The Fourty-Five Guardsmen - Alexandre Dumas père (best time to read books .txt) 📗

chair, muttered, "Poor father!" and then fell into a profound reverie. At last she called Remy.

The faithful servant soon appeared.

"Here I am, madame."

"My worthy friend, my brother--you, the last person who knows me on this earth--say adieu to me."

"Why so, madame?"

"Because the time has come for us to separate."

"Separate!" cried the young man. "What do you mean, madame?"

"Yes, Remy. My project of vengeance seemed to me noble and pure while there remained an obstacle between me and it, and I only contemplated it from afar off; but now that I approach the execution of it--now that the obstacle has disappeared--I do not draw back, but I do not wish to drag with me into crime a generous and pure soul like yours; therefore you must quit me, my friend."

Remy listened to the words of Diana with a somber look.

"Madame," replied he, "do you think you are speaking to a trembling old man? Madame, I am but twenty-six; and snatched as I was from the tomb, if I still live, it is for the accomplishment of some terrible action--to play an active part in the work of Providence. Never, then, separate your thoughts from mine, since we both have the same thoughts, sinister as they may be. Where you go, I will go; what you do I will aid in; or if, in spite of my prayers, you persist in dismissing me--"

"Oh!" murmured she, "dismiss you! What a word, Remy!"

"If you persist in that resolution," continued the young man, "I know what I have to do, and all for me will end with two blows from a poniard--one in the heart of him whom you know, and the other in your own."

"Remy! Remy!" cried Diana, "do not say that. The life of him you threaten does not belong to you--it is mine--I have paid for it dearly enough. I swear to you, Remy, that on the day on which I knelt beside the dead body of him"--and she pointed to the portrait--"on that day I approached my lips to that open wound, and the trembling lips seemed to say to me, 'Avenge me, Diana!--avenge me!'"

"Madame--"

"Therefore, I repeat, vengeance is for me, and not for you; besides, for whom and through whom did he die? By me and through me."

"I must obey you, madame, for I also was left for dead. Who carried me away from the middle of the corpses with which that room was filled?--You. Who cured me of my wounds?--You. Who concealed me?--You always. Order, then, and I will obey, provided that you do not order me to leave you."

"So be it, Remy; you are right; nothing ought to separate us more."

Remy pointed to the portrait.

"Now, madame," said he, "he was killed by treason--it is by treason that he must be revenged. Ah! you do not know one thing--the hand of God is with us, for to-night I have found the secret of the 'Aqua tofana,' that poison of the Medicis and of Rene the Florentine."

"Really?"

"Come and see, madame."

"But where is Grandchamp?"

"The poor old man has come sixty leagues on horseback; he is tired out, and has fallen asleep on my bed."

"Come, then," said Diana; and she followed Remy.


CHAPTER LX.

THE LABORATORY.

Remy led the lady into a neighboring room; and pushing a spring which was hidden under a board in the floor, and which, opening, disclosed a straight dark staircase, gave his hand to Diana to help her to descend. Twenty steps of this staircase, or rather ladder, led into a dark and circular cave, whose only furniture was a stove with an immense hearth, a square table, two rush chairs, and a quantity of phials and iron boxes. In the stove a dying fire still gleamed, while a thick black smoke escaped through a pipe fastened into the wall. From a still placed on the hearth a few drops of a liquid, yellow as gold, was dropping into a thick white phial. Diana looked round her without astonishment or terror; the ordinary feelings of life seemed to be unknown to her who lived only in the tomb. Remy lighted a lamp, and then approached a well hollowed out in the cave, attached a bucket to a long cord, let it down into the well, and then drew it up full of a water as cold as ice and as clear as crystal.

"Approach, madame," said he.

Diana drew near. In the bucket he let fall a single drop of the liquid contained in the phial, and the entire mass of the water became instantaneously yellow; then the color evaporated, and the water in ten minutes became as clear as before.

Remy looked at her.

"Well?" said she.

"Well, madame," said he, "now dip in that water, which has neither smell nor color, a glove or a handkerchief; soak it in scented soap, pour some of it into the basin where you are about to wash your hands or face, and you will see, as was seen at the court of Charles IX., the flower kill by its perfume, the glove poison by its contact, the soap kill by its introduction into the pores of the skin. Pour a single drop of this pure oil on the wick of a lamp or candle, and for an hour the candle or lamp will exhale death, and burn at the same time like any other."

"You are sure of what you say, Remy?"

"All this I have tried. See these birds who can now neither drink nor eat; they have drunk of water like this. See this goat who has browsed on grass watered with this same water; he moves and totters; vainly now should we restore him to life and liberty; his life is forfeited, unless, indeed, nature should reveal to his instinct some of those antidotes to poison which animals know, although men do not."--"Can I see this phial, Remy?"

"Yes, madame, presently."

Remy then separated it from the still with infinite care, then corked it with soft wax, tied the top up in cloth, and then presented it to Diana.

She took it, held it up to the light, and, after looking at it, said:

"It will do; when the time arrives we will choose gloves, lamp, soap, or flowers, as convenient. Will the liquor keep in metal?"--"It eats it away."

"But then, perhaps, the bottle will break?"

"I think not--see the thickness of the crystal; besides, we can shut it up in a covering of gold."

"Listen, Remy! I hear horses; I think ours have arrived."

"Probably, madame, it is about the time; but I will go and send them away."

"Why so?"

"Are they not useless?"

"Instead of going to Meridor, we will go into Flanders. Keep the horses."

"Ah! I understand!" and Remy's eyes gave forth a flash of sinister joy.

"But Grandchamp; what can we do with him?" said he.

"He has need of repose. He shall remain here, and sell this house, which we require no longer. But restore to liberty that unhappy animal, whom you were forced to torture. As you say, God may care for its recovery."

"This furnace, and these stills?"

"Leave them here."

"But these powders, essences, and acids?"

"Throw them in the fire, Remy."

"Go away, then, or put on this glass mask."

Then, taking similar precautions for himself, he blew up the fire again, poured in the powder, which went off in brilliant sparks, some green and some yellow; and the essences, which, instead of being consumed, mounted like serpents of fire into the pipe, with a noise like distant thunder.

"Now," said Remy, "if any one now discovers this cave, he will only think that an alchemist has been here, and though they still burn sorcerers, they respect alchemists."

"And besides," said the lady, "if they do burn us, provided I have only finished my task, I should not mind that sort of death more than any other."

At this moment they heard knocking.

"Here are our horses, madame," said Remy; "go up quickly, and I will close the trap-door."

Diana obeyed, and found Grandchamp, whom the noise had awakened, at the door.

The old man was not a little surprised to hear of his mistress's intended departure, who informed him of it without telling him where she was going.

"Grandchamp, my friend," said she, "Remy and I are going to accomplish a pilgrimage on which we have long determined; speak of this journey to none, and do not mention my name to any one."

"Oh! I promise you, madame," replied the old servant; "but we shall see you again?"

"Doubtless, Grandchamp; if not in this world, in the next. But, apropos, Grandchamp, this house is now useless to us."

Diana drew from a drawer a bundle of papers.

"Here are the title-deeds; let or sell this house; but if, in the course of a month, you do not find a purchaser, abandon it and return to Meridor."

"But if I find some one, how much am I to ask?"

"What you please, Grandchamp."

"Shall I take the money to Meridor?"

"Keep it for yourself, my good Grandchamp."

"What, madame, such a sum?"

"Yes, I owe it to you for your services; and I have my father's debts to pay as well as my own. Now, adieu!"

Then Diana went upstairs, cut the picture from the frame, rolled it up, and placed it in her trunk.

When Remy had tied the two trunks with leather thongs, and had glanced into the street to see that there were no lookers-on, he aided his mistress to mount.

"I believe, madame," said he, "that this is the last house in which we shall live so long."

"The last but one, Remy."

"And what will be the other?"

"The tomb, Remy."


CHAPTER LXI.

WHAT MONSEIGNEUR FRANCOIS, DUC D'ANJOU, DUC DE BRABANT AND COMTE DE FLANDERS, WAS DOING IN FLANDERS.

Our readers must now permit us to leave the king at the Louvre, Henri of Navarre at Cahors, Chicot on the road, and Diana in the street, to go to Flanders to find M. le Duc d'Anjou, recently named Duc de Brabant, and to whose aid we have sent the great admiral of France--Anne, duc de Joyeuse.

At eighty leagues from Paris, toward the north, the sound of French voices was heard, and the French banner floated over a French camp on the banks of the Scheldt. It was night; the fires, disposed in an immense circle, bordered the stream, and were reflected in its deep waters.

From the top of the ramparts of the town the sentinels saw shining, by the bivouac fires, the muskets of the French army. This army was that of the Duc d'Anjou. What he had come to do there we must tell our readers; and although it may not be very amusing, yet we hope they will pardon it in consideration of the warning; so many people are dull without announcing it.

Those of our readers who have read "Chicot," already know the Duc d'Anjou, that jealous, egotistical, ambitious prince, and who, born so near to the throne, had never been able to wait with resignation until death offered him a free passage to it. Thus he had desired the throne of Navarre under Charles IX., then that of Charles IX. himself, then that of his