The Mysteries Of Paris Volume Iii Part 25

"Because men have their caprices, as well as ladies, madame."

"Well, what is this caprice which thus impels you to act against your own interest? For I repeat, sir, that whatever may be your conditions, I accept them."

"You will accept all my conditions, madame?" said the notary, with a singular expression.

"All,--two, three, four thousand francs, more, if you please. For you must know, sir," added the d.u.c.h.ess, in a tone almost confidential, "I have no resource but in you, sir, and in you only. It will be impossible for me at this moment to find elsewhere what I require for to-morrow, and I must have it, as you know,--I must absolutely have it. Thus I repeat to you that, whatever terms you require for this service, I accept them; nothing will be a sacrifice to me,--nothing."

The breath of the notary became thick, and, in his ign.o.ble blindness, he interpreted the last words of Madame de Lucenay in an unworthy manner.

He saw, through his darkened understanding, a woman as bold as some of the females of the old court,--a woman driven to her wits' end for fear of the dishonour of him whom she loved, and capable, perhaps, of any sacrifice to save him. It was even more stupid than infamous to think so, but, as we have said already, Jacques Ferrand sometimes, though rarely, forgot himself.

He quitted his chair abruptly, and approached Madame de Lucenay, who, surprised, rose when he did, and looked at him with much astonishment.

"Nothing will be a sacrifice to you, say you? To you, who are so lovely?" he exclaimed, with a voice trembling and broken with agitation, as he went towards the d.u.c.h.ess. "Well, then, I will lend you this sum, on one condition,--one condition only,--and I swear to you--"

He could not finish his declaration.

By one of those singular contradictions of human nature, at the sight of the singularly ugly features of M. Ferrand, at the strange and whimsical thoughts which arose in Madame de Lucenay's mind, at his ridiculous pretensions, which she guessed in spite of her disquietude and anxiety, she burst into a fit of laughter, so hearty, so loud, and so excessive, that the disconcerted notary reeled back. Then, without allowing him a moment to utter another word, the d.u.c.h.ess gave way still more to her increasing mirth, lowered her veil, and, between two bursts of irrepressible laughter, she said to the notary, overwhelmed by hatred, rage, and fury:

"Really, I should much rather prefer asking this advance from M. de Lucenay."

She then left the room, laughing so heartily that, even when the door of his room was closed, the notary heard her still.

Jacques Ferrand no sooner recovered his reason than he cursed his imprudence; but he became rea.s.sured on reflecting that the d.u.c.h.ess could not allude to this adventure without compromising herself. Still, the day had been unpropitious, and he was plunged in thought when the door of his study opened, and Madame Seraphin entered in great agitation.

"Ah, Ferrand," she exclaimed, "you were right when you declared that, one day or other, we should be ruined for having allowed her to live!"

"Who?"

"That cursed little girl!"

"What do you mean?"

"A one-eyed woman, whom I did not know, and to whom Tournemine gave the little chit to get rid of her, fourteen years ago, when we wished to make her pa.s.s for dead--Ah, who would have thought it!"

"Speak! Speak! Why don't you speak?"

"This one-eyed woman has been here, was down-stairs just now, and told me that she knew it was I who had delivered up the little brat."

"Malediction! Who could have told her? Tournemine is at the galleys."

"I denied it, and treated the one-eyed woman as a liar. But bah! she declares she knows where the girl is now, and that she has grown up, that she has her, and that it only depends on her to discover everything."

"Is h.e.l.l, then, unchained against me to-day?" exclaimed the notary, in a fit of rage. "What shall I say to this woman? What shall I offer her to hold her tongue? Does she seem well off?"

"As I treated her like a beggar, she shook her hand-basket, and there was money inside of it."

"And she knows where this young girl is now?"

"So she says."

"And she is the daughter of the Countess Sarah Macgregor!" said the stupefied notary; "and just now she offered me so much to declare that her daughter was not dead; and the girl is alive, and I can restore her to her mother! But, then, the false register of her death! If a search were made, I am ruined! This crime may put others on the scent."

After a moment's silence, he said to Madame Seraphin:

"This one-eyed woman knows where the child is?"

"Yes."

"And the woman will call again?"

"To-morrow."

"Write to Polidori, to come to me this evening, at nine o'clock."

"What! Will you rid yourself of the young girl and the old woman, too?

Ferrand, that will be too much at once!"

"I bid you write to Polidori, to come here this evening, at nine o'clock!"

At the end of this day, Rodolph said to Murphy: "Desire M. de Graun to despatch a courier this instant; Cecily must be in Paris in six days."

"What! that she-devil again? The diabolical wife of poor David, as beautiful as she is infamous! For what purpose, monseigneur?"

"For what purpose, Sir Walter Murphy? Ask that question, in a month hence, of the notary, Jacques Ferrand."

CHAPTER VI.

THE ANONYMOUS LETTER.

Towards ten o'clock in the evening of the same day in which Fleur-de-Marie was carried off by the Chouette and Schoolmaster, a man on horseback arrived at the Bouqueval farm, representing himself as coming from M. Rodolph to tranquillise Madame Georges as to the safety of her young friend, and to a.s.sure her of her safe return ere long. The man further stated that M. Rodolph, having very important reasons for making the request, particularly desired no letters might be addressed to him at Paris for the present; but that, in the event of Madame Georges having anything particular to communicate, the messenger now sent would take charge of it, and deliver it punctually.

This pretended envoy on the part of Rodolph was, in fact, an emissary sent by Sarah, who, by this stratagem, effected the twofold purpose of quieting the apprehensions of Madame Georges and also obtaining a delay of several days ere Rodolph learned that the Goualeuse had been carried off; during which interval Sarah hoped to have induced the notary, Jacques Ferrand, to promote her unworthy attempt to impose a supposit.i.tious child on Rodolph, after the manner which has already been related. Nor was this all the evil planned by the countess; she ardently desired to get rid of Madame d'Harville, on whose account she entertained very serious misgivings, and whose destruction she had so nearly compa.s.sed, but for the timely interposition of Rodolph.

On the day following that in which the marquis followed his wife into the house in the Rue du Temple, Tom repaired thither, and, by skilfully drawing Madame Pipelet into conversation, contrived to learn from her how a young and elegantly dressed lady, upon the point of being surprised by her husband, had been preserved through the presence of mind and cleverness of a lodger in the house, named M. Rodolph.

Once informed of this circ.u.mstance, and possessing no positive proof of the a.s.signation made by Clemence with M. Charles Robert, Sarah conceived a plan evidently more hateful than the former: she resolved to despatch a second anonymous letter to M. d'Harville, calculated to bring about a complete rupture between himself and Rodolph; or, failing that, to infuse into the mind of the marquis suspicions so unworthy of his wife and friend as should induce him to forbid Madame d'Harville ever admitting the prince into her society.

This black and malignant epistle was couched in the following terms:

"... You have been grossly deceived the other day; your wife, being apprised of your following her, invented a tale of imaginary beneficence; the real purpose of her visit to the Rue du Temple was to fulfil an a.s.signation with an august personage, who has hired a room on the fourth floor in the house situated Rue du Temple,--this ill.u.s.trious individual being known only at his lodging under the simple name of Rodolph. Should you doubt these facts, which may probably appear to you too improbable to deserve credit, go to No. 17 Rue du Temple, and make due inquiries; obtain a description of the face and figure of the august personage alluded to; and you will be compelled to own yourself the most credulous and easily duped husband that was ever so royally supplanted in the affections of his wife.

Despise not this advice, if you would not have the world believe you carry your devotion to your prince rather too far."