CHAPTER V
The Chapel
Tuesday morning at Marly proved an ordeal for the army of valets and maids attendant on the ladies and gentlemen who had taken part in the amusement of the day before. His Majesty, indeed, could not be said to have set a good example to his companions. He was sulky, he was depressed by the weather, and he wanted de Berryer. While he was still in bed he was informed by de Rosset, his first gentleman, that the Chief of Police could not possibly be brought to Marly from Versailles under six hours. Louis made no comments, but kicked the bedclothes aside and began to dress himself with extreme rapidity, receiving his garments as willingly from the plebeian hands of Bachelier as from those of de Rosset, whose business it was to conduct matters properly. Being finally arrayed in a very much shorter time than usual, the King adjourned to the conventional room and sat down to the breakfast prepared for him. After gloomily striking off the tops of his eggs, dipping a bit of bread into each yolk, and throwing the rest away, till he had demolished seventeen of these commodities, without eating what one would contain, he ordered his sleigh prepared, and, at nine o'clock, left Marly behind, and set off at full trot for Versailles.
Behind him, at his grandfather's stiff old château, Louis left a pretty disposition of human emotions. Mme. de Châteauroux was very anxious. The more she brooded over the scene of the night before, the more she regretted the affair. Certainly it had turned out as badly as possible. Claude was inevitably ruined. He must by now have discovered how heartless and how cruel she was; and as to Louis being more jealous, and therefore more anxious to please her than before, why, that was a doubtful question. He could be very ambiguous when he chose.
As a matter of fact, Claude himself was less concerned at his position than his cousin for him. Claude had much, and, at the same time, little, to lose at Court. His love was strong, but his youthful buoyancy of spirit was stronger. He was young, happy-hearted, untrammelled. There was no one dependent on him for place. He would have passed the Bastille doors without grief had it only been promised him that Henri should visit his room there once a week with the latest stories and gossip, and that the Doublet-Persane Nouvelles à la Main and a billet from his lady should reach him every Wednesday and Saturday. This was not more on account of his frivolity of taste than because of his ability to make for himself a home and amusements out of the most unpromising material. He was blessed with two things, that only the gods can give and the gods only take away—a system of pure optimism and unbounded faith in the goodness of human nature.
Claude by no means lay awake during the hours that were left between his retirement and the dawn, on that night at Marly; but his eyes unclosed in the morning more heavily than was their wont, and it took him but a second to define the sense of weight at his heart when he was awake. Sounding the hand-bell for his man, he made a rapid and silent toilet, and then hastened off to the neighboring apartment of his cousin the Marquis. Henri was in bed, still in that dream-stage between sound slumber and preliminary yawns. Claude's repeated and vigorous knocks at the door succeeded at last in bringing him to a realizing sense of all that is disagreeable in life.
"Diable! Is it you, Chaumelle? What do you mean by rousing me at this hour? Is the château on fire? Is the King ill—or Anne in a temper? Wait—wait—wait! I open!"
The Marquis, shivering with cold, crept out of bed and unlocked his door.
"Oh! You, Claude! I might have guessed it. One's family is so inconsiderate. Will you come in? I'm going to bed again to keep myself warm. For the love of Heaven, get Chaumelle to bring a tripod of charcoal or to light my grate here!"
Claude obligingly sounded the gong, whereupon the Marquis' man appeared with admirable promptness.
"Run to my room, Chaumelle, and bring in the chauffier you will find there. His Majesty's too tender of his forests to provide us with wood for burning. It's abominably cold."