Hugo, always master of himself, and better able to see himself as others saw him than many worthier men, knew that his triumph would be to conquer Roger’s ill-will. So, taking his hat off, and showing a closely cropped black poll, to be surmounted later in the day by a handsome periwig, he said smoothly, as he patted his horse’s neck,—
“Whatever hard feelings, Roger, you may have for me, I cannot forget that you are my brother; nor do I wish to forget all the kindness I had from you. So I trust you will not refuse to come to Egremont. The estate was sequestered; what more right than that it should come to a younger brother, who could maintain the family name, and who would do by you as liberal a part as you could wish? So do not feed your resentment, but return with me.”
Roger’s reply to this was what might have been expected from that headstrong and determined young man.
“No!” he shouted, his voice ringing so loud that it frightened the cawing rooks from the trees overhead, “I go not to my house as long as you, bastard, and your brood are in it. Some day I will come and turn you out on the roadside. Look out for that time.”
Roger Egremont mounted his awkward beast, and taking off his hat, made a low bow to the people, who returned it with shouts and cheers and tears,—some of the women sobbing loudly.
“I take with me,” he said, “a handful of earth from Egremont. Every night of my life shall it lie under my head, so that I may ever sleep on English ground. When the King returns and comes into his own, then will I come too. Until then, fare you well.”
CHAPTER IV
SHOWING HOW ROGER EGREMONT FALLS INTO GOOD COMPANY
THE inn of Michot was almost as well known at St. Germains as the palace itself—and Madame Michot and her lame son, Jacques, were as well known as the inn. For this inn was the rendezvous for all the gay blades, young and old, among the fifteen or twenty thousand English, Scotch, and Irish Jacobites, who crowded the little town of St. Germains. And especially was it the resort of the body of guards, known as the gentlemen-at-arms, who attended the poor, broken-down old King James Stuart, at the palace. Sad dogs some of these were, and great was the score chalked up against them—and oftentimes generously rubbed out by Madame Michot. For, as the good woman said, some of the worst debtors she had were among her pleasantest customers, and kept the old place lively; and Madame Michot took as much pride in having her common room a jovial place as any duchess in Paris gloried in the brilliance of her salon. These merry gentlemen from over the sea made many promises to their hostess of what they would do for her when the King came into his own again,—for, like most men ill-treated of fortune, they had great confidence in her future favors. In truth, if Madame Michot were granted a royal audience for every favor she had done an exiled Jacobite, she would have spent her whole time in the King’s company. She was a handsome, stout woman, gifted with a good heart and a true genius for inn-keeping, and cherished but one folly in the world. Her otherwise sound brain had been a little turned by the laughing promises made by these devil-may-care, rollicking exiles,—for that was the sort which most frequented the inn of Michot. In her inmost heart Madame Michot fancied herself going to court at the palace of Vitall, as she called it, escorted by noblemen and gentlemen whom she had supplied with meat and drink, never asking for payment. And the object of her visit would be to get something handsome for poor Jacques—Jacques, the only son the King had left her at home; who, but for his lame foot, would be with his brothers under Marshal Villeroy. Madame Michot had never been able to decide exactly what she would ask for Jacques, but it would be “something handsome,” and Jacques should be able to sit at table with gentlemen.
The inn was a stone building of only one story, with a half-story, in the shape of a great bare attic, over one part of it. Originally it had been a huge granary, but being pleasantly situated on the sloping ground between the forest of St. Germains and the rich low-lying meadows through which the silver Seine runs laughing, Madame Michot had seen its good points, and buying it, had turned it into an inn. It had no courtyard, but opened directly upon a grassy space with trees. Behind it, toward the river, was an ancient orchard, and all around it were sweet fields and vineyards. Afar off could be seen the stately châteaux of the nobility, proudly secluded in their pleasure grounds. Looking upward to the right, was that glorious terrace of St. Germains, made by Louis le Grand, and which he could not surpass even when he wished to make Versailles the wonder of Europe. This terrace, a full two miles long, and as straight as line and rule could make it, four hundred feet broad, with the formal clipped trees, as straight as soldiers on parade, lining the side toward the town and forest; the stone parapet with its iron balustrade on the other side, overlooking a sheer descent of two hundred feet into the valley of the Seine; the stately old palace of Francis the First, with the pavilion at the very edge of the terrace, built by the great Henry for his “Charmante Gabrielle;” the gigantic flights of stone steps, down which twenty men-at-arms could march abreast; and in the blue distance, the slender spire of St. Denis shining,—St. Denis, where all the French kings are buried, and of which that slender spire was such a bugaboo to the Grand Monarque that he utterly deserted the palace at St. Germains, and gave it over to his poor relations, the exiled King and Queen of England,—all this beauty, poetry, and romance was in full sight of the inn of Michot.
The public room of the inn opened directly from the roadway. It was long and low, with narrow slits of windows, and a great fireplace in one end. The only fault Madame Michot had to find with her foreign patrons, who had, as it were, taken possession of the house, was that they knew no moderation in feeding the fire. On mild nights, when a few fagots would have been a plenty, thought Madame Michot, these wasteful English and Irish and Scotch would throw on great armfuls of wood, making the blaze from the fire to light up the whole place, and to dim the candles placed in sockets along the walls. Madame Michot protested, sighed, charged for wood, and charged high; there was no breaking up the custom short of turning the exiles away, and she had no heart for that.