One in a Thousand; or, The Days of Henri Quatre

by G. P. R. James

"I had nothing to do with the death of his brother," said D'Aubin, "but still I will not trust to an angry man. Tell me, however, my friend, can I trust to you?"

"On my life you may, sir," replied the guide; "and I would not take you now into Armençon for my right hand. But it is coming on to pour: your cloak will soon be wet through; and hereabouts there should be a hut where the wood-cutters live in the spring and autumn. That will give better shelter than the trees; and most likely you may find a bed of rushes, and some pine-wood to dry your cloak withal."

"That were luck, indeed!" replied D'Aubin: "let us hasten on then, my friend; and if you can meet with this hut, I will pay you for its shelter better than ever aubergiste was paid."

The memory of the guide was exact; and their search was not long. The hut was, indeed, but four walls, thatched with stubble and plastered with mud; and the door, which was made of straw, interwoven with boughs, was lying detached upon the ground: but it was soon replaced; and the frequent flashes of lightning enabled them to discover the bed of moss and rushes which the guide had expected, and a small store of dried fragments of the resinous pine, which, lighted by a flint and steel, soon shed some better light upon the interior than was afforded by the fitful glare without. The interior was too small to admit the horses also; but D'Aubin satisfied himself with placing his own beast under a tree, and mentally saying, "He will do well enough," returned to the shelter of the hut, cast off his dripping cloak, and seated himself upon the pile of dried herbs.

Still the storm continued, and still the incessant pattering of the heavy rain bade the travellers be contented with the refuge they had found. For awhile D'Aubin endeavoured to occupy his thoughts by asking a number of questions of his guide, and listening to the long-winded stories which the other, feeling the moments of inactivity as tedious to his own restless and wandering nature as they were to the Count, willingly poured forth for the sake of doing something. At length, however, his stock exhausted itself; and an hour more passed in silence and expectation; but the storm still went on.

The guide's patience now gave way. "My Lord," he said, "you will be starved here, if I can find you nothing to eat. You took neither bit nor sup at the auberge, though you had ridden many a league; but amongst the houses that lie under the chateau of Armençon, I have a cousin, and can, I doubt not, procure a piece of meat and a flask of wine. I will say that it is for an old lady, whom I am guiding through the wood, and who cannot come on for the storm."

D'Aubin did feel exhausted, and in need of food; but still he hesitated to let the man depart, for in those days acts of treachery were not uncommon; and his life might depend upon his passing the castle of Armençon unobserved. The guide, however, insisted; and as there was no means of staying him without showing suspicions, which often produce the very evils they point at, the Count at length suffered him to depart, and remained alone, determined to try whether he could not sleep away the time while the peasant was absent.

The attempt was vain; and, stretched upon the bed of moss where the hard limbs of honest industry had enjoyed many a night of comfortable repose, the gay and glittering Count d'Aubin strove in vain to banish from his bosom the torment of thought. Memory rested on the past, and conscience knew her hour, and seized it with relentless power. His gone existence was spread out before him like a map; and the upbraiding voice within proclaimed each stage of folly and of vice through which he had proceeded, and still read its sad comment upon every act, showing his gradual downfall from honour, wealth, splendour, reputation, happiness, and love, by his own errors and vanities. The long procrastinated examination was forced upon his heart at length; and oh! with what minute agony the moral torturer wracked forth the inmost secrets of his bosom, and then broke him upon the wheel of despair. His fortune irreparably injured; he himself bound by large debts to an unfeeling mercenary; the party which he had joined against his conscience ruined and falling; his baffled schemes holding him up to the laughter of his light companions; the woman whose wealth was to have repaired the consequences of his own extravagance flying him with horror, and avoiding him with success; and the only woman whom he had ever really loved now regarding him with what had once been affection, changed, by his own infamy, into hatred and contempt. Such were the terrible matters on which reason, and conscience, and remorse had to comment during his hours of solitude; and, from the first moment that those thoughts arose, he felt that it would be a madness to deem that he could sleep. The agony of his mind affected his body too much even to suffer him to lie still; and starting up, he sometimes paced the narrow limits of the hut like a tiger in its cage, sometimes cast himself down in his fury, and cursed the hour that he was born. He reproached, he reviled himself for everything; and, in the torture that he felt when alone, exclaimed, "Fool that I was to let the boor leave me! even he were better than no one, in this gloomy, accursed place, with the lightning flashing eternally in my eyes, and the melancholy rain pattering over head."

As he thus thought, the sound of horses' feet splashing through the wet ground made itself heard in the intervals of the thunder, and the moment after, D'Aubin could distinguish that there was more than one traveller upon the road. A suspicion of his guide instantly crossed his mind, and was immediately confirmed by hearing his voice exclaim, "There, in that hut! You will find him there!"

The Count loosened his dagger in the sheath; and partly drew his sword, while, stepping back to the farther side of the hut, he watched for the opening of the disjointed door. A moment or two elapsed, during which D'Aubin could hear the stranger on the outside speaking as if to his horse, while he tied him under a tree; and then the matted screen was pushed back, and the diminutive figure of Bartholo, the dwarf, stood before him. Without uttering a word, Bartholo advanced towards the Count, and cast himself at his feet with a look of imploring deprecation that D'Aubin did not understand. It was explained in a moment, however. "My Lord," said the dwarf, earnestly, "my Lord, I find that when last I saw you I deceived you; and, by the counsel that I gave you, I have brought insult and disappointment upon your head. My fault was involuntary; but I deserve to be punished; and I have sought you myself; that you may wreak what vengeance upon me you like."