Before anything had been said to soften these words-while he was still standing grave and stiff, like one struck by a blow-in came the others from the window. Meg, in fact, could not keep Cecile d'Aubepine back any longer from hindering such shocking impropriety as out tete-a-tete. We overheard her saving her little girl from corruption by a frightful French fib that the gentleman in black was Mademoiselle de Ribaumont's English priest.
I am sure out parting need have excited no suspicions. We were cold and grave and ceremonious as Queen Anne of Austria herself, and poor Lady Ommaney looked from one to the other of us in perplexity.
I went home between wrath and shame. I knew I had insulted Clement, and I was really mortified and angry that he should have accepted this French promotion instead of fleeing with us, and embracing our religion. I hated all the French politics together a great deal too much to have any comprehension of the patriotism that made him desire to support the only honest and loyal party, hopeless as it was. I could not tell Meg about our quarrel; I was glad Eustace was away at the English's ambassador's. I felt as if one Frenchman was as good, or as bad, as another, and I was more gracious to M. de Poligny than ever I had been before that evening.
My mother had a reception in honour of its being Mid-Lent week. Solivet was there, and, for a wonder, both the d'Aubepines, for the Count had come home suddenly with message from the Prince of Conde to the Duke of Orleans.
CHAPTER XXIX. MADAME'S OPPORTUNITY
(Annora's Narrative)
The Prince of Conde and Cardinal Mazarin were in arms against one another. The Queen and her son were devoted to Mazarin. The loyal folk in Paris held to the King, and were fain to swallow the Cardinal because Conde was in open rebellion. Monsieur was trying to hold the balance with the help of the Parliament, but was too great an ass to do any such thing. the mob was against everybody, chiefly against the Cardinal, and the brutal ruffians of the Prince's following lurked about, bullying every one who gave them umbrage, with some hope of terrifying the Parliament magistrates into siding with them.
It was therefore no great surprise to Eustace and Sir Francis Ommaney the next evening, when they were coming back on foot from the Louvre, to hear a scuffle in one of the side streets.
They saw in a moment half of dozen fellows with cudgels falling on a figure in black, who vainly struggled to defend himself with a little thin walking rapier. Their English blood was up in a moment two masked figures and hearing them egging on their bravoes with 'Hola, there! At him! Teach him to look at a lady of rank.'
The little rapier had been broken. A heavy blow had made the victim's arm fall, he had been tripped up, and the rascals were still belabouring him, when Eustace and Sir Francis sprang in among them, crying, 'Hold, cowardly rascals!' striking to the right and left, though with the flat of their swords, of which they were perfect masters, for even in their wrath they remembered that these rogues were only tools. And no doubt they were not recognized in the twilight, for one of the masked gentlemen exclaimed:
'Stop, sir! this is not a matter for gentlemen. This is the way we punish the insolence of fellows whose muddy blood would taint the swords of a noble.'
At the same moment Eustace saw that the victim, who had begun to raise himself, was actually Clement Darpent. He knew, too, the voice from the mask, and, in hot wrath, exclaimed:
'Solivet, you make me regret that you are my brother, and that I cannot punish such a cowardly outrage.'
'But I am no brother of yours!' cried d'Aubepine, flying at him. 'Thus I treat all who dare term me coward.'
Eustace, far taller and more expert in fence, as well as with strength of arm that all his ill-health had not destroyed, parried the thrust so as to strike the sword out of d'Aubepine's hand, and then said:
'Go home, Monsieur. Thank your relationship to my sister that I punish you no further, and learn that to use other men's arms to strike the defenceless is a stain upon nobility.'
And as the wretched little Count slunk away he added
'Solivet, I had though better things of you.'
To which Solivet responded, with the pretension derived from his few years of seniority:
'Bah! brother, you do not understand, half a foreigner as you are. This was the only way left to me to protect my sister from the insults your English folly had brought on her.'
Eustace made no answer. He could not speak, for the exertion and shock had been too much for him. His mouth was filled with blood. They were all about him in an instant then, Solivet and Darpent both in horror, each feeling that he might in a manner have been the cause of that bleeding, which might in a moment be fatal. Eustace himself knew best what to do, and sat down on the step leaning against Sir Francis, so as not to add to the danger.
The fray had been undisturbed. In that delectable city people held aloof from such things instead of stopping them, but a doctor suddenly appeared on the scene, 'attracted like a vulture,' as Sir Francis said; and they had some ado to prevent him from unbuttoning Eustace's doublet to search for a wound before they could make him understand what had really happened. They obtained a fiacre, and Eustace was placed in it. In this condition they brought him home and put him to bed, telling us poor women only that he had interfered in a street fray and over-exerted himself. It was shock enough for us to find all the improvements of a whole year overthrown, as he lay white and still, not daring to speak.
They had agreed on the way home to keep us in ignorance, or at least to let us think that the attack had been made by strangers, simply because of his connection with the Big Beard. Meg's Nicolas was first to tell us that it was M. Darpent whom they had rescued, and that he had called at the porter's lodge on his way home to inquire for M. le Baron, bruised all over, and evidently seriously hurt. And while still trying to disbelieve this, another report arrived through the maidservants that M. de Solivet and d'Aubepine had soundly cudgeled M. Darpent, and that M. le Baron and M. d'Aubepine had fought a duel on the spot, in which my brother had been wounded.
Meg was nearly as frantic as I was. We could not speak to Eustace, and Solivet and d'Aubepine, finding themselves known, had both hurried away at peep of day, for it was a serious thing to have nearly killed a man in office; but Meg desired that if Sir Francis called to inquire for my brother we should see him, and she also sent Nicolas to inquire for M. Darpent, who, we heard, was confined to his bed with a broken arm.
Poor Clement! such was his reward for the interview where I had used him so ill, and been so unjust to him. For, as we came to understand, it really was all that wretched little Cecile's fault. She would do anything to please that husband of hers, and she communicated to him that she understood the secret of my resistance to the Poligny match, and had been infinitely shocked at my behaviour at Lady Ommaney's.
The cowardly fellow had hated Clement ever since the baffling of the attempt on Margaret. So he told Solivet, and they united in this attack, with a half a dozen of their bravoes, got together for the occasion! We heard the truth of the affair from Sir Francis, and it was well for Solivet that he was out of my reach!
As for my mother, she thought it only an overflow of zeal for the honour of the family, and held it to be my fault that her dear son had been driven to such measures. Nothing was bad enough for the Ommaneys! Nothing would restore my reputation but marrying the little Chevalier at Easter. And in the midst, just as Eustace was a little better, and there was no excuse for refusing to obey the drag of her chains, Margaret was summoned away to attend on her absurd Princess, who was going to Orleans, by way of keeping the Cardinal's forces out of her father's city.