Александр Дюма - The Conspirators

Bathilde blushed: the chevalier bowed; and Bathilde, without knowing what she was doing, returned the salute.

Her first impulse was to go and close the window, but an instinctive feeling restrained her. She understood that this was giving importance to a thing which had none, and that to put herself on the defensive was to avow herself attacked. In consequence, she crossed to that part of the room where her neighbor's glance could not reach. Then, at the end of a few minutes, when she returned, she found that he had closed his window. Bathilde understood that there was discretion in this action, and she thanked him. Indeed, the chevalier had just made a masterstroke. On the terms which he was on with his neighbor, it was impossible that both windows should remain open at once; if the chevalier's window was open, his neighbor's must be shut; and he knew that when that was closed, there was not a chance of seeing even the tip of Mirza's nose behind the curtain; while if, on the contrary, his window was closed, hers might possibly remain open, and he could watch her passing to and fro, or working, which was a great amusement for a poor devil condemned to absolute seclusion; besides, he had made an immense step:—he had saluted Bathilde, and she had returned it. They were no longer strangers to each other, but, in order that their acquaintance might advance, he must be careful not to be too brusk.

To risk speaking to her after the salute would have been risking too much; it was better to allow Bathilde to believe that it was all the effect of chance. Bathilde did not believe it, but she appeared to do so. The result was that she left her window open, and, seeing her neighbor's closed, sat down by her own with a book in her hand. As to Mirza, she jumped on to the stool at her mistress's feet, but instead of resting her head as usual on the knees of the young girl, she placed it on the sill, of the window, so much was she occupied with the generous unknown. The chevalier seated himself in the middle of his room, took his pencils, and thanks to a corner of his curtain skillfully raised, he sketched the delicious picture before him. Unfortunately the days were short, and toward three o'clock the little light which the clouds and rain had permitted to descend to the earth began to decline, and Bathilde closed her window. Nevertheless, even in this short time the chevalier had finished the young girl's head, and the likeness was perfect. There was her waving hair, her fine transparent skin, the graceful curve of her swan–like neck; in fact, all to which art can attain with one of those inimitable models which are the despair of artists.

When night closed in, the Abbe Brigaud arrived. The chevalier and he wrapped themselves in their mantles, and went toward the Palais Royal; they had, it will be remembered, to examine the ground. The house in which Madame de Sabran lived, since her husband had been named maitre d'hotel to the regent, was No. 22, between the Hotel de la Roche–Guyon and the passage formerly called Passage du Palais Royal, because it was the only one leading from the Rue des Bons Enfants to the Rue de Valois. This passage, now called Passage du Lycée, was closed at the same time as the other gates of the garden; that is to say, at eleven o'clock in the evening; therefore, having once entered a house in the Rue des Bons Enfants, unless it had a second door opening on the Rue de Valois, no one could return to the Palais Royal after eleven o'clock without making the round, either by the Rue Neuve des Petits–Champs, or by the Cour des Fontaines.

Thus it was with Madame de Sabran's house; it was an exquisite little hotel, built toward the end of the last century, some five–and–twenty years before, by a merchant who wished to ape the great lords and have a petite maison of his own. It was a one–storied house, with a stone gallery, on which the servants' attics opened, and surmounted by a low tilted roof. Under the first–floor windows was a large balcony which jutted out three or four feet, and extended right across the house; but some iron ornaments, similar to the balcony, and which reached to the terrace, separated the two windows on each side from the three in the center, as is often done when it is desired to interrupt exterior communications. The two facades were exactly similar, only, as the Rue de Valois was eight or ten feet lower than that of the Bons Enfants, the ground–floor windows and door opened on a terrace, where was a little garden, filled in spring with charming flowers, but which did not communicate with the street, the only entrance being, as we have said, in the Rue des Bons Enfants.

This was all our conspirators could wish; the regent, once entered into Madame de Sabran's house, would—provided he stayed after eleven o'clock, which was probable—be taken as in a trap, and nothing would be easier than to carry out their plan in the Rue des Bons Enfants, one of the most deserted and gloomy places in the neighborhood; moreover, as this street was surrounded by very suspicious houses, and frequented by very bad company, it was a hundred to one that they would not pay any attention to cries which were too frequent in that street to cause any uneasiness, and that if the watch arrived, it would be, according to the custom of that estimable force, long after their intervention could be of any avail. The inspection of the ground finished, the plans laid, and the number of the house taken, they separated; the abbe to go to the Arsenal to give Madame de Maine an account of the proceedings, and D'Harmental to return to his attic.

As on the preceding night, Bathilde's room was lighted, but this time the young girl was not drawing but working; her light was not put out till one o'clock in the morning. As to the good man, he had retired long before D'Harmental returned. The chevalier slept badly; between a love at its commencement and a conspiracy at its height, he naturally experienced some sensations little favorable to sleep; but toward morning fatigue prevailed, and he only awoke on feeling himself violently shaken by the arm. Without doubt the chevalier was at that moment in some bad dream, of which this appeared to him the end, for, still half asleep, he stretched out his hand toward the pistols which were at his side.

"Ah, ah!" cried the abbe, "an instant, young man. What a hurry you are in! Open your eyes wide—so. Do you not recognize me?"

"Ah!" said D'Harmental, laughing, "it is you, abbe. You did well to stop me. I dreamed that I was arrested."

"A good sign," said the Abbe Brigaud: "you know that dreams always go by contraries. All will go well."

"Is there anything new?" asked D'Harmental.

"And if there were, how would you receive it?"

"I should be enchanted. A thing of this kind once undertaken, the sooner it is finished the better."

"Well, then," said Brigaud, drawing a paper from his pocket and presenting it to the chevalier, "read, and glorify the name of the Lord, for you have your wish."

D'Harmental took the paper, unfolded it as calmly as if it were a matter of no moment, and read as follows:

" Report of the 27th of March.

"Two in the Morning.

"To–night at ten o'clock the regent received a courier from London, who announces for to–morrow the arrival of the Abbe Dubois. As by chance the regent was supping with madame, the dispatch was given to him in spite of the late hour. Some minutes before, Mademoiselle de Chartres had asked permission of her father to perform her devotions at the Abbey of Chelles, and he had promised to conduct her there; but on the receipt of this letter his determination was changed and he has ordered the council to meet at noon.

"At three o'clock the regent will pay his majesty a visit at the Tuileries. He has asked for a tete–à–tete, for he is beginning to be impatient at the obstinacy of the Marechal de Villeroy, who will always be present at the interviews between the regent and his majesty. Report says that if this obstinacy continue, it will be the worse for the marshal.