The Seats Of The Mighty, Volume 3.

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THE SEATS OF THE MIGHTY

BEING THE MEMOIRS OF CAPTAIN ROBERT MORAY,
SOMETIME AN OFFICER IN THE VIRGINIA REGIMENT,
AND AFTERWARDS OF AMHERST'S REGIMENT

By Gilbert Parker

Volume 3.

XIV Argand Cournal
XV In the chamber of torture
XVI Be saint or imp
XVII Through the bars of the cage
XVIII The steep path of conquest
XIX A Danseuse and the Bastile

XIV

ARGAND COURNAL

The most meagre intelligence came to me from the outer world. I
no longer saw Gabord; he had suddenly been with drawn and a new
jailer substituted, and the sentinels outside my door and beneath
the window of my cell refused all information. For months I had no
news whatever of Alixe or of those affairs nearest my heart. I
heard nothing of Doltaire, little of Bigot, and there was no sign
of Voban.

Sometimes I could see my new jailer studying me, if my plans were
a puzzle to his brain. At first he used regularly to try the bars
of the window, and search the wall as though he thought my devices
might be found there.

Scarrat and Flavelle, the guards at my door, set too high a
price on their favours, and they talked seldom, and then with
brutal jests and ribaldry, of matters in the town which were not
vital to me. Yet once or twice, from things they said, I came to
know that all was not well between Bigot and Doltaire on one hand,
and Doltaire and the Governor on the other. Doltaire had set the
Governor and the Intendant scheming against him because of his
adherence to the cause of neither, and his power to render the
plans of either of no avail when he chose, as in my case.
Vaudreuil's vanity was injured, and besides, he counted Doltaire
too strong a friend of Bigot. Bigot, I doubted not, found in Madame
Cournal's liking for Doltaire all sorts of things of which he never
would have dreamed; for there is no such potent devilry in this
world as the jealousy of such a sort of man over a woman whose
vanity and cupidity are the springs of her affections. Doltaire's
imprisonment in a room of the Intendance was not so mysterious as
suggestive. I foresaw a strife, a complication of intrigues, and
internal enmities which would be (as they were) the ruin of New
France. I saw, in imagination, the English army at the gates of
Quebec, and those who sat in the seats of the mighty, sworn to
personal enmities--Vaudreuil through vanity, Bigot through cupidity,
Doltaire by the innate malice of his nature--sacrificing the
country; the scarlet body of British power moving down upon a
dishonoured city, never to take its foot from that sword of France
which fell there on the soil of the New World.

But there was another factor in the situation which I have not
dwelt on before. Over a year earlier, when war was being carried
into Prussia by Austria and France, and against England, the ally
of Prussia, the French Minister of War, D'Argenson, had, by the
grace of La Pompadour, sent General the Marquis de Montcalm to
Canada, to protect the colony with a small army. From the first,
Montcalm, fiery, impetuous, and honourable, was at variance with
Vaudreuil, who, though honest himself, had never dared to make open
stand against Bigot. When Montcalm came, practically taking the
military command out of the hands of the Governor, Vaudreuil
developed a singular jealous spirit against the General. It began
to express itself about the time I was thrown into the citadel
dungeon, and I knew from what Alixe had told me, and from the
gossip of the soldiers, that there was a more open show of
disagreement now.

The Governor, seeing how ill it was to be at variance with both
Montcalm and Bigot, presently began to covet a reconciliation with
the latter. To this Bigot was by no means averse, for his own
position had danger. His followers and confederates, Cournal,
Marin, Cadet, and Rigaud, were robbing the King with a daring and
effrontery which must ultimately bring disaster. This he knew, but
it was his plan to hold on for a time longer, and then to retire
before the axe fell, with an immense fortune. Therefore, about the
time set for my execution, he began to close with the overtures of
the Governor, and presently the two formed a confederacy against the
Marquis de Montcalm. Into it they tried to draw Doltaire, and were
surprised to find that he stood them off as to anything more than
outward show of friendliness.

Truth was, Doltaire, who had no sordid feeling in him, loathed
alike the cupidity of Bigot and the incompetency of the Governor,
and respected Montcalm for his honour, and reproached him for his
rashness. From first to last, he was, without show of it, the best
friend Montcalm had in the province; and though he held aloof from
bringing punishment to Bigot, he despised him and his friends,
and was not slow to make that plain. D'Argenson made inquiry of
Doltaire when Montcalm's honest criticisms were sent to France in
cipher, and Doltaire returned the reply that Bigot was the only
man who could serve Canada efficiently in this crisis; that he had
abounding fertility of resource, a clear head, a strong will, and
great administrative faculty. This was all he would say, save that
when the war was over other matters might be conned. Meanwhile
France must pay liberally for the Intendant's services.

Through a friend in France, Bigot came to know that his affairs
were moving to a crisis, and saw that it would be wise to retire;
but he loved the very air of crisis, and Madame Cournal, anxious to
keep him in Canada, encouraged him in his natural feeling to stand
or fall with the colony. He never showed aught but a hold and
confident face to the public, and was in all regards the most
conspicuous figure in New France. When, two years before, Montcalm
took Oswego from the English, Bigot threw open his palace to the
populace for two days' feasting, and every night during the war he
entertained lavishly, though the people went hungry, and their own
corn, bought for the King, was sold back to them at famine prices.

As the Governor amid the Intendant grew together in friendship,
Vaudreuil sinking past disapproval in present selfish necessity,
they quietly combined against Doltaire as against Montcalm. Yet at
this very time Doltaire was living in the Intendance, and, as he
had told Alixe, not without some personal danger. He had before
been offered rooms at the Chateau St. Louis; but these he would
not take, for he could not bear to be within touch of the Governor's
vanity and timidity. He would of preference have stayed in the
Intendance had he known that pitfalls and traps were at every
footstep. Danger gave a piquancy to his existence. I think he did
not greatly value Madame Cournal's admiration of himself; but when
it drove Bigot to retaliation, his imagination got an impulse, and
he entered upon a conflict which ran parallel with the war, and
with that delicate antagonism which Alixe waged against him, long
undiscovered by himself.

At my wits' end for news, at last I begged my jailer to convey a
message for me to the Governor, asking that the barber be let
come to me. The next day an answer arrived in the person of Voban
himself, accompanied by the jailer. For a time there was little
speech between us, but as he tended me we talked. We could do
so with safety, for Voban knew English; and though he spoke it
brokenly, he had freedom in it, and the jailer knew no word of it.
At first the fellow blustered, but I waved him off. He was a man
of better education than Gabord, but of inferior judgment and
shrewdness. He made no trial thereafter to interrupt our talk, but
sat and drummed upon a stool with his keys, or loitered at the
window, or now and again thrust his hand into my pockets, as if
to see if weapons were concealed in them.

"Voban," said I, "what has happened since I saw you at the
Intendance? Tell me first of mademoiselle. You have nothing from
her for me?"

"Nothing," he answered. "There is no time. A soldier come an
hour ago with an order from the Governor, and I must go all at
once. So I come as you see. But as for the ma'm'selle, she is well.
Voila, there is no one like her in New France. I do not know
all, as you can guess, but they say she can do what she will at
the Chateau. It is a wonder to see her drive. A month ago, a
droll thing come to pass. She is driving on the ice with ma'm'selle
Lotbiniere and her brother Charles. M'sieu' Charles, he has
the reins. Soon, ver' quick, the horses start with all their might.
M'sieu' saw and pull, but they go the faster. Like that for a mile
or so; then ma'm'selle remember there is a great crack in the ice a
mile farther on, and beyond the ice is weak and rotten, for there
the curren' is ver' strongest. She see that M'sieu' Charles, he can
do nothing, so she reach and take the reins. The horses go on; it
make no diff'rence at first. But she begin to talk to them so sof',
and to pull ver' steady, and at last she get them shaping to the
shore. She have the reins wound on her hands, and people on the
shore, they watch. Little on little the horses pull up, and stop at
last not a hunder' feet from the great crack and the rotten ice.
Then she turn them round and drive them home.

"You should hear the people cheer as she drive up Mountain
Street. The bishop stand at the window of his palace and smile at
her as she pass, and m'sieu'"--he looked at the jailer and
paused--"m'sieu' the gentleman we do not love, he stand in the
street with his cap off for two minutes as she come, and after she
go by, and say a grand compliment to her, so that her face go pale.
He get froze ears for his pains--that was a cold day. Well, at night
there was a grand dinner at the Intendance, and afterwards a ball in
the splendid room which that man" (he meant Bigot: I shall use names
when quoting him further, that he may be better understood) "built
for the poor people of the land for to dance down their sorrows. So
you can guess I would be there--happy. Ah yes, so happy! I go and
stand in the great gallery above the hall of dance, with crowd of
people, and look down at the grand folk.

"One man come to me and say, 'Ah, Voban, is it you here? Who would
think it!'--like that. Another, he come and say, 'Voban, he can not
keep away from the Intendance. Who does he come to look for? But no,
SHE is not here--no.' And again, another, 'Why should not Voban be
here? One man has not enough bread to eat, and Bigot steals his
corn. Another hungers for a wife to sit by his fire, and Bigot takes
the maid, and Voban stuffs his mouth with humble pie like the rest.
Chut! shall not Bigot have his fill?' And yet another, and voila,
she was a woman, she say, 'Look at the Intendant down there with
madame. And M'sieu' Cournal, he also is there. What does M'sieu'
Cournal care? No, not at all. The rich man, what he care, if he has
gold? Virtue! ha, ha! what is that in your wife if you have gold for
it? Nothing. See his hand at the Intendant's arm. See how M'sieu'
Doltaire look at them, and then up here at us. What is it in his
mind, you think? Eh? You think he say to himself, A wife all to
himself is the poor man's one luxury? Eh? Ah, M'sieu' Doltaire, you
are right, you are right. You catch up my child from its basket in
the market-place one day, and you shake it ver' soft, an' you say,
"Madame, I will stake the last year of my life that I can put my
finger on the father of this child." And when I laugh in his face,
he say again, "And if he thought he wasn't its father, he would cut
out the liver of the other--eh?" And I laugh, and say, "My Jacques
would follow him to hell to do it." Then he say, Voban, he say to
me, "That is the difference between you and us. We only kill men who
meddle with our mistresses!" Ah, that M'sieu' Doltaire, he put a
louis in the hand of my babe, and he not even kiss me on the cheek.
Pshaw! Jacques would sell him fifty kisses for fifty louis. But sell
me, or a child of me? Well, Voban, you can guess! Pah, barber, if
you do not care what he did to the poor Mathilde, there are other
maids in St. Roch.'"

Voban paused a moment then added quietly, "How do you think I bear
it all? With a smile? No, I hear with my ears open and my heart
close tight. Do they think they can teach me? Do they guess I sit
down and hear all without a cry from my throat or a will in my body?
Ah, m'sieu' le Capitaine, it is you who know. You saw what I would
have go to do with M'sieu' Doltaire before the day of the Great
Birth. You saw if I am coward--if I not take the sword when it was
at my throat without a whine. No, m'sieu', I can wait. Then is a
time for everything. At first I am all in a muddle, I not how what
to do; but by-and-bye it all come to me, and you shall one day what
I wait for. Yes, you shall see. I look down on that people dancing
there, quiet and still, and I hear some laugh at me, and now and
then some one say a good word to me that make me shut my hands
tight, so the tears not come to my eyes. But I felt alone--so much
alone. The world does not want a sad man. In my shop I try to laugh
as of old, and I am not sour or heavy, but I can see men do not say
droll things to me as once back time. No, I am not as I was. What am
I to do? There is but one way. What is great to one man is not to
another. What kills the one does not kill the other. Take away from
some people one thing, and they will not care; from others that
same, and there is nothing to live for, except just to live, and
because a man does not like death."

He paused. "You are right, Voban," said I. "Go on."

He was silent again for a time, and then he moved his hand in a
helpless sort of way across his forehead. It had become deeply
lined and wrinkled all in a couple of years. His temples were
sunken, his cheeks hollow, and his face was full of those shadows
which lend a sort of tragedy to even the humblest and least
distinguished countenance. His eyes had a restlessness, anon an
intense steadiness almost uncanny, and his thin, long fingers had a
stealthiness of motion, a soft swiftness, which struck me strangly.
I never saw a man so changed. He was like a vessel wrested from its
moorings; like some craft, filled with explosives, set loose along
a shore lined with fishing-smacks, which might come foul of one,
and blow the company of men and boats into the air. As he stood
there, his face half turned to me for a moment, this came to my
mind, and I said to him, "Voban, you look like some wicked gun
which would blow us all to pieces."

He wheeled, and came to me so swiftly that I shrank back in my
chair with alarm, his action was so sudden, and, peering into my
face, he said, glancing, as I thought, anxiously at the jailer,
"Blow--blow--how blow us all to pieces, m'sieu'?" He eyed me with
suspicion, and I could see that he felt like some hurt animal among
its captors, ready to fight, yet not knowing from what point danger
would come. Something pregnant in what I said had struck home, yet
I could not guess then what it was, though afterwards it came to me
with great force and vividness.

"I meant nothing, Voban," answered I, "save that you look dangerous."

I half put out my hand to touch his arm in a friendly way, but I
saw that the jailer was watching, and I did not. Voban felt what I
was about to do, and his face instantly softened, and his blood-shot
eyes gave me a look of gratitude. Then he said:

"I will tell you what happen next I know the palace very well,
and when I see the Intendant and M'sieu' Doltaire and others leave
the ballroom I knew that they go to the chamber which they call 'la
Chambre de la Joie,' to play at cards. So I steal away out of the
crowd into a passage which, as it seem, go nowhere, and come quick,
all at once, to a bare wall. But I know the way. In one corner of
the passage I press a spring, and a little panel open. I crawl
through and close it behin'. Then I feel my way along the dark
corner till I come to another panel. This I open, and I see light.
You ask how I can do this? Well, I tell you. There is the valet of
Bigot, he is my friend. You not guess who it is? No? It is a man
whose crime in France I know. He was afraid when he saw me here,
but I say to him, 'No, I will not speak--never'; and he is all
my friend just when I most need. Eh, voila, I see light, as I said,
and I push aside heavy curtains ver' little, and there is the
Chamber of the Joy below. There they all are, the Intendant and the
rest, sitting down to the tables. There was Capitaine Lancy, M'sieu'
Cadet, M'sieu' Cournal, M'sieu' le Chevalier de Levis, and M'sieu'
le Generale, le Marquis de Montcalm. I am astonish to see him there,
the great General, in his grand coat of blue and gold and red, and
laces tres beau at his throat, with a fine jewel. Ah, he is not ver'
high on his feet, but he has an eye all fire, and a laugh come quick
to his lips, and he speak ver' galant, but he never let them,
Messieurs Cadet, Marin, Lancy, and the rest, be thick friends with
him. They do not clap their hands on his shoulder comme le bon
camarade--non!

"Well, they sit down to play, and soon there is much noise and
laughing, and then sometimes a silence, and then again the noise,
and you can see one snuff a candle with the points of two rapiers,
or hear a sword jangle at a chair, or listen to some one sing ver'
soft a song as he hold a good hand of cards, or the ring of louis
on the table, or the sound of glass as it break on the floor. And
once a young gentleman--alas! he is so young--he get up from his
chair, and cry out, 'All is lost! I go to die!' He raise a pistol
to his head; but M'sieu' Doltaire catch his hand, and say quite
soft and gentle, 'No, no, mon enfant, enough of making fun
of us. Here is the hunder' louis I borrow of you yesterday. Take
your revenge.' The lad sit down slow, looking ver' strange at
M'sieu' Doltaire. And it is true: he took his revenge out of
M'sieu' Cadet, for he win--I saw it--three hunder' louis. Then
M'sieu' Doltaire lean over to him and say, 'M'sieu', you will
carry for me a message to the citadel for M'sieu' Ramesay, the
commandant.' Ah, it was a sight to see M'sieu' Cadet's face, going
this way and that. But it was no use: the young gentleman pocket
his louis, and go away with a letter from M'sieu' Doltaire. But
M'sieu' Doltaire, he laugh in the face of M'sieu' Cadet, and say
ver' pleasant, 'That is a servant of the King, m'sieu', who live by
his sword alone. Why should civilians be so greedy? Come, play,
M'sieu' Cadet. If M'sieu' the General will play with me, we two
will what we can do with you and his Excellency the Intendant.'

"They sit just beneath me, and I hear all what is said, I see all
the looks of them, every card that is played. M'sieu' the General
have not play yet, but watch M'sieu' Doltaire and the Intendant at
the cards. With a smile he now sit down. Then M'sieu' Doltaire, he
say, 'M'sieu' Cadet, let us have no mistake--let us be commercial.'
He take out his watch. 'I have two hours to spare; are you dispose
to play for that time only? To the moment we will rise, and there
shall be no question of satisfaction, no discontent anywhere--eh,
shall it be so, if m'sieu' the General can spare the time also?' It
is agree that the General play for one hour and go, and that M'sieu'
Doltaire and the Intendant play for the rest of the time.

"They begin, and I hide there and watch. The time go ver' fast,
and my breath catch in my throat to see how great the stakes they
play for. I hear M'sieu' Doltaire say at last, with a smile, taking
out his watch, 'M'sieu' the General, your time is up, and you take
with you twenty thousan' francs.'

"The General, he smile and wave his hand, as if sorry to take so
much from M'sieu' Cadet and the Intendant. M'sieu' Cadet sit dark,
and speak nothing at first, but at last he get up and turn on his
heel and walk away, leaving what he lose on the table. M'sieu' the
General bow also, and go from the room. Then M'sieu' Doltaire and
the Intendant play. One by one the other players stop, and come and
watch these. Something get into the two gentlemen, for both are
pale, and the face of the Intendant all of spots, and his little
round eyes like specks of red fire; but M'sieu' Doltaire's face,
it is still, and his brows bend over, and now and then he make a
little laughing out of his lips. All at once I hear him say, 'Double
the stakes, your Excellency!' The Intendant look up sharp and say,
'What! Two hunder' thousan' francs!'--as if M'sieu' Doltaire could
not pay such a like that. M'sieu' Doltaire smile ver' wicked, and
answer, 'Make it three hunder' thousan' francs, your Excellency.' It
is so still in the Chamber of the Joy that all you hear for a minute
was the fat Monsieur Varin breathe like a hog, and the rattle of a
spur as some one slide a foot on the floor.

"The Intendant look blank; then he nod his head for answer, and
each write on a piece of paper. As they begin, M'sieu' Doltaire
take out his watch and lay it on the table, and the Intendant
do the same, and they both look at the time. The watch of the
Intendant is all jewels. 'Will you not add the watches to the
stake?' say M'sieu' Doltaire. The Intendant look, and shrug a
shoulder, and shake his head for no, and M'sieu' Doltaire smile in
a sly way, so that the Intendant's teeth show at his lips and his
eyes almost close, he is so angry.

"Just this minute I hear a low noise behind me, and then some
one give a little cry. I turn quick and Madame Cournal. She stretch
her hand, and touch my lips, and motion me not to stir. I look down
again, and I see that M'sieu' Doltaire look up to the where I am,
for he hear that sound, I think--I not know sure. But he say once
more, 'The watch, the watch, your Excellency! I have a fancy for
yours!' I feel madame breathe hard beside me, but I not like to
look at her. I am not afraid of men, but a woman that way--ah, it
make me shiver! She will betray me, I think. All at once I feel her
hand at my belt, then at my pocket, to see if I have a weapon; for
the thought come to her that I am there to kill Bigot. But I raise
my hands and say, 'No,' ver' quiet, and she nod her head all right.

"The Intendant wave his hand at M'sieu' Doltaire to say he would
not stake the watch, for I know it is one madame give him; and then
they begin to play. No one stir. The cards go out flip, flip, on the
table, and with a little soft scrape in the hands, and I hear
Bigot's hound much a bone. All at once M'sieu' Doltaire throw down
his cards, and say, 'Mine, Bigot! Three hunder' thousan' francs,
and the time is up!' The other get from his chair, and say, 'How
would you have pay if you had lost, Doltaire?' And m'sieu' answer,
'From the coffers of the King, like you, Bigot' His tone is odd.
I feel madame's breath go hard. Bigot turn round and say to the
others, 'Will you take your way to the great hall, messieurs,
and M'sieu' Doltaire and I will follow. We have some private
conf'rence.' They all turn away, all but M'sieu' Cournal, and leave
the room, whispering. 'I will join you soon, Cournal,' say his
Excellency. M'sieu' Cournal not go, for he have been drinking, and
something stubborn got into him. But the Intendant order him rough,
and he go. I can hear madame gnash her teeth sof' beside me.

"When the door close, the Intendant turn to M'sieu' Doltaire and
say, 'What is the end for which you play?' M'sieu' Doltaire make a
light motion of his hand, and answer, 'For three hunder' thousan'
francs.' 'And to pay, m'sieu', how to pay if you have lost?'
M'sieu' Doltaire lay his hand on his sword sof'. 'From the King's
coffers, as I say; he owes me more than he has paid. But not like
you, Bigot. I have earned, this way and that, all that I might ever
get from the King's coffers--even this three hunder' thousan'
francs, ten times told. But you, Bigot--tush! why should we make
bubbles of words?' The Intendant get white in the face, but there
are spots on it like on a late apple of an old tree. 'You go too
far, Doltaire,' he say. 'You have hint before my officers and my
friends that I make free with the King's coffers.' M'sieu' answer,
'You should see no such hints, if your palms were not musty.' 'How
know you,' ask the Intendant, 'that my hands are musty from the
King's coffers?' M'sieu' arrange his laces, and say light, 'As
easy from the must as I tell how time passes in your nights by the
ticking of this trinket here.' He raise his sword and touch the
Intendant's watch on the table.

"I never hear such silence as there is for a minute, and then the
Intendant say, 'You have gone one step too far. The must on my
hands, seen through your eyes, is no matter, but when you must the
name of a lady there is but one end. You understan', m'sieu', there
is but one end.' M'sieu' laugh. 'The sword, you mean? Eh? No, no,
I will not fight with you. I am not here to rid the King of so
excellent an officer, however large fee he force for his services.'
'And I tell you,' say the Intendant, 'that I will not have you cast
a slight upon a lady.' Madame beside me start up, and whisper to
me, 'If you betray me, you shall die. If you be still, I too will
say nothing.' But then a thing happen. Another voice sound from
below, and there, coming from behind a great screen of oak wood, is
M'sieu' Cournal, his face all red with wine, his hand on his sword.
'Bah!' he say, coming forward--'bah! I will speak for madame. I
will speak. I have been silent long enough.' He come between the
two, and, raising his sword, he strike the time-piece and smash it.
'Ha! ha!' he say, wild with drink, 'I have you both here alone.' He
snap his fingers under the Intendant's nose. 'It is time I protect
my wife's name from you, and by God, I will do it!' At that M'sieu'
Doltaire laugh, and Cournal turn to him, and say, 'Batard!' The
Intendant have out his sword, and he roar in a hoarse voice, 'Dog,
you shall die!' But M'sieu' Doltaire strike up his sword, and face
the drunken man. 'No, leave that to me. The King's cause goes
shipwreck; we can't change helmsman now. Think--scandal and your
disgrace!' Then he make a pass at m'sieu' Cournal, who parry quick.
Another, and he prick his shoulder. Another, and then madame beside
me, as I spring back, throw aside the curtains, and cry out, 'No,
m'sieu'! no! For shame!'

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