That he should prefer a little brown thing, whose beauty
was so inferior to her own, had never crossed her mind; she did not
even know that he was invited to the pall-mall party, and was
greatly taken by surprise when her father sought an interview with
her, accused her of betraying their interests, and told her that
this foolish young fellow declared that he had been mistaken, and
having now discovered his veritable wife, protested against
resigning her.
By that time the whole party were gone to Montpipeau, but that the
Baron was among them was not known at the Louvre until Queen
Catherine, who had always treated Diane as rather a favoured,
quick-witted protegee, commanded her attendance, and on her way
let her know that Madame de Sauve had reported that, among all the
follies that were being perpetrated at the hunting-seat, the young
Queen was absolutely throwing the little Nid-de-Merle into the arms
of her Huguenot husband, and that if measures were not promptly
taken all the great estates in the Bocage would be lost to the
young Chevalier, and be carried over to the Huguenot interest.
Still Diane could not believe that it was so much a matter of love
as that the young had begun to relish court favour and to value the
inheritance, and she could quite believe her little cousin had been
flattered by a few attentions that had no meaning in them. She was
not prepared to find that Eustacie shrank from her, and tried to
avoid a private interview. In truth, the poor child had received
such injunctions from the Queen, and so stern a warning look from
the King, that she durst not utter a syllable of the evening that
had sealed her lot, and was so happy with her secret, so used to
tell everything to Diane, so longing to talk of her husband, that
she was afraid of betraying herself if once they were alone
together. Yet Diane, knowing that her father trusted to her to
learn how far things had gone, and piqued at seeing the transparent
little creature, now glowing and smiling with inward bliss, now
pale, pensive, sighing, and anxious, and scorning her as too
childish for the love that she seemed to affect, was resolved on
obtaining confidence from her.
And when the whole female court had sat down to the silk embroidery
in which Catherine de Medicis excelled, Diane seated herself in the
recess of a window and beckoned her cousin to her side, so that it
was not possible to disobey.
'Little one,' she said, 'why have you cast off your poor cousin?
There, sit down'--for Eustacie stood, with her silk in her hand, as
if meaning instantly to return to her former place; and now, her
cheeks in a flame, she answered in an indignant whisper, 'You know,
Diane! How could you try to keep him from me?'
'Because it was better for thee, my child, than to be pestered with
an adventurer,' she said, smiling, though bitterly.
'My husband!' returned Eustacie proudly.
'Bah! You know better than that!' Then, as Eustacie was about to
speak, but checked herself, Diane added, 'Yes, my poor friend, he
has a something engaging about him, and we all would have hindered
you from the pain and embarrassment of a meeting with him.'
Eustacie smiled a little saucy smile, as though infinitely superior
to them all.
'Pauvre petite,' said Diane, nettled; 'she actually believes in
his love.'
'I will not hear a word against my husband!' said Eustacie,
stepping back, as if to return to her place, but Diane rose and
laid her hand on hers. 'My dear,' she said, 'we must no part thus.
I only wish to know what touches my darling so nearly. I thought
she loved and clung to us; why should she have turned from me for
the sake of one who forgot her for half his life? What can he have
done to master this silly little heart?'
'I cannot tell you, Diane,' said Eustacie, simply; and though she
looked down, the colour on her face was more of a happy glow than a
conscious blush. 'I love him too much; only we understand each
other now, and it is of no use to try to separate us.'
'Ah, poor little thing, so she thinks,' said Diane; and as Eustacie
again smiled as one incapable of being shaken in her conviction,
she added, 'And how do you know that he loves you?'
Diane was startled by the bright eyes that flashed on her and the
bright colour that made Eustacie perfectly beautiful, as she
answered, 'Because I am his wife! That is enough!' Then, before
her cousin could speak again, 'But, Diane, I promised not to speak
of it. I know he would despise me if I broke my word, so I will
not talk to you till I have leave to tell you all, and I am going
back to help Gabrielle de Limeuil with her shepherdess.'
Mademoiselle de Ribaumont felt her attempt most unsatisfactory, but
she knew of old that Eustacie was very determined--all Bellaise
know that to oppose the tiny Baronne was to make her headstrong in
her resolution; and if she suspected that she was coaxed, she only
became more obstinate. To make any discoveries, Diane must take
the line of most cautious caresses, such as to throw her cousin off
her guard; and this she was forced to confess to her father when he
sought an interview with her on the day of her return to Paris. He
shook his head. She must be on the watch, he said, and get quickly
into the silly girl's confidence. What! had she not found out that
the young villain had been on the point of eloping with her? If
such a thing as that should succeed, the whole family was lost, and
she was the only person who could prevent it. He trusted to her.
The Chevalier had evidently come to regard his niece as his son's
lawful property, and the Baron as the troublesome meddler; and
Diane had much the same feeling, enhanced by sore jealousy at
Eustacie's triumph over her, and curiosity as to whether it could
be indeed well founded. She had an opportunity of judging the same
evening--mere habit always caused Eustacie to keep under her wing,
if she could not be near the Queen, whenever there was a reception,
and to that reception of course Berenger came, armed with his right
as gentleman of the bedchamber. Eustacie was colouring and
fluttering, as if by the instinct of his presence, even before the
tall fair head became visible, moving forward as well as the crowd
would permit, and seeking about with anxious eyes. The glances of
the blue and the black eyes met at last, and a satisfied radiance
illuminated each young face; then the young man steered his way
through the throng, but was caught midway by Coligny, and led up to
be presented to a hook-nosed, dark-haired, lively-looking young
man, in a suit of black richly laced with silver. It was the King
of Navarre, the royal bridegroom, who had entered Paris in state
that afternoon. Eustacie tried to be proud of the preferment, but
oh! she thought it mistimed, and was gratified to mark certain
wandering of the eye even while the gracious King was speaking.
Then the Admiral said something that brought the girlish rosy flush
up to the very roots of the short curls of flaxen hair, and made
the young King's white teeth flash out in a mirthful, good-natured
laugh, and thereupon the way opened, and Berenger was beside the
two ladies, kissing Eustacie's hand, but merely bowing to Diane.
She was ready to take the initiative.
'My cousins deem me unpardonable,' she said; 'yet I am going to
purchase their pardon. See this cabinet of porcelain a le Reine,
and Italian vases and gems, behind this curtain. There is all the
siege of Troy, which M. le Baron will not doubt explain to
Mademoiselle, while I shall sit on this cushion, and endure the
siege of St. Quentin from the bon Sieur de Selinville.'
Monsieur de Selinville was the court bore, who had been in every
battle from Pavia to Montcontour, and gave as full memoirs of each
as did Blaise de Monluc, only viva voce instead of in writing.
Diane was rather a favourite of his; she knew her way through all
his adventures. So soon as she had heard the description of the
King of Navarre's entry into Paris that afternoon, and the old
gentleman's lamentation that his own two nephews were among the
three hundred Huguenot gentleman who had formed the escort, she had
only to observe whether his reminiscences had gone to Italy or to
Flanders in order to be able to put in the appropriate remarks at
each pause, while she listened all the while to the murmurs behind
the curtain. Yet it was not easy, with all her court breeding, to
appear indifferent, and solely absorbed in hearing of the bad
lodgings that had fallen to the share of the royal troops at
Brescia, when such sounds were reaching her. It was not so much
the actual words she heard, though these were the phrases--'-mon
ange, my heart, my love;' those were common, and Diane had lived
in the Queen-mother's squadron long enough to despise those who
uttered them only less than those who believed them. It was the
full depth of tenderness and earnestness, in the subdued tones of
the voice, that gave her a sense of quiet force and reality beyond
all she had ever known. She had heard and overheard men pour out
frantic ravings of passion, but never had listened to anything like
the sweet protecting tenderness of voice that seemed to embrace and
shelter its object. Diane had no doubts now; he had never so
spoken to her; nay, perhaps he had had no such cadences in his
voice before. It was quite certain that Eustacie was everything to
him, she herself nothing; she who might have had any gallant in the
court at her feet, but had never seen one whom she could believe
in, whose sense of esteem had been first awakened by this stranger
lad who despised her. Surely he was loving this foolish child
simply as his duty; his belonging, as his right he might struggle
hard for her, and if he gained her, be greatly disappointed; for
how could Eustacie appreciate him, little empty-headed, silly
thing, who would be amused and satisfied by any court flatterer?
However, Diane held out and played her part, caught scraps of the
conversation, and pieced them together, yet avoided all appearance
of inattention to M. de Selinville, and finally dismissed him, and
manoeuvred first Eustacie, and after a safe interval Berenger, out
of the cabinet. The latter bowed as he bade her good night, and
said, with the most open and cordial of smiles, 'Cousin, I thank
you with all my heart.'
The bright look seemed to her another shaft. 'What happiness!'
said she to herself. 'Can I overthrow it? Bah! it will crumble of
its own accord, even if I did nothing! And my father and brother!'
Communication with her father and brother was not always easy to
Diane, for she lived among the Queen-mother's ladies. Her brother
was quartered in a sort of barrack among the gentlemen of
Monsieur's suite, and the old Chevalier was living in the room
Berenger had taken for him at the Croix de Lorraine, and it was
only on the most public days that they attended at the palace.
Such a day, however, there was on the ensuing Sunday, when Henry of
Navarre and Marguerite of France were to be wedded. Their
dispensation was come, but, to the great relief of Eustacie, there
was no answer with it to the application for the CASSATION of her
marriage. In fact, this dispensation had never emanated from the
Pope at all. Rome would not sanction the union of a daughter of
France with a Huguenot prince; and Charles had forged the document,
probably with his mother's knowledge, in the hope of spreading her
toils more completely round her prey, while he trusted that the
victims might prove too strong for her, and destroy her web, and in
breaking forth might release himself.
Strange was the pageant of that wedding on Sunday, the 17th of
August, 1572. The outward seeming was magnificent, when all that
was princely in France stood on the splendidly decked platform in
front of Notre-Dame, around the bridegroom in the bright promise of
his kingly endowments, and the bride in her peerless beauty.
Brave, noble-hearted, and devoted were the gallant following of the
one, splendid and highly gifted the attendants of the other; and
their union seemed to promise peace to a long distracted kingdom.
Yet what an abyss lay beneath those trappings! The bridegroom and
his comrades were as lions in the toils of the hunter, and the lure
that had enticed them thither was the bride, herself so unwilling a
victim that her lips refused to utter the espousal vows, and her
head as force forward by her brother into a sign of consent; while
the favoured lover of her whole lifetime agreed to the sacrifice in
order to purchase the vengeance for which he thirsted, and her
mother, the corrupter of her own children, looked complacently on
at her ready-dug pit of treachery and bloodshed.
Among the many who played unconscious on the surface of that gulf
of destruction, were the young creatures whose chief thought in the
pageant was the glance and smile from the gallery of the Queen's
ladies to the long procession of the English ambassador's train, as
they tried to remember their own marriage there; Berenger with
clear recollection of his father's grave, anxious face, and
Eustacie chiefly remembering her own white satin and turquoise
dress, which indeed she had seen on every great festival-day as the
best raiment of the image of Notre Dame de Bellaise. She remained
in the choir during mass, but Berenger accompanied the rest of the
Protestants with the bridegroom at their head into the nave, where
Coligny beguiled the time with walking about, looking at the
banners that had been taken from himself and Conde at Montcontour
and Jarnac, saying that he hoped soon to see them taken down and
replaced by Spanish banners. Berenger had followed because he felt
the need of doing as Walsingham and Sidney thought right, but he
had not been in London long enough to become hardened to the
desecration of churches by frequenting 'Paul's Walk.' He remained
bareheaded, and stood as near as he could to the choir, listening
to the notes that floated from the priests and acolytes at the high
altar, longing from the time when he and Eustacie should be one in
their prayers, and lost in a reverie, till a grave old nobleman
passing near him reproved him for dallying with the worship of
Rimmon. But his listening attitude had not passed unobserved by
others besides Huguenot observers.
The wedding was followed by a ball at the Louvre, from which,
however, all the stricter Huguenots absented themselves out of
respect to Sunday, and among them the family and guests of the
English Ambassador, who were in the meantime attending the divine
service that had been postponed on account of the morning's
ceremony. Neither was the Duke of Guise present at the
entertainment; for though he had some months previously been piqued
and entrapped into a marriage with Catherine of Cleves, yet his
passion for Marguerite was still so strong that he could not bear
to join in the festivities of her wedding with another. The
absence of so many distinguished persons caused the admission of
many less constantly privileged, and thus it was that Diane there
met both her father and brother, who eagerly drew her into a
window, and demanded what she had to tell them, laughing too at the
simplicity of the youth, who had left for the Chevalier a formal
announcement that he had dispatched his protest to Rome, and
considered himself as free to obtain his wife by any means in his
power.
'Where is la petite?' Narcisse demanded. Behind her Queen, as
usual?'
'The young Queen keeps her room to-night,' returned Diane. 'Nor do
I advise you, brother, to thrust yourself in the way of la petite
entetee just at present.'
'What, is she so besotted with the peach face? He shall pay for
it!'
'Brother, no duel. Father, remind him that she would never forgive
him.'
'Fear not, daughter,' said the Chevalier; 'this folly can be ended
by much quieter modes, only you must first give us information.'
'She tells me nothing,' said Diane; 'she is in one of her own
humours--high and mighty.'
'Peste! where is your vaunt of winding the little one round your
finger?'
'With time, I said,' replied Diane. Curiously enough, she had no
compunction in worming secrets from Eustacie and betraying them,
but she could not bear to think of the trap she had set for the
unsuspecting youth, and how ingenuously he had thanked her, little
knowing how she had listened to his inmost secrets.
'Time is everything,' said her father; 'delay will be our ruin.
Your inheritance will slip through your fingers, my son. The youth
will soon win favour by abjuring his heresy; he will play the same
game with the King as his father did with King Henri. You will
have nothing but your sword, and for you, my poor girl, there is
nothing but to throw yourself on the kindness of your aunt at
Bellaise, if she can receive the vows of a dowerless maiden.'
'It will never be,' said Narcisse. 'My rapier will soon dispose of
a big rustic like that, who knows just enough of fencing to make
him an easy prey. What! I verily believe the great of entreaty.
'And yet the fine fellow was willing enough to break the marriage
when he took her for the bride.'
'Nay, my son,' argued the Chevalier, will apparently to spare his
daughter from the sting of mortification, 'as I said, all can be
done without danger of bloodshed on either side, were we but aware
of any renewed project of elopement. The pretty pair would be
easily waylaid, the girl safely lodged at Bellaise, the boy sent
off to digest his pride in England.'
'Unhurt?' murmured Diane.
Her father checked Narcisse's mockery at her solicitude, as he
added, 'Unhurt? Yes. He is a liberal-hearted, gracious, fine young
man, whom I should much grieve to harm; but if you know of any plan
of elopement and conceal it, my daughter, then upon you will lie
either the ruin and disgrace of your family, or the death of one or
both of the youths.'
Diane saw that her question had betrayed her knowledge. She spoke
faintly. 'Something I did overhear, but I know not how to utter a
treason.'
'There is no treason where there is no trust, daughter,' said the
Chevalier, in the tone of a moral sage. 'Speak!'
Diane never disobeyed her father, and faltered, 'Wednesday; it is
for Wednesday. They mean to leave the palace in the midst of the
masque; there is a market-boat from Leurre to meet them on the
river; his servants will be in it.'
'On Wednesday!' Father and son looked at each other.
'That shall be remedied,' said Narcisse.
'Child,' added her father, turning kindly to Diane, 'you have saved
our fortunes. There is put one thing more that you must do. Make
her obtain the pearls from him.'
'Ah!' sighed Diane, half shocked, half revengeful, as she thought
how he had withheld them from her.
'It is necessary,' said the Chevalier. 'The heirloom of our house
must not be risked. Secure the pearls, child, and you will have
done good service, and earned the marriage that shall reward you.'
When he was gone, Diane pressed her hands together with a strange
sense of misery. He, who had shrunk from the memory of little
Diane's untruthfulness, what would he think of the present Diane's
treachery? Yet it was to save his life and that of her brother--
and for the assertion of her victory over the little robber,
Eustacie.