The Abbess Of Vlaye

by Stanley John Weyman

"Says that they are not her people, my lord."

The Vicomte groaned. "If I had a son worthy the name!" he said, and then he broke off, looking foolish. For Roger had left the room and des Ageaux also. They had slipped by the men while the Vicomte questioned them, and run out through the hall and to the gate--not unarmed. The Vicomte, seeing this, bade the men follow them; and when these too had vanished, and only four or five frightened women who had crowded into the room at the first alarm remained, he began to fumble with his sword, and to add to the confusion by calling fussily for this and that, and to bring him his arquebus, and not to open--not to open till he came! In truth years had worked imperceptibly on him. His nerves, like many things about him, were not what they had been--before Coutras. And he was still giving contrary directions, and scolding the women, and bidding them make way for him--since it seemed there was not a man to go to the gate but himself--when approaching voices broke on his ear and silenced him. An instant later one or two men appeared among the women in the doorway, and the little crowd fell back in wonder, to make room for a low dark man, bareheaded and breathing hard, with disordered hair and glittering eyes, who, thrusting the women to either side, cried--not once, but again, and yet again:--

"Room! Room for the Countess of Rochechouart! Way for the Countess!"

At the third repetition of this--which he seemed to say mechanically--his eyes took in the scene, the table, the room, and the waiting figure of the scandalized Vicomte, and his voice broke. "Saved!" he cried, flinging up his arms, and reeling slightly as if he would fall. "My lady is saved! Saved!"

And then, behind the low, dark man, who, it was plain, was almost beside himself, the Vicomte saw the white face and shrinking form of a small, slight girl little more than a child, whose eyes were like no eyes but a haunted hare's, so large and bright and affrighted were they.

CHAPTER IV.

[THE DILEMMA.]

Sheer amazement held the Vicomte silent. The Countess of Rochechouart, of the proud house of Longueville, that in those days yielded place to scarce a house in France--the Countess of Rochechouart to be seeking admittance at his door! And at this hour of the night! She, who was of the greatest heiresses of France, whose hand was weighted with a hundred manors, and of whose acquaintance the Abbess had lately boasted as a thing of which even a Villeneuve might be proud, she to be knocking at his gate in the dark hours! And seeking help! The Countess--his head went round. He was still gazing speechless with surprise when the short dark man who had entered with her fell on his knees before the girl, and seizing her hand mumbled upon it, wept on it, babbled over it, heedless alike of the crowd of gazers who pressed upon him, and of the master of the house, who stared aghast.

The Vicomte's amazement began at that to give place to perplexity. The Abbess, had she been here, would have known how to entertain such a guest. But Bonne and Roger--they were naught. Yet he must do something. He found his voice. "If I have, indeed," he said, for he was still suspicious of a trick, so forlorn and childish seemed the figure before him--"if I have indeed the honour," he repeated stiffly, "to address the Countess of Rochechouart, I--I bid her welcome to my poor house."

"I am Mademoiselle de Rochechouart," the girl murmured, speaking faintly. "I thank you."