THE MEMOIRS OF A PHYSICIAN (Complete Edition: Volumes 1-5). Alexandre Dumas
what was the dreadful truth you told her, my lord?" inquired the princess.
"She saw it in the gap which I tore in the veil over the future," rejoined the mysterious man. "That future which has appeared so awful to your royal highness that you have fled into a cloister to wrestle against it at the altar with tears and prayers. Is it fault of mine, I say, if this future, revealed to you as a holy woman, should be shown to me as a precursor; and if the dauphiness, alarmed at the fate personally threatening her, swooned when it loomed upon her?"
"Do you hear this?" said the cardinal.
"Woe is me!" moaned the Carmelite superior.
"For her reign is doomed as the most fatal and unfortunate of the entire monarchy," continued the count.
"My lord!" cried the abbess.
"Perchance your prayers will earn your grace," proceeded the prophet, "but then you will see nothing of what comes to pass, as you will rest in the arms of the angels. Pray, lady; continue to pray!"
Overcome by this prophetic voice, which harmonized so well with the terrors in her soul, the princess dropped kneeling before the crucifix and began indeed to pray, and with fervor.
"Now, our turn, cardinal," said the count turning to the prince, and leading him into a window recess. "Speak as to your want of me."
"I want to know what you are?"
"You do know—you say that I am a magician."
"I mean that you are called Joseph Balsamo in the south; and here, Count Fenix."
"That merely proves that I change my name."
"Yes; but I would have you know that such changes on the part of such a man will set Chief of Police Sartines to thinking."
"This is petty warfare for a Rohan," said the other, smiling.
"Your eminence stoops to wrangle over words. Verba et voces, says the Latin. Is there nothing worse to fling at me?"
"You are railing, my lord."
"Always; it is my style."
"Then I shall make you change your note; which will help me in the good graces of the dauphiness, whom you have offended."
"Do so, as it will not be a useless act, considering the delicate ground on which you stand as regards her," returned Balsamo phlegmatically.
"What will you say if I have you arrested straightway, my lord the horoscopist?"
"You would do yourself injury, my lord cardinal."
"Really! How do you make that out?" demanded the proud peer with crushing scorn.
"You would unmake yourself."
"At least, we shall know who really is Baron Joseph Balsamo, alias Count Fenix, a sprig of a family tree of which I have never seen the picture in any heraldic work in Europe."
"You should have asked to see it in the portfolio of the Duke of Breteuil, your friend——"
"His grace is no friend of mine."
"He was, and an intimate one, or your eminence would never have written him that letter—but draw closer, my lord, lest we are overheard in what may compromise you!—that letter written from Vienna to Paris to dissuade the dauphin from making his marriage."
"That letter!" gasped the prince, starting with fright.
"I know it by heart."
"Breteuil has betrayed? because he said it was—burned when I asked it back, when the marriage was settled."
"He did not like to admit that he had lost it. A lost letter may be found; and, indeed, I found it in the Marble Court at Versailles. I took good care not to restore it to the duke, for I knew your eminence was ill-disposed toward me. If you were going through the woods and expected highwaymen to attack you, and you found a loaded pistol, would you not pick it up to use it? A man would be an idiot not to do so."
The cardinal felt giddy and leaned on the window-sill. After hesitation, during which the count watched the play of his features, he said:
"Granted thus. But it shall never be said that a prince of my line yielded to the threats of a mountebank. Though this letter may have been lost, and found, and will be shown to the dauphiness herself, and may ruin me as a politician, I will stand to it that I am still a loyal subject and a faithful ambassador. I will speak the truth—that I thought the alliance injurious to the interests of my country, and let it defend me or blame me."
"But what will be the answer of this faithful subject and loyal envoy if somebody asserts that this gallant young beau of an ambassador, never doubting his winning all before him with his title of prince and name of Rohan, did not say this from any opinion that the alliance would be hurtful to his country, but because—being graciously welcomed by Marie Antoinette—this coxcomb of an envoy had the vanity to think the feast was fitter for Jack than his master?"
"He would deny; for of this feeling which you pretend to have existed, no proof can be exhibited."
"You are wrong; the token is in the dauphiness' coldness toward you."
The cardinal wavered.
"Believe me, prince," went on the count, "instead of quarreling, as we should have done, only for my having more prudence than you, we had better be friends—good ones, for such do one another service."
"Have I ever asked aught of your lordship?"
"Just there you are wrong; for you might have called on me during the two days you spent in town. You cannot conceal from a sorcerer what you have been about. You left the Austrian princess at Soissons, whence you rushed posthaste to Paris, where you dunned your friends for help, which they all refused you. This left you desperate."
"What kind of help could I expect from you, had I applied?" asked the Rohan, confounded.
"Such as a man gives who can make gold. And you ought to want gold when you have to pay five hundred thousand francs in forty-eight hours. You want to know what good a man is who makes gold? Why, he is the very one where you will find the cash demanded. You could easily tell my house in Saint Claude Street in the swamp, as the knocker is a brass griffin."
"When could I call?"
"Six, to-morrow afternoon, please your eminence, and whenever after you like. But we have finished our chat in time, for the princess has concluded her devotions."
The cardinal was conquered.
"Your highness," he said, "I am forced to acknowledge that Count Fenix is quite right; the document he produces is most reliable, and the explanations he has furnished have completely satisfied me."
"Your highness' orders?" asked the count, bowing.
"Let me put one last question to this young lady."
Again the count bowed in assent.
"Is it of your own free will that you quit the abbey of St. Denis, where you came to seek refuge?"
"Her highness," repeated Fenix, quickly, "asks you whether you are leaving this place of your own free will. Speak out Lorenza."
"I go of my own free will," replied the Italian.
"In order to accompany Count Fenix, your husband?" prompted the magician.
"To accompany my husband."
"In this case I retain neither of you," said the princess, "for it would be running counter to my feelings. But, if there be anything in all this out of the natural order of things, may the divine punishment fall on whomsoever disturbs the harmony of nature for his profit or interests. Go, my Lord Count Fenix; and you, Lorenza Feliciani—I detain you no more. But take back your jewels."
"They are for the poor," replied Balsamo; "distributed by your hands, the alms will be doubly agreeable to God. All I ask is to have my horse Djerid."
"Take him as you go forth. Begone!"