CHAPTER XXXVI.
VALENTINE LA NINA
The girl stood smiling upon the young man, a spray of the great scarletblossom of the pomegranate freshly plucked and held easily in her hand.She had broken it from the tree in the courtyard as she came in. Theflowers showed like handfuls of blood splashed upon the bosom and neckof her white clinging robe.
"You are very beautiful," said the Abbe John, his voice no more than ahoarse gasp; "what are you doing here in this place? Tell me your name.I seem to have seen you long ago, in dreams. But I have forgotten--Iforget everything!"
Then, without taking her eyes, mystically amber and gold, softlycaressing as the sea and as changeful, from the young man's face, shebeckoned him forward.
"We shall speak more at ease in another place," she said. And held outher hand to him, carelessly, palm downwards, as if he had been herbrother, and they were playing some lightheart game, or taking positionsfor an old-time dance of woven hands and measured paces.
Valentine la Nina led John d'Albret into a summer parlour, equallysecure from escape, being surrounded by the high fortress walls of theHotel of the Inquisition, but full of rich twilight, of flowers, ofbroidery, and of faint wafted perfumes from forgotten shawl or droppedkerchief, which told of a woman's abiding there.
"Now," said Valentine la Nina, throwing herself back luxuriously on awide divan of Seville, her hands clasped behind her head, "tell me allthere is to tell--keep back nothing. Then we will take counsel what isbest to be done! I have not forgotten, if you have!"
And John d'Albret, exhausted by the ceaseless searching of the Eyes intohis soul, and the need of the dark which would not come, told her all.To which Valentine la Nina listened, and saw the fear fade out and thereasonable man return. But as John d'Albret spoke, something movedstrangely in the depths of her own heart. Her face flushed; her templesthrobbed; her hands grew chill.
"And you have done this for the sake of a woman--of a girl?" she said.
"For Claire Agnew's sake," the Abbe John answered, still uncertainly;"so would any one--any one who loved her!"
Valentine la Nina smiled, stirring uneasily on her divan, and as shesmiled she sighed also, leaning forward, her great eyes on the youth.
"Any one?" she repeated, "any one who loved her! Aye, it may be so. Sheis a happy girl. I have found none such. I am fair--I should be loved.Yet I have only served and served and served all my life--ah!"
Suddenly, with a quick under-sob and an outward drive of the palm, as ifto thrust away some hateful thing, she rose to her feet and caught Johnd'Albret by the wrist. So lithe was her body that it seemed one singlegesture.
"If I had met you before she did," she whispered fiercely, "would youhave loved me like that? Answer me! Answer me! I command you! It is lifeor death, I tell you!"
But the Abbe John, not yet himself, could only stare at her blindly. Thegirl's eyes, large and mystic, held him in that dim place, and some ofhis pain returned. He covered his face with both hands.
She shook him fiercely.
"Look at me--you are a man," she cried, "say--am I not beautiful? Youhave said it already. If you had not met this Huguenot--this daughter ofGeneva, would you have loved me--not as men, ordinary men love, but asyou have loved, with a love strong enough to brave prison, torture, anddeath for me--for me?"
The Abbe John, too greatly astonished to answer in words, gazed at thestrange girl. Suddenly the anger dropped, the fierce curves faded fromthe lips that had been so haughty. Her eyes were soft and moist withunshed tears.
Valentine la Nina was pleading with him.
"Say it," she said, "oh, even if it be not true--say it! It would besuch a good lie. It would comfort a torn heart, made ever to do thething it hates. If I had been a fisher-girl spreading nets on the sands,a shepherdess on the hills, some brown sailor-lad or a bearded shepherdwould have loved me for myself. Children would have played about mydoor. Like other women, I would have had the sweet bitterness of life onmy lips. I would have sorrowed as others, rejoiced as others. And, whenall was done, turned my face to the wall and died as others, my childrenabout me, my man's hand in mine. But now--now--I am only poor Valentinela Nina, the tool of the League, the plaything of politics, the lure ofthe Jesuits, a thing to be used when bright, thrown away when rusted,but loved--never! No, not even by those who use me, and, in using, killme!"
And the Abbe John, moved at sight of the pain, answered as best hemight.
"A man can only love as the love comes to him," he murmured. "What mighthave been, I do not know. I have thought I loved many, but I never knewthat I loved till I saw little Claire Agnew."
"But if you had not--tell me," she sobbed; "I will be content, if youwill only tell me."
"I do not know," said John d'Albret, driven into a corner; "perhaps Imight--if I had seen you first."
To the young man it seemed an easy thing to say--a necessary thing,indeed. For, coming fresh from the fear and the place of torment, he wasglad to say anything not to be sent thither again.
"But say it," she cried, coming nearer and clasping his arm hard, "sayit all--not that you might, but that you would--with the same love thatgoes easily to death, that I--I--I might escape. Oh, for me, I would goto a thousand deaths if only I knew--surely--surely, that one man in theworld would do as much for me!"
But the Abbe John had reached his limit. Not even to escape the Place ofthe Eyes could he deny his love, or affirm that he could ever have lovedto the death any but his little Claire.
"I saw her, and I loved!" he said simply--"that is all I know. Had Iseen you, I might have loved--that also I do not know. More I cannotsay. But be assured that, if I had loved you, not knowing the other, Ishould have counted, for your sake, my poor life but as a leaf,wind-blown, a petal fallen in the way."
Valentine la Nina nervously crumpled the glorious red and fleshyblossoms of the pomegranate clusters in her fingers, till they fell inblood-drops on the floor.
"You are noble," she said; "I knew it when I saw you at Collioure on thehillside--more, a prince in your own land, near to the throne even. Soam I--and Philip the King himself would not deny me. He is yourcountry's enemy. Yet at my request he would stay his hand. He must fightthe English. He must subdue the Low Countries. That is his oath. But ifyou will--if you will--he would aid the Bearnais, or better still, youyourself to a throne, and give me--who can say what?--perhaps this veryRoussillon for a dower. For I am close of kin to the King. He wouldacknowledge me as such. I have vowed a vow, but now it is almost paid;and if it were not I would go to the Pope himself, though I walked everystep of the road to Rome!"
"I cannot--I cannot----" cried John d'Albret. "Thank God, I am not ofthe first-born of kings, whose hands are put up to the highest bidder.Where I have loved, there will I wed or not at all!"
"Ah, cruel!" cried Valentine la Nina, stamping her foot--"cruel, notonly to me, but to her whom you say you love. Think you she will be safefrom the Society, from the Holy Office in France? There is no rack ortorture perhaps, no Place of Eyes. But was Henry of Valois safe, whoslew the Duke of Guise? From whose bosom came forth Jacques Clement? Myuncle put the knife in his hand and blessed him ere he went. For me hewould do more. Think--this Claire of yours is condemned already. She isyoung. By your own telling she has many lovers. She will be happy. Iknow the heart of such maids. Besides, she has never promised youanything--never humbled herself to you as I--I, Valentine la Nina, whotill now have been the proudest maid in Spain!"
"I am not worthy," cried the Abbe John. "I cannot; I dare not; I willnot!"
"Ah," said Valentine la Nina, with a long rising inflection, and drawingherself back from him, "I have found it ever so with you heretics. Youare willing to die--to suffer. Because then you would wear the martyr'scrown, and have your name commemorated--in books, on tablets, and belauded by the outcasts of Geneva. But for your own living folk you willdo nothing. With all Roussillon, from Salses to the Pyrenees, for mydowry (Philip would be glad to be rid of it--and perhaps also of me
--myfriends of the Society are too strong for him), there would be an end tothis prisoning and burning and torturing through the land. Teruel andFrey Tullio we would send to their own place. By a word you could savethousands. Yet you will not. You think only of one chit of a girl, wholaughs at you, who cares not the snap of her finger for you!"
She stopped, panting with her own vehemence.
"Likely enough," said the Abbe John, "the more is the pity. But thatcannot change my heart."
"Was her love for you like mine?" she cried; "did she love you from thefirst moment she saw you? NO! Has she done for you what I havedone--risked my all--my uncle's anger--the Society's--that of the HolyOffice even? No!--No!--_No!_ She has done none of these things. She hasonly graciously permitted you to serve her on your knees--she, thedaughter of a spy, a common go-between of your Huguenot and hereticprinces! Shame on you, Jean d'Albret of Bourbon, you, a cousin of theKing of France, thus to give yourself up to fanatics and haters ofreligion."
But by this time the Abbe John was completely master of himself. Hecould carry forward the interview much more successfully on these lines.
"I am no Huguenot," he said calmly, "more is the pity, indeed. I have noclaim to be zealous for any religion. I have fought on the Barricades ofParis for the Guise, because I was but an idle fellow and there was muchexcitement and shouting. I have fought for the Bearnais, not because heis a Huguenot, but because he is my good cousin and a bravesoldier--none like him."
Valentine la Nina waved her hand in contempt.
"None like him!" she exclaimed. "Have you never heard of my cousinAlexander of Parma? To him your Bearnais is no better than a ruffler, abanditti captain, a guerilla chief. If you must fight, why, we will goto him. It is a service worth a thousand of the other. Then you willlearn the art of war indeed----"
"Aye, against my countrymen," said John d'Albret, with firmness. Bit bybit his courage was coming back to him. "I am but a poor idlish fellow,who have taken little thought of religion, Huguenot or Catholic. Once Ihad thought she would teach me, if life had been given me, and--and ifshe had been willing. But now I must take what Fate sends, and trustthat if I die untimeously, the Judge I shall chance to meet may proveless stern than He of the Genevan's creed, and less cruel than the Godof Dom Teruel and the Holy Inquisition!"
"Then you refuse?" She uttered the words in a low strained voice. "Yourefuse what I have offered? But I shall put it once more--honourablewedlock with an honourable maiden, of a house as good as your own, aprovince for your dower, the most Catholic King for sponsor of yourvows, noble service, and it like you, with the greatest captain of theage, the safety of all your kin, free speech, free worship, the entranceof these thousands of French folk into France. Ah, and love--love suchas the pale daughters of the north never dreamt of----"
She took a step towards him, her clasped hands pleading for her, herlips quivering, her head thrown back so far that the golden combslipped, and a heavy drift of hair, the colour of ripe oats, fell inwaves far below her shoulders.
"Do not let the chance go by," she said, "because you think you do notlove me now. That will come in time. I know it will come. I would loveyou so that it could not help but come!"
"I cannot--ah, I cannot!" said John d'Albret, his eyes on the floor, sothat he might not see the pain he could not cure.
The girl drew herself up, clenched her hands, and with a hissing indrawof the breath, she cried, "You cannot--you mean you will not, becauseyou love--the other--the spy's daughter--of whom I will presently makean end, as a child kills a fly on a window-pane--for my pleasure!"
"No," said John d'Albret clearly, lifting his head and looking into theangry eyes, flashing murkily as the sunlight flashes in the deep waterat a harbour mouth or in some estuary--"no, I will not do any of thethings you ask of me. And the reason is, as you have said, because Ilove Claire Agnew until I die. I know not at all whether she loves me ornot. And to me that makes no matter----"
"No, you say right," cried Valentine la Nina, "it will indeed make nodifference. For by these words--they are printed on my heart--you havecondemned her; the spy's daughter to the knife, and yourself----"
"To the fires of the Inquisition?" demanded the Abbe John. "I am ready!"
"Nay, not so fast," said Valentine la Nina, "that were far too easy adeath--too quick. You shall go to the galleys among the lowestcriminals, your feet in the rotting wash of the bilge, lingering out aslow death-in-life--slow--very slow, the lash on your back and--no,no--I cannot believe this is your answer. Here, here is yet one chance.Surely I have not humbled myself only for this?"
The Abbe John answered nothing, and after a pause the girl drew herselfup to her height, and spoke to him through her clenched teeth.
"You shall go to the galleys and pray--ah, you say you have neverlearned to pray, but you will--you will on Philip's galleys. They makegood theologians there; they practise. You will pray in vain for thedeath that will not come. And I, when I wake in the night, will turn meand sleep the sweeter on my pillow for the thought of you chained toyour oar, which you will never quit alive. Ah, I will teach you, Jeand'Albret of the house of Bourbon, cousin of kings, what it is to lovethe spy's daughter, and to despise me--me--Valentine la Nina, a daughterof the King of Spain!"