meals together
behind a screen in whatever public room they sat down, as was the
custom of the nobility when travelling; La Truaumont took his
alone behind another screen close by, while the _soi-disant_, or, it
may be, the actual Colonel--for Colonels could oft fall low in these
times!--Boisfleury took his in company with the sinister and truculent
Fleur de Mai.
"And, _sang bleu!_" exclaimed the latter individual on the third night
of their halt, which took place at Vitry, "if we were not ordered to
sit apart and to restore ourselves like serving men and valets by this
insolent La Truaumont, I would be well content with the office. This
ride through the air of Champagne is good for our health, the food and
drink is wholesome and ample, the absence of expense good for our
pockets. Nevertheless, I do think I must stick my rapier through La
Truaumont's midriff at the end of the ride. For his insults," and he
swallowed a large gulp of golden Avize, a local wine.
"Stick thy fork in thy mouth and thy glass down thy throat!" replied
Boisfleury, tearing the flesh off a chicken's wing with his teeth as
he spoke, "and utter no banalities. You are well paid, you sleep warm
and soft o' nights and eat and drink of the best, and all you have to
do is to ride by my side and listen to my sweet converse and hold your
babbling tongue. While as to rapiers through midriffs--what would the
attempt profit you? La Truaumont is a _ferrailleur_ of the first
water. Better put good food inside you than your vitals outside."
"I am as good as he," Fleur de Mai replied in a voice which was
getting husky with the Avize, when suddenly Boisfleury interrupted any
further observations by exclaiming:--
"Be silent, fool, and stagger to thy feet. See, the Duchess rises
from the table behind the screen. Ha! the Englishman bids madame
good-night. He kissed her hand and, _me damne!_ kisses slyly the ear
of the girl, d'Angelis. Ha! Ha! The kiss, the English kiss! They can
do nothing without that. And, observe, La Truaumont comes this way.
Stand steady on thy feet, _chameau_."
"Boot and saddle at six o'clock to-morrow," said La Truaumont as he
came down the great inn-room which was part hall, and, at the end,
part kitchen. "Up at five. Boisfleury, see he is up," looking at Fleur
de Mai.
"I shall be up," muttered that worthy. "Have no fear. A pint of this
wine will not make me sleep heavily. I'll throw the dice with you now
for a bottle of the best."
* * * * * * *
The noble lady, Ortenzia, Duchesse de Castellucchio, who was now
riding from Paris to Nancy on her way to cross the Alps and, later, to
join her own family, that of the Scoriatis, had some few years before
this made almost a similar journey to France, there to marry her
countryman the Duc de Castellucchio, a man whose family, originally
poor, had followed Concino Concini--the Maréchal d'Ancre--into France,
but had managed to escape the awful end that had overtaken both him
and his wife.
Having escaped such a fate as the assassination of the former or the
execution by burning of the latter, as well as any other forms of
death which the creatures of those once powerful adventurers might
well have expected to overtake them, the family thrived and prospered.
Steering clear of political machinations until the Concinis were
almost forgotten and, indeed, until Louis le Juste was himself in his
grave, they devoted themselves to commerce and, above all, to money
lending and, thereby, grew rich.
But when, at last, Mazarin's star was in the ascendant as it became
shortly after the death of Richelieu, they attached themselves to his
fortunes, while, as he grew all powerful, so did they who, coming to
France almost paupers, were now enormously wealthy.
One grief there was, however, that fell heavily on old Felice Ventura
who had, by this time, become Monsieur le Duc de Castellucchio (he
having decided to confer honour on his birthplace by taking its name
for his title), and that grief was that his only son and successor
gave signs of becoming a maniac, if he were not already one.
Always strange as a boy, this son had, as a young man, given still
more astonishing signs of mental derangement, and, a short time after
he had espoused Ortenzia Scoriati, the daughter of a noble and wealthy
Milanese family, he was regarded and spoken of not only as a lunatic
but a dangerous one. For, from such outbreaks as rousing the whole
house from their beds by saying that a ghost was wandering round it,
and by dragging his wife out of her own bed by the hair to look for
the apparition; by not allowing any footmen to be in his service who
were under seventy, in case his wife should fall in love with them,
and by breaking up all the statues he owned (which his father had
collected at an enormous cost) since he proclaimed such things to be
heathen and profligate, he proceeded to greater extremities. He
invariably tore the patches off his wife's face whenever she placed
them on it, saying that they were the allurements used by giddy women;
he insisted next that his wife should have her teeth drawn so that she
should become hideous in the eyes of the world, and it was only by the
flight from him which she was now undertaking that the Duchess was
able to prevent herself from being thus disfigured for the rest of her
life.
But even before this moment had arrived, his conduct had been such as
to induce the unhappy Duchess to determine to leave him. He ruined all
the costly furniture and pictures, as well as the statues, which his
old father had accumulated, on the usual plea that they were not fit
for modest people to gaze upon, while, not six months before this
flight took place, he invited his wife to go for a drive with him in
their coach one afternoon, and, when they had set out, calmly informed
her that they were going to Rome. But that which was worse than all
for the Duchess was that they actually did continue their journey to
that city, though neither of them had either a change of clothes or of
linen with them.
It was to De Beaurepaire, whom she had known ever since she came to
France, that the Duchess turned for assistance when she determined to
finally quit it, while for a companion in her journey she looked to
her _demoiselle de compagnie_, "Jacquette," or Jacqueline d'Angelis.
For Jacquette loved her and pitied her sad lot, and, had it not been
for her stronger love for Humphrey, and her hopes for a happy future
with him, she would not only have accompanied the Duchess on this
journey they were making at this moment but would never have
contemplated parting from her.
And now, therefore, not only was Mademoiselle d'Angelis a member of
that small band but so, also, was Humphrey West, since, having at
present no occupation whatsoever, and no interest in life except to be
by the side of the girl he loved so well, he had made interest with De
Beaurepaire and the Duchess--both of whom had always treated him well
and kindly--to be allowed to form one of the latter's escort as well
as to be the knight and sentinel of his betrothed.
That these two should love each other was not strange, nor would it
have been strange even if they had met no longer than a year ago. He
was young and good looking enough to win any woman's fancy, while,
beside his sufficiency of good looks, he was tall and broad and gave
signs of health and strength in every action of his body.
She, "his girl," as he called her to her face and to himself, was
worthy of him. Amidst a Court that, at least from the day when Louis
XIII. died, had been none too moral and, under the influence of the
Queen-Mother and the then young King, had long since verged towards
absolute recklessness, Jacquette moved free and pure herself, while
hating, averting her eyes from, and being unwilling to see, all that
went on around her. For, while the girl was as beautiful as though she
had just left some canvas painted by Correggio, she was, partly and
principally owing to her own nature and partly to her English mother's
training, almost as pure as though she had just left that mother's
side. Similarly, as neither late nights, nor masques, nor dances, nor
any wild dissipations whatever to which the Court and all who were in
it, or of it, gave themselves up, could impair that fair soft beauty,
so neither could whispered words nor looks nor hints from dissolute
courtiers impair her purity of mind. To crown all, she loved one man
and one alone, and she would never love any other.
And, now, this strangely assorted band of travellers had reached their
third halting-place on the road to Nancy, where shelter was to be
found in the house of De Beaurepaire's mother. This strangely assorted
band consisting of a woman of high rank in two countries, a young girl
whose life had been almost entirely passed in the glamour and ease of
the French Court, a valiant young Englishman who loved that girl, and
three reckless adventurers.
Yet the first three persons of the number had no thought, no
presentiment that, beneath the apparently insignificant nature of the
journey they were making, there lurked in the hearts of the other
three a deeper, a sterner, a more wicked purpose: a more profound and
horrible reason for their being on the road. The purpose of reaching a
city outside the King's dominions, a Republican city in which no
sympathies for a monarch or a monarchy were likely to exist, even
should that purpose become known; the purpose of there meeting the
arch-plotter of a hideous crime and being able to discuss in safety
how the workings of that crime should be decided on.
These first three knew this no more than they knew that, following
them, and sometimes preceding them, when opportunity offered, so that
she might await their arrival; spying on all their movements and
communicating those movements to De Beaurepaire as she learnt them,
went a woman whose mad love for him had spurred her on to sink from
what was almost as high as patriotism to that which was the deepest
depths of wicked intrigue.