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Title: The Quest of Glory
Author: Marjorie Bowen
A Project Gutenberg Australia eBook
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Language: English
Date first posted: June 2009
Date most recently updated: June 2009
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The Quest of Glory
Marjorie Bowen
“LA GLOIRE NOUS DONNE SUR LES COEURS UNE AUTORITÉ NATURELLE QUI
NOUS TOUCHE SANS DOUTE AUTANT QUE NULLE DE NOS SENSATIONS ET NOUS
ÉTOURDIT PLUS SUR NOS MISÈRES QU’UNE VAINE DISSIPATION; ELLE EST
DONG RÉELLEEN TOUS SENS.”
—MARQUIS DE VAUVENARGUES
Methuen and Co. Ltd
London
First Published 1912
CONTENTS
PART I # THE QUEST JOYFUL
I. PRAGUE, 1742
II. THE CHAPEL OF ST. WENCESLAS
III. CAROLA KOKLINSKA
IV. CARDINAL FLEURY’S BLUNDER
V. THE RETREAT FROM PRAGUE
VI. ON THE HEIGHTS
VII. THE HOME AT AIX
VIII. CLEMENCE DE SÉGUY
IX. THE HERETIC
X. THE MAGICIAN
XI. M. DE RICHELIEU
XII. THE DIAMOND RING
XIII. THREE LETTERS
PART II # THE QUEST SORROWFUL
I. PARIS
II. A WALLED GARDEN
III. A PAVILION AT VERSAILLES
IV. DESPAIR
V. THE PAINTER
VI. IN THE GARDEN
VII. A PICTURE
VIII. VOLTAIRE
IX. REFLECTIONS
X. IN THE LOUVRE
XI. THE FETE
XII. AFTERWARDS
XIII. CLMENCE
XIV. IN THE CONVENT
PART III # THE QUEST TRIUMPHANT
I. THE FATHER
II. RETURN TO LIFE!
III. THE BETROTHED
IV. THE CONFLICT
V. THE DEPARTURE FROM AIX
VI. THE GARRET
VII. THE ROSES OF M. MARMONTEL
VIII. THE END OF THE QUEST
*
PART I # THE QUEST JOYFUL
“Tout est très abject dans les hommes, la vertu, la gloire, la vie; mais
les choses les plus petites ont des proportions reconnues. Le chêne est
un grand arbre près du cerisier; ainsi les hommes à l’égard les uns des
autres.”
—LE MARQUIS DE VAU YEN ARGUES.
The Austrian guns had ceased with the early sunset, and the desolate
city of Prague was silent, encompassed by the enemy and the hard,
continuous cold of a Bohemian December: in the hall of Vladislav in the
Hradcany, that ancient palace of ancient kings that rose above the town,
several French officers wrapped in heavy cloaks were walking up and
down, as they had done night after night since the dragging siege began.
In the vast spaces of the huge pillarless hall with the high arched
Gothic roof, bare walls and floor, imperfectly lit by a few low-placed
lamps, their figures looked slight to insignificance, and the sound of
their lowered voices was a mere murmur in the great frozen stillness. At
one end of the hall rose a tall carved wooden throne and rows of benches
divided from the main hall by a light railing; these, which had once
been the seats of the King and nobility of Bohemia, were now decayed and
broken, and behind the empty chair of state was thrust a Bourbon flag
tied with the blue and white colours that the French carried in
compliment to the Elector of Bavaria, whom they, for many intricate
reasons,—some wise, and some foolish, and none just, were seeking to
place on the Austrian throne as Charles II.
These officers, who were the unquestioning instruments of this policy of
France, ceased talking presently and gathered round the degraded throne
before which burnt a handful of charcoal over an iron tripod. The only
near light was a heavy lamp suspended before the window; a stench of
rank oil and powder filled even the cold air, which rasped the throat
and the nostrils and had no freshness in it but only a great lifeless
chill.
There were four of these officers, and as they stood round the
struggling flame that leapt and sank on the brazier, the cross lights of
fire and lamp showed a great similarity in their persons. It was
noticeable how totally different they were from their surroundings; no
one ever would have thought that they were of the breed that had built
this vast barbaric hall or carved the bold monsters on the rude throne:
in every line they stood confessed foreign, alien to this crude grandeur
and of another nation, another civilization, old and thrice refined.
They were all slight men, though two were tall; they all wore under
their cloaks the uniforms of the famous régiment du roi; and they all
had their hair as carefully powdered and curled and their linen as fresh
and elaborate as if they were at Versailles: yet it was now several
months since Prince Lobkowitz and his Hungarian Pandours had driven the
French into Prague.
Their manner was as similar as their persons: a composed gaiety, an
unconscious courtesy, an absolute reserve and command of emotion were as
common to each as the silver epaulettes and frogs of their blue
uniforms. The four faces the charcoal flame lit were proud and delicate
and much alike in feature, but one was distinguished, even in that
light, by the fresh attractiveness of its youthful beauty—the beauty of
dark colour, of soft eyes, of rich hair that pomade could scarcely
disguise, of ardent lips and eager expression that even the formality of
that universal noble manner could not conceal; a face beautiful and
lovable, and one that had not yet looked on twenty years.
He was the youngest as he was the tallest. His companions were much of
an age and much of a height, and nothing remarkable distinguished one
from the other save that one wore the gorgeous uniform of a colonel, two
that of captain; the youth’s rank was merely that of lieutenant. They
were all silent; there was absolutely nothing to talk about. They had
been shut up in Prague all the winter, and though they could easily have
broken through the loose ranks of the unskilful besiegers, all thought
of leaving the city was impossible until the spring. Bohemia was ice
from end to end, and even in the encampment in Prague the Frenchmen died
of cold.
The siege was almost without incident and quite without excitement; the
Austrians made no attempt to take the city by storm, and the French made
no sallies. News of the outside war was their one diversion: all Europe
was in arms; Spain and England had been the last to march on to the
universal battle-field; France was but one member of a coalition that
endeavoured to wrest new possessions from the Empress-Queen, Maria
Theresa, whom English gold and Magyar loyalty alone supported. France
had signed the Pragmatic Sanction that left her heiress to her father’s
empire, but that promise had been lightly enough broken when France saw
her advantage in allying herself with Frederick of Prussia, who, after
his seizure of Silesia, had become a power in Europe. No Frenchman had
any personal feeling about the war; Prussian was the same as Austrian in
the eyes of most, and very few troubled to follow the ramifications of
the policy that had led the Ministers who ruled in Paris to side with
the effete Elector rather than the gallant Queen of Hungary in this
struggle for the succession of Charles V. Therefore, with no interest in
the war, little news from home, enclosed in a foreign and half-barbarous
town among a people strange and mostly unfriendly, the French, during
the long months of the nominal siege, were utterly overcome with
weariness and a dispirited lassitude from which these four standing over
the charcoal pan in the Vladislav Hall were not wholly free.
The opening of the door at the farther end of the hall caused them all
to turn with the expectancy born of monotony. Several figures entered
the shadows, themselves dark and casting shadows by reason of the
lantern the foremost held.
The officers moved forward. The light of dim lamp and swinging lantern
was merely confusing to the sight; the advancing group threw fantastic
blots of shade, and seemed to merge, subdivide, and merge again until
there might have been ten people or two coming down the great bare aisle
of the hall.
When the light above the throne at last flung its feeble illumination
over them, it disclosed a stout Bohemian servant carrying a lantern, a
young man in a splendid dress of scarlet and fur, and a woman rather
clumsily muffled in a military cloak which was caught up so as to show
her riding-boots and fantastic long spurs.
The officers saluted; the lady paused and looked at her companion, who
returned the salute and said in good French, “We are prisoners, I
believe.”
“Austrians?” asked the Colonel.
“No: Poles. On our way to Paris. We were captured by the Pandours, who
routed our escort, and then by a Bohemian regiment, who considered us
enemies”—he smiled engagingly. “But I have induced them to allow me an
audience of M. de Belleisle, who, I am certain, will allow us on our
way.”
“Why, doubtless,” returned the Frenchman, with disinterested courtesy;
“but it is severe weather for travelling, and in time of war, with a
lady.”
“My sister,” said the young Pole, “is used to the cold, for she has
lived all her life in Russia.”
The lady lifted a face pale with fatigue and shadowed with anxiety; her
black hair was very unbecomingly twisted tight round her head, and she
wore a fur cap of fox’s skin drawn down to her ears.
“I have a good reason to wish to hasten to Paris,” she said. “I am
summoned there by the Queen.”
She made an impatient gesture to the Bohemian who conducted them, and
with a weary little bow followed him through the small door that had
been cut in the high blank wall.
With a more elaborate courtesy her companion followed her, his heavy
tread echoing in the stillness even after the door had closed behind
him.
“I wish I were bound for Paris,” remarked the young Colonel, M. de
Biron.
One of the captains lightly echoed his wish; the other glanced at the
lieutenant and said in a very pleasing voice—
“No, M. le Duc, wish for a battle, which would suit us all better.”
M. de Biron smiled.
“You are very sanguine, Luc.”
“How sanguine, Monsieur?”
“You speak as if war was what it used to be in the days of Amathis de
Gaul: forays, single combats, pitched battles, one cause—reward,
honour, glory.”
The faint smile deepened on Luc de Clapiers’ face; he made no reply, but
the lieutenant flushed quickly and answered—
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