There was upon Anne d'Heilly's mobile features an expression of sadness mingled with compassion, which deceived Ascanio completely, and confirmed him, even before she had opened her mouth, in the impression that she was entirely innocent of any share in the catastrophe of which he and Colombe were victims.
"You here, Ascanio!" she said in a melodious voice; "you, to whom I would have given a palace to live in, I find in a prison!"
"Ah, madame!" cried the youth, "it is true, is it not, that you know nothing of the persecution to which we are subjected!"
"Did you suspect me for an instant, Ascanio?" said the duchess; "in that case you have every reason to hate me, and I can only bewail in silence my ill fortune in being so little known to him I know so well."
"No, madame, no," said Ascanio; "I was told that you were responsible for it all, but I refused to believe it."
"'T was well done of you! Ascanio, you do not love me, but with you hatred at least is not synonymous with injustice. You were right, Ascanio; not only am I not responsible for it, but I knew nothing whatever about it. It was the provost, Messire d'Estourville: he learned the whole story, I know not how, told it all to the king, and obtained from him the order to arrest you and recover Colombe."
"And Colombe is with her father?" demanded Ascanio eagerly.
"No, Colombe is with me."
"With you, madame!" cried the young man. "Why with you?"
"She is very lovely, Ascanio," murmured the duchess, "and I can understand why you prefer her to all the women in the world, even though the most loving of them all offers you the richest of duchies."
"I love Colombe, madame," said Ascanio, "and you know that love, which is a treasure sent from Heaven, is to be preferred to all earthly treasures."
"Yes, Ascanio, yes, you love her above everything. For a moment I hoped that your passion for her was only a passing fancy; I was mistaken. Yes, I realize now," she added with a sigh, "that to keep you apart any longer would be to run counter to God's will."
"Ah, madame!" cried Ascanio, clasping his hands, "God has placed in your hands the power to bring us together. Be noble and generous to the end, madame, and make two children happy who will love you and bless you all their lives."
"Yes," said the duchess. "I am vanquished, Ascanio; yes, I am ready to protect and defend you; but alas! it may be too late even now."
"Too late! what do you mean?" cried Ascanio.
"It may be, Ascanio, it may be that at this moment I am lost myself."
"Lost, madame! how so, in God's name?"
"For having loved you."
"For having loved me! You, lost because of me!"
"Yes, imprudent creature that I am, lost because of you; lost because I wrote to you."
"How so? I do not understand you, madame."
"You do not understand that the provost, armed with an order from the king, has directed a general search to be made at the Hôtel de Nesle? You do not understand that this search, the principal purpose of which is to find proofs of your affair with Colombe, will be most rigorously carried out in your bedroom."
"What then?" demanded Ascanio, impatiently.
"Why," continued the duchess, "if they find that letter, which in a moment of frenzy I wrote to you, if it is recognized as mine, if it is laid before the king, whom I was then deceiving, and whom I was willing to betray for you, do you not understand that my power is at an end from that moment? Do you not understand that I can then do nothing either for you or for Colombe? Do you not understand, in short, that I am lost?"
"Oh!" cried Ascanio, "have no fear, madame! There is no danger of that; the letter is here; it has never left me."
The duchess breathed freely once more, and the expression of her face changed from anxiety to joy.
"It has never left you, Ascanio!" she repeated; "it has never left you! To what sentiment, pray tell me, do I owe the fact that fortunate letter has never left you?"
"To prudence, madame," murmured Ascanio.
"Prudence! mon Dieu! mon Dieu! I am wrong once more! And yet I surely should be convinced ere this. Prudence! Ah well!" she added, seeming to make a powerful effort to restrain her feelings, "in that case, as I have naught but your prudence to thank, Ascanio, do you think it very prudent to keep it upon your person, when they may come to your cell at any moment and search you by force? do you think it prudent, I say, to keep a letter which, if it is found, will put the only person who can save you and Colombe in a position where it will be impossible for her to help you?"
"Madame," said Ascanio, in his melodious voice, and with that tinge of melancholy which all pure hearts feel when they are forced to doubt, "I know not if the purpose to save Colombe and myself exists at the bottom of your heart as it does upon your lips; I know not whether the desire to see that letter again, and nothing more, is the motive of your visit to me; I know not whether, as soon as you have it in your possession, you may not lay aside this rôle of protectress which you have assumed, and become our enemy once more; but this I do know, madame, that the letter is yours, that it belongs to you, and that the moment you claim it I cease to have the right to keep it from you."
Ascanio rose, went straight to the chair upon which his doublet lay, put his hand in the pocket, and took out a letter, the envelope of which the duchess recognized at a glance.
"Here, madame," he said, "is the paper you are so anxious to possess, and which can be of no use to me, while it may injure you seriously. Take it, tear it up, destroy it. I have done my duty; you may do what you choose."
"Ah! yours is indeed a noble heart, Ascanio!" cried the duchess, acting in obedience to one of those generous impulses which are sometimes found in the most corrupt hearts.
"Some one comes, madame! take care!" cried Ascanio.
"True," said the duchess.
At the sound of approaching footsteps she hastily thrust the paper into the flame of the lamp, which consumed it in an instant. The duchess did not let it drop until the flame had almost scorched her fingers, when the letter, three fourths consumed, drifted slowly downward: when it reached the floor it was entirely reduced to ashes, but the duchess was not content until she had placed her foot upon them.
At that moment the provost appeared in the doorway.
"I was told that you were here, madame," he said, looking uneasily from the duchess to Ascanio, "and I hastened to descend and place myself at your service. Is there aught in which I, or they who are under my orders, can be of any use to you?"
"No, messire," she replied, unable to conceal the feeling of intense joy which overflowed from her heart upon her face. "No, but I am none the less obliged to you for your readiness and your good will; I came simply to question this young man whom you arrested, and to ascertain if he is really as guilty as he was said to be."
"And what is your conclusion?" queried the provost, in a tone to which he could not refrain from imparting a slight tinge of irony.
"That Ascanio is less guilty than I thought. I beg you, therefore, messire, to show him every consideration in your power. The poor child is in wretched quarters. Could you not give him a better room?"
"We will look to it to-morrow, madame, for you know that your wishes are commands to me. Have you any other commands, and do you wish to continue your examination?"
"No, messire," was the reply, "I know all that I wished to know."
With that the duchess left the dungeon, darting at Ascanio a parting glance of mingled gratitude and passion.
The provost followed her and the door closed behind them.
"Pardieu!" muttered Jacques Aubry, who had not lost a word of the conversation between the duchess and Ascanio. "Pardieu! it was time."
It had been Marmagne's first thought on recovering consciousness to send word to the duchess that he had received a wound which might well prove to be mortal, and that before he breathed his last he desired to impart to her a secret of the deepest moment. Upon receipt of that message the duchess hastened to his side. Marmagne then informed her that he had been attacked and wounded by a certain student named Jacques Aubry, who was endeavoring to gain admission to the Châtelet in order to get speech of Ascanio and carry to Cellini a letter that was in Ascanio's possession.
The duchess needed to hear no more, and, bitterly cursing the passion which had led her once more to overstep the limits of her ordinary prudence, she hurried to the Châtelet although it was two o'clock in the morning, demanded to be shown to Ascanio's cell, and there enacted the scene we have described, which had ended in accordance with her wishes so far as she knew, although Ascanio was not altogether deceived.
As Jacques Aubry said, it was high time.
But only half of his task was accomplished, and the most difficult part remained to do. He had the letter which had come so near being destroyed forever; but in order that it should have its full effect it must be in Cellini's hands, not in Jacques Aubry's.
Now Jacques Aubry was a prisoner, very much a prisoner, and he had learned from his predecessor that it was no easy matter to get out of the Châtelet, once one was safely lodged therein. He was therefore, we might say, in much the same plight as the rooster who found the pearl, greatly perplexed as to the use to be made of his treasure.
To attempt to escape by resorting to violence would be utterly vain. He might with his dagger kill the keeper who brought his food, and take his keys and his clothes; but not only was that extreme method repugnant to the student's kindly disposition,—it did not afford sufficiently strong hopes of success. There were ten chances to one that he would be recognized, searched, relieved of his precious letter, and thrust back into his cell.
To attempt to escape by cunning was even less hopeful. The dungeon was eight or ten feet underground, there were huge iron bars across the air-hole through which the one faint ray of light filtered into his cell. It would take months to loosen one of those bars, and, suppose one of them to be removed, where would the fugitive then find himself?—in some courtyard with insurmountable walls, where he would inevitably be found the next morning?
Bribery was his only remaining resource; but, as a consequence of the sentence pronounced by the lieutenant criminal, whereby Gervaise was awarded twenty Paris sous for the loss of her honor, the prisoner's whole fortune was reduced to ten Paris sous, a sum utterly inadequate to tempt the lowest jailer of the vilest prison, and which could not decently be offered to the turnkey of a royal fortress.
Jacques Aubry was therefore, we are forced to confess, in the direst perplexity.
From time to time it seemed as if a hopeful idea passed through his mind; but it was evident that it was likely to entail serious consequences, for each time that it returned, with the persistence characteristic of hopeful ideas, Aubry's face grew perceptibly darker, and he heaved deep sighs, which proved that the poor fellow was undergoing an internal conflict of the most violent description.
This conflict was so violent and so prolonged that Aubry did not once think of sleep the whole night long: he passed the time in striding to and fro, in sitting down and standing up. It was the first time that he had ever kept vigil all night for purposes of reflection; his previous experiences in that line had been on convivial occasions only.
At daybreak the struggle seemed to have ended in the complete triumph of one of the opposing forces, for Jacques heaved a more heart-breaking sigh than any he had yet achieved, and threw himself upon his bed like a man completely crushed.
His head had hardly touched the pillow when he heard steps on the staircase, the key grated in the lock, the door turned upon its hinges, and two officers of the law appeared in the doorway; they were the lieutenant criminal and his clerk.
The annoyance of the visit was tempered by the student's gratification in recognizing two old acquaintances.
"Aha! my fine fellow," said the magistrate, recognizing Aubry, "so it's you, is it, and you succeeded after all in getting into the Châtelet? Tudieu ! what a rake you are! You seduce young women and run young noblemen through the body! But beware! a nobleman's life is more expensive than a grisette's honor, and you'll not be quit of this affair for twenty Paris sous!"
Alarming as the worthy magistrate's words undoubtedly were, the tone in which he uttered them reassured the prisoner to some extent. This jovial-faced individual, into whose hands he had had the good luck to fall, was such a good fellow to all appearance that it was impossible to think of him in connection with anything deadly. To be sure it was not the same with his clerk, who nodded his head approvingly at each word that fell from his principal's lips. It was the second time that Jacques Aubry had seen the two men side by side, and, deeply engrossed as he was by his own precarious situation, he could not forbear some internal reflections upon the whimsical chance which had coupled together two beings so utterly opposed to each other in character and feature.
The examination began. Jacques Aubry made no attempt at concealment. He declared that, having recognized the Vicomte de Marmagne as a man who had on several occasions betrayed his confidence, he seized his page's sword and challenged him; that Marmagne had accepted the challenge, and that after exchanging a few thrusts the viscount fell. More than that he did not know.
"You know no more than that! you know no more than that!" muttered the judge. "Faith, I should say that was quite enough, and your affair's as clear as day, especially as the Vicomte de Marmagne is one of Madame d'Etampes's great favorites. So it seems that she has complained of you to the higher powers, my boy."
"The devil!" exclaimed the scholar, beginning to feel decidedly ill at ease. "Tell me, Monsieur le Juge, is the affair so bad as you say?"
"Worse! my dear friend, worse! I am not in the habit of frightening those who come before me; but I give you warning of this, so that if you have any arrangements to make—"
"Arrangements to make!" cried the student. "Tell me, Monsieur le Lieutenant Criminel, for God's sake! do you think my life's in danger?"
"Certainly it is, certainly. What! you attack a nobleman in the street, you force him to fight, you run a sword through him, and then you ask if your life's in danger! Yes, my dear friend, yes,—in very great danger."
"But such affairs happen every day, and I don't see that the guilty ones are prosecuted."
"True, among gentlemen, my young friend. Oh! when it pleases two gentlemen to cut each other's throats, it's a privilege of their rank, and the king has nothing to say; but if the common people take it into their head some fine day to fight with gentlemen, as they are twenty times as numerous, there would soon be no more gentlemen, which would be a great pity."
"How many days do you think my trial will last?"
"Five or six, in all likelihood."
"What!" cried the student, "five or six days! No more than that?"
"Why should it? The facts are clear enough; a man dies, you confess that you killed him, and justice is satisfied. However," added the judge, assuming a still more benevolent expression, "if two or three days more would be agreeable to you—"
"Very agreeable."
"Oh well! we will spin out the report, and gain time in that way. You are a good fellow at heart, and I shall be delighted to do something for you."
"Thanks," said the student.
"And now," said the judge, rising, "have you any further request to make?"
"I would like to see a priest: is it impossible?"
"No; it is your right."
"In that case, Monsieur le Juge, ask them to send one to me."
"I will do your errand. No ill will, my young friend."
"Good lack! on the contrary, I am deeply grateful."
"Master Student," said the clerk in an undertone, stepping to Aubrey's side, "would you be willing to do me a favor?"
"Gladly," said Aubrey; "what might it be?"
"It may be that you have friends or relatives to whom you intend to bequeath all your possessions?"
"Friends? I have but one, and he's a prisoner like myself. Relatives? I have only cousins, and very distant cousins at that. So, say on, Master Clerk, say on."
"Monsieur, I am a poor man, father of a family, with five children."
"What then?"
"I have never had any opportunities in my position, which I fill, as you can testify, with scrupulous probity. All my confrères are promoted over my head."
"Why is that?"
"Why? Ah! why? I will tell you."
"Do so."
"Because they are lucky."
"Aha!"
"And why are they lucky?"
"That's what I would ask you, Master Clerk."
"And that's what I am about to tell you, Master Student."
"I shall be very glad to know."
"They are lucky,"—here the clerk lowered his voice a half-tone more,—"they are lucky because they have the rope a man was hanged with in their pocket: do you understand?"
"No."
"You're rather dull. You will make a will, eh?"
"A will! why should I?"
"Dame! so that there may be no contest among your heirs. Very good! write in your will that you authorize Marc-Boniface Grimoineau, cleric to Monsieur le Lieutenant Criminel, to claim from the executioner a hit of the rope you are hanged by."
"Ah!" said Aubry, in a choking voice. "Yes, now I understand."
"And you will grant my request?"
"To be sure!"
"Young man, remember what you have promised me. Many have made the same promise, but some have died intestate, others have written my name, Marc-Boniface Grimoineau so badly that there was a chance for cavilling; and others still, who were guilty, monsieur, on my word of honor very guilty, have been acquitted, and gone off elsewhere to be hanged; so that I was really in despair when you fell in my way."
"Very well, Master Cleric, very well; if I am hanged, you shall have what you want, never fear."
"Oh, you will be, monsieur, you will he, don't you doubt it!"
"Well, Grimoineau," said the judge.
"Here I am, monsieur, here I am. So it's a bargain, Master Student?"
"It's a bargain."
"On your word of honor?"
"On my word!"
"I think that I shall get it at last," muttered the clerk as he withdrew. "I will go home and tell my wife and children the good news."
He left the cell on the heels of the lieutenant criminal, who was grumbling good-humoredly at having to wait so long.