Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 363, January, 1846

"Oh, madam, you have access to the king!" cried Jocelyne imploringly. "He is your brother – and the power to save or to destroy is his. He will not refuse you, if you entreat his pardon and mercy for the Count."

Margaret shook her head doubtfully.

"Alas!" she said, with a look of distress, "other influences are at work which mine cannot resist. I knew not all – but now I tremble."

Jocelyne still entreated, in all the agony of despair; and the young Princess, again calling to her ladies, and learning that the Queen-mother had returned to her own apartment, at last departed from her chamber, bidding her fair suppliant await her return.

Long, eternally long, appeared those minutes, as the unhappy girl still waited for that return which she imagined was to bring her the news of life or death. To calm the agitation of her mind, she prayed. But her thoughts were far too disturbed for prayer; and the prayer brought her no comfort.

At length the Queen of Navarre came back to her apartment – as Jocelyne looked in her face, she could scarcely repress a scream; that face was one of sorrow, and disappointment – the poor girl trembled in every limb, and did not dare to speak.

"I have done all I could," said Margaret – "His door was obstinately closed to me – I could not see him – it was she – it was my mother, who has done this. I know it well."

"What is to be done? whether turn for help?" cried Jocelyne in dispair. "Oh! would that I could lay down my life to save his."

"Noble girl!" exclaimed the princess. "Thus devoted, whilst he loves another! How far more generous than was I; ay, I believe thee – couldst thou lay down thy life for him, thou wouldst do it."

"And is there no hope of seeking pardon at his hands?" resumed the afflicted girl.

"In time, perhaps – at another opportunity," replied Margaret; "but now my mother's influence triumphs."

"Another opportunity!" sobbed Jocelyne. "In time! Alas! such words are words of mockery – the king is dying – at his death the Queen-mother will command; and what have we then to hope?"

"Dying? the king – my brother!" exclaimed the Queen of Navarre – you rave, girl! he is ill – I know, but" —

"Know you not, madam," interrupted Jocelyne, "what all the city of Paris knows – that the king cannot live long – not many hours, perhaps – that he lies upon his death-bed?"

"Charles – dying! And my mother has concealed it from me!" cried Margaret. "I see through all her designs! she would keep us from his presence, that he bestow not upon my husband, whom he loves, the reins of power at his death. Charles – dying! Then there lies our only hope. If he die, let Henry of Navarre be Regent – he will listen to my prayer – and La Mole is saved. Yes, there lies the only chance. I will to my husband. We may have still time to effect our purpose, and secure the Regency, in these few last hours of the reign."

CHAPTER V

"O cousin, thou art come to set mine eye;
The tackle of my heart is crack'd and burn'd;
And all the shrouds, wherewith my life should sail,
Are turned to one thread, one little hair;
My heart hath one poor string to stay it by —

* * *

"All this thou see'st is but a clod,
And module of confounded royalty."

* * *

"But now a king – now thus —
This was now a king, and now is clay."

    Shakspeare.
The miserable king lay, indeed, upon his bed of death. He had refused to quit the room which he usually occupied, all encumbered as it was with his favourite hounds, his hunting accoutrements, and these horns, the winding of which had been his favourite amusement, and had contributed so powerfully to affect his lungs, and undermine his constitution. A sort of couch had been prepared for him of mattresses and cushions upon the floor; and upon that rude bed was the emaciated form of the dying monarch extended. To his customary attacks of blood-spitting, had succeeded a strange, and, until then, unknown symptom of malady, from which the very physicians recoiled with horror. Drops of red moisture, which bore all the appearance of blood, had burst, like perspiration, from the pores of the body; and there were moments when the wretched man writhed on his couch in the double anguish of body and mind, that, in spite of the efforts of the physicians to remove this extraordinary appearance, he might have been thought to be bathed in gore.

It was indeed an agony, and a bloody sweat!

The physicians had long since declared that there was no hope. In one of those fitful bursts of anger, in which Charles from time to time indulged, even in his state of exhaustion and in his dying moments, he had desired to be left by his doctors and attendants, and he slumbered his last slumber in this world, before closing his eyes for ever in the great sleep of death, to wake upon another. One person alone sat by the side of his couch; and that person was one, whom the incessant intriguing efforts of his mother would have taught him was his bitterest enemy.

That ivory paleness which had been so characteristic a trait of Charles, and had added at once to the melancholy and majesty of his face, was now of a yellow waxen colour, which might be said to increase from minute to minute in lividness of hue. His large nose stood frightfully prominent from those hollow sunken cheeks; his lips, in life, red almost to bleeding, were now ashy pale. Beneath his thin lids, the eyeballs, sunken into the deep cavities of his eyes, might be seen to roll and palpitate; whilst from his open and distorted mouth burst forth, even in his troubled sleep, moans, and then words of anguish.

The man who sat by his side, listened with varying feelings. Sometimes he started back with a movement of horror; sometimes he again bent forward in compassion, and with a kerchief lightly wiped away that fearful perspiration which burst from the hollow temples of the young man. The aspect of this personage was noble; his forehead was bold; his nose formed with that eagle curve which seems fashioned for command. The expression of his grey eyes denoted both resolution and wariness; whilst a general look of good temper and openness, which amounted almost to insouciance, pervaded the whole face. He was clothed in black. It was Henry of Navarre, the ill-used and betrayed victim of Catherine's policy.

During the whole reign of Charles IX., the Queen-mother had used every effort to instil into his mind suspicions of the loyalty of the man, who, were the Valois to die childless, would be heir to the throne of France; and whom the decrees of Providence finally led, through the wiles and plots set to snare his liberty and his life, and in the midst of the clashing of contending parties, to rule the destinies of the country, as Henry the Fourth. Henry of Navarre, whom the artifice and calumny of a Medicis had done their best to separate and estrange from his king and brother-in-law during life, was now the only attendant upon his last moments – the only friend to press his dying hand and close his eyes. By a last exercise of his authority, Charles had declared that it was his will that Henry of Navarre, and he alone, should be permitted to approach his couch, and receive his last instructions; and in spite of all the manœuvres of the crafty Catherine, who no longer ventured openly to oppose her son's commands, the two princes were united in this supreme and awful hour.

And now Henry of Navarre sat and watched his dying relation with oppressed and anxious heart, aware that, were the king to die without providing for his safety by a last exercise of his power, his liberty, and even his life, would be in danger from the manœuvres of the revengeful Catherine; that his only chance of escape was in flight before the death of the expiring king; and yet, too noble and generous to leave the man who, at such a time, had called him to his side, he sat and watched.

Presently the king rolled convulsively upon his couch; his parted lips quivered horribly; and with a mutter, which increased at last into a distinct and piercing scream, he let fall the words —

"Away – away – torment me not! Why do you haunt me thus? Fire – fire! Kill – kill! No – spare them – spare them, and spare me a hopeless misery. Ah! they fly – they bleed – they fall. And the poor old Admiral – his grey heirs are dabbled with blood. Away – away – it was not I – not I! Ah!" —

With a sudden start of horror, the king lifted his head from his pillow, and for a time gazed with staring and glassy eyes, as if the hideous vision which had tortured his sleep were still before him. Then with a bitter groan, he again fell back upon his couch. Again he raised his head, and, looking upon Henry, said, with a faint and plaintive voice, that contrasted strangely with these brusque and harsh tones which were natural to him,

"Why do they ever pursue me thus – those Huguenots, who perished with the Admiral? It was not I – it was my mother who was the cause of all. And yet, I myself, arquebuse in hand, I hunted them to the death. Oh! but my remorse has been long and bitter, Henry. What I have suffered none on earth can tell. Since that fatal night, I have never enjoyed a moment's peace of mind. Do kings ever enjoy peace of mind, Henry? Oh, be glad that thou art not a reigning king! Peace of mind is not for them. If there be a purgatory, Henry, in another world, I have already endured all its tortures on this earth. Is not remorse the worst purgatory? ay – the most damning hell. But why, then, do they pursue me thus in hideous visions still?"

The wretched king buried his head in his pillow.

"Strive to be calm," said Henry of Navarre, bending over him to lift up his head, and arrange his cushions. "Those visions will leave you."

"Yes! in the grave – perhaps!" replied Charles, again looking up with a shudder.

"Let us hope better things," continued Henry. "With more tranquillity of mind, you will regain your strength, and" —

"No – all is past," murmured the king. "I feel that I am dying. Know you not that there is one accused of practising sorcery upon me. Folly! madness! An evil deed has been practised upon me. Yes – the thought will not leave me. I would drive it away, but it still rankles in my heart. Evil has been done me, but not by sorcery. And yet the sorcerer must die. The world must believe that it was he who worked my death; but it was another. Come here, Henry; bend your ear to me, for I can no longer rise. Wouldst thou know who it was?"

A noise in the further part of the room startled the young King of Navarre at this moment, and he turned his head. The only living creature present was the favourite green ape of the king, that sat and grinned and moaned, as if in mockery of his dying master.

"Come nearer, Henry," pursued the king, "for I would speak that to thee, that not the very walls may hear. Know you what has caused my death – who has been my murderer?"

Henry bent his head over the dying man, more to satisfy a caprice of the sufferer, than in the expectation of any serious revelation; and, as Charles whispered in his ear, he started back in horror.

"Oh, sire, think not so! Drive away so miserable a suspicion!" he said. "It were too horrible. It is impossible!"

"Impossible!" repeated the king, with a faint ironical laugh. "To some hearts all things are possible."

"You had a mother once," continued Charles, after a painful pause. "But she was good and kind; and she is dead. Know you how she died? – Mine still lives – and now it is I who die."

"Speak not thus, I entreat you, sire!" interrupted Henry. "This is horrible!"

"Horrible! is it not?" repeated the wretched king with the same harrowing laugh. "Henry! trust not yourself to the tender mercies of my mother!"

Again the same strange noise struck upon the ear of Henry of Navarre.

"Nor shall my people, my poor suffering people, be trusted to her care," continued the king with more energy. "Henry, thou art the only one, in this my palace of the Louvre, who loves me. In spite of all that has been said and done, thou alone hast left me in repose, hast never troubled my last days by conspiracies against my crown, and against my life – ay, my life! Brother has been set against Brother in bitter hatred. Thou alone hast not hated me, Henry. Thou alone, in spite of all the wrongs I have done thee – thou hast loved me. To thee I commend my poor patient wife – to thee I commend my people!"