From the Memoirs of a Minister of France by Stanley John Weyman (hardest books to read .txt) 📖

Before these appeared, however, La Font, who was at the door, cried out that the two players were coming hack; and going to the window I saw with astonishment a whole troop, some mounted and some on foot, hurrying down the hill after them. For a moment I felt some alarm, supposing it to be a scheme of Epernon's to seize my person; and I cursed the imprudence which had led me to expose myself in this solitary place. But a second glance showing me that the Mayor of Bottitort was among the foremost, I repented almost as seriously of the unlucky trifling that had landed me in this foolish plight.

I even debated whether I should mount and, if it were possible, get clear before they arrived; but the rueful faces of the two players as they appeared breathless in the doorway, and the liking I had taken for the rascals, decided me to stand my ground "What is it?" I said.

"The Mayor, monsieur," Philibert answered, while Pierre pursed up his lips with gloomy gravity. "I fear it will not stop at the stocks this time," the rogue continued with a grimace.

His comrade muttered something about a rod and a fool's back; but M. Grabot's entrance cut his witticism short. The Mayor, between shame and rage, and the gratification of his revenge, was almost bursting, and the moment he caught sight of us opened fire. "All, M. de Gol; we have them all!" he cried exultingly. "Now they shall smart for it! Depend upon it, it is some deep-laid scheme of that party. I have said so."

But the Mayor of Gol, a stout, big, placid man, looked at us doubtfully. "Well," he said, "I know these two; they are strolling mountebanks, honest knaves enough but always in some mischief."

"What, strolling clowns?" M. Grabot rejoined, his face falling.

"Ay, and you may depend upon it it is some joke of theirs," his friend answered, his eyes twinkling. "I begin to think that you would have done better if you had waited a little before bringing M. le Comte into the matter."

"Ah, but there are these two," M. Grabot cried, as he recovered from the momentary panic into which the other's words had thrown him. "Depend upon it they are the chief movers. What else but treason could they mean by asserting that one of them was Mayor of Bottitort? By denying my title? By setting up other officers than those to whom his Gracious Majesty has delegated his authority?"

"Umph!" his brother Mayor said, "I don't know these gentlemen."

"No!" his companion cried in triumph. "But I intend to know them; and to know a good deal about them. Guard the window there," he continued fussily. "Where is my clerk? Is M. de Laval coming?"

Two or three cried obsequiously that he had crossed the hill; and would arrive immediately.

Hearing this, and thinking it more becoming not to enter into an altercation, I kept my seat and the scornful silence I had hitherto maintained. The two Mayors had brought with them a posse of busybodies—huissiers, constables, tip-staves, and the like; and these all gaped upon us as if they saw before them the most notable traitors of the age. The women of the house wept in a corner, and the strollers shrugged their shoulders and strove to appear at their ease. But the only person who felt the indifference which they assumed was La Font; who, obnoxious to none of the annoyances which I foresaw, could hardly restrain his mirth at the DENOUEMENT which he anticipated.

Meanwhile the Mayor, foreseeing a very different issue, stood blowing out his cheeks and fixing us with his little eyes with an expression of dignity that would have pleased me vastly if I had been free to enjoy it. But the reflection that Laval's presence, which would cut the knot of our difficulties, would also place me at the mercy of his wit, did not enable me to contemplate it with entire indifference.

By-and-by we heard him dismount, and a moment later he came in with a gentleman and two or three armed servants. He did not at once see me, but as the crowd made way for him he addressed himself sharply to M. Grabot. "Well, have you got them?" he said.

"Certainly, M. le Comte."

"Oh! very well. Now for the particulars, then. You must state your charge quickly, for I have to be in Vitre to-day."

"He alleged that he had been appointed Mayor of Bottitort," Grabot answered pompously.

"Umph! I don't know?" M. de Laval muttered, looking round with a frown of discontent. "I hope that you have not brought me hither on a fool's errand. Which one?"

"That one," the Mayor said, pointing to the solemn man, whose gravity and depression were now something preternatural.

"Oh!" M. de Laval grumbled. "But that is not all, I suppose. What of the others?"

M. Grabot pointed to me. "That one," he said—

He got no farther; for M. de Laval, springing forward, seized my hand and saluted me warmly. "Why, your excellency," he cried, in a tone of boundless surprise, "what are you doing in this GALERE! All last evening I waited for you, at my house, and now—"

"Here I am," I answered jocularly, "in charge it seems, M. le Comte!"

"MON DIEU!" he cried. "I don't understand it!"

I shrugged my shoulders. "Don't ask me," I said. "Perhaps your friend the Mayor call tell you."

"But, Monsieur, I do not understand," the Mayor answered piteously, his mouth agape with horror, his fat cheeks turning in a moment all colours. "This gentleman, whom you seem to know, Monsieur le Comte—"

"Is the Marquis de Rosny, President of the Council, blockhead!" Laval cried irately. "You madman! you idiot!" he continued, as light broke in upon him, and he saw that it was indeed on a fool's errand that he had been roused so early. "Is this your conspiracy? Have you dared to bring me here—"

But I thought that it was time to interfere. "The truth is," I said, "that M. Grabot here is not so much to blame. He was the victim of a trick which these rascals played on him; and in an idle moment I let it go on. That is the whole secret. However, I forgive him for his officiousness since it brings us together, and I shall now have the pleasure of your company to Vitre."

Laval assented heartily to this, and I did not think fit to tell him more, nor did he inquire; the Mayor's stupidity passing current for all. For M. Grabot himself, I think that I never saw a man more completely confounded. He stood staring with his mouth open; and, as much deserted as the statesman who has fallen from office, had not the least credit even with his own sycophants, who to a man deserted him and flocked about the Mayor of Gol. Though I had no reason to pity him, and, indeed, thought him well punished, I took the opportunity of saying a word to him before I mounted; which, though it was only a hint that he should deal gently with the woman of the house, was received with servility equal to the arrogance he had before displayed; and I doubt not it had all the effect I desired. For the strollers, I did not forget them, but bade them hasten to Vitre, where I would see a performance. They did so, and hitting the fancy of Zamet, who chanced to be still there, and who thought that he saw profit in them, they came on his invitation to Paris, where they took the Court by storm. So that an episode trifling in itself, and such as on my part requires some apology, had for them consequences of no little importance.

Towards the autumn of 1601, when the affair of M. de Biron, which was so soon to fill the mouths of the vulgar, was already much in the minds of those whom the King honoured with his confidence, I was one day leaving the hall at the Arsenal, after giving audience to such as wished to see me, when Maignan came after me and detained me; reporting that a gentleman who had attended early, but had later gone into the garden, was still in waiting. While Maignan was still speaking the stranger himself came up, with some show of haste but none of embarrassment; and, in answer to my salutation and inquiry what I could do for him, handed me a letter. He had the air of a man not twenty, his dress was a trifle rustic; but his strong and handsome figure set off a face that would have been pleasing but for a something fierce in the aspect of his eyes. Assured that I did not know him, I broke the seal of his letter and found that it was from my old flame Madame de Bray, who, as Mademoiselle de St. Mesmin, had come so near to being my wife; as will be remembered by those who have read the early part of these memoirs.

The young man proved to be her brother, whom she commended to my good offices, the impoverishment of the family being so great that she could compass no more regular method of introducing him to the world, though the house of St. Mesmin is truly respectable and, like my own, allied to several of the first consequence. Madame de Bray recalled our old TENDRESSE to my mind, and conjured me so movingly by it—and by the regard which her family had always entertained for me—that I could not dismiss the application with the hundred others of like tenor that at that time came to me with each year. That I might do nothing in the dark, however, I invited the young fellow to walk with me in the garden, and divined, even before he spoke, from the absence of timidity in his manner, that he was something out of the common. "So you have come to Paris to make your fortune?" I said.

"Yes, sir," he answered.

"And what are the tools with which you propose to do it?" I continued, between jest and earnest.

"That letter, sir," he answered simply; "and, failing that, two horses, two suits of clothes, and two hundred crowns."

"You think that those will suffice?" I said, laughing.

"With this, sir," he answered, touching his sword; "and a good courage."

I could not but stand amazed at his coolness; for he spoke to me as simply as to a brother, and looked about him with as much or as little curiosity as Guise or Montpensier. It was evident that he thought a St. Mesmin equal to any man under the King; and that of all the St. Mesmins he did not value himself least.

"Well," I said, after considering him, "I do not think that I can help you much immediately. I should be glad to know, however, what plans you have formed for yourself."

"Frankly, sir," he said, "I thought of this as I travelled; and I decided that fortune can be won by three things—by gold, by steel, and by love. The first I have not, and for the last I have a better use. Only the second is left. I shall be Crillon."

I looked at him in astonishment; for the assurance of his manner exceeded that of his words. But I did not betray the feeling. "Crillon was one in a million," I said drily.

"So am I," he answered.

I confess that the audacity of this reply silenced me. I reflected that the young man who—brought up in the depths of the country, and without experience, training or fashion—could so speak in the face of Paris was so far out of the common that I hesitated to dash his hopes in the contemptuous way which seemed most natural. I was content to remind him that Crillon had lived in times of continual war, whereas now we were at peace; and, bidding him come to me in a week, I hinted that in Paris his crowns would find more frequent opportunities of leaving his pockets than his sword its sheath.

He parted from me with this, seeming perfectly satisfied with his reception; and marched away with the port of a man who expected adventures at every corner, and was prepared to make the most of them. Apparently he did not take my hint greatly to