Memoirs of a Physician (66 page)
” And this gray ? “
“Followed my carriage, carrying on his back a courier.”
“What do you think of this circumstance, and for what purpose could the duke have caused you to be followed ?”
“With the intention of playing me some scurvy trick. Modest as you are, my dear Count de Fenix, you must be aware that nature has gifted you with personal advantages enough to make a king jealous of my visits to you or of yours to me.”
” Monsieur de Eichelieu cannot be dangerous to you in any way, madame.” replied Balsamo.
” But he was so, my dear count ; he was dangerous before this last event.”
Balsamo comprehended that there was a secret concealed beneath the words which Lorenza had not yet revealed to him. He did not therefore venture on the unknown ground, and replied merely by a smile.
” He was, indeed,” repeated the countess ; ” and I was nearly falling a victim to a most skilfully constructed plot a plot in which you also had some share, count.”
” I engaged in a plot against you ? Never, madame ! “
” Was it not you who gave the Duke de Eichelieu the philter ? “
“What philter?”
“A draught which causes the most ardent love.”
” No, madame ; Monsieur de Richelieu composes those draughts himself, for he has long known the recipe ; I merely gave him a simple narcotic.”
” Ah ! indeed ? “
‘ ‘ Upon my honor ! “
” And on what day did Monsieur de Eichelieu ask for this narcotic ? Eemember the date, count ; it is of importance.”
“Madame, it was last Saturday the day previous to that on which I had the honor of sending you, through Fritz, the note requesting you to meet me at Monsieur de Sartiues’.”
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” The eve of that day ! ” exclaimed the countess. ” The eve of the day on which the king was seen going to the little Trianon ? Oh ! now everything is explained.”
” Then, if all is explained, you see I only gave the narcotic.”
“Yes, the narcotic saved us all.”
This time Balsamo waited ; he was profoundly ignorant of the subject.
” I am delighted, madame,” replied he, ” to have b’een useful to yon, even unintentionally.”
” Oh ! you are always kindness itself. But you can do more for me than you have ever yet done. Oh ! doctor ! I have been very ill, poetically speaking, and even now I can scarcely yet believe in my recovery.”
“Madame,” said Balsamo, “the doctor, since there is a doctor in the case, always requires the details of the illness he is to cure. Will you give me the exact particulars of what you have experienced ? and, if possible, do not forget a single symptom.”
” Nothing can be more simple, my dear doctor, or dear sorcerer whichever yon prefer. The eve of the day on which this narcotic was used, his majesty refused to accompany me to Luciennes. He remained like a deceiver, as he is, at Trianon, pretending fatigue, and yet, as I have since learned, he supped at Trianon with the Duke de Eichelien and the Baron de Taverney.”
“Ha!”
” Now you understand. At supper the love-draught was given to the king.”
” Well, what happened ? “
” Oh ! that is difficult to discover. The king was seen going in the direction of the offices of Trianon, and all I can tell you is, that his majesty returned to Trianon through a fearful storm, pale, trembling 1 , and feverish almost on the verge of delirium.”
” And you think ‘ said Balsamo, smiling, ” that it was not the storm alone which alarmed his majesty ? “
“No, for the valet heard him cry several times : ‘ Dead, dead, dead ! ‘ “
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” Oh ! ” said Balsamo.
” It was the narcotic,” continued
Mme.
Dubarry. “Nothing alarms the king so much as death, and next to death its semblance. He had found Mademoiselle de Taverney sleeping a strange sleep, and must have thought her dead.”
” Yes, yes ; dead indeed,” said Balsamo, who remembered having fled without awakening Andre ; ” dead or at least presenting all the appearance of death. Yes, yes it must be so. Well, madame, and what then ?”
” No one knows what happened during the night. The king, on his return, was attacked by a violent fever and a nervous trembling, which did not leave him until the morning, when it occurred to the dauphiness to open the shutters and show his majesty a lovely morning, with the sun shining upon merry faces. Then all these unknown visions disappeared with the night, which had produced them. At noon the king was better, took some broth, and ate a partridge’s wing ; and in the evening “
” And in the evening ? ” repeated Balsamo.
“In the evening,” continued
Mme.
Dubarry, “his majesty, who no doubt would not stay at Trianon after his fright, came to see me at Luciennes.”
The triumphant countenance and graceful but roguish look of the countess reassured Balsamo as to” the power the favorite yet exercised over the king.
” Then you are satisfied with me, madame ? ” inquired he.
” Delighted, count ! and when you spoke of impossibilities you could create, you told the exact truth.”
And in token of thanks she gave him her soft, white, perfumed hand, which was not fresh as Lorenza’s, but almost as beautiful.
” And now, count, let us speak of yourself.”
Balsamo bowed like a man ready to listen.
” If you have preserved me from a great danger,” continued
Mme.
Dubarry, ” I think I have also saved you from no inconsiderable peril.”
“MeJ” said Balsamo, concealing his emotion. “I do
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not require that to feel grateful to you ; but yet, be good enough to inform me in what “
” Yes. The coffer question “
“Well, madame?”
” Contained a multitude of secret ciphers, which Monsieur de Sartines caused all his clerks to translate. All signed their several translations, executed apart, and all gave the same result. In consequence of this, Monsieur, de Sartines arrived at Versailles this morning while I was there, bringing with him all these translations and the dictionary of diplomatic ciphers.”
” Ha ! and what did the king say ? “
” The king seemed surprised at first, then alarmed. His majesty easily listens to those who speak to him of danger. Since the stab of Damien’s penknife, there are two words which are ever eagerly hearkened to by Louis XV. ; they are : ‘ Take care ! ‘ “
” Then Monsieur de Sartines accused me of plotting ? “
” At first Monsieur de Sartines endeavored to make me leave the room ; but I refused, declaring that as no one was more attached to his majesty than myself, no one had a right to make me leave him when danger was in question. Monsieur de Sartines insisted, but I resisted, and the king, looking at me in a manner I know well, said :
” ‘ Let her remain, Sartines ; I can refuse her nothing to-day.’
” Then you understand, count, that as I was present, Monsieur de Sartines, remembering our adieu, so clearly expressed, feared to displease me by attacking you. He therefore spoke of the evil designs of the King of Prussia toward France ; of the disposition prevalent to facilitate the march of rebellion by supernatural means. In a word, he accused a great many people, proving always by the papers he held that these persons were guilty.”
” Guilty of what ? “
“Of what! Count, dare I disclose secrets of state ? “
” Which are our secrets, madame. Oh ! you risk nothing. I think it is my interest not to speak.”
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” Yes, count, I know that Monsieur de Sartines wished to prove that a numerous and powerful sect, composed of bold, skilful, resolute agents, were silently undermining the repect due to the king, by spreading certain reports concerning his majesty.”
” What rumors ? “
” Saying, for instance, that his majesty was accused of starving his people.”
” To which the king replied “
” As the king always replied, by a joke.”
Balsamo breathed again.
” And what was the joke ? ” he asked.
” ‘ Since I am accused of starving the people,’ said he, ‘ there is only one reply to make to the accusation let us feed them.’
” ‘ How so, sire ? ‘ said Monsieur de Sartines.
” ( I will take the charge of feeding all those who spread this report and moreover, will give them safe lodging in my chateau of the Bastile.’ ‘
A slight shudder passed through Balsamo’s limbs, but he retained his smiling countenance.
” What followed ?” asked he.
” Then the king seemed to consult me by a smile. ‘ Sire said I, ‘ I can never believe that those little black characters which Monsieur de Sartines has brought to you mean that you are a bad king.’
” Then the lieutenant of the police exclaimed loudly.
” ‘ Any more,’ I added, ‘ than they prove that our clerks can read.’”
” And what did the king say, countess ? ” asked Balsamo.
” That I might be right, but that Monsieur de Sartiues was not wrong.”
” Well, and then ? “
” Then a great many lettres-de-cachet were made out, and I saw that Monsieur de Sartines tried to slip among them one for you. But I stood firm, and arrested him by a single word.
“‘Sir,’ I said, aloud, and before the king, ‘arrest all
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Paris, if you like that is your business, but you had better reflect a little before you lay a finger on one of my friends if not ‘
” ‘ Oh, ho ! ‘ said the king, < she is getting angry ; take care, Sar tines.’
” ‘ But, sire, the interest of the kingdom ‘
” ‘ Oh ! you are not a Tally said I, crimson with rage, ‘ and I am not a Gabrielle.’
” ‘ Madame, they intend to assassinate the king, as Henri IV. was assassinated.’
” For the first time the king turned pale, trembled, and put his hand on his head.
” I feared I was vanquished.
” ‘ Sire said I, ‘ you must let Monsieur de Sartines have his own way ; for his clerks have, no doubt, read in these ciphers that I also am conspiring against you.’
” And I left the room.
” But, dame ! my dear count, the king preferred my company to that of Monsieur de Sartines, and ran after me.
” ‘ Ah ! for pity’s sake, my dear countess said he, ‘ pray do not get angry.’
” ‘ Then send away that horrid man, sire ; he smells of dungeons
” ( Go, Sartines be off with you ! ‘ said the king, shrugging his shoulders.
” * And, for the future, I forbid you not only to visit me, but even to bow to me added I.
“At this blow our magistrate became alarmed ; he approached me, and humbly kissed my hand.
” ‘ Well said he, ‘ so be it ; let us speak no more of it, fair lady, but you will ruin the state. Since you absolutely insist upon it, your protege shall be respected by my agents. ‘ “
Balsamo seemed plunged in a deep reverie.
” Well,” sa ; d the countess, “so you do not even thank me for having saved you from the pleasure of lodgings in the Bastile, which, perhaps, might have been unjust, but assuredly no less disagreeable on that account.”
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Balsamo made no reply. He drew a small vial, filled with a fluid red as blood, from his pocket.
” Hold, madame ! ” said he ; ” for the liberty you have procured for me, I give you twenty years of additional youth.”
The countess slipped the vial into her bosom, and took her leave joyous and triumphant.
Balsamo still remained thinking.
” They might perhaps have been saved,” said he, ” but for the coquetry of a woman. This courtezan’s little foot dashes them down into the depths of the abyss. Decidedly, God is with us ! “
CHAPTER LXIII.
BLOOD.
THE door had no sooner closed upon
Mme.
Dubarry than Balsamo ascended the secret staircase and entered the chamber of furs. This conversation with the countess had been long, and his impatience had two causes.
The first was the desire to see Lorenza; the second, the fear that she might be fatigued ; for in the new life he had given her there was no room for weariness of mind ; she might be fatigued, inasmuch as she might pass, as she sometimes did, from the magnetic sleep to ecstasy ; and to this ecstatic state always succeeded those nervous crises which prostrated Lorenza’s strength, if the intervention of the restoring fluid did not restore the necessary equilibrium between the various functions of her being.
Balsamo, therefore, having entered and closed the door, immediately glanced at the couch where he had left Lorenza.
$he was no longer there.
Only the fine shawl of cashmere’ embroidered with gold-en flowers, which had enveloped her like a scarf, was still lying upon the cushions, as an evidence that she had been in the room, and had been reclining on them.
Balsamo stood motionless, gazing at the empty sofa.
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Perhaps Lorenza had felt herself incommoded by a strange odor which seemed to have filled the room since he left it ; perhaps, by a mechanical movement, she had usurped some of the functions of actual life, and instinctively changed her place.
Balsamo’s first idea was that Lorenza had returned to the laboratory, whither she had accompanied him a short time previously.
He entered the laboratory. At the first glance it seemed empty ; but in the shadow of the gigantic furnace, or be-hind the Oriental tapestry, a woman could easily conceal herself.
He raised the tapestry, therefore he made the circuit of the furnace nowhere could he discover even a trace of Lorenza.
There remained only the young girl’s chamber, to which she had, no doubt, returned ; for this chamber was a prison to her only in her waking state.
He hastened to the chamber and found the secret door closed. This was no proof that Lorenza had not entered. Nothing was more probable, in fact, than that Lorenza, in her lucid sleep, had remembered the mechanism, and . remembering it, had obeyed the hallucination of a dream bare-ly effaced from her mind. Balsamo pressed the spring.
The chamber was empty like the laboratory ; it did not appear as if Lorenza had even entered it.
