Petticoat Rule Part 49

A deep red stain was visible on the left side, spreading on the fine cloth of the coat. With clumsy though willing fingers, Mortemar was doing his best to get the waistcoat open, and to stop temporarily the rapid flow of blood with Lydie's scarf, which she had wrenched from her shoulders.

"Quick, Jean Marie! the leech!" he ordered, "and have the rooms prepared . . ."

Then, as Jean Marie obeyed with unusual alacrity and anon his stentorian voice calling to ostler and maids echoed through the silence of the house, Lydie's eyes met those of the young man.

"Madame! Madame! I beseech you," he said appalled at the terrible look of agony expressed on the beautiful, marble-like face, "let me attend you . . . I vow that you are hurt."

"No! no!" she rejoined quickly, "only my hand . . . I tried to clutch the weapon . . . but 'twas too late . . ."

But she yielded her hand to him. The shot had indeed pierced the fleshy portion between thumb and forefinger, leaving an ugly gash: the wound was bleeding profusely and already she felt giddy and sick. De Mortemar bound up the little hand with his handkerchief as best he could. She hardly heeded him, beyond that persistent appeal, terrible in its heartrending pathos:

"He'll not die . . . tell me that he'll not die."

Whilst not five paces away, Gaston de Stainville still knelt, praying that the ugly stain of murder should not for ever sully his hand.

CHAPTER x.x.xVIII

THE HOME IN ENGLAND

The first words which milor uttered when presently consciousness returned were:

"The letter . . . Madonna . . . 'tis destroyed . . . I swear. . . ."

He was then lying in Jean Marie's best bed, between lavender-scented sheets. On his right a tiny open window afforded a glimpse of sea and sky, and of many graceful craft gently lolling on the breast of the waves, but on his left, when anon he turned his eyes that way, there was a picture which of a truth was not of this earth, and vaguely, with the childish and foolish fancy of a sick man who hath gazed on the dark portals, he allowed himself to think that all the old tales of his babyhood, about the first glimpse of paradise after death, must indeed be true.

He was dead and this was paradise.

What he saw was a woman's face, with grave anxious eyes fixed upon him, and a woman's smile which revealed an infinity of love and promised an infinity of happiness.

"Madonna!" he murmured feebly. Then he closed his eyes again, for he was weak from loss of blood and from days and nights of fever and delirium, and he was so afraid that the vision might vanish if he gazed at it too long.

The leech--a kindly man--visited him frequently. Apparently the wound was destined to heal. Life was to begin anew, with its sorrows, its disappointments, its humiliations, mayhap.

Yet a memory haunted him persistently--a vision, oh! 'twas a mere flash--of his madonna standing with her dear, white hand outstretched, betwixt him and death.

It was a vision, of course; such as are vouchsafed to the dying: and the other picture?--nay! that was a fevered dream; there had been no tender, grave eyes that watched him, no woman's smile to promise happiness.

One day M. le Duc d'Aumont came to visit him. He had posted straight from Paris, and was singularly urbane and anxious when he pressed the sick man's hand.

"You must make a quick recovery, milor," he said cordially; "_par Dieu!_ you are the hero of the hour. Mortemar hath talked his fill."

"I trust not," rejoined Eglinton gravely.

M. le Duc looked conscious and perturbed.

"Nay! he is a gallant youth," he said rea.s.suringly, "and knows exactly how to hold his tongue, but Belle-Isle and de Lugeac had to be taught a lesson . . . and 'twas well learned I'll warrant you. . . . As for Gaston. . . ."

"Yes! M. le Duc? what of M. le Comte de Stainville?"

"He hath left the Court momentarily . . . somewhat in disgrace . . .

'twas a monstrous encounter, milor," added the Duke gravely. "Had Gaston killed you it had been murder, for you never meant to shoot, so says de Mortemar."

The sick man's head turned restlessly on the pillow.

"De Mortemar's tongue hath run away with him," he said impatiently.

"The account of the duel . . . nothing more, on my honour," rejoined the Duke. "No woman's name has been mentioned, but I fear me the Court and public have got wind of the story of a conspiracy against the Stuart prince, and connect the duel with that event--hence your popularity, milor," continued the older man with a sigh, "and Gaston's disgrace."

"His Majesty's whipping-boy, eh? the scapegoat in the aborted conspiracy?"

"Poor Gaston! You bear him much ill-will, milor, no doubt?"

"I? None, on my honour."

M. le Duc hesitated a while, a troubled look appeared on his handsome face.

"Lydie," he said tentatively. "Milor, she left Paris that night alone . . . and travelled night and day to reach Le Havre in time to help you and to thwart Gaston . . . she had been foolish of course, but her motives were pure . . . milor, she is my child and . . ."

"She is my wife, M. le Duc," interrupted Lord Eglinton gravely; "I need no a.s.surance of her purity even from her father."

There was such implicit trust, such complete faith expressed in those few simple words, that instinctively M. le Duc d'Aumont felt ashamed that he could ever have misunderstood his daughter. He was silent for a moment or two, then he said more lightly:

"His Majesty is much angered of course."

"Against me, I hope," rejoined Eglinton.

"Aye!" sighed the Duke. "King Louis is poorer by fifteen million livres by your act, milor."

"And richer by the kingdom of honour. As for the millions, M. le Duc, I'll place them myself at His Majesty's service. My chateau and dependencies of Choisy are worth that," added milor lightly. "As soon as this feeble hand can hold a pen, I'll hand them over to the crown of France as a free gift."

"You will do that, milor?" gasped the Duke, who could scarce believe his ears.

"'Tis my firm intention," rejoined the sick man with a smile.

A great weight had been lifted from M. le Duc's mind. Royal displeasure would indeed have descended impartially on all the friends of "le pet.i.t Anglais" and above all on milor's father-in-law, whose very presence at Court would of a surety have become distasteful to the disappointed monarch. Now this unparalleled generosity would more than restore Louis' confidence in a Prime Minister whose chief virtue consisted in possessing so wealthy and magnanimous a son-in-law.

Indeed we know that M. le Duc d'Aumont continued for some time after these memorable days to enjoy the confidence and grat.i.tude of Louis the Well-beloved and to bask in the suns.h.i.+ne of Madame de Pompadour's smiles, whilst the gift of the chateau and dependencies of Choisy by Milor the Marquis of Eglinton to the crown of France was made the subject of a public fete at Versailles and of an ode by M. Jolyot Crebillon of the Inst.i.tut de France, writ especially for the occasion.

But after the visit of M. le Duc d'Aumont at his bedside in the "auberge des Trois Matelots" the munificent donor of fifteen millions livres felt over-wearied of life.

The dream which had soothed his fevered sleep no longer haunted his waking moments, and memory had much ado to feed love of life with the rememberance of one happy moment.

Milor the Marquis of Eglinton closed his eyes, sighing for that dream.

The little room was so still, so peaceful, and from the tiny window a gentle breeze from across the English Channel fanned his aching brow, bringing back with its soothing murmur the memory of that stately home in England, for which his father had so often sighed.