One in a Thousand; or, The Days of Henri Quatre. G. P. R. James

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      CHAPTER IX.

      We must now turn to trace the proceedings of Philip Count d'Aubin, who, riding on at full speed, drew not his bridle rein till he reached the magnificent Hotel de Guise; where, pushing through the mingled crowd of attendants and petitioners, that swarmed, round the porte cochere of the dwelling, in which, for the time, resided all the power of Paris, if not of France, he advanced, with hasty steps and abstracted look, to the foot of the great staircase. He had even proceeded some way up the stairs ere he noticed, or even seemed to hear, the reiterated inquiries regarding his name and business, which were addressed to him by the various grooms and porters in his progress. When, at length--called for a moment from his fit of absence--he did condescend to speak, he merely mentioned his name, without indicating in any manner which of the many persons that the house contained was the object of his present visit.

      Although unacquainted with his person, the valet, who had at length obtained an answer, happening to recall some of the court scandal of former times, instantly, by an association not unnatural, connected the coming of the Count d'Aubin with the presence of the Duchess de Montpensier, the sister of the Duke de Mayenne, in the house at that moment; and he proceeded forthwith to show the Count to her apartments. D'Aubin entered the splendid saloon in which the Duchess was sitting with the same thoughtful and abstracted air which had been left behind by the strong and turbulent passions, that had just been excited in his bosom by his interview with Beatrice of Ferrara. Madame de Montpensier, surrounded by a group of the gay idlers of the capital, who even at that time mingled in their character that degree of levity and ferocity which marked with such dreadful traits the first French revolution, was engaged in the seemingly puerile employment of cutting out a paper crown with a huge pair of scissors, the sheath of which, black, coarse, and disfiguring, was passed through the silken girdle that spanned her beautiful waist.

      Shouts of laughter were ringing through the hall, when the valet opened the door, and announced the Count d'Aubin. The Duchess instantly looked up, with a smile of pleasure; but, remarking the ruffled aspect of the Count, she instantly exclaimed--"Why, how now, D'Aubin! how now! After so long an absence, do you come back to our feet, not like a penitent suing for pardon, but rather like a harsh husband, full of scoldings and tempests?"

      The cause of those gloomy looks, which she remarked, was not one which Philip d'Aubin would willingly have communicated to the gay, satirical Duchess de Montpensier, who, to the libertine freedom common to the whole court, added many a wily art, and many a vindictive passion, derived from the angry political factions of the time. The immediate cause of his visit to Paris, however, afforded him a ready motive to assign for his dark brow and agitated look. "Well may I be disturbed, madam," he replied, after a hasty word of salutation, "when my noble cousin, St. Real, confiding in an authentic pass, from the hands of your Highness's brother, has been entrapped in the neighbourhood of Senlis, and is now, as I am informed, a prisoner in Paris!"

      "Nay, but why bear such a countenance into our presence, Count d'Aubin?" rejoined the Duchess; "I am guiltless of entrapping your cousin, or of even trying to entrap yourself; though, once upon a time," she added in a low tone, "I may have seen the Count d'Aubin a tassel not unwilling to be lured;" and she looked up at him with a glance in which reproach was so skilfully mingled with playfulness and tenderness, that D'Aubin, although he knew that full two-thirds of the pageant which daily played its part on her countenance, was mere artifice, could not refrain from smiling in his turn.

      "Ever willing to be lured, dear lady, where the lure is fair!" he replied; "and though I certainly came to speak reproaches, they were not to you. I know not why your blockhead groom," he added, "brought me hither, unless he divined, indeed, how much the sight of your Highness softens all wrath. My business was with your brother, the Duke of Mayenne."

      The Duchess muttered to herself--"That will never do! If he see Mayenne, he will spoil the whole! I appeal to you, fair ladies and gentlemen all," she exclaimed aloud, with one of those quick and happy turns of artifice, which no one knew better how to employ, "if this is not a high crime and misdemeanour in the court of love and gallantry, to tell a lady, whom he dare not deny to be fair, that he came for any other purpose on earth than to see herself?"

      "Blasphemy! blasphemy! utter blasphemy!" cried half a dozen voices. "Judge him, fair lady, for his great demerits!"

      "Philip d'Aubin!" exclaimed the Duchess, putting on a theatrical air, "you are condemned by your peers; but, under consideration of your having been thoroughly brutalized, by a two months' residence at the distance of a hundred leagues from Paris, we are inclined to show you lenity: kneel down here, then; humbly, at our feet, confess your crime! and swear upon this paper crown, which we have cut expressly СКАЧАТЬ