Servants of Sin

"Her scruples show that she, at least, is fit to do so. Vandecque, she must be my wife. I am resolved. What pressure can you bring to bear upon her? Oh! that I, Desparre, should be forced to sue thus!" he broke off, muttering to himself in his rage.

"I must think, reflect," Vandecque replied. "Leave it to me. You are willing to wait, Monsieur?"

"I must have her. She must be my wife."

"Leave it to me."

Monsieur did leave it to him, and, as the autumn drew towards the winter, Vandecque was able to tell his employer-for such he was-that all scruples were overcome, that the girl was willing to become his wife. One thing, however, he did not tell-namely, the influence he had brought to bear upon her, such influence consisting of the information he had furnished as to her being an unknown and nameless waif and stray, who, as he said, he had adopted out of charity. For, naturally enough, he omitted all mention of the bag of louis' d'or which he had received on her behalf, and also all mention of anything else which he imagined his wife had previously received. So, when his tale was done, it was with no astonishment that he heard Laure Vauxcelles announce that she was willing to become the Duchesse Desparre, since he concluded that, as she had now learnt who she was-or rather who she was not-she was willing to sink all trace of what she doubtless considered was a shameful origin in a brilliant future. It never dawned upon his warped and sordid mind that this very story, while seeming to induce her to compliance, had, in truth, forced her to a determination to seek oblivion in a manner far different from that of marriage; an oblivion which should be utter.

As for Desparre, he asked no questions as to how Vandecque had brought her to that compliance. It was sufficient for him to know, and revel in the knowledge, that the girl, who moved his middle-aged pulses in a manner in which they had never been stirred for years before by any woman, was now to be his possession; sufficient for him also to know that, in so becoming possessed of her, he would be able to administer a crushing blow to the vanity as well as the cupidity of the family which had so long ignored him; a blow from which he thought it was very doubtful if their arrogance could ever recover.

CHAPTER VI

THE DUKE'S BRIDE

The Duc Desparre was making his toilette for his approaching marriage-about to take place at midday at the church of St. Gervais, which was conveniently placed between the streets in which his mansion and Vandecque's new apartments were situated.

Strange to say, Monsieur was in a bad temper for such a joyous occasion, and, in consequence, his valet was passing an extremely bad time. Many things had conspired to bring about this unfortunate state of affairs, the foremost of which was that there had been a great fall in the value of "Mississippians" or "Louisiana" stock, owing to the fact that adverse accounts were reaching France as to the state of the colony. Some of the settlers, who had gone out within the last two or three years, had but recently returned and given the lie to all the flourishing accounts so assiduously put about. There were, they said, neither gold mines nor silver to be found there, as had been stated; the Indians, especially the Natchez, were in open warfare with the French and slaughtering all who came in their way; the soil was unproductive, marshy and feverous-the colonists were dying by hundreds. Law, the great promoter of the Louisiana scheme, was a liar, they said, while, La Salle and Hennepin, the Franciscan monk who had sent home such flourishing accounts to the late king, were, they added, the same; and so were all who held out any hopes that Louisiana could ever be aught to France but a suitable place to which to send its surplus population, there to find death. It is true these wanderers had been flung into the Bastille for daring to return and promulgate such statements-but, all the same, those statements had their effect on the funds, and "Mississippians" had fallen.

Wherefore the Duc Desparre was a poorer man on this, his wedding morn, than he had been yesterday, by one-half his newly acquired wealth, and he was in a great state of irritation in consequence. While, also, he remembered at this moment that Vandecque had had a deal of money from him, none of which he was ever likely to see the colour of again. So that, altogether, he was in a very bad humour-and there were other things besides to annoy him.

"Have you sent this morning to enquire how Mademoiselle Vauxcelles is?" he asked of his valet, who at this moment was affixing a patch to his face. "She has not been well for four days, and has been invisible. I trust her health is restored. What is the answer?"

"Mademoiselle is better, Monsieur," the man replied, "much better."

"Is that the answer? No message for me?"

"None was delivered to me from her, Monsieur le Duc. But Monsieur Vandecque sent his compliments and said he expected you eagerly."

"Did he? Without doubt! Perhaps, too, he expects a little more money from me." This he whispered to himself. "Well, he will find himself disappointed. If he requires more he may go seek it at the gambling tables, or of the devil; he will get nothing further from me. Henceforth it will be sufficient to have to support his niece."

Then, his toilet being completed, he asked the valet if the company were below and the carriages ready to convey them to the church where the bride was to be met?

"They assemble, Monsieur le Duc, they assemble. Already the distinguished relatives of Monsieur are arriving, and many friends have called to ask after Monsieur's health this morning, and have proceeded to the church," while, as the little clock struck eleven in silvery tones, the man added, "If Monsieur is agreeable it will be well to descend now, perhaps."

"So," said Desparre, rising, "I will descend. Yet, before I go, give me my tablets, let me see that everything has been carried out as I ordered," while, taking from the servant's hand a little ivory notebook, he glanced his eye over it.

"Yes," he muttered. "Yes. Humph! Yes. Rosina's allowance to be paid monthly-ha! – curse her! – yet, otherwise, she would not hold her tongue. The exempt to sell up the widow Lestrange if she pays not by the 31st. Good! Good! The outfitters to be told that I will not pay for the new furniture until the end of the year; ha! but I shall not pay it then, though." And, so, he read down his tablets until he had gone through all his notes. When, bidding his man perfume his ruffles and lace pocket-handkerchief, he descended to the salon to greet his relatives and guests; those dearly beloved relatives, who, he strongly believed and hoped, were cursing themselves and their fate at this very moment.

In spite of their intense disapproval of the union which Desparre was about to enter into, a union with the niece of a man whose reputation was of the worst-which really would not have mattered much had he belonged to the aristocracy! – those relatives had not thought it altogether advisable to abstain from gracing the impending ceremony with their presence. For Monsieur was the head of a great house, of their great house, he had interest unbounded. And he was the Regent's friend. He was almost one of the most prominent of the roués. What might he not still do for them, in spite of this atrocious misalliance he was about to perpetrate, if only they kept on friendly terms with him? Then again, he was, as they supposed, enormously wealthy, rumour saying that he had made some millions over Law's system-in which case rumour, as usual, exaggerated-and, above all, he was approaching old age; he was, and always had been, a dissolute man; there was little likelihood that he would leave any heirs behind him. And, if so, there would be some fine pickings for the others. Wherefore they swallowed their disapproval and disgust of this forthcoming mésalliance and trooped to his house to wish him that joy which they earnestly hoped he would never experience, notwithstanding that it was a cruel, bitter winter and that, unfortunately, wedding ceremonies took place at an hour when most of them were accustomed to be snoring in their beds.

These relatives formed a strange group; a strange collection of beings which, perhaps, no other period than that of the Regency, five years after the death of Louis XIV., could have produced. There were old women present, including his paternal aunt, the Dowager Duchesse Desparre, whose lives had been one long sickening reek of immorality and intrigue under The Great King; women who, as she had done, had struggled and schemed for that king's favours-or for what was almost as good, the reputation of having gained those favours. Women who had betrayed their husbands over and over again, women who had sinned against those husbands with the latters' own consent, so long as the deception had aided their fortunes. Yet, withal, their manners were those of the most perfect ease and grace which the world has ever known, and which are now to be found only amongst dancing mistresses and masters of ceremonies.

Amidst them all, however, the battered, half-worn-out roué moved with a grace equal to theirs, he having become a very prince of posturers; while bowing to one old harridan in whose veins ran the blood of crusading knights and-some whispered-even of Henry of Navarre; kissing the hand of another who had tapped the late Dauphin on the cheek with her fan when he asked her if she liked hunting, and had made answer that "innocent pleasures were not pleasure to her;" leering at a younger female cousin in a manner that might almost have made the Duc de Richelieu himself jealous, but which did not disturb the fair recipient of the ogle at all. And he kissed the hand of the Dowager Duchess with respectful rapture (though once she had refused to let the impoverished soldier into her house), while he regretted that such a trifle as his marriage should have brought her forth from her home that morning; he carried a glass of tokay to one aunt and ordered his servant to hand a cup of chocolate to another-the distinction being made because the rank of this latter was not quite so exalted as that of the former.

He was revelling in his revenge! And then, suddenly, his face dropped and he stood staring at the door. Staring, indeed, with so ghastly a look upon that face that a boon companion of his began to think that, after all, an apoplectic fit was about to seize him, and that leeches to his head and a cupping would more likely be his portion than a wedding on that day.

For, at the door, was standing Vandecque, alone-and on his face was a look which told the Duke very plainly that something had happened.

"What is it?" he muttered, as he came close to him, while lurching a little in his gait, as the boon companion thought-as though he had fetters about his feet-and while his words came from his mouth with difficulty. "Speak. Speak. Curse you! speak. Why are you here when-when-you should be with her-at-the-church?"

And all the time the eyes of the old and young members of his family were looking at him, and the Dowager Duchess was wondering if the bride had committed suicide sooner than go to his arms, while the battered hulk who had been drinking the chocolate was raising the wrinkles in her brow as much as she dared do without fear of cracking her enamel, and leering at the other worn-out wreck whose shaking hand held the glass of tokay.

"There is no Duchess yet," she whispered to a neighbour, through her thin lips, "and my boy, Henri, is second in succession." And again she leered hideously.

"Speak, I say," Desparre continued. "Something has happened. I can see it in your face. Quick."

"She-she-is-gone. Escaped. Married," Vandecque stammered. "Married!" And Desparre's face worked so that Vandecque turned his eyes away while he muttered. "Alas! Yes. This morning."

"To whom? Tell me. Tell me. I-did-not-know-she had a lover."

"Nor I. Yet it appears she had. She loved him all the time. That Englishman. Walter Clarges."

There was a click in the Chevalier's throat such as a clock makes ere it is about to strike, and Vandecque saw the cords twitching in that throat-after which Desparre gasped, "And I have called them here to see my triumph!" and then glanced his eyes round his great salon. Then he muttered, "Married!" and, controlling himself, walked steadily out into the corridor and to a chair, into which he sank.

"Tell me here," he whispered, "here. Where they cannot see my face, nor look at me."

"The woman found this in her room when she went to warn her the time was near. She had no maid; therefore, I had engaged one from the person who made the bridal dress. It was on her mirror. Look. Read."

Desparre took the paper in his hands; they were shaking, but he forced them to be still; then he glanced at it. It ran: -

"I refuse to be sold to the man who would have bought me from you. Therefore I have sought a lesser evil. I am gone to be married to another man whom, even though I do not love him, I can respect. An hour hence I shall be the wife of Monsieur Clarges. He has loved me for a year; now, his love is so strong, or, I should better say, his nobility is so great, that he sacrifices himself to save me. God forgive me for accepting the sacrifice, but there was no other way than death."

The Duke's hand fell to his knee while still holding the paper in it, after which he raised his eyes to the other's face.

"You suspected nothing; knew nothing of this?" he asked, his lips still twitching, his eyes half-closed in a way peculiar to him when agitated or annoyed.

"Nothing. I swear it. Do you think that, if I had dreamed of such a catastrophe, I would not have prevented it? It was to you I wished her married-to you."

"Ay," Desparre answered, "no doubt. We have worked together in other things-you-but no matter for that now." Then he raised his half-hidden eyes to the other. "Where does this man live?" he asked. "I do not know. Yet his address can be found. There are many to whom he is known. Why do you ask?"

"Why!" and now there was another look in Desparre's face that Vandecque did not understand. "Why! I will tell you. Yet, stay; ere I do so send those people all away. Go. Tell them-damn them! – there is no marriage to-day, nor-for-me-on any other day. Get rid of them. Bid them pack. Then return," while, rising from the antique chair into which he had dropped in the corridor, he went slowly into another room, feeling that his feet dragged under him, that they were heavy as lead.

"By night," he murmured, "it will be all over Paris-at Versailles and St. Germain-the Palais Royal. The Regent will laugh and make merry over it with La Phalaris-countless women whom I have cast off will be gloating over it, laughing at the downfall, the humiliation of Desparre-the fool, Desparre, who had boasted of the trick he was to play on his kinsfolk. Dieu! to be fooled by this beggar's brat. Yet. Yet. Yet-well! let Orleans laugh-still-he shall help me to be avenged. He shall. He must. Or-I will tell my tale, too. Sirac and I know as much as he about the deaths of the Duc and Duchesse de Bourgogne and the Duc de Bretagne-about the Spanish snuff. Ha! he must avenge me on these two-he shall."

Vandecque came back now, saying that the company was departing, but that some of the ladies, especially the Dowager Duchess, were very anxious to see him and express their sympathy. Would he receive them?

"Sympathy, faugh! Let them express their sympathy to the Devil, their master. Now, Vandecque, listen to me. There is but one way of re-establishing myself in the eyes of Paris. By retaliation, punishment-swift, hard, unceasing. You understand?"

Vandecque nodded.

"Good. If you did not understand I should have to assist your memory with reminders of other things-which would have been no more remembered had all gone well-and of several little matters in your past known to me. However, you need no reminders such as those, I think."

Again Vandecque showed by a nod that such was the case.

"Good. Therefore, you will assist me to rehabilitate myself. So. So. Very well. We must begin at once. Because, Vandecque, I am not well, this has been a great shock to me-and-and, Vandecque, I had a-perhaps it was an apoplectic seizure six months ago, when-when-I was falsely accused of-but no matter. I am afraid I may have another ere long. I feel symptoms. My feet are heavy, my speech is uncertain. I must not leave the thing undone."

"What," asked the other, "will you do?"

"What!" Desparre paused a moment, and again the twitching came to his lips; then, when it was over, he went on. "What! Vandecque," speaking rapidly this time, "do you love your niece at all?"

"Passably," and he shrugged his shoulders, "she was beloved of my dead wife, and she was useful. Also, I hoped great things from her marriage."

"Those hopes are vanished, Vandecque. So, too, for the matter of that, is your niece. Therefore, it will not grieve you never to see her again?"

"I shall never see her again. You forget she has a husband."

"No, Vandecque. No! I do not forget. It is that which I am remembering."

"What do you mean, Monsieur?"

"Later on you will know. Meanwhile," and he put a finger out and touched him, "do you love this Englishman, who has spoilt your niece's chances?"

"Love him!" exclaimed Vandecque. "Love him! Ah! do I love him!" while, as he spoke, he looked straight into Desparre's eyes.

CHAPTER VII

MAN AND WIFE

"This," said Walter Clarges, as he thrust open the door, "has been my home for the last four years. You will find it comfortable enough, I hope. Let me assist you to remove your cloak and hood."

It was a large room into which he led his newly-married wife, situated on the ground floor of an old street, the Rue de la Dauphine, in the Quartier St. Germain. A room in which a wood fire burnt on this cold wintry day, and which was furnished sufficiently well-far more so, indeed, than were the habitations of most of the English refugees in Paris after the "'15." The furniture, if old and solid, was good of its kind; there were a number of tables and chairs and a huge lounge, an excellent Segoda carpet on the floor, and a good deal of that silver placed about, against the sale of which, for gambling purposes, a strangely stringent law had just been passed in France. On the walls there were some pictures-one of an English country house, another of a horse, a third of a lady.

"That is my mother," Clarges said. "My mother! Shall I ever see her again? God knows!"

She, following him with her eyes as he moved about the room, could think only of one thing; of the nobility of the sacrifice he had made for her that morning; the sacrifice of his life. He had married her because it was the only way to save her from Desparre, the only legal bar he could place between her and her uncle's desire to sell her to the best bidder who had appeared. The law, passed by the late King, which accorded to fathers and guardians the total right to dispose of the hands of their female children and wards, was terrible in its power; there was no withstanding it. Nothing but a previous marriage could save those children and wards, and, even if that marriage had taken place clandestinely, the law punished it heavily. But, punish severely as it might, it could not undo the marriage. That stood against all.

"Oh! Monsieur Clarges," Laure exclaimed, as she sat by the side of his great fire, the cloak removed from her shoulders, her hood off, and her beautiful hair, unspoilt by any wig, looped up behind her head. "Oh! Monsieur Clarges, now it is finished I reproach myself bitterly with the wrong I have performed against you. I-I-"

"I beseech you," he said, coming back to where she sat, and standing in front of her. "I beseech you not to do so. What has been done has been my own thought; my own suggestion. And you will remember that, when I asked you to be my wife a year ago and you refused, I told you that, if you would accept me, I would never force my love on you further than in desiring that I might serve you. The chance has come for me to do so-I thank God it has come! – I have had my opportunity. Whatever else may happen, I have been enabled to save you from the terrible fate you dreaded."

He stood as he spoke against the great mantel-shelf, gazing down at her, and she, while looking up at him in turn, recognised how great was the nobility of this man. She saw, too, and she wondered now why it struck her for the first time-struck her as it had never done before-that he was one who should have but little difficulty in gaining a woman's love if he desired it. She had always known that he was possessed of good looks, was well-made and graceful, and had clear-cut, handsome features. Now-perhaps because of what he had done for her that day, because he had wrecked his existence to save hers-hers! the existence of an abandoned child, a nameless woman-and had placed a barrier between him and the love of some honest woman who would make a home and happiness for him, she thought he seemed more than good-looking; indeed, he almost seemed in her eyes superb in his dignity and manliness. And she asked herself, "Why, why could she not have given him the love he craved for? Why not?"

"There was," she said aloud and speaking slowly, while, with her hands before her on her knees, she twined her fingers together. "There was no just reason why you should have made this sacrifice for me. I-I refused to give the love you craved, therefore you were absolved from all consideration of me. I had no claim on you-no part nor share in your life. Oh! Monsieur," she broke off, "why tempt me with so noble an opportunity of escape from my impending fate; why tempt me to avail myself of so great a surrender by you of all that could make life dear? Especially since I have told you! – thank God, I told you! – that I am a nameless woman. That I have no past."

"Hush," he said. "Hush, I beseech you. I loved you a year ago, and I made my offer-even proffered my terms. You would not accept those terms then; yet, because the offer was made, I have kept to it. Do you think the story of your unacknowledged birth and parentage could cause me to alter? Nay! – if I have saved you, I am content."

Still she looked up at him standing there; still, as she gazed at him who had become her husband, she felt almost appalled at the magnanimity of his nature. How far above her was this man whose love she had refused; how great the nobleness of his sacrifice! And-perhaps, because she was a woman-even as he spoke to her she noticed that he never mentioned the love which had prompted him to the sacrifice as being in the present, but always as having been in the past. "I loved you last year," he had said once; not, "I love you."

"Now," he went on, seating himself in a chair opposite to her on the other side of the great fireplace. "Now, let us talk of the future. Of what we must do. This is what I purpose."

She raised her eyes from the fire again and looked at him, wondering if he was about to suggest that their life should be arranged upon the ordinary lines of a marriage brought about on the principles of expediency; and, although she knew it not, there was upon her beautiful face a glance which testified that her curiosity was aroused.

Then he went on.

"You know," he said, "that my own country is closed to me. For such as I, who, although little more than twenty at the time-for such as those who were out with the Earl of Mar-there is no return to England, in spite of the Elector having pardoned many. Nor, indeed, would I have it so. We Clarges have been followers of the Royal House always. My grandfather fell fighting against Fairfax and the Puritans; my father was abroad with King Charles II., and returned with him; I and my elder brother fought for the present King whom, across the water, they term 'The Pretender.'" He paused a moment, then said, "I pray I may not weary you. But, without these explanations, the future-our future-can scarce be provided for."

"Go on," she said, very gently. Whereupon he continued. "England is consequently closed to me-for ever. After to-day's work it may be that France will be, too-and then-"

"France, too!" she repeated, startled, "France, too! and 'after to-day's work.' Oh!" and she made a motion as though to rise from her chair, "what do your words mean? Tell me. Tell me."

Her suddenly aroused anxiety surprised him somewhat; he wondered, seeing it, if she feared that, even now, the relief against her fate which he had provided her with was not sufficient; if still she feared other troubles. Then, with a slight smile, he continued.