"That is enough," said Bernard de Rohan, thoughtfully, "that is enough. I must go on to Grenoble now, however. Come with me; you will not be wanted at Gandelot's inn;" and, thus saying, he rode on to the town, where it was necessary to give his own horse a long time to rest, for the distance which he had come was more than fifty miles, and the road steep, difficult, and fatiguing.
Judging by the rate at which Isabel was proceeding, it was clear that she must reach Lyons before that day closed; for, though she might not accomplish her purpose of arriving at Vienne on the day before, yet the distance to Lyons itself was but two easy days' journey.
Every means that long military experience suggested was employed by Bernard de Rohan to refresh and invigorate his horse more speedily, and those means were very successful, although some of them may appear to us, in this age, somewhat fantastic. Balls of spice were given to the animal, his feet and pasterns were bathed in red wine, and various other proceedings of the same kind were adopted with a similar view. It was impossible, however, to go on till towards the evening, and even then the young cavalier found that it was in vain to seek Vienne that night, as neither his own horse nor that of his attendant could accomplish the distance. They proceeded as far as possible, however, so as to leave a moderate day's journey between them and Lyons; and on the succeeding evening Bernard de Rohan had the pleasure of seeing the fair city of the Rhone spread out before his eyes, and of knowing that there could not well be more than one day's journey between him and her he loved.
The great difficulty, however, now was to discover at what inn Isabel had lodged on the preceding night, in order to ascertain what route she had followed on her farther journey. Lyons, even at that time, was a very large and important city, filled with inns of every sort and description; and, as in those days despotic suspicion had not invented the fetter-lock of passports; as there was no tyrannical police, no licensed spies to whom the abode of every citizen, the sleeping-place of every traveller, the movements of every being in the realm were known, as is now the case in France, Bernard de Rohan had no other means of ascertaining the resting-place of Isabel during the preceding night than his own conjectures or inquiries made at all the principal places of public reception.
When he had himself passed through Lyons some time before, he had been in command of a considerable body of soldiers, and had lodged at an inn in the suburb of La Guillotiere. That suburb was not so large in those days as at present; but it possessed at that period one of the best inns which Lyons could boast of; and, as the servants who now accompanied Isabel de Brienne were then with him, and he had remained for several days there, he judged it not at all unlikely that they might have conducted his fair bride to the resting-place where they had previously lodged. He rode, then, directly to the same inn, which was surrounded by its own court and gardens; but the faces that presented themselves were strange to him; for, among all the mutable things of this earth, there are few more mutable than the servants of an inn.
In general, at all the auberges on the road, a man on horseback was sure to meet with attention and good treatment; but, in such a city as Lyons, luxury had of course brought fastidious notions along with it; and the frequent visits of persons with large trains, ladies in immense rumbling carriages or clumsy horse-litters, made the horseman with his single attendant and weary horses an object of very little importance in the eyes of the drawers and ostlers.
Perceiving some slackness of civility, the young cavalier ordered the host to be sent to him, and the landlord of the Checkers—for so the inn was called—presented himself, gazing upon the young gentleman at first as a perfect stranger. A moment after, however, the face of the Baron de Rohan came to his remembrance, at first connecting itself vaguely with considerable sums of money received, and numerous expensive attendants, horses, arms, banners, et cetera; so that his satellites were very soon surprised by seeing various low and profound inclinations of his head, as he welcomed "his lordship" back to Lyons; hoped that the campaign had gone well with him. Gradually recollecting more of the circumstances, he recalled even his visiter's name itself, and, in tones of indignant haste, bade the stable-boys take Monseigneur de Rohan's horses, and the chamberlain show monseigneur himself to the best apartments of the inn, while he followed, bowing lowly every time the young cavalier turned round.
Bernard de Rohan's first inquiries were for Isabel de Brienne; but the good host was far too wise and practised in his profession to satisfy the young gentleman fully before he had fixed him at his own inn. Oh yes, undoubtedly, he said, such a lady had been there, and had set off that very morning, with just such attendants as monseigneur described. He would come back and tell him more, he continued, in one minute, when he had merely given orders for a nice little supper to be sent up, and had seen that the horses were properly cared for. But, when he at length made his appearance, after being absent till the supper he talked of was nearly ready, and the young gentleman actually sent for him, it then turned out, of course, that the lady he spoke of was quite a different person, some forty years of age, and the widow of some famous marshal dead many years before.
Bernard de Rohan was disappointed, but he did not suffer his equanimity to be disturbed at finding some little want of sincerity in an innkeeper. He partook but lightly, however, of the good host's supper; and then, directing the attendant who accompanied him to make inquiries at all the inns in the suburb where they then were, he himself set out on foot, and, passing the bridge, pursued the search throughout the town of Lyons. That search, however, proved vain; and not the slightest tidings of Isabel and her train had Bernard de Rohan been able to find before the sun went down.
He was preparing to return to the inn, in the hope that his servant might have been more successful than himself, when, in passing down one of the long, narrow streets which led from the great square, he was met by a crowd of people so dense that he found it would be absolutely impossible to traverse it, and he accordingly turned (little caring what had caused the assemblage) in order to pass round by the Church of the Feuillans, and make his way homeward by another street.