Let him shun castles;
Safer shall he be on the sandy plain Than where castles mounted
stand.--KING HENRY VI.
While Berenger slept a heavy morning’s sleep after a resless night,
Philip explored the narrow domain above and below. The keep and its
little court had evidently been the original castle, built when the
oddly-nicknamed Fulkes and Geoffreys of Anjou had been at daggers drawn
with the Dukes of Normandy and Brittany, but it had since, like most
other such ancient feudal fortresses, become the nucleus of walls and
buildings for use, defence, or ornament, that lay beneath him like a
spider’s web, when he had gained the roof of the keep, garnished with
pepper-box turrets at each of the four angles. Beyond lay the green
copses and orchards of the Bocage, for it was true, as he had at first
suspected, that this was the chateau de Nid de Merle, and that Berenger
was a captive in his wife’s own castle.
Chances of escape were the lad’s chief thought, but the building on
which he stood went sheer down for a considerable way. Then on the north
side there came out the sharp, high-pitched, tiled roof of the _corps du
logis_; on the south, another roof, surmounted by a cross at the gable,
and evidently belonging to the chapel; on the other two sides lay
courts--that to the east, a stable-yard; that to the west, a small
narrow, chilly-looking, paved inclosure, with enormously-massive walls,
the doorway walled up, and looking like a true prison-yard. Beyond
this wall--indeed, on every side--extended offices, servants’ houses,
stables, untidy desolate-looking gardens, and the whole was inclosed by
the white wall with flanking red-tiled turrets, whose gaudy appearance
had last night made Philip regard the whole as a flimsy, Frenchchified
erection, but he now saw it to be of extremely solid stone and lime,
and with no entrance but the great barbican gateway they had entered by;
moreover, with a yawning dry moat all round. Wherever he looked he saw
these tall, pointed red caps, resembling, he thought, those worn by
the victims of an _auto-de-fe_, as one of Walsingham’s secretaries had
described them to him; and he ground his teeth at them, as thought they
grinned at him like emissaries of the Inquisition.
Descending, he found Berenger dressing in haste to avoid receiving an
invalid visit from the Chevalier, looking indeed greatly shaken, but
hardly so as would have been detected by eyes that had not seen him
during his weeks of hope and recovery. He was as resolved as Philip
could wish against any sign of weakness before his enemy, and altogether
disclaimed illness, refusing the stock of cooling drinks, cordials, and
febrifuges, which the Chevalier said had been sent by his sister the
Abbess of Bellaise. He put the subject of his health aside, only asking
if this were the day that the gendarme-captain would return to
Paris, and then begging to see that officer, so as to have a distinct
understanding of the grounds of his imprisonment. The captain had,
however, been a mere instrument; and when Philip clamoured to be taken
before the next justice of the peace, even Berenger smiled at him for
thinking that such a being existed in France. The only cause alleged was
the vague but dangerous suspicion of conveying correspondence between
England and the heretics, and this might become extremely perilous to
one undeniably half English, regarded as whole Huguenot, caught on
the way to La Rochelle with a letter to La Noue in his pocket; and,
moreover, to one who had had a personal affray with a king famous for
storing up petty offences, whom the last poor king had favoured,
and who, in fine, had claims to estates that could not spared to the
Huguenot interest.
He was really not sure that there was not some truth in the professions
of the Chevalier being anxious to protect him from the Queen-mother and
the Guises; he had never been able to divest himself of a certain trust
in his old kinsman’s friendliness, and he was obliged to be beholden
to him for the forms in which to couch his defence. At the same time he
wrote to Sir Francis Walsingham, and to his grandfather, but with great
caution, lest his letters should be inspected by his enemies, and with
the less hope of their availing him because it was probable that the
Ambassador would return home on the king’s death. No answer could be
expected for at least a fortnight, and even then it was possible that
the Queen-mother might choose to refer the cause to King Henry, who was
then in Poland.
Berenger wrote these letters with much thought and care, but when they
were once sealed, he collapsed again into despair and impatience, and
frantically paced the little court as if he would dash himself against
the walls that detained him from Eustacie; then threw himself moodily
into a chair, hid his face in his crossed arms, and fell a prey to all
the wretched visions called up by an excited brain.
However, he was equally alive with Philip to the high-spirited
resolution that his enemies should not perceive or triumph in his
dejection. He showed himself at the noon-day dinner, before Captain
Delarue departed, grave and silent, but betraying no agitation; and he
roused himself from his sad musings at the supper-hour, to arrange his
hair, and assume the ordinary dress of gentlemen in the evening; though
Philip laughed at the roses adorning his shoes, and his fresh ruff,
as needless attentions to an old ruffian like the Chevalier. However,
Philip started when he entered the hall, and beheld, not the Chevalier
alone, but with him the beautiful lady of the velvet coach, and another
stately, extremely handsome dame, no longer in her first youth, and
in costly black and white garments. When the Chevalier called her his
sister, Madame de Bellaise, Philip had no notion that she was anything
but a widow, living a secular life; and though a couple of nuns attended
her, their dress was so much less conventual than Cecily’s that he did
not at first find them out. It was explained that Madame de Selinville
was residing with her aunt, and that, having come to visit her father,
he had detained the ladies to supper, hoping to enliven the sojourn of
his _beaux cousins_.
Madame de Selinville, looking anxiously at Berenger, hoped she saw him
in better health. He replied, stiffly, that he was perfectly well;
and then, by way of safety, repaired to the society of the Abbess, who
immediately began plying him with questions about England, its court,
and especially the secret marriage of Queen Elisabeth and ‘_ce_ Comte
de Dudley,’ on which she was so minutely informed as to put him to the
blush. Then she was very curious about the dispersed convents, and how
many of the nuns had married; and she seemed altogether delighted to
have secured the attention of a youth from the outer world. His soul at
first recoiled from her as one of Eustacie’s oppressors, and from her
unconvent-like talk; and yet he could not but think her a good-natured
person, and wonder if she could rally have been hard upon his poor
little wife. And she, who had told Eustacie she would strangle with her
own hands the scion of the rival house!--she, like most women, was
much more bitter against an unseen being out of reach, than towards a
courteously-mannered, pale, suffering-looking youth close beside her.
She had enough affection for Eustacie to have grieved much at her
wanderings and at her fate; and now the sorrow-stricken look that by no
effort could be concealed really moved her towards the youth bereaved
husband. Besides, were not all feuds on the point of being made up by
the excellent device concocted between her brother and her niece?
Meantime, Philip was in raptures with the kindness of the beautiful
Madame de Selinville. He, whom the Mistresses Walsingham treated as a
mere clumsy boy, was promoted by her manner to be a man and a cavalier.
He blushed up to the roots of his hair and looked sheepish whenever one
of her entrancing smiles lit upon him; but then she inquired after his
brother so cordially, she told him so openly how brilliant had been
Berenger’s career at the court, she regretted so heartily their present
danger and detention, and promised so warmly to use her interest with
Queen Catherine, that in the delight of being so talked to, he
forgot his awkwardness and spoke freely and confidentially, maybe too
confidentially, for he caught Berenger frowning at him, and made a
sudden halt in his narrative, disconcerted but very angry with his
brother for his distrust.
When the ladies had ridden away to the convent in the summer evening,
and the two brothers had returned to their prison, Philip would have
begun to rave about Madame de Selinville, but his mouth was stopped at
once with ‘Don’t be such a fool, Phil!’ and when Perrine shut his eyes,
leant back, and folded his arms together, there was no more use in
talking to him.
This exceeding defection continued for a day or two, while Berenger’s
whole spirit chafed in agony at his helplessness, and like demons there
ever haunted him the thoughts of what might betide Eustacie, young,
fair, forsaken, and believing herself a widow. Proudly defiant as
he showed himself to all eyes beyond his tower, he seemed to be fast
gnawing and pining himself away in the anguish he suffered through these
long days of captivity.
Perhaps it was Philip’s excitement about any chance of meeting Madame
de Selinville that first roused him from the contemplation of his own
misery. It struck him that if he did not rouse himself to exert his
influence, the boy, left to no companionship save what he could make for
himself, might be led away by intercourse with the gendarmes, or by the
blandishments of Diane, whatever might be her game. He must be watched
over, and returned to Sir Marmaduke the same true-hearted honest lad
who had left home. Nor had Berenger lain so long under Cecily St. John’s
tender watching without bearing away some notes of patience, trust, and
dutifulness that returned upon him as his mind recovered tone after the
first shock. The whispers that had bidden him tarry the Lord’s leisure,
be strong, and commit his way to Him who could bring it to pass, and
could save Eustacie as she had already been saved, returned to him once
more: he chid himself for his faintness of heart, rallied his powers,
and determined that cheerfulness, dutifulness, and care for Philip
should no longer fail.
So he reviewed his resources, and in the first place arranged for a
brief daily worship with his two English fellow-prisoners, corresponding
to the home hours of chapel service. Then he proposed to Philip to spend
an hour every day over the study of the Latin Bible; and when Philip
showed himself reluctant to give up his habit of staring over the
battlements, he represented that an attack on their faith was not so
improbable but that they ought to be prepared for it.
‘I’m quite prepared,’ quoth Philip; ‘I shall not listen to a word they
say.’
However, he submitted to this, but was more contumacious as to
Berenger’s other proposal of profiting by Sidney’s copy of Virgil.
Here at least he was away from Mr. Adderley and study, and it passed
endurance to have Latin and captivity both at once. He was more obliged
for Berenger’s offer to impart to him the instruction in fencing he
had received during his first visit to Paris; the Chevalier made no
difficulty about lending them foils, and their little court became the
scene of numerous encounters, as well as of other games and exercises.
More sedentary sports were at their service, chess, tables, dice, or
cards, but Philip detested these, and they were only played in the
evening, or on a rainy afternoon, by Berenger and the Chevalier.
It was clearly no part of the old gentleman’s plan to break their health
or spirits. He insisted on taking them out riding frequently, though
always with four gendarmes with loaded arquebuses, so as to preclude
all attempt at escape, or conversation with the peasants. The rides were
hateful to both youths, but Berenger knew that so many hours of tedium
were thus disposed of, and hoped also to acquire some knowledge of
the country; indeed, he looked at every cottage and every peasant with
affectionate eyes, as probably having sheltered Eustacie; and Philip,
after one visit paid to the convent at Bellaise, was always in hopes of
making such another. His boyish admiration of Madame de Selinville was
his chief distraction, coming on in accesses whenever there was a hope
of seeing her, and often diverting Berenger by its absurdities, even
though at other times he feared that the lad might be led away by it, or
dissension sown between them. Meetings were rare--now and then Madame
de Selinville would appear at dinner or at supper as her father’s
guest; and more rarely, the Chevalier would turn his horse’s head in the
direction of Bellaise, and the three gentlemen would be received in the
unpartitioned parlour, and there treated to such lemon cakes as had been
the ruin of La Sablerie; but in general the castle and the convent had
little intercourse, or only just enough to whet the appetite of the
prisoners for what constituted their only variety.
Six weeks had lagged by before any answer from Paris was received, and
then there was no reply from Walsingham, who had, it appeared, returned
home immediately after King Charles’s funeral. The letter from the
Council bore that the Queen-mother was ready to accept the Baron de
Ribaumont’s excuses in good part, and to consider his youth; and she
had no doubt of his being treated with the like indulgence by the
King, provided he would prove himself a loyal subject, by embracing the
Catholic faith, renouncing all his illegitimate claims to the estates of
Nid de Merle, and, in pledge of his sincerity, wedding his cousin,
the Countess de Selinville, so soon as a dispensation should have been
procured. On no other consideration could he be pardoned or set at
liberty.
‘Then,’ said Berenger, slowly, ‘a prisoner I must remain until it be the
will of Heaven to open the doors.’
‘Fair nephew!’ exclaimed the Chevalier, ‘make no rash replies. Bethink
you to what you expose yourself by obstinacy; I may no longer be able to
protect you when the King returns. And he further went on to represent
that, by renouncing voluntarily all possible claims on the Nid de Merle
estates, the Baron would save the honour of poor Eustacie (which indeed
equally concerned the rest of the family), since they then would gladly
drop all dispute of the validity of the marriage; and the lands of
Selinville would be an ample equivalent for these, as well as for all
expectations in England.
‘Sir, it is impossible!’ said Berenger. ‘My wife lives.’
‘Comment! when you wear mourning for her.’
‘I wear black because I have been able to procure nothing else since I
have been convinced that she did not perish at La Sablerie. I was on my
way to seek her when I was seized and detained here.’
‘Where would you have sought her, my poor cousin?’ compassionately asked
the Chevalier.
‘That I know not. She may be in England by this time; but that she
escaped from La Sablerie, I am well assured.’
‘Alas! my poor friend, you feed on delusion. I have surer evidence--you
shall see the man yourself--one of my son’s people, who was actually at
the assault, and had strict orders to seek and save her. Would that I
could feel the least hope left!’
‘Is the man here? Let me see him,’ said Berenger, hastily.
He was at once sent for, and proved to be one of the stable servants, a
rough, soldierly-looking man, who made no difficulty in telling that M.
de Nid de Merle had bidden his own troop to use every effort to reach
the Widow Laurent’s house, and secure the lady. They had made for
it, but missed the way, and met with various obstacles; and when they
reached it, it was already in flames, and he had seen for a moment
Mademoiselle de Nid de Merle, whom he well knew by sight, with an infant
in her arms at an upper window. He had called to her by name, and was
about to send for a ladder, when recognizing the Ribaumont colours, she
had turned back, and thrown herself and her child into the flames. M. de
Nid de Merle was frantic when he heard of it, and they had searched for
the remains among the ruins; but, bah! it was like a lime-kiln, nothing
was to be found--all was calcined.
‘No fragment left?’ said Berenger; ‘not a corner of tile or beam?’
‘Not so much wood as you could boil an egg with; I will swear it on the
Mass.’
‘That is needless,’ said Berenger. ‘I have seen the spot myself. That is
all I desired to ask.’
The Chevalier would have taken his hand and condoled with him over
the horrible story; but he drew back, repeating that he had seen Widow
Laurent’s house, and that he saw that some parts of the man’s story were
so much falsified that he could not believe the rest. Moreover, he knew
that Eustacie had not been in the town at the time of the siege.
Now the Chevalier _bona fide_ believed the man’s story, so far as that
he never doubted that Eustacie had perished, and he looked on Berenger’s
refusal to accept the tale as the mournful last clinging to a vain hope.
In his eyes, the actual sight of Eustacie, and the total destruction of
the house, were mere matters of embellishment, possibly untrue, but not
invalidating the main fact. He only said, ‘Well, my friend, I will not
press you while the pain of this narration is still fresh.’
‘Thank you, sir; but this is not pain, for I believe not a word of it;
therefore it is impossible for me to entertain the proposal, even if I
could forsake my faith or my English kindred. You remember, sir, that
I returned this same answer at Paris, when I had no hope that my wife
survived.’
‘True, my fair cousin, but I fear time will convince you that this
constancy is unhappily misplaced. You shall have time to consider; and
when it is proved to you that my poor niece is out of the reach of your
fidelity, and when you have become better acquainted with the claims
of the Church to your allegiance, then may it only prove that your
conversion does not come too late. I have the honour to take my leave.’
‘One moment more, sir. Is there no answer as to my brother?’
‘None, cousin. As I told you, your country has at present no Ambassador;
but, of course, on your fulfillment of the conditions, he would be
released with you.’
‘So,’ said Philip, when the old knight had quitted the room, ‘of course
you cannot marry while Eustacie lives; but if---’
‘Not another word, profane boy!’ angrily cried Berenger.
‘I was only going to say, it is a pity of one so goodly not to bring her
over to the true faith, and take her to England.’
‘Much would she be beholden to you!’ said Berenger. ‘So!’ he added,
sighing, ‘I had little hope but that it would be thus. I believe it is
all a web of this old plotter’s weaving, and that the Queen-mother acts
in it at his request. He wants only to buy me off with his daughter’s
estates from asserting my claim to this castle and lands; and I trow he
will never rise up here till--till---’
‘Till when, Berry?’
‘Till mayhap my grandfather can move the Queen to do something for
us; or till Madame de Selinville sees a face she likes better than her
brother’s carving; or, what can I tell? till malice is tired out, and
Heaven’s will sets us free. May Eustacie only have reached home! But I’m
sorry for you, my poor Phil.’
‘Never heed, brother,’ said Philip; ‘what is prison to me, so that I can
now and then see those lovely eyes?’
And the languishing air of the clumsy lad was so comical as to beguile
Berenger into a laugh. Yet Berenger’s own feeling would go back to his
first meeting with Diane; and as he thought of the eyes then fixed on
him, he felt that he was under a trial that might become more severe.