The king's stockbroker : the sequel to "A princess of Paris" : a novel

Front matter

THE KINGS

STOCKBROKER

ARCHIBALD CLAVERING GUMTER

Book II. The Raid Of The Police

Chapter VII. — Robbing the Old World, - - 75 " VIII.— The Ambush in the Senart

Forest, - - - - 89 " IX.— The Empty Coach on the Melun

Road, .... 100 " X. — The Defense of the Auberge, - 107

" XL — Lanty Thinks He's Fighting the

" XIII.— The Gamekeeper D'Arnac, - 133

4 CONTENTS.

Book III. The Struggle On The Quincampoix

Chapter XIV. — "That Awful Woman Speculator! " 144 XV.— The Battle of the Brokers, - 153 XVI.— "The Chevalier Lanigan," -165 " XVII. — Lanty's Wedding, - - -177 " XVIII.— The Feast of Belshazzar, - -188

Book IV. Juggling With Fate

Chapter XIX. — The Three Lettres de Cachet, - 195 " XX. — A Comtesse for a Minute, - 204

" XXL— The One Marked with the Cross, 217

XXII.— "Use This, in the King's

XXIIL— La Quinault's Wedding Gift, -232

" XXIV. — An Actress' Love, - - - 242

Book V. The Flight From France

Chapter XXV. — Fickle Paris, - 253

XXVI.— The Last Stand, - - -265

XXVII.— The Dying Boatswain of La

Sylphide, - - - - 277

THE KING'S STOCKBROKER.

BOOK I. The Mecca of Financiers

CHAPTER I.

STEALING A GALLEY SLAVE.

It is the night of the ist of June, 17 19.

Upon the moonlit waters of the Mediterranean, just out of the port of Marseilles, a King's galley, La Sylphide, is rowing slowly into the harbor.

Behind her, the distant lights and fireworks from the Isle Pomegue give the last trace of the great water fete of Marseilles, that this day has been given to celebrate the making of the city a free port, and the arrival of the first great fleet from Louisiana, bearing the products of the new colony to France ; upon which the Regent, the Due d'Orleans, and his financier, Monseigneur Law, expect to build up the grandest commercial enterprise yet given to the world — that of the India Company.

The galley slaves are rowing slowly, for their day's work of transporting passengers to the island and towing the ships of the Mississippi squadron has been an awful one, under the burning sun.

The free sailors and soldiers are asleep upon the forecastle, tired with firing salutes and cheering for the Regent and Monseigneur Law.

Upon the center gangplank running through the low waist of the vessel the somnolent boatswain and his mates are not doing their usual flogging, and the cadence of the oars is languid.

Upon the high decorated poop at the stern, one or two under officers are asleep.

A little apart, upon this poop deck, is a creature just released from his chains, wearing the cap and camisole of a galley slave. Bending over him, with tears in his eyes, is a young man bedecked with the gorgeous uniform of a general of the army of France.

An officer of the galley approaches them.

"Hush! he is sleeping," whispers the general.

"Oh, ho! your format" laughs Lieutenant Polignac of the galley.

" Quiet! don't wake him!" mutters General le Comte dArnac, commandant of the port of Marseilles.

" Tonnerre de Brest ! you take a good deal of interest in the poor devil," replies the officer of marine. "You give me a thousand crowns to-morrow morning to transfer a slave from the oar to your shore hospital for infectious diseases, in which, according to you, mon general, the last attendant galley slave died to-day. Parbleu ! the man would live longer at the oar ! One would think you wished him to die soon."

"Perhaps I do," remarks DArnac shortly, not anxious to give any one his secret.

" Oh, ho ! just put him at the oar again, and for one hundred crowns our comite" will guarantee he will not live the week through."

" No, I prefer for him to die my way."

"Which means not at all — you are so careful of his comfort," remarks Polignac slyly.

Raymond can see the man wink in the moonlight. After a minute's pause, he thinks perhaps a half confidence will be best.

"You have guessed it, my sea dog," he replies, clapping the lieutenant on the shoulder. " I want to make his lot as easy as is consistent with my duty. Would you not do the same if you suddenly discovered one who had fought by your side, a hero in the old Army of the Rhine, toiling with criminals on the oars of the galley ? "

He gazes down at the shackled creatures plying the oars to which they are chained, in the low waist of the vessel almost at his feet, and mutters: "Would you not do a little to lighten his hard lot on earth — for I presume he is condemned for life ? "

"Undoubtedly," remarks Polignac, "under the circumstances I would do the same, as far as consistent with duty."

Then the lieutenant walks forward to give the comite some further orders, wondering in his sailor mind what the deuce the whole affair means, but being very confident of the thousand crowns that have been promised him by the general commanding the port of Marseilles.

Looking at the wretches that row the King's galley, under the lashes of the boatswain and his mates, two hundred and ninety-seven of the three hundred that began the day's toil of this water fite at Marseilles, for two have died as they rowed, and one has just been released from his irons and lies upon the poop deck, the moonlight shining on his face and the young general bending over him, Polignac mutters: " Tonn.. de Dieu! a general of the army taking interest in a galley slave! It's as curious as the mermaid and the sea serpent."

But if Polignac, lieutenant of La Sylphide, is astonished, Raymond le Comte d'Arnac, general of the army of France, is not only astounded, but dazed and horrified, as he stands on the deck of the galley that is being swept into the harbor of Marseilles, and looking over the moonlit waters towards the Isle Pomegue sees the great feu de joie twinkling in the distance, and commences to appreciate what he is doing.

These lights of the celebration set him to thinking very deeply ; he begins to realize the awful responsibility of the task he has set himself to do.

For Raymond le Comte d'Arnac, general of the army of France, has determined to steal from the galleys the wretched forcat upon whom he looks — well knowing that all the power of the Regent and all his clique of financiers, courtiers and officers of police will be against him.

But as he glances down on the face of his old comrade and sees it drawn with toil and pinched with want and suffering, he heats the pale, trembling lips of the sleeping man murmur "Together!" This word of their friendship takes him back to the Army of the Rhine, and he sees again the laughing, light-hearted soldier of fortune, O'Brien Dillon, who saved his life the night they stormed the lone bastion of Friburg; and he remembers how they had been happy comrades during the days at Rastadt.

Then he gazes back over the five years between that time and this, and recollects how this man had married the beautiful woman he had fought for by the camp fire, and that his love for her had brought him to what he now is.

Raymond sees as in a dream his own attempt to rescue this enchanting creature, who had been made the bait to lure from the Regent of France the concessions for Monseigneur Law, and how he himself had fallen under her wondrous charms.

With this comes to him the remembrance of O'Brien Dillon's return to Paris a general in the Austrian service and count of the Empire, to again seek the wife of his heart, not guessing that under the name of the beautiful Hilda de Sabran she was mistress of the Regent of France. How, made rich by the spoils of the Turk, and covered by the diamonds of the Ottoman Vizier, Dillon had enjoyed a second honeymoon in the arms of the siren who, though she loved him again for one short evening, was ready to give him over to his enemies the next morning, knowing that his was no nature to submit to dishonor even from the Potentate of France; that she must throw away her ambition and conceal her shame from her husband, or permit those to do their will upon him who, to keep the friendship of the Due d'Orleans, were willing to consign O'Brien Dillon to the oblivion of death, or to a life-long prison.

This brings Raymond to the details of that curious night at the Cafe St. Michel, where his Irish friend was seized by a mob of apparently affrighted spectators, after making his wonderful stroke at billiards — the first masse shot ever made in public in the world.

That it was this shot that had been used to secretly convict O'Brien Dillon of sorcery, Raymond has learned from the muttered words of the creature lying before him, faltered from pale lips before the sleep of intense toil came upon the released slave of the oar.

Meditating upon this, D'Arnac concludes this conviction had probably been obtained under some old edict of the past century, not yet wiped out from the jurisprudence of the country.

For in France, in 1520, fires had burned for the execution of witches, wizards and sorcerers in every town, in every province, and for nearly two centuries thereafter necromancers, sorcerers and diaboles had suffered death at the stake as often as the superstitious wished. A few short years before this very night such transactions were not absolutely unusual.

Even as Raymond looks at the man, he knows enough about the still mysterious powers supposed to be transmitted from the evil one to be aware that half the galley slaves — marauders, thieves and bandits as they are — toiling under the lash of the boatswain, would shudder with fear at the thought that rowing beside them, suffering the same stripes, uttering the same shrieks, had been one accused of having intercourse with the devil.

" Pardieu /" mutters D'Arnac, lookingat'the motionless form, "if poor O'Brien had been a wizard, he could have used the black art to have escaped, and not needed me to assist him. If there is sorcery in the matter, it belongs to la Sabran, whose beauty bewitches all who come near her enchanting charms — to love her; most of them to their undoing."

Then thinking of the assignation he has even now with this beautiful creature who is waiting for him in vain on the Island Pomegue, he cogitates: "Mori Dieu ! For this she will never forgive me ! "

With this he sets to thinking very hard and very desperately, for he imagines that the beautiful Hilda, who has twice been balked of his wooing, will hate him — not love him the more — for this night's desertion — and will use every means in her power to effect his downfall.

"If I make a false step, I am lost! I have so few friends to turn to," he reflects. "Even Cousin Charlie, who has betrayed this man, would destroy me. In stealing a galley slave unpardoned from the bagne, I am committing a crime from which even my rank will not save me, with every power of the clique about the Regent arrayed against me to urge my condemnation.

IO THE KING S STOCKBROKER.

But steal him I will," he mutters, "and steal him by cunning, as I cannot use my power, Commandant, though I am, of the Port of Marseilles."

Meditating upon this, a sudden idea comes to Raymond, but with it comes the signal from the galley to the forts at the entrance of the basin, to lower the immense iron chain that is always raised at midnight to keep vessels from entering unsignalled.

The clanking of this barrier to the harbor warns him he must act quickly. Stepping to the sleeping galley slave D'Arnac attempts to awaken him, and is answered with a moan.

"Arise!" he whispers, shaking the sleeping format. "Wake up! You must act!"

To his assaults the pale lips give a subdued shriek: "I awake, comity — for the love of God, not the bastinado!— I awake!" And the shivering wretch, with every faculty nerved by fear, springs up, trembling, ready to take the oar.

Then, looking round in a half-dazed manner, O'Brien Dillon sees his comrade, and murmurs, "Raymond — Mon Dieu ! I dreamt I was a galley slave," Here the cadence of the oars comes to him, mingled with a shriek brought by the comitd's lash, and he trembles and, looking at himself, mutters: " No — not a dream — your face is a dream. They will drag me back!" then shuddering, clutches D'Arnac, moaning: "Friend of the sword, save a comrade from the cruel boatswain ! "

And Raymond whispers in his ear: "You are safe — I am by your side. You remember?"

"Yes."

"You recall "

"Yes! let me sleep — let me sleep! I am released from the irons — watch over me — let me sleep! " and the man, exhausted with the fearful toil of the day, sinks upon the deck.

But Raymond is at him again whispering: "Wake up!"

" Let me sleep! "

"Wake up for revenge!"

"For revenge!" And suddenly a giant rises up; no more the shrinking galley slave — but the man who will avenge his manhood's wrongs. And O'Brien Dillon

THE KING'S STOCKBROKER. II

says: "Where are they — my wife and my uncle Johnny Law, the financier of France?" His voice has an eager but horrible tone.

"They are not here. In order to escape, you must do as I direct. For ten minutes you must control yourself! " whispers Raymond. "Are you strong enough to swim one hundred yards?"

"One hundred yards? For revenge I could swim five miles!"

"Then, when I walk forward to speak to the lieutenant of the galley, utter the yell of the maniac and spring overboard. Dive deep and long, and make those stone stairs on the opposite side of the basin. You see them?"

"Yes."

"There I will meet you — you understand?"

"As well as I did at Friburg! " And the galley slave gives his hand to the general of the army, and whispers, "Together!"

"Yes, always together now!" mutters Raymond, tears dimming his sight, as he thinks of what this man had once been, and what he is.

Then as the galley sweeps into the basin of Marseilles, D'Arnac steps up to Lieutenant Polignac, who has gone forward along the center plank of the waist, and is talking to the comity and says to him: "I will sign, as you suggested, a requisition for galley slave number one of the second oar."

"Yes, number 1392 of Toulon, unbranded," replies Polignac, looking over a book that he has just received from the boatswain, being a record of the formats employed on the vessel.

"Unbranded?" chuckles the comite. "He's a rare bird; no fieur-de-lys on him! He came to us unbranded, and I had no orders as to what letter designating his crime should be put upon him. He's a strong devil and we'll miss him! But that matter you must settle with our captain, Monsieur le General."

Then he suddenly cries : ' ' Tonnerre de Brest ! but he's gone crazy ! "

And Polignac echoes: "Your galley slave is a maniac! "

For at this moment, just as the vessel is dropping anchor, O'Brien Dillon, rising from the poop deck, utters three or four demoniac yells, and springing over the side of the ship into the deep water of the basin, disappears from sight; and though they all run to the railings, and Polignac orders the sailors to look out and see when the man rises, no living thing comes under their eyes in the basin of the harbor of Marseilles.

Then Polignac remarks: "Tonn.. de Dieu ! General d'Arnac, it will not be necessary for you to write a receipt for the format; would you kindly attest this affair in the log-book ? "

This Raymond does in the poop cabin, and it is the following record :

June i, 1719.

Galley slave number 1392, of Toulon, being relieved from his irons to be placed upon shore duty at hospital for infectious diseases, suddenly went crazy, and springing overboard, was drowned, about midnight, in the harbor of Marseilles.

This over, D'Arnac steps to the gangway to leave the vessel, but Polignac is at his side, and whispers: " How about the thousand crowns ntnv?"

"At my office at twelve to-morrow morning!" returns Raymond.

"Oh! I understand," chuckles the sea dog. "Bon soir ! Monsieur le General. I hope the result of your excursion upon La Sylphide will be as pleasant to you as it has been profitable to me."

"God knows! " mutters D'Arnac, as he steps off the vessel, and with slashing tread, goes straight to his quarters, for into his mind has suddenly sprung a serious problem — how to clothe the format so he can pass unchallenged through the streets of the town ?

' ' Parbleu ! my quarters as commandant of the garrison are cursed with sentries ! " Raymond mutters as he walks.

This he finds to be the case, for the sergeant of the guard seems unusually alert this night, and very wide awake; an activity which his superior would praise at any other time, but at this particular moment anathematizes under his breath.

Going to his own apartments D'Arnac discovers his lackeys are by no means so wakeful; every one of them is out on various junketings about town, as, with the- instinct of servants, they have divined that when their master departed, he went for an all-night cruise.

Finding his flunkies absent, Raymond, after a little consideration, selects some clothes of his own that he has worn so long ago that their loss will hardly attract his valet's notice, and blessing God that the fashion for gentlemen still dictates their wearing wigs, hunts up an old peruke of his to cover the shaven head of his stolen galley slave. Carrying these under his long military overcoat, he departs again from his quarters.

Passing the saluting sergeant of the guard and the sentries he soon reaches the basin of the harbor of Marseilles, and coming to a little stone stairway leading up from the splashing water, sees reclining, sleeping again, the man registered that night as "Format number 1392, drowned in the harbor of Marseilles."

After one or two efforts, he succeeds in waking him, for these galley slaves were accustomed to sleep like dogs, and wake like dogs — to be aroused at any hour of the day or night that the vessel might be put in motion.

Shaking himself like a great water spaniel, O'Brien Dillon stands once more before his old comrade and friend.

"Clothe yourself in these! They are the dress of gentlemen, dear friend," whispers the latter.

"Bedad," answers O'Brien, "anything is better than the nothing I have worn." After a moment he adds: "Faith, it's about me usual method of toilet to dress myself after a bath!"

These words bring sudden joy to D'Arnac — the first he has had since he made his awful discovery — for in them he sees a flicker of the old Irish spirit. The words that come to him a moment after give him even greater hope.

"By Saint Patrick ! " says the format who is rapidly putting himself in the habiliments of civil life, " ye've given me the fine clothes of a gentleman — that came from your heart, ma bouchal.'" Then he says suddenly, with a shudder: " By me soul! you've put me in black! Is it a bad omen ?"

Oh," answers Raymond, "I forgot — . I've been in mourning for nearly a year for the Comte de Crevecoeur , my uncle, who died in Paris."

With this O'Brien turns curious eyes upon his friend and whispers: " How long is it since the night I made that accursed shot at billiards ? "

" Eighteen months," replies D'Arnac, after a pause of consideration.

"Eighteen months ? " gasps Dillon. " By the powers of hell ! it has seemed to me eighteen years ! Ah ! the infernal click of the billiard balls that has been in my ears ! The slash of the oars in the rowlocks, the snap of the boatswain's lash have been the click of the billiard balls. The screams of the tortured wretches have been the billiard balls to me. Oh, my God! But if I think of that time — it will make me the cur, when I have to be the lion — the lion hungry for revenge!" And his face in the moonlight is an awful one to look at.

Then trying to regain his spirits he attempts a chuckle : " And it's fine looking ye are, in your general's uniform and decorations. I was a general once and a count!" and his eyes gleam bright and lustrous as he mutters: "Give me a sword, and I'll be a general and a count again."

"Then be one!" and D'Arnac buckles his own weapon around his old comrade s waist, who cries and laughs over it, and pets it, and fondles its hilt, saying it is his friend, and now that he has a weapon in his hands, he feels a general once more.

At this Raymond grows more easy. He sees the indomitable spirit has not all been tortured out of this man; that in time O'Brien Dillon. will become again the dashing soldier of the Rhine campaign.

"Come," he says, "I can't give you a general's quarters this evening."

' ' But ye'll give me the welcome of a friend !' mutters O'Brien as he strides beside Raymond.

"I want to ask you two questions, quick. It is for your safety as well as mine," remarks D'Arnac, anxiously. "Were you convicted by regular tribunal?"

" Faith, I'm afraid so. They took me in naked into the Conciergerie. I was charged within ten minutes

THE KING'S STOCKBROKER. ij

after I arrived there with being a sorcerer and a wizard. The judges seemed to be ready for me. Your Cousin Charlie came in as Procureur du Roy, and proffered himself to me as my counsel, and told me not to say a word and he would fix everything. Then I heard a rigmarole about somebody that wasn't me — Paul Casanova — and of course I answered nothing and Cousin Charlie he answered nothing. Two minutes after I was chained and ironed, and in a van being driven out of Paris to a living hell!" Then he suddenly whispers, trembling: "God help me! Raymond! Save me! Don't let him see me ! It is the comitd coming — the cruel comite! "

And D'Arnac sees the gentleman walking at his side become a trembling format again and shrink behind him, as at a little distance they see pass before them the boatswain of the galley La Sylphide, whistling a merry strain, en route for some neighboring wine shop; but fortunately he doesn't see them.

"You are sure my cousin betrayed you?" asks Raymond the moment the man has disappeared.

"As I am a living wretch, despoiled of property and name, and degraded from my manhood, I know it — and now I know the reason of it. Uncle Johnny Law, the financier of France, and my wife, were sure from what I said to them on my return from Vienna that the minute I discovered that Madame la Comtesse Dillon (I'd made her that, hadn't I, my boy, by the sword?) was De Sabran, the mistress of the Regent of France, I would punish her unfaithfulness to me — that is the reason they made me what I am. Your cousin, Charlie de Moncrief, heard me tell of my wonderful shot at billiards I was to make that night. It was arranged for. The mob flew at me and cried 'sorcerer!' and 'demon!' and tore every bit of clothes from me, and robbed me of the diamonds that I had on me — so that I could not be identified. The judges were ready. The Procureur was on hand! So under an assumed name O'Brien Dillon, General of the Imperial Army and Count of the Empire, was condemned and smuggled away to the galleys of France — the doom of felons. "

" My Heaven ! the ineffable villain!" mutters Raymond. "Why, Charles de Moncrief came to me after

B he had assisted at your condemnation, and went with me to the office of the Lieutenant of Police to make inquiries about you."

"And you heard nothing ? "

"Nothing from the police."

"Then the Lieutenant of Police is against me! Doesn't that prove what I have told you — that it is the power of France that is upon me ? Raymond, my comrade, give me a little money — let me fly from here on my own account — else I will bring ruin upon you, my friend ! "

And O'Brien Dillon holds out eager hands and would take money and disappear, perhaps forever, from the light of the world ; but Raymond's grip is upon him, and his hand clutches his, and he mutters: "Together — the old word, O'Brien — together — as at Friburg, when you saved my life ! "

With that, the escaped format embraces the general of France with such a terrible grip that D'Arnac almost feels his bones crush together. And he knows that his comrade of the Rhine, from being a strong man, has become under the fearful exercise and training of the galleys, a very giant in strength.

"If I can get his mind as potent as his body," Raymond thinks, " together we will win our battle even against the power of France."

So, with more confidence than has come to him before in this adventure, D'Arnac conducts O'Brien Dillon past saluting sentries, into his quarters, and showing him a vacant room, and placing before him wine and provisions, hurriedly obtained from his sideboard, tells him to refresh himself, and then to lie down and sleep.

" Indade and I will! God of mercy! to think that I shall lie in a bed again this night — I, who have slept, it seems for ages, on the hard bench of the galley slave. I, who have — my God ! Raymond — " and he bursts into tears that make his comrade weep also.

But eventually the Irish general is comforted, and goes to sleep like a child, sighing the long sighs of exhausted manhood; once more under the roof of man

—once more with the comforts of man about him ■

once more with a man's hope in the world,

Chapter II. The Tavern Of The Turk's Head

Upon his own couch Raymond lies tossing a good deal of the night; sometimes thinking what a difference it would have been to him had not the galley slave whispered " Together! " ; perchance with an awful longing for the beauty he now knows shall never be his, because he has determined that this woman, he once thought in his boyish way he loved, is a siren who leads men to destruction, and will destroy his life eventually, should he ever take her to his heart, as fully and perhaps as awfully as she has done that of the man who is sleeping in the adjoining room.

On awakening next morning, D'Arnac finds sudden movement is necessary.

A package comes to him which astounds and delights him, yet embarrasses him.

It is an order to relinquish his post as Commandant of Marseilles, and to return forthwith to Paris.

An official notification that he has been promoted to the rank of lieutenant general in the army of France, and has been made honorary lieutenant colonel of the Musqiietaires Noirs, and commandant of a portion of the garrison of the capital, accompanies the epistle.

This promotion is so unexpected D'Arnac cannot guess to whose good offices it is due. A little consideration makes him think he owes it to his old chief of the Army of the Rhine, the Marechal de Villars.

Upon it he must act at once.

He does so, leaving his office hurriedly to make arrangements for departure, but taking the precaution to lock the door of O'Brien Dillon's room, to prevent intrusion by any of his servants, most of whom are sleeping off the effects of their last night's festivity, and do not imagine their master has yet returned to his quarters.

Occupied about this, Raymond, passing the Hotel de Ville, sees the carriages of Monseigneur Law and his party drawn up ready to take departure from Marseilles.

The financier calls to him and says affably: "General d'Arnac, permit me to congratulate you upon your promotion! "

Law has had word of it by post also, and rather hints that it is owing to his good offices that the young man has received his important command, for this shrewd diplomatist imagines that it will be well to be en rapport, during the coming year, with any officer controlling a portion of the garrison of Paris.

He continues, rather eagerly: "Won't you join our party on this journey to the capital ? "

" That will be impossible ! I cannot turn over my command here in a minute," replies D'Arnac, anxious to get the affair over, for he sees the goddess that he had worshipped until to-day, the alluring Hilda de Sabran, is seated in the carriage immediately behind that of Monseigneur Law.