Delphi Complete Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated) (418 page)

“You are very strong, monsieur,” said he, glancing keenly at the broad shoulders and arching chest of the young stranger. “You are from Canada, I presume?”

“I have been there, sir. But I am from New York.”

Conde shook his head. “An island?”

“No, sir; a town.”

“In what province?”

“The province of New York.”

“The chief town, then?”

“Nay; Albany is the chief town.”

“And how came you to speak French?”

“My mother was of French blood.”

“And how long have you been in Paris?”

“A day.”

“Heh! And you already begin to throw your mother’s country-folk out of windows!”

“He was annoying a young maid, sir, and I asked him to stop, whereon he whipped out his sword, and would have slain me had I not closed with him, upon which he called upon his fellows to aid him. To keep them off, I swore that I would drop him over if they moved a step. Yet when I let him go, they set upon me again, and I know not what the end might have been had this gentleman not stood my friend.”

“Hem! You did very well. You are young, but you have resource.”

“I was reared in the woods, sir.”

“If there are many of your kidney, you may give my friend De Frontenac some work ere he found this empire of which he talks. But how is this, Captain Dalbert? What have you to say?”

“The king’s orders, your Highness.”

“Heh! Did he order you to molest the girl? I have never yet heard that his Majesty erred by being too harsh with a woman.” He gave a little dry chuckle in his throat, and took another pinch of snuff.

“The orders are, your Highness, to use every means which may drive these people into the true Church.”

“On my word, you look a very fine apostle and a pretty champion for a holy cause,” said Conde, glancing sardonically out of his twinkling black eyes at the brutal face of the dragoon. “Take your men out of this, sir, and never venture to set your foot again across this threshold.”

“But the king’s command, your Highness.”

“I will tell the king when I see him that I left soldiers and that I find brigands. Not a word, sir! Away! You take your shame with you, and you leave your honour behind.” He had turned in an instant from the sneering, strutting old beau to the fierce soldier with set face and eye of fire. Dalbert shrank back from his baleful gaze, and muttering an order to his men, they filed off down the stair with clattering feet and clank of sabres.

“Your Highness,” said the old Huguenot, coming forward and throwing open one of the doors which led from the landing, “you have indeed been a saviour of Israel and a stumbling-block to the froward this day. Will you not deign to rest under my roof, and even to take a cup of wine ere you go onwards?”

Conde raised his thick eyebrows at the scriptural fashion of the merchant’s speech, but he bowed courteously to the invitation, and entered the chamber, looking around him in surprise and admiration at its magnificence. With its panelling of dark shining oak, its polished floor, its stately marble chimney-piece, and its beautifully moulded ceiling, it was indeed a room which might have graced a palace.

“My carriage waits below,” said he, “and I must not delay longer. It is not often that I leave my castle of Chantilly to come to Paris, and it was a fortunate chance which made me pass in time to be of service to honest men. When a house hangs out such a sign as an officer of dragoons with his heels in the air, it is hard to drive past without a question. But I fear that as long as you are a Huguenot, there will be no peace for you in France, monsieur.”

“The law is indeed heavy upon us.”

“And will be heavier if what I hear from court is correct. I wonder that you do not fly the country.”

“My business and my duty lie here.”

“Well, every man knows his own affairs best. Would it not be wise to bend to the storm, heh?”

The Huguenot gave a gesture of horror.

“Well, well, I meant no harm. And where is this fair maid who has been the cause of the broil?”

“Where is Adele, Pierre?” asked the merchant of the old servant, who had carried in the silver tray with a squat flask and tinted Venetian glasses.

“I locked her in my room, master.”

“And where is she now?”

“I am here, father.” The young girl sprang into the room, and threw her arms round the old merchant’s neck. “Oh, I trust these wicked men have not hurt you, love!”

“No, no, dear child; none of us have been hurt, thanks to his Highness the Prince of Conde here.”

Adele raised her eyes, and quickly drooped them again before the keen questioning gaze of the old soldier. “May God reward your Highness!” she stammered. In her confusion the blood rushed to her face, which was perfect in feature and expression. With her sweet delicate contour, her large gray eyes, and the sweep of the lustrous hair, setting off with its rich tint the little shell-like ears and the alabaster whiteness of the neck and throat, even Conde, who had seen all the beauties of three courts and of sixty years defile before him, stood staring in admiration at the Huguenot maiden.

“Heh! On my word, mademoiselle, you make me wish that I could wipe forty years from my account.” He bowed, and sighed in the fashion that was in vogue when Buckingham came to the wooing of Anne of Austria, and the dynasty of cardinals was at its height.

“France could ill spare those forty years, your Highness.”

“Heh, heh! So quick of tongue too? Your daughter has a courtly wit, monsieur.”

“God forbid, your Highness! She is as pure and good—”

“Nay, that is but a sorry compliment to the court. Surely, mademoiselle, you would love to go out into the great world, to hear sweet music, see all that is lovely, and wear all that is costly, rather than look out ever upon the Rue St. Martin, and bide in this great dark house until the roses wither upon your cheeks.”

“Where my father is, I am happy at his side,” said she, putting her two hands upon his sleeve. “I ask nothing more than I have got.”

“And I think it best that you go up to your room again,” said the old merchant shortly, for the prince, in spite of his age, bore an evil name among women. He had come close to her as he spoke, and had even placed one yellow hand upon her shrinking arm, while his little dark eyes twinkled with an ominous light.

“Tut, tut!” said he, as she hastened to obey. “You need not fear for your little dove. This hawk, at least, is far past the stoop, however tempting the quarry. But indeed, I can see that she is as good as she is fair, and one could not say more than that if she were from heaven direct. My carriage waits, gentlemen, and I wish you all a very good day!” He inclined his be-wigged head, and strutted off in his dainty, dandified fashion. From the window De Catinat could see him slip into the same gilded chariot which had stood in his way as he drove from Versailles.

“By my faith,” said he, turning to the young American, “we all owe thanks to the prince, but it seems to me, sir, that we are your debtors even more. You have risked your life for my cousin, and but for your cudgel, Dalbert would have had his blade through me when he had me at a vantage. Your hand, sir! These are things which a man cannot forget.”

“Ay, you may well thank him, Amory,” broke in the old Huguenot, who had returned after escorting his illustrious guest to the carriage. “He has been raised up as a champion for the afflicted, and as a helper for those who are in need. An old man’s blessing upon you, Amos Green, for my own son could not have done for me more than you, a stranger.”

But their young visitor appeared to be more embarrassed by their thanks than by any of his preceding adventures. The blood flushed to his weather-tanned, clear-cut face, as smooth as that of a boy, and yet marked by a firmness of lip and a shrewdness in the keen blue eyes which spoke of a strong and self-reliant nature.

“I have a mother and two sisters over the water,” said he diffidently.

“And you honour women for their sake?”

“We always honour women over there. Perhaps it is that we have so few. Over in these old countries you have not learned what it is to be without them. I have been away up the lakes for furs, living for months on end the life of a savage among the wigwams of the Sacs and the Foxes, foul livers and foul talkers, ever squatting like toads around their fires. Then when I have come back to Albany where my folk then dwelt, and have heard my sisters play upon the spinet and sing, and my mother talk to us of the France of her younger days and of her childhood, and of all that they had suffered for what they thought was right, then I have felt what a good woman is, and how, like the sunshine, she draws out of one’s soul all that is purest and best.”

“Indeed, the ladies should be very much obliged to monsieur, who is as eloquent as he is brave,” said Adele Catinat, who, standing in the open door, had listened to the latter part of his remarks.

He had forgotten himself for the instant, and had spoken freely and with energy. At the sight of the girl, however, he coloured up again, and cast down his eyes.

“Much of my life has been spent in the woods,” said he, “and one speaks so little there that one comes to forget how to do it. It was for this that my father wished me to stay some time in France, for he would not have me grow up a mere trapper and trader.”

“And how long do you stop in Paris?” asked the guardsman.

“Until Ephraim Savage comes for me.”

“And who is he?”

“The master of the Golden Rod.”

“And that is your ship?”

“My father’s ship. She has been to Bristol, is now at Rouen, and then must go to Bristol again. When she comes back once more, Ephraim comes to Paris for me, and it will be time for me to go.”

“And how like you Paris?”

The young man smiled. “They told me ere I came that it was a very lively place, and truly from the little that I have seen this morning, I think that it is the liveliest place that I have seen.”

“By my faith,” said De Catinat, “you came down those stairs in a very lively fashion, four of you together with a Dutch clock as an avant-courier, and a whole train of wood-work at your heels. And you have not seen the city yet?”

“Only as I journeyed through it yester-evening on my way to this house. It is a wondrous place, but I was pent in for lack of air as I passed through it. New York is a great city. There are said to be as many as three thousand folk living there, and they say that they could send out four hundred fighting-men, though I can scarce bring myself to believe it. Yet from all parts of the city one may see something of God’s handiwork — the trees, the green of the grass, and the shine of the sun upon the bay and the rivers. But here it is stone and wood, and wood and stone, look where you will. In truth, you must be very hardy people to keep your health in such a place.”

“And to us it is you who seem so hardy, with your life in the forest and on the river,” cried the young girl. “And then the wonder that you can find your path through those great wildernesses, where there is naught to guide you.”

“Well, there again! I marvel how you can find your way among these thousands of houses. For myself, I trust that it will be a clear night to-night.”

“And why?”

“That I may see the stars.”

“But you will find no change in them.”

“That is it. If I can but see the stars, it will be easy for me to know how to walk when I would find this house again. In the daytime I can carry a knife and notch the door-posts as I pass, for it might be hard to pick up one’s trail again, with so many folk ever passing over it.”

De Catinat burst out laughing again. “By my faith, you will find Paris livelier than ever,” said he, “if you blaze your way through on the door-posts as you would on the trees of a forest. But perchance it would be as well that you should have a guide at first; so, if you have two horses ready in your stables, uncle, our friend and I might shortly ride back to Versailles together, for I have a spell of guard again before many hours are over. Then for some days he might bide with me there, if he will share a soldier’s quarters, and so see more than the Rue St. Martin can offer. How would that suit you, Monsieur Green?”

“I should be right glad to come out with you, if we may leave all here in safety.”

“Oh, fear not for that,” said the Huguenot. “The order of the Prince of Conde will be as a shield and a buckler to us for many a day. I will order Pierre to saddle the horses.”