The King broke in: “Enough! I give order for that sum with all my heart. These are expenses I do not look at twice. I have never regretted that money. Proceed.”
“For constructing a new cage—”
“Ah!” said the King, grasping the arms of his chair, “I knew I had come to the Bastille for something special. Stop, Master Olivier, I will see that cage myself. You shall read over the cost of it to me while I examine it. Messieurs the Flemings, you must come and see this; it is curious.”
He rose to his feet, leaned on the arm of his interlocutor, signed to the sort of mute standing beside the door to precede them, to the two Flemings to follow, and left the chamber.
The King’s cortége was recruited at the door by a party of men-at-arms ponderous with steel, and slim pages carrying torches. It proceeded for some time through the interior of the grim donjon-keep, perforated by flights of stairs and corridors even to the thickness of the walls. The captain of the Bastille walked at its head, and directed the opening of the successive narrow doors before the bent and decrepit King, who coughed as he walked along.
At each door every head was obliged to stoop, except that of the old man already bent with age. “Hum!” said he between his gums, for he had no teeth; “we are in excellent trim for the gate of the sepulchre. A low door needs a stooping passenger.”
At length, after passing through the last door of all, so encumbered with complicated locks that it took a quarter of an hour to get them all open, they entered a lofty and spacious Gothic hall, in the centre of which they could discern by the light of the torches a great square mass of masonry, iron, and wood-work. The interior was hollow. It was one of those famous cages for state prisoners familiarly known as “Fillettes du roi” —little daughters of the King. There were two or three small windows in its walls, but so closely grated with massive iron bars that no glass was visible. The door consisted of a huge single slab of stone, like that of a tomb —one of those doors that serve for entrance alone. Only here, the dead was alive.
The King began pacing slowly. round this small edifice, examining it with care, while Ma?tre Olivier, who followed him, read aloud the items of the account:
“For making a great wooden cage of heavy beams, joists, and rafters, measuring nine feet in length and eight in breadth, and seven feet high between roof and floor, mortised and bolted with great iron bolts; which has been placed in a certain chamber situated in one of the towers of the Bastille Saint-Antoine; in the which said cage is put and kept by command of our lord the King a prisoner, who before inhabited an old, decayed, and unserviceable cage. Used in the building of the said new cage, ninety-six horizontal beams and fifty-two perpendicular, ten joists, each three toises long. Employed in squaring, planing, and fitting the same wood-work in the yard of the Bastille, nineteen carpenters for twenty days—”
“Fine solid timber, that!” remarked the King, rapping his knuckles on the wood.
“Used in this cage,” continued the other, “two hundred and twenty great iron bolts nine feet and eight feet long, the rest of medium length, together with the plates and nuts for fastening the said bolts; the said iron weighing in all three thousand seven hundred and thirty-five pounds; besides eight heavy iron clamps for fixing the said cage in its place, altogether two hundred and eighteen pounds; without reckoning the iron of the grating to the windows of the chamber and other items—”
“Here’s a deal of iron to restrain the levity of a spirit!”
“—The whole amounts to three hundred and seventeen livres, five sols, seven deniers.”
“Pasque-Dieu!” exclaimed the King. This oath, which was the favourite one of Louis XI, apparently aroused some one inside the cage: there was sound of clanking chains being dragged across its floor, and a feeble voice that seemed to issue from the tomb, wailed: “Sire! Sire, mercy!” The speaker was not visible.
“Three hundred and seventeen livres, five sols, seven deniers!” repeated Louis XI.
The voice of lamentation which had issued from the cage chilled the blood of all present, even Ma?tre Oliver. The King alone gave no evidence of having heard it. At his command Olivier resumed his reading, and his Majesty coolly continued his inspection of the cage.
“Besides the above, there has been paid to a mason, for making the holes to fix the window-grating and the flooring of the chamber containing the cage, forasmuch as the floor would not otherwise have supported the said cage by reason of its weight—twenty-seven livres, fourteen sols parisis—”
The voice began its wailing again. “Mercy, Sire! I swear to you it was Monsieur the Cardinal of Angers who committed the treason—not I!”
“The mason’s charge is exorbitant!” said the King. “Go on, Olivier.”
Olivier went on: “To a joiner for window-frames, bed-stead, closet-stool, and other things—twenty livres, two sols parisis—”
The voice also went on: “Woe is me, Sire! will you not hear me? I protest that it was not I who wrote that to the Duke of Guyenne, but Monsieur the Cardinal Balue!”
“The joiner is dear,” observed the King. “Is that all?”
“No, Sire. To a glazier for the windows of the said chamber, forty-six sols, eight deniers parisis.”
“Have mercy, Sire!” cried the voice again. “Is it not enough that all my possessions have been given to my judges —my table service to M. de Torcy, my library to Ma?tre Pierre Doriolle, my tapestries to the Governor of Roussillon? I am innocent. Lo, these fourteen years have I shivered in an iron cage. Have mercy, Sire! and you shall find it in heaven!”
“Ma?tre Olivier,” said the King, “the total?”
“Three hundred and sixty-seven livres, eight sols, three deniers parisis—”
“Notre-Dame!” cried the King. “ ’Tis an outrageous cage!”
He snatched the paper from Olivier’s hand, and began to reckon it up himself on his fingers, examining the schedule and the cage by turns—while the prisoner was heard sobbing within it. It was a dismal scene in the darkness, and the bystanders paled as they looked at one another.
“Fourteen years, Sire! It is fourteen years—since April, 1469. I conjure you in the name of the Holy Mother of God, listen to me, Sire! During all those years you have enjoyed the warmth of the sun; shall I, feeble wretch that I am, never see the light of day again? Mercy, Sire! Show mercy! Clemency is a noble virtue in a King, and turns aside the current of the wrath to come. Think you, your Majesty, that at the hour of death it will be a great satisfaction to a King to know that he has never let an offence go unpunished? Moreover, I never betrayed your Majesty—it was Monsieur of Angers. And I have a very heavy chain on my foot with a huge iron ball attached to it—far heavier than there is any need for. Oh, Sire, have pity on me!”
“Olivier,” said the King, shaking his head, “I observe that they charge me the bushel of plaster at twenty sols, though it is only worth twelve. You will draw up this memorandum afresh.”
He turned his back on the cage, and began to move towards the door of the chamber. The wretched prisoner judged by the withdrawal of the torchlight and by the sounds that the King was preparing to depart.
“Sire! Sire!” he cried in anguish.
The door closed. He saw nothing more, and heard nothing but the raucous voice of the turnkey singing close by:
“Ma?tre Jean Balue
Has lost from view
His bishoprics all.
Monsieur de Verdun
Has now not got one;
They’re gone, one and all.”
The King returned in silence to his closet, followed by his train, all horror-struck at the last bitter cry of the prisoner. Suddenly his Majesty turned to the Governor of the Bastille.
“By-the-bye,” said he, “was there not some one in that cage?”
“Pardieu! yes, Sire!” answered the governor, dumfounded by the question.
“And who?”
“Monsieur the Bishop of Verdun.”
The King knew that better than any one, but it was a way he had.
“Ah,” said he blandly, with the air of remembering it for the first time, “Guillaume de Harancourt, the friend of Monsieur the Cardinal Balue. A good fellow of a bishop!”
A few minutes later, the door of the closet had opened and closed again on the five persons whom the reader found there at the beginning of this chapter, and who had severally resumed their places, their attitudes, and their whispered conversation.
During the King’s absence some despatches had been laid upon the table, of which he himself broke the seal. He then began reading them attentively one after another, motioned to Ma?tre Olivier, who seemed to fill the post of minister to him, to take a pen, and without imparting to him the contents of the despatches, began in a low voice to dictate to him the answers, which the latter wrote kneeling uncomfortably at the table.
Guillaume Rym watched them.
The King spoke so low that the Flemings could hear nothing of what he was dictating, except here and there a few isolated and scarcely intelligible fragments, such as: “Maintain the fertile tracts by commerce and the sterile ones by manufactures.—Show my lords the English our four bombards: the Londres, the Brabant, the Bourg-en-Bresse, the Saint-Omer.—It is owing to artillery that war is now more reasonably carried on.—To Monsieur de Bressuire, our friend.—Armies cannot be maintained without contributions,” etc.
Once he raised his voice. Pasque-Dieu! Monsieur the King of Sicily seals his letters with yellow wax like a King of France! Perhaps we do wrong to permit this. My good cousin of Burgundy accorded no arms of a field gules. The greatness of a house is secured by upholding the integrity of its prerogatives. Note that down, friend Olivier.”
Another time: “Oh, oh!” said he, “a big missive! What does our friend the Emperor demand of us now?” Then, running his eye over the despatch and interrupting the perusal now and again with brief interjections: “Certes, Germany is getting so grand and mighty it is scarcely credible. But we do not forget the old proverb: ‘The finest country is Flanders; the finest duchy, Milan; the finest kingdom, France.’ Is that not so, Messieurs the Flemings?”
This time Coppenole bowed as well as Guillaume Rym. The hosier’s patriotism was tickled.
The last of the batch made Louis XI knit his brows. “What have we here?” he exclaimed. “Complaints and petitions against our garrisons in Picardy! Olivier, write with all speed to Monsieur the Marshal de Rouault: That discipline is relaxed; that the men-at-arms, the nobles, the free archers, and the Swiss are doing infinite mischief to the inhabitants; that the military, not content with the good things they find in the dwellings of the husbandmen, must needs compel them with heavy blows of staves or bills to fetch them from the town wine, fish, spices, and other superfluous articles; that the King knows all this; that we mean to protect our people from annoyance, theft, and pillage; that such is our will, by Our Lady! That, furthermore, it does not please us that any musician, barber, or man-at-arms whatsoever, should go clad like a prince in velvet, silk, and gold rings; that such vanities are hateful to God; that we, who are a gentleman, content ourselves with a doublet of cloth at sixteen sols parisis the ell; that messieurs the varlets may very well come down to that price likewise. Convey and command this—To M. de Rouault, our friend.—Good.”
He dictated this letter in a loud voice with a firm tone, and in short, abrupt sentences. As he spoke the last word, the door flew open and admitted a fresh person, who rushed into the chamber in breathless agitation, crying:
“Sire! Sire! there is a rising of the populace of Paris!”
The King’s grave face contracted, but such emotion as he displayed passed like a flash. He controlled himself. “Compére Jacques,” he said in a tone and with a look of quiet severity, “you enter very abruptly.”
“Sire! Sire! there is a revolt!” gasped Ma?tre Jacques.
Louis, who had risen from his seat, seized him roughly by the arm, and in a tone of concentrated anger and a side-long glance at the Flemings, said in his ear so as to be heard by him alone: “Hold thy peace, or speak low!”
The newcomer grasped the situation and proceeded to tell his news in a terrified whisper, the King listening unmoved, while Guillaume Rym directed Coppenole’s attention to the messenger’s face and dress, his furred hood (caputia forrata), his short cloak (epitogia curta), his gown of black velvet, which proclaimed him a president of the Court of Accompts.
Scarcely had this person given the King a few details, when Louis exclaimed in a burst of laughter: “Nay, in good sooth, speak up, Compére Coictier. What need to whisper thus? Our Lady knows we have no secrets from our good Flemish friends.”
“But, Sire—”
“Speak up!” said the King.
Compére Coictier stood in mute surprise.
“So,” resumed the King—“speak out, monsieur. So there is a rising of the populace in our good city of Paris?”
“Yes, Sire.”
“Which is directed, you tell me, against Monsieur the Provost of the Palais de Justice?”
“It would seem so,” replied the man, who still found his words with difficulty, so confounded was he by the sudden and inexplicable change in the King’s manner.
“Where did the watch encounter the mob?” asked Louis.
“Advancing from the Great Truanderie towards the Pontaux-Changeurs. I met it myself on my way here in obedience to your Majesty’s orders. I heard some of them cry, ‘Down with the Provost of the Palais!” ’
“And what is their grievance against the provost?”
“Oh,” said Jacques, “that he is their liege lord.”
“In truth?”
“Yes, Sire. They are rascals from the Court of Miracles. They have long been complaining of the provost whose vassals they are. They will not acknowledge him either as justiciary or as lord of the highway.”
“So, so!” retorted the King, with a smile of satisfaction which he strove in vain to conceal.
“In all their petitions to the Parliament,” continued Compére Jacques, “they claim to have only two masters—your Majesty and their God; who is, I believe, the devil.”
“Hè, hè!” chuckled the King, rubbing his hands with that internal laugh which irradiates the countenance. He could not disguise his delight, though he made a momentary effort to compose himself. No one had the least idea what it meant, not even Olivier. He remained silent for a moment, but with a thoughtful and satisfied air.
“Are they in force?” he asked suddenly.
“They are indeed, Sire,” replied Coictier.
“How many?”
“Six thousand at the very least.”
The King could not repress a pleased “Good!—Are they armed?” he went on.
“With scythes, pikes, hackbuts, pickaxes—every description of violent weapon.”
The King seemed in nowise disturbed by this alarming list. Compére Jacques thought it advisable to add: “If your Majesty sends not speedy succour to the provest, he is lost!”
