The Greatest Historical Novels. Rafael Sabatini
told them of the graciousness of Madame's welcome and of the condescension of Monsieur.
'He spoke to me at length of you, André.'
'Of me?' André-Louis was startled.
'Your manner yesterday made him curious about you. He inquired in what relationship we stood. I told him that we are affianced. Then, because he seemed surprised, I told him something of your history. How once you had represented your godfather in the States of Brittany, where you were the most powerful advocate of the nobility. How the killing of your friend Philippe de Vilmorin had turned you into a revolutionary. How in the end you had turned again, and at what sacrifice you had saved us and brought us out of France. He regards you very favourably, André.'
'Ah? He said so?'
She nodded. 'He said that you have a very resolute air, and that he had judged you to be a bold, enterprising man.'
'He meant to say that I am impudent and do not know my place.'
'André!' she reproached him.
'Oh, he is right. I don't. I refuse to know it until it is a place worth knowing.'
A tall, spare gentleman in black approached them, a swarthy man in the middle thirties, calm and assured of manner. His cheeks were deeply scored with lines, and hollow, as if from loss of teeth. This and the close set of his eyes lent a sinister air to the not unhandsome face. He came, he announced, to seek the acquaintance of Monsieur Moreau. Aline presented him as Monsieur le Comte d'Entragues, a name already well known for that of a daring, resolute royalist agent, a man saturated with the spirit of intrigue.
He made amiable small-talk until the Countess of Provence, a foolish artificial smile on her plain face, descended upon them. Archly scolding them for seducing her new lady-in-waiting from her duties, she swept Aline away, and left the two men together. But they were not long alone. Monsieur le Comte d'Artois very deliberately approached them, a tall, handsome man of thirty-five, so elegant of shape and movement that it was difficult to believe that he sprang from the same stock as his ponderous brothers, King Louis and Monsieur de Provence.
He was attended by a half-dozen gentlemen, two of whom wore the glittering green-and-silver with scarlet collars which was the uniform of his own bodyguard. Among the others André-Louis beheld the sturdy sardonic Monsieur de Batz, who flashed him a smile of friendly recognition, and the pompous countenance of Monsieur de Plougastel, who nodded frigidly.
Monsieur d'Artois, gravely courteous, his fine eyes intent, expressed satisfaction at the presence here of Monsieur Moreau in the happy circumstances which brought him. Soon André-Louis began to suspect that there was calculation in all this. For after Monsieur d'Artois's compliments came a shrewd questioning from Monsieur d'Entragues on affairs in Paris and of the movements and immediate aims of the revolutionary circles.
André-Louis answered frankly and freely where he could and with no sense of betraying anyone. In his heart he believed that the information he supplied could no more change the course of destiny than a weather-prophet's judgments can control the elements. This frankness conveyed the impression that he served the cause of the monarchists, and Monsieur d'Artois commended him for it.
'You will permit me to rejoice, Monsieur Moreau, in that a gentleman of your parts should have seen at last the error of his ways.'
'It is not the error of my ways that matters or was deplorable.'
The dry answer startled them. 'What, then, monsieur?' asked the King's brother, as dryly.
'The circumstance that those whose duty it is to enforce the constitution, so laboriously achieved, should be allowing their power to slip into the hands of scoundrels who will enlist a desperate rabble to gain them the ascendancy.'
'So that you are but half a convert, Monsieur Moreau?' His Highness spoke slowly. He sighed. 'A pity! You draw between two sets of canaille a distinction too fine for me. I had thought to offer you employment in the army. But since its aim is to sweep away without discrimination your constitutional friends as well as the others, I will not distress you with the offer.'
He swung abruptly on his heel and moved away. His gentlemen followed him, with the exception of Plougastel and de Batz, and of these Monsieur de Plougastel at once made it plain that he had lingered to condemn.
'You were ill-advised,' he said, gloomily self-sufficient.
'To come to Coblentz, do you mean, monsieur?'
'To take that tone with his Highness. It was ... unwise. You have ruined yourself.'
'I am used to that. I have often done it.'
Considering how André-Louis had last ruined himself with the revolutionaries and that Madame de Plougastel was one of those for whose sake he had done it, the hit, if sly, was shrewd and palpable.
'Ah, we know. We know your generosity, monsieur,' Plougastel made haste to amend in some slight confusion. 'But this was ... wanton. A little tact, monsieur. A little reticence.'
André-Louis looked him between the eyes. 'I'll practise it now with you, monsieur.'
He wondered why he disliked so much this husband of the lady whose natural son he knew himself to be. His first glimpse of him had been almost enough to make André-Louis understand and excuse his mother's frailty. This dull, pompous, shallow man, who lived by forms and ready-made opinions, incapable of independent thought, could never have commanded the fidelity of any woman. The marvel was not that Madame de Plougastel should have had a lover, but that she should have confined herself to one. It was, thought André-Louis, a testimonial to her innate purity.
Meanwhile Monsieur de Plougastel was being immensely, ludicrously dignified.
'I suspect, sir, that you laugh at me. I am too deeply in your debt to be in a position to resent it. You should remember that, sir. You should remember that.' And he sidled away, a man offended.
'It's an ungrateful task the giving of advice,' said de Batz, ironical.
'Too ungrateful to be worth undertaking uninvited.'
De Batz checked, stared, then frankly laughed. 'You are quick. Sometimes too quick. As now. And it's as bad to be too soon as too late. As a fencing-master, you should know that. The secret of success in life as in swordsmanship lies in a proper timing.'
'All this will have a meaning,' said André-Louis.
'Why, that I had no notion of offering advice. I never give unless I am sure of being thanked.'
'I hope that you do yourself less than justice.'
'Faith, I hope so, too. You goad a man. You would make it almost a pleasure to quarrel with you.'
'Few have found it so. Is that your aim, Monsieur de Batz?'
'Oh! Far from it, I assure you.' The Gascon smiled. 'From what you said to Monsieur d'Artois just now, I gather that you are at least a monarchist.'
'If I am anything at all, monsieur, which I sometimes doubt. I wrought, of course, with those who sought to give France a constitution, to set up a constitutional monarchy akin to that which governs England. There was nothing hostile to the King in this. Indeed, his Majesty himself has always professed to favour the idea.'
'Whereby his Majesty became unpopular with messieurs his brothers and with the nobles, so that some thirty thousand of them who support absolutism and privilege have emigrated and have set up here a new court. France today is a little like the Papacy when it had two sees, one in Rome and one in Avignon. This is the stronghold of absolutism, and since you not only are an enemy of absolutism, but have actually divulged the fact, there is nothing for you here. You have, in fact, been told so by Monsieur d'Artois. Now it is not good for an able and enterprising young man to be without employment. And for a monarchist abundant work is waiting at this moment.'
The Baron paused, his keen eyes on André-Louis's face.
'Continue, pray, monsieur.'
'It is kind of you to wish to hear me further.' Monsieur de Batz looked about him. They stood