Part 27
They crossed the lawn, in the middle of which rose a handsome fountain with bronze mermaids, and went on talking along the terrace, at the foot of whose brick enclosure opened into the park several summerhouses of varied shape; but, as most of these cabinets were occupied, the young women passed by: one was blushing, the other dreaming.
At length they came to the end of the terrace that overlooked the whole Thames, and, finding a cool retreat, sat down side by side.
“Where are we going, Stewart?” said the younger of the two women to her companion.
“My dear Graffton, we are going, as you well see, where you are leading us.”
“I?”
“Undoubtedly, you! to the end of the palace, toward that bench where the young Frenchman waits and sighs.”
Miss Mary Graffton stopped short.
“No, no,” said she, “I am not going there.”
“Why?”
“Let us go back, Stewart.”
“On the contrary, let us advance, and let us have an explanation.”
“About what?”
“About the fact that the Vicomte de Bragelonne is present at all the walks you take, just as you are present at all the walks he takes.”
“And you conclude from that he loves me, or I love him?”
“Why not? He is a charming gentleman. No one can hear us, I hope,” said Miss Lucy Stewart, turning round with a smile which indicated, moreover, that her uneasiness was not great.
“No, no,” said Mary, “the king is in his oval cabinet with Mr. de Buckingham.”
“Speaking of Mr. de Buckingham, Mary…”
“What?”
“It seems to me he has declared himself your knight since his return from France; how fares your heart on that side?”
Mary Graffton shrugged her shoulders.
“Very well! very well! I shall ask that of the handsome Bragelonne,” said Stewart, laughing; “let us go rejoin him quickly.”
“What for?”
“I have to speak to him, I.”
“Not yet; one word beforehand. Come, you, Stewart, who know the king’s little secrets.”
“You think so?”
“Why, you ought to know them, or no one will; tell me, why is Mr. de Bragelonne in England, and what is he doing here?”
“What every gentleman sent by his king to another king does.”
“Be it so; but, seriously, though politics are not our strong point, we know enough to understand that Mr. de Bragelonne has no serious mission here.”
“Listen,” said Stewart with affected gravity, “I am willing, for your sake, to betray a state secret. Shall I recite to you the letter of credit given by King Louis XIV to Mr. de Bragelonne, and addressed to His Majesty King Charles II?”
“Yes, certainly.”
“Here it is: ‘My brother, I send you a gentleman of my court, son of one whom you love. Treat him well, I pray you, and make him love England.’”
“Was that in it?”
“Plainly… or the equivalent. I do not answer for the wording, but I answer for the substance.”
“Well! what have you deduced from it, or rather what has the king deduced from it?”
“That His French Majesty had his reasons for sending Mr. de Bragelonne away, and marrying him… elsewhere than in France.”
“So that, by virtue of this letter?…”
“King Charles II received Bragelonne, as you know, splendidly and friendly; he gave him the finest room in Whitehall, and, as you are the most precious person of his court, seeing that you have refused his heart… come, do not blush… he wished to give you a taste for the Frenchman and to make him this fair present. That is why, you, heiress of three hundred thousand pounds, you, future duchess, you, fair and good, he put you in all the walks of which Mr. de Bragelonne formed a part. In short, it was a plot, a kind of conspiracy. See if you will set fire to it; I hand you the fuse.”
Miss Mary smiled with the charming expression that was familiar to her, and pressing her companion’s arm:
“Thank the king,” said she.
“Yes, yes, but Mr. de Buckingham is jealous. Take care!” replied Stewart.
These words were hardly spoken when Mr. de Buckingham came out of one of the pavilions of the terrace and, approaching the two women with a smile:
“You are mistaken, Miss Lucy,” said he, “no, I am not jealous, and the proof, Miss Mary, is that yonder is he who should be the cause of my jealousy, the Vicomte de Bragelonne, who dreams all alone. Poor lad! Pray allow me to abandon your gracious company to him for a few minutes, inasmuch as I need to talk for those few minutes with Miss Lucy Stewart.”
Then, inclining toward Lucy:
“Will you do me the honor,” said he, “of taking my hand to go and salute the king, who awaits us?”
And thereupon Buckingham, still laughing, took Miss Lucy Stewart’s hand and led her away.
Left alone, Mary Graffton, her head inclined upon her shoulder with that graceful languor peculiar to young Englishwomen, remained a moment motionless, her eyes fixed upon Raoul, but as if uncertain what she ought to do. At length, after her cheeks, by turns paling and reddening, had revealed the conflict passing in her heart, she seemed to take a resolution and advanced with a fairly firm step toward the bench where Raoul sat, and dreamed as had been well said.
The sound of Miss Mary’s steps, light though they were upon the green turf, awakened Raoul; he turned his head, perceived the young girl, and walked toward the companion whom his happy destiny brought him.
“I am sent to you, sir,” said Mary Graffton; “do you accept me?”
“And to whom am I to be grateful for such happiness, mademoiselle?” asked Raoul.
“To Mr. de Buckingham,” replied Mary, affecting gaiety.
“To Mr. de Buckingham, who so passionately seeks your precious company! Mademoiselle, am I to believe you?”
“Indeed, sir, you see, everything conspires that we should pass the best, or rather the longest, part of our days together. Yesterday, it was the king who ordered me to seat you near me at table; today, it is Mr. de Buckingham who begs me to come and sit near you, on this bench.”
“And he went away to leave me free?” asked Raoul, with embarrassment.
“Look yonder, at the turn of the walk, he is about to disappear with Miss Stewart. Have they such complaisance as that in France, Monsieur le Vicomte?”
“Mademoiselle, I could not well say what is done in France, for scarcely am I French. I have lived in several countries and almost always as a soldier; then I passed much time in the country; I am a savage.”
“You do not like it in England, do you not?”
“I know not,” said Raoul distractedly, and with a sigh.
“How, you know not?…”
“Pardon,” said Raoul, shaking his head and recalling his thoughts. “Pardon, I did not hear.”
“Oh!” said the young woman, sighing in her turn, “how wrong the Duke of Buckingham was to send me here!”
“Wrong?” said Raoul quickly. “You are right: my company is gloomy, and you are bored with me. Mr. de Buckingham was wrong to send you here.”
“It is precisely,” replied the young woman with her serious and vibrating voice, “it is precisely because I am not bored with you that Mr. de Buckingham was wrong to send me to you.”
Raoul reddened in his turn.
“But,” he resumed, “how does Mr. de Buckingham send you to me, and how do you come yourself? Mr. de Buckingham loves you, and you love him…”
“No,” answered Mary gravely, “no! Mr. de Buckingham does not love me, since he loves Madame the Duchess of Orleans; and, as for me, I have no love for the duke.”
Raoul looked at the young woman with astonishment.
“Are you the friend of Mr. de Buckingham, Vicomte?” asked she.
“The duke does me the honor of calling me his friend, since we saw each other in France.”
“You are mere acquaintances, then?”
“No, for the Duke of Buckingham is the very intimate friend of a gentleman whom I love as a brother.”
“Of the Count de Guiche.”
“Yes, mademoiselle.”
“Who loves Madame the Duchess of Orleans?”
“Oh! what are you saying there?”
“And who is loved by her,” continued the young woman tranquilly.
Raoul lowered his head; Miss Mary Graffton continued, sighing:
“They are happy!… Come, leave me, Monsieur de Bragelonne, for Mr. de Buckingham gave you a sorry commission in offering me to you as a walking companion. Your heart is elsewhere, and scarcely do you bestow upon me the alms of your mind. Confess it, confess… It would be ill done of you, Vicomte, not to confess.”
“Madame, I confess it.”
She looked at him.
He was so simple and so fair, his eye had such limpidity, such sweet frankness and resolution, that it could not enter the mind of a woman as distinguished as Miss Mary that the young man was discourteous or foolish.
She saw only that he loved another woman than herself in all the sincerity of his heart.
“Yes, I understand,” said she; “you are in love in France.”
Raoul bowed.
“Does the duke know this love?”
“No one knows it,” answered Raoul.
“And why tell it to me, to me?”
“Mademoiselle…”
“Come, speak.”
“I cannot.”
“Then it is for me to go before the explanation; you will tell me nothing, to me, because you are now convinced that I do not love the duke, because you see that I might have loved you, because you are a gentleman full of heart and delicacy, and that, instead of taking, were it but to distract yourself a moment, a hand that was offered to yours, instead of smiling at my mouth that smiled at you, you have preferred, you who are young, to say to me who am fair: ‘I love in France!’ Well! thank you, Monsieur de Bragelonne, you are a noble gentleman, and I love you the more for it… with friendship. Now, let us speak no more of me, let us speak of you. Forget that Miss Graffton spoke to you of herself; tell me why you are sad, why you are sadder still these last few days?”
Raoul was moved to the depths of his heart by the soft and sad accent of that voice; he could not find a word in reply; the young girl came once more to his aid.
“Pity me,” said she. “My mother was French. I may therefore say that I am French by blood and soul. But over this ardor ever hover the fog and sadness of England. Sometimes I dream of gold and magnificent felicities; but suddenly the mist arrives and spreads over my dream, which it extinguishes. Thus has it been again this time. Pardon, enough of that; give me your hand and tell your griefs to a friend.”
“You are French, did you say, French in soul and blood!”
“Yes, not only, I repeat, was my mother French; but also, as my father, a friend of King Charles I, had exiled himself in France, both during the trial of the prince and during the life of the Protector, I was brought up in Paris; at the restoration of King Charles II, my father returned to England to die there almost immediately, poor father! Then King Charles made me a duchess and completed my dowry.”
“Have you still some relative in France?” asked Raoul with deep interest.
“I have a sister, seven or eight years older than I, married in France and already a widow; she is called Madame de Bellière.”
Raoul made a movement.
“You know her?”
“I have heard her name pronounced.”
“She loves too, and her last letters announce to me that she is happy, therefore she is loved. I, as I told you, Monsieur de Bragelonne, have half her soul, but I have not half her happiness. But let us speak of you. Whom do you love in France?”
“A young girl gentle and white as a lily.”
“But, if she loves you, why are you sad?”
“I was told she no longer loves me.”
“You do not believe it, I hope?”
“He who writes to me did not sign his letter.”
“An anonymous denunciation! Oh! it is some treason,” said Miss Graffton.
“See,” said Raoul, showing the young girl a note he had read a hundred times.
Mary Graffton took the note and read:
“Vicomte,” said this letter, “you are quite right to divert yourself yonder with the fair ladies of King Charles II; for, at the court of King Louis XIV, they besiege you in the castle of your loves. Remain then forever in London, poor vicomte, or return quickly to Paris.”
“No signature?” said Miss Mary.
“No.”
“Therefore, do not believe it.”
“Yes; but here is a second letter.”
“From whom?”
“From Mr. de Guiche.”
“Oh! that is another matter! And this letter says?…”
“Read.”
“My friend, I am wounded, sick. Return, Raoul; return!
De Guiche.”
“And what will you do?” asked the young girl with a tightening of the heart.
“My intention, on receiving this letter, was to take leave of the king that very instant.”
“And you received it?…”
“The day before yesterday.”
“It is dated from Fontainebleau.”
“That is strange, is it not? the Court is at Paris. In short, I would have departed. But, when I spoke to the king of my departure, he began to laugh and said to me: ‘Monsieur the ambassador, whence comes it that you leave? Does your master recall you?’ I blushed, I was disconcerted, for, indeed, the king sent me here, and I have received no order of return.”
Mary knit a thoughtful brow.
“And you stay?” asked she.
“It must be, mademoiselle.”
“And she whom you love?…”
“Well?…”
“Does she write to you?”
“Never.”
“Never! Oh! then she does not love you?”
“At least, she has not written to me since my departure.”
“Did she write to you, before?”
“Sometimes… Oh! I hope she will have had some hindrance.”
“Here is the duke: silence.”
Indeed, Buckingham reappeared at the end of the walk, alone and smiling; he came slowly and offered his hand to the two talkers.
“Have you come to an understanding?” said he.
“About what?” asked Mary Graffton.
“About what may render you happy, dear Mary, and make Raoul less unhappy?”
“I do not understand you, my lord,” said Raoul.
“This is my thought, Miss Mary. Will you that I tell it you before Monsieur?”
And he smiled.
“If you mean,” answered the young girl with pride, “that I was disposed to love Mr. de Bragelonne, it is useless, for I have told him so.”
Buckingham reflected, and without being disconcerted, as she expected:
“It is,” said he, “because I know you for a delicate mind and above all a loyal soul, that I left you with Mr. de Bragelonne, whose sick heart may be cured in the hands of a physician such as you.”
“But, my lord, before speaking to me of the heart of Mr. de Bragelonne, you spoke to me of yours. Would you then that I cure two hearts at once?”
“It is true, Miss Mary; but you will render me this justice, that I soon ceased a useless pursuit, recognizing that my wound, mine, was incurable.”
Mary collected herself an instant.
“My lord,” said she, “Mr. de Bragelonne is happy. He loves, he is loved. He has therefore no need of a physician such as I.”
“Mr. de Bragelonne,” said Buckingham, “is on the eve of falling into a grave sickness, and he has need, more than ever, that his heart be cared for.”
“Explain yourself, my lord?” asked Raoul quickly.
“No, little by little I would explain myself; but, if you wish, I can say to Miss Mary what you cannot hear.”
“My lord, you put me to the torture: my lord, you know something.”
“I know that Miss Mary Graffton is the most charming object a sick heart could meet on its path.”
“My lord, I have already told you that the Vicomte de Bragelonne loves elsewhere,” said the young girl.
“He is wrong.”
“You know then, Monsieur le Duc? you know then that I am wrong?”
“Yes.”
“But whom does he love then?” cried the young girl.
“He loves a woman unworthy of him,” said Buckingham tranquilly, with that phlegm which an Englishman alone draws from his head and his heart.
Miss Mary Graffton uttered a cry which, no less than the words spoken by Buckingham, called to the cheeks of Bragelonne the pallor of dismay and the shudder of terror.
“Duke,” cried he, “you have just uttered such words that, without delaying a second, I go to seek the explanation of them in Paris.”
“You will remain here,” said Buckingham.
“I?”
“Yes, you.”
“And how so?”
“Because you have not the right to depart, and one does not leave the service of a king for that of a woman, were she worthy to be loved as is Mary Graffton.”
“Then instruct me.”
“I am willing. But will you remain?”
“Yes, if you speak to me frankly.”
They were at this point, and no doubt Buckingham was about to say, not all that was, but all that he knew, when a footman of the king appeared at the end of the terrace and advanced toward the cabinet where the king was with Miss Lucy Stewart.
This man preceded a dusty courier who seemed to have alighted but a few moments before.
“The courier from France! the courier from Madame!” cried Raoul, recognizing the livery of the duchess.
The man and the courier sent word to the king, while the duke and Miss Graffton exchanged an intelligent glance.
“Would you then that I weep?”
“No, but I should like to see you a little more melancholy.”
“Thank God! my fair, I have been so long enough: fourteen years of exile, of poverty, of misery; it seemed to me it was a debt paid; and then melancholy disfigures.”
“Not so, see rather the young Frenchman.”
“Oh! the Vicomte de Bragelonne, you too! God damn me! they will all go mad for him one after another; besides, he, he has reason to be melancholy.”
“And why so?”
“Ah well! I must reveal to you the secrets of state.”
“You must, if I wish it, since you said you were ready to do all I wished.”
“Well! he is bored in this country, there! Are you satisfied?”
“He is bored?”
“Yes, proof that he is a fool.”
“How, a fool?”
“Doubtless. Do you understand that? I permit him to love Miss Mary Graffton, and he is bored!”
“Come! it seems that, if you were not loved by Miss Lucy Stewart, you would console yourself, you, in loving Miss Mary Graffton?”
“I do not say that: first, you know well that Mary Graffton does not love me; now, one consoles oneself for a lost love only by a found love. But, again, it is not of me that we speak, it is of this young man. Would one not say that she he leaves behind is a Helen, a Helen before Paris, mind you.”
“But he leaves someone behind, then, this gentleman?”
“That is to say, he is left.”
Chapter CLXXVII — The Courier from Madame
Charles II was in the act of proving, or trying to prove, to Miss Stewart that he thought only of her; accordingly, he promised her a love like that which his ancestor Henri IV had had for Gabrielle.
Unfortunately for Charles II, he had fallen on a bad day, on a day when Miss Stewart had taken it into her head to make him jealous.
So, at this promise, instead of softening as Charles II hoped, she burst out laughing.
“Oh! Sire, Sire,” cried she, still laughing, “if I had the misfortune to ask you a proof of that love, how easy it would be to see that you lie!”
“Listen,” said Charles to her, “you know my portfolios of Raphael; you know if I care for them; the world envies me them, you know that too: my father had them bought by Van Dyck. Will you that I have them carried this very day to your house?”
“Oh! no,” answered the young girl; “keep them well, Sire, I am too straitened to lodge such guests.”
“Then I will give you Hampton Court to put the portfolios in.”
“Be less generous, Sire, and love longer, that is all I ask of you.”
“I shall love you always; is that not enough?”
“You laugh, Sire.”
“Poor lad! After all, so much the worse!”
“How, so much the worse!”
“Yes, why does he go away?”
“Do you believe it is of his own will that he goes?”
“He is then forced?”
“By order, my dear Stewart, he left Paris by order.”
“And by what order?”
“Guess.”
“The king’s?”
“Just so.”
“Ah! you open my eyes.”
“Say nothing of it, at least.”
“You know well that, for discretion, I am worth a man. So the king sends him back?”
“Yes.”
“And, during his absence, he takes his mistress.”
“Yes, and, do you understand, the poor child, instead of thanking the king, laments!”
“Thank the king for taking his mistress from him? Come now! but that is not gallant in the least, for women in general and mistresses in particular, what you say there, Sire.”
“But understand, zounds! If she the king takes from him were a Miss Graffton or a Miss Stewart, I should be of his opinion, and should not even find him desperate enough; but it is a thin and lame little girl… The devil take such fidelity! as they say in France. To refuse her who is rich for her who is poor, her who loves him for her who deceives him, was ever such a thing seen?”
“Do you believe Mary has seriously a mind to please the vicomte, Sire?”
“Yes, I believe it.”
“Well! the vicomte will grow used to England. Mary has a good head, and, when she wills, she wills well.”
“My dear Miss Stewart, take care, if the vicomte acclimates to our country: it is not long since, only the day before yesterday, he came to ask me leave to quit it.”
“And you refused him?”
“I should think so! the king my brother has too much at heart that he be absent, and, as for me, I take a pride in it: it shall not be said that I offered this young man the noblest and sweetest bait of England…”
“You are gallant, Sire,” said Miss Stewart with a charming pout.
“I do not count Miss Stewart,” said the king, “she is a royal bait, and, since I took her, another, I hope, will not take her; I say then, in short, that I shall not have made eyes in vain at this young man; he will remain with us, he will marry with us, or, God damn me!…”
“And I hope well that, once married, instead of bearing a grudge against Your Majesty, he will be grateful to him; for everyone hastens to please him, even Mr. de Buckingham who, incredible thing, effaces himself before him.”
“And even Miss Stewart, who calls him a charming cavalier.”
“Listen, Sire, you have praised Miss Graffton enough to me, pass me in my turn a little of Bragelonne. But, by the way, Sire, you have for some time a goodness that surprises me; you think of the absent, you pardon offenses, you are almost perfect. Whence comes it?…”
Charles II began to laugh.
“It is because you let yourself be loved,” said he.
“Oh! there must be another reason.”
“Why, I oblige my brother Louis XIV.”
“Give me yet another.”}
“Stories of the world, in your language.”