"But in our country of Bearn we all worship our mothers--with us it is a cult."

"I have noticed it," said Jean-aux-Choux. "In my country we have it also, with this difference--in Scotland it is for our children's mothers, chiefly before marriage."

But at this moment they heard the voice of the King within.

"Where is D'Aubigne? Why does he not insure quiet in the house? I have ridden far and would sleep! Surely even a king may sleep sometimes?"

"Your Majesty, it is I--Anthony Arpajon, the Calvinist, and with me is John Stirling, the Scot, called Jean-aux-Choux, the Fool of the Three Henries."

"And what does he want with this Henry--does he jest by day and sing psalms by night?"

"I have to inform Your Majesty," said Jean-aux-Choux, "that the Duke d'Epernon is below, and would see the King of Navarre."

Now there was neither blessing nor cursing. The Bearnais did not kiss the picture of his mother. A scabbard clattered on the stone floor, was caught deftly, and snapped into its place on his belt.

"Where is my other pistol? Ah, I remember--D'Aubigne took it to clean.

Lend me one of yours, Jean-aux-Choux. Is it primed and loaded?"

"He is with my lady mistress, the daughter of Francis the Scot, and with him are only the Sorbonne doctor and your cousin D'Albret for all retinue."

"Oh, ho," said Henry of Navarre, "a lady--more dangerous still. Hold the candle there, Jean-aux-Choux. I must look less like a hodman and more like a king."

And he drew from his inner pocket a little gla.s.s that fitted a frame, and a pocket-comb, with which he arranged his locks and the curls of his beard with a care at which the stout Calvinist, Anthony Arpajon, chafed and fumed.

"It is for the sake of his mother," whispered Jean in his ear, to comfort him, after the King had finished at last and signified that he was ready to descend. "She taught him that cleanliness is next to G.o.dliness," said Jean, "and now, when he is a man, the habit clings to him still."

"If he were somewhat less of a man," said the Calvinist, in the same whisper, "he would be the better king."

"Ah, wait," said Jean-aux-Choux--"wait till you have seen him on a battle-front, and you will be sure that, for all his faults, there never was a more manly man or a kinglier king!"

CHAPTER XIII.

A MIDNIGHT COUNCIL

The Bearnais met D'Epernon in the inner dining-room of Master Anthony's house. His servants had hastily lighted a few wax candles. In the waggon-littered courtyard without, a torch or two flamed murkily. With a quick burst of anger, Henry leaned from a window and bade them be extinguished. So, with a jetting of sparks on the hard-beaten earth of the courtyard, the darkness suddenly re-established itself.

There was, on the side of the Duke, some attempt at a battle of eyes.

But, after all, he had only been the little scion of a Languedocean squire when the Bearnais was already--the Bearnais.

The Duke bowed himself as if to set knee to the ground, but Henry caught him up.

"Caumont," he said, using the old boyish name by which they had known each other in their wild Paris youth, "you have never liked me. You have never been truly my friend. Why do you come to seek me now?"

The busy scheming brain behind the Valois favourite's brow was working.

He had a bluff subject to deal with, therefore he would be bluff.

"Your Majesty," he said, "there is no one in all France who wishes better to your cause, or more ill to the League than I. When you are King, you shall have no more faithful or obedient subject. But friendship, like love, is born of friendship; it comes not by command.

When the King of Navarre makes me his friend, I shall be his!"

"Spoken like a man, and no courtier," cried the Bearnais, slapping his strong hand into the white palm of D'Epernon with a report like a pistol; "I swear I shall be your friend till the day I die!"

And the Bearnais kept his word, and gave his friendship all his life to the dark, scheming, handsome man, who had served many masters in his time, but had never loved any man save himself, any woman except his wife, and any interest outside of his own pocket.

The soldiers of the Guard Royal made a rhyme which went not ill in the patois of the camp, but which goes lamely enough translated into English. Somewhat thus it ran:

"Duke Epernon and his wife, Jean Caumont and his wife, Cadet Valette and his Cadette, Louis Nogaret and _his_ wife-- If ever I wagered I would bet My pipe, my la.s.s, and eke my life, That this brave world was made and set _For Duke Epernon and his wife-- Jean Caumont and his wife, Louis Nogaret and his wife, Cadet Valette and his Cadette!_"

And so _Da Capo_--to any tune which happened to occur to them in their semi-regal license of King's free guardsmen.

Which was only the barrack and guard-room way of saying that Jean Louis de Nogaret, Cadet de la Valette, Duc d'Epernon and royal favourite, looked after the interests of a certain important numeral with some care.

"Caumont," said the King of Navarre, "how came you to know I was in this town? I arrived but an hour ago, and in disguise."

"Our spies are better than Your Majesty's," smiled the Duke. "Your true Calvinist is something too stiff in the backbone to make a capable informer. You ought to employ a few supple Politiques, accustomed to palace backstairs. But, on this occasion, I acknowledge I was favoured by circ.u.mstances. For I have with me the daughter of Francis the Scot, called Francis d'Agneau, born, I believe, of a Norman house long established in Scotland near to the Gulf of Solway. Among the saddle-bags of the damsel's pony, hastily concealed by other hands than her own (I suspect a certain red-haired fool), there was found a series of letters written by Your Majesty, which, in case they might fall into worse hands, I have the honour of returning to you. Also we found an appointment for this very night, to meet with Francis the Scot at the town of Blois in the house of Anthony Arpajon! Your Majesty has, as the Leaguers know, a habit of uncomfortable punctuality in the keeping of your trysts. So I have availed me of that to confide the letters and the maid to you, together with a good Doctor of the Sorbonne, one who has done you no mean service to the honest cause in that wasps' nest--so good, indeed, that if he went back, the Leaguers of his own hive would sting him to death. Therefore I commit them all to you! Only the young man I would gladly keep by me. But that shall be as Your Majesty judges."

"No, no," cried the King. "I must have my cousin, if only to look after.

If the Leaguers get hold of him, he might gain a throne, indeed, but a.s.suredly he would lose his head. He is a fine lad, and will do very well in the fighting line when Rosny has licked him a little into shape! But I am truly grateful to you, D'Epernon. And in the good times to come, I shall have better ways of proving my grat.i.tude than here, in the house of Anthony Arpajon and in the guise of a carter."

This was all that D'Epernon had been waiting for, and he promptly bowed himself out. The instant the Duke was through the door, the Bearnais turned to the little circle of his immediate followers.

"Who of you knows the town and Chateau of Blois? It might be worth while following the fellow, just to see if any treachery be in the wind. It may be I do him wrong. If so, I shall do him the greater right hereafter. No, not you, D'Aubigne. I could not risk you. You are my father-confessor, and task me soundly with my faults. Indeed, I might as well be a Leaguer--they say the Cardinal sets more easy penances.

Brother Guise is the true Churchman--he and the King of Spain!"

The King looked about from one to another doubtfully, seeking a fit envoy.

"No, nor you, Rosny; you can fight all day, and figure all night. But for spying we want a lad of another build. Let me see--let me see!"

As the King was speaking, Jean-aux-Choux put on his brown Capuchin robe, and covered his red furze brush with the hood.

"I tracked my Lord of Epernon this night once before," he said, "and by the grace of G.o.d I can do as much again. I know his trail, and will be at the orchard gate of the Chateau before he has time to blow the dust out of his key!"

"How do you come to know so much?" demanded the Bearnais.

"By this token," said Jean carelessly; "that I saw my lady here and the three men come out of the Chateau, I followed them hither, and had your men roused and ready, so that if there had been any treachery, his Dukeship, at least, would have been the first to fall!"

The King looked about him inquiringly.

"Rosny and D'Aubigne," he said, "what do you know of this--does the man speak true?"

"A pupil of John Calvin speaks no lie," said Jean bravely. The King laughed, whereupon Jean added, "If I do act a lie, it is to save Your Majesty--the hope of the Faith!"

"That is rather like the old heresy of doing evil that good may come,"

said Henry; "but off with you! If I can accommodate my conscience to a waggoner's blouse, I do not see why you should not reconcile yours to a monk's hood!"