“Let that suffice you, Rodenard,” I said, touching him with my foot. “See that I never set eyes upon you again, if you cherish your miserable life!”
“Not that, monseigneur.” groaned the wretch. “Oh, not that! You have punished me; you have whipped me until I cannot stand; forgive me, monseigneur, forgive me now!”
“I have forgiven you, but I never wish to see you again, lest I should forget that I have forgiven you. Take him away, some of you,” I bade my men, and in swift, silent obedience two of them stepped forward and bore the groaning, sobbing fellow from the room. When that was done “Host,” I commanded, “prepare me a room. Attend me, a couple of you.”
I gave orders thereafter for the disposal of my baggage, some of which my lacqueys brought up to the chamber that the landlord had in haste made ready for me. In that chamber I sat until very late; a prey to the utmost misery and despair. My rage being spent, I might have taken some thought for poor Ganymede and his condition, but my own affairs crowded over-heavily upon my mind, and sat the undisputed rulers of my thoughts that night.
At one moment I considered journeying to Lavedan, only to dismiss the idea the next. What could it avail me now? Would Roxalanne believe the tale I had to tell? Would she not think, naturally enough, that I was but making the best of the situation, and that my avowal of the truth of a story which it was not in my power to deny was not spontaneous, but forced from me by circumstances? No, there was nothing more to be done. A score of amours had claimed my attention in the past and received it; yet there was not one of those affairs whose miscarriage would have afforded me the slightest concern or mortification. It seemed like an irony, like a Dies ire, that it should have been left to this first true passion of my life to have gone awry.
I slept ill when at last I sought my bed, and through the night I nursed my bitter grief, huddling to me the corpse of the love she had borne me as a mother may the corpse of her first-born.
On the morrow I resolved to leave Toulouse – to quit this province wherein so much had befallen me and repair to Beaugency, there to grow old in misanthropical seclusion. I had done with Courts, I had done with love and with women; I had done, it seemed to me, with life itself. Prodigal had it been in gifts that I had not sought of it. It had spread my table with the richest offerings, but they had been little to my palate, and I had nauseated quickly. And now, when here in this remote corner of France it had shown me the one prize I coveted, it had been swift to place it beyond my reach, thereby sowing everlasting discontent and misery in my hitherto pampered heart.
I saw Castelroux that day, but I said no word to him of my affliction. He brought me news of Chatellerault. The Count was lying in a dangerous condition at the Auberge Royale, and might not be moved. The physician attending him all but despaired of his life.
“He is asking to see you,” said Castelroux.
But I was not minded to respond. For all that he had deeply wronged me, for all that I despised him very cordially, the sight of him in his present condition might arouse my pity, and I was in no mood to waste upon such a one as Chatellerault even on his deathbed – a quality of which I had so dire a need just then for my own case.
“I will not go,” said I, after deliberation. “Tell him from me that I forgive him freely if it be that he seeks my forgiveness; tell him that I bear him no rancour, and – that he had better make his will, to save me trouble hereafter, if he should chance to die.”
I said this because I had no mind, if he should perish intestate, to go in quest of his next heirs and advise them that my late Picardy estates were now their property.
Castelroux sought yet to persuade me to visit the Count, but I held firmly to my resolve.
“I am leaving Toulouse to-day,” I announced.
“Whither do you go?”
“To hell, or to Beaugency – I scarce know which, nor does it matter.”
He looked at me in surprise, but, being a man of breeding, asked no questions upon matters that he accounted secret.
“But the King?” he ventured presently.
“His Majesty has already dispensed me from my duties by him.”
Nevertheless, I did not go that day. I maintained the intention until sunset; then, seeing that it was too late, I postponed my departure until the morrow. I can assign no reason for my dallying mood. Perhaps it sprang from the inertness that pervaded me, perhaps some mysterious hand detained me. Be that as it may, that I remained another night at the Hotel de l’Epee was one of those contingencies which, though slight and seemingly inconsequential in themselves, lead to great issues. Had I departed that day for Beaugency, it is likely that you had never heard of me – leastways, not from my own pen – for in what so far I have told you, without that which is to follow, there is haply little that was worth the labour of setting down.
In the morning, then, I set out; but having started late, we got no farther than Grenade, where we lay the night once more at the Hotel de la Couronne. And so, through having delayed my departure by a single day, did it come to pass that a message reached me before it might have been too late.
It was high noon of the morrow. Our horses stood saddled; indeed, some of my men were already mounted – for I was not minded to disband them until Beaugency was reached – and my two coaches were both ready for the journey. The habits of a lifetime are not so easy to abandon even when Necessity raises her compelling voice.
I was in the act of settling my score with the landlord when of a sudden there were quick steps in the passage, the clank of a rapier against the wall, and a voice – the voice of Castelroux – calling excitedly “Bardelys! Monsieur de Bardelys!”
“What brings you here?” I cried in greeting, as he stepped into the room.
“Are you still for Beaugency?” he asked sharply, throwing back his head.
“Why, yes,” I answered, wondering at this excitement.
“Then you have seen nothing of Saint-Eustache and his men?”
“Nothing.”
“Yet they must have passed this way not many hours ago.” Then tossing his hat on the table and speaking with sudden vehemence: “If you have any interest in the family of Lavedan, you will return upon the instant to Toulouse.”
The mention of Lavedan was enough to quicken my pulses. Yet in the past two days I had mastered resignation, and in doing that we school ourselves to much restraint. I turned slowly, and surveyed the little Captain attentively. His black eyes sparkled, and his moustaches bristled with excitement. Clearly he had news of import. I turned to the landlord.
“Leave us, Monsieur l’Hote,” said I shortly; and when he had departed, “What of the Lavedan family, Castelroux?” I inquired as calmly as I might.
“The Chevalier de Saint-Eustache left Toulouse at six o’clock this morning for Lavedan.”
Swift the suspicion of his errand broke upon my mind.
“He has betrayed the Vicomte?” I half inquired, half asserted.
Castelroux nodded. “He has obtained a warrant for his apprehension from the Keeper of the Seals, and is gone to execute it. In the course of a few days Lavedan will be in danger of being no more than a name. This Saint-Eustache is driving a brisk trade, by God, and some fine prizes have already fallen to his lot. But if you add them all together, they are not likely to yield as much as this his latest expedition. Unless you intervene, Bardelys, the Vicomte de Lavedan is doomed and his family houseless.”
“I will intervene,” I cried. “By God, I will! And as for Saint-Eustache – he was born under a propitious star, indeed, if he escapes the gallows. He little dreams that I am still to be reckoned with. There, Castelroux, I will start for Lavedan at once.”
Already I was striding to the door, when the Gascon called me back.
“What good will that do?” he asked. “Were it not better first to return to Toulouse and obtain a counter-warrant from the King?”
There was wisdom in his words – much wisdom. But my blood was afire, and I was in too hot a haste to reason.