CHAPTER XXX. "NO SPEECH OF SILK WILL SERVE YOUR TURN."
Angelique des Meloises was duly informed, through the sharp espionage ofLizette, as to what had become of Le Gardeur after that memorable nightof conflict between love and ambition, when she rejected the offer ofhis hand and gave herself up to the illusions of her imagination.
She was sorry, yet flattered, at Lizette's account of his conduct at theTaverne de Menut; for, although pleased to think that Le Gardeur lovedher to the point of self-destruction, she honestly pitied him, and felt,or thought she felt, that she could sacrifice anything except herselffor his sake.
Angelique pondered in her own strange, fitful way over Le Gardeur. Shehad no thought of losing him wholly. She would continue to hold him inher silken string, and keep him under the spell of her fascinations.She still admired him,--nay, loved him, she thought. She could not helpdoing so; and if she could not help it, where was the blame? She wouldnot, to be sure, sacrifice for him the brilliant hopes which dancedbefore her imagination like fire-flies in a summer night--for no man inthe world would she do that! The Royal Intendant was the mark she aimedat. She was ready to go through fire and water to reach that goal of herambition. But if she gave the Intendant her hand it was enough; it wasall she could give him, but not the smallest corner of her heart, whichshe acknowledged to herself belonged only to Le Gardeur de Repentigny.
While bent on accomplishing this scheme by every means in her power, andwhich involved necessarily the ruin of Le Gardeur, she took a sort ofperverse pride in enumerating the hundred points of personal and moralsuperiority possessed by him over the Intendant and all others of heradmirers. If she sacrificed her love to her ambition, hating herselfwhile she did so, it was a sort of satisfaction to think that LeGardeur's sacrifice was not less complete than her own; and she ratherfelt pleased with the reflection that his heart would be broken, and noother woman would ever fill that place in his affections which she hadonce occupied.
The days that elapsed after their final interview were days of vexationto Angelique. She was angry with herself, almost; angry with Le Gardeurthat he had taken her at her word, and still more angry that she did notreap the immediate reward of her treachery against her own heart. Shewas like a spoiled and wilful child which will neither have a thing norlet it go. She would discard her lover and still retain his love! andfelt irritated and even jealous when she heard of his departure to Tillywith his sister, who had thus, apparently, more influence to take himaway from the city than Angelique had to keep him there.
But her mind was especially worked upon almost to madness by the ardentprofessions of love, with the careful avoidance of any proposal ofmarriage, on the part of the Intendant. She had received his dailyvisits with a determination to please and fascinate him. She haddressed herself with elaborate care, and no woman in New France equalledAngelique in the perfection of her attire. She studied his tastes in herconversation and demeanor, which were free beyond even her wont,because she saw that a manner bold and unconstrained took best withhim. Angelique's free style was the most perfect piece of acting inthe world. She laughed loudly at his wit, and heard without blushes hisdouble entendres and coarse jests, not less coarse because spoken inthe polished dialect of Paris. She stood it all, but with no more resultthan is left by a brilliant display of fireworks after it is over. Shecould read in the eager looks and manner of the Intendant that she hadfixed his admiration and stirred his passions, but she knew by a no lesssure intuition that she had not, with all her blandishments, suggestedto his mind one serious thought of marriage.
In vain she reverted to the subject of matrimony, in apparent jest butsecret earnest. The Intendant, quick-witted as herself, would acceptthe challenge, talk with her and caracole on the topic which she hadcaparisoned so gaily for him, and amid compliments and pleasantries,ride away from the point, she knew not whither! Then Angelique would beangry after his departure, and swear,--she could swear shockingly for alady when she was angry!--and vow she would marry Le Gardeur after all;but her pride was stung, not her love. No man had ever defeated herwhen she chose to subdue him, neither should this proud Intendant! SoAngelique collected her scattered forces again, and laid closer siege toBigot than ever.
The great ball at the Palais had been the object of absorbing interestto the fashionable society of the Capital for many weeks. It came on atlast, turning the heads of half the city with its splendor.
Angelique shone the acknowledged queen of the Intendant's ball. Hernatural grace and beauty, set off by the exquisite taste and richness ofher attire, threw into eclipse the fairest of her rivals. If there wasone present who, in admiration of her own charms, claimed for herselfthe first place, she freely conceded to Angelique the second. ButAngelique feared no rival there. Her only fear was at Beaumanoir. Shewas profoundly conscious of her own superiority to all present, whileshe relished the envy and jealousy which it created. She cared butlittle what the women thought of her, and boldly challenging the homageof the men, obtained it as her rightful due.
Still, under the gay smiles and lively badinage which she showered onall around as she moved through the brilliant throng, Angelique felt abitter spirit of discontent rankling in her bosom. She was angry, andshe knew why, and still more angry because upon herself lay the blame!Not that she blamed herself for having rejected Le Gardeur: she had donethat deliberately and for a price; but the price was not yet paid, andshe had, sometimes, qualms of doubt whether it would ever be paid!
She who had had her own way with all men, now encountered a man whospoke and looked like one who had had his own way with all women, andwho meant to have his own way with her!
She gazed often upon the face of Bigot, and the more she looked the moreinscrutable it appeared to her. She tried to sound the depths of histhoughts, but her inquiry was like the dropping of a stone into thebottomless pit of that deep cavern of the dark and bloody ground talkedof by adventurous voyageurs from the Far West.
That Bigot admired her beyond all other women at the ball, was visibleenough from the marked attention which he lavished upon her and thecourtly flatteries that flowed like honey from his lips. She also readher preeminence in his favor from the jealous eyes of a host of rivalswho watched her every movement. But Angelique felt that the admirationof the Intendant was not of that kind which had driven so many men madfor her sake. She knew Bigot would never go mad for her, much as he wasfascinated! and why? why?
Angelique, while listening to his honeyed flatteries as he led hergaily through the ballroom, asked herself again and again, why did hecarefully avoid the one topic that filled her thoughts, or spoke of itonly in his mocking manner, which tortured her to madness with doubt andperplexity?
As she leaned on the arm of the courtly Intendant, laughing like onepossessed with the very spirit of gaiety at his sallies and jests, hermind was torn with bitter comparisons as she remembered Le Gardeur, hishandsome face and his transparent admiration, so full of love and readyfor any sacrifice for her sake,--and she had cast it all away for thisinscrutable voluptuary, a man who had no respect for women, but whoadmired her person, condescended to be pleased with it, and affected tobe caught by the lures she held out to him, but which she felt would beof no more avail to hold him fast than the threads which a spider throwsfrom bush to bush on a summer morn will hold fast a bird which fliesathwart them!
The gayest of the gay to all outward appearance, Angelique missed sorelythe presence of Le Gardeur, and she resented his absence from the ballas a slight and a wrong to her sovereignty, which never released a loverfrom his allegiance.
The fair demoiselles at the ball, less resolutely ambitious thanAngelique, found by degrees, in the devotion of other cavaliers, amplecompensation for only so much of the Intendant's favor as he liberallybestowed on all the sex; but that did not content Angelique: she lookedwith sharpest eyes of inquisition upon the bright glances which now andthen shot across the room where she sat by the side of Bigot, apparentlysteeped in happiness, but with a serpent bitin
g at her heart, for shefelt that Bigot was really unimpressible as a stone under her mostsubtle manipulation.
Her thoughts ran in a round of ceaseless repetition of the question:"Why can I not subdue Francois Bigot as I have subdued every other manwho exposed his weak side to my power?" and Angelique pressed her foothard upon the floor as the answer returned ever the same: "The heart ofthe Intendant is away at Beaumanoir! That pale, pensive lady" (Angeliqueused a more coarse and emphatic word) "stands between him and me like aspectre as she is, and obstructs the path I have sacrificed so much toenter!"
"I cannot endure the heat of the ballroom, Bigot!" said Angelique; "Iwill dance no more to-night! I would rather sit and catch fireflies onthe terrace than chase forever without overtaking it the bird that hasescaped from my bosom!"
The Intendant, ever attentive to her wishes, offered his arm to leadher into the pleached walks of the illuminated garden. Angelique rose,gathered up her rich train, and with an air of royal coquetry took hisarm and accompanied the Intendant on a promenade down the grand alley ofroses.
"What favorite bird has escaped from your bosom, Angelique?" askedthe Intendant, who had, however, a shrewd guess of the meaning of hermetaphor.
"The pleasure I had in anticipation of this ball! The bird has flown, Iknow not where or how. I have no pleasure here at all!" exclaimed she,petulantly, although she knew the ball had been really got up mainly forher own pleasure.
"And yet Momus himself might have been your father, and Euphrosyne yourmother, Angelique," replied Bigot, "to judge by your gaiety to-night.If you have no pleasure, it is because you have given it all away toothers! But I have caught the bird you lost, let me restore it to yourbosom pray!" He laid his hand lightly and caressingly upon her arm.Her bosom was beating wildly; she removed his hand, and held it firmlygrasped in her own.
"Chevalier!" said she, "the pleasure of a king is in the loyalty of hissubjects, the pleasure of a woman in the fidelity of her lover!" Shewas going to say more, but stopped. But she gave him a glance whichinsinuated more than all she left unsaid.
Bigot smiled to himself. "Angelique is jealous!" thought he, but he onlyremarked, "That is an aphorism which I believe with all my heart! If thepleasure of a woman be in the fidelity of her lover, I know no one whoshould be more happy than Angelique des Meloises! No lady in New Francehas a right to claim greater devotion from a lover, and no one receivesit!"
"But I have no faith in the fidelity of my lover! and I am not happy,Chevalier! far from it!" replied she, with one of those impulsivespeeches that seemed frankness itself, but in this woman were artful toa degree.
"Why so?" replied he; "pleasure will never leave you, Angelique, unlessyou wilfully chase it away from your side! All women envy your beauty,all men struggle to obtain your smiles. For myself, I would gather allthe joys and treasures of the world, and lay them at your feet, wouldyou let me!
"I do not hinder you, Chevalier!" she replied, with a laugh ofincredulity, "but you do not do it! It is only your politeness to saythat. I have told you that the pleasure of a woman is in the fidelityof her lover; tell me now, Chevalier, what is the highest pleasure of aman?"
"The beauty and condescension of his mistress,--at least, I knownone greater." Bigot looked at her as if his speech ought to receiveacknowledgement on the spot.
"And it is your politeness to say that, also, Chevalier!" replied shevery coolly.
"I wish I could say of your condescension, Angelique, what I have saidof your beauty: Francois Bigot would then feel the highest pleasure of aman." The Intendant only half knew the woman he was seeking to deceive.She got angry.
Angelique looked up with a scornful flash. "My condescension, Chevalier?to what have I not condescended on the faith of your solemn promise thatthe lady of Beaumanoir should not remain under your roof? She is stillthere, Chevalier, in spite of your promise!"
Bigot was on the point of denying the fact, but there was sharpnessin Angelique's tone, and clearness of all doubt in her eyes. He saw hewould gain nothing by denial.
"She knows the whole secret, I do believe!" muttered he. "Argus with hishundred eyes was a blind man compared to a woman's two eyes sharpened byjealousy."
"The lady of Beaumanoir accuses me of no sin that I repent of!" repliedhe. "True! I promised to send her away, and so I will; but she is awoman, a lady, who has claims upon me for gentle usage. If it were yourcase, Angelique--"
Angelique quitted his arm and stood confronting him, flaming withindignation. She did not let him finish his sentence: "If it were mycase, Bigot! as if that could ever be my case, and you alive to speak ofit!"
Bigot stepped backwards. He was not sure but a poniard glittered in theclenched hand of Angelique. It was but the flash of her diamond rings asshe lifted it suddenly. She almost struck him.
"Do not blame me for infidelities committed before I knew you,Angelique!" said he, seizing her hand, which he held forcibly in his, inspite of her efforts to wrench it away.
"It is my nature to worship beauty at every shrine. I have ever doneso until I found the concentration of all my divinities in you. I couldnot, if I would, be unfaithful to you, Angelique des Meloises!" Bigotwas a firm believer in the classical faith that Jove laughs at lovers'perjuries.
"You mock me, Bigot!" replied she. "You are the only man who has everdared to do so twice."
"When did I mock you twice, Angelique?" asked he, with an air of injuredinnocence.
"Now! and when you pledged yourself to remove the lady of Beaumanoirfrom your house! I admire your courage, Bigot, in playing false with meand still hoping to win! But never speak to me more of love while thatpale spectre haunts the secret chambers of the Chateau!"
"She shall be removed, Angelique, since you insist upon it," replied he,secretly irritated; "but where is the harm? I pledge my faith she shallnot stand in the way of my love for you."
"Better she were dead than do so!" whispered Angelique to herself. "Itis my due, Bigot!" replied she aloud, "you know what I have given up foryour sake!"
"Yes! I know you have banished Le Gardeur de Repentigny when it had beenbetter to keep him securely in the ranks of the Grand Company. Why didyou refuse to marry him, Angelique?"
The question fairly choked her with anger. "Why did I refuse to marryhim? Francois Bigot! Do you ask me seriously that question? Did you nottell me of your own love, and all but offer me your hand, giving meto understand--miserable sinner that you are, or as you think me tobe--that you pledged your own faith to me, as first in your choice, andI have done that which I had better have been dead and buried withthe heaviest pyramid of Egypt on top of me, buried without hope ofresurrection, than have done?"
Bigot, accustomed as he was to woman's upbraidings, scarcely knew whatto reply to this passionate outburst. He had spoken to her words oflove, plenty of them, but the idea of marriage had not flashed acrosshis mind for a moment,--not a word of that had escaped his lips. He hadas little guessed the height of Angelique's ambition as she the depthsof his craft and wickedness, and yet there was a wonderful similaritybetween the characters of both,--the same bold, defiant spirit, the sameinordinate ambition, the same void of principle in selecting means toends,--only the one fascinated with the lures of love, the other by thecharms of wit, the temptations of money, or effected his purposes by therough application of force.
"You call me rightly a miserable sinner," said he, half smiling, as onenot very miserable although a sinner. "If love of fair women be a sin, Iam one of the greatest of sinners; and in your fair presence, Angelique,I am sinning at this moment enough to sink a shipload of saints andangels!"
"You have sunk me in my own and the world's estimation, if you mean whatyou say, Bigot!" replied she, unconsciously tearing in strips the fanshe held in her hand. "You love all women too well ever to be capable offixing your heart upon one!" A tear, of vexation perhaps, stood in herangry eye as she said this, and her cheek twitched with fierce emotion.
"Come, Angelique!" said he, soothingly, "some of our gu
ests have enteredthis alley. Let us walk down to the terrace. The moon is shining brightover the broad river, and I will swear to you by St. Picaut, my patron,whom I never deceive, that my love for all womankind has not hindered mefrom fixing my supreme affection upon you."
Angelique allowed him to press her hand, which he did with fervor. Shealmost believed his words. She could scarcely imagine another womanseriously preferred to herself, when she chose to flatter a man with abelief of her own preference for him.
They walked down a long alley brilliantly illuminated with lamps ofBohemian glass, which shone like the diamonds, rubies, and emeraldswhich grew upon the trees in the garden of Aladdin.
At every angle of the geometrically-cut paths of hard-beaten sea-shells,white as snow, stood the statue of a faun, a nymph, or dryad, in Parianmarble, holding a torch, which illuminated a great vase running overwith fresh, blooming flowers, presenting a vista of royal magnificencewhich bore testimony to the wealth and splendid tastes of the Intendant.
The garden walks were not deserted: their beauty drew out many a couplewho sauntered merrily, or lovingly, down the pleached avenues, whichlooked like the corridors of a gorgeously-decorated palace.
Bigot and Angelique moved among the guests, receiving, as they passed,obsequious salutations, which to Angelique seemed a foretaste ofroyalty. She had seen the gardens of the palace many times before, butnever illuminated as now. The sight of them so grandly decorated filledher with admiration of their owner, and she resolved that, cost what itwould, the homage paid to her to-night, as the partner of the Intendant,should become hers by right on his hearthstone as the first lady in NewFrance.
Angelique threw back her veil that all might see her, that the womenmight envy and the men admire her, as she leaned confidingly on the armof Bigot, looking up in his face with that wonderful smile of herswhich had brought so many men to ruin at her feet, and talking with suchenchantment as no woman could talk but Angelique des Meloises.
Well understanding that her only road to success was to completelyfascinate the Intendant, she bent herself to the task with such powerof witchery and such simulation of real passion, that Bigot, wary andexperienced gladiator as he was in the arena of love, was more than oncebrought to the brink of a proposal for her hand.
She watched every movement of his features, at these critical momentswhen he seemed just falling into the snares so artfully set for him.When she caught his eyes glowing with passionate admiration, she shylyaffected to withdraw hers from his gaze, turning on him at times flashesof her dark eyes which electrified every nerve of his sensuous nature.She felt the pressure of his hand, the changed and softened inflectionsof his voice, she knew the words of her fate were trembling on his lips,and yet they did not come! The shadow of that pale hand at Beaumanoir,weak and delicate as it was, seemed to lay itself upon his lips whenabout to speak to her, and snatch away the words which Angelique,trembling with anticipation, was ready to barter away body and soul tohear spoken.
In a shady passage through a thick greenery where the lights were dimmerand no one was near, she allowed his arm for a moment to encircle heryielding form, and she knew by his quick breath that the words weremoulded in his thoughts, and were on the point to rush forth ina torrent of speech. Still they came not, and Bigot again, to herunutterable disgust, shied off like a full-blooded horse which startssuddenly away from some object by the wayside and throws his riderheadlong on the ground. So again were dashed the ardent expectations ofAngelique.
She listened to the gallant and gay speeches of Bigot, which seemed toflutter like birds round her, but never lit on the ground where she hadspread her net like a crafty fowler as she was, until she went almostmad with suppressed anger and passionate excitement. But she kept onreplying with badinage light as his own, and with laughter so soft andsilvery that it seemed a gentle dew from Heaven, instead of the driftand flying foam of the storm that was raging in her bosom.
She read and re-read glimpses of his hidden thoughts that went and camelike faces in a dream, and she saw in her imagination the dark, pleadingeyes and pale face of the lady of Beaumanoir. It came now like arevelation, confirming a thousand suspicions that Bigot loved thatpale, sad face too well ever to marry Angelique des Meloises while itspossessor lived at Beaumanoir,--or while she lived at all!
And it came to that! In this walk with Bigot round the glorious garden,with God's flowers shedding fragrance around them; with God's starsshining overhead above all the glitter and illusion of the thousandlamps, Angelique repeated to herself the terrific words, "Bigot lovesthat pale, sad face too well ever to marry me while its possessor livesat Beaumanoir--or while she lives at all!"
The thought haunted her! It would not leave her! She leaned heavily uponhis arm as she swept like a queen of Cyprus through the flower-borderedwalks, brushing the roses and lilies with her proud train, and treading,with as dainty a foot as ever bewitched human eye, the white paths thatled back to the grand terrace of the Palace.
Her fevered imagination played tricks in keeping with her fear: morethan once she fancied she saw the shadowy form of a beautiful womanwalking on the other side of Bigot next his heart! It was the formof Caroline bearing a child in one arm, and claiming, by that supremeappeal to a man's heart, the first place in his affections.
The figure sometimes vanished, sometimes reappeared in the same place,and once and the last time assumed the figure and look of Our Lady ofSt. Foye, triumphant after a thousand sufferings, and still ever bearingthe face and look of the lady of Beaumanoir.
Emerging at last from the dim avenue into the full light, where afountain sent up showers of sparkling crystals, the figure vanished, andAngelique sat down on a quaintly-carved seat under a mountain-ash, verytired, and profoundly vexed at all things and with everybody.
A servant in gorgeous livery brought a message from the ballroom to theIntendant.
He was summoned for a dance, but he would not leave Angelique, he said.But Angelique begged for a short rest: it was so pleasant in the garden.She would remain by the fountain. She liked its sparkling and splashing,it refreshed her; the Intendant could come for her in half an hour; shewanted to be alone; she felt in a hard, unamiable mood, she said, and heonly made her worse by stopping with her when others wanted him, and hewanted others!
The Intendant protested, in terms of the warmest gallantry, that hewould not leave her; but seeing Angelique really desired at the presentmoment to be alone, and reflecting that he was himself sacrificing toomuch for the sake of one goddess, while a hundred others were adornedand waiting for his offerings, he promised in half an hour to return forher to this spot by the fountain, and proceeded towards the Palace.
Angelique sat watching the play and sparkle of the fountain, whichshe compared to her own vain exertions to fascinate the Intendant, andthought that her efforts had been just as brilliant, and just as futile!
She was sadly perplexed. There was a depth in Bigot's character whichshe could not fathom, a bottomless abyss into which she was falling andcould not save herself. Whichever way she turned the eidolon ofCaroline met her as a bar to all further progress in her design upon theIntendant.
The dim half-vision of Caroline which she had seen in the pleachedwalk, she knew was only the shadow and projection of her own thoughts, abrooding fancy which she had unconsciously conjured up into the form ofher hated rival. The addition of the child was the creation of the deepand jealous imaginings which had often crossed her mind. She thought ofthat yet unborn pledge of a once mutual affection as the secret spell bywhich Caroline, pale and feeble as she was, still held the heart of theIntendant in some sort of allegiance.
"It is that vile, weak thing!" said she bitterly and angrily to herself,"which is stronger than I. It is by that she excites his pity, and pitydraws after it the renewal of his love. If the hope of what is not yetbe so potent with Bigot, what will not the reality prove ere long? Theannihilation of all my brilliant anticipations! I have drawn a blank inlife's lottery, by the rejection o
f Le Gardeur for his sake! It is thehand of that shadowy babe which plucks away the words of proposal fromthe lips of Bigot, which gives his love to its vile mother, and leavesto me the mere ashes of his passion, words which mean nothing, whichwill never mean anything but insult to Angelique des Meloises, so longas that woman lives to claim the hand which but for her would be mine!"
Dark fancies fluttered across the mind of Angelique during the absenceof the Intendant. They came like a flight of birds of evil omen, ravens,choughs, and owls, the embodiments of wicked thoughts. But such thoughtssuited her mood, and she neither chid nor banished them, but let themlight and brood, and hatch fresh mischief in her soul.
She looked up to see who was laughing so merrily while she was so angryand so sad, and beheld the Intendant jesting and toying with a clusterof laughing girls who had caught him at the turn of the broad stair ofthe terrace. They kept him there in utter oblivion of Angelique! Notthat she cared for his presence at that moment, or felt angry, as shewould have done at a neglect of Le Gardeur, but it was one proof among athousand others that, gallant and gay as he was among the throng of fairguests who were flattering and tempting him on every side, not oneof them, herself included, could feel sure she had made an impressionlasting longer than the present moment upon the heart of the Intendant.
But Bigot had neither forgotten Angelique nor himself. His wily spiritwas contriving how best to give an impetus to his intrigue with herwithout committing himself to any promise of marriage. He resolvedto bring this beautiful but exacting girl wholly under his power. Hecomprehended fully that Angelique was prepared to accept his hand atany moment, nay, almost demanded it; but the price of marriage was whatBigot would not, dared not pay, and as a true courtier of the period hebelieved thoroughly in his ability to beguile any woman he chose, andcheat her of the price she set upon her love.