The Suitors of Yvonne: being a portion of the memoirs of the Sieur Gaston de Luynes

  Produced by John Stuart Middleton

  THE SUITORS OF YVONNE

  Being a Portion of the Memoirs of the Sieur Gaston de Luynes

  By Rafael Sabatini

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER

  I. OF HOW A BOY DRANK TOO MUCH WINE, AND WHAT CAME OF IT

  II. THE FRUIT OF INDISCRETION

  III. THE FIGHT IN THE HORSE-MARKET

  IV. FAIR RESCUERS

  V. MAZARIN, THE MATCH-MAKER

  VI. OF HOW ANDREA BECAME LOVE-SICK

  VII. THE CHATEAU DR CANAPLES

  VIII. THE FORESHADOW OF DISASTER

  IX. OF HOW A WHIP PROVED A BETTER ARGUMENT THAN A TONGUE

  X. THE CONSCIENCE OF MALPERTUIS

  XI. OF A WOMAN'S OBSTINACY

  XII. THE RESCUE

  XIII. THE HAND OF YVONNE

  XIV. OF WHAT BEFELL AT REAUX

  XV. OF MY RESURRECTION

  XVI. THE WAY OF WOMAN

  XVII. FATHER AND SON

  XVIII. OF HOW I LEFT CANAPLES

  XIX. OF MY RETURN TO PARIS

  XX. OF HOW THE CHEVALIER DE CANAPLES BECAME A FRONDEUR

  XXI. OF THE BARGAIN THAT ST. AUBAN DROVE WITH MY LORD CARDINAL

  XXII. OF MY SECOND JOURNEY TO CANAPLES

  XXIII. OF HOW ST. AUBAN CAME TO BLOIS

  XXIV. OF THE PASSING OF ST. AUBAN

  XXV. PLAY-ACTING

  XXVI. REPARATION

  CHAPTER I. OF HOW A BOY DRANK TOO MUCH WINE, AND WHAT CAME OF IT

  Andrea de Mancini sprawled, ingloriously drunk, upon the floor. His legswere thrust under the table, and his head rested against the chair fromwhich he had slipped; his long black hair was tossed and dishevelled;his handsome, boyish face flushed and garbed in the vacant expression ofidiocy.

  "I beg a thousand pardons, M. de Luynes," quoth he in the thick,monotonous voice of a man whose brain but ill controls his tongue,--"Ibeg a thousand pardons for the unseemly poverty of our repast. 'T isno fault of mine. My Lord Cardinal keeps a most unworthy table forme. Faugh! Uncle Giulio is a Hebrew--if not by birth, by instinct. Hecarries his purse-strings in a knot which it would break his heart tounfasten. But there! some day my Lord Cardinal will go to heaven--to thelap of Abraham. I shall be rich then, vastly rich, and I shall bidyou to a banquet worthy of your most noble blood. The Cardinal'shealth--perdition have him for the niggardliest rogue unhung!"

  I pushed back my chair and rose. The conversation was taking a turn thatwas too unhealthy to be pursued within the walls of the Palais Mazarin,where there existed, albeit the law books made no reference to it, theheinous crime of lese-Eminence--a crime for which more men had beenbroken than it pleases me to dwell on.

  "Your table, Master Andrea, needs no apology," I answered carelessly."Your wine, for instance, is beyond praise."

  "Ah, yes! The wine! But, ciel! Monsieur," he ejaculated, for a momentopening wide his heavy eyelids, "do you believe 't was Mazarin providedit? Pooh! 'T was a present made me by M. de la Motte, who seeks myinterest with my Lord Cardinal to obtain for him an appointment inhis Eminence's household, and thus thinks to earn my good will. He'sa pestilent creature, this la Motte," he added, with a hiccough,--"apestilent creature; but, Sangdieu! his wine is good, and I'll speak tomy uncle. Help me up, De Luynes. Help me up, I say; I would drink thehealth of this provider of wines."

  I hurried forward, but he had struggled up unaided, and stood swayingwith one hand on the table and the other on the back of his chair. Invain did I remonstrate with him that already he had drunk overmuch.

  "'T is a lie!" he shouted. "May not a gentleman sit upon the floor fromchoice?"

  To emphasise his protestation he imprudently withdrew his hand from thechair and struck at the air with his open palm. That gesture cost himhis balance. He staggered, toppled backward, and clutched madly at thetablecloth as he fell, dragging glasses, bottles, dishes, tapers, and ascore of other things besides, with a deafening crash on to the floor.

  Then, as I stood aghast and alarmed, wondering who might have overheardthe thunder of his fall, the fool sat up amidst the ruins, and filledthe room with his shrieks of drunken laughter.

  "Silence, boy!" I thundered, springing towards him. "Silence! or weshall have the whole house about our ears."

  And truly were my fears well grounded, for, before I could assist himto rise, I heard the door behind me open. Apprehensively I turned, andsickened to see that that which I had dreaded most was come to pass. Atall, imposing figure in scarlet robes stood erect and scowling on thethreshold, and behind him his valet, Bernouin, bearing a lighted taper.

  Mancini's laugh faded into a tremulous cackle, then died out, and withgaping mouth and glassy eyes he sat there staring at his uncle.

  Thus we stayed in silence while a man might count mayhap a dozen; thenthe Cardinal's voice rang harsh and full of anger.

  "'T is thus that you fulfil your trust, M. de Luynes!" he said.

  "Your Eminence--" I began, scarce knowing what I should say, when he cutme short.

  "I will deal with you presently and elsewhere." He stepped up to Andrea,and surveyed him for a moment in disgust. "Get up, sir!" he commanded."Get up!"

  The lad sought to obey him with an alacrity that merited a kinder fate.Had he been in less haste perchance he had been more successful. As itwas, he had got no farther than his knees when his right leg slid fromunder him, and he fell prone among the shattered tableware, mumblingcurses and apologies in a breath.

  Mazarin stood gazing at him with an eye that was eloquent in scorn, thenbending down he spoke quickly to him in Italian. What he said I knownot, being ignorant of their mother tongue; but from the fierceness ofhis utterance I'll wager my soul 't was nothing sweet to listen to. Whenhe had done with him, he turned to his valet.

  "Bernouin," said he, "summon M. de Mancini's servant and assist him toget my nephew to bed. M. de Luynes, be good enough to take Bernouin'staper and light me back to my apartments."

  Unsavoury as was the task, I had no choice but to obey, and to stalk onin front of him, candle in hand, like an acolyte at Notre Dame, and inmy heart the profound conviction that I was about to have a bad quarterof an hour with his Eminence. Nor was I wrong; for no sooner had wereached his cabinet and the door had been closed than he turned upon methe full measure of his wrath.

  "You miserable fool!" he snarled. "Did you think to trifle with thetrust which in a misguided moment I placed in you? Think you that, whena week ago I saved you from starvation to clothe and feed you and giveyou a lieutenancy in my guards, I should endure so foul an abuse asthis? Think you that I entrusted M. de Mancini's training in arms to youso that you might lead him into the dissolute habits which have draggedyou down to what you are--to what you were before I rescued you--to whatyou will be to-morrow when I shall have again abandoned you?"

  "Hear me, your Eminence!" I cried indignantly. "'T is no fault of mine.Some fool hath sent M. de Mancini a basket of wine and--"

  "And you showed him how to abuse it," he broke in harshly. "You havetaught the boy to become a sot; in time, were he to remain under yourguidance, I make no doubt but that he would become a gamester and aduellist as well. I was mad, perchance, to give him into your care; butI have the good fortune to be still in time, before the mischief hassunk farther, to withdraw him from it, and to cast you back into thekennel from which I picked you."

  "Your Eminence does no
t mean--"

  "As God lives I do!" he cried. "You shall quit the Palais Royal thisvery night, M. de Luynes, and if ever I find you unbidden within half amile of it, I will do that which out of a misguided sense of compassionI do not do now--I will have you flung into an oubliette of theBastille, where better men than you have rotted before to-day. Per Dio!do you think that I am to be fooled by such a thing as you?"

  "Does your Eminence dismiss me?" I cried aghast, and scarce creditingthat such was indeed the extreme measure upon which he had determined.

  "Have I not been plain enough?" he answered with a snarl.

  I realised to the full my unenviable position, and with the realisationof it there overcame me the recklessness of him who has played his laststake at the tables and lost. That recklessness it was that caused me toshrug my shoulders with a laugh. I was a soldier of fortune--or should Isay a soldier of misfortune?--as rich in vice as I was poor in virtue;a man who lived by the steel and parried the blows that came as best hemight, or parried them not at all--but never quailed.

  "As your Eminence pleases," I answered coolly, "albeit methinks that forone who has shed his blood for France as freely as I have done, a littleclemency were not unfitting."

  He raised his eyebrows, and his lips curled in a malicious sneer.

  "You come of a family, M. de Luynes," he said slowly, "that is famed forhaving shed the blood of others for France more freely than its own.You are, I believe, the nephew of Albert de Luynes. Do you forget theMarshal d'Ancre?"

  I felt the blood of anger hot in my face as I made haste to answer him:

  "There are many of us, Monseigneur, who have cause to blush for thefamilies they spring from--more cause, mayhap, than hath Gaston deLuynes."

  In my words perchance there was no offensive meaning, but in my tone andin the look which I bent upon the Cardinal there was that which told himthat I alluded to his own obscure and dubious origin. He grew livid, andfor a moment methought he would have struck me: had he done so, then,indeed, the history of Europe would have been other than it is to-day!He restrained himself, however, and drawing himself to the full heightof his majestic figure he extended his arm towards the door.

  "Go," he said, in a voice that passion rendered hoarse. "Go, Monsieur.Go quickly, while my clemency endures. Go before I summon the guard anddeal with you as your temerity deserves."

  I bowed--not without a taint of mockery, for I cared little what mightfollow; then, with head erect and the firm tread of defiance, I stalkedout of his apartment, along the corridor, down the great staircase,across the courtyard, past the guard,--which, ignorant of my disgrace,saluted me,--and out into the street.

  Then at last my head sank forward on my breast, and deep in thought Iwended my way home, oblivious of all around me, even the chill bite ofthe February wind.

  In my mind I reviewed my wasted life, with the fleeting pleasures andthe enduring sorrows that it had brought me--or that I had drawn fromit. The Cardinal said no more than truth when he spoke of having savedme from starvation. A week ago that was indeed what he had done. Hehad taken pity on Gaston de Luynes, the nephew of that famous Albert deLuynes who had been Constable of France in the early days of the lateking's reign; he had made me lieutenant of his guards and maitre d'armesto his nephews Andrea and Paolo de Mancini because he knew that a betterblade than mine could not be found in France, and because he thought itwell to have such swords as mine about him.

  A little week ago life had been replete with fresh promises, the gatesof the road to fame (and perchance fortune) had been opened to me anew,and now--before I had fairly passed that gate I had been thrust rudelyback, and it had been slammed in my face because it pleased a fool tobecome a sot whilst in my company.

  There is a subtle poetry in the contemplation of ruin. With ruin itself,howbeit, there comes a prosaic dispelling of all idle dreams--a hard, agrim, a vile reality.

  Ruin! 'T is an ugly word. A fitting one to carve upon the tombstone of areckless, godless, dissolute life such as mine had been.

  Back, Gaston de Luynes! back, to the kennel whence the Cardinal's handdid for a moment pluck you; back, from the morning of hope to the nightof despair; back, to choose between starvation and the earning of apauper's fee as a master of fence!