“Be it so, then,” replied De Blenau, scarcely able to assume even the appearance of civility towards his companion. “Henry de La Mothe,” he proceeded, “order a dozen of my best men to attend me, bearing my full colours in their sword-knots and scarfs. Trick out my horses gaily, as if I were going to a wedding, for Claude de Blenau is about to visit the Cardinal; and remember,” he continued, his anger at the forced journey he was taking overcoming his prudence, “that there be saddled for my own use the good black barb that carried me so stoutly when I was attacked by assassins in the wood of Mantes;” and as he spoke, his eye glanced towards the Statesman, who sitting in the window seat, had taken up the Poems of Rotrou, and apparently inattentive to all that was passing, read on with as careless and easy an air, as if no more important interest occupied his thoughts, and no contending passions struggled in his breast.
CHAPTER X.
Shows how the Count de Blenau supped in a place that he little expected.
THOUGH the attendants of the Count de Blenau did not expend much time in preparing to accompany their master, the evening was nevertheless too far spent, before they could proceed, to permit the hope of reaching Paris ere the night should have set in. It was still quite light enough, however, to show all the preparations for the Count’s departure to the boys of St. Germain’s, who had not beheld for many a good day such a gay cavalcade enliven the streets of that almost deserted town.
Chavigni and De Blenau mounted their horses together; and the four or five servants which the Statesman had brought with him from Paris, mingling with those of De Blenau, followed the two gentlemen as they rode from the gate. Having the privilege of the Park, Chavigni took his way immediately under the windows of the Palace, thereby avoiding a considerable circuit, which would have occupied more time than they could well spare at that late hour of the evening.
The moment Pauline de Beaumont had seen her lover depart, the tears, which she had struggled to repress in his presence, flowed rapidly down her cheeks. The noble, candid manner of De Blenau had nearly quelled all suspicion in her mind. The graces of his person, the tone of his voice, the glance of his eye, had realized the day-dreams which she had nourished from her youth.
Fame had long before told her that he was brave, high-spirited, chivalrous; and his picture, as well as memory, had shown him as strikingly handsome; but still it did not speak, it did not move; and though Pauline had often sat with it in her hand, and imagined the expressions of his various letters as coming from those lips, or tried in fancy to animate the motionless eyes of the portrait, still the hero of her romance, like the figure of Prometheus ere he had robbed the Sun of light to kindle it into active being, wanted the energy of real life. But at length they had met, and whether it was so in truth, or whether she imagined it, matters not, but every bright dream of her fancy seemed fulfilled in De Blenau; and now that she had cause to fear for his safety, she upbraided herself for having entertained a suspicion.
She wept then—but her tears were from a very different cause to that which had occasioned them to flow before. However, her eyes were still full, when a servant entered to inform her that the Queen desired her society with the other ladies of her scanty Court. Pauline endeavoured to efface the marks which her weeping had left, and slowly obeyed the summons, which being usual at that hour, she knew was on no business of import; but on entering the closet, she perceived that tears had also been in the bright eyes of Anne of Austria.
The circle, which consisted of Madame de Beaumont, Mademoiselle de Hauteford, and another Lady of honour, had drawn round the window at which her Majesty sat, and which, thrown fully open, admitted the breeze from the Park.
“Come hither, Pauline,” said the Queen as she saw her enter, “What! have you been weeping too? Nay, do not blush, sweet girl; for surely a subject need not be ashamed of doing once what a Queen is obliged to do every day. Why, it is the only resource that we women have. But come here: there seems a gay cavalcade entering the Park gates. These are the toys with which we are taught to amuse ourselves. Who are they, I wonder? Come near, Pauline, and see if your young eyes can tell.”