Catherine De Medici, Honoré de Balzac [best short novels of all time TXT] 📗

four o'clock was ringing from the clock-tower of the Louvre. Lights were on in the queen-mother's room; she had not yet gone to bed.

"My mother is still on the watch," said Charles to the Comte de Solern.

"She has her forge as you have yours," remarked the German.

"Dear count, what do you think of a king who is reduced to become a conspirator?" said Charles IX., bitterly, after a pause.

"I think, sire, that if you would allow me to fling that woman into the river, as your young cousin said, France would soon be at peace."

"What! a parricide in addition to the Saint-Bartholomew, count?" cried the king. "No, no! I will exile her. Once fallen, my mother will no longer have either servants or partisans."

"Well, then, sire," replied the Comte de Solern, "give me the order to arrest her at once and take her out of the kingdom; for to-morrow she will have forced you to change your mind."

"Come to my forge," said the king, "no one can overhear us there; besides, I don't want my mother to suspect the capture of the Ruggieri. If she knows I am in my work-shop she'll suppose nothing, and we can consult about the proper measures for her arrest."

As the king entered a lower room of the palace, which he used for a workshop, he called his companion's attention to the forge and his implements with a laugh.

"I don't believe," he said, "among all the kings that France will ever have, there'll be another to take pleasure in such work as that. But when I am really king, I'll forge no swords; they shall all go back into their scabbards."

"Sire," said the Comte de Solern, "the fatigues of tennis and hunting, your toil at this forge, and--if I may say it--love, are chariots which the devil is offering you to get the faster to Saint-Denis."

"Solern," said the king, in a piteous tone, "if you knew the fire they have put into my soul and body! nothing can quench it. Are you sure of the men who are guarding the Ruggieri?"

"As sure as of myself."

"Very good; then, during this coming day I shall take my own course. Think of the proper means of making the arrest, and I will give you my final orders by five o'clock at Madame de Belleville's."

As the first rays of dawn were struggling with the lights of the workshop, Charles IX., left alone by the departure of the Comte de Solern, heard the door of the apartment turn on its hinges, and saw his mother standing within it in the dim light like a phantom. Though very nervous and impressible, the king did not quiver, albeit, under the circumstances in which he then stood, this apparition had a certain air of mystery and horror.

"Monsieur," she said, "you are killing yourself."

"I am fulfilling my horoscope," he replied with a bitter smile. "But you, madame, you appear to be as early as I."

"We have both been up all night, monsieur; but with very different intentions. While you have been conferring with your worst enemies in the open fields, concealing your acts from your mother, assisted by Tavannes and the Gondis, with whom you have been scouring the town, I have been reading despatches which contained the proofs of a terrible conspiracy in which your brother, the Duc d'Alencon, your brother-in-law, the king of Navarre, the Prince de Conde, and half the nobles of your kingdom are taking part. Their purpose is nothing less than to take the crown from your head and seize your person. Those gentlemen have already fifty thousand good troops behind them."

"Bah!" exclaimed the king, incredulously.

"Your brother has turned Huguenot," she continued.

"My brother! gone over to the Huguenots!" cried Charles, brandishing the piece of iron which he held in his hand.

"Yes; the Duc d'Alencon, Huguenot at heart, will soon be one before the eyes of the world. Your sister, the queen of Navarre, has almost ceased to love you; she cares more for the Duc d'Alencon; she cares of Bussy; and she loves that little La Mole."

"What a heart!" exclaimed the king.

"That little La Mole," went on the queen, "wishes to make himself a great man by giving France a king of his own stripe. He is promised, they say, the place of connetable."

"Curse that Margot!" cried the king. "This is what comes of her marriage with a heretic."

"Heretic or not is of no consequence; the trouble is that, in spite of my advice, you have brought the head of the younger branch too near the throne by that marriage, and Henri's purpose is now to embroil you with the rest and make you kill one another. The house of Bourbon is the enemy of the house of Valois; remember that, monsieur. All younger branches should be kept in a state of poverty, for they are born conspirators. It is sheer folly to give them arms when they have none, or to leave them in possession of arms when they seize them. Let every younger son be made incapable of doing harm; that is the law of Crowns; the Sultans of Asia follow it. The proofs of this conspiracy are in my room upstairs, where I asked you to follow me last evening, when you bade me good-night; but instead of doing so, it seems you had other plans. I therefore waited for you. If we do not take the proper measures immediately you will meet the fate of Charles the Simple within a month."

"A month!" exclaimed the king, thunderstruck at the coincidence of that period with the delay asked for by the princes themselves. "'In a month we shall be masters,'" he added to himself, quoting their words. "Madame," he said aloud, "what are your proofs?"

"They are unanswerable, monsieur; they come from my daughter Marguerite. Alarmed herself at the possibilities of such a combination, her love for the throne of the Valois has proved stronger, this time, than all her other loves. She asks, as the price of her revelations that nothing shall be done to La Mole; but the scoundrel seems to me a dangerous villain whom we had better be rid of, as well as the Comte de Coconnas, your brother d'Alencon's right hand. As for the Prince de Conde, he consents to everything, provided I am thrown into the sea; perhaps that is the wedding present he gives me in return for the pretty wife I gave him! All this is a serious matter, monsieur. You talk of horoscopes! I know of the prediction which gives the throne of the Valois to the Bourbons, and if we do not take care it will be fulfilled. Do not be angry with your sister; she has behaved well in this affair. My son," continued the queen, after a pause, giving a tone of tenderness to her words, "evil persons on the side of the Guises are trying to sow dissensions between you and me; and yet we are the only ones in the kingdom whose interests are absolutely identical. You blame me, I know, for the Saint-Bartholomew; you accuse me of having forced you into it. Catholicism, monsieur, must be the bond between France, Spain, and Italy, three countries which can, by skilful management, secretly planned, be united in course of time, under the house of Valois. Do not deprive yourself of such chances by loosing the cord which binds the three kingdoms in the bonds of a common faith. Why should not the Valois and the Medici carry out for their own glory the scheme of Charles the Fifth, whose head failed him? Let us fling off that race of Jeanne la Folle. The Medici, masters of Florence and of Rome, will force Italy to support your interests; they will guarantee you advantages by treaties of commerce and alliance which shall recognize your fiefs in Piedmont, the Milanais, and Naples, where you have rights. These, monsieur, are the reasons of the war to the death which we make against the Huguenots. Why do you force me to repeat these things? Charlemagne was wrong in advancing toward the north. France is a body whose heart is on the Gulf of Lyons, and its two arms over Spain and Italy. Therefore, she must rule the Mediterranean, that basket into which are poured all the riches of the Orient, now turned to the profit of those seigneurs of Venice, in the very teeth of Philip II. If the friendship of the Medici and your rights justify you in hoping for Italy, force, alliances, or a possible inheritance may give you Spain. Warn the house of Austria as to this,--that ambitious house to which the Guelphs sold Italy, and which is even now hankering after Spain. Though your wife is of that house, humble it! Clasp it so closely that you will smother it! _There_ are the enemies of your kingdom; thence comes help to the Reformers. Do not listen to those who find their profit in causing us to disagree, and who torment your life by making you believe I am your secret enemy. Have _I_ prevented you from having heirs? Why has your mistress given you a son, and your wife a daughter? Why have you not to-day three legitimate heirs to root out the hopes of these seditious persons? Is it I, monsieur, who am responsible for such failures? If you had an heir, would the Duc d'Alencon be now conspiring?"

As she ended these words, Catherine fixed upon her son the magnetic glance of a bird of prey upon its victim. The daughter of the Medici became magnificent; her real self shone upon her face, which, like that of a gambler over the green table, glittered with vast cupidities. Charles IX. saw no longer the mother of one man, but (as was said of her) the mother of armies and of empires,--_mater castrorum_. Catherine had now spread wide the wings of her genius, and boldly flown to the heights of the Medici and Valois policy, tracing once more the mighty plans which terrified in earlier days her husband Henri II., and which, transmitted by the genius of the Medici to Richelieu, remain in writing among the papers of the house of Bourbon. But Charles IX., hearing the unusual persuasions his mother was using, thought that there must be some necessity for them, and he began to ask himself what could be her motive. He dropped his eyes; he hesitated; his distrust was not lessened by her studied phrases. Catherine was amazed at the depths of suspicion she now beheld in her son's heart.

"Well, monsieur," she said, "do you not understand me? What are we, you and I, in comparison with the eternity of royal crowns? Do you suppose me to have other designs than those that ought to actuate all royal persons who inhabit the sphere where empires are ruled?"

"Madame, I will follow you to your cabinet; we must act--"

"Act!" cried Catherine; "let our enemies alone; let _them_ act; take them red-handed, and law and justice will deliver you from their assaults. For God's sake, monsieur, show them good-will."

The queen withdrew; the king remained alone for a few moments, for he was utterly overwhelmed.

"On which side is the trap?" thought he. "Which of the two--she or they--deceive me? What is my best policy? _Deus, discerne causam meam_!" he muttered with tears in his eyes. "Life is a burden to me! I prefer death, natural or violent, to these perpetual torments!" he cried presently, bringing down his hammer upon the anvil with such force that the vaults of the palace trembled.