The Scourge of God

CHAPTER XII
"I AM A PROTESTANT."

An hour later the meeting in the Hôtel de Ville had broken up, yet not before Buscarlet had said words such as he had better have bitten out his tongue than have uttered; for, after he had told his tale truthfully (as nothing would have prevented him from telling it) and had described all that had taken place from the moment when, singing their psalms, the men of the mountains had passed down the village street, bidding all the inhabitants keep within doors-narrating, too, how he had besought them to spare the abbé and return good for evil-the Intendant had remarked almost angrily to him:

"Yet, in spite of all you say, the rebellion against the king's authority, the murder, and all other violence has happened, as it always happens, in a place of strong heretical leanings. Oh, you Protestants, as you term yourselves; oh, you of the Reformed faith, as you blasphemously name yourselves-ever are you at the root of all rebellion, of all eruption, all attacks upon those who are God's anointed. Yet you can never triumph. Never-here in France."

As he spoke he revealed to those around him what were his true feelings in regard to all that had taken place, though indeed some of them knew or suspected those feelings; revealed that it was the resistance to the king's power, the constituted authority, which he was determined to crush more than the resistance to the ancient and, in this place at least, cruel faith of the land. These were indeed his feelings, this his guiding motive. He was above all things a courtier, a king's man; and though for thirty-three years he never quitted Languedoc for a single day, he becoming its Intendant in 1685 and retiring from it in 1718, Versailles with its powerful master was the star on which his eyes were ever fixed. Nay, he himself had said that Le roi était son Dieu, and that to do him service was all he lived for. As for the outraged Romish faith, let Rome repay that outrage. His duty was to crush rebellion, and he did it well. When he finally left the province, he had caused twelve thousand Protestants to suffer either death, imprisonment, or transportation to the galleys.

But now from Buscarlet there came a denial of Baville's charges against his creed. Rising from his seat by Martin's side he spoke, while all in the room gazed in astonishment at the old man, never expecting to hear the words he uttered.

"Your Excellency," he said, "have you weighed well your words ere you uttered them? Scarcely, I think. All rebellion comes from us, the Protestants, you have said, all attack upon those who are God's anointed. Is this so? Pause, sir, and reflect. Who was it who first uttered the maxim that bad kings should be deposed? Who were those whom Henri of Valois saw force their way into his palace of the Louvre, carry off his furniture, reverse his arms, destroy his portrait, break his great seal, style him Lâche, Hérétique, Tyran? Was it not the Sorbonne who declared the people absolved from their vow to him, erased his name from the prayers of the Romish Church? Who slew him at St. Cloud? Jacques Clement, the monk-was he a Protestant?"

"Henri de Valois was himself a murderer," the bishop made answer. "Himself slew the Guises at Blois."

"How many Protestants have been murdered by orders of our present king? Yet there is not one in France who would raise his hand against him," the pastor continued. Then, as though carried away by one of those ecstasies which caused men, especially men among the refugees of the mountains, to seem almost inspired, he continued:

"Your Excellency has said we attack those who are God's anointed. Do we so? Who formed the rebel league to exclude Henry of Navarre from the succession? Who was it struck that great king to the heart in the Rue de la Ferronnerie? Ravillac! Was he of the Reformed faith? Who would have turned Louis off the throne he now sits securely on, have set up the Prince of Condé in his place? Who? Who? Not Protestants for sure! Name one who has slain a king or attempted to slay one in all our land."

"Monsieur Buscarlet," Baville replied, still containing himself, "there is no accusation against those of your faith as to their desiring to slay King Louis. But they have revolted against all constituted authority, against all who here rule for the king, against his priests. Your statement as to what misguided men of our own faith have done helps you not. Two wrongs do not make one right. And because it is by the Protestants that the sacred soil of France is threatened, the Protestants must go. Nay, more: those who rebel must pay the penalty."

* * * * * * *

"Monsieur," said Baville, coming in two hours later to another room in which Martin sat, he and Buscarlet having been requested to leave the apartment in which the council were, after they had both testified to all that had happened at Montvert on the night when the abbé was slain, "Monsieur, I have heard strange news of you. I wonder you did not see fit to tell me with whom I had the honour of conversing."

"With whom you had the honour of conversing!" Martin replied, looking at him in astonishment. "I think, sir, you forget. I told you my name, also where my property is-in France."

"Pardon me, you did so tell me." And, even as he spoke, Martin observed, to his still further astonishment, that the Intendant's manner had become one of almost deference, certainly of increased courtesy, though he had never been in any way impolite to him since they had met at Montvert. "You did tell me that. What you omitted to inform me of, quite within your perfect right, doubtless, was that you were of the de Rochebazon family. Sir, permit me to congratulate you. There is no nobler house in all France, in Europe."

"Your Excellency, I have not the honour to be of the house of de Rochebazon-"

"Not?"

"But, instead, a relative of the late Princesse de Rochebazon."

And as he spoke he did not doubt, nay, he felt sure, that he had given himself into this man's power. If he knew so much of the de Rochebazons as he seemed to do, he must know that the late princess had been an Englishwoman. Baville would also be aware, therefore, what his nationality was. Yet, still strong in the honour which lay deep within his heart; strong, too, in his determination to profit by no evasion of the truth when the telling of it was absolutely necessary, he announced his kinsmanship with her, looking straight into the Intendant's eyes as he did so.

In an instant he recognised that he stood in no peril at present. Whatever Baville might know of the family of de Rochebazon, it was evident he did not know that the princess was not a Frenchwoman.

"Monsieur," Baville replied, "it is the same thing. And, sir, I welcome you to Languedoc, you, a member of a great family which has stood ever by the throne, the Church. I hope you will make my house-it is at Montpellier-your resting place while you remain in the Midi. You will be very welcome."

"I thank your Excellency, but it is impossible I should accept. You will remember I told you I have a mission here-one that I can not put aside even amid the troublous times which have now arisen in the neighbourhood. I must prosecute my mission to the end."

"To find the lost man you spoke of?"

"To find him."

"Is he a de Rochebazon? If so, he should be very near to a great inheritance-an inheritance which, the Franciscan tells me (the monk who recognised you as the gentleman who attended the last moments of Madame la Princesse), the Church has fallen heir to."

"The monk! What monk? Yet-I remember. There were two at her bedside: one who watched continuously, another who came at the last moment. Which is he?"

"I can not say. Yet I will bring you into intercourse with him if you desire it. He is here to assist in stamping out this accursed Protestantism, in helping to convert them to the true faith."

"Your Excellency hates bitterly these Protestants."

"I hate the king's enemies. And all Protestants are such."

As the Intendant uttered these words Martin told himself the time had come. He must speak now or be henceforth a coward in his own esteem. It was for nothing that his father had cast off forever his allegiance to James, had openly acknowledged that henceforth he abjured the religion to which James belonged. Not for nothing, since by so doing he had stood his trial before Sir Francis Wytham and Sir Creswell Levinz, narrowly escaping Jeffreys himself. Not for nothing, since he had been fined and imprisoned, he who had followed the Stuarts into exile, almost ruined.

Yet all would be for nothing-his father's tribulations, his own repudiation of the wealth his aunt had amassed for him-all would be worth nothing if now he stood here before this man and, hearing the cause reviled for which both father and son had sacrificed so much, held his peace like a coward.

The time had come.

"Your Excellency," he said quietly, "stigmatizes Protestants as accursed; also as the king's enemies. Well, as to being accursed I know not; it may be even as you say. But I do know that I am no enemy of King Louis. Yet-I am a Protestant."

"You!" Baville exclaimed, taking a step back in sheer astonishment. "You! Yet a kinsman by marriage of the de Rochebazons. It is impossible."

"Nevertheless it is true."

Baville shrugged his shoulders, then suddenly turning round on him, he said:

"Your sympathies, then, are with these rebels here. You approve, perhaps, of what you saw on the bridge at Montvert two nights ago. Are here, it may be, to foment further troubles."

"You mistake. I utterly disapprove of what I saw. Would indeed have saved the priest had it been in my power. It is not by cruelty that wrongs are righted."

"In Heaven's name, then, if these are your sentiments what makes you a Protestant?"

"Conviction. As conviction made that de Rochebazon a Protestant whom I am here to find some traces of, alive or dead."

They had remained standing face to face with one another since the Intendant had come into the room; they were face to face still as Martin told how the missing heir to the de Rochebazon name and wealth had himself changed his religion, and, being face to face, he saw a strange look, a shade of startled perplexity, come into the countenance of Baville. Also he noticed that he paled perceptibly. Then the latter said:

"De Rochebazon, the de Rochebazon, turned a Protestant! turned Protestant! -c'est incroyable!-and came here to Languedoc. When-how long ago?"

"I do not know. Possibly forty years ago. Your Excellency," and now the clear blue eyes of the young man looked into the equally clear dark eyes of the ruler of the province, "do you know aught of him? Can you put me in the way of finding him?"

"I-no. Why do you ask? I came not here till '85. And-and-alas! that it should be so. It is their own doing. The Protestants and I have been at enmity ever since. They have made my rule a bitter one. It is their own doing, I repeat. Their own fault."

"They have not risen until now. Done no overt act!" Martin exclaimed.

"Unfortunately, they have done many. You do not know. And they have resisted the king's ordinances." Then changing the subject swiftly, he said:

"Monsieur Martin, you tell me you are here to seek this missing man; that you have no intention of aiding these rebels. I am glad to hear it. Yet, remember, if you remain here you do so at dire peril to yourself. If you take part in any act of rebellion, if you join in any way in their uprisings, proclaim yourself in the least as an opponent of the law and order which must be re-established at all costs here, then you too must be responsible for whatever may befall you. Do you think you can stay here and also remain neutral?"

"Are there not others in France who, being of my faith, are doing so? Are there not still De Colignys, De Rohans, De la Trémoilles, De Sullys in France, surrounding the king's person? Yet they are loyal to him and he molests them not; accept their service; lets them worship God in their own way."

"They are not in Languedoc," Baville said briefly yet very pertinently. "And the day will come when they will all return to their own faith. Otherwise France is not for them.¹ Nor will it be for you or yours."

Martin shrugged his shoulders at the latter part of this speech, since no answer was possible. France was not for him under any circumstances when he had once carried out his dead kinswoman's request, had found and done justice to Cyprien de Beauvilliers or his children, if he had left any, or, failing to find them, had at last discontinued his search.

"Meanwhile," continued Baville, "I would counsel you to reside at Montpellier. There, for the present at least, your co-religionists are not troublesome, and up to now I have not had to exercise the strong hand. Also," and now he bowed with the easy grace which had never forsaken him though he had been absent from Versailles for seventeen years, "if you will permit me, if you will accept of any courtesy at my hands-at the hands of Baville, the hated Intendant-I shall be pleased to be of service to you. As a connection of the house of de Rochebazon I may do that, while as a private gentleman, who does not obtrude his religious belief upon me, I shall be happy to assist you in your quest. Though I warn you I do not think you will succeed."

"You think the man I seek for never came here, or, coming, is dead?"

For a moment the other paused ere answering, his handsome face indicating that he was lost in thought, his clear eyes gazing searchingly into the eyes of the other. "I do not know. I can not say. It is most probable that if he ever came he is dead."

"Leaving no children?"

"How can I say? At least-if-if he is dead he must have died and left no trace or sign. Died without divulging who he was."

Then Baville turned to the door as though to go; yet ere he did so he spoke again, repeating his words:

"I should counsel you to make Montpellier your resting place. If aught is to be learned I may help you to learn it there."

"I thank you. Doubtless it would be best. Yet there is one request I must make to you; it is to-to deal gently with Buscarlet. On my word of honour as a gentleman, he has had no hand in these recent troubles. He besought those mountaineers who descended on Montvert to spare the abbé."

"There is nothing against Monsieur Buscarlet at present which calls for severity. Yet if he does not change his faith I know not what may be the end. If these Cévenoles do not desist, or are not stamped out, the retribution will be terrible."

"On all?"

"I fear on all. The Church never forgives. The Church will cry for vengeance against the Huguenots, and I, the ruler, must hear that cry."

"And answer it?"

"And answer it; for their resistance is rebellion, and rebellion must be crushed. Warn him, therefore, to be on his guard. To preach, above all, obedience to the king. Otherwise there is no hope. The prisons are already full of his brethren. Bid him beware, I say. They term Louis the 'Scourge of God,' and they speak truly. He will scourge the land of all who oppose him. And if not he-then his wife."

CHAPTER XIII
URBAINE

From the Mediterranean the warm, luscious breezes of the south sweep up to where Montpellier stands ere they pass the city and waft to the summits of the Cévennes the perfume of the flowers and the odours of the rich fruits which grow upon the shores of the beauteous sea. And from Montpellier itself, from the old Place de Peyrou, may be obtained a view that is unsurpassed both in its beauty and in its power of recalling to the memory the loathsome cruelties which, perpetrated in the days of Louis the Great King, have smirched forever that beauty. Far away, too, where rise the tips of the mountains of Ventoux on the confines of fair Provence, the Alps begin to show-those Alps over which the weary feet of escaping Protestants had been dragged as their owners sought the sanctuary of a more free land. Below lies a beautiful valley watered on one side by the Loire and on another by the Rhône, watered once also by the blood and the tears of the heartbroken dwellers therein. A valley teeming once again with the fruits of the earth, and with now all signs erased of the devastation which he, whose statue stands in that Place de Peyrou, caused to be spread around; erased from human sight, but not from human recollection.

Upon the other side lies Cette, of scant importance in these times as seacoast towns and harbours are reckoned, and dead and done with-lies there basking and smiling beneath the warm sun that shines alike in winter as in summer. Cette, the place which, in the minds of the forefathers of those who now dwell there, bore the blackest, most hated name of all the villages bordering the blue sea. For here the galleys harboured, here fathers and husbands, brothers and sons, were flung to horrors and miseries and the life of an earthly hell-a hell whose pangs knew no assuagement till death, most welcome, brought release.

From where Baville sat in his open window Cette could be seen; the harbour in which half a dozen of those galleys lay waiting for their victims. On a table before him were papers for the sending of other victims to the prisons of the surrounding towns; also the sentences of death allotted to many rebels, death in hideous forms. Some to be hung upon the bridges of their own town, some to be broken on the wheel, some to be burned in market places, some to have their forefingers struck off (a form of punishment peculiar to the neighbourhood and to those who had been captured in the present uprisings), and afterward to be hanged.

Also on tables at either side of him were orders to the colonels of local regiments to place themselves under direction of Julien; orders to others to provide forage and stabling for so many horses and accommodation for so many men; orders, too, for provisions and forage to be sent in to Montpellier and Nîmes for the victualling of the forces quartered there. And to all and every one of these he had already affixed his signature, "Baville" – a signature which here carried as much authority as if, instead, it had been "Louis."

Yet it was not about these papers that Nicholas de Lamoignon de Baville, Comte de Launai-Courson, Seigneur de Bris, Vaugrigneuse, Chavagne, Lamothe-Chaudemier, Beuxes and other places, as well as Conseiller d'Etat, Intendant de Justice, polices et finances-to give him his full names and titles-was thinking on this bright morning, nor on them that his eyes rested. Instead, upon a far smaller thing-a thing on which one would scarcely have thought he would have wasted a moment's attention-a little plain cornelian seal which he was turning over and over in his hands and regarding carefully through a small magnifying glass.

"Strange," he muttered to himself, "strange if, after all, after years of meditation and inquiry, I should thus have lit upon the clew! Strange, strange!"

He struck, as thus he mused, upon a little bronze gong that stood by his side and ready to his hand, and a moment later the door was opened and a man of about his own age came into the room in answer to the summons; a man whose plain garb, made of the local Nîmes serge, and wig à trois marteaux, proclaimed almost with certainty that he was a clerk or secretary.

"Casalis," the Intendant said, he having put the seal beneath some papers ere the other entered, "there is in the library a book entitled, Devises et blasons de la Noblesse Française, is there not?"

"There is, your Excellency. Prepared a year ago by Monsieur le Comte-"

"Precisely. Fetch it, if you please."

The man retired, and, after being absent some few moments, came back, bearing in his hand a large, handsome volume bound in pale brown morocco, the back and sides covered with fine gold tooling and with Baville's crest stamped also on each side-a splendid book, if its contents corresponded with its exterior.

"Shall I find any particular entry for your Excellency?" the man asked, pausing with the volume in his hand.

"No, leave it. I may desire to look into it presently."

Left alone, however, Baville looked into it at once, pausing at the names under "B" to regard with some complacency his own crest and arms beautifully reproduced in colours on vellum.

Then he turned over a vast number of leaves in a mass, arriving at the letter "T," and re-turning back to "R," finding thereby the page which was headed "De Rochebazon." And emblazoned in the middle of the vellum in red, gold, and blue was the coat of arms of that great family; above it was the crest of the house, on a rock proper a hawk with wings elevated-the motto "Gare."

"So," said Baville to himself, "he was of noble family, was a de Rochebazon. Had I looked at this book when the Comte de Paysac sent it to me, compared it with the seal, I should have known such was the case a year ago. Yet what use even if I had done so? What use? One can not recall-undo the past."

And Baville-even Baville, the "tiger of Languedoc," as he had been termed-sighed.

He took next the seal from the papers where he had pushed it and compared it with the Comte de Paysac's book, though even as he did so he knew there was no need for such comparison; the crest upon it was as familiar to him as his own. Then he muttered:

"It is pity Monsieur le Comte did not make his work even more complete. Some information would be useful. As to whom he married, to wit, as to whom this young man may be, who is related to the late princess. Also as to the family of the princess-I should know that. I would the count were still alive."

As thus he mused a shadow fell across the path that wound before his open window. From behind the orange tubs which formed a grove in front of that window there stepped out a girl who, seeing him there, smiled and said, "Bon jour, mon père." Then came on to the window and, leaning against the open frame, asked if she might come in, might bring him some flowers she had plucked to decorate his cabinet.

"Always, Urbaine," he said, "always," and he put out his hand as though to draw her to him. "Come in, come in."

Had this been a darkened room, a sombre cabinet into which no ray of sunlight ever stole, instead of being, in truth, a bright, gay apartment, the presence of the girl whom he addressed as Urbaine would have made it cheerful, have seemed to bring the needed sunlight to it; for, as she stood there, her long white dress giving fresh radiance to the room, her fair hair irradiated by the beams of light that glinted in through the dark-green leaves of the orange trees, she seemed to cast even more lustre around, making even the grave, serious face of the Intendant look less severe. In her hands she carried a mass of roses and ferns on which the dew sparkled, also some large white lilies.

"Come, Urbaine," he said to her, "come, sit on your accustomed seat. When you are at Versailles you will have no father's knee to sit upon," and, caressingly, he drew her toward him, while she, sitting there, arranged the flowers into bunches.

As he mentioned Versailles she sighed and turned her eyes on him, then said:

"Why send me away, father? I do not wish to go. I desire to stay here by your side. By my mother's, too. Let me remain," and she bent forward and kissed his forehead.

"Nay," he answered, "nay, Montpellier is no place for you now. You are best away from it. At present all is not well. Urbaine, these rebels are stronger than we thought. Julien has been here a month, and what has he done? Nothing, except sustain defeat. Now we must have more troops from Paris. Montrevel, they say, will come; yet ere he does so much may happen. Nîmes, even Montpellier, may fall into their hands. Urbaine, I will not have you here to-to-fall into their hands also."

"Surely they will not hurt women. They say they attack none but soldiers-and-and priests; that, rough and fierce as they are, no woman has ever suffered at their hands. We of our side," and she sighed, "can scarcely say as much."

"Who has told you this, child? Perhaps your new friend, Monsieur Martin. Nay, I see by your blush it is so. Urbaine, you must not believe all he says. Remember, he is a Huguenot too."

"He has never spoken to me on such themes, or, speaking, has said nothing you could disapprove of. He says this uprising is wicked, unlawful; is not the way to gain their ends. Also he has told me that the murder of the Abbé Du Chaila was revolting to him; that he would have saved him had he not been powerless."

"Where is he now?" Baville asked, without making any remark on what she told him as to Martin Ashurst's sentiments. "I have not seen him for some days."

"I do not know," the girl said; "neither have I seen him. Yet he spoke of going to Alais to see his friend the pastor."

"Urbaine," Baville said, "you must speak to him before you set out for Paris. He may listen to words from you which he will not hear from me. You must warn him to leave Languedoc, to return to the north."

"To leave Languedoc! Return to the north!" she repeated. And it seemed to the sharp eyes of the Intendant as though her colour changed again.

"Ay, child, he is in deadly peril here. Can you not understand?"

"No," Urbaine replied, "no. What has he done?"

"Actively, he has done nothing. Yet he is a doomed man, because of his religion. My dear one, ere long the king will be roused to awful fury by this rebellion; there will not be a réformé left in France. And those who are passive will suffer the same as those who take up arms-in the Midi-here-at least. Even I shall not be able to shield him. Nay, more, how can I shield one and destroy all the rest?"

"Can there be no peace?"

"None! Peace! How can there be peace when none will make it? These Protestant rebels are the aggressors this time. Ask for no peace. It is war, a war which means extermination. A month ago I should have said extermination of them alone; now God knows who, which side, is to be exterminated. Louis is weakened by these attacks from without, from every side; all over Europe there is a coalition against France. And half her enemies are of the Reformed faith, as they term it. It is said that the old religion is to be destroyed, abolished. Yet Louis, France, will not fail without one effort; dying, we shall drag to destruction numberless foes. Urbaine, if we do not suppress these Camisards we have an internal foe to deal with as well. Do you think one Protestant will be spared?"

"I may not see him again ere I set out for Versailles," the girl whispered, terrified at his words.

"Then he must take his chance. At best he is but a quixotic fool."

"Let me remain here; if there is danger let me share it."

"Never!" Baville said. "The nobility are threatened, the 'Intendant' above all. Your place must be in safety. Oh, that your mother would go too! Yet," he added reflectively, "her place is by my side."

"And mine is not? Do you say that?" And she touched his face caressingly with her hand.

"Your place is where I can best shield you from the least threat of danger, my loved one; where danger can never come near you." And beneath his breath he added the word "again."

Speaking thus to the girl upon his knee, a girl scarce better than a child, seeing she was now but seventeen years old, Baville-of whom the greatest of French diarists has said that il en étoit la terreur er l'horreur de Languedoc-was at his best. For if he loved any creature more than another on this earth-more than Madame l'Intendante, more even than his own son-that creature was Urbaine.

She was not in truth his daughter, was of no blood relationship to him, yet he cared for her dearly and fondly and the love was returned. As the history of this girl was known to many in the province, so it shall be told here.

Early in his Intendancy, when Baville (already known as an esprit fort by the ministers round Louis) had been appointed to this distant Government, with, to console him, an absolute authority, he had returned one winter night from a raid that he had been making on a village in the Cévennes which, to use his own words, "reeked of Calvinism" and was full of persons who refused to comply with the new orders that were brought into force by the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. He was then but newly married to a sister of Gourville, the colonel of a local regiment of dragoons, and his wife's welcome to him was somewhat cooled by the announcement which he made to her that an intimate friend of his had perished in the raid, leaving behind a motherless child of whom he proposed to constitute himself the guardian.

Apprised of the fact that Ducaire was the name of the intimate friend, Madame l'Intendante shrugged her shoulders and contented herself with saying that it was the first time she had ever heard of him.

Later, after reflection, she laughed a little, quoted some words of M. de Voiture as to les secrets de la comédie which were no secrets either to actors or audience, and, in the course of the next two or three days, uttered pointed remarks to the effect that if politics failed at any future time, doubtless M. l'Intendant might earn a pleasant livelihood as a weaver of romances and of plots for plays.

"En vérité" she said, with her little laugh, "Jean de la Fontaine is old, also Racine; profitez vous de l'occasion, mon ami. Profitez vous."

Then, because they were alone in Madame's boudoir, Baville rose and stood before his wife and, speaking seriously, bade her cease her badinage forever.

And after the conversation which ensued, after, also, the story which Baville told her, Madame did cease her flippancy, and henceforth had no further qualms of jealousy.

In truth, as the child grew up, she too came to love it, to pet it as much as her husband did, to-because she was an honest, tender-hearted woman who, beneath all her pride for Baville's great position, had still many feminine qualities in her breast-weep over it.

"Pauvrette!" she would sometimes whisper to little Urbaine, long ere the child had come to understanding, "pauvre petite. Neither mother nor father either. Ah, well! Ah, well! they shall never be wanting while we live-say, Baville, shall they?"