I felt the blood of anger hot in my face as I made haste to answer him:
“There are many of us, Monseigneur, who have cause to blush for the families they spring from—more cause, mayhap, than hath Gaston de Luynes.”
In my words perchance there was no offensive meaning, but in my tone and in the look which I bent upon the Cardinal there was that which told him that I alluded to his own obscure and dubious origin. He grew livid, and for a moment methought he would have struck me: had he done so, then, indeed, the history of Europe would have been other than it is to-day! He restrained himself, however, and drawing himself to the full height of his majestic figure he extended his arm towards the door.
“Go,” he said, in a voice that passion rendered hoarse. “Go, Monsieur. Go quickly, while my clemency endures. Go before I summon the guard and deal with you as your temerity deserves.”
I bowed—not without a taint of mockery, for I cared little what might follow; then, with head erect and the firm tread of defiance, I stalked out of his apartment, along the corridor, down the great staircase, across the courtyard, past the guard—which, ignorant of my disgrace, saluted me—and out into the street.
Then at last my head sank forward on my breast, and deep in thought I wended my way home, oblivious of all around me, even the chill bite of the February wind.
In my mind I reviewed my wasted life, with the fleeting pleasures and the enduring sorrows that it had brought me—or that I had drawn from it. The Cardinal said no more than truth when he spoke of having saved me from starvation. A week ago that was indeed what he had done. He had taken pity on Gaston de Luynes, the nephew of that famous Albert de Luynes who had been Constable of France in the early days of the late king's reign; he had made me lieutenant of his guards and maître d'armes to his nephews Andrea and Paolo de Mancini because he knew that a better blade than mine could not be found in France, and because he thought it well to have such swords as mine about him.
A little week ago life had been replete with fresh promises, the gates of the road to fame (and perchance fortune) had been opened to me anew, and now—before I had fairly passed that gate I had been thrust rudely back, and it had been slammed in my face because it pleased a fool to become a sot whilst in my company.
There is a subtle poetry in the contemplation of ruin. With ruin itself, howbeit, there comes a prosaic dispelling of all idle dreams—a hard, a grim, a vile reality.
Ruin! 'T is an ugly word. A fitting one to carve upon the tombstone of a reckless, godless, dissolute life such as mine had been.
Back, Gaston de Luynes! back, to the kennel whence the Cardinal's hand did for a moment pluck you; back, from the morning of hope to the night of despair; back, to choose between starvation and the earning of a pauper's fee as a master of fence!
CHAPTER II.
THE FRUIT OF INDISCRETION
Despite the dejection to which I had become a prey, I slept no less soundly that night than was my wont, and indeed it was not until late next morning when someone knocked at my door that I awakened.
I sat up in bed, and my first thought as I looked round the handsome room—which I had rented a week ago upon receiving the lieutenancy in the Cardinal's guards—was for the position that I had lost and of the need that there would be ere long to seek a lodging more humble and better suited to my straitened circumstances. It was not without regret that such a thought came to me, for my tastes had never been modest, and the house was a fine one, situated in the Rue St. Antoine at a hundred paces or so from the Jesuit convent.
I had no time, however, to indulge the sorry mood that threatened to beset me, for the knocking at my chamber door continued, until at length I answered it with a command to enter.
It was my servant Michelot, a grizzled veteran of huge frame and strength, who had fought beside me at Rocroi, and who had thereafter become so enamoured of my person—for some trivial service he swore I had rendered him—that he had attached himself to me and my luckless fortunes.
He came to inform me that M. de Mancini was below and craved immediate speech with me. He had scarce done speaking, however, when Andrea himself, having doubtless grown tired of waiting, appeared in the doorway. He wore a sickly look, the result of his last night's debauch; but, more than that, there was stamped upon his face a look of latent passion which made me think at first that he was come to upbraid me.
“Ah, still abed, Luynes?” was his greeting as he came forward.
His cloak was wet and his boots splashed, which told me both that he had come afoot and that it rained.
“There are no duties that bid me rise,” I answered sourly.
He frowned at that, then, divesting himself of his cloak, he gave it to Michelot, who, at a sign from me, withdrew. No sooner was the door closed than the boy's whole manner changed. The simmering passion of which I had detected signs welled up and seemed to choke him as he poured forth the story that he had come to tell.
“I have been insulted,” he gasped. “Grossly insulted by a vile creature of Monsieur d'Orleans's household. An hour ago in the ante-chamber at the Palais Royal I was spoken of in my hearing as the besotted nephew of the Italian adventurer.”
I sat up in bed tingling with excitement at the developments which already I saw arising from his last night's imprudence.
“Calmly, Andrea,” I begged of him, “tell me calmly.”
“Mortdieu! How can I be calm? Ough! The thought of it chokes me. I was a fool last night—a sot. For that, perchance, men have some right to censure me. But, Sangdieu! that a ruffler of the stamp of Eugène de Canaples should speak of it—should call me the nephew of an Italian adventurer, should draw down upon me the cynical smile of a crowd of courtly apes—pah! I am sick at the memory of it!”
“Did you answer him?”
“Pardieu! I should be worthy of the title he bestowed upon me had I not done so. Oh, I answered him—not in words. I threw my hat in his face.”
“That was a passing eloquent reply!”
“So eloquent that it left him speechless with amazement. He thought to bully with impunity, and see me slink into hiding like a whipped dog, terrified by his blustering tongue and dangerous reputation. But there!” he broke off, “a meeting has been arranged for four o'clock at St. Germain.”
“A meeting!” I exclaimed.
“What else? Do you think the affront left any alternative?”
“But—”
“Yes, yes, I know,” he interrupted, tossing his head. “I am going to be killed. Verville has sworn that there shall be one less of the Italian brood. That is why I have come to you, Luynes—to ask you to be my second. I don't deserve it, perhaps. In my folly last night I did you an ill turn. I unwittingly caused you to be stripped of your commission. But if I were on my death-bed now, and begged a favour of you, you would not refuse it. And what difference is there 'twixt me and one who is on his death-bed? Am I not about to die?”
“Peste! I hope not,” I made answer with more lightness than I felt. “But I'll stand by you with all my heart, Andrea.”
“And you'll avenge me?” he cried savagely, his Southern blood a-boiling. “You'll not let him leave the ground alive?”
“Not unless my opponent commits the indiscretion of killing me first. Who seconds M. de Canaples?”
“The Marquis de St. Auban and M. de Montmédy.”