CHAPTER XIV.

We must now entirely change the scene. The spot is no longer the same--the actors different. From the mountains of Savoy, the feudal castle, the lonely chapel, and the humble inn, let us turn to the capital of France, her stately palaces, and the gay and glittering hall where laughed and revelled the bright, the brave, the fair, and the witty of that splendid epoch which began with Francis the First, and ended with his immediate successor. The personages, too, have changed with the scene. The young warrior and his fair bride, the wily Italian and the supercilious and unprincipled Count de Meyrand, are no longer before us. Even good Father Willand himself is left behind, and one for whom we owe no slight affection, Corse de Leon, is, for the time, off the stage.

At the door--or rather, we may say, beyond the door, for they were not actually in the chamber--stood two of the king's guard, with their halberds resting on their shoulders, embroidered on which appeared the well-known cognisance of the salamander. They were there merely to perform the place of a living gate, barring the way against any who would enter, till such time as the orders of the king threw open the halls of the Louvre.

Henry himself, in the prime of his years, graceful, handsome, vigorous, with a countenance full of fire, but still kindly and good-humoured, stood at the farther end of the large and nearly vacant reception room, close to one of the windows, which looked out upon the river Seine, speaking with a lady, on whose appearance we may well be expected to pause for a moment. That lady was the celebrated Diana of Poitiers; and, though the period had by this time pa.s.sed by when her dazzling beauty captivated all eyes as well as those of her royal lover, she was certainly still very handsome. But she had also in her countenance an expression of power and resolution, of quickness of understanding and of sparkling vivacity, which at once displayed many of the chief points of her character. As one stood and looked at her, and saw the play of her fine features, the rapid changes, the sudden lighting up of the eyes, the occasional look of intense eagerness, the shade of momentary meditation, succeeded by the bright smile, the gay laugh, the eyes cast up to heaven, it was easy to understand what manifold powers of charming and persuading lay beneath, and to perceive that, whatever might have been at any time the mere beauty of feature and expression, the chief loveliness of that lovely countenance must ever have been in its wonderful variety.

What was it that moved her now? What was the eager scheme that she was urging upon the king with such a host of wiles, and charms, and graces, that it was hardly possible to expect that he should resist? Lo! how she hangs upon his arm with those two fair hands, and gazes up into his face with those speaking eyes! Now comes a shade of vexation over her brow.

One hand drops from his arm. Her head is partly turned away: a tear dims the eye for an instant, then leaves it brighter than before. Now, again, how merrily she laughs, with the clear, joyous, ringing laugh that we so seldom hear but from the lips of infancy; and then, again, that look of bright and eloquent thoughtfulness, while with her extended hand she argues with the monarch on some mighty theme, and carries high conviction on her lofty brow! What a wonderful picture does she form there, even at this very moment, changing by her words the destinies of Europe, and with smiles, and tears, and laughter, and high thoughts, all mingled in a wondrous antidote, curing one of those spoiled children of fortune that we call kings of that venomous and pestilential sickness, the love of war!

"Well," said the king, "well, you have triumphed. He shall have the powers, although it goes against my soul to yield anything to that cold and haughty Spaniard. What though Fortune have, with all her fickleness, left at the last a momentary balance in the scale against France, have we not already retrieved much, and are we not daily retrieving?"

"True, sire, true," replied Diana of Poitiers, "your armies are retrieving all that was once lost. But your country, sire, alas! your country is not. France suffers, France groans even, while Spain is wounded, and each blow that you strike at the enemy but injures yourself far more."

The king was about to reply, but she stopped him eagerly: "I am foolish to argue with you," she continued; "You have said I have triumphed, you have said I shall have the powers; and, though he may conquer me in argument, my Henry's word is never broken. Besides," she added, "have I not a private suit to be heard and granted also?"

"Ha!" said the king, after pausing thoughtfully for a moment or two, as if he were still unconvinced, and unwilling to leave the subject on which they had just been conversing, "ha! I had forgot! You did mention some private suit--what, I remember not now, sweet Diana. But yet it is hard even to hear of peace after defeat. Were we just hot from victory--were we flushed with triumph, and our enemy reduced to lowly supplication--then, indeed, then we might hear of terms of peace, and grant them liberally and willingly. But after this accursed battle of St. Laurence; after so total, so signal, and terrible a defeat--the constable himself taken, one half of the n.o.bility of the land wounded or slain, our soldiers scattered, and our provinces, invaded--it is bitter indeed to hear the name of peace."

"As bitter to Henry's heart," replied the lady, "as the sound of war to many another man. But you have promised, sire. You have promised Montmorency the full powers, and--you have forgotten my pet.i.tion."

"Well, well," said the king, with a sigh, "what is your pet.i.tion? I know that you have no private interest in this matter, Diana, You never were a friend to Montmorency."

The lady coloured slightly, but replied at once. "I never was his friend, sire, while haughty fortune smiled upon him, and when he urged measures harsh and injurious to the country upon your majesty; but I will own that I am his friend now, when, bearing his adversity with calmness and with dignity, he would fain persuade your majesty to that which is most necessary for the safety of your realm. So much, indeed, am I his friend, your majesty, now, that I have promised to mingle our families together by the marriage of our sweet Henrietta with his son Damville. Nay, start not, sire, I told you of this before."

"Did you?" exclaimed the king, "did you? I recollect it not. Yet now methinks I do remember something thereof; but I must have been thinking of other things. How can I consent to such a contract?" continued the king. "Recollect, dear lady! Is there not a story current of Damville, like his brother, having bound himself by a secret marriage to an Italian woman?"

"There is some tale of the kind, sire," replied the d.u.c.h.ess of Valentinois, "but I believe without foundation. Even were it so, however, sire," she continued, eagerly, "what matters it, in truth? The connexion has long ceased: the pope will annul the marriage instantly; and, not many months ago, your majesty vowed that you would give an edict rendering clandestine marriages of no effect, and declaring all illegal but such as have the full consent of the nearest surviving relative of both parties, always under your majesty's good pleasure."

"I recollect," replied the king. "The edict was drawn up, but never signed, because, as it deeply affected ecclesiastical matters, it was thought best to have the sanction of our holy father in Rome, and he made manifold objections. But that edict, even had it issued, could not affect the past."

"Your majesty will pardon me," replied the lady. "It had a clause which rendered it retrospective--at least I am so informed, in a letter which I received not many hours ago from your faithful subject the good Count of Meyrand, whom you intrusted to carry the edict to Rome. Had it not that retrospective sense," she added, eagerly, "the hopes and expectations of Montmorency and myself would both be very bitterly disappointed."

The king's brow grew somewhat cloudy, and she added suddenly, "Not for myself, sire! I speak not for myself, and with no reference to this proposed marriage between Henriette de la Mark and the young Damville.

But there is one thing for which I know the good constable has long sighed. The duke, his eldest son, is more ambitious than your majesty dreams of."

"Indeed!" said the king, with a slight smile. "What do you mean, fair lady? Is his ambition dangerous to the state?"

"Nay, nay, sire, not so," replied the d.u.c.h.ess, with a smile, seeing that the king, while affecting ignorance, in reality understood what she meant. "There is a certain lovely lady bearing the same name as my more humble self, and somewhat near to the affections of your royal person--near, even as a daughter, some men say. She has now wept for some time in widowhood; and the young Duke of Montmorency, daringly priding himself upon the royal blood that flows also in his veins, has ventured to sigh for this fair lady's hand. But the great impediment is that fatal contract which he signed with Mademoiselle de Pienne, without his father's knowledge and consent."

"I have heard something of this before," said the king, to whom the idea of uniting his natural daughter to the high race of Montmorency was not a little grateful. "But does the constable desire this marriage for his son? If so, why did he not speak long since?"

"Most humbly, sire, does he desire it," replied the lady, "and has commissioned me to sue, by every means of persuasion and entreaty, that your majesty would condescend to grant your consent to the union of his son with Madame de Farnese. He overrates my means, I know; but he does calculate that your majesty has some affection still for me, as well as some regard and esteem for him."

"Much, much for both, dear lady," replied the king; and then, falling into a fit of thought, he added, as if speaking to himself, "This marriage is most unfortunate. But that a rash boy should pay, by a whole life of celibacy and regret, for the idle folly of signing his name to a promise extracted from him by an artful woman, is indeed too much. I would fain see the draught of the edict which was proposed."

"Here is the chancellor, sire, hard by," replied the lady, pointing to a group of three or four persons who had followed her into the hall at her first entrance, but who had remained gathered together in a group at the other end of the chamber, conversing in a low voice. "Here is the chancellor, sire: perhaps he may have a copy of the edict with him now."

"Perchance he may, fair dame," replied the king, laying his hand fondly upon her shoulder, and smiling, at the same time, at the evident preparation of the whole affair, "perchance he may. Ho! my good chancellor, we would fain speak with you here a while."

At the very first word the king addressed to him, a tall and somewhat meager man, in the rich and gorgeous habit of one of the princes of the Roman Church, took a step forward from the rest of the group, and, bowing low, advanced towards the king. He was dark and pale in countenance, and his features were of an Italian cast, while a look of shrewd, calm cunning, which that cast is so well calculated to a.s.sume, was the predominant expression.

"His majesty, my Lord Cardinal," said the d.u.c.h.ess, addressing the famous John Bertrandi, and having marked well the shrewd smile upon the king's countenance, "his majesty, my Lord Cardinal, would fain see a copy of that edict referring to clandestine marriages, which was drawn up some months ago, but never signed. I besought you this morning to seek for it: has it been found?"

"I have it here, madam," replied the chancellor at once, opening a portfolio which he carried under his arm; "may I present it to your majesty:" and, selecting from among a number of papers which the portfolio contained the one that was required at the moment, he put it into the hands of Henry the Second.

The king took and read it attentively. "And is this, my lord," he demanded, "in all due form, and ready for promulgation?"

"It is, sire," replied the chancellor: "wanting nothing but your majesty's signature and the seal."

Henry paused thoughtfully. "And is it," he asked, "and is it altogether, and in all parts, in strict accordance with the laws of France?"

"_Que veut le roi, veut le loi_," replied the chancellor. "What the king wills, the law wills;" and, with that tyrannical axiom, the attempted enforcement of which, in France, has caused more bloodshed than perhaps any other line that ever was written, John Bertrandi satisfied his conscience in sanctioning that which was contrary to the true spirit of all law.

Henry himself, however, was not satisfied! Although it is so easy for base counsellors--on whom be eternal shame--to find specious arguments in favour of those things which monarchs wish, however evil; and although it certainly was the case that the King of France himself, eagerly desiring the marriage of his natural daughter with the heir of Montmorency, had potent tempters in his own bosom to second the words of Bertrandi, still he was not satisfied that the retrospective act proposed to him was right. He looked first at the cardinal; next turned his eyes for a moment to the countenance of Diana of Poitiers; smiled doubtfully, and then said, "Put it up, my Lord Cardinal, put it up! I will take one day more to consider of it. Nay, look not grieved, fair dame, it shall have favourable consideration. Forget not that both our wishes run in the same way. Now let us speak of other things, Diana. Do you come to our gay hall to-night? Nay, you must not be absent," he added, seeing that the d.u.c.h.ess looked down somewhat mournfully; "Henriette de la Mark must dance a gaillarde with her lover Damville."

"But can her lover ever be her husband?" demanded Diana, gazing reproachfully in the king's face; and then adding, with consummate skill in the management of that monarch, "It matters not! Since I have accomplished what I sought for the good of the country, even if I have failed in what I sought for my own pleasure, it matters not! My good Lord Chancellor, the king has been pleased to promise that powers shall be immediately granted to the n.o.ble constable of Montmorency to treat with Spain and with the empire for a good and perfect peace. Let it be said that this has been obtained by the solicitations of one who could obtain nothing for herself! but still, not to her honour let it be, but to the king's, inasmuch as he overcame in his own heart the love of glory and the thirst of victory for the sake of his good land of France.

Will you, sire," she continued, "will you not order the chancellor at once to expedite the powers for the good constable? It cannot be done too rapidly."

"Why so?" demanded Henry. "There is, surely, no such haste."

"Because, sire," replied the lady, "there are two great and fortunate men, whose first wish must be to change your majesty's counsels in this regard. The conqueror of Calais may well have a say in matters of peace and war. The Cardinal of Lorraine is still at your majesty's ear. The purpose may evaporate and pa.s.s away, war be continued gloriously and long, and France be ruined."

"Nay, nay," replied the king, looking at the d.u.c.h.ess reproachfully, "I am not so vacillating in my purposes. The Guises have not the influence you think."

"They have had the influence, sire," replied Diana, boldly, "they have had the influence to delay, for months, that very edict, drawn up by the orders of the king himself, for the security and protection of the French people, and to guard against the evils under which half of the n.o.ble families of France now smart, from alliances contracted in wild youth with races of inferior blood."

"The Guises had nothing to do with that--have nothing to do with it,"

replied the king, impatiently. "What interest have they in this matter?

I remember, it is true, the Cardinal of Lorraine did oppose the edict, but upon motives of general justice. What interest had he, or his brother either, for or against the edict?"

"To keep down the house of Montmorency," replied Diana of Poitiers. "To blast the expectations of the young duke, in the hopes which he, perhaps presumptuously, had entertained."

"I believe that it is so, indeed, sire," said the chancellor. "There is much reason to think that the opposition of our holy father the pope was raised up by the instigations of the Cardinal of Lorraine. You are well aware, sire, that a messenger from the cardinal outstripped even the Count de Meyrand, and that the latter gentleman found the holy father already prepared to oppose the edict."

"I will think of the matter," said the king again. "If the opposition be but factious, we will give it no head; but I would fain, before I promulgate the edict, have some cause before me to justify it, in which my own personal wishes, and yours, fair lady, are not interested. I must have time for thought upon it. Now let the doors be opened, for we have kept our court too long without."

The doors of the anteroom were accordingly thrown open. The guards, with their halberds, drew back, and in a few minutes the great hall of reception was crowded with the n.o.bles of France. While the king, with affable condescension, received his subjects, spoke with many of them, and smiled upon all, and the buzz of voices, steps, and rustling garments raised a sort of whispering murmur through the halls, the chancellor was seen speaking, in a low voice, to the d.u.c.h.ess of Valentinois; and some one who was pa.s.sing heard the latter say, "Not only that, my lord, but the abbey of St. Martin also, if we succeed. The revenues are twelve thousand crowns a year."

The chancellor bowed low, with an humble and obsequious smile, and the d.u.c.h.ess turned to speak to some one else.

CHAPTER XV.