"This is your business man," said he at length, to Tristan. "Go and search out this matter."
He rose, and went forward a few steps; his courtiers left him to himself. He then perceived Cornélius, who, mounted on his mule, was going off in company with the Provost.
"And the thousand crowns?" said the King.
"Nay, Sire, you are too great a King! No sum of money could pay for your justice——"
Louis XI. smiled. The courtiers envied the old Fleming his bold tongue and many privileges; he rode off at a good pace, down the avenue of mulberry-trees that led from Le Plessis to Tours.
Exhausted by fatigue, the young gentleman was, in fact, sleeping soundly. On his return from his adventure of gallantry, he had ceased to feel such spirit and ardor for defending himself against distant and perhaps imaginary dangers, as had inspired him to rush on perilous delights. So he had postponed till morning the task of cleaning his soiled raiment and effacing the traces of his success. It was a great blunder, but one towards which everything tended. When, in the absence of the moon, which had set while he was happy with his love, he failed to find all the screws of the vexatious staple, he lost patience. Then, with the happy recklessness of a man full of contentment, or longing for rest, he trusted to the good luck of his fate, which had so far served him so well. He did, indeed, make a sort of bargain with himself, in virtue of which he was to wake at daybreak; but the events of the day and the excitements of the night hindered him from keeping the promise. Happiness is oblivious. The goldsmith seemed less formidable to the young gentleman as he lay on the hard truckle-bed whence so many of his predecessors had risen only to go to execution, and this recklessness was his undoing.
While the King's treasurer was on his way back from Plessis-les-Tours, escorted by the Provost and his terrible bowmen, the self-styled Goulenoire was being watched by the old sister, who sat knitting stockings for Cornélius on one of the steps of the turret stair, never heeding the cold.
The youth, meanwhile, was prolonging the joys of that enchanting night, ignorant of the disaster which was coming down on him at a gallop. He was dreaming. His dreams, like all the visions of youth, were so vividly colored that he was unconscious of where illusion began and reality ended. He saw himself on a cushion at the lady's feet; his head on her knees warm with affection; he was listening to the tale of the persecutions and petty tyranny the Count had so long inflicted on his wife; he wept with the Countess, who was, in fact, of all his natural children the daughter Louis XI. loved best; he promised her that he would go on the morrow and reveal all the facts to that terrible father. They had settled everything in their mind, annulling the marriage and imprisoning the husband, while they themselves might at any moment be the victims of his sword if the least sound had roused him. But in his dream the light of the lamp, the flame in their eyes, the hues of stuffs and tapestries, were brighter than in fact; a richer perfume exhaled from their night garments; there was more love in the air, more glow in the atmosphere, than there had been in reality. And the Marie of his dream was far less obdurate than the living Marie had been, to the languishing looks, the insinuating prayers, the magical questioning, the expressive silence, the voluptuous solicitation, the affected generosity which make the first moments of passion so fiercely ardent, and rouse lovers' souls to increased intoxication at each step in their love.
In accordance with the jurisprudence of love in those days Marie de Saint-Vallier granted her adorer the superficial privileges of la petite oie; that is to say, she willingly allowed him to kiss her feet, her robe, her hands, and her throat; she confessed her love; she accepted her lover's attentions and vows; she would permit him to die for her; she allowed herself to encourage an intoxication to which this half reserve, severe and often cruel as it was, gave added heat; but she was herself immovable, and would promise the highest reward of love only as the price of her deliverance. To annul a marriage in those days recourse to Rome was necessary. The parties needed the devotion of a few cardinals, and had to appear in the presence of the Sovereign Pontiff armed with the King's protection. Marie wished to owe her liberty to love, that she might resign it into love's hands.
In those days almost every woman had power enough so to establish her empire in the heart of a man as to make his passion the history of his whole life, the mainspring of the highest resolve. But then ladies could be numbered in France; they were so many sovereigns; they had a noble pride; their lovers belonged to them rather than they to the men; their love often cost much bloodshed, and to be accepted by them dangers had to be faced.