"A struggle to the death against the revolution; the exaltation of royalty, of the privileges of the n.o.bility and the Church; the extermination of our enemies. Only on these conditions, Abbot, shall my love receive its sweetest recompense."
"Count," cried the Jesuit after a moment"s silence, "you are only twenty years old! What am I saying? You are barely sixteen--you are still at the age of innocence and childlike credulity. You have been blindfolded, duped, made game of, tossed in a blanket, like the most artless of young fellows! Oh, the women! And you think yourself a Lovelace, a lady-killer, my poor Count! And you presume to play a role in the politics of the court!"
"Monsieur Abbot Morlet, familiarity has its limits--do not oblige me to recall the fact to you any more forcibly!" exclaimed Monsieur Plouernel, flaring into a rage. Then, calming himself with an effort, he continued, sarcastically: "It suits you ill indeed, my reverend sir, to twit me on the empire exercised over me by women. Has no woman ever reigned over you? Could not the record of the vestry tell of a fertile gossip, the hirer-out of chairs at the Church of St. Medard, and widow of Goodman Rodin, the dispenser of holy water in the same parish? Your mistress is the mother of that little Rodin whom you brought here one day last year!"
Unmoved by the raillery of Monsieur Plouernel, the Jesuit replied:
"Your sarcasm is in the last degree pleasant, and moreover, well to the point, in that it furnishes me the occasion, Count, to give you an excellent lesson. You need the bit, the bridle, and also the whip, my fine gentleman."
"I am listening, reverend sir."
"Your love for fine ladies of irresistible beauty is capable of leading you into the most mournful follies; while I, by reason of my love for my gossip Rodin, shall be, I hope, able to prevent, and what is more, to repair your insanities."
"This is getting curious, Abbot. Continue."
"About four months ago, about the beginning of April, at a late hour of the night, a child, overcome with fatigue, fell on the doorstep of a house in St. Francois Street, in the Swamp."
"St. Francois Street, in the Swamp! A rascal of a Jew, a skin-flint of a usurer, lives there. You know him, Abbot? He does business with the clergy too?"
"It was at the door of that very house that the child sank down with weariness, crying and shivering. The Jew, out of the pity of his heart, took in the little fellow, who, he supposed, had lost his way. Then, succ.u.mbing to fatigue and drowsiness, the lad fell asleep on a bench in the room in which the Jew and his wife were conversing."
"Bless my heart, holy Father! Your voice is trembling, your nose is growing red, your look is softening, and your eye grows moist! That infant gifted with so precocious an intelligence, that prodigy, surely can be no other than little Rodin, your G.o.d-son! Honor to you, Abbot, and to your gossip! You have performed a prodigy, like the Virgin Mary with the Holy Ghost!"
"Throughout, the little fellow lost not a word of the conversation between the Jew and his wife; and thanks to a false alarm, adroitly given without by one of our brothers and myself, my G.o.d-son, in the course of his feigned sleep, surprised two secrets of inestimable import for the welfare of religion and the n.o.bility. You shall judge--"
"You are deceiving yourself, Abbot, in trying to make me believe that from the chatter of a miserable Jew and his wife, a chatter surprised by an urchin, secrets of such importance can be won."
"Count--what do you think of a fortune of nearly 220 millions of francs?
Isn"t it a magnificent sum? If these 220 millions should pa.s.s into the possession of a party religious, able, tireless, blessed with cleverness and boldness, would they not become a lever of immense power? Again, suppose there were a mysterious sect, the object of which was the annihilation of the Catholic Church, the overthrow of thrones, the abolition of the privileges of birth and of fortune; suppose that sect extended its ramifications throughout all Europe, that it counted in its ranks cla.s.ses the most diversified in society, from the lowest to the highest, and that some of them were even of kingly rank; suppose that a.s.sociation had at its disposal a considerable treasure; suppose its masters, men and women, to be capable of a.s.suming, at need, any mask, any role; that, thanks to their specious masquerade, they introduced themselves among the royalists, and fathomed the secrets of our party;--then, Count, what would you think of the discovery of that sect?
Would it not be of the primest importance? What say you?"
"Surely; but only if the pretended sect existed. Come, holy Father, it is with surprise and regret that I see a man of your good sense fall into the net of these absurd fables about the Voyants of France, the Illuminati of Germany, and other fish-yarns, veritable Mother Goose tales!"
"If I prove to you the existence of this society--if I show you the place where their leaders meet, will you admit that the revealer of the secret has rendered a signal service to the throne and the altar? Well, Count, compare now the results of your mad-cap pa.s.sion for the beautiful foreign Marchioness, with the consequences of what you term my love for my gossip Rodin. According to you, my G.o.d-son is one of the visible and carnal outcomes of that love; if so I owe to the wily youngster first--the discovery of a treasure which should some day reach more than 200 millions, on the trail of which our Society of Jesus has been for over a century; and, second--the unearthing of a den of Voyants."
CHAPTER VI.
ROYALISTS AT BANQUET.
The answer which the Count of Plouernel was about to make to his friend the Jesuit was interrupted by the arrival of several of his convivial friends of the court party--dukes, marquises, canons, and archbishops.
Among them was the Viscount of Mirabeau, nicknamed, by reason of his portly front and the quant.i.ty of liquor he could contain, "Barrel Mirabeau." He was an infantry colonel, and younger brother to the famous orator of the Third Estate. He seemed to be in great heat, and cried in a loud voice to Monsieur Plouernel:
"Good evening, my dear Count. Devil take this infamous town of Paris and its Parisians! Long live Versailles, the true capital of France."
"Whence all this anger, Viscount?"
"Anger! Allow me to inform you that just now this vile populace, which to-night overflows in all the streets, had the impudence to stop my carriage on the Louis XV Bridge. By G.o.d"s death, I shall punish these people!"
"What did you say to the insolent creatures?"
"I was treating this fraction of the "sovereign people" like the abject rabble that they are, when my lackey, trembling like a hare, and hoping to secure our release, conceived the infernal idea of calling out to the beggars "Make way, there, if you please, for the carriage of Monsieur Mirabeau!" Immediately the tempest turned to a zephyr, and the stupid people made way for me, to cries of "Long live Mirabeau!""
"They must have taken you for your brother!"
"Death and fury! It is but too true! I shall never forgive my brother that insult!"
"Calm yourself, Viscount; but yet a few days and that filthy populace will be clouted back into the mire where it belongs."
"Her Excellency, Marchioness Aldini," loudly announced one of Plouernel"s valets at that moment, swinging back both sides of the great door of the parlor, into which he introduced--Victoria Lebrenn under her borrowed name and t.i.tle.
The friends of Monsieur Plouernel thus beheld Marchioness Aldini for the first time. All were struck with astonishment at her beauty, heightened as it was by the splendor of her toilet. For Victoria now wore a trailing robe of poppy-colored cloth of Tours, trimmed with black lace.
The cut of her corsage left bare her arms, shoulders and the rise of her breast, which seemed sculptured in the purest marble. Her black hair was not buried, as was the custom of the time, under a layer of white powder, but, glowing with the l.u.s.ter of ebony, and rolled in thick and numerous ringlets around her head, majestically crowned her brow. A triple string of Venetian sequins served both as diadem and collar.
Nothing can give an adequate idea of the effect of this original mode, at once elegant and severe, which was still more remarkable in that it differed completely from the pomponned attires of the period, and harmonized marvellously with Victoria"s own cast of beauty.
Plouernel"s friends, seized with admiration, were for a moment speechless. Every look was fastened on the foreign dame;--even Abbot Morlet experienced the fascination, and said to himself as he gazed at her:
"I can understand how the Count is mad over her. The danger is greater than I suspected. She is a very siren."
Of all Plouernel"s a.s.sembled friends, the Abbot was the only one to penetrate the true nature of Victoria"s beauty. Her pallor, her flashing black eyes, her bitter and sardonic smile, gave to her face an indefinable somberness, which was in accord with the severity of her costume of red, black and gold.
Soon the voice of Monsieur Plouernel"s chief butler was heard, announcing that supper was served. The Count offered his arm to Victoria, to lead her into the capacious dining room. Walls of white plaster were relieved by gilded moldings which framed large panels frescoed with birds, fruits and flowers. A splendid silver service was laid out on the table, along with a brilliantly colored set of Sevres china. On the burnished surface of the silver glittered the glow of rose-colored candles, held in candelabra of vermilion. The banqueters took their seats about the table. The Count, who had escorted Victoria to a place beside himself, opened the feast.
"Permit me, my friends," he said, "to follow a custom recently introduced from England into France, and to propose a first toast to Madam the Marchioness Aldini, who has deigned to accept my invitation to supper." The Count rose, gla.s.s in hand--"To Madam the Marchioness Aldini!"
The whole company, following the Count"s example, rose in their places; holding their gla.s.ses in their out-stretched hands, they repeated:
"To Madam the Marchioness Aldini!"
Draining their gla.s.ses, they resumed their seats.
Victoria in her turn rose. After a moment"s pause she replied:
"In response to the courtesy of Monsieur the Count of Plouernel, and of yourselves, my lords prelates, and gentlemen, I propose with my heart and with my lips a toast to the Church, to the monarchy, and to the n.o.bility,--and to the extermination of revolutionists, of whatever rank."
With these words Victoria moistened her lips in the wine which filled her gla.s.s, while Plouernel"s friends, transported by the words of the young woman, repeated in ecstasy, to the music of their clinking gla.s.ses--
"To the Church! To the King! To the n.o.bility! To the extermination of the revolutionists!"
The roisterers sat down; even Abbot Morlet muttered to himself, "Ah, if the Marchioness is sincere, what an ally we should have in her! What a magic effect the energy of her words produced on these foppish gentlemen, and on these brainless and imprudent prelates, imbeciles who don"t even know how to cloak their vices under their sacred robes!"
Victoria, who had been cautiously watching the Jesuit, replied to his thought in her own mind: "That priest with the cadaverous mask keeps his snaky looks ever fastened on me. He alone, of all this company, seems to mistrust me. We must redouble our care and boldness--the game is on."
Meanwhile a Cardinal was puzzling over something, and thinking to himself: "Where did I meet that beautiful Marchioness, or at least a girl who much resembled her? Ah! I remember! It was in the little house where the Dubois woman kept her nymphs, in the King"s "Doe Park," as he called it, near Versailles. Come, come, that must be an illusion--although, that Italian lord, Aldini, not knowing the antecedents of the old inmate of the Dubois house, might well have left her his name, his t.i.tle, and all. But let us look into things a bit before we pa.s.s a rash judgment."
The Viscount of Mirabeau was the first to speak aloud. "Madam the Marchioness," he said, "has pledged us a toast to the death of the revolutionists of all ranks and conditions. I understand how a bourgeois, or a peasant, can be a revolutionary; but I can not admit that princes, n.o.bles, or clericals would train with that breed."