The Wandering Jew Part 150

"You strangle me," said the Jesuit, in a stifled voice, as he tried to escape from the soldier.

"Where are the orphans, since they are not here, and the convent door has been closed against me?" cried Dagobert, in a voice of thunder.

"Help! help!" gasped Rodin.

"Oh! it is dreadful!" said Adrienne, as, pale and trembling, she held up her clasped hands to Dagobert. "Have mercy, sir! listen to me! listen to him!"

"M. Dagobert!" cried Mother Bunch, seizing with her weak hands the soldier's arm, and showing him Adrienne, "this is Mdlle. de Cardoville.

What violence in her presence! and then, you are deceived doubtless!"

At the name of Mdlle. de Cardoville, the benefactress of his son, the soldier turned round suddenly, and loosened his hold on Rodin. The latter, crimson with rage and suffocation, set about adjusting his collar and his cravat.

"I beg your pardon, madame," said Dagobert, going towards Adrienne, who was still pale with fright; "I did not known who you were, and the first impulse of anger quite carried me away."

"But what has this gentleman done to you?" said Adrienne. "If you had listened to me, you would have learned--"

"Excuse me if I interrupt you, madame," said the soldier to Adrienne, in a hollow voice. Then addressing himself to Rodin, who had recovered his coolness, he added: "Thank the lady, and begone!--If you remain here, I will not answer for myself."

"One word only, my dear sir," said Rodin.

"I tell you that if you remain, I will not answer for myself!" cried Dagobert, stamping his foot.

"But, for heaven's sake, tell me the cause of this anger," resumed Adrienne; "above all, do not trust to appearances. Calm yourself, and listen."

"Calm myself, madame!" cried Dagobert, in despair; "I can think only of one thing, ma dame--of the arrival of Marshal Simon--he will be in Paris to-day or to-morrow."

"Is it possible?" said Adrienne. Rodin started with surprise and joy.

"Yesterday evening," proceeded Dagobert, "I received a letter from the marshal: he has landed at Havre. For three days I have taken step after step, hoping that the orphans would be restored to me, as the machinations of those wretches have failed." He pointed to Rodin with a new gesture of impatience. "Well! it is not so. They are conspiring some new infamy. I am prepared for anything."

"But, sir," said Rodin advancing, "permit me--"

"Begone!" cried Dagobert, whose irritation and anxiety redoubled, as he thought how at any moment Marshal Simon might arrive in Paris. "Begone!

Were it not for this lady, I would at least be revenged on some one."

Rodin made a nod of intelligence to Adrienne, whom he approached prudently, and, pointing to Dagobert with a gesture of affectionate commiseration, he said to the latter: "I will leave you, sir, and the more willingly, as I was about to withdraw when you entered." Then, coming still closer to Mdlle. de Cardoville, the Jesuit whispered to her, "Poor soldier! he is beside himself with grief, and would be incapable of hearing me. Explain it all to him, my dear young lady; he will be nicely caught," added he, with a cunning air. "But in the meantime," resumed Rodin, feeling in the side-pocket of his great-coat and taking out a small parcel, "let me beg you to give him this, my dear young lady. It is my revenge, and a very good one."

And while Adrienne, holding the little parcel in her hand looked at the Jesuit with astonishment, the latter laying his forefinger upon his lip, as if recommending silence, drew backward on tiptoe to the door, and went out after again pointing to Dagobert with a gesture of pity; while the soldier, in sullen dejection, with his head drooping, and his arms crossed upon his bosom, remained deaf to the sewing-girl's earnest consolations. When Rodin had left the room, Adrienne, approaching the soldier, said to him, in her mild voice, with an expression of deep interest, "Your sudden entry prevented my asking you a question that greatly concerns me. How is your wound?"

"Thank you, madame," said Dagobert, starting from his painful lethargy, "it is of no consequence, but I have not time to think of it. I am sorry to have been so rough in your presence, and to have driven away that wretch; but 'tis more than I could master. At sight of those people, my blood is all up."

"And yet, believe me, you have been too hasty in your judgment. The person who was just now here--"

"Too hasty, madame! I do not see him to-day for the first time. He was with that renegade the Abbe d'Aigrigny--"

"No doubt!--and yet he is an honest and excellent man."

"He!" cried Dagobert.

"Yes; for at this moment he is busy about only one thing restoring to you those dear children!"

"He!" repeated Dagobert, as if he could not believe what he heard. "He restore me my children?"

"Yes; and sooner, perhaps, than you think for."

"Madame," said Dagobert, abruptly, "he deceives you. You are the dupe of that old rascal."

"No," said Adrienne, shaking her head, with a smile. "I have proofs of his good faith. First of all, it is he who delivers me from this house."

"Is it true?" said Dagobert, quite confounded.

"Very true; and here is, perhaps, something that will reconcile you to him," said Adrienne, as she delivered the small parcel which Rodin had given her as he went out. "Not wis.h.i.+ng to exasperate you by his presence, he said to me: 'Give this to that brave soldier; it is my revenge.'"

Dagobert looked at Mdlle. de Cardoville with surprise, as he mechanically opened the little parcel. When he had unfolded it, and discovered his own silver cross, black with age, and the old red, faded ribbon, treasures taken from him at the White Falcon Inn, at the same time as his papers, he exclaimed in a broken voice: "My cross! my cross!

It is my cross!" In the excitement of his joy, he pressed the silver star to his gray moustache.

Adrienne and the other were deeply affected by the emotion of the old soldier, who continued, as he ran towards the door by which Rodin had gone out: "Next to a service rendered to Marshal Simon, my wife, or son, nothing could be more precious to me. And you answer for this worthy man, madame, and I have ill used him in your presence! Oh! he is ent.i.tled to reparation, and he shall have it."

So saying, Dagobert left the room precipitately, hastened through two other apartments, gained the staircase, and descending it rapidly, overtook Rodin on the lowest step.

"Sir," said the soldier to him, in an agitated voice, as he seized him by the arm, "you must come upstairs directly."

"You should make up your mind to one thing or the other, my dear sir,"

said Rodin, stopping good-naturedly; "one moment you tell me to begone, and the next to return. How are we to decide?"

"Just now, sir, I was wrong; and when I am wrong, I acknowledge it.

I abused and ill-treated you before witnesses; I will make you my apologies before witnesses."

"But, my dear sir--I am much obliged to you--I am in a hurry."

"I cannot help your being in a hurry. I tell you, I must have you come upstairs, directly--or else--or else," resumed Dagobert, taking the hand of the Jesuit, and pressing it with as much cordiality as emotion, "or else the happiness you have caused the in returning my cross will not be complete."

"Well, then, my good friend, let us go up."

"And not only have you restored me my cross, for which I have wept many tears, believe me, unknown to any one," cried Dagobert, much affected; "but the young lady told me, that, thanks to you, those poor children but tell me--no false joy-is it really true?--My G.o.d! is it really true?"

"Ah! ah! Mr. Inquisitive," said Rodin, with a cunning smile. Then he added: "Be perfectly tranquil, my growler; you shall have your two angels back again." And the Jesuit began to ascend the stairs.

"Will they be restored to me to-day?" cried Dagobert, stopping Rodin abruptly, by catching hold of his sleeve.

"Now, really, my good friend," said the Jesuit, "let us come to the point. Are we to go up or down? I do not find fault, but you turn me about like a teetotum."

"You are right. We shall be better able to explain things upstairs. Come with me--quick! quick!" said Dagobert, as, taking the Jesuit by the arm, he hurried him along, and brought him triumphantly into the room, where Adrienne and Mother Bunch had remained in much surprise at the soldier's sudden disappearance.

"Here he is! here he is!" cried Dagobert, as he entered. "Luckily, I caught him at the bottom of the stairs."

"And you have made me come up at a fine pace!" added Rodin, pretty well out of breath.