“You have done a very rash and unwise thing, monsieur,” he had commented regretfully, and it was in answer to this that I poured out the whole story. I had determined upon this course while we were supping, for Castelroux was now my only hope, and as we rode beneath the stars of that September night I made known to him my true identity.
I told him that Chatellerault knew me, and I informed him that a wager lay between us – withholding the particulars of its nature –which had brought me into Languedoc and into the position wherein he had found and arrested me. At first he hesitated to believe me, but when at last I had convinced him by the vehemence of my assurances as much as by the assurances themselves, he expressed such opinions of the Comte de Chatellerault as made my heart go out to him.
“You see, my dear Castelroux, that you are now my last hope,” I said.
“A forlorn one, my poor gentleman!” he groaned.
“Nay, that need not be. My intendant Rodenard and some twenty of my servants should be somewhere betwixt this and Paris. Let them be sought for monsieur, and let us pray God that they be still in Languedoc and may be found in time.”
“It shall be done, monsieur, I promise you,” he answered me solemnly. “But I implore you not to hope too much from it. Chatellerault has it in his power to act promptly, and you may depend that he will waste no time after what has passed.”
“Still, we may have two or three days, and in those days you must do what you can, my friend.”
“You may depend upon me,” he promised.
“And meanwhile, Castelroux,” said I, “you will say no word of this to any one.”
That assurance also he gave me, and presently the lights of our destination gleamed out to greet us.
That night I lay in a dank and gloomy cell of the prison of Toulouse, with never a hope to bear company during those dark, wakeful hours.
A dull rage was in my soul as I thought of my position, for it had not needed Castelroux’s recommendation to restrain me from building false hopes upon his chances of finding Rodenard and my followers in time to save me. Some little ray of consolation I culled, perhaps, from my thoughts of Roxalanne. Out of the gloom of my cell my fancy fashioned her sweet girl face and stamped it with a look of gentle pity, of infinite sorrow for me and for the hand she had had in bringing me to this.
That she loved me I was assured, and I swore that if I lived I would win her yet, in spite of every obstacle that I myself had raised for my undoing.
CHAPTER XII THE TRIBUNAL OF TOULOUSE
I had hoped to lie some days in prison before being brought to trial, and that during those days Castelroux might have succeeded in discovering those who could witness to my identity. Conceive, therefore, something of my dismay when on the morrow I was summoned an hour before noon to go present myself to my judges.
From the prison to the Palace I was taken in chains like any thief –for the law demanded this indignity to be borne by one charged with the crimes they imputed to me. The distance was but short, yet I found it over-long, which is not wonderful considering that the people stopped to line up as I went by and to cast upon me a shower of opprobrious derision – for Toulouse was a very faithful and loyal city. It was within some two hundred yards of the Palace steps that I suddenly beheld a face in the crowd, at the sight of which I stood still in my amazement. This earned me a stab in the back from the butt-end of the pike of one of my guards.
“What ails you now?” quoth the man irritably. “Forward, Monsieur le traite!”
I moved on, scarce remarking the fellow’s roughness; my eyes were still upon that face – the white, piteous face of Roxalanne. I smiled reassurance and encouragement, but even as I smiled the horror in her countenance seemed to increase. Then, as I passed on, she vanished from my sight, and I was left to conjecture the motives that had occasioned her return to Toulouse. Had the message that Marsac would yesterday have conveyed to her caused her to retrace her steps that she might be near me in my extremity; or had some weightier reason influenced her return? Did she hope to undo some of the evil she had done? Alas, poor child! If such were her hopes, I sorely feared me they would prove very idle.
Of my trial I should say but little did not the exigencies of my story render it necessary to say much. Even now, across the gap of years, my gorge rises at the mockery which, in the King’s name, those gentlemen made of justice. I can allow for the troubled conditions of the times, and I can realize how in cases of civil disturbances and rebellion it may be expedient to deal summarily with traitors, yet not all the allowances that I can think of would suffice to condone the methods of that tribunal.
The trial was conducted in private by the Keeper of the Seals – a lean, wizened individual, with an air as musty and dry as that of the parchments among which he had spent his days. He was supported by six judges, and on his right sat the King’s Commissioner, Monsieur de Chatellerault – the bruised condition of whose countenance still advertised the fact that we had met but yesterday.
Upon being asked my name and place of abode, I created some commotion by answering boldly “I am the Sieur Marcel de Saint-Pol, Marquis of Bardelys, of Bardelys in Picardy.”
The President – that is to say, the Keeper of the Seals – turned inquiringly to Chatellerault. The Count, however, did no more than smile and point to something written on a paper that lay spread upon the table. The President nodded.
“Monsieur Rene de Lesperon,” said he, “the Court may perhaps not be able to discriminate whether this statement of yours is a deliberate attempt to misguide or frustrate the ends of justice, or whether, either in consequence of your wounds or as a visitation of God for your treason, you are the victim of a deplorable hallucination. But the Court wishes you to understand that it is satisfied of your identity. The papers found upon your person at the time of your arrest, besides other evidence in our power, remove all possibility of doubt in that connection. Therefore, in your own interests, we implore you to abandon these false statements, if so be that you are master of your wits. Your only hope of saving your head must lie in your truthfully answering our questions, and even then, Monsieur de Lesperon, the hope that we hold out to you is so slight as to be no hope at all.”
There was a pause, during which the other judges nodded their heads in sage approval of their President’s words. For myself, I kept silent, perceiving how little it could avail me to continue to protest, and awaited his next question.
“You were arrested, monsieur, at the Chateau de Lavedan two nights ago by a company of dragoons under the command of Captain de Castelroux. Is that so?”
“It is so, monsieur.”
“And at the time of your arrest, upon being apprehended as Rene de Lesperon, you offered no repudiation of the identity; on the contrary, when Monsieur de Castelroux called for Monsieur de Lesperon, you stepped forward and acknowledged that you were he.”
“Pardon, monsieur. What I acknowledged was that I was known by that name.”
The President chuckled evilly, and his satellites smiled in polite reflection of his mood.
“This acute differentiating is peculiar, Monsieur de Lesperon, to persons of unsound mental condition,” said he. “I am afraid that it will serve little purpose. A man is generally known by his name, is he not?” I did not answer him. “Shall we call Monsieur de Castelroux to confirm what I have said?”
“It is not necessary. Since you allow that I may have said I was known by the name, but refuse to recognize the distinction between that and a statement that ‘Lesperon’ is my name, it would serve no purpose to summon the Captain.”
The President nodded, and with that the point was dismissed, and he proceeded as calmly as though there never had been any question of my identity.
“You are charged, Monsieur de Lesperon, with high treason in its most virulent and malignant form. You are accused of having borne arms against His Majesty. Have you anything to say?”
“I have to say that it is false, monsieur; that His Majesty has no more faithful or loving subject than am I.”