The signal only was lacking. It would come, said some, from Saumur,
where Montsoreau, the Duke of Anjou's Lieutenant-Governor and a Papist,
had his quarters. From Paris, said others, directly from the King. It
might come at any hour now, in the day or in the night; the magistrates,
it was whispered, were in continuous session, awaiting its coming. No
wonder that from lofty gable windows, and from dormers set high above the
tiles, haggard faces looked northward and eastward, and ears sharpened by
fear imagined above the noises of the city the ring of the iron shoes
that carried doom.
Doubtless the majority desired--as the majority in France have always
desired--peace. But in the purlieus about the cathedral and in the lanes
where the sacristans lived, in convent parlours and college courts, among
all whose livelihood the new faith threatened, was a stir as of a hive
deranged. Here was grumbling against the magistrates--why wait? There,
stealthy plannings and arrangements; everywhere a grinding of weapons and
casting of slugs. Old grudges, new rivalries, a scholar's venom, a
priest's dislike, here was final vent for all. None need leave this
feast unsated!
It was a man of this class, sent out for the purpose, who first espied
Count Hannibal's company approaching. He bore the news into the town,
and by the time the travellers reached the city gate, the dusky street
within, on which lights were beginning to twinkle from booths and
casements, was alive with figures running to meet them and crying the
news as they ran. The travellers, weary and road-stained, had no sooner
passed under the arch than they found themselves the core of a great
crowd which moved with them and pressed about them; now unbonneting, and
now calling out questions, and now shouting, "Vive le Roi! Vive le Roi!"
Above the press, windows burst into light; and over all, the quaint
leaning gables of the old timbered houses looked down on the hurry and
tumult.
They passed along a narrow street in which the rabble, hurrying at Count
Hannibal's bridle, and often looking back to read his face, had much ado
to escape harm; along this street and before the yawning doors of a great
church whence a breath heavy with incense and burning wax issued to meet
them. A portion of the congregation had heard the tumult and struggled
out, and now stood close-packed on the steps under the double vault of
the portal. Among them the Countess's eyes, as she rode by, a sturdy man-
at-arms on either hand, caught and held one face. It was the face of a
tall, lean man in dusty black; and though she did not know him she seemed
to have an equal attraction for him; for as their eyes met he seized the
shoulder of the man next him and pointed her out. And something in the
energy of the gesture, or in the thin lips and malevolent eyes of the man
who pointed, chilled the Countess's blood and shook her, she knew not
why.