The Man in Black.

by Stanley J. Weyman.

CHAPTER I.

The Fair At Fecamp.

"I am Jehan de Bault, Seigneur of--I know not where, and Lord of seventeen lordships in the County of---I forget the name, of a most n.o.ble and puissant family, possessing the High Justice, the Middle, and the Low. In my veins runs the blood of Roland, and of my forefathers were three marshals of France. I stand here, the----"

It was the eve of All Saints, and the famous autumn horse-fair was in progress at Fecamp--Fecamp on the Normandy coast, the town between the cliffs, which Boisrose, in the year '93, s.n.a.t.c.hed for the Great King by a feat of audacity unparalleled in war. This only by the way, however; and that a worthy deed may not die. For at the date of this fair of which we write, the last day of October, 1637, stout Captain Boisrose, whom Sully made for his daring Lieutenant-General of the Ordnance, had long ceased to ruffle it; the Great King had lain in his grave a score of years or more; and though Sully, duke and peer and marshal, still lived, an aged, formal man, in his chateau of Villebon by Chartres, all France, crouching under the iron hand of the Cardinal, looked other ways.

The great snarled, biting at the hem of the red soutane. But that the mean and Jacques Bonhomme, the merchant and the trader, flourished under his rule, Fecamp was as good evidence this day as man could desire. Even old burghers who remembered Charles the Ninth, and the first gla.s.s windows ever seen in Fecamp outside the Abbey, could not say when the price of horses had been higher or the town more full. All day, and almost all night, the clatter of hoofs and babble of bargains filled the narrow streets; while hucksters' cries and drunkards' oaths, with all raucous sounds, went up to heaven like the smoke from a furnace. The Chariot d'Or and the Holy Fig, haunts of those who came to buy, fairly hummed with guests, with n.o.bles of the province and gay sparks from Rouen, army contractors from the Rhine, and dealers from the south. As for the Dame Belle and the Green Man, houses that lower down the street had food and forage for those who came to sell, they strewed their yards a foot deep with straw, and saying to all alike, "Voila, monsieur!" charged the full price of a bed.

Beyond the streets it was the same. Strings of horses and ponies, with an army of grooms and chaunters, touts and cutpurses, camped on every piece of level ground, while the steeper slopes and hill-sides swarmed with troupes more picturesque, if less useful. For these were the pitches of the stilt-walkers and funambulists, the morris dancers and hobby-horses: in a word, of an innumerable company of quacks, jugglers, poor students, and pasteboard giants, come together for the delectation of the gaping Normans, and all under the sway and authority of the Chevalier du Guet, in whose honour two gibbets, each bearing a creaking corpse, rose on convenient situations overlooking the fair. For brawlers and minor sinners a pillory and a whipping-post stood handy by the landward gate, and from time to time, when a l.u.s.ty vagrant or a handsome wench was dragged up for punishment, outvied in attraction all the professional shows.

Of these, one that seemed as successful as any in catching and chaining the fancy of the shifting crowd consisted of three persons--a man, a boy, and an ape--who had chosen for their pitch a portion of the steep hill-side overhanging the road. High up in this they had driven home an iron peg, and stretching a cord from this to the top of a tree which stood on the farther edge of the highway, had improvised a tight-rope at once simple and effective. All day, as the changing throng pa.s.sed to and fro below, the monkey and the boy might be seen twisting and turning and posturing on this giddy eminence, while the man, fantastically dressed in an iron cap a world too big for him, and a back- and breast-piece which ill-matched his stained crimson jacket and taffety breeches, stood beating a drum at the foot of the tree, or now and again stepped forward to receive in a ladle the sous and eggs and comfits that rewarded the show.

He was a lean, middle-sized man, with squinting eyes and a crafty mouth. Unaided he might have made his living by cutting purses. But he had the wit to do by others what he could not do himself, and the luck to have that in his company which pleased all comers; for while the clowns gazed saucer-eyed at the uncouth form and hideous grimaces of the ape, the thin cheeks and panting lips of the boy touched the hearts of their mistresses, and drew from them many a cake and fairing. Still, with a crowd change is everything; and in the contest of attractions, where there was here a flying dragon and there a dancing bear, and in a place apart the mystery of Joseph of Arimathaea and the Sacred Fig-tree was being performed by a company that had played before the King in Paris--and when, besides all these raree shows, a score of quacks and wizards and collar-grinners with lungs of bra.s.s, were advertising themselves amid indescribable clanging of drums and squeaking of trumpets, it was not to be expected that a boy and a monkey could always hold the first place. An hour before sunset the ladle began to come home empty. The crowd grew thin. Gargantuan roars of laughter from the players' booth drew off some who lingered. It seemed as if the trio's run of success was at an end; and that, for all the profit they were still likely to make, they might pack up and be off to bed.

But Master Crafty Eyes knew better. Before his popularity quite flickered out he produced a folding stool. Setting it at the foot of the tree with a grand air, which of itself was enough to arrest the waverers, he solemnly covered it with a red cloth. This done, he folded his arms, looked very sternly two ways at once, and raising his hand without glancing upwards, cried, "Tenez! His Excellency the Seigneur de Bault will have the kindness to descend."

The little handful of gapers laughed, and the laugh added to their number. But the boy, to whom the words were addressed, did not move. He sat idly on the rope, swaying to and fro, and looked out straight before him, with a set face, and a mutinous glare in his eyes. He appeared to be about twelve years old. He was lithe-limbed, and burned brown by the sun, with a ma.s.s of black hair and, strange to say, blue eyes. The ape sat cheek by jowl with him; and even at the sound of the master's voice turned to him humanly, as if to say, "You had better go."

Still he did not move. "Tenez!" Master Crafty Eyes cried again, and more sharply. "His Excellency the Seigneur de Bault will have the kindness to descend, and narrate his history. ecoutez! ecoutez! mesdames et messieurs! It will repay you."

This time the boy, frowning and stubborn, looked down from his perch. He seemed to be measuring the distance, and calculating whether his height from the ground would save him from the whip. Apparently he came to the conclusion it would not, for on the man crying "Vitement! Vitement!" and flinging a grim look upwards, he began to descend slowly, a sullen reluctance manifest in all his movements.

On reaching the ground, he made his way through the audience--which had increased to above a score--and climbed heavily on the stool, where he stood looking round him with a dark shamefacedness, surprising in one who was part of a show, and had been posturing all day long for the public amus.e.m.e.nt. The women, quick to espy the hollows in his cheeks, and the great wheal that seamed his neck, and quick also to admire the straightness of his limbs and the light pose of his head, regarded him pitifully. The men only stared; smoking had not yet come in at Fecamp, so they munched cakes and gazed by turns.

"Oyez! Oyez! Oyez!" cried the man with the drum. "Listen to the remarkable, lamentable, and veritable history of the Seigneur de Bault, now before you! Oyez!"

The boy cast a look round, but there was no escape. So, sullenly, and in a sing-song tone--through which, nevertheless, some note of dignity, some strange echo of power and authority, that gave the recital its bizarre charm and made it what it was, would continually force itself--he began with the words at the head of this chapter:-- "I am Jehan de Bault, Seigneur of--I know not where, and Lord of seventeen lordships in the County of--I forget the name, of a most n.o.ble and puissant family, possessing the High Justice, the Middle, and the Low. In my veins runs the blood of Roland, and of my forefathers were three marshals of France. I stand here, the last of my race; in token whereof may G.o.d preserve my mother, the King, France, and this Province! I was stolen by gypsies at the age of five, and carried off and sold by my father's steward, as Joseph was by his brethren, and I appeal to--I appeal to--all good subjects of France to--help me to----"

"My rights!" interjected Crafty Eyes, with a savage glance.

"My rights," the boy whispered, lowering his head.

The drum-man came forward briskly. "Just so, ladies and gentlemen," he cried with wonderful glibness. "And seldom as it is that you have before you the representative of one of our most n.o.ble and ancient families a-begging your help, seldom as that remarkable, lamentable, and veritable sight is to be seen in Fecamp, sure I am that you will respond willingly, generously, and to the point, my lord, ladies and gentlemen!" And with this, and a far grander air than when it had been merely an affair of a boy and an ape, the knave carried round his ladle, doffing his cap to each who contributed, and saying politely, "The Sieur de Bault thanks you, sir. The Sieur de Bault is your servant, madam."

There was something so novel in the whole business, something so odd and inexplicably touching in the boy's words and manner, that with all the appearance of a barefaced trick, appealing only to the most ignorant, the thing wrought on the crowd: as doubtless it had wrought on a hundred crowds before. The first man to whom the ladle came grinned sheepishly and gave against his will; and his fellows throughout maintained a position of reserve, shrugging their shoulders and looking wisdom. But a dozen women became believers at once, and despite the blare and flare of rival dragons and Moriscoes and the surrounding din and hubbub, the ladle came back full of deniers and sous.

The showman was counting his gains into his pouch, when a silver franc spun through the air and fell at his feet, and at the same time a harsh voice cried, "Here, you, sirrah! A word with you."

Master Crafty Eyes looked up, and doffing his cap humbly--for the voice was a voice of authority--went cringing to the speaker. This was an elderly man, well mounted, who had reined up his horse on the skirts of the crowd as the boy began his harangue. He had a plain soldier's face, with grey moustachios and a small, pointed grey beard, and he seemed to be a person of rank on his way out of the town; for he had two or three armed servants behind him, of whom one carried a valise on his crupper.

"What is your will, n.o.ble sir?" the showman whined, standing bare-headed at his stirrup and looking up at him.

"Who taught the lad that rubbish?" the horseman asked sternly.

"No one, my lord. It is the truth."

"Then bring him here, liar!" was the answer.

The showman obeyed, not very willingly, dragging the boy off the stool, and jerking him through the crowd. The stranger looked down at the child for a moment in silence. Then he said sharply, "Hark ye, tell me the truth, boy. What is your name?"

The lad stood straight up, and answered without hesitation, "Jehan de Bault."

"Of nowhere in the County of No Name," the stranger gibed gravely. "Of a n.o.ble and puissant family--and the rest. All that is true, I suppose?"

A flicker as of hope gleamed in the boy's eyes. His cheek reddened. He raised his hand to the horse's shoulder, and answered in a voice which trembled a little, "It is true."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "THE SHOWMAN WAS COUNTING HIS GAINS INTO HIS POUCH" (p. 11).]

"Where is Bault?" the stranger asked grimly.

The lad looked puzzled and disappointed. His lip trembled, his colour lied again. He glanced here and there, and finally shook his head. "I do not know," he said faintly.

"Nor do I," the horseman replied, striking his long brown boot with his riding-switch to give emphasis to the words, and looking sternly round. "Nor do I. And what is more, you may take it from me that there is no family of that name in France! And once more you may take this from me too. I am the Vicomte de Bresly, and I have a government in Guienne. Play this game in my county, and I will have you both whipped for common cheats, and you, Master Drummer, branded as well! Bear it in mind, sirrah; and when you perform, give Perigord a wide berth. That is all."

He struck his horse at the last word, and rode off; sitting, like an old soldier, so straight in his saddle that he did not see what happened behind him, or that the boy sprang forward with a hasty cry, and would, but for the showman's grasp, have followed him. He rode away, unheeding and without looking back; and the boy, after a brief pa.s.sionate struggle with his master, collapsed.

"You limb!" the man with the drum cried, as he shook him. "What bee has stung you? You won't be quiet, eh? Then take that! and that!" and he struck the child brutally in the face--twice.

Some cried shame and some laughed. But it was n.o.body's business, and there were a hundred delights within sight. What was one little boy, or a blow more or less, amid the whirl and tumult of the fair? A score of yards away a dancing girl, a very Peri--or so she seemed by the light of four tallow candles--was pirouetting on a rickety platform. Almost rubbing elbows with her was a philosopher, who had conquered all the secrets of Nature except cleanliness, and was prepared to sell infallible love-philtres and the potion of perpetual youth--for four farthings! And beyond these stretched a vista of wonders and prodigies, all vocal, not to say deafening. So one by one, with a shrug or a sneer, the onlookers melted away, until only our trio remained: Master Crafty Eyes counting his gains, the boy sobbing against the bank on which he had thrown himself, and the monkey gibbering and chattering overhead--a dark shapeless object on an invisible rope. For night was falling: where the fun of the fair was not were gloom and a rising wind, lurking cutpurses, and waste land.

The showman seemed to feel this, for having counted his takings, he kicked up the boy and began to pack up. He had nearly finished, and was stooping over the coil of rope, securing the end, when a touch on his shoulder caused him to jump a yard. A tall man wrapped in a cloak, who had come up unseen, stood at his elbow.

"Well!" the showman cried, striving to hide his alarm under an appearance of bl.u.s.ter. "And what may you want?"

"A word with you," the unknown answered.

The voice was so cold and pa.s.sionless it gave Crafty Eyes a turn. "Diable!" he muttered, striving to pierce the darkness and see what the other was like. But he could not; so as to shake off the impression, he asked, with a sneer, "You are not a vicomte, are you?"

"No," the stranger replied gravely, "I am not."

"Nor the governor of a county?"

"No."

"Then you may speak!" rejoined the showman grandly.

"Not here," the cloaked man answered. "I must see you alone."

"Then you will have to come home with me, and wait until I have put up the boy," the other said. "I am not going to lose him for you or anyone. And for a penny he'd be off! Does it suit you? You may take it or leave it."

The unknown, whose features were completely masked by the dusk, nodded a.s.sent, and without more ado the four turned their faces towards the streets; the boy carrying the monkey, and the two men following close on his heels. Whenever they pa.s.sed before a lighted booth the showman strove to learn something of his companion's appearance but the latter wore his cloak so high about his face, and was so well served by a wide-flapped hat which almost met it, that curiosity was completely baffled; and they reached the low inn where the showman rented a corner of the stable without that cunning gentleman being a jot the wiser for his pains.

It was a vile, evil-smelling place they entered, divided into six or eight stalls by wooden part.i.tions reaching half-way to the tiles. A horn lantern hung at each end filled it with yellow lights and deep shadows. A pony raised its head and whinnied as the men entered, but most of the stalls were empty, or tenanted only by drunken clowns sleeping in the straw.

"You cannot lock him in here," said the stranger, looking round him.

The showman grunted. "Cannot I?" he said. "There are tricks in all trades, master. I reckon I can--with this!" And producing from somewhere about him a thin steel chain, he held it before the other's face. "That is my lock and door," he said triumphantly.

"It won't hold him long," the other answered impa.s.sively. "The fifth link from the end is worn through now."

"You have sharp eyes!" the showman exclaimed, with reluctant admiration. "But it will hold a bit yet. I fasten him in yonder corner. Do you wait here, and I will come back to you."

He was not long about it. When he returned he led the stranger into the farthest of the stalls, which, as well as that next to it, was empty. "We can talk here," he said bluntly. "At any rate, I have no better place. The house is full. Now, what is it?"

"I want that boy," the tall man answered. The showman laughed--stopped laughing--laughed again. "I dare say you do," he said derisively. "There is not a better or a pluckier boy on the rope out of Paris. And for patter? There is nothing on the road like the bit he did this afternoon, nor a bit that pays as well."

"Who taught it him?" the stranger asked.

"I did."

"That is a lie," the other answered in a perfectly unmoved tone. "If you like I will tell you what you did. You taught him the latter half of the story. The other he knew before: down to the word 'province.'"

The showman gasped. "Diable!" he muttered. "Who told you?"

"Never mind. You bought the boy. From whom?"

"From some gypsies at the great fair of Beaucaire," the showman answered sullenly.

"Who is he?"

Crafty Eyes laughed dryly. "If I knew I should not be padding the hoof," he said. "Or, again, he may be n.o.body, and the tale patter. You have heard as much as I have. What do you think?"

"I think I shall find out when I have bought the boy," the stranger answered coolly. "What will you take for him?"

The showman gasped again. "You come to the point," he said.

"It is my custom. What is his price?"

The showman's imagination had never soared beyond nor his ears ever heard of a larger sum than a thousand crowns. He mentioned it trembling. There might be such a sum in the world.

"A thousand livres, if you like. Not a sou more," was the answer.

The nearer lantern threw a strong light on Crafty Eyes' face; but that was mere shadow beside the light of cupidity which sparkled in his eyes. He could get another boy; scores of boys. But a thousand livres! A thousand livres! "Tournois!" he said faintly. "Livres Tournois!" In his wildest moments of avarice he had never dreamed of possessing such a sum.

"No, Paris livres," the stranger answered coldly. "Paid to-morrow at the Golden Chariot. If you agree, you will deliver the boy to me there at noon, and receive the money."

The showman nodded, vanquished by the mere sound of the sum. Paris livres let it be. Danae did not more quickly succ.u.mb to the golden shower.

CHAPTER II.

SOLOMON NoTREDAME.

A little later that night, at the hour which saw the showman pay his second visit to the street before the Chariot d'Or, there to stand gaping at the lighted windows, and peering into the courtyard in a kind of fascination--or perhaps to a.s.sure himself that the house would not fly away, and his golden hopes with it--the twelve-year-old boy, the basis of those hopes, awoke and stirred restlessly in the straw. He was cold, and the chain galled him. His face ached where the man had struck him. In the next stall two drunken men were fighting, and the place reeked with oaths and foulness. But none of these things were so novel as to keep the boy awake; and sighing and drawing the monkey nearer to him, he would in a moment have been asleep again if the moon, shining with great brightness through the little square aperture above him, had not thrown its light directly on his head, and roused him more completely.

He sat up and gazed at it, and G.o.d knows what softening thoughts and pitiful recollections the beauty of the night brought into his mind; but presently he began to weep--not as a child cries, with noise and wailing, but in silence, as a man weeps. The monkey awoke and crept into his breast, but he hardly regarded it. The misery, the hopelessness, the slavery of his life, ignored from hour to hour, or borne at other times with a boy's nonchalance, filled his heart to bursting now. Crouching in his lair in the straw, he shook with agony. The tears welled up, and would not be restrained, until they hid the face of the sky and darkened even the moon's pure light.

Or was it his tears? He dashed them away and looked, and rose slowly to his feet; while the ape, clinging to his breast, began to mow and gibber. A black ma.s.s, which gradually resolved itself, as the boy's eyes cleared, into a man's hat and head, filled the aperture.

"Hush!" came from the head in a cautious whisper. "Come nearer. I will not hurt you. Do you wish to escape, lad?"

The boy clasped his hands in an ecstasy. "Yes, oh yes!" he murmured. The question chimed in so naturally with his thoughts, it scarcely surprised him.

"If you were loose, could you get through this window?" the man asked. He spoke cautiously, under his breath; but the noise in the next stall, to say nothing of a vile drinking song which was being chanted forth at the farther end of the stable, was such he might safely have shouted. "Yes? Then take this file. Rub at the fifth link from the end: the one that is nearly through. Do you understand, boy?"

"Yes, yes," Jehan cried again, groping in the straw for the tool, which had fallen at his feet. "I know."

"When you are loose, cover up the chain," continued the other in a slow biting tone. "Or lie on that part of it, and wait until morning. As soon as you see the first gleam of light, climb out through the window. You will find me outside."

The boy would have uttered his trembling thanks. But lo! in a moment the aperture was clear again; the moon sailed unchanged through an unchanged sky; and all was as before. Save for the presence of the little bit of rough steel in his hand, he might have thought it a dream. But the file was there; it was there, and with a choking sob of hope and fear and excitement, he fell to work on the chain.

It was clumsy work he made of it in the dark. But the link was so much worn, a man might have wrenched it open, and the boy did not spare his fingers. The dispute next door covered the song of the file; and the smoky horn lantern which alone lighted that end of the stable had no effect in the dark corner where he lay. True, he had to work by feel, looking out all the while for his tyrant's coming; but the tool was good, and the fingers, hardened by many an hour of work on the rope, were strong and lithe. When the showman at last stumbled to his place in the straw, the boy lay free--free and trembling.

All was not done, however. It seemed an hour before the man settled himself--an hour of agony and suspense to Jehan, feigning sleep; since at any moment his master might take it into his head to look into things. But Crafty Eyes had no suspicion. Having kicked the boy and heard the chain rattle, and so a.s.sured himself that he was there--so much caution he exercised every night, drunk or sober--he was satisfied; and by-and-by, when his imagination, heated by thoughts of wealth, permitted it, he fell asleep, and dreamed that he had married the Cardinal's cook-maid and ate collops on Sundays.

Even so, the night seemed endless to the boy, lying wakeful, with his eyes on the sky. Now he was hot, now cold. One moment the thought that the window might prove too strait for him threw him into a bath of perspiration; the next he shuddered at the possibility of re-capture, and saw himself dragged back and flayed by his brutal owner. But a watched pot does boil, though slowly. The first streak of dawn came at last--as it does when the sky is darkest; and with it, even as the boy rose warily to his feet, the sound of a faint whistle outside the window.

A common mortal could no more have pa.s.sed through that window without noise than an old man can make himself young again. But the boy did it. As he dropped to the ground outside he heard the whistle again. The air was still dark; but a score of paces away, beyond a low wall, he made out the form of a horseman, and went towards it.

It was the man in the cloak, who stooped and held out his hand. "Jump up behind me," he muttered.

The boy went to obey, but as he clasped the outstretched hand, it was suddenly withdrawn. "What is that? What have you got there?" the rider exclaimed, peering down at him.

"It is only Taras, the monkey," Jehan said timidly.

"Throw it away," the stranger answered. "Do you hear me?" he continued in a stern, composed tone. "Throw it away, I say."

The boy stood hesitating a moment; then, without a word, he turned and fled into the darkness the way he had come. The man on the horse swore under his breath, but he had no remedy; and before he could tell what to expect, the boy was at his side again. "I've put it through the window," Jehan explained breathlessly. "If I had left it here, the dogs and the boys would have killed it."

The man made no comment aloud, but jerked him roughly to the crupper; and bidding him hold fast, started the horse, which, setting off at an easy amble, quickly bore them out of Fecamp. As they pa.s.sed through the fair-ground of yesterday--a shadowy, ghastly waste at this hour, peopled by wandering a.s.ses, and packhorses, and a few lurking figures that leapt up out of the darkness, and ran after them whining for alms--the boy shivered and clung close to his protector. But he had no more than recognised the scene before they were out of sight of it, and riding through the open fields. The grey dawn was spreading, the c.o.c.ks at distant farms were crowing. The dim, misty countryside, the looming trees, the raw air, the chill that crept into his ill-covered bones--all these, which might have seemed to others wretched conditions enough, filled the boy with hope and gladness. For they meant freedom.