The Mysteries Of Paris Volume Iv Part 38

"I read my resolution in my heart."

Florestan's father made no rejoinder. He walked up and down the room with his two hands thrust into the pockets of his long coat. He was very pale.

"M. Pet.i.t-Jean," said Boyer, introducing a man of a mean, sordid, and crafty look.

"Where is the bill?" inquired the comte.

"Here it is, sir," said Pet.i.t-Jean (Jacques Ferrand the notary's man of straw), handing the bill to the comte.

"Is this it?" said the latter, showing the bill to his son.

"Yes, father."

The comte took from his waistcoat pocket twenty-five notes of a thousand francs each, handed them to his son, and said:

"Pay!"

Florestan paid, and took the bill with a deep sigh of the utmost satisfaction. M. Pet.i.t-Jean put the notes carefully in an old pocket-book, made his bow, and retired. M. de Saint-Remy left the salon with him, whilst Florestan was very carefully tearing up the bill.

"At least Clotilde's twenty-five thousand francs are still in my pocket, and if nothing is revealed, that is a comfort. But how she treated me!

But what can my father have to say to the man Pet.i.t-Jean?"

The noise of a door being double-locked made the vicomte start. His father returned to the room. His pallor had even increased.

"I fancied, father, I heard you lock the door of my cabinet?"

"Yes, I did."

"And why, my dear father?" asked Florestan, greatly amazed.

"I will tell you."

And the comte placed himself so that his son could not pa.s.s out by the secret staircase which led to the ground floor.

Florestan, greatly disquieted, now observed the sinister look of his father, and followed all his movements with mistrust. Without being able to account for it, he felt a vague alarm.

"What ails you, father?"

"This morning when you saw me, your only thought was, 'My father will not allow his name to be dishonoured; he will pay if I can but contrive to wheedle him by some feigned words of repentance.'"

"Can you indeed think--"

"Do not interrupt me. I have not been your dupe; you have neither shame, regret, nor remorse. You are vicious to the very core, you have never felt one honest aspiration, you have not robbed as long as you have been in possession of wherewithal to gratify your caprices,--that is what is called the probity of rich persons of your stamp. Then came the want of delicate feeling, then meannesses, then crime, then forgery. This is but the first period of your life,--it is bright and pure in comparison with that which would be yet to come."

"If I did not change my conduct, a.s.suredly; but I shall change it, father, I have sworn to you."

"You will not change it."

"But--"

"You will not change it! Expelled from society in which you have hitherto lived, you would become very quickly criminal, like the wretches amongst whom you would be cast, a thief inevitably, and, if your need were, an a.s.sa.s.sin. That would be your future life."

"I an a.s.sa.s.sin?--I?"

"Yes, because you are a coward!"

"I have had duels, and have evinced--"

"I tell you, you are a coward! You have already preferred infamy to death. A day would come in which you would prefer the impunity for fresh crimes to the life of another. This must not be,--I will not allow it. I have come in time, at least, to save my name from public dishonour hereafter. There must be an end to this."

"What do you mean, dearest father? How an end to this? What would you imply?" exclaimed Florestan, still more alarmed at the fearful expression and the increased pallor of his father's countenance.

Suddenly there was a violent blow struck on the cabinet door. Florestan made a motion to go and open it, in order to put an end to a scene which terrified him; but the comte seized him with a hand of iron, and held him fast.

"Who knocks?" inquired the comte.

"In the name of the law, open! Open!" said a voice.

"That forgery, then, was not the last," exclaimed the comte, in a low voice, and looking at his son with a terrible air.

"Yes, my father, I swear it!" exclaimed Florestan, endeavouring, but vainly, to extricate himself from the vigorous grasp of his father.

"In the name of the law, open!" repeated the voice.

"What is it you seek?" demanded the comte.

"I am a commissary of police, and I have come to make a search after a robbery of diamonds, of which M. de Saint-Remy is accused. M. Baudoin, a jeweller, has proofs. If you do not open, sir, I shall be compelled to force open the door."

"Already a thief! I was not then deceived," said the comte, in a low voice. "I came to kill you,--I have delayed too long."

"Kill me?"

"There is already too much dishonour on my name,--it must end. I have here two pistols; you must blow out your brains, or I will blow them out, and I will say that you killed yourself in despair in order to escape from shame."

And, with a fearful _sang-froid_, the comte drew a pistol from his pocket, and, with the hand that was free, presented it to his son, saying:

"Now an end to this, if, indeed, you are not a coward!"

After repeated and ineffectual attempts to free himself from the comte's hand, his son fell back aghast and livid with fear. He saw by the fearful look, the inexorable demeanour of his father, that he had no pity to expect from him.

"My father!" he exclaimed.

"You must die!"

"I repent!"

"It is too late. Hark! They are forcing in the door!"

"I will expiate my faults!"