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CHAPTER XXVII

It was, as the King had whispered to himself, De Beaurepaire's last night on earth, as it was also of those others. Of the woman he loved; of the vagabond who, bully though he might be, had been staunch and inflexible; of the old man who, the chief conspirator of all, was now to suffer the most ignominious of deaths.

In the chamber in the Bastille allotted to De Beaurepaire the prisoner sat now before the fire musing on what all would say when they knew of his end; of what his friends who had loved him well would feel, and of how his enemies, of whom he had so many, would gloat over his downfall. Naturally he thought also of the women who had loved him once and the women who loved him now, in this his darkest hour.

"The women who love me now!" he said to himself. "Who are they? Who? My mother and-and-Emérance. Emérance who is not fifty paces away from me, Emérance who dies by my side to-morrow, yet whom I may not see until, to-morrow, we stand on the same scaffold together. And then but for a moment ere the axe falls."

"Whom I may not see until to-morrow," he repeated. "Not until to-morrow."

And again he said to himself, "Not until to-morrow," while adding: "And there are so many long hours until three o'clock to-morrow!"

As though to corroborate this thought there boomed out the tones of the prison clock striking midnight, the sound being followed an instant later by the deeper boom of the great bell of Notre Dame and then by that of the other clocks in the city.

"Midnight," De Beaurepaire said. "Midnight. Fifteen hours yet of life, fifteen hours spent apart from her! And she here, close by. Ah! it is hard."

He rose from the chair he sat in and went across to the other side of the great fireplace where, in another chair, was seated the Père Bourdaloue reading his breviary. Some time before this the priest had prayed with him and would do so again at intervals during the night, while later-before the end came to-morrow-he would confess and absolve the condemned man as his brother priest would confess and absolve the others, with the exception of Van den Enden, who was resolute not to see either priest or minister of any faith. Now, however, as has been said, the good man read his breviary.

"Father," the condemned man said, standing before him and waiting to speak until he looked up from his book, "Father, help me to see her. I must see her ere we meet there. Below. Help me to bid her a last, a long farewell."

"To see her, my son! The woman who has brought you to this?"

"Nay! nay! Never. None has brought me to this but my own self; my own wickedness, my treachery and ambition. Above all, not she. Instead, her undoing lies heavy at my charge. Had she not loved me with a love passing the love of women, she might have gone free, have escaped. But-but-she grappled herself to me out of that great love and, as I fell, she fell with me. Let me see her once more. Here. To-night."

"What has this love of yours and hers been, Louis de Beaurepaire? The love that honours a woman in its choice, or the mad frenzy, the wild passion, the evil desires that sweep all boundaries and obstacles and laws aside even as the torrent sweeps aside all that stands in its way?"

"An honest love, heaven be praised. On my part the love of the captor for the poor maimed thing he has caught in his hand, and, even in bruising, soothes and comforts too. The love of one who cannot put aside that which, in capturing, he has thus come to love. Yet, further-"

"Yes. What?"

"Our love was not evil. For even as it quickened in our hearts we saw before us a pure, a nobler life that might, that should, be ours. If we had escaped from this our doom; had we never been taken, or, being taken, had we by chance been let go free-we should have wed. Our vows were sworn and deeply, too; they would have been kept."

"You would have kept them knowing what she was?"

"As she would have kept hers knowing what I was. What better am I than she? An intriguer, a traitor, even as she is an intrigante, a traitress; yet without her reasons, without her love of her own province as excuse, as extenuation. Had we wedded, our marriage would have but made us more akin and equal."

"If this is in your heart, the chance is still yours. Your vows may still be fulfilled. Louis de Beaurepaire, remembering who and what you are, remembering also who and what she is-as all learnt who were in the Arsenal at your confrontations-are you willing to make this woman your wife to-night?"

"Willing! To-night! Ay! willing a thousandfold. God help her! she has had no return for her attachment to such as I am; if this be an expiation, an atonement from me to her-even at this our last hour-it shall be hers. And-and-" he murmured so low that scarcely could the priest hear him, "for me it will be happiness extreme. To die by her side though only as her lover might have brought its little share of comfort; to die by her side-I her husband, she my wife-will make death happiness. Yet," he exclaimed, looking down suddenly at the priest from his great height, "can you do this? Can this be lawful? Without flaw or blemish?"

"In our holy Church's eyes? Yes."

"And in the law's eyes?"

"The law cannot over-rule us."

"Hasten then, father, to make us one."

"I will go seek the Lieutenant du Roi, yet it needs not even that. Alas! too often have I passed the last night in this place with other prisoners to make any permission necessary for what I do. Yet this I must do," he said, withdrawing the key of the door from his pocket, putting it in the lock and then opening the door itself.

And De Beaurepaire, observing, smiled grimly.

"I could not escape if I would, yet I have no thought of that," he said. "He who awaits at the altar steps the woman he loves seeks flight no more than I who now await her."

After he had heard the key turned in the lock outside, he sat down in his chair again and gave himself up to further meditation. Perhaps-it might well be! – he thought in those moments of all that he had thrown away, with, last of all, his life: perhaps he thought how he, who had once been the chosen comrade of the King, was now to meet his death for his treachery to that King. Above all he must have thought of the proud, handsome woman who was his mother; the woman who, haughty, disdainful of all others, had worshipped and idolised him. And she was not yet old, he remembered; in spite of the early blanching of her hair she was not yet fifty, and he had entailed upon her so bitter a shame that, henceforth, her once great life must be passed in grey, dull obscurity. Her life that had hitherto been so splendid and bright!

"Almost," he whispered, "I could bring myself to pray that God may see fit to take her soon. How shall she continue to live when I am dead, and dead in such a way; for such a sin?"

He thought also of others now, on whom, perhaps, in different circumstances, he would scarcely have bestowed a thought or memory.

He thought of Humphrey West whose death had been so treacherously attempted-thanking heaven devoutly, fervently, as he did so, that in this, at least, he had had no hand or knowledge; and he recalled, too, the gentle loving girl who was, as the Père Bourdaloue had told him only an hour or so earlier, to become Humphrey's bride within a month. That it was not in this man's nature to pray for the happiness of any human being, is not, perhaps, strange, remembering what his own existence had been; yet now, with more gentle, more humane thoughts possessing that nature it was also not strange that he should be able to hope their lives together would be long and pleasant.

"And," he said to himself, Pagan-like to the last, "had I served another as he served me, faithfully and honestly, as a friend, so would I, like him, have denounced that other as he denounced me when set upon and almost done to death by that other's myrmidons. He held the ace-he would have been more than man if he refused to throw it."

Of one other, however, he thought little and cared less. He had never loved the Duchesse de Castellucchio, beautiful as she was; he had regarded her only as a woman who might by a fortunate chance, if the Pope should prove yielding, be able to rehabilitate him in the eyes of the world-and able also to free him from the load of debt that bore him down. Able to assist him to regain the pinnacle to which by his birth and rank he was entitled, but from which by his own failings and errors he had been hurled headlong.

"Nor," he said, and once more he smiled bitterly, "did she love me. Has one of her family ever loved aught but himself or herself? But I served her turn, I enabled her to escape out of France and from her demoniac. While, had a pis-aller been required, a De Beaurepaire might well have replaced a Ventura. Now she is safe in Italy and I am here. She should be content."

The key grated in the lock as the doomed man mused thus upon the woman whom he had helped to save from a hateful life; and the bitterness of his fate must stand as atonement for his thoughts of one who was far from being the hard, selfish creature he pronounced her.

A moment later the other woman, the woman he loved so fondly, was by his side. Behind her followed the Père Bourdaloue, who, after bidding two of the gendarmerie to remain outside until he called them, went to the farther end of the room and left the lovers as much alone as was possible.

"Louis!" Emérance exclaimed, as she drew near him. "Louis! Once more we are together. Louis! Louis! Oh! my love."

"Mon amour. Ma mie," he cried, clasping her in his arms, while, as he did so, he saw that, though her face was white-white as the long gown (tied round her waist with a cord) which she now wore, and in which to-morrow, nay, to-day! she would go to the scaffold-there was still upon that face, in those soft eyes, a look of happiness extreme. "Thank God it is so. And he," with a look at the priest at the farther end of the room, "has told you? We shall die, we shall go to our death together as man and wife."

"Nay," Emérance whispered, though as she did so her arms had sought his neck and enlaced it, "Nay, not as that. But-"

"Not as that! You-you who love me so-will not be my wife?"

"I am your wife. In heart, in soul, in every thought, in every fibre of my being. There is nought of me that is not you, that is not De Beaurepaire now. What would an idle ceremony, performed over us by him," with a glance towards the priest, "and witnessed by those soldiers outside, do for us? Could I love you more in the few hours that I should be your wife than I have loved you, not being your wife? Shall we sleep less calmly and peacefully in our graves to-morrow and for ever-yes, for ever! – because that ceremony has not been performed? Louis, there is no wedded wife in all this world to-night who loves her lawful husband more madly than I love you to whom no tie binds me. And-I was a wife once, and my husband beat and ill-used me, and I hated him. You are no husband of mine and I adore, I worship, you."

"But-but-once-we-spoke of marriage, of being wed. Of a life to be passed together."

"There is no life left to us to pass together. Only this hour, these moments-now. When we spoke of that wedded life which should, which might, be ours; when you thought of stooping from your high estate to marry such as I am, there was a hope for us. We might have escaped when we had failed in our attempt-succeed we never could! – and then have been together always. Always. Always. Now," and the soft, clear eyes were very close to the dark eyes of the man so near to her, "we may not be wedded but-I thank God for it-neither shall we ever more be parted. Together we have lived and loved for-how long? A month-six weeks-two months-ah! I cannot well recall. To-morrow brings us together for all eternity."

"You will not be my wife!" De Beaurepaire said again, his voice hoarse, lost in his throat. "You can be so-great-as to reject the one poor repayment I can make for your sweet, your precious, love?"

"Repayment! Does love need repayment? Can there be debtor and creditor in that? And-if so-why, then Louis, Louis, mon adore, have you not repaid? You-such as you-to me!"

"My children," the Père Bourdaloue said, turning round and advancing to them, "the night is passing. If you will be wed, now is the time. The Lieutenant du Roi granted you an hour together for that purpose, that hour is running through."

"Father," the woman said, advancing towards him, standing before him so white and pale, yet with, on her face, so calm, so happy a look that he could recall no other dying woman-even as she passed peacefully away surrounded by all who loved her and whom she loved-who had seemed as calm and happy as she. "Father, there is no need. We are wedded."

"Wedded!" he exclaimed. "Wedded! You are wedded?"

"Ay. As much as two need ever be who love each other as we love, who go hand in hand to their doom, to their grave; to that eternal parting which will be an eternal union. Take me," she said now, "back to my cell. To-morrow I shall come forth a bride."

"And you?" Bourdaloue asked, looking at De Beaurepaire. "Are you agreed?"

"As she will have it so let it be," De Beaurepaire answered.

"Come then," the priest said. "Come."

Following him, Emérance took two or three steps towards the door then, suddenly, she stopped and laid her hand on Bourdaloue's arm, although as she spoke her eyes were fixed upon her lover.

"Father," she said, "my life has not been all evil, yet-yet-God help and pity me! – it has not been that of an upright woman, but of one who has been a spy, a conspirator. Not that which my mother prayed it might be as she lay dying. But-if-if-there is aught of atonement for that life, it is that I freely, gladly, yield it up so that as I leave the world I leave it with him whom, of all men alone, I have loved."

A moment later she was back by her lover's side, once more her arms were around his neck, once more she was clasped to his heart.

"To-morrow. To-morrow. To-morrow, we shall be together," she whispered. "Ah! mon amour adoré, to-morrow I shall be yours only. To-morrow and for ever."

"You will be brave?" he murmured back. "You will not fear?"

"Be brave!" she repeated. "Brave! Why! what should I fear when you are by my side? When I have all I ask."

CHAPTER XXVIII

The crowd outside the Bastille had begun to form even before the dawn of the gloomy November day which was to witness the execution of the four principal conspirators in the Norman plot; the four conspirators whom alone, of many others of high and low degree, it had been thought advisable to bring to trial. This was because, amongst those others, were names of such importance that, coupled with the name of De Beaurepaire, they would have revealed the existence of so deep-rooted a conspiracy against France and the King as to absolutely threaten the existence of France as a monarchy, as well as the existence of Le Roi Soleil. Therefore, since justice was now to be done upon those four, it had been deemed the highest policy to ignore all others concerned, and thus veil in obscurity the wide-spreading roots of the wicked scheme.

By mid-day the crowd was so augmented that one-eighth of the population of Paris was calculated to be present; the mass of people was so closely wedged that any movement had become impossible. If women fainted from the pressure they were subjected to, they had to remain standing insensible or be supported by others until they recovered, since there was not room for them to fall to the ground. If infants in arms-of which, as always at any public "spectacle," many had been brought-fell or were dropped, it was in most cases impossible to recover them: several old as well as very young persons were trampled to death, and more than one birth took place amongst that crowd.

And still the mob continued to swell and increase until three o'clock, while some hundreds of persons helped to add farther to it long after the "spectacle" was over.

In front of the great door of the prison, above which was carved a bas-relief representing two slaves manacled together, a long scaffold had been erected on which were placed three blocks. Some short distance off was a small movable rostrum, or smaller scaffold, above which was reared a gallows with the rope hanging loosely from it. On this rostrum Van den Enden would later take his stand until, the rope being fastened tightly round his neck, the rostrum would be pushed from under his feet and he would be left hanging. Still a farther distance off was a brazier, the fire in which was not yet ignited. At three o'clock it would be lit and, into it, a huge bundle of papers would be cast. These papers were those which had been found in La Truaumont's possession after death, and contained not only innumerable letters and other documents dealing with the plot, but also his birth certificate and his parchment commissions and brevets. As far as was possible his memory, as well as the records of his association with the conspiracy, were to be effaced for ever.

Early in the morning three sides of a square had been formed round the scaffolds and the brazier-the prison wall and the great door of the prison making the fourth side-by a large body of troops. These troops consisted of three lines, the innermost one, which was composed of several companies of the Regiment de Rouen, being so placed owing partly to the fact that the regiment happened at the moment to be quartered in Paris, and partly because it was thought well that its men should witness what had befallen those who had endeavoured to stir up rebellion in the particular province to which it belonged.

Behind these soldiers were those of the Garde du Corps du Roi under the command of De Brissac who, from dawn, had sat his horse statue-like. Behind this were the Mousquetaires, both black and grey.

"How slowly that clock moves," a sandy-haired, good-looking girl of the people said as, at last, the clock of the Bastille struck two and the final hour of waiting was at hand. "Have you ever seen this handsome Prince who is to die?" she asked, turning to a big, brawny man who stood by her side.

"Ay, often," the man, who was totally unknown to the girl, replied, looking down at her. "Often. I was a soldier myself until six months ago. And in the Garde du Corps. Are you an admirer of handsome men?"

"I have heard so much of his beauty. And of his loves. They say all the aristocratic women loved him."

"Vertu dieu!" the man said with a laugh; "I wonder then that he did not disfigure himself. One can be fed too full on love as well as other things, ma belle," he added with a hoarse laugh, while recalling perhaps some of his own galanteries de caserne.

"There is one who dies with him to-day," a dark, pale woman struck in now, "whom they say he loved passing well, as she him. Dieu! what is sweeter than to die with those we love!"

"To live for them, bonne femme," the soldier replied, still jeeringly. Then, seeing that this woman's face had clouded with a look of pain, he said in a gentler voice, "Ah! pardon. I have not wounded you?"

"Nay. Not much. But I have loved and been left behind. I would I might have gone too."

"They say he and the woman and the old Jew who is to hang," a cripple exclaimed, "sought to kill the King. Oh-é! Oh-é!" the creature grunted, "I would I were tall enough to see the Jew swinging. Mon brave," looking up at the ex-soldier, "will you not lift me to your shoulder when they come out?"

"Ay! will I, and fling you at the Jew's head afterwards. If you miss him mayhap you will fall into the brazier. And, so, an end to you."

"Is there a brazier! And for the Jew! Oh! Oh! Oh! To burn him all up. Oh! Oh!" and the cripple, in his efforts to caper about, trod so on his neighbours' feet that they kicked and cuffed him till he was almost senseless.

"The Dutch fleet was off Havre a week ago," one old man remarked to another in solemn, almost awestruck, whispers. "Ah! if the Normans had been ready. If the enemy had landed. If France had been invaded. Oh, mon Dieu!"

"Pschut!" exclaimed the other old man, one of different mettle from his companion. "The Normans ready! Fichtre pour les Normans! There were none who had the power to cause a single village to rise. France might have slept in peace."

"Attention!" rang out the voice of the officer in command of the Mousquetaires a little while later, and, as it did so, the crowd roared like so many beasts of prey; then, gradually, yet quickly, too, the roar subsided into a deep, hoarse murmur, and an indescribable tremor, or movement, passed through the thousands present.

For, now, the great bell of the Bastille that had, in days past, so often sounded the tocsin over St. Antoine-and was so often to sound it again in days to come-was tolling slowly: the huge doors were open, they were coming forth.

Ahead of all walked some bareheaded and barefooted Carmelites chanting the Salve Regina: following them, the Governor of the Bastille and the Lieutenant du Roi marched side by side. Next, came the headsman and his assistants, masked, the former carrying his axe over his shoulder.

Behind them the condemned ones came forth. First, with the Père Bourdaloue by his side, appeared De Beaurepaire, superb and stately, his head bare. He was dressed all in black velvet but, underneath his outer coat might be caught the gleam of his handsome justaucorps. Yet, noble as his presence was, there was missing from his face to-day the look of arrogance and haughty contempt that had hitherto been the one disfigurement of his manly beauty. Now, he walked calmly and solemnly and resigned, as one might walk who followed another to his grave instead of as one who, with every step he took, drew nearer to his own.

Behind him came the woman he loved, the woman who loved him so, the woman whose eyes were fixed upon him as he preceded her and who, it seemed to those who were in a position to observe her, would have drawn closer to him had it been possible.

But still there were the others. Fleur de Mai, big, stalwart, burly, marching with a firm, well-assured step; with an eye that seemed to roam in pride and satisfaction over the vast crowd that was assembled there to see them die; with lips pursed out as though in contempt of what he was about to suffer.

Last of all came Van den Enden, supported, almost dragged along, between two jailers, and muttering as he went: "An old man. So old. So old and feeble!"

That the crowd should make its comments even at such a moment of supreme solemnity was not to be doubted, and that those comments should come principally from the female portion of it was equally certain. The men, excepting only those of the more base and contemptible kind, were mostly silent while, perhaps, feeling within their hearts some satisfaction that the two principal sufferers of their own sex were representing that sex so fearlessly.

From the women there issued, however, almost universal sobbing and weeping, coupled with many exclamations on the splendid bearing of De Beaurepaire as well as the resignation and calm, placid beauty of his companion. "How pale yet brave she is," some said. "How happy she should be to die with him-by his side," said others.

All were now at the foot of the scaffold, Van den Enden going on to the gallows waiting for him, where, when the heads of the others were struck off, he would be hanged. Already the executioner's chief assistant had commenced to cut off the hair from the back of the head and neck of Emérance; another was tucking the long locks of Fleur de Mai up above his neck and tying it with a piece of cord, while the headsman, observing that De Beaurepaire's wavy hair was cut quite short behind, muttered that "it would not interfere."

"Has monseigneur a piece of this to spare?" he asked, pointing to the dark ribbon with which De Beaurepaire's jacket was tied in front.

"Nay," the doomed man said quietly, while uttering the words which were long afterwards remembered and, when repeated to his mother, brought some solace to her bruised heart. "Nay. Bind me with cord. He Who never sinned was thus bound; shall I go to my death better than He?" Then, putting his purse into the man's hand, he said: "Strike quick and hard. Also be merciful to her," turning his eyes towards Emérance as he spoke.

"Never fear," the man said under his breath.

By this time the others were ready. La toilette des morts was made for all. The hair was now all cut away from the neck of Emérance; the executioner had gently turned down the collar of her white robe so that her neck was bare to her shoulders, her wrists were tied together behind. As regards Fleur de Mai, he also was prepared and stood calmly regarding the enormous concourse of people, as though endeavouring to discover among it some friends or acquaintances who might be able to testify how he had died. Later, when the executioner was interrogated by La Reynie as to the events of that day, the man stated that Fleur de Mai hummed a tune as he was being made ready.

It had been ordained that De Beaurepaire's head was to fall first, Fleur de Mai's the second, and that of Emérance the third, and, though the latter had pleaded against this refinement of cruelty to a woman, she was told that her prayer to be executed first could not be granted.

And now the time had come.

With a touch of his hand, a glance of his eyes through the hideous mask he wore, the executioner motioned each to their respective blocks. Fleur de Mai was placed before the outer block on the right of the scaffold, Emérance before the extreme one on the left, De Beaurepaire between them.

"Altesse," the headsman whispered. "It is the moment."

Amidst a silence such as perhaps no crowd-perhaps no French crowd! – had ever before maintained, De Beaurepaire turned towards the woman he had learnt to love so fondly.

"Adieu," he whispered, bending down to her so that, for the last time in life, their lips met-embrace they could not, since their hands were tied behind their backs. "Adieu for ever, ma adorée."

But from her lips as they met his, the word "Adieu" did not proceed, but, instead, the word "Wedded." As she spoke he saw that she smiled at him.

Advancing now towards the block, he was about to kneel by it; with a sign from his eyes he signalled to the executioner's assistant to give him his hand to assist him in doing so, when, to his astonishment, as well as to that of all in the vast concourse, De Brissac's powerful voice rang out on the dense silence. From his lips were heard to issue the order: "Stop. Defer your task. Proceed no farther in it as yet."

As he thus commanded, his eyes, glancing over the head of the crowd from where he sat above them on his horse, were directed towards a man clad in the soutane of a priest, one who was frantically waving a paper in the air. A priest who was seated by the side of the coachman on the box of one of the royal carriages.

"What does this mean?" De Beaurepaire asked in a hoarse tone, while, as he did so, his eyes were directed towards Emérance who had reeled back as she heard De Brissac's stern command and was now supported by one of the monks who had followed the condemned on to the scaffold. In that look he saw that she was white as marble, that her eyes had in them a strange unnatural glance, a glance perceptible even through their half-closed lids.

"Has the King relented at the last moment?" De Brissac muttered to himself. After which he cried to his men: "Make way through your ranks for the Reverend Father. Let him approach at once. It is," he whispered to the officer nearest to him, "the King's Confessor."

This order was easily to be obeyed in so far as the troops were concerned, but more difficult of accomplishment as regarded the crowd behind them. Nor-since it must be told! – was the majority of that crowd very willing to see any interruption of le spectacle take place. They had stood here since the November dawn had broken, wet, cold and foggy to observe three men and a woman die, and now, it would appear, they were to be baulked of their sport.

Moreover, there was happening to them that which has always been, and still is, obnoxious to a large multitude of Parisians gathered together, either for their amusement or for the gratification of a sickly, a neurotic curiosity. The troops were dominating them; they were being dispersed, pushed away at the very moment when the great tableau was to have been presented to their gaze. Slowly backing their horses, the troopers of the Garde du Roi and of the two corps of Mousquetaires were driving back, and, above all, parting the mass of spectators; in a few moments the closely serried gathering was split apart-the priest escorted by some of the men of the Regiment de Rouen was nearing the steps of the scaffold.

"It is an infamy," many in the great gathering muttered. "Has the Splendid one become a Nero?" exclaimed others. "It is torture to them and an insult to us," said still more. "In what days are we living?" While one or two exclaimed, "It has never been done before."

"You are wrong, my son," the priest said, overhearing this last remark and turning round to look at one of the speakers. "I myself have stood on the scaffold and seen a man reprieved, set free; a man to whom I had already given the last absolution. And your mother could not have paid for you to learn the history of your own country. Did you never hear of Saint Vallier, father of Diane de Poitiers, who was spared as he stood on the scaffold through her prayers to the King, even as this man is saved from death-but death alone-through the prayers of his mother to our King?"

"His mother!" many of the dispersed assembly muttered now, a different chord struck by that word so sacred to all French. "His mother. Ah! Grand Dieu, c'est autre chose. His mother has saved him! The King has a heart within his bosom. Vive le Roi!"

By now the priest was upon the scaffold, the paper he had waved in the air was in the hands of the Lieutenant du Roi, who was scanning it hurriedly, A moment later he turned round to some of his warders and said: "Remove the Prince de Beaurepaire. His life is spared. To-morrow he goes to-"