Part 17 (1/2)

”Oh, you have merit, Montignac,” said La Chatre, with lofty condescension. Then he glanced at the letter, and his face clouded. ”But meanwhile,” he added, in obedience to a childish necessity of communicating his troubles, ”my favor depends, even for its continuance in its present degree, on the speedy capture of this Tournoire. The rascal appears to have obtained the special animosity of the Duke by some previous act. Moreover, he is an enemy to the King, also a deserter from the French Guards, so that he deserves death on various accounts, old and new.”

Herein I saw exemplified the inability of the great to forget or forgive any who may have eluded their power.

”Let me, therefore,” continued the governor, ”consider as to what person shall be chosen for the task of bagging this wary game.”

And he was silent, seeming to be considering in his mind, but really, I thought, waiting for the useful Montignac to suggest some one.

”It need not be a person of great skill,” said Montignac, ”if it be one who has a strong motive for accomplis.h.i.+ng the service with success. For, indeed, the work is easy. The chosen person,” he went on, as if taking pleasure in showing the rapidity and ingenuity of his own thoughts, ”has but to go to the southern border, pretending to be a Huguenot trying to escape the penalties of the new edicts. In one way or another, by moving among the lower cla.s.ses, this supposed fugitive will find out real Huguenots, of whom there are undoubtedly some still left at Clochonne and other towns near the mountains. Several circ.u.mstances have shown that this Tournoire has made himself, or his agents, accessible to Huguenots, for these escapes of heretics across the border began at the same time when his rescues of Huguenot prisoners began. Without doubt, any pretended Protestant, apparently seeking guidance to Guienne, would, in a.s.sociating with the Huguenots along the Creuse, come across one who could direct him to this Tournoire.”

”But what then?” said the governor, his eagerness making him forget his pretence of being wiser than his secretary. ”To find him is not to make him prisoner,--for the Duke desires him to be taken alive. He probably has a large following of rascals as daring and clever as himself.”

”Knowing his hiding-place, you would send a larger body of troops against him.”

”But,” interposed the governor, really glad to have found a weak point in the plan suggested by his secretary, ”in order to acquaint me with his hiding-place, if he has a permanent hiding-place, my spy would have to leave him. This would excite his suspicions, and he would change his hiding-place. Or, indeed, he may be entirely migratory, and have no fixed place of camping. Or, having one, he might change it, for any reason, before my troops could reach it. Doubtless, his followers patrol the hills, and could give him ample warning in case of attack.”

”Your spy,” said Montignac, who had availed himself of the governor's interruption to empty a mug of wine, ”would have to find means of doing two things,--the first to make an appointment with La Tournoire, which would take him from his men; the second, to inform you of that appointment in time for you to lead or send a company of soldiers to surprise La Tournoire at the appointed place.”

”_Par dieu_, Montignac!” cried the governor, with a laugh of derision.

”Drink less wine, I pray you! Your scheme becomes preposterous. Of what kind of man do you take him to be, this Sieur de la Tournoire, who offers a reward, in my own province, for my head and that of the Duke of Guise?”

”The scheme, monsieur,” said Montignac, quietly, not disclosing to the governor the slightest resentment at the latter's ridicule, ”is quite practicable. This is the manner in which it can be best conducted. Your chosen spy must be provided with two messengers, with whom he may have communication as circ.u.mstances may allow. When the spy shall have met La Tournoire, and learned his hiding-place, if he have a permanent one, one messenger shall bring the information to you at Bourges, that you may go to Clochonne to be near at hand for the final step. Having sent the first messenger, the spy shall fall ill, so as to have apparent reason for not going on to Guienne. On learning of your arrival at Clochonne,--an event of which La Tournoire is sure to be informed,--your spy shall make the appointment of which I spoke, and shall send the second messenger to you at Clochonne with word of that appointment, so that your troops can be at hand.”

”The project is full of absurdities, Montignac,” said the governor, shaking his head.

”Enumerate them, monsieur,” said Montignac, without change of tone or countenance.

”First, the lesser one. Why impede the spy with the necessity of communicating with more than one messenger?”

”Because the spy may succeed in learning the enemy's hiding-place, if there be one, and yet fail in the rest of the design. To learn his hiding-place is at least something worth gaining, though the project accomplish nothing more. Moreover, the arrival of the first messenger will inform you that the spy is on the ground and has won La Tournoire's confidence, and that it is time for you to go to Clochonne. The appointment must not be made until you are near at hand, for great exactness must be observed as to time and place, so that you can surely surprise him while he is away from his men.”

”Montignac, I begin to despair of you,” said the governor, with a look of commiseration. ”How do you suppose that La Tournoire could be induced to make such an appointment? What pretext could be invented for requesting such a meeting? In what business could he be interested that would require a secret interview at a distance from his followers?”

I thought the governor's questions quite natural, and was waiting in much curiosity for the answer of Montignac, of whose perspicacity I was now beginning to lose my high opinion, when the inn-maid entered the kitchen, and the secretary repressed the reply already on his lips. She took from the spit a fowl that had been roasting, and brought it to our chamber. To avoid exciting her suspicions I had to leave my place of observation and reseat myself on the bed.

Having placed the fowl, hot and juicy, on the table between us, the maid went away, again leaving the door partly open. Blaise promptly attacked the fowl, but I returned to my post of outlook.

”Lack of zeal?” I heard the governor say. ”_Par-dieu,_ where have I let a known Huguenot rest in peace in my provinces since the edicts have been proclaimed? And I have even made Catholics suffer for showing a disposition to s.h.i.+eld heretics. There was that gentleman of this very town--”

”M. de Varion,” put in Montignac.

”Ay, M. de Varion,--a good Catholic. Yet I caused his arrest because he hid his old friend, that Polignart, who had turned heretic. _Mon dieu_, what can I do more? I punish not only heretics, but also those who s.h.i.+eld heretics. Yet the Duke of Guise hints that I lack zeal!”

”As to M. de Varion,” said Montignac; ”what is your intention regarding him?”

”To make an example of him, that hereafter no Catholic will dare shelter a Huguenot on the score of old friends.h.i.+p. Let him remain a prisoner in the chateau of Fleurier until the judges, whom I will instruct, shall find him guilty of treason. Then his body shall hang at the chateau gate for the nourishment of the crows.”

”Fortunately,” said Montignac listlessly, ”he has no family to give trouble afterward.”

”No son,” replied the governor. ”Did not M. de Brissard say that there was a daughter?”

”Yes, an unmarried daughter who was visiting some bourgeois relation in Bourges at the time of her father's arrest.”