The cardinal's musketeer

by Mary Imlay Taylor

“To Nançay?” madame said quickly, and she too looked at Péron.

“Ah, may I not go?” cried the boy, turning from one to the other. “I will be good, I will do just as I am bid!”

“Poor baby!” exclaimed the woman, “’tis a pity, and yet—”

“There can be no harm done, I think,” Jacques remarked, after a moment, “and it is meet that the child should see something besides the shop and the Rue de la Ferronnerie. Give me what he may need for three days, and he shall go.”

Péron uttered a cry of delight, and danced about on the doorstep, while Madame Michel hesitated yet a moment longer.

“Ought we to ask Père Antoine?” she said doubtfully.

Jacques des Horloges shook his head. “I have not time,” he said, “and, after all, it is no great matter. So be quick, for I must be off.”

Without more ado a little bundle for Péron was added, he was mounted behind the clockmaker, and they set out on their journey, the child as full of eagerness as though they were going out into a new world. He looked about him proudly from his perch behind Jacques; he felt that it was an important event in his life, and he was conscious of the envious glances of the children in the streets. But the sights of the city were familiar to him, and it was not until they had passed beyond the limits of Paris and were traversing the green meadows that he realized the delights of a ride in the open country. He was not a talkative child, and he took his pleasure silently, gazing about him with great interest and noting every unusual object. The river seemed so beautiful out here, running through the fields, that he could scarcely believe that it was the same Seine into which he had so often looked from the Pont Neuf. Those observant dark eyes saw every wild flower, every green leaf by the wayside, and followed eagerly the flight of the swallows overhead.

Jacques des Horloges was as little inclined to conversation as the child. The clockmaker’s broad, sturdy figure sat squarely on the back of his stout horse, and he kept his eyes on the road, attending steadily to his own business. He was not a romantic person, and would have been much amazed at the child’s fancies about the matter-of-fact objects in view. He was a plain man who saw only plain duties in life, and, for the most part, performed his share of them in a simple way.

This silent couple made the journey of five leagues to St. Germain-en-Laye without interruption and without incident, and riding into the town stopped for dinner at the Three Moons. The child, tired from the long ride, was glad to find a seat at the table in the public room, where they were forced to wait some time to be served, for it was crowded with guests. It was the season for the annual fair in the forest of St. Germain, and the inn was filled with traders, mummers, and merrymakers going there for business or entertainment. At a table near Michel’s sat a company of strolling players, and the jests and the grimaces of the clown soon aroused Péron in spite of his weariness. The grotesquely painted face and the gay dress with its fringe of bells delighted the child and diverted his attention even from his food. There were soldiers here too; but he had cared less for them since the scene at Archambault’s, although he could not yet entirely resist the fascination of their highly polished corselets and the rattle of swords and spurs. There were peddlers there with their packs, on the way to trade at the fair, musicians, countrymen, a motley gathering and a lively one, the ripple of talk and laughter, the clatter of dishes, the rush and hurry of attendance, all enlivening the scene. Yet there was grave enough talk whispered in some of the corners of that very room. Where there was a knot of persons of the better class, the conversation ran on the quarrel of the queen-mother and the king, on the defeat of her troops at Ponts-de-Cé and the possibilities of peace; of the influence of Albert de Luynes and the return of the Bishop of Luçon from exile at Avignon. Food enough for talk, but it was low spoken; there had been two courts and two factions too long for men to venture free speech. Marie de’ Medici, the queen-mother of France, who had ruled during the king’s long minority, could not retire from a foremost place in the government. Jealous, spiteful, scheming,—a wily Italian,—she never rested from her endeavors to control her son and his affairs until she was defeated by the wit and determination of Richelieu; and for years France beheld the strange spectacle of two courts and two trains of courtiers, a mother and son at swords’ points with each other. Behind all this was the ever-watchful jealousy of the two religious parties. The Huguenots, no longer protected by the great Henry, were suspicious of his son and fearful that their rights would be infringed. The Catholics, on the other hand, liberated from the strong rule of the dead king, and hoping much from Louis XIII., were as restless and eager for strife as ever, and found themselves, in their turn, encroached upon by the Huguenots, who were unwilling to grant the freedom of religion to others which they demanded for themselves. So long the victims of intolerance, they were themselves intolerant. Already the great trouble was brewing that would culminate in the siege and fall of La Rochelle, the stronghold of the Protestants. During the regency of Marie de’ Medici—a season of weakness between the time of Henri IV. and that of Richelieu—the grandees had grown restless again under the royal yoke. Since the days of François I. the power of the great nobles had been diminishing; they saw it with infinite discontent, and now gathered around the queen-mother, intriguing and plotting for a larger part in affairs, encouraged to hope much from the divisions in the state, and from the jealousy and reckless ambition of Monsieur, the king’s brother. All these matters therefore furnished fruitful topics of conversation at every public house; and dangerous gossip it was.