"So be it," taking the offered hand in his own. "Listen. I believe that I am the Duke de Vannes."

"What!" exclaimed Boussac, "you the Duke de Vannes! _Mon Dieu_, monsieur, this is extraordinary. But stay. You bewilder me. Your name is St. Georges--if it is as you say, it should be De la Bresse. I knew him--your father. He died at Salzbach the same day as Turenne did. And _you believe_--do you not know? Or--or did--or was----"

"Stop there, Boussac. I can suppose what you are going to say. To ask if my mother was--well, no matter. But be sure of this: if I am what I think, I am his lawful son. His heir, and myself a De Vannes, the De Vannes."

"But 'what you think!' 'what you believe yourself to be!' Do you not know?"

"No. I may be his son, I may in truth be only Monsieur St. Georges.

Yet--yet--this attack on me and mine points to the presumption that I am what I believe myself to be. The cavalry soldier, St. Georges, and his helpless babe would not be worth waylaying, putting out of existence forever. De Vannes's heir would be."

"Only--again--you do not know. Does not a man know whose son he is?"

Chatillon still lay far off on the plain through which they were riding; the flickering flambeaux on its gate and walls were but little specks of light at present, and St. Georges decided that he would confide in the mousquetaire who had shown himself so good a friend that night. Moreover, Boussac had said he was of gentle blood; his being in the Mousquetaires proved it, since none were admitted who had not some claim to good birth--above all, he wanted a friend, a confidant. And as, in those days, there was scarcely any gulf between the officers of the inferior grades and the soldiers themselves, Boussac was well fitted to be that friend and confidant. Also he knew, he felt now, since the attack of the evening, how insecure his own life was; he recognised that at any moment the little motherless child he bore on his breast might be left alone unfriended in the world.

Suppose, for instance, he fell to-night in a second attack, or ere he reached Paris, in a week, or a month hence. Well! a mousquetaire whose princ.i.p.al duties were in Paris near the king's person would be a friend worth having!

So he told him his tale.

"My mother, a Protestant cavalier's daughter, was in Holland with her father after the execution of the king. As you know, that country was full of refugees from England. There she met my father, 'Captain St.

Georges.' But at that time De Vannes was out of favour with the court; he was allied with the party of the Fronde, also he was a Protestant.

And I believe he was 'Captain St. Georges,' I believe he was my mother's husband."

"Always you 'believe,' monsieur. Surely there must be proofs! Your mother, what does she say?"

"She died," went on St. Georges, "when I was two years old--suddenly of the plague that spread from Sardinia to many parts of Europe. It was because of her memory that I spared that fellow we have left behind from the infected grave. I would not condemn him to the death that robbed me of her."

"Therefore," exclaimed Boussac, "you gathered nothing from her!"

"Nothing. I cannot even remember her. Nay, some more years had to pa.s.s ere I, growing up, knew that my name was St. Georges. Then, as gradually intelligence dawned, I learned from the man with whom I lived, a Huguenot pastor at Montereau, that I had no mother, and that my father was a soldier who could rarely find time to come and see me.

Nay, was not often in Paris, and then not always able to make even so short a journey as that to Montereau. Yet," went on St. Georges, meditatively, "he came sometimes, loaded with presents for me which he brought in the coach, and pa.s.sed the day with us, being always addressed as Captain St. Georges by the pastor. Those were happy days, for he was always kind and good to me, would walk out with me hand in hand, would spend the day with me in the Forest of Fontainebleau, hard by, and would talk about my future. Yet he was sad, too; his eyes would fill with tears sometimes as he looked at me or stroked my hair, and always he asked me if I would be a soldier as he was. And always in reply I answered, 'Yes,' which seemed to please him. So I grew up, treated with more and more respect mingled with affection from the pastor as time went on; and, also, I was now taught military exercises and drilled in preparation for my future career. But as the time went on my father came less and less, though he never failed to send ample sums to provide for my education and also for my pleasures. When I asked the pastor why he never came near us, he said he was occupied with his profession, that he was away in the Palatinate with Turenne.

Now, at that period, I being then about eighteen, there came frequently to Paris the story of all that was doing in the Palatinate--stories that made the blood run cold to hear. Stories of villages and towns burnt, so that never more should that region send forth enemies against Louis."

"They penetrated further than Paris and Montereau," interrupted Boussac, "ay, even to our out-of-the-way part of France. And not only of villages and towns burnt and destroyed, but of fathers and breadwinners burnt in their beds, women ill treated, ruin everywhere.

There were those who said it was not war, but rapine."

"And so I said," replied St. Georges; "once even I went so far as to say that I regretted that my father followed so cruel and bloodthirsty a man as Turenne. But the pastor stopped me, rose up in his chair in anger, bade me never say another word against him--told me that I, of all alive, had least right to judge him."

"But," exclaimed Boussac, "this does not show that the duke was your father, monsieur. The worthy pastor may have thought it wrong to encourage you in speaking ill of one----"

"Nay; listen," said St. Georges. "The year 1674 arrived, my twentieth year, when there came one night my commission in the regiment--the Nivernois. You have perhaps never seen one of these doc.u.ments, Boussac, but you will ere long, I make no doubt, when your own is made out for the Mousquetaires. Therefore, I will tell you of its strange character and wording. It was that the king, at the request of the Duc de Vannes, had been graciously pleased to appoint me to the position of _porte-drapeau_ in the Nivernois under De Mailly-Sebret--a brave man, now dead--and that I was to join it in Holland. I did so, and, from that day to this, have prosecuted many inquiries as to why De Vannes should have procured me that commission. But up to now I have never received positive proof that he was my father--though still I do believe it."

"But why, why, why?" asked Boussac impatiently. "A man must have some friend who obtains him his presentation to a regiment--even I had our grand seigneur. And I never suspected _him_ of being my father!"

"Doubtless you had no reason to do so. Yet, again, listen. De Vannes was killed in 1675; in the same year--a month before him--died my old friend and protector--the one man who had ever stood in the light of a parent to me. His successor found among his papers and chattels a packet addressed to me, and forwarded it by a sure hand to Holland.

When I opened it I found therein a miniature of my mother--though I should not have known it was she had he not informed me of it--and also instructions that I should myself seek out the Duc de Vannes at the first opportunity and boldly ask him who my father was. 'For,' he wrote, 'he can tell you if he will, and he ought in justice to tell you. I would do so only the most solemn promise binds me to keep silence--a promise which, had I never given it, would have stood in the way of my ever being to you all that I have been--of having my life cheered by you, my dear, dear one.' I was preparing to seek the duke out, had obtained leave to do so and to join Turenne in the campaign, when, lo! the news came that both he and De Vannes were killed on the same day."

"And you know no more?" asked Boussac, as now the plain was pa.s.sed, and from the watch towers of Chatillon they could hear the guard being changed. And also, as they rode up to the gate, the challenge of "Who comes there?" rang out on the frosty air.

Again the usual answer was given, "Chevau-Leger" and "Mousquetaire,"

and then, while the bolts were heard creaking harshly in their sockets as the gate was being opened for them, St. Georges turning to his comrade said, in answer to his last question:

"I know no more, though still my belief is fixed. But, Boussac, she at whose manoir I am bidden to stay at Troyes--the Marquise de Roquemaure--may be able to enlighten me. She was, if all reports are true, beloved by De Vannes once, and I have heard loved him. Yet they never married--perhaps because they were of different faith--and she instead married De Roquemaure, De Vannes's cousin and heir. He left a son by his first wife, who is now that heir in his place. Boussac, does any light break in on you now--can you conceive why I and my little darling asleep under my cloak should run hourly, daily risks of a.s.sa.s.sination--ay! even as to-night we have run them?"

"_Mon Dieu!_" exclaimed Boussac, "yes. You stand in the path of----"

"Precisely. Hush! See, the gate is open. We may enter."

The soldiers of the guard saluted St. Georges as he rode in, followed by the mousquetaire, while the officer of the night, after bowing politely to him, held out his hand, as greeting to a comrade.

"Monsieur has had a cold journey, though fine--Heavens!" he exclaimed, as he saw that the other had a strange burden under his cloak, "what does monsieur carry there?"

"A harmless child," St. Georges said, while the men of the garrison gathered round to peer at the little creature whose blue eyes were now staring at them in the rays of the great lantern that swung over the gateway. "My child, whose life would have been taken to-night by five desperadoes had it not been for this honest mousquetaire who, by Heaven's providence, happened to be riding my road."

From the soldiers around the newcomers--some risen half asleep from their wooden planks in the guard room, some already on duty and with every sense awake to its utmost--there rose a murmur of indignation that was not at all extinguished by Boussac's description of the attack in the graveyard, and at the pa.s.ses made more than once at Dorine under his own guard and the _chevau-leger's_ arm.

"_Grand Dieu!_" exclaimed the officer, "five men attack two, and one burdened with a little child under his arm. Of what appearance were these a.s.sa.s.sins?"

St. Georges described them as well as he could--mentioning in particular the leader, who wore the burganet, and the fellow who skulked outside the fight--the man who, the comrades knew, had brought the news from Dijon that they were on the road. And then from all who surrounded those fresh comers there arose a hubbub, a babel of sound that drowned everything like intelligible question or answer.

"A man who wore a burganet," one cried; "a rusty thing that would have disgraced the days of the Bearnais." "_Fichte!_" hissed another, "you have come an hour too late." "'Twas but at midnight," exclaimed a third, "that he rode through--ten minutes of midnight. And, by good chance for him, it was to-night, since 'tis the last of our New-Year carousals; to-morrow the town will be closed at dusk as usual."

"But where--where is he gone?" asked St. Georges.

"_Corbleu!_" exclaimed the officer, "we had no right to ask him, since both this and the other gates were open. Yet, stay; has he left the town yet? It may be not."

"Ay! but he has, though," exclaimed a boyish young officer who at this moment joined the group. "In truth, he has. I was at the north gate as he clattered up to it, calling out that he must go through. 'And why the devil must you?' I asked, not liking the fellow's tone, which sounded hollow enough through the rusty iron pot on his head. 'I have been attacked,' he said;' nigh murdered by some ruffians, and am wounded. I must get me home.' 'And where is your home?' I asked.

'Beyond Bar,' he replied; 'for Heaven's sake, do not stop me!'

Whereon," continued the young officer, "since I had no right whatever to prevent his exit, I let him go, and a second afterward the clock struck midnight, and we clapped the gate behind him. Yet, ere that was done, I saw him spurring along the north road as though the devil, or a king's exempt, were after him."

"The north road!" St. Georges said in a low voice to Boussac. "The north road! You hear? And the north road leads to De Roquemaure's manoir."

CHAPTER VIII.

DRAWING NEAR.

Two days later, when again the wintry evening was fast approaching, St. Georges, by now alone, drew near to the ancient city of Troyes. So near, indeed, had he arrived that its walls and fortifications were plainly visible to him, and from its steeples the bells could be heard, either chiming the hour or summoning the inhabitants to evening worship. Beneath his cloak, as ever, he bore his precious burden, who showed no signs of being fatigued by the long journey she had made in so rough a fashion, but often woke up and, thrusting her little head from out the folds of the cloak, smiled up into the face of her father.

He had parted with Boussac at Bar, leaving him there surrounded by his comrades of two troops of the Mousquetaires Noirs, from whom he had received the joyful intelligence that they were soon to move on to Paris, to be quartered at Versailles, while two other troops of the "Gris" were to replace them--a piece of news that had given St.

Georges almost as much pleasure as it had done to the other. For it seemed to him that, should aught take him away from Paris when he had left the child in the house of the Sieur Blecy in the Rue de Timoleon, there was one faithful friend on whom he could rely to keep watch over it and see to its welfare.

"And be sure," said the mousquetaire, "that I will do so. Monsieur St.

Georges, we are friends now in spite of our difference in military rank; we have fought side by side; if you are not there to guard your child, I shall be. Meanwhile, prosecute your inquiries as to the rank and position--ay, and the fortune!--you believe, is yours, and may the good G.o.d put you in the right way! Farewell, monsieur, and Heaven bless you! You know where I may be communicated with; let me know also where I may send to you," and he stooped down and kissed the child ere he grasped the other's hand as he prepared to mount his horse.

"Adieu," St. Georges said, "adieu, friend. You helped me to save her life once. For that I thank you, am bound to you forever. I pray Heaven that, if she should need it, you may be by to do so again."

Whereon, with a farewell to his new friend and to several officers and men who had all testified as much interest in him and his charge as those others had done at Chatillon, he set forth once more upon another stage of his journey.