Memoirs of a Physician (48 page)
But the marshal soon relieved his friend from all anxiety. Drawing him into a corner of the gallery :
“Baron,” said he, as soon as he saw that they were alone, ” you have at times seemed to doubt my friendship for you.”
” Never since our reconciliation ‘ replied Taverney.
” At least you doubted your own good fortune and that of your children ? “
” Oh ! as for that yes.”
” Well, you are wrong. Your children’s fortune and your own is made with a rapidity which might make you giddy.”
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” Bah ! ” said Taverney, who suspected part of the truth, but who, as he was not quite certain, took care to guard against mistakes, ” what do you mean ? “
” Monsieur Philip is already a captain, with a company paid for by the king.”
” It is true I owe that to you.”
” By no means. Then we shall have Mademoiselle de Taverney a marchioness, perhaps.”
” Come, come ! ” exclaimed Taverney. ” How ? my daughter ! “
“Listen, Taverney. The king has great taste; and beauty, grace, and virtue, when accompanied by talent, delight his majesty. Now Mademoiselle de Taverney unites all these qualities in a very high degree. The king is therefore delighted with Mademoiselle de Taverney.”
” Duke,” replied Taverney, assuming an air of dignity at which the marshal could scarcely repress a smile, ” duke, what do you mean by ‘ delighted ‘ ? “
” Baron, I am not a great linguist. I am not even well versed in orthography. I have always thought that ‘ delighted ‘ signified ‘ content beyond measure.’ If you are grieved beyond measure to see the king pleased with the beauty, the talent, the merit of your children, you have only to say so. I am about to return to his majesty.”
And Eichelieu turned on his heel and made a pirouette with truly juvenile grace.
” You misunderstand me, duke,” exclaimed the baron, stopping him. ” Ventre bleu ! how hasty you are ! “
” What did you say that you were not satisfied ? “
” I did not say so.”
“You ask for explanations of the king’s pleasure plague take the fool ! “
” But, duke, I did not breathe a syllable of that. I am most certainly content.”
” Ah ! you well, who will be displeased ? Your daughter?”
“Oh! oh!”
” My dear friend, you have brought up your daughter like a savage, as you are.”
” My dear friend, the young lady educated herself ; you
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may easily imagine that I could not possibly trouble my-self with any such matter. I had enough to do to support life in my den at Taverney. Virtue in her sprung up spon-taneously.”
“And yet people say that country folk know how to pull up weeds ? In short, your daughter is a prude.”
” You mistake; she is a dove.”
Kichelieu made a grimace. ” Well,” said he, ” the poor child must only look out for a good husband, for opportunities of making a fortune happen rarely with this de-fect.”
Taverney looked uneasily at the duke.
” Fortunately for her,” continued he, ” the king is so desperately in love with Dubarry, that he will never think seriously of another.”
Taverney’s alarm was changed to anguish.
” Therefore,” continued Eichelieu, ” you and your daughter may make your minds easy. I will state the necessary objections to his majesty, and the king will never bestow another thought on the matter.”
” But objections to what ? good heavens ! ” exclaimed Taverney, turning pale, and holding his friend’s arm.
” To his making a little present to Mademoiselle An-dree, my dear baron.”
” A little present ! What is it ? ” asked the baron, brim-ful of hope and avarice.
” Oh ! a mere trifle,” said Kichelieu, carelessly, and he took a casket from its silken covering.
” A casket ! “
” A mere trifle a necklace worth a few millions of livres, which his majesty, flattered at hearing her sing his favorite air, wished to present to the fair singer. It is the usual custom. But if your daughter is proud, we will say no more about it.”
” Duke, you must not think of it that would be to of-fend the king ! “
” Of course it would ; but is it not the attribute of virtue always to offend some person, or something ? “
” But, duke, consider the child is not so unreasonable.”
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” That is to say, it is you, and not your child, who speaks ? “
” Oh ! I know so well what she will do and say.”
” The Chinese are a very fortunate nation,” said Kichelieu.
” Why ? ” asked Taverney, astonished.
” Because they have so many rivers and canals in the country.”
” Duke, you turn the conversation do not drive me to despair; speak to me.”
” I am speaking to you, baron, and am not changing the conversation at all.”
” Then why do you speak of China ? What have its rivers to do with my daughter ? “
” A great deal. The Chinese, I repeat, have the happiness of being able to drown their daughters when they are too virtuous, and no one can forbid it.”
” Come, duke, you must be just. Suppose you had a daughter yourself.”
” Pardieu ! I have one ; and if any one were to tell me that she is too virtuous, it would be very ill-natured of him that’s all.”
” In short, you would like her better otherwise, would you not ? “
” Oh ! for my part, I don’t meddle with my children after they are eight years old.”
” Listen to me, at least. If the king were to commission me to offer a necklace to your daughter, and if your daughter were to complain to you ? “
” Oh, my dear sir ! there is no comparison. I have al-ways lived at court, you have lived like a North American Indian; there is no similarity. What you call virtue, I think folly. Remember for the future that nothing is more ill-bred than to say to people : * What would you do in this or that case ? ‘ And besides, your comparisons are erroneous, my friend. It is not true that I am about to present a necklace to your daughter.”
” You said so.”
” I said nothing of the sort. I said that the king had directed me to bring him a casket for Mademoiselle de
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Taverney, whose voice had pleased him; but I did not say his majesty had charged me to give it to her.”
” Then in truth,” said the baron, in despair, ” I know not what to think. I do not understand a single word you speak in enigmas. Why give this necklace if it is not to be given? Why do you take charge of it if not to deliver it ? “
Kichelieu uttered an exclamation as if he had seen a spider.
” Ah ! ” said he ; ” pouali I pouah ! the huron the ugly animal ! “
“Who?”
” You, my good friend you, my trusty comrade you seem as if you had fallen from the clouds, baron.”
” I am at my wits’ end.”
” No, you never had any. When a king makes a lady a present, and when he charges Monsieur de Kichelieu with the commission, the present is noble and the commission well executed remember that. I do not deliver caskets, my dear sir that was Monsieur Lebel’s office. Did you know Monsieur Lebel ? “
” What is your office, then ? “
” My friend,” said Kichelieu, tapping Taverney on the shoulder, and accompanying this amiable gesture by a sardonic smile, ” when I have to do with such paragons of virtue as Mademoiselle Andre, I am the most moral man in the world. When I approach a dove, as you call your daughter, I do not display the talons of the hawk. When I am deputed to wait on a young lady, I speak to her father. I speak to you, therefore, Taverney, and give you the cas-ket to present to your daughter. Well, are you willing ? ” And he offered the casket. ” Or do you decline ? ” And he drew it back.
” Oh, say at once ! ” exclaimed the baron ; ” say at once that I am commissioned by his majesty to deliver the present. If so, it assumes quite a correct and paternal character it is, so to speak, purified from “
” Purified ! Why, you must have suspected his majesty of evil intentions ! ” said Richelieu, seriously. ” Now, you cannot have dared to do that.”
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” Heaven forbid ! But the world that is to say, my daughter “
Eichelieu shrugged his shoulders.
” Will you take it yes or no ? ” asked he.
Taverney rapidly held out his hand.
” You are certain it is moral ? ” said he to the duke, with a smile, the counterpart of that which the duke had just addressed to him,
” Do you not think it pure morality, baron,” said the marshal, “to make the father, who,. as you have just said, purifies everything, an intermediate party between the king’s delights and your daughter’s charms? Let Monsieur Rousseau of Geneva, who was hovering about here just now, be the judge. He would say that Cato of happy memory was impure compared to me.”
Richelieu pronounced these few words with a calmness, an abrupt haughtiness, a precision, which silenced Taverney’s objections, and assisted to make him believe” that he ought to be convinced. He seized his illustrious friend’s hand, therefore, and pressing it:
” Thanks to your delicacy,” said he, ” my daughter can accept this present.”
” The source and origin of the good fortune to which I alluded at the commencement of our tiresome discussion on virtue.”
” Thanks, deac, duke most hearty thanks ! “
” One word more. Conceal this favor carefully from the Dubarrys. It might make Madame Dubarry leave the king and take flight.”
” And the king would be displeased ? “
” I don’t know, but the countess would not thank us. As for me, I should be lost; be discreet, therefore “
” Do not fear. But at least present my most humble thanks to the king.”
” And your daughter’ & I shall not fail. But you have not yet reached the limits of the favors bestowed upon you. It is you who are to thank the king, my dear sir; his majesty invites you to sup with him this evening.”
“Me?”
” You, Taverney. We shall be a select party his ma-
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jesty, you, and myself. We will talk of your daughter’s virtue. Adieu, Taverney, I see Dubarry with Monsieur d’Aiguillon. We must not be perceived together.”
And, agile as a page, he disappeared at the further end of the gallery, leaving Taverney gazing at his casket, like a Saxon child who awakens and finds the Christmas gifts which had been placed in his hands while he slept.
CHAPTER XLVI.
KING LOUIS XV.‘S PETIT SOUPER.
THE marshal found the king in the little saloon whither several of the courtiers had followed him, preferring rather to lose their supper than to allow the wandering glance of their sovereign to fall on any others than themselves. But Louis XV. seemed to have something else to do this evening than to look at these gentlemen. He dismissed every one, saying that he did not intend to sup, or that, if he did, it would be alone. All the guests having thus received their dismissal, and fearing to displease the dauphin if they were not present at the fete which he was to give at the close of the rehearsal, instantly flew off like a cloud of parasite pigeons, and winged their way to him whom they were permitted to see, ready to assert that they had deserted his majesty’s drawing-room for him.
Louis XV., whom they left so rapidly, was far from bestowing a thought on them. At another time the little-ness of all this swarm of courtiers would have excited a smile, but on this occasion it awoke no sentiment in the monarch’s breast a monarch so sarcastic, that he spared neither bodily or mental defect in his best friend, alwa} r s supposing that Louis XV. ever had a friend.
No, at that moment Louis XV. concentrated his entire attention on a carriage which was drawn up opposite the door of the offices of Trianon, the coachman seeming to wait only for the step which should announce the owner’s presence in the gilded vehicle, to urge on his horses. The
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carriage was
Mme.
Dubarry’s, and was lighted by torches. Zamore, seated beside the coachman, was swinging his legs backward and forward like a child at play.
At last
Mme.
Dubarry, who had, no doubt, delayed in the corridors in the hope of receiving some message from the king, appeared, supported on M. d’Aiguillon’s arm. Her anger, or at least her disappointment, was apparent in tto rapidity of her gait. She affected too much resolution not to have lost her presence of mind.
After
Mme.
Dubarry followed Jean, looking gloomy in the extreme, and absently crushing his hat beneath his arm. He had not been present at the representation, the dauphin having forgotten to invite him ; but he had stolen into the anteroom somewhat after the fashion of a lackey, and stood pensive as Hippolytus, with his shirt-frill falling over his vest, embroidered with silver and red flowers, and not even looking at his tattered ruffles, which seemed in harmony with his sad thoughts. Jean had seen his sister look pale and alarmed, and had concluded from this that the danger was great. Jean was brave in diplomacy only when opposed in flesh and blood, never when opposed to phantoms.
Concealed behind the window-curtain, the king watched this funereal procession defile before him, and ingulf themselves in the countess’s carriage like a troop of phantoms. Then, when the door was closed, and the footman had mounted behind the carriage, the coachman shook the reins, and the horses started forward with a gallop.
” Oh ! ” said the king, ” without making an attempt to see me to speak to me ? The countess is furious ! “
And he repeated aloud:
” Yes, the countess is furious ! “
Richelieu, who had just glided into the room like an expected visitor, caught these last words.
” Furious, sire ; and for what ? Because your majesty is amused for a moment. Oh ! that is not amiable of the countess.”
” Duke,” replied Louis XV., ” I am not amused ; on the contrary, I am wearied and wish for repose. Music enervates me. If I had listened to the countess, I ought to
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