Denounced: A Romance

by John Bloundelle-Burton

Bluet came in as he made these resolutions, and began busying himself with preparing their midday meal, laying three covers at the table in the middle of the room. As, usual the fellow was in his accustomed semi-drunken condition, which Bertie had long since discovered was owing to his habit of abstracting some or all of the prisoners' wine ere he brought it to them--a pleasing custom none complained of, since he was, otherwise, an obliging rascal; and, as usual, he began to chatter in his familiar manner to those in the calotte.

"Ma foi!" he exclaimed, "if things go on as they now are, we shall soon have no guests at all. The examiners come again to-night; we are informed they will dine with le vieux singe De Launey; there will be some clearances to-morrow morning."

It was natural that at these words hope should spring into the breast of Elphinston; that he should be excited with the thought that now his case might be considered. Also, perhaps, it was natural that to De Chevagny they caused not the slightest emotion.

"Is--is there any possibility, any chance of knowing who will be called before them?" asked the former. "Can you, Bluet, give any guess?"

"Mon Dieu! non," replied the other, "not the least. When D'Argenson, who is the presiding Examiner, has supped--and, Heavens! he will punish old De Launey's vin de Brequiny, which is a wine to make the goats dance--then he will call for the list of our visitors, and will go over it from the first here to the last; and from that list he will select the names of some, but who they will be D'Argenson and his friend, the devil, alone can tell."

"There will be one," said the marquis softly, "whose name at least he will not select--one who is forgotten by all outside these walls. Yet, how well he was known and loved once by many--by many!"

"Ah, Monsieur le Marquis," said the good-natured vagabond, trying to cheer him, "what should we within the walls do if he did not forget you? Mon Dieu! I would disband myself, would go forth also if you, the father of our company, our Bastille flower, left us. Non, non, marquis, we cannot part with you. You are our father, our pride."

"I was here," said the poor old prisoner, shaking his head--and as he did so he shook a drop from each of his eyes on to his long beard--"when Bernaville was Governor. He put me first in the Tour de la Comte, where Lauzun had been, and where, when he tried to escape, they hanged his servant outside his door as a warning; him they dared not hang; and then I thought always that the Examiner--it was D'Argenson's father in those far-off days--might send for me. But he never did, he never did. And none have sent for me yet, and never will. You will go," he said, looking at Elphinston, "as the others have gone, and he," looking at the maniac on the bed, "will go to his doom, but I shall remain until I go, too--unto my grave. Ah, my grave, my grave! And then--I may see again the young wife they took me from--'tis almost forty-three years ago--and the little babe I left slumbering on her breast; the little child that we were going to make so brave a feast over and christen Brigide because it was my mother's name, because it had blue eyes like hers."

Bertie had turned his face away from the old man to hide his tears, and now he took him by the hand and wrung it softly, while Bluet, who, for a turnkey of the Bastille, seemed also much affected, exclaimed boisterously:

"Courage, courage, monsieur! We may lose you yet to our desolation. And Madame la Marquise may welcome you still--without doubt she lives for you--and la petite mademoiselle, now surely a great lady, as a De Chevagny must be. Heart of grace, monsieur, heart of grace, and see the fine dinner I have brought you! Regardez moi ça. Here is a fish--ombre chevalier, of the best--and two pigeons, some beef with the gravy in it, and a salad, some rennets and biscuits, and, for the wine, two little bottles. Because, you see, monsieur," turning to Bertie with a husky whisper, "here in the calottes the visitors drink not with such abundance as in the chapel rooms. 'Tis not my fault."