The Mesmerist's Victim

“Baron,” he drily replied, “I am not strong on language and not even good at spelling. For me, delighted signifies pleased beyond measure. If you would not be delighted beyond measure to see your sovereign content with the grace, beauty and virtue of your offspring, say so. I will go back to his Majesty,” and he spun round on his red heels with quite youthful sprightliness.

“Duke, you don’t understand me – hang it! how sudden you are,” grumbled Taverney, stopping him.

“Why do you say you are not pleased?”

“I never said so.”

“You ask comments on the King’s good pleasure – plague on the dunce who questions it!”

“Again, I tell you, I never opened my mouth on that subject. It is certain that I am pleased.”

“Yes, you – for any man of sense would be: but your girl?”

“Humph!”

“My dear fellow, you have brought up the child like the savage that you are.”

“My dear fellow, she has brought herself up all alone; you might guess that I did not bother myself about her. It was hard enough to keep alive in that hole at Taverney. Virtue sprang up in her of its own impulsion.”

“Yet I thought that the rural swains rooted out ill weeds. In short, your girl is a nun.”

“You are wrong – she is a dove.”

Richelieu made a sour face.

“The dove had better get another turtle to mate, for the chances to make a fortune with that blessing are pretty scarce nowadays.”

Taverney looked at him uneasily.

“Luckily,” went on the other, “the King is so infatuated with Dubarry that he will never seriously lean towards others.”

Taverney’s disquiet became anxiety.

“You and your daughter need not worry,” continued Richelieu. “I will raise the proper objections to the King and he will think no more about it.”

“About what?” gasped the old noble, pale, as he shook his friend’s arm.

“About making a little present to Mdlle. Andrea.”

“A little present – what is it?” cried the baron full of hope and greediness.

“A mere trifle,” said Richelieu, negligently, as he opened the parcel and showed a diamond collar. “A miserable little trinket costing only a few thousand livres, which his Majesty, flattered by having heard his favorite song sung well, wanted the singer to be sued to accept. It is the custom. But let us say no more since your daughter is so easily frightened.”

“But you do not seem to see that a refusal would offend the King.”

“Of course; but does not virtue always tread on the corn of somebody or other?”

“To tell the truth, duke, the girl is not so very lost to reason. I know what she will say or do.”

“The Chinese are a very happy people,” observed Richelieu.

“How so?” asked Taverney, stupefied.

“Because they are allowed to drown girls who are a trouble to their parents and nobody says a word.”

“Come, duke, you ought to be fair,” said Taverney; “suppose you had a daughter.”

“‘Sdeath! have I not a daughter, and it would be mighty unkind of anybody to slander her by saying she was ice. But I never interfere with my children after they get out of the nursery.”

“But if you had a daughter and the King were to offer her a collar?”

“My friend, pray, no comparisons. I have always lived in the court and you have lived latterly like a Red Indian; there is no likeness. What you call virtue I rate as stupidity. Learn for your guidance that nothing is more impolite than to put it to people what they would do in such a case. Besides, your comparison will not suit. I am not the bearer of a diamond collar to Mdlle. de Taverney, as Lebel the valet of the King is a carrier; when I have such a mission, which is honorable as the present is rich, I am moral as the next man. I do not go near the young lady, who is admirable for her virtue – I go to her father – I speak to you, Taverney, and I hand you the collar, saying: Take it or leave it.”

“If the present is only a matter of custom,” observed the baron: “if legitimate and paternal – ”

“Why, you are never daring to suspect his Majesty of evil intentions,” said Richelieu, gravely.

“God forbid, but what will the world say – I mean, my daughter – ”

“Yes or no, do you take it,” demanded the intermediary, shrugging his shoulders.

Out darted Taverney’s fingers, as he said with a smile twin-like to the envoy’s:

“Thus you are moral.”

“Is it not pure morality,” returned the marshal, “to place the father, who purifies all, between the enchanted state of the monarch and the charm of your daughter? Let Jean Jacques Rousseau, who was in these precincts a while ago, be the judge: he will declare that the famous Joseph of Biblical name was impure alongside of me.”

He uttered these words with a phlegm, dry nobility, and perkiness imposing silence on Taverney’s observations, and helping him to believe that he ought to dwell convinced. So he grasped his illustrious friend’s hand and as he squeezed it, he said:

“Thanks to your delicacy, my daughter may accept this present.”

“The source and origin of the fortune of which I was speaking to you at the commencement of our annoying discussion on virtue.”

“I thank you with all my heart, duke.”

“One word: most carefully keep the news of this boon from the Dubarry’s friends. She is capable of quitting the King and running away.”

“Would the King be sorry for that?”

“I do not know, but the countess would bear you ill-will. I would be lost, in that case; so be wary.”

“Fear nothing: but bear my most humble thanks to his Majesty.”

“And your daughter’s – I shall not fail. But you are not at the end of the favor. You can thank him personally, dear friend, for you are invited to sup with him. We are a family party. We – his Majesty, you, and I, will talk about your daughter’s virtue. Good bye, Taverney! I see Dubarry with Aiguillon and they must not spy us in conversation.”

Light as a page, he skipped out of the gallery, leaving the old baron with the jewels, like a child waking up and finding what Santa Claus left in his sock while he slept.

CHAPTER XXI

THE KING’S PRIVATE SUPPER-PARTY

THE marshal found his royal master in the little parlor, whither a few courtiers had followed him, preferring to lose their meal than have his glances fall on somebody else.

But Louis had other matters to do than look at these lords. The paltriness of these parasites would have made him smile at another time: but they awakened no emotion on this occasion in the railing monarch, who would spare no infirmity in his best friend – granting that he had any friends.

He went to the window and saw the coach of Dubarry driven away at great speed.

“The countess must be in a rage to go off without saying good-bye to me,” he said aloud.

Richelieu, who had been waiting for his cue to enter, glided in at this speech.

“Furious, Sire?” he repeated; “because your Majesty had a little sport this evening? that would be bad on her ladyship’s part.”

“Duke, deuce a bit did I find sport,” said the King: “on the other hand, I am fagged, and want repose. Music enervates me: I should have done better to go over to Luciennes for supper and wine: yes, plenty of drink, for though the wine there is wretched, it sends one to sleep. Still I can have a doze here.”

“Your Majesty is a hundred times right.”

“Besides, the countess will find more fun without me. Am I so very lively a companion? though she asserts I am, I don’t believe a word of it.”

“Your Majesty is a hundred times wrong, now.”

“No, no, duke; really! I count my days now and I fall into brown studies.”

“Sire, the lady feels that she will never meet a jollier companion and that is what makes her mad.”

“Dash me if I know how you manage it, duke; you lure all the fair sex after you, as if you were still twenty. At that age, man may pick and choose: but at mine – women lead us by the nose.”

The marshal laughed.

“My lord, if the countess is finding diversion elsewhere, the more reason for us to find ours where we can.”

“I do not say that she is finding but that she will seek it.”

“I beg to say that such a thing was never known.”

“Duke,” said the King, rising from the seat he had taken, “I should like to know by a sure hand whether the countess has gone home.”

“I have my man Rafté, but it seems to me that the countess has gone sure enough. Where but straight home do you imagine she would go?”

“Who can tell – jealousy has driven her mad.”

“Sire, would it not rather be your Majesty who has given her cause for it – any other assumption would be humiliating to all of us.”

“I, make her jealous,” said the King with a forced laugh; “in fact, duke, are you speaking in earnest?”

Richelieu did not believe what he said: he was close to the truth in thinking that the King wanted to know whether Lady Dubarry had gone home in order to be sure that she would not drop in at the Trianon.

“I will send Rafté to learn,” he said: “what is your Majesty going to do before supper?”

“We shall sup at once. Is the guest without?”

“Overflowing with gratitude.”

“And the daughter?”

“He has not mentioned her yet.”

“If Lady Dubarry were jealous and was to come back – ”

“Oh, Sire, that would show such bad taste, and I do not believe the lady is capable of such enormity.”

“My lord, she is fit for anything at such times, particularly when hate supplements her spite. She execrates Taverney, as well as your grace.”

“Your Majesty might include a third person still more execrated – Mdlle. Andrea.”

“That is natural enough,” granted the King; “so it ought to be prepared that no uproar could be made to-night. Here is the steward – hush! give your orders to Rafté, and bring the person into the supper room.”

In five minutes, Richelieu rejoined the King, accompanied by Taverney, to whom the host wished good evening most pleasantly.

The baron was sharp and he knew how to reply to crowned and coroneted heads so that they would see he was one of themselves and be on easy terms with them.

They sat at table and began to feast.

Louis XV. was not a good King, but he was a first-rate boon companion; when he liked, he was fine company for those who like jolly eaters, hearty drinkers and merry talkers. He ate well and drew the conversation round to Music. Richelieu caught the ball on the fly.

“Sire,” said he, “if Music brings men into harmony, as our ballet-master says and your Majesty seems to think, I wonder if it works the same with the softer sex?”

“Oh, duke, do not drag them into the chat,” said the King. “From the siege of Troy to our days, women have always exerted the contrary effect to music. You above all have good reasons not to bring them on the board. With one, and not the least dangerous, you are at daggers-drawn.”

“The countess, Sire? is it any fault of mine?”

“It is.”

“I hope your Majesty will kindly explain – ”

“I can briefly; and will with pleasure,” returned the host jestingly: “public rumor says that she offered you the portfolio of some ministerial office and you refused it, which won you the people’s favor.”

Richelieu of course only too clearly saw that he was impaled in the dilemma. The King knew better than anybody that he had not been offered any place in any cabinet. But it was necessary to keep Taverney in the idea that it had been done. Hence the duke had to answer the joke so skillfully as to avoid the reproach the baron was getting ready for him.

“Sire,” said he, “let us not argue about the effects so much as the cause. My refusal of a portfolio is a secret of state which your Majesty is the last to divulge at a merry board; but the cause of my rejecting, it is another matter.”

“Ho, ho, so the cause is not a state secret, eh?” said the King chuckling.

“No, Sire, particularly none for your Majesty: who is at present, for my lord baron and myself, the most amiable host man mortal ever had; I have no secrets from my master. I yield up my whole mind to him for I do not wish it to be said that the King of France has a servant who does not tell him the truth.”

“Pray, let us have the whole truth,” said the monarch, while Taverney smoothed his face in imitation of the King’s for fear the duke would go too far.

“Sire, in the kingdom are two powers that should be obeyed; your will, to begin with, and next that of the friends whom you deign to choose as intimates. The first power is irresistible and none try to elude it. The second is more sacred as it imposes duties of the heart on whomsoever serves you. This is called your trust: a minister ought to love while he obeys the favorite of your Majesty.”

“Duke,” said the King, laughing: “That is a fine maxim which I like to hear coming from your mouth. But I defy you to shout it out on the market-place.”

“Oh, I am well aware that it would make the philosophers fly to arms,” replied the old politician; “but I do not believe their cries or their arms much daunt your Majesty or me. The main point is that the two preponderating wills of the realm should be satisfied. Well, I shall speak out courageously to your Majesty, though I incur my disgrace or even my death – I cannot subscribe to the will of Lady Dubarry.”

Louis was silent.

“But then,” went on the duke, “is that ever to be the only other will? the contrary idea struck me the other day, when I looked around the court and saw the beavy of radiantly beauteous noble girls; were I the ruler of France, the choice would not be difficult to make.”

Louis turned to the second guest, who, feeling that he was being brought into the arena, was palpitating with hope and fear while trying to inspire the marshal, like a boy blows on the sail of his toy-boat in a tub of water.

“Is this your way of thinking, baron?” he asked.

“Sire,” responded the baron with a swelling heart, “it seems to me that the duke is saying capital things.”

“You agree with him about the handsome girls?”

“Why, my lord, it is plain that the court is adorned with the fairest blossoms of the country.”

“Do you exhort me then to make a choice among the court beauties?”

“I should say I am altogether of the marshal’s advice if I knew it was your Majesty’s opinion.”

During a pause the monarch looked complaisantly on the last speaker.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “I should snap at your advice were I thirty; but I am a little too old now to be credulous about my inspiring a flame.”

“Oh, Sire,” said Richelieu, “I did think up to the time being that your Majesty was the most polite gentleman in the realm; but I see with profound grief that I was wrong; for I am old as Mathusaleh, for I was born in ‘94. Just think of it, I am sixteen years older than your Majesty.”

This was adroit flattery. Louis always admired the lusty old age of this man who had outlived so many promising youngsters in his service; for with such an example he might hope to reach the same age.

“Granted: but I suppose you do not still fancy you can be loved for your own sake?”

“If I thought that aloud, I should be in disgrace with two ladies who told me the contrary this very morning.”

“Ha, ha! but we shall see, my lords! Nothing like youthful society to rejuvenate a man.”

“Yea, my lord, and noble blood is a salutary infusion, to say nothing of the gain to the mind.”

“Still, I can remember that my grandfather, when he was getting on in years, never courted with the same dash as earlier.”

“Pish, Sire,” said Richelieu. “You know my respect for the King who twice put me in the Bastile; but that ought not to stay me from saying that there is no room for a comparison between the old age of Louis XIV. and Louis XV. at his prime.”

The King was in the meet state this evening to receive this praise, which fell on him like the spray from the Fountain of Youth, or Althota’s magic elixir.

Thinking the opening had come, Richelieu gave Taverney the hint by knocking his knee against his.

“Sire,” said the baron, “will your Majesty allow me to present my thanks for the magnificent present made my daughter?”

“Nothing to thank me for, my lord. Mdlle. de Taverney pleased me with her decent and honorable bearing. I only wish my daughters had come from the convent as creditably. Certainly, Mdlle. Andrea – I think I have the name – ”

“Yes, Sire,” cried the noble, delighted at the King having his daughter’s name so pat.

“A pretty name! Certainly, she would have been the first on my list, and not solely from the alphabetical order: but it is not to be thought of – all my time is monopolized. But, baron, take this as settled: the young lady shall have all my protection. I fear she is not richly dowered?”

“Alas, no, Sire!”

“Then, I shall arrange about her marriage.”

Taverney saluted very lowly.

“Rest on that score: but nothing presses, for she is quite young.”

“Yes, and shrinks from marriage.”

“Look at that, now!” exclaimed Louis, rubbing his hands and glancing at Richelieu. “In any case, apply to me if you are bothered in any way. Marshal,” called the King, rising. “Did the little creature like the jewel?” he asked him.

“Pardon my speaking in an undertone,” said the duke, “but I do not want the father to hear. I want to say that though the creature shrinks from marriage, it does not follow that she shrinks from Majesty.”

This was uttered with a freedom which pleased the King by its excess. The marshal trotted away to join Taverney, who had drawn aside to be respectful, and the pair quitted the gallery and went through the gardens.

It was here that Gilbert, in ambush, heard the old diplomatist say to his friend:

“All things taken into account and pondered over, it must be stated, though it may come hard, that you ought to send your daughter back into the convent, for I wager the King is enamored of her.”

These words turned Gilbert more white than the snowflakes falling on his shoulder and brow.

CHAPTER XXII

PRESENTIMENTS

AS the hour of noon was sounding from the Trianon clock, Nicole ran in to tell Andrea that Captain Philip was at the door.

Surprised but glad, Andrea ran to meet the chevalier, who dismounted from his horse and was asking if his sister could be seen.

She opened the door herself to him, embraced him, and the pair went up into her rooms. It was only there that she perceived that he was sadder than usual, with sorrow in his smile. He was dressed in his stylish uniform with the utmost exactness and he had his horseman’s cloak rolled up under his left arm.

“What is the matter, Philip?” she asked, with the instinct of affectionate souls for which a glance is sufficient revelation.

“Sister, I am under orders to go and join my regiment at Rheims.”

“Oh, dear!” and Andrea exhaled in the exclamation part of her courage and her strength.

Natural as it was to hear of his departure, she felt so upset that she had to cling to his arm.

“Gracious, why are you afflicted to this decree?” he asked, as to shed. “It is a common thing in a soldier’s life. And the journey is nothing to speak of. They do say the regiment is to be sent back to Strasburg in all probability.”

“So you have come to bid me farewell?”

“That is it. Have you something particular to say?” he questioned, made uneasy by her grief, too exaggerated not to be founded.

Nicole was looking on at the scene with surprise for the leave-taking of an officer going to his garrison was not a catastrophe to be received by tears. Andrea understood this emotion, and she put on her lace mantilla to accompany her brother through the grounds to the outer gate.

“My only dear one,” said she, deadly pale and sobbing, “you are going to leave me all alone and you ask why I weep? You will say the Dauphiness is kind to me? so she is, perfect in my eyes, and I regard her as a divinity? but it is because she dwells in a superior sphere that I feel for her respect, not affection. Affection is so needful to my heart that the want of it makes it collapse. Father? Oh, heaven, I am telling you nothing new when I say that our father is not a friend or guardian to me. Sometimes he looks at me so that I am frightened. I am more afraid than ever of him since you go away. I cannot tell, but the birds know that a storm is coming when they take to flight while still it is calm?”

“What storm are you to be on your guard against? I admit that misfortune may await us. Have you some forewarning of it? Do you know whether you ought to run to meet it or flee to avoid it?”

“I do not, Philip, only that my life hangs on a thread. It seems to me that in my sleep I am rolled to the brink of a chasm, where I am awakened, too late for me to withstand the attraction which will drag me over. With you absent, and none to help me, I shall be crushed at the bottom of the chasm.”

“Dear sister, my good Andrea,” said the captain, moved despite himself by this genuine fright, “you make too much of affection for which I thank you. You lose a defender, it is true, but only for the time. I shall not be so far that I am not within call. Besides, apart from fancies, nothing threatens you.”

“Then, Philip, how is it that you, a man, feel as mournful as I do at this parting? explain this, brother?”

“It is easy, dear,” returned Philip. “We are not only brother and sister, but had a lonely life which kept us together. It is our habit to dwell in close communion and it is sad to break the chain. I am sad, but only temporarily. I do not believe in any misfortune, save our not seeing each other for some months, or it may be a year. I resign myself and say Good-bye till we meet again.”

“You are right,” she said, staying her tears, “and I am mad. See, I am smiling again. We shall meet soon again.”

She tenderly embraced him, while he regarded her with an affection which had some parental tenderness in it.

“Besides,” he said, “you will have a comfort, in our father coming here to live with you. He loves you, believe me, but it is in his own peculiar way.”

“You seem embarrassed, Philip – what is wrong?”

“Nothing, except that my horse is chafing at the gates because I ought to have been gone an hour ago.”

Andrea assumed a calm face and said in a tone too firm not to be affectation:

“God save you, brother!”

She watched him mount his horse and ride off, waving his hand to the last. She remained motionless as long as he was in sight.

Then she turned and ran at hazard in the wood like a wounded fawn, until she dropped on a bench under the trees where she let a sob burst from her bosom.

“Oh, Father of the motherless,” she exclaimed, “why am I left all alone upon earth?”

A slight sound in the thicket – a sigh, she took it to be, made her turn. She was startled to see a sad face rise before her. It was Gilbert’s, as pale and cast-down as her own.

At sight of a man, though he was not a stranger, Andrea hastened to dry her eyes, too proud to show her grief to another. She composed her features and smoothed her cheeks which had been quivering with despair.

Gilbert was longer than she in regaining his calm, and his countenance was still mournful when she looked on it.

“Ah, Master Gilbert again,” she said, with the light tone she always assumed when chance brought her and the young man together. “But what ails you that you should gaze on me with that dolorous air? Something must have saddened you – pray, what has saddened you?”

“If you really want to know,” he answered with the more sorrow as he perceived the irony in her words, “it is the sadness of seeing you in misery.”

“What tells you so? I am not in any grief,” replied Andrea, brushing her eyes for the second time with her handkerchief.

Feeling that the gale was rising, the lover thought to lull it with his humility.

“I beg pardon, but I heard you sobbing – ”

“What, listening? you had better – ”

“It was chance,” stammered the young man, who found it hard to tell her a lie.

“Chance? I am sorry that chance should help you to overhear my sobs, but I prithee tell me how does my distress concern you?”

“I cannot bear to hear a woman weep,” rejoined Gilbert in a tone sovereignly displeasing the patrician.

“Am I but a woman to you, Master Gilbert?” replied the haughty girl. “I do not crave the sympathy of any one, and least of all of Master Gilbert.”

“You are wrong to treat me to rudely,” persisted the ex-dependent of the Taverneys, “I saw you sad in affliction. I heard you say that you would be all alone in the world by the departure of Master Philip. But no, my young lady, for I am by you, and never did a heart beat more devoted to you. I repeat that never will you be alone while my brain can think, my heart throb, or my arm be stretched out.”