Saint Martins Summer | Page 6

kerb, one elbow leaning
lightly on the overmantel, she proceeded leisurely to remove her
gloves.

The Seneschal observed her with eyes that held an odd mixture of
furtiveness and admiration, his fingers - plump, indolent-looking
stumps - plucking at his beard.
"Did you but know, Marquise, with what joy, with what a - "
"I will imagine it, whatever it may be," she broke in, with that brusque
arrogance that marked her bearing. "The time for flowers of rhetoric is
not now. There is trouble coming, man; trouble, dire trouble."
Up went the Seneschal's brows; his eyes grew wider.
"Trouble?" quoth he. And, having opened his mouth to give exit to that
single word, open he left it.
She laughed lazily, her lip curling, her face twisting oddly, and
mechanically she began to draw on again the glove she had drawn off.
"By your face I see how well you understand me," she sneered. "The
trouble concerns Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye."
"From Paris - does it come from Court?" His voice was sunk.
She nodded. "You are a miracle of intuition today, Tressan."
He thrust his tiny tuft of beard between his teeth - a trick he had when
perplexed or thoughtful. "Ah!" he exclaimed at last, and it sounded like
an indrawn breath of apprehension. "Tell me more."
"What more is there to tell? You have the epitome of the story."
"But what is the nature of the trouble? What form does it take, and by
whom are you advised of it?"
"A friend in Paris sent me word, and his messenger did his work well,
else had Monsieur de Garnache been here before him, and I had not so
much as had the mercy of this forewarning."
"Garnache?" quoth the Count. "Who is Garnache?"

"The emissary of the Queen-Regent. He has been dispatched hither by
her to see that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye has justice and
enlargement."
Tressan fell suddenly to groaning and wringing his hands a pathetic
figure had it been less absurd.
"I warned you, madame! I warned you how it would end," he cried. "I
told you - "
"Oh, I remember the things you told me," she cut in, scorn in her voice.
"You may spare yourself their repetition. What is done is done, and I'll
not - I would not - have it undone. Queen-Regent or no Queen-Regent,
I am mistress at Condillac; my word is the only law we know, and I
intend that so it shall continue."
Tressan looked at her in surprise. This unreasoning, feminine obstinacy
so wrought upon him that he permitted himself a smile and a lapse into
irony and banter.
"Parfaitement," said he, spreading his hands, and bowing. "Why speak
of trouble, then?"
She beat her whip impatiently against her gown, her eyes staring into
the fire. "Because, my attitude being such as it is, trouble will there be."
The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and moved a step towards her.
He was cast down to think that he might have spared himself the
trouble of donning his beautiful yellow doublet from Paris. She had
eyes for no finery that afternoon. He was cast down, too, to think how
things might go with him when this trouble came. It entered his
thoughts that he had lain long on a bed of roses in this pleasant corner
of Dauphiny, and he was smitten now with fear lest of the roses he
should find nothing remaining but the thorns.
"How came the Queen-Regent to hear of - of mademoiselle's - ah -
situation?" he inquired.

The Marquise swung round upon him in a passion.
"The girl found a dog of a traitor to bear a letter for her. That is enough.
If ever chance or fate should bring him my way, by God! he shall hang
without shrift."
Then she put her anger from her; put from her, too, the insolence and
scorn with which so lavishly she had addressed him hitherto. Instead
she assumed a suppliant air, her beautiful eyes meltingly set upon his
face.
"Tressan," said she in her altered voice, "I am beset by enemies. But
you will not forsake me? You will stand by me to the end - will you not,
my friend? I can count upon you, at least?"
"In all things, madame," he answered, under the spell of her gaze.
"What force does this man Garnache bring with him? Have you
ascertained?"
"He brings none," she answered, triumph in her glance.
"None?" he echoed, horror in his. "None? Then - then - "
He tossed his arms to heaven, and stood a limp and shaken thing. She
leaned forward, and regarded him stricken in surprise.
"Diable! What ails you?" she snapped. "Could I have given you better
news?"
"If you could have given me worse, I