The White Plumes of Navarre: A Romance of the Wars of Religion Page 15

  CHAPTER XIV.

  EYES OF JADE

  Claire Agnew was left alone among a world of men. But as she had knownfew women all her life, that made the less matter. Her dark, denselyringleted hair, something between raven-black and the colour of bog-oak,was crisped about a fine forehead, which in his hours of ease her fatherhad been wont to call "Ailsa Craig."

  "Oh, cover up Ailsa!" he would say often to tease her, "no girl can havebrains enough for a brow such as that!" And so, to please him, she hadtrained her hair to lie low on her forehead, and then to ripple andtwist away gracefully to the nape of her neck, looking, as she turnedher head, like a charming young Medusa with deep green eyes of mysticjade.

  Such was Claire Agnew in the year of grace 1588, when she found herselffatherless in that famous town of Blois, soon to be the terror, the joy,and the hope of the world. Not that any description can do much to makethe personality of a fair woman leap from the printed page. Slowly andonly in part, it must disengage itself in word and thought and deed.

  Like almost all lonely girls, Claire Agnew kept, in her father's tongue,often in his very dialect, a journal of events and feelings andimaginings--her "I-book," as she used to name it to herself.

  That night as she curled herself up to sleep--it was almost morning--shearranged in her mind how she would begin the very next day to write down"all that happened, as well as" (because she was a girl) "all that shehoped would happen."

  The closely-packed script has come down to us, the writing fine, likeGreek cursive. The paper has been preserved marvellously, but the ink isbrowned with time, and the letters so small and serried that they canonly be made out with a magnifying-glass.

  "This is my I-Book, and I mean to be more faithful with myself in writing it out; from this time forward--I shall write it every night, no matter how tired I may be. Or--at least, the next day, without the least failure. This shall have the force of a vow!"

  (Poor Claire--even thus have all diaries opened, since the firstCave-man began to scratch the details of his Twelfth of August "bag" ona mammoth-tusk! What a feeble proportion of these diaries have survivedeven one fortnight!)

  "Yes, I like him," Claire wrote, without prelude or the formality of naming the him--"I like him, but I am glad he is gone. Somehow, till I have thought and rested a while, I shall feel safer with just our excellent Doctor Long, who preaches at me much as Pastor Gras used to do at Geneva. Indeed, I see little difference, except that the pastor was older, and did not hold my hand as he talked. But no doubt he does that because I have lost my father."

  Doubtless it was so; nevertheless it needs some little explanation tomake it clear why, after having been committed by D'Epernon to the careof the King of Navarre, Claire and the Professor should still be in thelittle town of Blois, with the young girl busily writing her journal,and lifting her eyes at the end of every sentence to look across thebroad blue river at the squares and oblongs of ripening vintages whichwent clambering irregularly over the low hills opposite.

  "The Loire here in this place" (so she wrote) "is broad and calm, not swift and treacherous like the Rhone, or sleepy like the Seine, nor yet fierce like the Rhine as I saw it long ago, lashing green as sea-water about the old bridge at Basel. I love the Loire--a wide river, still and unrippled, not a leaping fish, not a stooping bird, a water of silver flowing on and on in a dream. And though my father is dead and I greatly alone (save for old Madame Granier in her widow's crape) I cannot feel that I am very unhappy. Perhaps it is wicked to say so. I reproach myself that I lack feeling--that if I had loved my father more, surely I would now have been more unhappy. I do not know. One is as one is made.

  "Yet I did love him--God knows I did! But here--it is so peaceful. Sadness falls away."

  And peaceful it certainly was. The Bearnais had gone back to his camp,taking the Abbe John with him, where, in the incessant advance andretreat of the Huguenot army, there was little room for fair maids.

  Before he went away, the King had had a talk with Jean-aux-Choux andwith his host, Anthony Arpajon. They reminded him that for some monthsat least, no one would be more welcome in Blois than this learnedProfessor of the Sorbonne. Was not the Parliament of the King--the loyalStates-General--to be gathered there in a few weeks? And, meantime, theprovident Blesois were employed in making their rooms fit and proper forthe reception of the rich and noble out of all France, excepting onlythe Leaguer provinces of the north and the Huguenot south-east from theLoire to the Pyrenees.

  "I would willingly keep the maid and the Professor," said Anthony, "butit is of the nature of my business that there should be at times abustle and a noise of rough lads coming and going. And though none ofthem would harm the daughter of Francis the Scot--having me to dealwith, as well as wearing, for the most part, the silver cow-bell attheir girdles--yet a hostelry is no place for a well-favoured Calvinistmaid, and the daughter of Master Francis Agnew!"

  "What, then, would you do with her?"

  The brow of the King was frowning a little. After all, he thought, hadthe girl not followed her father, and been accustomed to the rough sideof the blanket? He had not found women so nice about their accommodationwhen a king catered for them.

  But a well-timed jest of Jean-aux-Choux concerning the young bladeswhich the mere sight of Claire would set bickering, caused the Bearnaisto smile, and with a sigh he gave way.

  "Well, Anthony the Calvinist, you are an obstinate varlet. Have it asyou will. I am an easy man. But tell me your plans. For, after all, thegirl has been committed to my charge."

  The Calvinist innkeeper had his answer ready.

  "There dwells," he said, "by the water-side yonder a wise and prudentwife, whose husband was long at the wars, a sergeant in your Cevenollevies. She will care for the maid. And if there be need, Madame Granierknows a door in her back-yard by which, at all times, she can have suchhelp or shelter as the house of Anthony Arpajon can give her."

  "And the Professor of Eloquence?" said Henry, with a quick glance.

  "Is he not her uncle--in a way, her guardian?" said Anthony, with animpenetrable countenance. "She could not be in safer hands. Leave usalso the fool, Jean-aux-Choux, and, by my word, you shall have the firstand the best intelligence of that the King and his wise Parliamentersmay devise. They say my Lord of Guise is soon to be here with a thousandgentlemen, and such a tail of the commonalty as will eat up all thedecent folk in Blois like a swarm of locusts!"

  "Good," said the King of Navarre. "Guise has long been tickling theadder's tail; he will find what the head holds some fine day, when heleast expects it!"

  These were quiet days in the little white house, with only the narrowquay underneath, and the changing groups of washerwomen, bare-armed,lilac-bloused, laving and lifting in the tremulous heat-haze of theafternoon. But somehow they were very dear days to Claire Agnew, and sheclung to the memory of them long afterwards.

  She was near enough for safety to the hostelry of the Silver Cow-bell(presently held by Anthony Arpajon), yet far enough from it to be quiteapart from its throng and bustle. All day Madame Granier gathered up thegossip of the quarter, and passing it through a kind of moral sieve,retailed it at intervals to her guest.

  Furthermore, Claire had time to bethink herself. She had long, longthoughts of the Abbe John. She remembered how bright and willing he hadever been in her service, how he had respected her grief, and neverbreathed word her father might not have heard.

  And her good Professor of Eloquence--Doctor Anatole Long? What of him?He was there close under her hand, always willing to stroll with heralong the river's bank. Or in Dame Granier's little living-room, hewould explain the universe to Claire Agnew to the accompaniment ofMadame Granier's clattering platters and her rhyme of King Francis.

  "Brave Francis went the devil's way, Bold sprang the hawk, laughed maidens gay! Yet he learned to eat from an Emperor's tray, _Sans_ hawk, _sans_ hound
, _sans_ maiden gay. A-lack-a-day! A-lack-a-day! From Pavia's steeple struck Doomsday!"

  After all, it was best by the river-side. You saw things there, and ifthe Professor were in good humour, he would talk on and on, while youcould--that is, Claire could--throw stones in the water withoutdisturbing the even flow of the big, fine words. Not too large stones,but only pebbles, else he would rise and march on, with a frown at beinginterrupted, but without at all perceiving the cause. For at such timesClaire always looked especially demure.

  "You are indeed my dear Uncle Anatole," she said one day, when they hadbeen longer by the water-side than usual; "you were just made for it. Ifyou had not been--I declare I should have adopted you!"

  There was something teasing about Claire's accent, at once girlish andlight, which fell pleasantly on the Professor's ear. But the words--hewas not so sure that he liked the words.

  "I am not so old," he said, the deep furrow which dinted downwardsbetween his thick eyebrows smoothing itself out as he looked, or ratherpeered at her with his short-sighted blue eyes; "my mother is activestill. I long for you to see her; and I have two brothers, one of whomwas thinking of marrying last year, but after all it came to nothing!"

  "I should think so, indeed," said Claire suddenly.

  "And pray why?" The Professor swung about and faced her. "What was thereto prevent it?"

  "The girl, of course!" said Claire, smiling simply.

  "Umph!" said the Professor, and for half a mile spoke no more.

  Then he nodded his head sagely, and communed to himself without speech.

  "She is right," he said; "she is warning me. What have I to do withyoung maids?--I who might have had maids of my own, fool that I was!Hey, what's that? Stand back there, or I will spit any two ofyou--dogs!"

  A laughing, dancing convoy of gold-laced pages from the Chateau, nowrapidly filling up for the momentous meeting of the States-General,swirled out of the willow-copses by the Loire side. Claire was caughtinto the turmoil of the dance, as a flight of wild pigeons might envelopa tame dove wandering from the Basse Cour.

  "Go up, bald-head!" they cried, "grey beards and young maids go not welltogether!"

  The Professor of Eloquence, stung by the affront, lifted his onlyweapon, a stout oaken cudgel. And with such a pack of beardless loons,the mere threat was enough. They scattered, screaming and laughing.

  "I will report you to the Provost-Marshal, to the Major-domo of thepalace, and your backs shall pay for this insolence to my niece!"

  "I think they meant no harm, sir," said Claire breathlessly, taking thearm of the Professor of the Sorbonne. She was astonished at his heat.

  "The whipping-bench and a good dozen spare rods are what they want!"growled the Professor. "These are ill times. 'Train up a child in theway he should go,' saith the Book. But in these days the young see onlyevil all their days, and when they are old they depart not from that!"