The Queen's Necklace - Alexandre Dumas père (electric book reader TXT) 📗

of the cabriolet, which certainly required some care on their part to avoid, and the lady, perhaps half frightened at the murmurs, and knowing the present excited state of the people, only urged on her horse the faster to escape from them.

Thus they proceeded until they reached the Rue du Coq St. Honore, and here had been raised one of the most beautiful of those monuments in snow of which we have spoken.

Round this a great crowd had collected, and they were obliged to stop until the people would make an opening for them to pass, which they did at last, but with great grumbling and discontent.

The next obstacle was at the gates of the Palais Royal, where, in a courtyard, which had been thrown open, were a host of beggars crowding round fires which had been lighted there, and receiving soup, which the servants of M. le Duc d'Orleans were distributing to them in earthen basins; and as in Paris a crowd collects to see everything, the number of the spectators of this scene far exceeded that of the actors.

Here, then, they were again obliged to stop, and to their dismay, began to hear distinctly from behind loud cries of "Down with the cabriolet! down with those that crush the poor!"

"Can it be that those cries are addressed to us?" said the elder lady to her companion.

"Indeed, madame, I fear so," she replied.

"Have we, do you think, run over any one?"

"I am sure you have not."

But still the cries seemed to increase. A crowd soon gathered round them, and some even seized Belus by the reins, who thereupon began to stamp and foam most furiously.

"To the magistrate! to the magistrate!" cried several voices.

The two ladies looked at each other in terror. Curious heads began to peep under the apron of the cabriolet.

"Oh, they are women," cried some; "Opera girls, doubtless," said others, "who think they have a right to crush the poor because they receive ten thousand francs a month."

A general shout hailed these words, and they began again to cry, "To the magistrate!"

The younger lady shrank back trembling with fear; the other looked around her with wonderful resolution, though with frowning brows and compressed lips.

"Oh, madame," cried her companione, "for heaven's sake, take care!"

"Courage, Andree, courage!" she replied.

"But they will recognize you, madame."

"Look through the windows, if Weber is still behind the cabriolet."

"He is trying to get down, but the mob surrounds him. Ah! here he comes."

"Weber," said the lady in German, "we will get out."

The man vigorously pushed aside those nearest the carriage, and opened the door. The ladies jumped out, and the crowd instantly seized on the horse and cabriolet, which would evidently soon be in pieces.

"What in heaven's name does it all mean? Do you understand it, Weber?" said the lady, still in German.

"Ma foi, no, madame," he replied, struggling to free a passage for them to pass.

"But they are not men, they are wild beasts," continued the lady; "with what do they possibly reproach me?"

She was answered by a voice, whose polite and gentlemanly tone contrasted strangely with the savage murmurs of the people, and which said in excellent German, "They reproach you, madame, with having braved the police order, which appeared this morning, and which prohibited all cabriolets, which are always dangerous, and fifty times more so in this frost, when people can hardly escape fast enough, from driving through the streets until the spring."

The lady turned, and saw she was addressed by a young officer, whose distinguished and pleasing air, and fine figure, could not but make a favorable impression.

"Oh, mon Dieu, monsieur," she said, "I was perfectly ignorant of this order."

"You are a foreigner, madame?" inquired the young officer.

"Yes, sir; but tell me what I must do? they are destroying my cabriolet."

"You must let them destroy it, and take advantage of that time to escape. The people are furious just now against all the rich, and on the pretext of your breaking this regulation would conduct you before the magistrate."

"Oh, never!" cried Andree.

"Then," said the officer, laughing, "profit by the space which I shall make in the crowd, and vanish."

The ladies gathered from his manner that he shared the opinion of the people as to their station, but it was no time for explanations.

"Give us your arm to a cab-stand," said the elder lady, in a voice full of authority.

"I was going to make your horse rear, and thereby clear you a passage," said the young man, who did not much wish to take the charge of escorting them through the crowd; "the people will become yet more enraged, if they hear us speaking in a language unknown to them."

"Weber," cried the lady, in a firm voice, "make Belus rear to disperse the crowd."

"And then, madame?"

"Remain till we are gone."

"But they will destroy the carriage."

"Let them; what does that matter? save Belus if you can, but yourself above all."

"Yes, madame;" and a slight touch to the horse soon produced the desired effect of dispersing the nearest part of the crowd, and throwing down those who held by his reins.

"Your arm, sir!" again said the lady to the officer; "come on, petite," turning to Andree.

"Let us go then, courageous woman," said the young man, giving his arm, with real admiration, to her who asked for it.

In a few minutes he had conducted them to a cab-stand, but the men were all asleep on their seats.


CHAPTER V.

THE ROAD TO VERSAILLES.

The ladies were free from the crowd for the present, but there was some danger that they might be followed and recognized, when the same tumult would doubtless be renewed and escape a second time be more difficult. The young officer knew this, and therefore hastened to awaken one of the half-frozen and sleepy men. So stupefied, however, did they seem, that he had great difficulty in rousing one of them. At last he took him by the collar and shook him roughly.

"Gently, gently!" cried the man, sitting up.

"Where do you wish to go, ladies?" asked the officer.

"To Versailles," said the elder lady, still speaking German.

"Oh, to Versailles!" repeated the coachman; "four miles and a half over this ice. No, I would rather not."

"We will pay well," said the lady.

This was repeated to the coachman in French by the young officer.

"But how much?" said the coachman; "you see it is not only going, I must come back again."

"A louis; is that enough?" asked the lady of the officer, who, turning to the coachman, said,--

"These ladies offer you a louis."

"Well, that will do, though I risk breaking my horses' legs."

"Why, you rascal, you know that if you were paid all the way there and back, it would be but twelve francs, and we offer you twenty-four."

"Oh, do not stay to bargain," cried the lady; "he shall have twenty louis if he will only set off at once."

"One is enough, madame."

"Come down, sir, and open the door."

"I will be paid first," said the man.

"You will!" said the officer fiercely.

"Oh! let us pay," said the lady, putting her hand in her pocket. She turned pale. "Oh! mon Dieu, I have lost my purse! Feel for yours, Andree."

"Oh! madame, it is gone too."

They looked at each other in dismay, while the young officer watched their proceedings, and the coachman sat grinning, and priding himself on his caution.

The lady was about to offer her gold chain as a pledge, when the young officer drew out a louis, and offered it to the man, who thereupon got down and opened the door.

The ladies thanked him warmly and got in.

"And now, sir, drive these ladies carefully and honestly."

The ladies looked at each other in terror; they could not bear to see their protector leave them.

"Oh! madame," said Andree, "do not let him go away."

"But why not? we will ask for his address, and return him his louis to-morrow, with a little note of thanks, which you shall write."

"But, madame, suppose the coachman should not keep faith with us, and should turn us out half way, what would become of us?"

"Oh! we will take his number."

"Yes, madame, I do not deny that you could have him punished afterwards; but meanwhile, you would not reach Versailles, and what would they think?"

"True," replied her companion.

The officer advanced to take leave.

"Monsieur," said Andree, "one word more, if you please."

"At your orders, madame," he said politely, but somewhat stiffly.

"Monsieur, you cannot refuse us one more favor, after serving us so much?"

"What is it, madame?"

"We are afraid of the coachman, who seems so unwilling to go."

"You need not fear," replied he; "I have his number, and if he does not behave well, apply to me."

"To you, sir?" said Andree in French, forgetting herself; "we do not even know your name."

"You speak French," exclaimed the young man, "and you have been condemning me all this time to blunder on in German!"

"Excuse us, sir," said the elder lady, coming to Andree's rescue, "but you must see, that though not perhaps foreigners, we are strangers in Paris, and above all, out of our places in a hackney coach. You are sufficiently a man of the world to see that we are placed in an awkward position. I feel assured you are generous enough to believe the best of us, and to complete the service you have rendered, and above all, to ask us no questions."

"Madame," replied the officer, charmed with her noble, yet pleasing manner, "dispose of me as you will."

"Then, sir, have the kindness to get in, and accompany us to Versailles."

The officer instantly placed himself opposite to them, and directed the man to drive on.

After proceeding in silence for some little time, he began to feel himself surrounded with delicate and delicious perfumes, and gradually began to think better of the ladies' position. "They are," thought he, "ladies who have been detained late at some rendezvous, and are now anxious to regain Versailles, much frightened, and a little ashamed; still, two ladies, driving themselves in a cabriolet! However," recollected he, "there was a servant behind; but then again, no money on either of them, but probably the footman carried the purse; and the carriage was certainly a very elegant one, and the horse could not have been worth less than one hundred and fifty louis; therefore they must be rich, so that the accidental want of money proves nothing. But why speak a foreign language when they must be French? However, that at least shows a good education, and they speak both languages with perfect purity; besides, there is an air of distinction about them. The supplication of the younger one was touching, and the request of the other was noble and imposing; indeed, I begin to feel it dangerous to pass two or three hours in a carriage with two such pretty women, pretty and discreet also; for they do not speak, but wait for me to begin."

On their parts, the ladies were doubtless