Bardelys the Magnificent by Rafael Sabatini (best ebook reader under 100 .txt) đź“–
- Author: Rafael Sabatini
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their head, thundered across the drawbridge, giving pause to those
within, and drawing upon themselves the eyes of all, as they rode,
two by two, under the old-world arch of the keep into the courtyard.
And Gilles, who knew our errand, and who was as ready-witted a rogue
as ever rode with me, took in the situation at a glance. Knowing
how much I desired to make a goodly show, he whispered an order.
This resulted in the couples dividing at the gateway, one going to
the left and one to the right, so that as they came they spread
themselves in a crescent, and drawing rein, they faced forward,
confronting and half surrounding the Chevalier’s company.
As each couple appeared, the curiosity - the uneasiness, probably
—of Saint-Eustache and his men, had increased, and their expectancy
was on tiptoe to see what lord it was went abroad with such regal
pomp, when I appeared in the gateway and advanced at the trot into
the middle of the quadrangle. There I drew rein and doffed my hat
to them as they stood, open-mouthed and gaping one and all. If it
was a theatrical display, a parade worthy of a tilt-ground, it was
yet a noble and imposing advent, and their gaping told me that it
was not without effect. The men looked uneasily at the Chevalier;
the Chevalier looked uneasily at his men; mademoiselle, very pale,
lowered her eyes and pressed her lips yet more tightly; the
Vicomtesse uttered an oath of astonishment; whilst Lavedan, too
dignified to manifest surprise, greeted me with a sober bow.
Behind them on the steps I caught sight of a group of domestics,
old Anatole standing slightly in advance of his fellows, and
wondering, no doubt, whether this were, indeed, the bedraggled
Lesperon of a little while ago - for if I had thought of pomp in
the display of my lacqueys, no less had I considered it in the
decking of my own person. Without any of the ribbons and fopperies
that mark the coxcomb, yet was I clad, plumed, and armed with a
magnificence such as I’ll swear had not been seen within the grey
walls of that old castle in the lifetime of any of those that were
now present.
Gilles leapt from his horse as I drew rein, and hastened to hold my
stirrup, with a murmured “Monsieur,” which title drew a fresh
astonishment into the eyes of the beholders.
I advanced leisurely towards Saint-Eustache, and addressed him with
such condescension as I might a groom, to impress and quell a man
of this type your best weapon is the arrogance that a nobler spirit
would resent.
“A world of odd meetings this, Saint-Eustache,” I smiled disdainfully.
“A world of strange comings and goings, and of range transformations.
The last time we were here we stood mutually as guests of Monsieur le
Vicomte; at present you appear to be officiating as a - a tipstaff.”
“Monsieur!” He coloured, and he uttered the word in accents of
awakening resentment. I looked into his eyes, coldly, impassively,
as if waiting to hear what he might have to add, and so I stayed
until his glance fell and his spirit was frozen in him. He knew me,
and he knew how much I was to be feared. A word from me to the King
might send him to the wheel. It was upon this I played. Presently,
as his eye fell, “Is your business with me, Monsieur de Bardelys?” he
asked, and at that utterance of my name there was a commotion on the
steps, whilst the Vicomte started, and his eyes frowned upon me, and
the Vicomtesse looked up suddenly to scan me with a fresh interest.
She beheld at last in the flesh the gentleman who had played so
notorious a part, ten years ago, in that scandal connected with the
Duchesse de Bourgogne, of which she never tired of reciting the
details. And think that she had sat at table with him day by day
and been unconscious of that momentous fact! Such, I make no doubt,
was what passed through her mind at the moment, and, to judge from
her expression, I should say that the excitement of beholding the
Magnificent Bardelys had for the nonce eclipsed beholding even her
husband’s condition and the imminent sequestration of Lavedan.
“My business is with you, Chevalier,” said I. “It relates to your
mission here.”
His jaw fell. “You wish—?”
“To desire you to withdraw your men and quit Lavedan at once,
abandoning the execution of your warrant.”
He flashed me a look of impotent hate. “You know of the existence
of my warrant, Monsieur de Bardelys, and you must therefore realize
that a royal mandate alone can exempt me from delivering Monsieur
de Lavedan to the Keeper of the Seals.”
“My only warrant,” I answered, somewhat baffled, but far from
abandoning hope, “is my word. You shall say to the Garde des Sceaux
that you have done this upon the authority of the Marquis de
Bardelys, and you have my promise that His Majesty shall confirm my
action.”
In saying that I said too much, as I was quickly to realize.
“His Majesty will confirm it, monsieur?” he said interrogatively,
and he shook his head. “That is a risk I dare not run. My warrant
sets me under imperative obligations which I must discharge - you
will see the justice of what I state.”
His tone was all humility, all subservience, nevertheless it was
firm to the point of being hard. But my last card, the card upon
which I was depending, was yet to be played.
“Will you do me the honour to step aside with me, Chevalier?” I
commanded rather than besought.
“At your service, sir,” said he; and I drew him out of earshot of
those others.
“Now, Saint-Eustache, we can talk,” said I, with an abrupt change
of manner from the coldly arrogant to the coldly menacing. “I
marvel greatly at your temerity in pursuing this Iscariot business
after learning who I am, at Toulouse two nights ago.”
He clenched his hands, and his weak face hardened.
“I would beg you to consider your expressions, monsieur, and to
control them,” said he in a thick voice.
I vouchsafed him a stare of freezing amazement. “You will no doubt
remember in what capacity I find you employed. Nay, keep your hands
still, Saint-Eustache. I don’t fight catchpolls, and if you give me
trouble my men are yonder.” And I jerked my thumb over my shoulder.
“And now to business. I am not minded to talk all day. I was saying
that I marvel at your temerity, and more particularly at your having
laid information against Monsieur de Lavedan, and having come here
to arrest him, knowing, as you must know, that I am interested in
the Vicomte.”
“I have heard of that interest, monsieur,” said he, with a sneer
for which I could have struck him.
“This act of yours,” I pursued, ignoring his interpolation, “savours
very much of flying in the face of Destiny. It almost seems to me
as if you were defying me.”
His lip trembled, and his eyes shunned my glance.
“Indeed - indeed, monsieur—” he was protesting, when I cut him
short.
“You cannot be so great a fool but that you must realize that if I
tell the King what I know of you, you will be stripped of your
ill-gotten gains, and broken on the wheel for a double traitor - a
betrayer of your fellow-rebels.”
“But you will not do that, monsieur?” he cried. “It would be
unworthy in you.”
At that I laughed in his face. “Heart of God! Are you to be what
you please, and do you still expect that men shall be nice in
dealing with you? I would do this thing, and, by my faith, Monsieur
de Eustache, I will do it, if you compel me!”
He reddened and moved his foot uneasily. Perhaps I did not take
the best way with him, after all. I might have confined myself to
sowing fear in his heart; that alone might have had the effect I
desired; by visiting upon him at the same time the insults I could
not repress, I may have aroused his resistance, and excited his
desire above all else to thwart me.
“What do you want of me?” he demanded, with a sudden arrogance which
almost cast mine into the shade.
“I want you,” said I, deeming the time ripe to make a plain tale of
it, “to withdraw your men, and to ride back to Toulouse without
Monsieur de Lavedan, there to confess to the Keeper of the Seals
that your suspicions were unfounded, and that you have culled
evidence that the Vicomte has had no relations with Monsieur the
King’s brother.”
He looked at me in amazement - amusedly, almost.
“A likely story that to bear to the astute gentlemen in Toulouse,”
said he.
“Aye, ma foi, a most likely story,” said I. “When they come to
consider the profit that you are losing by not apprehending the
Vicomte, and can think of none that you are making, they will have
little difficulty in believing you.”
“But what of this evidence you refer to?”
“You have, I take it, discovered no incriminating evidence - no
documents that will tell against the Vicomte?”
“No, monsieur, it is true that I have not—”
He stopped and bit his lip, my smile making him aware of his
indiscretion.
“Very well, then, you must invent some evidence to prove that he
was in no way, associated with the rebellion.”
“Monsieur de Bardelys,” said he very insolently, “we waste time in
idle words. If you think that I will imperil my neck for the sake
of serving you or the Vicomte, you are most prodigiously at fault.”
“I have never thought so. But I have thought that you might be
induced to imperil your neck - as you have it - for its own sake,
and to the end that you might save it.”
He moved away. “Monsieur, you talk in vain. You have no royal
warrant to supersede mine. Do what you will when you come to
Toulouse,” and he smiled darkly. “Meanwhile, the Vicomte goes with
me.”
“You have no evidence against him!” I cried, scarce believing that
he would dare to defy me and that I had failed.
“I have the evidence of my word. I am ready to swear to what I know
—that, whilst I was here at Lavedan, some weeks ago, I discovered
his connection with the rebels.”
“And what think you, miserable fool, shall your word weigh against
mine?” I cried. “Never fear, Monsieur le Chevalier, I shall be in
Toulouse to give you the lie by showing that your word is a word to
which no man may attach faith, and by exposing to the King your past
conduct. If you think that, after I have spoken, King Louis whom
they name the just will suffer the trial of the Vicomte to go further
on your instigation, or if you think that you will be able to slip
your own neck from the noose I shall have set about it, you are an
infinitely greater fool than I deem you.”
He stood and looked at me over his shoulder, his face crimson, and
his brows black as a thundercloud.
“All this may betide when you come to Toulouse, Monsieur de
Bardelys,” said he darkly, “but from here to Toulouse it is a matter
of some twenty leagues.”
With
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