Molly Elliot Seawell

“ At this, Michelle would smile,—a lovely smile that began in her eyes and ended on her lips, showing a faint, elusive dimple in her creamy cheek, not like the dimples in Bess Lukens’s rosy face. Roger’s conversation about grass for man and beast was certainly unlike that of most gentlemen who live at court. Yet was he so far from a rustic that he knew more of books than any man at St. Germains. Michelle was wise enough to see that nothing escaped Roger Egremont’s watchful eye,—neither the growth of the grass in the meadow nor the politics of Europe. ”

“ Germains, Roger Egremont thought her absolutely beautiful.
Roger spoke a few incoherent words, and Michelle replied, she knew not what. Such a meeting as theirs, with the recollections of seven years behind them, with those weeks of rapture, mixed with anguish, at la Rivière, standing out, glowing with delight, and, alas! red with shame,—does not bring the soft, unthinking joy which comes to those who have not suffered greatly. Each read the heart of the other, and read there shame and sorrow for that one lapse from integrity; but with that remorse was a deep, deep thankfulness. ”

“ At three o’clock the French King would arrive, to make with the King and Queen of England a grand promenade along the terrace; and the gentlemen-at-arms of King James would be paraded before the palace gates to receive the great King who clothed and fed them. But until then, Roger was his own master, and he used his liberty to walk briskly about, exercising his awkward French as well as his legs, in the crowded town, the great forest, alive with people, and the noble terrace, already a panorama of delight, and was charmed and delighted with all he saw. ”

“ He felt as in a dream; and the spell seemed over Michelle too, for when the party separated he found himself walking alone with her in the dusk, along the road, under over-arching trees, that led through the park to the château. They were still singing softly, and Roger, without knowing why or even when he did it, held out his hand, and she laid hers within it, and so, like a shepherd and shepherdess, they passed along together. What sweet and peaceful thoughts, like birds nesting in the trees after the day’s work, were theirs! All the world was left behind and out of sight. ”

“ Egremont, a gentleman who had not so much as a pair of boots, except what he might win with his sword. Obviously love should never so much as be thought of between them; but—perversity governs the world. And this vast inequality between them disappeared when they stood alone together in the moonlight, Michelle’s eyes, the only feature she knew not how to control, looking at poor Roger with a world of meaning in their soft depths. ”

“ But, oh, Dicky, cannot money get thee out of this? I have a plenty,—my own and Madame de Beaumanoir’s,—and I know this place well,—and Diggory Hutchinson, the turnkey, is my friend.”
“No Bess. ’Tis useless. Perhaps a week ago—but not now. However, ’tis no matter. Better men than I have died as I shall die to-morrow morning. I am no hero,—but I hope I can die as becomes a priest and a gentleman.”
“Tell me all,” said Bess, still trembling convulsively, “that I may take it back to France,—to those that love you,—to poor Roger.” ”

“ Every man has it in him to do something good, even Karl, Prince of Orlamunde. What was good in him was the capacity for art. His palace was exquisite, his orchestra was perfect. When the violins and violoncello and flutes breathed forth the divine music of Gluck, it was as if the Saloon of the Swans palpitated with delight, so delicious, so searching, so heavenly was the harmony. Roger listened, thinking it was like the music of Paradise; and when the rapture of melody had lasted some time, he turned [374] to look into Michelle’s eyes and saw the saddest sight. ”

“ Madame de Beaumanoir, catching sight of Dicky, called out,—
“So that’s the young Egremont who is to be a Jesuit, and to go to England to be hanged for it.”
“A man can die but once,” answered Dicky, very readily, but blushing still more; “and if I am to be hanged, I feel sure an English hangman would do the job better, in less time, and in a manner more becoming a gentleman, than a hangman of any other country whatever.”
“Why, boy,” cried the old Duchess, “I did not dream your black beretta had so much wit under it; and you are comely too, like the Egremonts—too comely for a priest. ”

“ She was, by far, the most intellectual woman he had ever known; and besides all her gifts and graces, she had, in perfection, all those delicate reserves which a woman should have, the want of which had always shocked Roger in poor Bess Lukens. Although every hour she remained at la Rivière Michelle risked her name and fame, yet did she as scrupulously observe etiquette as if she had been living in the palace of Versailles, with two thousand pairs of critical eyes fixed on her. ”

“ They were standing close by an open window, and in spite of the mellow light of wax candles, the young moon shone in softly upon them.
[117] “After all,” said Michelle, “one can only live in the open. I often wish to know how it feels to sleep in the woods and fields, to rise and mount at dawn, on a good horse, with arms by my side, and all the work I had to do that day to be done under God’s sun. In such a life I could live happy, and die with a quiet and joyful mind.”
“I know what it is to sleep at the sign of the Shining Stars,” said Roger. ”

“ Old Marianne gave them some breakfast, and then Michelle, this wearied lady, who was not able to travel in a chaise a day’s ride, suddenly recovered her strength and spirits. When Roger said that it was not prudent for her health for her to go farther until the next day, her face became so illumined, she smiled so radiantly, the faint dimple showing in her cheek, that Roger was dazed with joy, and thought the six years since they had made hay in the meadows of St. Germains must be a bad dream. ”

“ He would spare the woman he loved. He had loved her with a true and honorable love, and true and honorable should his love remain. He adored God and thanked Him for His mercy in bringing His unworthy servant to a knowledge of sin. For the first time since his boyhood he wept, wept tears of penitence and of thankfulness, and those burning drops washed his soul and made it clean again. The bell continued its sweet chiming; it sounded to Roger Egremont like the pæans of angels rejoicing over one sinner doing penance. ”

“ Berwick was no killjoy. They made a night of it; poor human nature requires some solace, and these unfortunate gentlemen had but little. Roger Egremont did not reach his garret until two o’clock. He stood looking out upon the quiet stars before he threw himself into his bed. He began to think he should never see Egremont again, and it tortured him; and then he thought of the journey with Michelle, and his pain was turned to a joy so keen, so penetrating, so agitating, that it was more painful than pain itself. ”

“ Hugo Egremont, still by a great effort, kept a scornful smile on his face; and then every other face grew grave, and the ploughman added,—
“If your honor smiles, sir, at the notion that such a horse is good enough for Master Roger, we all do smile with you. But if you smile because he has no better—well, sir, ’tis because there is no better one in this village.”
Hugo, always master of himself, and better able to see himself as others saw him than many worthier men, knew that his triumph would be to conquer Roger’s ill-will. ”

“ But work, pain, and death, with love at hand, these made up the sum of perfect life. Work was easy; pain could be endured with joy,—he remembered the thorn that pressed into his hand and hers at la Rivière; and death could be met with courage, if only love stood beside him, not only love for Michelle, but love for all of God’s creatures and love of God’s righteousness. ”

“ And there was always laughing and singing going on of [66] evenings, and sometimes all night long, in that quaint old common room, to say nothing of dancing and playing. The cards and dice were flying every night; the violins and viols da gamba were forever thrilling and making melody; some voice was ever being lifted up in song, proclaiming the joys that awaited all good Jacobites in England; and rattling choruses in praise of war and love and wine, and dispraise of William of Orange, were perpetually rolling and reverberating among the black rafters of the ceiling. ”

“ So Roger hastened to his garret at Madame Michot’s and scratched a hasty line to Dicky; then finding his man in the village sent off the note, and began making his preparations to start at an hour’s notice.
He had not much to do; your man whose purse is light and his wardrobe scanty, can make ready in a little while to go to the ends of the earth. He looked around his great, bare room with the affection one feels for a place where one has been well treated. Yes, it was in that garret, on that narrow, hard bed, that he had dreamed his first dreams about Michelle. ”

“ But I had never before seen a masquerade. I have been three years in prison, for loyalty to my King, James Stuart, and in all those three years I had not once breathed God’s free air, or trod this green earth of ours; and to be once more my own man, free to see, to walk, to speak, to mix with crowds at will, was so sweet to me that I thirsted for this masquerade. Then I wearied of it.”
“Yes,” replied my lady, “I have often noted that the way to cure a man of a liking for anything is to give him all that he wants, and more, of it. ’Twill cure you of something more than a taste for masquerades.” ”

“ And sweet moments like these must be many before they reached Orlamunde; and after that—well, a campaign was coming; a soldier with his sword could cut his way through a forest of obstacles. So thought Roger.
They were roused from their dream in Paradise by Madame de Beaumanoir’s voice in the distance, cutting the air like a knife. They ran back, like a couple of school children caught playing truant,—the bold Roger Egremont as meek and apologetic as François Delaunay could have been. ”

“ And—oh, joy!—Michelle raked the hay for him to cock! She too as far surpassed the ladies in work as Roger surpassed all the men except Berwick. She seemed as insensible to fatigue as he was, and making hay in August is no merry jest. Roger thought [127] he had never seen so fascinating an employment for a graceful woman,—raking and tossing the hay, lightly, yet with strength, every motion revealing the grace of her figure, and the beauty of her arms and her dainty feet, and bringing a flush, deep yet delicate, to her usually colorless face. ”

“ At the palace, ’tis different, but, it seems to me, the farther hope flies away of our return to dear England, the more the people frolic, and dance, and drink. And I tell you, Roger, my chief hope now is in the Duke of Berwick,—the Pike, they call him, because he is so tall, and thin, and straight; and I think the name suits him, because he does not bend to flattery, nor to anything ignoble. He is the only man who has the confidence of all, and is the favorite of the French King too. ”

“ Not many gayer evenings were spent at the inn than the first night there of Roger Egremont. When the bats and owls in the forest of St. Germains were crying aloud in the midnight, the fiddle was again singing, and the rafters trembling with the carolling. There was a song with the fiddling,—a very tender song,—and Dicky was the singer. Some Scotch gentlemen did the manly sword dance very nobly, but one did it better, and that was Dicky. There was play, and a good deal of money changed hands, and poor Dicky lost all he had—about seven livres—and laughed rather ruefully at his own ill luck. ”

“ I am convinced that Nature is affronted when Art seeks too close acquaintance with her. I do not believe the ancient silent trees like the company of fauns and nymphs, such as they have at Marly and Versailles and all these royal places. It frightens away the real fauns and nymphs.”
“Do you believe in those divinities?” asked Roger, smiling. “I thought I was the only Christian pagan in the world.”
“There you are wrong,” gravely answered Michelle. “All who love the earth as it stands, believe in those divinities. ”

“ The face of nature was newly washed, the trees were putting on their new green liveries for the festal time of spring. The sun shone out with a generous and penetrating ardor that warmed the whole earth and all the people on it. The gray old castle basked in the noonday light. Roger Egremont wandered over it and, standing on the ancient parapet under the deep blue sky, saw all the beauty around him—and could enjoy none of it, because Michelle was not there. ”

“ And Roger Egremont, this honorable gentleman, whose creed was gentleness to women, who had gone to sleep a penitent man, resolving to do right even if it required the crucifixion of the soul, fell into the most unseemly passion imaginable. The devil in a man dies hard, and even after he is conquered he can give much trouble. Roger Egremont, this strong, weather-beaten man, was unnerved and unstrung by the strain of furious emotions from which he had suffered the whole night, and these words of Marianne’s seemed altogether unbearable to him. ”

“ He re-forms his men, and making a rush for the garden, a soldier climbs nimbly over the wall, unbars the gate, and Roger and his men scamper in, just in time to lock and bar the gate behind them. The wall is high and spiked, and opposite the oaken door is an open iron-work gate looking on to the street, where can be seen men fighting furiously, English and French in confusion, riderless horses plunging, and no one clearly understanding what has happened, or what he has to do, only to fight, to fight, to fight. ”

“ To-day, she smiled and opened her eyes wider, like a person roused from sleep, when Roger spoke.
“May I ask, mademoiselle,” he said, “why you are in this desert place, so far from home?”
“By rare good fortune,” she said pleasantly, “I rode afar with my cousin François. His horse cast a shoe about a mile away, and he stopped at a peasant’s cottage, where he found a man able to do some rude smith’s-work, and I came on here, promising to rejoin him. It is good to be away from the crowds of people one encounters in every by-path between Versailles, Marly, and St. Germains.” ”

“ He had expected to see poverty and squalor on every hand, showing the price the people of Orlamunde had to pay for having so magnificent a prince, and was rather disappointed at the general signs of prosperity, both in the country and the little capital.
And, lo, they were approaching the ancient gateway of the town, with its drawbridge and stone gate-house pierced for arquebuses. And there was a glittering procession made up of the whole court, awaiting the bride, and making a splendor of color in the sunny noon, with the ivy-clad gateway and battlements for background. ”

“ And at last, when the black sky was turning a ghostly gray, and in the heart of the forest there was a rustling of wings and a chirping, and a small wind stirred the budding twigs, Roger and Dicky went up together to the great, bare attic room, and throwing themselves down on a pallet, slept with Dicky’s arm around Roger’s neck, as they had often slept when they were lads together at Egremont. ”

“ He had lost, [357] as men do, that gayety of heart which shines through the eyes, and his curling brown hair, which he still wore upon his shoulders, now more from habit than vanity, had some silver threads in it. But he looked a soldier, straight of figure and direct of glance. Bess thought him more nearly handsome than ever in his life. His tender friendship to her showed no abatement. As for that other woman, some woman’s instinct as true as truth told Bess Lukens that Roger Egremont had loved Michelle well, and could never forget her. Bess would rather have had it so. ”

“ But Bess, who treated Diggory Hutchinson—an honest lad, for all he was an under-turnkey—like a dog, and whose sharp tongue and strong arm were ample protection against any man in Newgate, could not so easily put Roger out of her mind. Oftentimes she stopped in her spinning and knitting and sweeping and dusting and bent her handsome brows to listen for the sound of his footstep, or his pleasant, courtier-like voice, as he passed to and fro at the end of the corridor. ”

“ How to get it back unless the Dutchmen were driven from England, he did not know, but the sooner the actual struggle was begun, the better. He would go over to France, whither most of the active partisans of King James had gone, and would ask the honor of leading the very vanguard of the reconquering army.
The vivid moon grew pale and sank, leaving only the trembling stars set in the blue-black sky; the lights in the distant house went out; the earth and all its creatures slept; and Roger Egremont, throwing himself on the ground, fell into a heavy slumber. ”

“ In the spring of 1694, more fighting; in the summer, more fighting still,—in Flanders, in Italy, on the Rhine, on the coasts of France,—everywhere arms resounded. In the winter all was peace, and the gallants fled to Paris. This year of 1694, Roger Egremont, conscious that he was growing to be a mere campaigner, that books and women, to whom every gentleman should be devoted, had lost their charm for him, determined to go to St. Germains for a while. He longed to see Dicky. ”

“ All at once the scene grew less melancholy.
“Ah!” cried Michelle, with a sudden change in her air, a quick gleam of daring in her eyes, which Roger saw by the faint moonlight, a laugh upon her lips, as she struck her horse smartly with the spur she wore, “we are talking like a couple of death’s heads. After all, one must take chances in life. Anything is better than the dull stagnation of mere fine ladies and gentlemen. We may learn a lesson from the poor players in Monsieur Molière’s play-house at Paris. ”

“ Michelle stopped, offended, but not knowing how to go on.
“I say nothing, mademoiselle, of your King, the great Louis, except that he is not only the most generous king, but the most generous man who ever lived, to those in misfortune; and every man of us at St. Germains—English, Scotch, and Irish—would shed the last drop of our blood for him, for his kindness to our master. But I see that kings and people know little of each other. Our English people knew little of King James, or they would not have turned him out, and less of King William, or they would not have put him in. ”

“ So, partly from policy, partly from lassitude and disgust, King William was minded to let bygones be bygones with Roger Egremont—which was better for both than another arrest, another state trial, and another raking up of the popular fury which had attended the trials of the Egremonts.
Roger Egremont settled himself down for a year of preparation for the greatest happiness in the world; he had no reason to doubt that Michelle was doing the same thing. And meanwhile there was happiness in finding himself once more master of Egremont. No man was ever less fitted for exile than Roger Egremont. ”

“ Madame Michot had paid her liberally for her two months’ work, and in good, hard, round, solid gold-pieces. The good woman still disapproved of so excellent a cook and laundress trying the uncertain future of an artist, but her experience with Bess for two months had convinced her that there was no danger in Paris or anywhere else for that robust young woman. Jacques, an honest fellow, who would have been in love with Bess had he not been so mortally afraid of her, presented her with a handsome set of ribbons; and Roger Egremont, taking her off privately, gave her two gold louis d’or. ”

“ Mademoiselle d’Orantia simply declined to be pumped. Madame de Beaumanoir frankly admitted she knew nothing about it, except that all her expenses were paid, and she should not stay a day at Orlamunde longer than she pleased—if she had to risk a lettre de cachet by returning home.
All last things are sad; Roger could not but think Michelle’s merriment put on, with her peach-colored satin gown, and pearl chain. At last, however, it was time to go home; the gentlemen fiddlers grew tired of fiddling. The King sent for Roger Egremont into the royal closet, where he found Berwick and the Queen. ”

“ So, already the news had flown about of his pitching Hugo out of the window. Hugo had thought it wise to depart, particularly as he had lost his sword, without which, he could not, according to etiquette, appear at the levee.
“Madam,” asked Roger, “is not that the way with most men in the presence of a sworn enemy?”
“No, no,” cried the Princess, looking at the Prince who was standing on the dais close by her. “In Orlamunde, for example, when a man is angry with his enemy, be it man or woman, he watches his chance stealthily, and when he thinks he is quite safe, he deals a poisoned thrust.” ”