and went out promising an excellent dinner forthwith.
"So I am in Vayenne at last!" Herrick exclaimed as he glanced around the old room, pleased with its panelled walls and low, beamed ceiling. "In Vayenne! I hardly thought when the time came that the fact would impress me so much."
He went to the window, opened it, and looked out. Like shadows in the darkness he could dimly discern the towers of the castle above the roofs opposite, and the slender spire with its top lost in the night. The chimes made little bursts of ecstatic music like the voices and laughter of spirits in the air. Somewhere there was the low rumble of a cart over the cobbles, but the street below him was empty. The diligence had gone; no pedestrian was on the narrow footway. It almost seemed as though he were deserted, left here for all time; that, however anxious he might be to leave Vayenne, he would not be able to do so. The city of his dreams had him fast, and already the first of her surprises was preparing for him. Could he have looked but for an instant into the near future, he might possibly have gone to dinner with less appetite than he did.
The long, low room had its windows toward the street, and was broken up by partitions. A waiter pointed to one of these separate retreats as Herrick entered, and he saw that his table was laid there. On the other side of the partition four men were sitting, a bottle of wine and glasses on the table between them. Herrick casually noticed that one was in uniform and that another wore the cassock of a priest, but took no further interest in them, and he had come into the room so quietly that they did not look up at his entrance, and were perhaps unconscious that any one was dining on the other side of the partition.
The landlord had been true to his word, and had provided an excellent dinner. It was good wine, too, that was set upon the table, and Herrick began to discover how hungry he really was. For a long time his attention was confined to the business in hand, and then he suddenly became conscious of the conversation on the other side of the partition. It seemed to have taken a more serious turn, the voices were dropped a little, and it was this fact, no doubt, which made Herrick listen unconsciously.
"Such men as he is die hard," said one man. "The old Duke may hold death at arm's length for years yet."
"Not so, my son. I know something of his disease, and naught but a miracle can help him. A few weeks perhaps, and then – "
It was evidently the priest who spoke. His voice was soft and persuasive, and Herrick thought that some suggestive gesture, explaining what must ensue, had probably finished the sentence.
There was silence for a few moments, and then the ring of a glass as it was placed on the table.
"When the reins fall from a strong hand there is always trouble," said another man.
"And opportunity, don't forget that," said the priest. "You have your ambitions; have we not talked of them before this? They are within a few short weeks of realization, if you will be guided by me."
"Ay, or I am within measurable distance of losing my head, if things go awry," was the answer. "There are always two sides to such a scheme as this."
"I hadn't thought to find a coward in Gaspard Lemasle," said the priest.
There was a sudden movement and quick shuffle of feet, then a laugh, the laugh of a strong man, deep-chested and resonant.
"Bah! I forgot. One cannot fight with a cassock. See here, Father Bertrand, granted I have ambitions, where it not better to stand by the stronger side? Count Felix is strong, even as his uncle. The old Duke looks upon him as his successor. Strong hands are ready to catch the reins as they fall. In the face of such a man will Vayenne shout for a pale-faced scholar it has little knowledge of, think you?"
"And what reward is Gaspard Lemasle to win from Count Felix?" asked the priest. "Is Gaspard Lemasle's support necessary to him? Rewards come only to those who struggle for them. For you they lie in the hands of that pale scholar at Passey. There will be many to shout for him, and, with a determined leader to fight for him, I can see enthusiastic crowds in the streets of Vayenne."
"Father Bertrand speaks nothing but the truth," said another man, and it seemed certain that only Lemasle's consent was wanting to complete a scheme which had long occupied the priest's attention.
"Maybe," Lemasle returned, "I care not overmuch which way it goes."
"And you have forgotten Mademoiselle de Liancourt," said the priest.
"A second time your cassock protects you, father," laughed the other. "It were a sin, indeed, to forget her. Pass the bottle, and let us have brimming glasses to drink her health. Christine de Liancourt, the most beautiful woman in Montvilliers."
"In the world," corrected the priest quietly. "She is heart and soul for this pale scholar, and she has mentioned Gaspard Lemasle to me."
"By the faith, you shall tell me what she said," the other cried, striking the table until the glasses rattled.
"Nay, nay, it was for no ears but mine; yet, mark you, she knows a brave man when she sees him, and – "
The priest stopped suddenly. The silent street had suddenly awoke. There were hurrying feet and men shouting to each other as they ran, then the sound of a gun which boomed in deep vibration and died slowly away in the distance.
With inarticulate and fragmentary exclamations the four men sprang up and hurried to the door. Herrick followed them more leisurely.
"The Duke is dead!" a man cried to them as they stood in the doorway, and as he ran he shouted the news to others who had been brought from their houses by the sound of the gun. "The Duke is dead!"
"Dead!" said the priest slowly, crossing himself, more by habit than intention it seemed, for other thoughts than of death were reflected in his face. He looked at his companions one after the other, deep meaning in his look, and last of all his eyes rested on Roger Herrick, standing a little in the rear, his face lit up by the light of a lamp hanging in the passage. For a moment the priest did not appear to realize that Herrick was a stranger, and then his eyes opened wider and remained fixed upon him.
"A sudden death," said Herrick. "I heard you say just now that he might live for weeks."
Father Bertrand glanced back into the room they had left, to the place where he and his companions had been sitting.
"Very sudden," he answered, and then after a pause he added, "Very strange."
CHAPTER II
THE CROIX VERTE LOSES ITS GUEST
"Does the death of a man prevent the living from finishing the bottle? It's a sin to waste good wine," said Lemasle, striding back into the room.
He spoke rather as a man who was perplexed than as one who was callous. Whatever scheme Father Bertrand was persuading him to, had been in the future a few moments ago; there was plenty of time to weigh it and digest it, to play with it and calculate the chances; that cannon booming out into the night had made a quick decision imperative, and Gaspard Lemasle was troubled.
"Leave him to me," said the priest to the other two men, and then as Herrick turned and went down the passage toward the stairs, Father Bertrand drew his companions closer to him, and talked eagerly to them for a few moments.
When Herrick descended the stairs a few minutes later the passage was empty, and only a waiter was in the long room. The conversation he had chanced to overhear had made little impression upon him. Was there ever a state yet in which every citizen was contented with his rulers? Here in Montvilliers there were contentions, and the coming demise of the Duke prompted men to talk. How dangerous such talk might be, Herrick had no means of judging. He had heard a few names which had little meaning for him – a count, a beautiful woman, and a scholar. Evidently they were of import in the Duchy, but of what interest could they be to him? Nor had he particularly noticed the priest's close scrutiny of his face. Father Bertrand had been astonished to see a stranger there, one who had certainly overheard something of what had been said, and, being a politician as well as a churchman, more loyal as the latter possibly than as the former, he had naturally sought to understand what manner of man this stranger might be. That was all.
So Herrick sought to dismiss the occurrence from his mind as he passed out of the inn, and, after