Cerise: A Tale of the Last Century

by G. J. Whyte-Melville

His heart beat high. Could she have expected him? Could she know intuitively why he was there to-night? Was it possible she would run down and grant him a meeting in the garden? The thought was rapture! Yet perhaps with all its intoxication, he scarcely loved her so dearly as he had done a moment before, as he did a moment after, when he actually distinguished a white dress flitting along the terrace at the farthest corner of the building.

Then indeed he forgot duty, danger, exile, uncertainty, the future, the past, everything but the intense happiness of that moment. He was conscious of the massive trees, the deep shadows, the black clusters of shrubs, the dusky outlines of the huge indistinct building traversed here and there by a broad shimmer of light, the stars above his head, the crescent moon, the faint whisper of leaves, the drowsy perfume of flowers, but only because of her presence who turned the whole to a glimpse of fairyland. He stole towards the terrace, treading softly, keeping carefully in the shadow of the trees. So intent was he, and so cautious, that he never observed Cerise return to her post of observation.

She had resumed it, however, at the very moment when the Musketeer, having advanced some ten paces with the crouching stealthy gait of a Red Indian drawing on his game, stopped short—like the savage when he has gone a step too far—rigid, motionless, scarcely breathing, every faculty called up to watch.

The attention of Mademoiselle de Montmirail was aroused at the same moment by the same cause.

It is scarcely necessary to observe that the Duke of Orleans, Regent of France, was no less ambitious of distinction in the fields of love than of war. That in the one, though falling far short of his heroic ancestor, whom he so wished to resemble, his prowess was not below the average, scandal itself must admit; but that, if experience ought to count for anything, his encounters in the other should have made him the most successful campaigner of his time, history cannot conscientiously deny.

Like all such freebooters, however, he met with many a bitter reverse, many a signal defeat never mentioned in despatches. His rebuffs, we may be sure, were written on water, though his triumphs were carved in stone; and it was for those on whom he could make least impression that he cherished the greatest interest. The way to captivate the Regent was not so much to profess, as to entertain a thorough contempt for his character, an utter disregard of his position. The noble mind, the stout heart, the strong will, the sagacious, deep-thinking, yet open disposition, true type of manhood, is to be won by love; but the sensualist, the coward, the false, the wicked, and the weak, are all best tamed by scorn. With a new face, the Regent was captivated, as a matter of course, for an hour or two; seldom during a whole day; though on occasion, if the face were very beautiful, and strictly guarded, he besieged its owner for a week; but Madame de Montmirail was the only long-established beauty of the Court who had seriously captivated his fancy, and, indeed, what little was left of his miserable self-indulgent heart. This triumph she owed to her perfect unconsciousness of it, and complete disregard for her admirer, therefore it became more firmly established day by day; and when Malletort, who thoroughly comprehended the nature he wished to rule, hinted that his kinswoman was not insensible to the Prince’s merits, he did but blow into flame a fire that had been smouldering longer than even he was aware.

Now the Abbé had sufficient confidence in her powers and her attractions to be sure that if Madame de Montmirail once obtained an acknowledged and ostensible influence over the Regent she would become the virtual ruler of France; and the Abbé, in his own way, loved his cousin better than anything but the excitement of ambition and the possession of political power. He believed that her disgrace would be of infinite advantage to herself as well as to him, and thought he could see her way clearly, with his own assistance, to an eventual throne. He was a man without religion, without principle, without honour, without even the common sympathies of humanity. It is difficult in our days to conceive such a character, though they were common enough in France during the last century; but in his views for his cousin, evil as they were, he seemed at least honest—more, self-sacrificing, since she was the only creature on earth for whom he cared.

With his knowledge of her disposition, he did not conceal from himself that great difficulties attended his task. However lightly the cynical Abbé might esteem a woman’s virtue, his experience taught him not to underrate the obstinacy of a woman’s pride. That his cousin, in common with her family, possessed an abundance of the latter quality, he was well aware, and he played his game accordingly. It was his design to compromise her by a coup-de-main, after he had sapped her defences to the utmost by the arguments of ambition and self-interest. Like all worldly men in their dealings with women, he undervalued both her strength and her weakness—her aversion to the Regent, and her fancy for the Musketeer; this even while he made use of the latter to overcome the former sentiment. If she could be induced by any means, however fraudulent, to grant the Prince an interview at night in her own gardens, he argued, that first step would have been taken, which it is always so difficult to retract; and to bring this about, he had forged Captain George’s signature to the polite note which had proved so effectual in luring the Marquise down the terrace steps, and across the velvet lawn, under the irresistible temptation of a meeting by moonlight with the man she loved. As a measure of mere politeness, connected with certain military precautions, of course!

But under such circumstances it would appear that one Musketeer ought to be company enough for one lady at a time. Cerise, viewing the performances from her window above, might have come to the conclusion, had she not been too anxious, agitated, terrified, to retain full possession of her faculties, that the arrival of a few more of these guardsmen on such a scene, at such a crisis, was conducive rather to tumult and bloodshed than appropriate conversation.

Captain George, stopping short in his eager though stealthy advance towards the white figure flitting noiselessly across the lawn, first thought he was dreaming; next, that he beheld a spectral or illusive image of himself, denoting near approach of death; lastly, that the discipline of the corps had become relaxed to a degree which his military indignation resolved should be severely visited within an hour, though he abandoned his command the next.