The Scourge of God 21 – Bloundelle-Burton · Verses Across
Literature · Historical Fiction
The Scourge of God 21Chapter 21
18
Literature · Historical Fiction
The Scourge of God 21
Chapter 21
Bloundelle-BurtonEnglish
"YOU WILL NEVER FIND HIM."
"When you and your charge, Mademoiselle Ducaire, have left us you will betray no secrets," Cavalier had said to Martin, as they stood side by side watching the army of Montrevel on its way through the province? Yet some weeks passed, and still they remained in the hands of the Camisards, well treated, yet still there.
For their accommodation two large caverns had been prepared as sleeping rooms; prepared, too, in such a manner as would indeed have astonished the Camisards' enemies, the dwellers in the valleys below, had they been able to observe them. To observe that Urbaine's chamber--if such a name could be given to the vault in which she slept--was furnished not only with comfort, but indeed luxury, her bed, which had been constructed expressly for her by one of the attroupés who was a carpenter, being covered with fine white linen and made soft with skins and rugs. Also the sides of the vault were hung with tapestry and brocade; the ewer from which she poured water was solid silver; the floor on which she trod was covered with carpets made at Aubusson. Yet the girl shuddered as, nightly, daily, she glanced round this luxuriously furnished cavern, knowing full well, or at least being perfectly able to divine, whence all these things came; for none who had ever knelt, as Urbaine had done since her earliest recollection, at the altar of any church of the Ancient Faith could doubt that that silver jug had been torn from some such altar which had been devastated with the edifice itself; none who had seen the luxurious fittings and adornments of the noblesse of Languedoc could doubt that the tapestries and hangings and rich fine linen had once adorned the château of Catholic noblemen or gentlemen. Everything which surrounded her, all--even to the choice plate off which they both ate their meals, and the crystal glass from which they drank the Ginestoux and Lunel placed before them--told the same story; the story of robbery and pillage, of an awakened vengeance that spared nothing and hesitated at nothing.
Both, too, were free now, free to wander on the mountain slopes, no parole being demanded, since escape was impossible through those closely guarded paths and defiles, a little mule being at the girl's service when she chose to use it, an animal which had been captured from Julien's forces during a defeat sustained by him and while bearing on its back two mountain guns. Now those guns guarded, with other captured cannon, one of the approaches from the valley, and the mule was given over entirely to her service. Yet she rarely rode it, preferring, indeed, to sit upon a high promontory whence, at sunset, she could see the spires of distant cathedrals or churches sparkling far down in the valley, sometimes with Martin by her side, sometimes alone.
"Monsieur," she said to him now one crisp, sunny October afternoon as together they strolled toward this promontory to watch the sunset, "monsieur, why do you not go away, return to your own land? You will have the chance soon to escape out of France forever. You heard what the chief said last night, that an English agent was at Nîmes endeavouring to discover what chance the fleet in the Mediterranean will have of invading us there."
"You forget, mademoiselle. I am in their power; you forget that----"
"Nay," she exclaimed, "why speak thus? I know that you are free to go to-morrow, to-night; that you might have gone long since had you chosen. That you remain here only because you will not leave me alone in their power. I know, I understand," and the soft, clear eyes stole a glance into his.
"I saved you once, by God's mercy," he said. "I shall not leave you now. Not until I return you to your father's arms. And take heart! It will not be long. Whether Montrevel or my countrymen effect a landing from the sea, you will be soon free. If the former happens, it will be a rescue; if the latter, you will be detained no longer, since they deem you beyond all doubt a Protestant."
"The woman was mistaken," she answered. "It is impossible."
"Yet Cavalier thinks he has confirmation of the fact. You know that he has been in the valleys lately, even in Montpellier, disguised. He has met one, an old woman, who knew Monsieur Ducaire, your real father. You know that?"
"She has said so, yet I deem it impossible. Who is this woman?"
"She will not say. But he seems confident. And--and--even though my religion is so hateful to you--think, think, I beseech you, of what advantage to you it is to be deemed here one of our faith. Mademoiselle, if that strange seer, that prophetess whose knowledge astounds, mystifies me, had not proclaimed you one of them and a Protestant, you would have been dead by now," and he shuddered as he spoke.
"You wrong me," she said, "when you say that the Protestant--that your--faith is hateful to me. It is only that I have been taught from my earliest days to believe so strongly in my own, to regard nothing as true but that. Also," she continued, "because it is yours, the religion of you who have saved me, it could never be hateful to me."
And as she spoke the soft rose-blush came to her cheek and her eyes fell. To her, and to Cavalier, Martin Ashurst had given a full account of himself, concealing nothing, and at last not even hesitating to avow himself an Englishman, a fact which, if known in any other part of Louis' dominions but this Protestant and rebel stronghold, would have led to his instant destruction. For England was pressing France sorely now, trampling her under the iron heel of the vast armies headed by Marlborough, attacking her on every coast she possessed, even now sending a fleet under Sir Cloudesley Shovel to attempt a landing at Cette and Toulon to succour and aid the Huguenots. Also it was to her principally that France's cruelly-used subjects had been fleeing for years, by her that they had been warmly welcomed and humanely treated. What hopes of anything short of a swift and awful death could an Englishman hope for at this time if caught in France?
Yet that he was safe in telling Urbaine Ducaire who and what he was he never doubted, even though she, in her turn, should tell Baville; for, since he meant himself to restore her to Baville's arms, it was not too much to suppose that this restoration would cancel the awful crime, in the eyes of the man who cherished this girl so, of being a British subject.
Also he had told both of what had brought him to Languedoc--his quest for the last of the de Rochebazons--and of how that quest had failed up to now, must fail entirely, since it was impossible that any investigations could be carried on in the distracted state of the province at the present time. Nor did Cavalier, whose mind would have better become a man of forty than one of twenty, give him any encouragement to hope that he would ever find the man he sought.
"For, figurez vous," he remarked, "this land, this sweet, fair Languedoc, has been a prey to dissension, slaughter, upon one side only up till now" (and he laughed grimly as he spoke, perhaps at the change which had come about), "to misery and awful wrongs for how long? Long before this present king--this Dieudonné, this Roi Soleil--came to the throne, and when his father Le Juste was harrying our fathers. Le Juste!" he repeated with bitter scorn, "Le Juste! A man who had a hundred virtues that became a valet--witness his love for shaving his courtiers, for larding his own fillets of veal, for combing his mignon's wigs--and not one that became a master, a king, except dissimulation! My God! he had that royal gift, at least. You know what he and that devil incarnate, Richelieu, did here in the south, did at Rochelle?"
"I know," Martin replied. "Alas! all the world knows. Yet it must have been after his time that Cyprien de Beauvilliers, as he then was, came here."
"If he came," said Cavalier, "he came under another guise, a mask; under another name. And it is long ago; you will never find him."
"I fear not."
"Moreover, even should you do so, of what avail to you, to him? Will Louis disgorge the de Rochebazon wealth, will the Church of Rome release one dernier of what she has clutched? Monsieur, you have flung your fortune away for a shadow, a chimera, since you yourself will never get it now. Better have taken it, have got back to your own land, have enjoyed it in peace."
"It would have been treachery to the dead--to her who believed in me and died deeming that I was a true child of her own faith. And," he added, "she was a good woman in spite of that faith."
Cavalier glanced at him, then shrugged his shoulders. Yet as he turned away he muttered:
"I begin to understand why your country is so great, so prosperous. Understand! if all Englishmen are like you."
That conversation was not to end thus, however, with a delicate compliment to Martin's honour, since, ere Cavalier had strode many paces from him, he came back and, taking a seat by his side in the great cavern where they then were, began to talk to him about the future hopes of the Protestant cause, in Languedoc especially. "We shall win," he said, "we shall win! What we want, which after all is not much for Louis to grant, we must have: Freedom to worship as we choose, freedom from paying taxes for a Church we have revolted from, freedom to come and go out of France as we desire. Let Louis grant that and I will place at his disposal so fine a regiment that none of his dragoons or chevaux-légers shall be our superiors. None! He shall say to me what he said to Jean Bart, the sailor."
"What did he say to him?"
"He sent for Jean Bart one day at Versailles, received him among all his grinning, shoulder-shrugging courtiers, and, looking on Jean and his rough, simple comrades, said, 'Bart, mon ami, you have done more for me than all my admirals.' And I love Bart for his reply when, casting his eyes round on all the admirals and captains who stood in the throng, he answered, 'Mon Dieu! je crois bien. Without doubt! That is, if these petits crevés are your admirals and captains.'"
Martin smiled at the little story, then he said:
"I would to God your cause, my own faith, could prosper here. We have gone through much stress ourselves to make it secure and safe in England. Discarded our king, who was of the family more dearly loved in England than any that have ever sat on her throne, yet we were forced to do it. But the Protestants of England can make a stronger boast than those of your land, Monsieur Cavalier. They alone have suffered; they never retaliated as you have done."
"As we were forced to retaliate," he exclaimed, striking the table in his excitement. "My God! think of what we have suffered. And not our men alone, but our wives, our sisters, our old mothers. Have you ever seen a gray-haired woman stripped and beaten in a market place? Have you ever seen a young innocent girl stretched naked on a wheel, the shame of her exposure even more frightful than the blows of la massue? Have you ever stood on board a galley laden with Protestant slaves or smelled the burning flesh of old men at the stake? We have, we of these mountain deserts, and--and--my God!" while even as he spoke he wept, brushing the tears from his eyes fiercely, "I wonder that that girl, Urbaine Ducaire, is still alive, Protestant though she be. Wonder she is spared, since she is the loved treasure of that tiger, Baville."
"Protestant though she be!" Martin repeated. "You know that? From some surer source than the divinations, the revelations of La Grande Marie?"
"I know it," Cavalier said, facing round suddenly on him, "I know it now for certain. Ducaire was a Protestant living at Mont Joyre. I have discovered all. And I curse the discovery! For otherwise we would have repaid Baville a thousandfold for all his crimes, wrung his heartstrings as he has wrung ours for years, slaughtered his pet lamb as he has slaughtered hundreds of ours. But she is a Protestant, therefore safe."
"When will you release her, let her return to him?"
"Ho! la, la!" the other replied. "That must be thought upon. Even now she is a great hostage in our hands, a card that may win the trick. And--and--you and she are very intimate; yet can I tell you something without fear of its being repeated to her?"
"I will respect any confidence you place in me so long as it thrusts not against her welfare."
"It will not do that. Yet listen. Ere she leaves us there is something to be told her as regards Baville's friendship for her father, Ducaire. And, when she has heard that, it may be she will never wish to return to him, to set eyes on her beloved Intendant again."
"My God! What is to become of her then?"
For reply Cavalier only laughed. Then he said:
"There is always a home for any Protestant here, and she can not complain of how we have treated her. I think myself she will elect to stay with us, unless----"
"Unless?"
"Something more tempting offers," and again he laughed. "She might, monsieur will understand, fall in love. With--say--some hero."
For a moment Martin wondered if Cavalier alluded to himself; in another he knew that he did so. There was no mistaking the glance in the Camisard's eyes. But he gave him no opportunity of saying anything further on the subject, asking instead if he might be confided in with regard to the strange story which, when told to Urbaine, was to quench every spark of love and affection in her heart for Baville, the man who, with all his faults, had cherished and loved her so fondly.
"No, monsieur," Cavalier replied. "That can not be--as yet. Later you will doubtless know all, know the reason why Urbaine Ducaire should change her love for him to an undying hate. Meanwhile I have to ask a favour of you."
"A favour? What is there in my power to do?"
"This: The power to help us end this war--you, a Protestant, an Englishman."
"I can not understand. God knows I desire nothing better."
"Soit! Then aid us. Thus: The English agent is at Nîmes, disguised. He passes under the name of Flottard, and has plans for the use of your admiral, who will bring his fleet to Cette or Toulon when the time is ripe. Unfortunately, however, this man, this soi-disant Flottard, has not the French very clearly. As for us--poor weavers, carders, husbandmen--what should we know of other tongues? We can not speak a word of your language. Monsieur Martin, you are a Protestant, an Englishman. Before God I think you English the greatest of all. Help us, help us to be free without more bloodshed, to worship the Almighty as we see fit, to bow our necks no more before the Scourge of God. Help us! Help us!" he repeated, "us of your own faith."
Stirred to the heart's core by the man's appeal, though he scarce needed such impulse, every fibre in him, every drop of blood in his veins, tingling for those of his own faith, of his own loved religion, he answered quietly, saying again:
"What I can do I will," and adding, also quietly, "or die in the attempt."
