Roger was at Compiègne when he got this letter. He replied at once, agreeing to it. His leave was arranged without trouble, and in March he found himself at St. Germains, to meet Berwick, and to pay his respects to his King and Queen.
St. Germains was always a haunted place to him. He had not heard one word direct from Michelle since the day, five years before, that he had parted from her. He dared not ask. But not for one day in those five years had she been absent wholly from his mind. The beauty of her eyes, the faint perfume of her hair, was ever present to him. He had not one single memorial of her—he needed none. He had however, his little bag of earth from Egremont; and still slept with it under his pillow.
He found Berwick but little changed outwardly. He had ever been a sedate man, but with a quiet fund of bonhomie. Now, however, under that calm and composed exterior, Roger saw in him a grief so deep, so unspoken, that it must have changed the whole man. Berwick’s brief and fleeting time of happiness had been overclouded by the apprehension that Honora de Burgh’s sweet spirit was not long for this world; and when she was called away, in the springtime of her youth, he felt as if so sweet and delicate a flower was not fitted to withstand the chilling blasts of this life. He spoke of her occasionally to Roger, and often of the beautiful boy, like—too like—herself, which she had left him; and Roger came to love and respect Berwick the more, from the deep and manly Christianity with which he bore this dreadful sorrow. This time Roger was lodged in the palace close to Berwick’s apartments. The glory of the inn of Michot had departed. The crowd of brave and merry gentlemen who had thronged the little town five and six years before, and who had regarded St. Germains as a place of temporary retirement, were gone—many of them to the country from which there is no return. The others were chiefly, like Roger Egremont, grown hardy soldiers, living honorably upon scanty pay.
Roger had three things to do: first, to provide himself with a horse, for Merrylegs, after having carried him through five campaigns, was now to be honorably retired. Roger bestowed him upon Madame Michot, to draw the weekly cart to and from Paris, he being yet fitted for such light work. The second was, to see Dicky; and the third, to see Bess Lukens.
He heard of Bess at St. Germains before he saw her. Bess was making a great noise in the world in more ways than one. As a regular singer in the King’s Opera, she was supposed to be under the tutelage of the Abbé d’Albret, conductor of the music. Bess, however, who was as hard to govern as most prime donne, refused to submit as absolutely as she should have done to the Abbé, and still clung to the methods of Papa Mazet, whose house she declined to leave. The Abbé and herself had words, and Bess in a rage, called him “a popish liar and meddler.” There was but one thing to do for this: Mademoiselle Luccheni was retired from the Opera until she should learn to acquiesce in discipline. The King, however, noting her absence, sent for the Abbé, and desired that Mademoiselle Luccheni be at once reinstated. His Majesty went so far as to say there was not in Paris such another voice as Mademoiselle Luccheni’s. The Abbé, raging but helpless, went to Bess and proposed an armistice. Bess, to whom it had been conveyed that the King desired her return, coolly declined any terms short of absolute surrender. The Abbé was forced to capitulate. Things went on harmoniously for about a fortnight. Then the Abbé, giving a musical party at his house, at which Monseigneur deigned to signify he would attend, rashly promised, without consulting Bess, that she would sing. Bess, on hearing this, betook herself to St. Germains, alleging that she had been asked to sing at the château, and the commands of her own King and Queen must ever take precedence. This producing a great commotion, the English Queen felt herself called upon to write a letter to Monseigneur, saying that Miss Luccheni had misunderstood things. Her invitation turned out to have come from the ten-year-old Prince of Wales, who, meeting her in the forest, recognized her, and asked her to sing to him then and there. Bess was delighted to sing for him, and so charmed the lad that he invited her to come to the château the next Sunday, and sing for his father and mother. This, Bess stoutly declared, she considered a command, as coming from her Prince. Several dozens of eminent persons, including the Kings of France and England, the Dauphin and the Archbishop of Paris, became mixed up in the affair. It was very exciting, and eclipsed in interest the news from Spain. Bess Lukens was the only person involved in the matter who thoroughly enjoyed it. All this, Roger had heard at St. Germains, and it lost nothing in the telling when Bess, with glowing cheeks and bright eyes, recounted it again to him at Paris. A born comic actress, she brought out all the absurdities in the matter, mimicking the furious little Abbé to the life, and even repeating the King’s own words, and the King’s own walk as he strutted up and down the Orangerie at the Petit Trianon, and Madame de Maintenon’s pious exhortations.
“Of course,” said Bess, coolly, in conclusion, as she plumped herself down in a chair, “that old ape of a popish Abbé is right,—excuse me, Roger; I forgot for the moment you were a papist yourself. Papa Mazet is too old, and his methods are not those of this age, and he can’t teach as well as the people the Abbé employs. But an’t that the more reason why I should swear that Papa Mazet is just as capable as ever he was, and is to-day the best teacher in Paris? Didn’t I tell that old monkey of an Abbé that Papa Mazet could walk ten miles, ride twenty, and go thirty in a coach, just as well as ever he could, when the poor, dear man can barely go twice round the garden, with his stick and my arm to help him? I hope I am an honest woman,” declared Bess, with an air of extreme virtue, “and I mean to stand by Papa Mazet if I lose my place in the Opera for it.”
Roger laughed as he had not done for years, so heartily; and then, both of them growing sober, they studied each other furtively, to see such marks as Time might leave. Roger Egremont was now thirty-two years old. His complexion had grown dark and weather-beaten during his years of campaigning. He had lost, as men do, that gayety of heart which shines through the eyes, and his curling brown hair, which he still wore upon his shoulders, now more from habit than vanity, had some silver threads in it. But he looked a soldier, straight of figure and direct of glance. Bess thought him more nearly handsome than ever in his life. His tender friendship to her showed no abatement. As for that other woman, some woman’s instinct as true as truth told Bess Lukens that Roger Egremont had loved Michelle well, and could never forget her. Bess would rather have had it so. She shrank from the thought that he should be any woman’s successful lover. As for Roger, he never saw Bess without an increase of admiration for her. She improved year by year, in a certain dignity of appearance and manners. She would never dream now of putting on man’s apparel to disguise herself for travelling. She was now fully able to command respect for herself in her own proper person. Her beauty seemed to grow in perfection, for in place of that rosy flush of girlhood her features had acquired greater delicacy, which comported well with her softer manners. She was now in her twenty-eighth year, but she showed the flight of time less than Roger.
“And so you took care of my cousin Dicky when he was so ill on his return from England two years ago. Truly, we must stop calling him Dicky, and say Father Egremont,” said Roger.
“He will be Dicky Egremont as long as he lives,” replied Bess, smiling; “he never can be rid of that boyishness which makes us all love him. Have you seen him yet?”
“I go to see him from here. He is not free to see visitors until the afternoon.”