CHAPTER IV.

LES ATTROUPÉS.

It was October in the year 1701 when she who had borne the title for

so long of Princesse de Rochebazon was laid in the family vault in the

Church of St. Sépulcre. It was July of the next year when a gentleman,

looking somewhat travel-stained and weary, halted his horse at the

foot of the Mont de Lozère, in Languedoc--the same man who had

travelled from England eight months ago as Martin Ashurst, to attend

his aunt's death-bed, but who since then had been known as Monsieur

Martin.

There were more reasons than one why this change of name should be

made--primarily because war having been declared by England in

conjunction with Austria and Holland against Louis, no subject of

Queen Anne was permitted within France, or, being in, would be safe

if known and identified as such. But with an assumed name, or rather

with part of his own name discarded--Martin being common to both

countries--and with his knowledge of the French language perfect,

owing to his long residence in the country as a child, the

identification of Martin Ashurst with England was, if he held his

peace, almost impossible. Also there were other reasons. He believed

that at last he had found traces of the missing man, of him to whom by

right fell all the vast wealth of the de Rochebazons, accumulated for

centuries.

"Yet even now," he said to himself, "God knows if I shall succeed in

finding him, or even should I do so, if I shall persuade him to claim

what is his own. And, though he should still be willing, will that

scourge of God, Louis, that curse of France, his wife, let one penny

ever come to his hands? A Huguenot, and with the Huguenots in open

rebellion, what chance would he have? I must be careful, more careful

than ever, now that I am in the hotbed of revolution."

As he pondered thus he turned his wrist and urged his horse forward at

a walk, making his way on slowly through the mountains to the village

of Montvert.

"Three months," he said, "three months since I set out for

Switzerland--for Geneva and Lausanne--and now, even now, but little

nearer to the end than before. Coming here, I was told that it was

almost impossible that Cyprien de Beauvilliers could have settled in

the Cévennes without being known; travelling on to Savoy and to

Lausanne, I learn at last that he did most undoubtedly come here from

Geneva years ago. Shall I ever know--ever find out?"

A league or so accomplished at a walking pace, for his poor beast was

almost exhausted now, it having been ridden across the mountains from

St. Victor de Gravière since daybreak, and from Geneva within the last

three weeks, and the banks of a river named Le Tarn being slowly

followed, the rider entered Montvert, and passing across the bridge,

proceeded slowly up the village street. Yet even as he did so he cast

his eyes on a house at the side of that bridge and on the small trim

garden between it and the stream, muttering to himself:

"Ah! Monsieur l'abbé! Monsieur l'abbé! you are one of the firebrands

who stir up dissension in these valleys--you and your familiar spirit,

Baville. Also your evil fame has travelled far. You are known and

hated in Geneva, Lausanne, Vevey--maybe in Holland by now. 'Tis best

you pray to Heaven to avert your fate. 'Tis threatened! And, if all

the stories of you be true, it is almost deserved, no matter in what

form it comes."

Proceeding still farther along the little main street of the bourg, he

came to a wooden house also standing in a small trimly-kept garden, in

which there grew all kinds of simple flowers that made the place gay

with their colours, and here he dismounted, while calling to a boy who

was raking the crushed shells on the path, he bade him take his horse

to the stable in the rear.

"For you see, Armand," he said with a pleasant smile, "here I am back

again, after a long while--yet still back."

The boy smiled a greeting and said all would be glad to welcome him,

then did as he was bid and led the animal away, while Martin, going up

to the door, knocked lightly on it and asked, as he threw his voice

into the passage, if the _pasteur_ was within.

To which, in answer, there came down toward the door an elderly

gray-haired man, who held out both his hands and shook those of the

younger one cordially.

"Back! Back!" he exclaimed joyously. "Ah! this is good. Come in. Come

in. The room is always ready, the bed kept aired, the lavender in the

drawers. Welcome! Welcome!" Then, after looking at him and saying that

his journey had not harmed him, he exclaimed: "Well, what news? Or--is

it disappointment again?"

"But little news; scarcely, in truth, more than before. Yet something.

I met a man at Geneva who had known Cyprien de Beauvilliers, but he

was very old and, alas! it is forty years and more since he set eyes

on him."

"Forty years! A lifetime!"

"Ay, a lifetime--long enough for him to have disappeared from all

human knowledge, to have died. That, I fear, is what has happened.

Otherwise, this man says, they of the reformed faith would almost

surely have heard of him."

"Not of necessity," the pastor answered. "If he so hated his kin and

their religion that he was determined to break off forever from them

and their customs, he may have resolved to obliterate every clew. He

told the princess's husband that he renounced his name, his

birthright. Other men have resolved on that, and kept their

resolution."

While they had been speaking the pastor had led Martin Ashurst into

his little salon, and he called now to an elderly woman to prepare the

evening meal.

"And a good one to-night, Margot; a good one to-night to welcome back

the wanderer."

Whereon the old servant smiled upon that wanderer and murmured also

some words of greeting, while she said it should be a good one.

_Fichtre_, but it should!

"_Soit!_ Let us see," went on her master. "First for the solids. Now,

there is a trout, caught this morning and brought me by Leroux--oh,

such a trout! Two kilos if an ounce, and with the true deep speckles.

_Ma foi!_ he was a fool, he clung too much to the neighbourhood of the

lower bridge, derided Leroux with his wicked eye; yet, observe, Leroux

has got him. _Si! Si!_ Half an hour hence he will be _truite au vin

blanc_, a thing not half so wholesome for him as the stream and the

rushes. _Hein!_"

Martin smiled to himself, yet gravely, as always now since his aunt's

dying revelation. How far off seemed to him the merry days, or nights,

at Locket's and Pontac's, and the jokes and jeers and flashes of wit

of Betterton and Nokes, Vanburgh and gentle Farquhar!--while still the

good old pastor prattled on, happy at preparing his little feast.

"_Truite au vin blanc_. Ha! And the right wine, too, to wash it down.

Ha! The _Crépi_, in the long, tapering glasses that the Chevalier de

Fleuville brought me from Villefranche. Poor de Fleuville! Poor, poor

de Fleuville! Then, Margot, the _ragoût_ and the white chipped bread,

and, forget not these, clean _serviettes_ to-night, if we never have

others, and the cheese from Joyeuse. Oh! we will _faire la noce_

to-night, _mon brave_. God forgive me," he broke off suddenly, his

voice changing, "that even your return should make me think of feasts

and _noces_ at such a time as this--a time of blood and horror and

cruelty!"

Over the meal, the trout being all that was expected of him, and the

_Crépi_ a fitting accompaniment thereto, they talked on what had been

the object of "Monsieur Martin's" journey into Switzerland, then

neutral in both religion and politics, and offering, consequently, a

home for refugees of all classes and denominations; talked also of

what results that journey had had, or had failed to have. But all

ended, or was comprised, in what the young man had already told the

other--namely, that it seemed certain that Cyprien de Beauvilliers had

at first gone to Geneva and Lausanne after he renounced his family and

his religion, and that from there he had come to Languedoc, meaning to

settle in the one spot in France where Protestantism was in its

strongest force.

"He would thereby," the pastor said, as now they reached the _fromage

de Joyeuse_, nestling white and creamy in the vine leaves, "be able to

enjoy his religion in peace for many years, until--until the unhappy

events of '85. Alas! that revocation! That revocation, born of that

fearful woman! What--what will be the outcome of all, for even now it

is but beginning to bear its worst fruits. Martin," he continued,

"Martin, _mon ami_, we are but at the commencement. I fear for what

will happen here ere long. I fear, I fear, I fear."

"Here! Is it as bad as that?"

"It is dreadful, appalling. My friend, they will suffer no longer.

They can support neither Baville's tyranny, which extends over all the

district, nor--here, in this little village once so happy--the

monstrous cruelties of the abbé."

"The abbé! Du Chaila! What is he doing now?"

"Tongue scarce dare tell for fear of not being believed. In after

years, in centuries to come, when religion is free and tolerant, as

some day it must be--it must! it must!--those who read of what we have

suffered will deem the story false. O Martin! there, in that house by

the bridge, are done things that would almost excite the envy of the

Inquisition, ay! of Torquemada himself, were he still in existence.

And he, this abbé, is the man who will light the flame in this

tranquil spot. I pray God it may be extinguished almost ere lit." And

Martin Ashurst saw that even as he spoke his hands were folded under

the table, as though in prayer, and that his lips moved.

"But what," he said, "what do you fear? Also to what extremes does he

now proceed?"

"'Proceed!' Ah, Martin, listen. There in that house by the bridge,

once Fleuville's, who was hung by De Genne upon the bridge itself, so

that his wife might see the thing each morning when she rose, he

tortures us, the Protestants. Keeps prisoners confined, too, in the

cellars deeper than the river itself. In stocks some, naked some, some

with food only twice a week. He boasts he is God's appointed, then

jeers and says, 'Appointed, too, by Baville under Louis.'"

"And Louis knows this?"

"Some say not, some say yes. For myself, I do not know. But things are

near the end." And again the good pastor murmured, "I fear, I fear, I

fear." Then went on, his voice lowered now and his eyes glancing

through the windows, opened to let in the soft autumn air, cool and

luscious as though it had passed over countless groves of flowers:

"Listen. Masip--you have heard of him, Masip, the guide, he who shows

the way to Switzerland and freedom--he is now there, in the cellars,

in the stocks, bent double, his hands through two holes above the two

where his feet are."

"For what?"

"He showed the Demoiselles Sexti the road to Chambery--they went

dressed as boys. The girls escaped into the mountains. Masip is

doomed. He dies to-morrow."

"God help him!"

"Him! God help all, Martin. He hunts us everywhere. Some of my brother

preachers have been executed; I myself am suspended, my hour may

come--to-night--to-morrow. Sooner or later it must come. Then for me

the wheel or the flames or the gibbet--there." And he pointed down the

street toward where the bridge was on which Fleuville's body had been

hanged.

"Never! Never!" Martin exclaimed, touching the old man's arm. "Never,

while I have a sword by my side." Then added, a moment later:

"My friend, I must declare myself. While all are so brave, all going

to, or risking, their doom, I am but a craven hound to wear a mask.

To-morrow I announce--or rather denounce--myself as a Protestant. My

aunt died ere I could tell the secret which would have caused her to

curse me instead of leaving me her heir. Here, I will shelter myself

under that secret no more. To-morrow I see this abbé in his own house,

to-morrow I defy him to do his worst on me as on others. I proclaim

myself."

"No, no, no!" the old pastor cried, springing at him, placing his hand

upon his lips to prevent further words from being heard or from

penetrating outside. "No, no! In God's name, no! I forbid you. If you

do that, how will you ever find de Beauvilliers--de Rochebazon, as he

is if alive--or, he being dead, find his children? I forbid you," he

reiterated again and again in his agitation. "I forbid you."

"Forbid me? Force me to live a coward in my own esteem? To see those

of my own faith slaughtered like oxen in the shambles and stand by, a

poltroon, afraid to declare myself?"

"I forbid you. Not yet, at least. Remember, too, you are an

Englishman, of France's deepest, most hated foes; your doom is doubly

threatening. Yet, oh, oh, my son," he exclaimed in a broken voice,

"how I love, how I reverence you! Brave man, brave, honest Protestant,

I love--my God!" he exclaimed, changing his tone suddenly, desisting

in his speech, "My God! what is that?"

Desisted, turning a stricken, blanched face upon the younger man, who

had reached for his sword and sash and was already donning them, while

he whispered through white lips, "It has come! It has come! The storm

has burst," while even as he spoke he fell on his knees by the table,

and sinking his head into his hands, commenced to pray long and

silently.

Prayed long and silently, while from outside the bourg--yet advancing,

approaching nearer every moment--there came a deep sound. At first a

hum, then, next, a clearer, more definite noise, and next, they being

distinguishable, the words of a hymn sung by many voices.

Upon the soft night air, so calm and peaceful a moment earlier, those

words rolled, the cadence falling and rising until it seemed as though

it must reach the mountain tops o'erhanging the village. Rolled up and

swelled, and sunk and rose again, telling how the Lord set ambushments

against the children of Ammon, Moab, and Mount Seir, who came against

Judah; telling how, when they had made an end of one of their

particular foes, each helped to destroy another.

Again the pastor moaned: "They have risen. They have risen. God help

us all!"

"Who?" asked Martin. "Who? Our own faith? The Protestants? The

Camisards? Risen at last."

"At last! At last!" the old man said, glancing up from his prayers.

And he began to pray aloud to God to avert the horrors of battle and

murder and sudden death.

The tramp of many men came nearer. Past the foot of the garden those

men went, a compact mass; in their hands and belts, and borne also

upon their shoulders, swords, old halberds, musketoons and pistols, in

some cases scythes and reaping hooks. And ahead of all marched three

gaunt, weird men, the inspired ones, the prophets of the Cevennes, of

the Camisards.

"Keep all within doors," a deep-toned voice exclaimed from out the

throng, "on pain of death. Disturb not the children of God, his

persecuted ones. No harm is meant to those who interfere not. Keep

within doors, also appear not at the windows. All will thereby be

well."

And again the psalm uprose, though now there were some who shouted:

"To the vile abbé's! To the murderer's! To the house on the bridge!

On! On! The soldiers first, the abbé next! On! On! To avenge the

Lord!"

Then from farther ahead there rang the report of musketry, and one man

fell dead pell-mell among the moving crowd, and was left lying in the

white dust of the roadway, as from the window Martin could well see.

But still the others shouted: "On! On! God's will be done!"

And again the pastor lifted his hands from where he knelt and cried

aloud, "From battle, murder, and sudden death, good Lord deliver us."