Collected Works of Rafael Sabatini, Page 2

  He came to inform me that M. de Mancini was below and craved immediate speech with me. He had scarce done speaking, however, when Andrea himself, having doubtless grown tired of waiting, appeared in the doorway. He wore a sickly look, the result of his last night’s debauch; but, more than that, there was stamped upon his face a look of latent passion which made me think at first that he was come to upbraid me.

  “Ah, still abed, Luynes?” was his greeting as he came forward.

  His cloak was wet and his boots splashed, which told me both that he had come afoot and that it rained.

  “There are no duties that bid me rise,” I answered sourly.

  He frowned at that, then, divesting himself of his cloak, he gave it to Michelot, who, at a sign from me, withdrew. No sooner was the door closed than the boy’s whole manner changed. The simmering passion of which I had detected signs welled up and seemed to choke him as he poured forth the story that he had come to tell.

  “I have been insulted,” he gasped. “Grossly insulted by a vile creature of Monsieur d’Orleans’s household. An hour ago in the ante-chamber at the Palais Royal I was spoken of in my hearing as the besotted nephew of the Italian adventurer.”

  I sat up in bed tingling with excitement at the developments which already I saw arising from his last night’s imprudence.

  “Calmly, Andrea,” I begged of him, “tell me calmly.”

  “Mortdieu! How can I be calm? Ough! The thought of it chokes me. I was a fool last night — a sot. For that, perchance, men have some right to censure me. But, Sangdieu! that a ruffler of the stamp of Eugène de Canaples should speak of it — should call me the nephew of an Italian adventurer, should draw down upon me the cynical smile of a crowd of courtly apes — pah! I am sick at the memory of it!”

  “Did you answer him?”

  “Pardieu! I should be worthy of the title he bestowed upon me had I not done so. Oh, I answered him — not in words. I threw my hat in his face.”

  “That was a passing eloquent reply!”

  “So eloquent that it left him speechless with amazement. He thought to bully with impunity, and see me slink into hiding like a whipped dog, terrified by his blustering tongue and dangerous reputation. But there!” he broke off, “a meeting has been arranged for four o’clock at St. Germain.”

  “A meeting!” I exclaimed.

  “What else? Do you think the affront left any alternative?”

  “But—”

  “Yes, yes, I know,” he interrupted, tossing his head. “I am going to be killed. Verville has sworn that there shall be one less of the Italian brood. That is why I have come to you, Luynes — to ask you to be my second. I don’t deserve it, perhaps. In my folly last night I did you an ill turn. I unwittingly caused you to be stripped of your commission. But if I were on my death-bed now, and begged a favour of you, you would not refuse it. And what difference is there ‘twixt me and one who is on his death-bed? Am I not about to die?”

  “Peste! I hope not,” I made answer with more lightness than I felt. “But I’ll stand by you with all my heart, Andrea.”

  “And you’ll avenge me?” he cried savagely, his Southern blood a-boiling. “You’ll not let him leave the ground alive?”

  “Not unless my opponent commits the indiscretion of killing me first. Who seconds M. de Canaples?”

  “The Marquis de St. Auban and M. de Montmédy.”

  “And who is the third in our party?”

  “I have none. I thought that perhaps you had a friend.”

  “I! A friend?” I laughed bitterly. “Pshaw, Andrea! beggars have no friends. But stay; find Stanislas de Gouville. There is no better blade in Paris. If he will join us in this frolic, and you can hold off Canaples until either St. Auban or Montmédy is disposed of, we may yet leave the three of them on the field of battle. Courage, Andrea! Dum spiramus, speramus.”

  My words seemed to cheer him, and when presently he left me to seek out the redoubtable Gouville, the poor lad’s face was brighter by far than when he had entered my room.

  Down in my heart, however, I was less hopeful than I had led him to believe, and as I dressed after he had gone, ‘t was not without some uneasiness that I turned the matter over in my mind. I had, during the short period of our association, grown fond of Andrea de Mancini. Indeed the wonted sweetness of the lad’s temper, and the gentleness of his disposition, were such as to breed affection in all who came in contact with him. In a way, too, methought he had grown fond of me, and I had known so few friends in life, — truth to tell I fear me that I had few of the qualities that engender friendship, — that I was naturally prone to appreciate a gift that from its rareness became doubly valuable.

  Hence was it that I trembled for the boy. He had shown aptitude with the foils, and derived great profit from my tuition, yet he was too raw by far to be pitted against so cunning a swordsman as Canaples.

  I had but finished dressing when a coach rumbled down the street and halted by my door. Naturally I supposed that someone came to visit Coupri, the apothecary, — to whom belonged this house in which I had my lodging, — and did not give the matter a second thought until Michelot rushed in, with eyes wide open, to announce that his Eminence, Cardinal Mazarin, commanded my presence in the adjoining room.

  Amazed and deeply marvelling what so extraordinary a visit might portend, I hastened to wait upon his Eminence.

  I found him standing by the window, and received from him a greeting that was passing curt and cavalier.

  “Has M. de Mancini been here?” he inquired peremptorily, disregarding the chair I offered him.

  “He has but left me, Monseigneur.”

  “Then you know, sir, of the harvest which he has already reaped from the indiscretion into which you led him last night?”

  “If Monseigneur alludes to the affront put upon M. de Mancini touching his last night’s indiscretion, by a bully of the Court, I am informed of it.”

  “Pish, Monsieur! I do not follow your fine distinctions — possibly this is due to my imperfect knowledge of the language of France, possibly to your own imperfect acquaintance with the language of truth.”

  “Monseigneur!”

  “Faugh!” he cried, half scornfully, half peevishly. “I came not here to talk of you, but of my nephew. Why did he visit you?”

  “To do me the honour of asking me to second him at St. Germain this evening.”

  “And so you think that this duel is to be fought? — that my nephew is to be murdered?”

  “We will endeavour to prevent his being — as your Eminence daintily puts it — murdered. But for the rest, the duel, methinks, cannot be avoided.”

  “Cannot!” he blazed. “Do you say cannot, M. de Luynes? Mark me well, sir: I will use no dissimulation with you. My position in France is already a sufficiently difficult one. Already we are threatened with a second Fronde. It needs but such events as these to bring my family into prominence and make it the butt for the ridicule that malcontents but wait an opportunity to slur it with. This affair of Andrea’s will lend itself to a score or so of lampoons and pasquinades, all of which will cast an injurious reflection upon my person and position. That, Monsieur, is, methinks, sufficient evil to suffer at your hands. The late Cardinal would have had you broken on the wheel for less. I have gone no farther than to dismiss you from my service — a clemency for which you should be grateful. But I shall not suffer that, in addition to the harm already done, Andrea shall be murdered by Canaples.”

  “I shall do my best to render him assistance.”

  “You still misapprehend me. This duel, sir, must not take place.”

  I shrugged my shoulders.

  “How does your Eminence propose to frustrate it? Will you arrest Canaples?”

  “Upon what plea, Monsieur? Think you I am anxious to have the whole of Paris howling in my ears?”

  “Then possibly it is your good purpose to enforce the late king’s edict against duelling, and send your guards to St. Germain to arrest the
men before they engage?”

  “Benone!” he sneered. “And what will Paris say if I now enforce a law that for ten years has been disregarded? That I feared for my nephew’s skin and took this means of saving him. A pretty story to have on Paris’s lips, would it not be?”

  “Indeed, Monseigneur, you are right, but I doubt me the duel will needs be fought.”

  “Have I not already said that it shall not be fought?”

  Again I shrugged my shoulders. Mazarin grew tiresome with his repetitions.

  “How can it be avoided, your Eminence?”

  “Ah, Monsieur, that is your affair.”

  “My affair?”

  “Assuredly. ‘T was through your evil agency he was dragged into this business, and through your agency he must be extricated from it.”

  “Your Eminence jests!”

  “Undoubtedly,— ‘t is a jesting matter,” he answered with terrible irony. “Oh, I jest! Per Dio! yes. But I’ll carry my jest so far as to have you hanged if this duel be fought — aye, whether my nephew suffers hurt or not. Now, sir, you know what fate awaits you; fight it — turn it aside — I have shown you the way. The door, M. de Luynes.”

  CHAPTER III. THE FIGHT IN THE HORSE-MARKET

  I let him go without a word. There was that in his voice, in his eye, and in the gesture wherewith he bade me hold the door for him, that cleared my mind of any doubts touching the irrevocable character of his determination. To plead was never an accomplishment of mine; to argue, I saw, would be to waste the Cardinal’s time to no purpose.

  And so I let him go, — and my curse with him, — and from my window I watched his coach drive away in the drizzling rain, scattering the crowd of awe-stricken loiterers who had collected at the rumour of his presence.

  With a fervent prayer that his patron saint, the devil, might see fit to overset his coach and break his neck before he reached the Palace, I turned from the window, and called Michelot.

  He was quick to answer my summons, bringing me the frugal measure of bread and wine wherewith it was my custom to break my fast. Then, whilst I munched my crust, I strode to and fro in the little chamber and exercised my wits to their utmost for a solution to the puzzle his Eminence had set me.

  One solution there was, and an easy one — flight. But I had promised Andrea de Mancini that I would stand beside him at St. Germain; there was a slender chance of saving him if I went, whilst, if I stayed away, there would be nothing left for his Eminence to do but to offer up prayers for the rest of his nephew’s soul.

  Another idea I had, but it was desperate — and yet, so persistently did my thoughts revert to it that in the end I determined to accept it.

  I drank a cup of Armagnac, cheered myself with an oath or two, and again I called Michelot. When he came, I asked him if he were acquainted with M. de Canaples, to which he replied that he was, having seen the gentleman in my company.

  “Then,” I said, “you will repair to M. de Canaples’s lodging in the Rue des Gesvres, and ascertain discreetly whether he be at home. If he is, you will watch the house until he comes forth, then follow him, and bring me word thereafter where he is to be found. Should he be already abroad before you reach the Rue des Gesvres, endeavour to ascertain whither he has gone, and return forthwith. But be discreet, Michelot. You understand?”

  He assured me that he did, and left me to nurse my unpleasant thoughts for half an hour, returning at the end of that time with the information that M. de Canaples was seated at dinner in the “Auberge du Soleil.”

  Naught could have been more attuned to my purpose, and straightway I drew on my boots, girt on my sword, and taking my hat and cloak, I sallied out into the rain, and wended my way at a sharp pace towards the Rue St. Honoré.

  One o’clock was striking as I crossed the threshold of the “Soleil” and flung my dripping cloak to the first servant I chanced upon.

  I glanced round the well-filled room, and at one of the tables I espied my quarry in company with St. Auban and Montmédy — the very gentlemen who were to fight beside him that evening — and one Vilmorin, as arrant a coxcomb and poltroon as could be found in France. With my beaver cocked at the back of my head, and a general bearing that for aggressiveness would be hard to surpass, I strode up to their table, and stood for a moment surveying them with an insolent stare that made them pause in their conversation. They raised their noble heads and bestowed upon me a look of haughty and disdainful wonder, — such a look as one might bestow upon a misbehaving lackey, — all save Vilmorin, who, with a coward’s keen nose for danger, turned slightly pale and fidgeted in his chair. I was well known to all of them, but my attitude forbade all greeting.

  “Has M. de Luynes lost anything?” St. Auban inquired icily.

  “His wits, mayhap,” quoth Canaples with a contemptuous shrug.

  He was a tall, powerfully built man, this Canaples, with a swart, cruel face that was nevertheless not ill-favoured, and a profusion of black hair.

  “There is a temerity in M. de Canaples’s rejoinder that I had not looked for,” I said banteringly.

  Canaples’s brow was puckered in a frown.

  “Ha! And why not, Monsieur?”

  “Why not? Because it is not to be expected that one who fastens quarrels upon schoolboys would evince the courage to beard Gaston de Luynes.”

  “Monsieur!” the four of them cried in chorus, so loudly that the hum of voices in the tavern became hushed, and all eyes were turned in our direction.

  “M. de Canaples,” I said calmly, “permit me to say that I can find no more fitting expression for the contempt I hold you in than this.”

  As I spoke I seized a corner of the tablecloth, and with a sudden tug I swept it, with all it held, on to the floor.

  Dame! what a scene there was! In an instant the four of them were on their feet, — as were half the occupants of the room, besides, — whilst poor Vilmorin, who stood trembling like a maid who for the first time hears words of love, raised his quavering voice to cry soothingly, “Messieurs, Messieurs!”

  Canaples was livid with passion, but otherwise the calmest in that room, saving perhaps myself. With a gesture he restrained Montmédy and St. Auban.

  “I shall be happy to give Master de Luynes all the proof of my courage that he may desire, and more, I warrant, than he will relish.”

  “Bravely answered!” I cried, with an approving nod and a beaming smile. “Be good enough to lead the way to a convenient spot.”

  “I have other business at the moment,” he answered calmly. “Let us say to-morrow at—”

  “Faugh!” I broke in scornfully. “I knew it! Confess, Monsieur, that you dare not light me now lest you should be unable to keep your appointments for this evening.”

  “Mille diables!” exclaimed St. Auban, “this insolence passes all bounds.”

  “Each man in his turn if you please, gentlemen,” I replied. “My present affair is with M. de Canaples.”

  There was a hot answer burning on St. Auban’s lips, but Canaples was beforehand with him.

  “Par la mort Dieu!” he cried; “you go too far, sir, with your ‘dare’ and ‘dare not.’ Is a broken gamester, a penniless adventurer, to tell Eugène de Canaples what he dares? Come, sir; since you are eager for the taste of steel, follow me, and say your prayers as you go.”

  With that we left the inn, amidst a prodigious hubbub, and made our way to the horse-market behind the Hôtel Vendôme. It was not to be expected, albeit the place we had chosen was usually deserted at such an hour, that after the fracas at the “Soleil” our meeting would go unattended. When we faced each other — Canaples and I — there were at least some twenty persons present, who came, despite the rain, to watch what they thought was like to prove a pretty fight. Men of position were they for the most part, gentlemen of the Court with here and there a soldier, and from the manner in which they eyed me methought they favoured me but little.

  Our preparations were brief. The absence of seconds disposed of all formal
ities, the rain made us impatient to be done, and in virtue of it Canaples pompously announced that he would not risk a cold by stripping. With interest did I grimly answer that he need fear no cold when I had done with him. Then casting aside my cloak, I drew, and, professing myself also disposed to retain my doublet, we forthwith engaged.

  He was no mean swordsman, this Canaples. Indeed, his reputation was already widespread, and in the first shock of our meeting blades I felt that rumour had been just for once. But I was strangely dispossessed of any doubts touching the outcome; this being due perchance to a vain confidence in my own skill, perchance to the spirit of contemptuous raillery wherewith I had from the outset treated the affair, and which had so taken root in my heart that even when we engaged I still, almost unwittingly, persisted in it.

  In my face and attitude there was the reflection of this bantering, flippant mood; it was to be read in the mocking disdain of my glance, in the scornful curl of my lip, and even in the turn of my wrist as I put aside my opponent’s passes. All this, Canaples must have noted, and it was not without effect upon his nerves. Moreover, there is in steel a subtle magnetism which is the index of one’s antagonist; and from the moment that our blades slithered one against the other I make no doubt but that Canaples grew aware of the confident, almost exultant mood in which I met him, and which told him that I was his master. Add to this the fact that whilst Canaples’s nerves were unstrung by passion mine were held in check by a mind as calm and cool as though our swords were baited, and consider with what advantages I took my ground.

  He led the attack fiercely and furiously, as if I were a boy whose guard was to be borne down by sheer weight of blows. I contented myself with tapping his blade aside, and when at length, after essaying every trick in his catalogue, he fell back baffled, I laughed a low laugh of derision that drove him pale with fury.

  Again he came at me, almost before I was prepared for him, and his point, parried with a downward stroke and narrowly averted, scratched my thigh, but did more damage to my breeches than my skin, in exchange I touched him playfully on the shoulder, and the sting of it drove him back a second time. He was breathing hard by then, and would fain have paused awhile for breath, but I saw no reason to be merciful.