"Softly, softly!" warned the youth, taking up the carving knife and jestingly testing the edge with his thumb-nail.
Some one laughed aloud.
"Monsieur Nicot, for pity"s sake, remember where you are!" Maitre le Borgne pressed back the soldier.
"Ah! it is Monsieur Nicot who has such a delicate nose?" said the youth banteringly. "Well, Monsieur Nicot, permit me to finish this excellent pie. I have tasted nothing half so good since I left Paris."
"Postilion!" cried Nicot, pushing Le Borgne aside.
"Monsieur," continued the youth imperturbably, "I am on the king"s service."
Several at the tables stretched their necks to observe the stranger. A courier from the king was not an everyday event in Roch.e.l.le. De Puys rose.
"Pah!" snorted Nicot; "you look the groom a league off. Leave the table."
"All in good time, Monsieur. If I wear the livery of a stable-boy, it is because I was compelled by certain industrious gentlemen of the road to adopt it in exchange for my own. The devil! one does not ride naked in March. They left me only my sword and papers and some pistoles which I had previously hidden in the band of my hat. Monsieur, I find a chair; I take it. Having ordered a pie, I eat it; in fact, I continue to eat it, though your displeasure causes me great sorrow.
Sit down, or go away; otherwise you will annoy me; and I warn you that I am something terrible when I am annoyed." But the good nature on his face belied this statement.
"Rascal, I will flog you with the flat of my sword!" roared Nicot; and he was about to draw when a strong hand restrained him.
"Patience, comrade, patience; you go too fast." Du Puys loosened Nicot"s hand.
The young man leaned back in his chair and twirled the ends of his blond mustache. "If I were not so tired I could enjoy this comedy.
Horns of Panurge! did you Huguenots eat so many horses that your gorge rises at the smell of one?"
"Monsieur, are you indeed from the king?" asked Du Puys courteously.
The very coolness of the stranger marked him as a man of importance.
"I have that honor."
"May I be so forward as to ask your name?"
"Victor de Saumaise, cadet in her Majesty"s Guards, De Guitaut"s company."
"And your business?"
"The king"s, Monsieur; horns of Panurge, the king"s! which is to say, none of yours." This time he pushed back his chair, stood upon his feet and swung his sword in place. "Is this once more a rebel city?
And are you, Monsieur, successor to Guibon, the mayor, or the governor of the province, or some equally distinguished person, to question me in this fashion? I never draw my sword in pothouses; I simply dine in them; otherwise I should be tempted to find out why a gentleman can not be left in peace."
"Your reply, Monsieur," returned Du Puys, coloring, "would be entirely just were it not for the fact that a messenger from Paris directly concerns me. I am Captain Zachary du Puys, of Fort Louis, Quebec."
"Indeed, Captain," said De Saumaise, smiling again, "that simplifies everything. You are one of the gentlemen whom I am come to seek."
"Monsieur," said the choleric Nicot, "accept my apologies; but, nevertheless, I still adhere to the statement, that you smell badly of wet horses." He bowed.
"And I accept the apology and confess to the impeachment."
"And besides," said Nicot, naively, "you kicked my shin cruelly."
"What! I thought it was the table-leg! It is my turn to apologise.
You no longer crave my blood?"
"No, Monsieur," sadly. Every one laughed.
Maitre le Borgne, wiped his perspiring forehead and waited for the orders which were likely to follow this amicable settlement of the dispute; and bewailed not unwisely. Brawls were the bane of his existence, and he did his utmost to prevent them from becoming common affairs at the Corne d"Abondance. He trotted off to the cellars, muttering into his beard. Nicot and the king"s messenger finished their supper, and then the latter was led to one of the chimney benches by Du Puys, who was desirous of questioning him.
"Monsieur," began De Saumaise, "I am told that I bear your commission as major." He produced a packet which he gave to the captain.
"I am perfectly aware of that. It was one of Mazarin"s playful devices. I was to have had it while in Paris; and his Eminence put me off for no other reason than to worry me. Ah, well, he has the gout."
"And he has also the money," laughed Victor; "and may he never rid himself of the one till he parts from the other. But I congratulate you, Major; and her Majesty and Father Vincent de Paul wish you well in your perilous undertaking. Come; tell me about this wonderful New France. Is it true that gold is picked up as one would pick up sand?"
"By the Hundred a.s.sociates, traders, and liquor dealers," grimly.
"Alas! I had hopes "twere picked up without labor. The rings on my purse slip off both ends, as the saying goes."
"Why not come to Quebec? You have influence; become a grand seigneur."
"Faith, I love my Paris too well. And I have no desire to wear out my existence in opening paths for my descendants, always supposing I leave any. No, no! There is small pleasure in praying all day and fighting all night. No, thank you. Paris is plenty for me." Yet there was something in the young man"s face which spoke of fear, a nervous look such as one wears when caught in the toils of secret dread.
"Still, life at court must have its pinches, since his Majesty sleeps between ragged sheets. What kind of money-chest does this Mazarin possess that, engulfing all the revenues of France, the gold never reaches high enough to be taken out again?"
"With all his faults, Mazarin is a great minister. He is a better financier than Richelieu was. He is husbanding. Louis XIV will become a great king whenever Mazarin dies. We who live shall see. Louis is simply repressed. He will burst forth all the more quickly when the time comes."
"Is it true that her Majesty is at times attacked by a strange malady?"
"A cancer has been discovered growing in her breast."
Du Puys opened his commission and ran over it. He studied the lean, slanting chirography of the prime minister and stroked his grizzled chin. His thought went back to the days when the handsome Buckingham threw his pearls into an admiring crowd. "Woman and the world"s end,"
he mused. "Who will solve them?"
"Who indeed!" echoed Victor, resting his chin on the knuckles of his hand. "Monsieur, you have heard of the Chevalier du Cevennes?"
"Aye; recently dismissed from court, stripped of his honors, and exiled in disgrace."
"I am here to command his immediate return to Paris," and De Saumaise blinked moodily at the fire.
"And what brought about this good fortune?"
"His innocence and another man"s honesty."
"Ah!"
"Monsieur, you are a man of experience; are there not times when the best of us are unable to surmount temptation?"
"Only his Holiness is infallible."
"The Chevalier was unjustly exiled for a crime he knew nothing about.