France -- History -- Henry III, 1574-1589 -- Fiction
Rémy rode along, wondering in what humor he should find Diana,
and what he should say to her. He had just arrived at the park
wall, when his horse, which had been trotting, stopped so suddenly
that, had he not been a good rider, he would have been thrown
over his head. Rémy, astonished, looked to see the cause, and
saw before him a pool of blood, and a little further on, a body,
lying against the wall. “It is Monsoreau!” cried he; “how strange!
he lies dead there, and the blood is down here. Ah! there is
the track; he must have crawled there, or rather that good M.
de St. Luc leaned him up against the wall that the blood might
not fly to his head. He died with his eyes open, too.”
All at once Rémy started back in horror; the two eyes, that he
had seen open, shut again, and a paleness more livid than ever
spread itself over the face of the defunct. Rémy became almost
as pale as M. de Monsoreau, but, as he was a doctor, he quickly
recovered his presence of mind, and said to himself that if Monsoreau
moved his eyes, it showed he was not dead. “And yet I have read,”
thought he, “of strange movements after death. This devil of a
fellow frightens one even after death. Yes, his eyes are quite
closed; there is one method of ascertaining whether he is dead
or not, and that is to shove my sword into him, and if he does
not move, he is certainly dead.” And Rémy was preparing for this
charitable action, when suddenly the eyes opened again. Rémy
started back, and the perspiration rolled off his forehead as
he murmured, “He is not dead; we are in a nice position. Yes,
but if I kill him he will be dead.” And he looked at Monsoreau,
who seemed also to be looking at him earnestly.
“Oh!” cried Rémy, “I cannot do it. God knows that if he were
upright before me I would kill him with all my heart; but as he
is now, helpless and three parts dead, it would be an infamy.”
“Help!” murmured Monsoreau, “I am dying.”
“Mordieu!” thought Rémy, “my position is embarrassing. I am a
doctor, and, as such, bound to succor my fellow-creatures when
they suffer. It is true that Monsoreau is so ugly that he can
scarcely be called a fellow-creature, still he is a man. Come,
I must forget that I am the friend of M. de Bussy, and do my
duty as a doctor.”
“Help!” repeated the wounded man.
“Here I am,” said Rémy.
“Fetch me a priest and a doctor.”
“The doctor is here, and perhaps he will dispense with the priest.”
“Rémy,” said Monsoreau, “by what chance--”
Rémy understood all the question might mean. This was no beaten
road, and no one was likely to come without particular business.
“Pardieu!” he replied, “a mile or two off I met M. de St. Luc----”
“Ah! my murderer.”
“And he said, ‘Rémy, go to the old copse, there you will find
a man dead.’”
“Dead?”
“Yes, he thought so; well, I came here and saw you.”
“And now, tell me frankly, am I mortally wounded?”
“I will try to find out.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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