The Blacksmith's Hammer; or, The Peasant Code: A Tale of the Grand Monarch

When the Count of Plouernel entered Madam Tremblay's salon he was laboring under a violent irritation, caused by the information transmitted to him by his Mezlean bailiff in a letter that he had just received, advising him of Bertha's intervention in behalf of the vassals of his seigniory. He was pressed to meet the enormous financial obligations required by his ostentatious living at Versailles – his equipages, his jewelry, his banquets, his splendid balls, without taking into account his reckless gambling. Seeing the courtier's fortune consisted almost exclusively in his seigniorial domains, there was no way of increasing his revenues except by overwhelming his vassals with exorbitant imposts. The Count of Plouernel, as almost all the other members of his caste, neither felt, nor was able to feel, any pity for his vassals, whom he had the right to tax at pleasure. Were they not a conquered and disinherited race? an inferior species, standing midway between man and the brute? bent, broken and deformed by a ceaseless round of sorrows and toil? condemned by fate to labor and produce wealth for the benefit of their seigneur? The Count of Plouernel approved himself consistent with his race, his traditions and his times by exhibiting inexorable severity towards this species, which he sincerely and naïvely looked upon as an inferior race, and at all points unlike his own. Accordingly, in an angry voice, with flashing eyes, and holding out to the Marchioness the letter which he had just received, and that he crumpled with rage, he said:

"Do you know, madam, what my sister was up to during her short sojourn at Mezlean? My Mezlean bailiff informs me that he was about to execute a seizure upon several teams belonging to certain recalcitrant vassals who were evading payment of the taxes that it pleased me to impose upon them, when my sister, happening to ride by along the road, took it upon herself to forbid my bailiff to carry out his orders, or even to arrest a scamp of a poacher who deserves to hang!"

"That is unheard of! That is downright impudence!" cried the Marchioness.

"Wait, madam, that is not yet all – my bailiff and an usher of the fisc, who also had a process against those clowns, being aware of their malignant disposition, secured the escort of a squad of soldiers from the regiment of the Marquis, who has set up his headquarters at Vannes, since the Duke of Chaulnes apprehends some trouble in the province. Well, madam! Would you believe such an excess of audacity possible? The clowns dared to rebel against the escort of the bailiff, and tried to disarm them!"

"Why nephew! that is a very alarming piece of news. It is grave!"

"The sergeant of the escort, a resolute man, soon had the upper hand of the canaille. He seized three of the ringleaders in the mutiny, and had them pinioned tightly by his soldiers. And what do you imagine my sister did? No, you will not believe such audacity possible!"

"I suppose she begged mercy for them. Oh! I doubt not that she interceded in their behalf also – "

"Worse than that, Abbot! She demanded their immediate liberation, and threatened the sergeant with the anger of the Marquis of Chateauvieux!"

"Steps have to be taken in the matter of this poor insane girl."

"I am all the readier for that, madam, seeing that, according to what my bailiff writes, my sister's intervention in these matters has produced detestable effects. My vassals, finding themselves encouraged in resisting the payment of the taxes, are now loudly clamoring that the imposts are exorbitant, and will not pay them! Finally, the most lawless of them, feeling encouraged by immunity, are no longer afraid to declare that the hay-fork of a Breton does not fear the bayonet of a soldier of the King; that if the latter are well armed, the peasants are more numerous; and that the fury of their despair will render them a match for the soldiers when the hour of revolt shall have sounded! It is a call to insurrection! To a popular revolt!"

"An insurrection! A revolt!" cried the Marchioness, alarmed. "How dare the wretches talk of insurrection and revolt!"

"We are relapsing into the Jacquerie!" put in the Abbot, raising his hands heavenward. "Jacques under Louis XIV! Under the Grand Monarch! In the Seventeenth Century! It must be the end of the world! Woe is us!"

"Prompt and terrible punishment will, I still hope, my dear Abbot, bring these clowns back to their duty," answered the Count. "But my sister has encouraged the scoundrels. Her insane generosity has chosen for its object the very worst elements of all my vassals. The poacher and the recalcitrant vassal belong to a certain Lebrenn family, that numbers among its members two mariners of the port of Vannes – a brace of active and intriguing adventurers, who are strongly suspected of aiming at sedition, and of even having secret understandings with the republicans of Holland! They are both men of thought and action – most dangerous fellows!"

"Marchioness," observed the Abbot, casting a meaning look at Madam Tremblay, "what did I tell you about that family, which our venerable Society of Jesus over a century and a half ago entered in its secret register as one of the most dangerous? My information evidently was most correct and accurate. An eye will have to be kept upon those people."

"What do you refer to?" asked the Count of Plouernel. "What information can you have had concerning these people?"

"We shall go over that more at our leisure, my dear Raoul. The details of the matter would now lead us too far away. Only be certain that you can not have a more pernicious family among your vassals than this identical Lebrenn family. We shall talk over the matter later. Suffice it now to say that they are the sort of people that must be suppressed. I may be able to render you some assistance in that direction; but I consider that the most urgent thing just now is to place your sister where it would be absolutely impossible for her to pursue the course of her eccentricities and follies."

"Oh! Abbot, do you not know there is an obstacle, a serious one in the way?"

"I know full well that your projects of a double marriage compel you to humor the brainless creature – but, one thing or the other: Bertha is either willing, or she is not willing, to lead the plan to a successful issue. Now, then, it is my opinion that she is not willing. Her determination is made."

"You are in error, Abbot," said the Count of Plouernel. "Bertha does not object to the marriage."

"But she demands time – to reflect! Not so, my dear Raoul? Well, then, all her delays have but one object in view: Bertha seeks to gain time in order to deliver herself without restraint to her follies, perhaps to – it is this that, above all, frightens me for the honor of your house – the bare thought frightens and terrifies me – "

"What is the cause of your fear? Come, explain yourself!"

"My dear Raoul, our poor Abbot thinks Bertha is in love."

"Good God!" broke in the Count, stupefied. "Do you think so, madam? Bertha in love! Impossible!"

"Everything leads to the belief that her love is an unworthy love, since Bertha surrounds it with profound mystery," the Abbot proceeded to explain. "Neither the Marchioness, nor yourself, nor I – I admit it – have until now been able to suspect, or even remotely guess who the object can be of this evidently monstrous passion. That such a passion does exist I make no doubt. All signs point in that direction."

"Thinking the matter over, and recalling certain circumstances that now rise vividly to my mind, I share the Abbot's opinion," added the Marchioness. "Bertha must have availed herself of the freedom that we allowed her to abandon herself to some disgraceful choice. One of these days she will flee with her lover, and the honor of our house will be tarnished forever! A scandal, dishonor, shame to our family!"

"The devil take it!" cried the Count of Plouernel. "If my sister should ever carry her disregard of all duty to the point of refusing a marriage that secures such great advantages to me, I swear to God! if the cause of her refusal be some disgraceful love, I shall immediately go and throw myself at the feet of the King, and request him to have the wretch locked up in the Prison of the Repentant Women where she will be treated with the utmost rigor."

"Mademoiselle Plouernel consigned to the Prison of the Repentant Women! Oh, my dear boy, you can not mean that!" said Abbot Boujaron with devout unction. "No; no; that is out of the question! But what is sensible and proper is that your sister take the veil, and that the share of the inheritance due her according to the custom of Brittany, be assigned to the community that may receive the great sinner, to aid it in exercising its charitable works. Besides, believe me, my dear boy," added the Abbot, smiling, "it is not necessary that our sinner be confined in the Prison of the Repentant Women in order to be treated with the uttermost rigor, and be severely chastised in the flesh and in her pride – for the salvation of her soul."

The Count of Plouernel lent but an inattentive ear to the prelate's words, and resumed in a towering rage:

"My sister in love with some vulgar fellow! My marriage, upon which I raised so many hopes, thwarted by the ill-will of the wretched creature! Malediction! Let her tremble before my anger!"

"My dear boy," said the Abbot to the exasperated Count, "there is a way of putting an end to these perplexities. Demand to-day, instantly, from Bertha a categoric answer – yes, or no – on her marriage with the Marquis."

"Zounds! Abbot – I know beforehand she will say neither yes nor no."

"That may be. But after you shall have urged her a last time, entreated, implored her in the name of your most cherished interests to decide this very day, would not her persistence in further delays prove to you that she is determined not to marry the Marquis, and that it is certain she is sacrificing him to some unworthy love?"

"In that event – malediction! a curse upon her! A dungeon cell will overcome her resistance."

"My dear boy, we must not curse anybody," remarked the Abbot piously; "but it is necessary that, without flinching, you perform the duties that devolve upon you, the head of your illustrious house. It is urgent that to-morrow, yes, not later than to-morrow, you prevent your sister by prompt and rigorous measures from dishonoring your name and herself. You have plenty of cells and dungeons."

"I swear to God!" cried the Count of Plouernel, "if Bertha refuses to decide to accept the marriage – I shall be pitiless. Yes, and to-morrow we shall take the steps that may be necessary to safeguard our honor."

The Count was interrupted in the flow of his threats by the entrance of a lackey who said to Madam Tremblay:

"Monsieur the Marquis of Chateauvieux has presented himself at the door, and requests to be admitted before madam. May I introduce him, madam?"

"Beg Monsieur the Marquis to enter," answered the Marchioness of Tremblay. "The dear colonel! How happy we are that he comes to pay us a visit!"

And immediately after the lackey withdrew she added hurriedly:

"Raoul, not a word to the Marquis about what we have been saying, before we have heard from Bertha."

As the Marchioness addressed these words to the Count of Plouernel, who answered her with an affirmative nod, the Marquis of Chateauvieux appeared at the door of the salon, and saluted the company with the graceful ease of a courtier. Nevertheless, the colonel seemed troubled in mind; he held a letter in his hand.

"Madam," he said, addressing the Marchioness, "I have news for you that grieves me doubly."

"What about, my dear Marquis?"

"This despatch that I have just received by a courier from Monsieur the Duke of Chaulnes, Governor of Brittany, orders me to join him immediately with the two battalions of my regiment which I am to collect on the way thither. A sedition, believed to have been fomented by the parliament, has broken out in Rennes. The King's authority is assailed; the citizens are up in arms; the whole populace is in rebellion. The Duke of Chaulnes does not feel safe."

"Great God!" cried Madam Tremblay, no less alarmed than the Abbot. "What you are telling us, Marquis, is a most grave event."

"All the graver," interjected the Count of Plouernel thoughtfully, "seeing this sedition seems to coincide with the recent rebellion of my own vassals of Mezlean. Would you believe it, Marquis, that canaille had the audacity of resisting your soldiers; the woolen caps tried to disarm your men!"

"I have been informed of that occurrence by a letter from one of my subaltern officers, who was compelled on that occasion to release his prisoners upon orders from Mademoiselle Plouernel. As a consequence, I have had to recall that detachment, it being impolitic to leave my soldiers in a region where they had to submit to an outrage left unpunished. They will arrive here this evening. The honor of the regiment is compromised until the guilty parties are punished."

"Believe me, my dear Marquis, I feel grieved at my sister's rash interference on the occasion."

"Without stopping to consider the consequences of her act, Mademoiselle Plouernel yielded to a generous impulse for which I would not dare to blame her. But since I did myself the honor of pronouncing her name," added the Marquis of Chateauvieux, "allow me, my dear Count, and you Madam the Marchioness, to address a request to you. I must leave the Castle of Plouernel within two hours; however insignificant may be the revolt of the ill-intentioned people of Rennes, whom I expect to chastise severely, civil war has its risks. The bullet from an old musket fired by a bourgeois not infrequently hits its mark as unerringly as that of our own soldiers. I do not know what fate awaits me in the conflict that is about to take place. Before taking leave of you, my dear Count, I entertain the liveliest desire not to be left in doubt concerning the favorable or unfavorable success of a double marriage that is the highest aspiration of myself and my father."

"Dear Marquis," answered the Count of Plouernel with emphasis, "my aunt, the Abbot and myself were just considering the urgency of obtaining this very day a final answer from my sister, which I doubt not will be in accord with the desires of our two families. The untoward events that hasten your departure render the necessity for her answer all the more urgent. If she is what she should be, and what I doubt not she is, our chaplain will betroth you to-day to my sister in the chapel of the castle. It will be your induction into the family. I had so decided."

"And after you shall have chastised the insolent bourgeois of Rennes, a thing that will be easy to do and will be done promptly, thanks to you and your soldiers, my dear Marquis," put in Madam Tremblay, feeling more at ease, "you will return to us. Monsieur the Duke your father and Mademoiselle Chateauvieux as agreed before our departure from Versailles, will come to Plouernel, where the festivities of the double marriage will be held with so much splendor and magnificence that they will be the admiration of all Brittany."

"Above all, Monsieur the Marquis, induce the Duke of Chaulnes to hang high and dry as many bourgeois as he can," added Abbot Boujaron, who seemed less sure than the Marchioness of the speedy quelling of the sedition. "The minds of the scamps must be struck with terror. The repression must be merciless."

"The customary severity of the Duke of Chaulnes should be an ample guarantee to you, Monsieur Abbot, that he will not flinch before the populace," was the Marquis of Chateauvieux's answer. "He will be inexorable."

And, proceeding to address the Marchioness and the Count:

"I can not express to you how touched I feel at your words! I can now hope for the best – unless the health of Mademoiselle Plouernel should prevent our betrothal. She has not left her room for two days, a circumstance that has desolated me; it prevented me from presenting to her my homage upon her return from Mezlean. I hope you can give me a favorable report of her health."

"Reassure yourself, my dear Marquis; my niece's indisposition was caused only by the fatigue of the journey. It will in no wise prevent her from proceeding to the chapel to solemnize her betrothal, if, as I do not doubt, any more than my nephew, she consents to hasten the conclusion of the marriage. I shall immediately visit Bertha. I shall tell her that her brother and myself wish to converse with her; and I doubt not, dear Marquis, that the issue will fully meet your wishes and ours."

Saying this the Marchioness of Tremblay proceeded immediately to Bertha's apartment. Mademoiselle Plouernel occupied the chamber that her mother formerly inhabited, contiguous to the library of the castle. As the Marchioness crossed this vast room she met Dame Marion, Bertha's nurse, who was devotedly attached to her. Madam Tremblay ordered her to notify her mistress that she wished to speak to her shortly.

"She is probably still in bed," added the Marchioness. "She must rise without delay and dress herself to receive her brother, myself and Monsieur the Abbot. We have to speak to her upon matters of the highest importance."

"Oh! Mademoiselle has risen and dressed herself more than two hours ago, madam."

"That being the case, go and request Monsieur the Count and Monsieur the Abbot to come and join me in my niece's chamber."

"Madam the Marchioness will not find mademoiselle in her chamber."

"Where is she?"

"Mademoiselle went out for a walk in the park, as she often does."

"What! Gone out! And yesterday and this morning she pretended to feel so ill that she could not receive me?"

"The weather is so beautiful that mademoiselle believed a walk would do her good. She went down and walked towards the park."

"You lie! My niece did not go out!"

"Madam the Marchioness can ascertain the truth for herself by walking into the room."

"This sudden going out looks highly suspicious. Toward what part of the park did my niece go?"

"I could not say as to that, madam; mademoiselle took her gloves, her mask⁶ and her taffeta hood to protect herself from the heat of the sun – and she left. That is all I know."

"There is some mystery in this – you are hiding something from me."

"I am telling madam all I know."

"You are an accomplice in all the follies of Mademoiselle Plouernel, and it may happen that you will have reason to feel sorry for it!"

"I obey the orders of mademoiselle the same as I obeyed the orders of Madam the Countess, her mother. That is my duty."

"It is impossible that my niece, who only this morning claimed to be ill, can have gone out without some particular reason. You know the reason. Answer! What caused my niece to leave her chamber?"

"I have already told madam. The weather is so beautiful that mademoiselle believed a walk would help her."

"Enough!" ordered Madam Tremblay angrily, and casting a threatening look upon old Marion. "I shall remember your obstinacy. I shall find out the truth."

The Marchioness hastened to rejoin the Count of Plouernel and the Abbot, who were no less surprised, alarmed and angry than herself at Mademoiselle Plouernel's unexpected outing. The Marquis of Chateauvieux could prolong his stay at the castle only a couple of hours, so that, if Bertha did not return before his departure the marriage would have to undergo a further postponement. Accordingly, not satisfied with sending several of his men in quest of his sister in all directions through the park, the Count himself took horse together with the Marquis of Chateauvieux in the hope of meeting Mademoiselle Plouernel; while, anxious not to be themselves idle in the search, Abbot Boujaron and the Marchioness of Tremblay went out in a carriage.

CHAPTER VI.
BERTHA AND NOMINOE

As has already been told, the ruins of the ancient feudal manor of Plouernel rose on the crest of an abruptly rising ridge that once was wholly stripped of vegetation, but that was since planted with trees, seeing it was one of the views from the new castle, the park of which it bounded from the north. The antique dungeon, like all fortified seigniorial castles of the middle ages, had a secret and subterranean issue which opened at a considerable distance from the manor itself. Thanks to this issue, the seigneur, who was always involved in feuds with his neighbors, could flee and elude his enemies if he found his lair on the point of being forced. The subterranean passage of the dungeon of Plouernel which was cut through the living stone by the labor of serfs, communicated, at its near end, with the floors that were constructed below the level of the ground, where were located the prison cells, the torture rooms, and the oubliettes of the manor, and, at the further end, with a precipitous slope at the foot of the mountain, at the top of which rose the dungeon itself. This outer issue opened just outside of but close to the park. One of the numerous gates of the park, the one nearest to the modern castle, opened on the outside upon an avenue, cut through the forest that belonged to the domain of the Count of Plouernel. To the right of the avenue, which ran into the highroad to Rennes, extended a thick wood of old trees, and about two hundred paces from the edge of the same, where the wood grew thickest, was the location of the outer issue of the underground passage from the dungeon. This issue, obstructed in the course of many centuries by underbrush and the slow rise of the soil, bore marks of having recently been cleared, although a curtain of ivy and wild trailing vines, that fell over a natural platform formed by a rocky projection upon which the tangled vegetation had taken root, was left to mask the entrance. Thanks to his family archives, Salaun Lebrenn was aware of this entrance to the dungeon, and he and his son having put themselves in touch with some of the Count's vassals – resolute men and leaders in the projected uprising – he had acquainted them with the secret passage that communicated with the open country, and which offered a safe place for the deposit of arms and munitions of war. The mouth of the passage, partially masked by the vines, lay about twenty paces from a clump of old trees that surrounded a little clearing carpeted with grass. In the middle of the clearing rose an enormous oak, so old, so very old, that, crowned with age, as foresters say, its sap had dried out, and not a leaf greened its immense spread of branches. A living spring furnished a natural reservoir at the extremity of the clearing. A narrow path, worn across the copse of the wood by the hoofs of the does and stags who came during the night to drink at the spring, ran out into the road.

At the hour when Mademoiselle Plouernel's family was searching for her in the park, Nominoë Lebrenn, standing with his back against the dead oak tree in the middle of the clearing, was a prey to profound anxiety. Pale, worn, with his head drooping, his eyes fixed upon the ground, and his arms crossed on his breast, he was saying to himself:

"No, she will not come! Oh! now that this desperate attempt has been made, I recognize how insensate it was! To write to Dame Marion, to beg her to place in the hands of Mademoiselle Plouernel the letter that accompanied my note, to entrust the package to the gateman at the castle with the words: 'For Dame Marion,' and then run back to wait for her at this place! To believe that she would come! It is a crazy man's dream! No, she will not come."

After a short pause Nominoë resumed:

"Who knows but she may have lost her way! But the directions in my letter were accurate – 'Take, to the right of the avenue, that runs from the park, the first path that leads to a clearing where rises a big dead oak near a running spring of water.' Oh, I know this wood! For the last two days I have prowled around it like a bandit! I also know that underground passage," added Nominoë, turning his head in the direction of the issue masked by the ivy and wild vines. "In that underground place have bleached the bones of one of my ancestors – a serf of a sire of Plouernel." With a start Nominoë continued: "Strange fatality! Woe is me! It is for a daughter of this race – a race that mine has so often cursed across the ages – it is for a daughter of the Nerowegs that I am consumed with delirious love – and soon, perhaps – but no! Go to! Set your hopes at rest, poor fool! She will not come. No, however generous her heart may be, she cannot forget that she is of noble origin, and that my family are vassals to her brother! No! she will not come – and if she did – would I dare to meet her gaze! Have I not virtually imposed this rendezvous upon her gratitude! Did I not write to her: 'He who at The Hague saved your life and your honor – waits for you – you will come if you have preserved the remembrance of the service he rendered you.' If she does come, will it not be with a haughty front and a severe mien?"

Suddenly, as he turned his ear toward the wood, a tremor ran through Nominoë's frame. He quickly straightened up. His heart, that before heaved heavily, now stopped beating. His strength failed him. He attempted to take a step, but fell upon his knees on the grass and clasped his hands as in prayer. Mademoiselle Plouernel entered the clearing, holding her silken mask in her hand.

What was his surprise and joy! The features of Mademoiselle Plouernel, so far from expressing the sentiment of wounded pride, revealed profound tenderness. She advanced with steady step towards Nominoë, who remained on his knees; pulled off her glove, and extended to him her charming hand that illness, alas! had thinned. Presently, her beautiful face suffused with a slight blush, she said without attempting to restrain the tears that enhanced the brilliancy of her large black eyes:

"Thanks to you, Monsieur Lebrenn. You afford me at last the opportunity of telling you that never have I forgotten that on the coast of Holland you saved my life – and in The Hague you saved my honor! Yes, thanks to you," repeated the young girl in an accent of ineffable tenderness, while sweet tears slowly rolled down her cheeks. "I owe to you the only happy moment that I have tasted for a long time."

Mademoiselle Plouernel's emotion, her words, her tone, the cordiality of her gesture as she extended her hand to Nominoë, threw him into such confusion that, remaining on his knees and contemplating the young girl with a sort of adoration, he tremblingly received the hand which she offered him, wet it with his tears, and pressed his burning front upon it. Sobs smothered his words.

Bertha gently withdrew her hand from Nominoë's, saying in a moved voice:

"Monsieur Lebrenn, rise – "

And noticing a few steps from where they were a rock covered with moss, a sort of natural bench, the young girl added:

"I am barely convalescent – my weakness is still great. I feel tired; allow me to repose on that rock."

Nominoë rose, and obeyed a sign of Mademoiselle Plouernel, who, after seating herself, invited him to a place beside her. The girl remained silent for a moment and then proceeded:

"Situations that seem difficult, and even false, become, I think, easy and right, thanks to straightforwardness of conduct. I shall be frank. You also will be sincere, Monsieur Lebrenn. You will answer all my questions."

"I feel grateful to you, mademoiselle, that you judge me so favorably," answered Nominoë. "You will find me straightforward and sincere in all things."

"First of all, in order to render intelligible what may otherwise seem inexplicable to you, Monsieur Lebrenn, I must inform you that even before I owed my life – and then my honor – to you, I already felt a deep interest, if not in you personally, at least in all the members of your family."

And in response to a gesture of surprise on the part of Nominoë, Bertha added:

"I am acquainted with a part of your family legend."

"You, mademoiselle! You are acquainted with our plebeian legends!"

"Yes; thanks to a manuscript left to us by Colonel Plouernel, one of my ancestors."

"Does that manuscript date back to the last century?" inquired Nominoë, struck by a sudden recollection. "Colonel Plouernel, a Huguenot, intended those pages for his son. Yes, indeed, our family narrative mentions the fact."

"My mother discovered the manuscript in the library of the castle. My mother suffered a great deal, Monsieur Lebrenn; she was a woman of great understanding and of a large heart. Therefore, so far from embittering her disposition, her sufferings rendered her still more generous. Herself acquainted with sorrow, she sympathized all the more with the sorrows of others. A victim of iniquity, she felt tender compassion for the victims of all iniquity, and a vigorous hatred for all oppression. Although she was of patrician origin, and although the wife of the Count of Plouernel, my mother, ripened by misfortune and by reflection, being instructed by the revelations contained in your family narratives, embraced the convictions of the Huguenot colonel who was the friend of your ancestor Odelin Lebrenn, the armorer of La Rochelle. Oh, I have not forgotten a single incident of that interesting narrative."

"What, mademoiselle! You remember that obscure name?"

"That obscure name was the name of an honorable man and one of the brave soldiers of Admiral Coligny, wrote Colonel Plouernel in the pages that he destined for his son. You seem surprised at the accuracy of my memory, Monsieur Lebrenn," added Bertha with a melancholy smile; "and yet my recollections are not circumscribed to that incident alone. At this moment there is present to my memory the name of another of your ancestors – Den-Brao the mason, who, assisted by other serfs, cut the underground gallery, one of the issues of which you can see yonder." With these words the young girl pointed to the orifice of the vault cut in the rock, and added, with a shiver, "It is a mournful history, that history of your ancestor Den-Brao! He was starved to death in the passage his own hands had built."