Count Hannibal by Stanley J. Weyman

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They found themselves in a long narrow cockloft, not more than six feet
high at the highest, and insufferably hot. Between the tiles, which
sloped steeply on either hand, a faint light filtered in, disclosing the
giant rooftree running the length of the house, and at the farther end of
the loft the main tie-beam, from which a network of knees and struts rose
to the rooftree.

Tignonville, who seemed possessed by unnatural energy, stayed only to put
off his boots. Then "Courage!" he panted, "all goes well!" and, carrying
his boots in his hands, he led the way, stepping gingerly from joist to
joist until he reached the tie-beam. He climbed on it, and, squeezing
himself between the struts, entered a second loft, similar to the first.
At the farther end of this a rough wall of bricks in a timber-frame
lowered his hopes; but as he approached it, joy! Low down in the corner
where the roof descended, a small door, square, and not more than two
feet high, disclosed itself.

The two crept to it on hands and knees and listened. "It will lead to
the leads, I doubt?" La Tribe whispered. They dared not raise their
voices.

"As well that way as another!" Tignonville answered recklessly. He was
the more eager, for there is a fear which transcends the fear of death.
His eyes shone through the mask of dust, the sweat ran down to his chin,
his breath came and went noisily. "Naught matters if we can escape him!"
he panted. And he pushed the door recklessly. It flew open; the two
drew back their faces with a cry of alarm.

They were looking, not into the sunlight, but into a grey dingy garret
open to the roof, and occupying the upper part of a gable-end somewhat
higher than the wing in which they had been confined. Filthy truckle-
beds and ragged pallets covered the floor, and, eked out by old saddles
and threadbare horserugs, marked the sleeping quarters either of the
servants or of travellers of the meaner sort. But the dinginess was
naught to the two who knelt looking into it, afraid to move. Was the
place empty? That was the point; the question which had first stayed,
and then set their pulses at the gallop.

Painfully their eyes searched each huddle of clothing, scanned each
dubious shape. And slowly, as the silence persisted, their heads came
forward until the whole floor lay within the field of sight. And still
no sound! At last Tignonville stirred, crept through the doorway, and
rose up, peering round him. He nodded, and, satisfied that all was safe,
the minister followed him.

They found themselves a pace or so from the head of a narrow staircase,
leading downwards. Without moving, they could see the door which closed
it below. Tignonville signed to La Tribe to wait, and himself crept down
the stairs. He reached the door, and, stooping, set his eye to the hole
through which the string of the latch passed. A moment he looked, and
then, turning on tiptoe, he stole up again, his face fallen.

"You may throw the handle after the hatchet!" he muttered. "The man on
guard is within four yards of the door." And in the rage of
disappointment he struck the air with his hand.

"Is he looking this way?"

"No. He is looking down the passage towards our room. But it is
impossible to pass him."

La Tribe nodded, and moved softly to one of the lattices which lighted
the room. It might be possible to escape that way, by the parapet and
the tiles. But he found that the casement was set high in the roof,
which sloped steeply from its sill to the eaves. He passed to the other
window, in which a little wicket in the lattice stood open. He looked
through it. In the giddy void white pigeons were wheeling in the
dazzling sunshine, and, gazing down, he saw far below him, in the hot
square, a row of booths, and troops of people moving to and fro like
pigmies; and--and a strange thing, in the middle of all! Involuntarily,
as if the persons below could have seen his face at the tiny dormer, he
drew back.

He beckoned to M. Tignonville to come to him; and when the young man
complied, he bade him in a whisper look down. "See!" he muttered.
"There!"

The younger man saw and drew in his breath. Even under the coating of
dust his face turned a shade greyer.

"You had no need to fear that he would let us go!" the minister muttered,
with half-conscious irony.

"No."

"Nor I! There are two ropes." And La Tribe breathed a few words of
prayer. The object which had fixed his gaze was a gibbet: the only one
of the three which could be seen from their eyrie.

Tignonville, on the other hand, turned sharply away, and with haggard
eyes stared about the room. "We might defend the staircase," he
muttered. "Two men might hold it for a time."

"We have no food."

"No." Suddenly he gripped La Tribe's arm. "I have it!" he cried. "And
it may do! It must do!" he continued, his face working. "See!" And
lifting from the floor one of the ragged pallets, from which the straw
protruded in a dozen places, he set it flat on his head.

It drooped at each corner--it had seen much wear--and, while it almost
hid his face, it revealed his grimy chin and mortar-stained shoulders. He
turned to his companion.

La Tribe's face glowed as he looked. "It may do!" he cried. "It's a
chance! But you are right! It may do!"

Tignonville dropped the ragged mattress, and tore off his coat; then he
rent his breeches at the knee, so that they hung loose about his calves.

"Do you the same!" he cried. "And quick, man, quick! Leave your boots!
Once outside we must pass through the streets under these"--he took up
his burden again and set it on his head--"until we reach a quiet part,
and there we--"

"Can hide! Or swim the river!" the minister said. He had followed his
companion's example, and now stood under a similar burden. With breeches
rent and whitened, and his upper garments in no better case, he looked a
sorry figure.

Tignonville eyed him with satisfaction, and turned to the staircase.

"Come," he cried, "there is not a moment to be lost. At any minute they
may enter our room and find it empty! You are ready? Then, not too
softly, or it may rouse suspicion! And mumble something at the door."

He began himself to scold, and, muttering incoherently, stumbled down the
staircase, the pallet on his head rustling against the wall on each side.
Arrived at the door, he fumbled clumsily with the latch, and, when the
door gave way, plumped out with an oath--as if the awkward burden he bore
were the only thing on his mind. Badelon--he was on duty--stared at the
apparition; but the next moment he sniffed the pallet, which was none of
the freshest, and, turning up his nose, he retreated a pace. He had no
suspicion; the men did not come from the part of the house where the
prisoners lay, and he stood aside to let them pass. In a moment,
staggering, and going a little unsteadily, as if they scarcely saw their
way, they had passed by him, and were descending the staircase.

So far well! Unfortunately, when they reached the foot of that flight
they came on the main passage of the first-floor. It ran right and left,
and Tignonville did not know which way he must turn to reach the lower
staircase. Yet he dared not hesitate; in the passage, waiting about the
doors, were four or five servants, and in the distance he caught sight of
three men belonging to Tavannes' company. At any moment, too, an upper
servant might meet them, ask what they were doing, and detect the fraud.
He turned at random, therefore--to the left as it chanced--and marched
along bravely, until the very thing happened which he had feared. A man
came from a room plump upon them, saw them, and held up his hands in
horror.

"What are you doing?" he cried in a rage and with an oath. "Who set you
on this?"

Tignonville's tongue clave to the roof of his mouth. La Tribe from
behind muttered something about the stable.

"And time too!" the man said. "Faugh! But how come you this way? Are
you drunk? Here!" He opened the door of a musty closet beside him,
"Pitch them in here, do you hear? And take them down when it is dark.
Faugh. I wonder you did not carry the things though her ladyship's room
at once! If my lord had been in and met you! Now then, do as I tell
you! Are you drunk?"

With a sullen air Tignonville threw in his mattress. La Tribe did the
same. Fortunately the passage was ill-lighted, and there were many
helpers and strange servants in the inn. The butler only thought them
ill-looking fellows who knew no better.

"Now be off!" he continued irascibly. "This is no place for your sort.
Be off!" And, as they moved, "Coming! Coming!" he cried in answer to a
distant summons; and he hurried away on the errand which their appearance
had interrupted.

Tignonville would have gone to work to recover the pallets, for the man
had left the key in the door. But as he went to do so the butler looked
back, and the two were obliged to make a pretence of following him. A
moment, however, and he was gone; and Tignonville turned anew to regain
them. A second time fortune was adverse; a door within a pace of him
opened, a woman came out. She recoiled from the strange figure; her eyes
met his. Unluckily the light from the room behind her fell on his face,
and with a shrill cry she named him.

One second and all had been lost, for the crowd of idlers at the other
end of the passage had caught her cry, and were looking that way. With
presence of mind Tignonville clapped his hand on her mouth, and, huddling
her by force into the room, followed her, with La Tribe at his heels.

It was a large room, in which seven or eight people, who had been at
prayers when the cry startled them, were rising from their knees. The
first thing they saw was Javette on the threshold, struggling in the
grasp of a wild man, ragged and begrimed; they deemed the city risen and
the massacre upon them. Carlat threw himself before his mistress, the
Countess in her turn sheltered a young girl, who stood beside her and
from whose face the last trace of colour had fled. Madame Carlat and a
waiting-woman ran shrieking to the window; another instant and the alarm
would have gone abroad.

Tignonville's voice stopped it. "Don't you know me?" he cried, "Madame!
you at least! Carlat! Are you all mad?"

The words stayed them where they stood in an astonishment scarce less
than their alarm. The Countess tried twice to speak; the third time--

"Have you escaped?" she muttered.

Tignonville nodded, his eyes bright with triumph. "So far," he said.
"But they may be on our heels at any moment! Where can we hide?"

The Countess, her hand pressed to her side, looked at Javette.

"The door, girl!" she whispered. "Lock it!"

"Ay, lock it! And they can go by the back-stairs," Madame Carlat
answered, awaking suddenly to the situation. "Through my closet! Once
in the yard they may pass out through the stables."

"Which way?" Tignonville asked impatiently. "Don't stand looking at me,
but--"

"Through this door!" Madame Carlat answered, hurrying to it.

He was following when the Countess stepped forward and interposed between
him and the door.

"Stay!" she cried; and there was not one who did not notice a new
decision in her voice, a new dignity in her bearing. "Stay, Monsieur, we
may be going too fast. To go out now and in that guise--may it not be to
incur greater peril than you incur here? I feel sure that you are in no
danger of your life at present. Therefore, why run the risk--"

"In no danger, Madame!" he cried, interrupting her in astonishment. "Have
you seen the gibbet in the Square? Do you call that no danger?"

"It is not erected for you."

"No?"

"No, Monsieur," she answered firmly, "I swear it is not. And I know of
reasons, urgent reasons, why you should not go. M. de Tavannes"--she
named her husband nervously, as conscious of the weak spot--"before he
rode abroad laid strict orders on all to keep within, since the smallest
matter might kindle the city. Therefore, M. de Tignonville, I request,
nay I entreat," she continued with greater urgency, as she saw his
gesture of denial, "you to stay here until he returns."

"And you, Madame, will answer for my life?"

She faltered. For a moment, a moment only, her colour ebbed. What if
she deceived herself? What if she surrendered her old lover to death?
What if--but the doubt was of a moment only. Her duty was plain.

"I will answer for it," she said, with pale lips, "if you remain here.
And I beg, I implore you--by the love you once had for me, M. de
Tignonville," she added desperately, seeing that he was about to refuse,
"to remain here."

"Once!" he retorted, lashing himself into ignoble rage. "By the love I
once had! Say, rather, the love I have, Madame--for I am no
woman-weathercock to wed the winner, and hold or not hold, stay or go, as
he commands! You, it seems," he continued with a sneer, "have learned
the wife's lesson well! You would practise on me now, as you practised
on me the other night when you stood between him and me! I yielded then,
I spared him. And what did I get by it? Bonds and a prison! And what
shall I get now? The same! No, Madame," he continued bitterly,
addressing himself as much to the Carlats and the others as to his old
mistress. "I do not change! I loved! I love! I was going and I go! If
death lay beyond that door"--and he pointed to it--"and life at his will
were certain here, I would pass the threshold rather than take my life of
him!" And, dragging La Tribe with him, with a passionate gesture he
rushed by her, opened the door, and disappeared in the next room.

The Countess took one pace forward, as if she would have followed him, as
if she would have tried further persuasion. But as she moved a cry
rooted her to the spot. A rush of feet and the babel of many voices
filled the passage with a tide of sound, which drew rapidly nearer. The
escape was known! Would the fugitives have time to slip out below?

Some one knocked at the door, tried it, pushed and beat on it. But the
Countess and all in the room had run to the windows and were looking out.

If the two had not yet made their escape they must be taken. Yet no; as
the Countess leaned from the window, first one dusty figure and then a
second darted from a door below, and made for the nearest turning, out of
the Place Ste.-Croix. Before they gained it, four men, of whom, Badelon,
his grey locks flying, was first, dashed out in pursuit, and the street
rang with cries of "Stop him! Seize him! Seize him!" Some one--one of
the pursuers or another--to add to the alarm let off a musket, and in a
moment, as if the report had been a signal, the Place was in a hubbub,
people flocked into it with mysterious quickness, and from a neighbouring
roof--whence, precisely, it was impossible to say--the crackling fire of
a dozen arquebuses alarmed the city far and wide.

Unfortunately, the fugitives had been baulked at the first turning.
Making for a second, they found it choked, and, swerving, darted across
the Place towards St.-Maurice, seeking to lose themselves in the
gathering crowd. But the pursuers clung desperately to their skirts,
overturning here a man and there a child; and then in a twinkling,
Tignonville, as he ran round a booth, tripped over a peg and fell, and La
Tribe stumbled over him and fell also. The four riders flung themselves
fiercely on their prey, secured them, and began to drag them with oaths
and curses towards the door of the inn.

The Countess had seen all from her window; had held her breath while they
ran, had drawn it sharply when they fell. Now, "They have them!" she
muttered, a sob choking her, "they have them!" And she clasped her
hands. If he had followed her advice! If he had only followed her
advice!

But the issue proved less certain than she deemed it. The crowd, which
grew each moment, knew nothing of pursuers or pursued. On the contrary,
a cry went up that the riders were Huguenots, and that the Huguenots were
rising and slaying the Catholics; and as no story was too improbable for
those days, and this was one constantly set about, first one stone flew,
and then another, and another. A man with a staff darted forward and
struck Badelon on the shoulder, two or three others pressed in and
jostled the riders; and if three of Tavannes' following had not run out
on the instant and faced the mob with their pikes, and for a moment
forced them to give back, the prisoners would have been rescued at the
very door of the inn. As it was they were dragged in, and the gates were
flung to and barred in the nick of time. Another moment, almost another
second, and the mob had seized them. As it was, a hail of stones poured
on the front of the inn, and amid the rising yells of the rabble there
presently floated heavy and slow over the city the tolling of the great
bell of St.-Maurice.

CHAPTER XXX. SACRILEGE!

M. de Montsoreau, Lieutenant-Governor of Saumur almost rose from his seat
in his astonishment.

"What! No letters?" he cried, a hand on either arm of the chair.

The Magistrates stared, one and all. "No letters?" they muttered.

And "No letters?" the Provost chimed in more faintly.

Count Hannibal looked smiling round the Council table. He alone was
unmoved.

"No," he said. "I bear none."

M. de Montsoreau, who, travel-stained and in his corselet, had the second
place of honour at the foot of the table, frowned.

"But, M. le Comte," he said, "my instructions from Monsieur were to
proceed to carry out his Majesty's will in co-operation with you, who, I
understood, would bring letters _de par le Roi_."

"I had letters," Count Hannibal answered negligently. "But on the way I
mislaid them."

"Mislaid them?" Montsoreau cried, unable to believe his ears; while the
smaller dignitaries of the city, the magistrates and churchmen who sat on
either side of the table, gaped open-mouthed. It was incredible! It was
unbelievable! Mislay the King's letters! Who had ever heard of such a
thing?

"Yes, I mislaid them. Lost them, if you like it better."

"But you jest!" the Lieutenant-Governor retorted, moving uneasily in his
chair. He was a man more highly named for address than courage; and,
like most men skilled in finesse, he was prone to suspect a trap. "You
jest, surely, Monsieur! Men do not lose his Majesty's letters, by the
way."

"When they contain his Majesty's will, no," Tavannes answered, with a
peculiar smile.

"You imply, then?"

Count Hannibal shrugged his shoulders, but had not answered when Bigot
entered and handed him his sweetmeat box; he paused to open it and select
a prune. He was long in selecting; but no change of countenance led any
of those at the table to suspect that inside the lid of the box was a
message--a scrap of paper informing him that Montsoreau had left fifty
spears in the suburb without the Saumur gate, besides those whom he had
brought openly into the town. Tavannes read the note slowly while he
seemed to be choosing his fruit. And then--

"Imply?" he answered. "I imply nothing, M. de Montsoreau."

"But--"

"But that sometimes his Majesty finds it prudent to give orders which he
does not mean to be carried out. There are things which start up before
the eye," Tavannes continued, negligently tapping the box on the table,
"and there are things which do not; sometimes the latter are the more
important. You, better than I, M. de Montsoreau, know that the King in
the Gallery at the Louvre is one, and in his closet is another."

"Yes."

"And that being so--"

"You do not mean to carry the letters into effect?"

"Had I the letters, certainly, my friend. I should be bound by them. But
I took good care to lose them," Tavannes added naively. "I am no fool."

"Umph!"

"However," Count Hannibal continued, with an airy gesture, "that is my
affair. If you, M. de Montsoreau, feel inclined, in spite of the absence
of my letters, to carry yours into effect, by all means do so--after
midnight of to-day."

M. de Montsoreau breathed hard. "And why," he asked, half sulkily and
half ponderously, "after midnight only, M. le Comte?"

"Merely that I may be clear of all suspicion of having lot or part in the
matter," Count Hannibal answered pleasantly. "After midnight of to-night
by all means do as you please. Until midnight, by your leave, we will be
quiet."

The Lieutenant-Governor moved doubtfully in his chair, the fear--which
Tavannes had shrewdly instilled into his mind--that he might be disowned
if he carried out his instructions, struggling with his avarice and his
self-importance. He was rather crafty than bold; and such things had
been, he knew. Little by little, and while he sat gloomily debating, the
notion of dealing with one or two and holding the body of the Huguenots
to ransom--a notion which, in spite of everything, was to bear good fruit
for Angers--began to form in his mind. The plan suited him: it left him
free to face either way, and it would fill his pockets more genteelly
than would open robbery. On the other hand, he would offend his brother
and the fanatical party, with whom he commonly acted. They were looking
to see him assert himself. They were looking to hear him declare
himself. And--

Harshly Count Hannibal's voice broke in on his thoughts; harshly, a
something sinister in its tone.

"Where is your brother?" he said. And it was evident that he had not
noted his absence until then. "My lord's Vicar of all people should be
here!" he continued, leaning forward and looking round the table. His
brow was stormy.

Lescot squirmed under his eye; Thuriot turned pale and trembled. It was
one of the canons of St.-Maurice, who at length took on himself to
answer.

"His lordship requested, M. le Comte," he ventured, "that you would
excuse him. His duties--"

"Is he ill?"

"He--"

"Is he ill, sirrah?" Tavannes roared. And while all bowed before the
lightning of his eye, no man at the table knew what had roused the sudden
tempest. But Bigot knew, who stood by the door, and whose ear, keen as
his master's, had caught the distant report of a musket shot. "If he be
not ill," Tavannes continued, rising and looking round the table in
search of signs of guilt, "and there be foul play here, and he the
player, the Bishop's own hand shall not save him! By Heaven it shall
not! Nor yours!" he continued, looking fiercely at Montsoreau. "Nor
your master's!"

The Lieutenant-Governor sprang to his feet. "M. le Comte," he stammered,
"I do not understand this language! Nor this heat, which may be real or
not! All I say is, if there be foul play here--"

"If!" Tavannes retorted. "At least, if there be, there be gibbets too!
And I see necks!" he added, leaning forward. "Necks!" And then, with a
look of flame, "Let no man leave this table until I return," he cried,
"or he will have to deal with me. Nay," he continued, changing his tone
abruptly, as the prudence, which never entirely left him--and perhaps the
remembrance of the other's fifty spearmen--sobered him in the midst of
his rage, "I am hasty. I mean not you, M. de Montsoreau! Ride where you
will; ride with me, if you will, and I will thank you. Only remember,
until midnight Angers is mine!"

He was still speaking when he moved from the table, and, leaving all
staring after him, strode down the room. An instant he paused on the
threshold and looked back; then he passed out, and clattered down the
stone stairs. His horse and riders were waiting, but, his foot in the
stirrup, he stayed for a word with Bigot.

"Is it so?" he growled.

The Norman did not speak, but pointed towards the Place Ste.-Croix,
whence an occasional shot made answer for him.

In those days the streets of the Black City were narrow and crooked,
overhung by timber houses, and hampered by booths; nor could Tavannes
from the old Town Hall--now abandoned--see the Place Ste.-Croix. But
that he could cure. He struck spurs to his horse, and, followed by his
ten horsemen, he clattered noisily down the paved street. A dozen groups
hurrying the same way sprang panic-stricken to the walls, or saved
themselves in doorways. He was up with them, he was beyond them! Another
hundred yards, and he would see the Place.

And then, with a cry of rage, he drew rein a little, discovering what was
before him. In the narrow gut of the way a great black banner, borne on
two poles, was lurching towards him. It was moving in the van of a dark
procession of priests, who, with their attendants and a crowd of devout,
filled the street from wall to wall. They were chanting one of the
penitential psalms, but not so loudly as to drown the uproar in the Place
beyond them.

They made no way, and Count Hannibal swore furiously, suspecting
treachery. But he was no madman, and at the moment the least reflection
would have sent him about to seek another road. Unfortunately, as he
hesitated a man sprang with a gesture of warning to his horse's head and
seized it; and Tavannes, mistaking the motive of the act, lost his self-
control. He struck the fellow down, and, with a reckless word, rode
headlong into the procession, shouting to the black robes to make way,
make way! A cry, nay, a shriek of horror, answered him and rent the air.
And in a minute the thing was done. Too late, as the Bishop's Vicar,
struck by his horse, fell screaming under its hoofs--too late, as the
consecrated vessels which he had been bearing rolled in the mud, Tavannes
saw that they bore the canopy and the Host!

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