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The Mysteries of Paris V2

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"But what is this caprice, which makes you act thus against your
interest? for, I repeat to you, make your conditions; whatever they
may be, I accept them!"

"Your grace will accept all the conditions?" said the notary, with a
singular expression.

"All! two, three, four thousand francs--more, if you will; for I tell
you," added the duchess, frankly, in a tone almost affectionate, "I
have no resource but in you, sir--in you alone. It will be impossible
for me to find elsewhere that which I ask you for to-morrow; and it
must be--you understand--it must be absolutely. Thus, I repeat to you,
whatever condition you impose on me for this service, I accept."

In his blindness, he had interpreted in an unworthy manner the last
words of the duchess. It was an idea as stupid as it was infamous; but
we have already said that sometimes Jacques Ferrand became a tiger or
a wolf; then the beast overpowered the man. He arose quickly and
advanced toward the duchess. She, thunder-struck, rose at the same
moment and regarded him with astonishment.

"You will not regard the cost?" cried he, in a broken voice,
approaching still nearer to the duchess. "Well, this sum I will lend
to you on one condition, one single condition--and I swear that----"
He could not finish his declaration.

By one of those strange contradictions of human nature at the sight of
the hideous face of M. Ferrand, at the mere thought of what his
conditions might be, Madame de Lucenay, notwithstanding her
inquietudes and troubles, burst out in a laugh so frank, so loud, so
mirthful, that the notary recoiled confounded.

Without giving him time to utter a word, the duchess, abandoning
herself more and more to her hilarity, pulled down her veil, and
between two renewed bursts of laughter, said to the notary, who was
almost blind with rage, hatred, and fury, "I prefer, upon the whole,
to ask this favor openly of the duke." She then went out, continuing
to laugh so loudly that, though the door of the cabinet was closed,
the notary could still hear her.

Jacques Ferrand returned to his senses only to curse his imprudence
bitterly. Yet, by degrees he reassured himself in thinking that the
duchess could not speak of this interview without gravely compromising
herself.

Nevertheless, it was a bad day for him. He was buried in the blackest
thoughts, when the private door of his cabinet was opened, and Mrs.
Seraphin entered wildly.

"Oh, Ferrand!" cried she, clasping her hands, "you were right enough
in saying that we should some day regret having spared her life!"

"Whose?"

"That cursed little girl's."

"How?"

"A one-eyed woman, whom I did not know, to whom Tournemine delivered
the little girl to rid us of her, fourteen years ago, when we said she
was dead. Oh, who would have thought it!"

"Speak!"

"This woman has just been here; she was below just now. She told me
she knew it was I who gave up the child."

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

"I denied everything, treating her as a liar. But she maintains that
she has found this child again, now grown up; that she knows where she
is, and that it only depends upon herself to discover everything."

"Is hell unchained against me to-day?" cried the notary, in a fit of
rage that rendered him hideous.

"What shall be said to the woman? What must we promise, to keep her
silent?"

"Does she look as if she were poor?"

"As I treated her like a beggar, she shook her reticule--there was
money in it."

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

"She declares she knows."

"And she is the daughter of Countess M'Gregor!" said the notary to
himself, "who just now offered me so much to say that her child was
not dead! And the child lives. I can restore her to her! Yes; but this
false certificate of death--if any inquiry is made, I am lost! This
crime may put them on the scent of others." After a moment's thought,
he said to Madame Seraphin, "This one-eyed woman knows where the girl
is?"

"Yes."

"And this woman will return to-morrow?"

"To-morrow."

"Write to Polidori to be here to-night at nine o'clock."

"Do you mean to get rid of the girl and the old woman? It will be too
much for one time, Ferrand!"

"I tell you to write to Folidori to be here to-night by nine o'clock."



At the close of this day, Rudolph said to Murphy, who had not been
able to see the notary, "Let M. de Graun send a courtier off at once.
Cicily must be in Paris in six days."

"Once more that infernal she-devil! the execrable wife of poor David,
as handsome as she is infamous! For what good, your highness?"

"For what good, Sir Walter? In a month's time you may ask this
question of the notary, Jacques Ferrand."




CHAPTER X.

DENUNCIATION.


About ten o'clock in the evening of the day on which Fleur-de-Marie
had been carried off by Screech-owl and the Schoolmaster, a man on
horseback arrived at the farm, coming, as he said, on the part of
Rudolph, to reassure Mrs. George as to the disappearance of her young
_protegee_, who would return to her in a few days. For several
very important reasons, added this man, Rudolph begged Mrs. George, in
the event of her having anything to send him, not to write him at
Paris, but to hand the letter to the courier, who would take charge of
it.

This courier was an emissary of Sarah's. By this she tranquilized Mrs.
George, and retarded thus for some days the moment when Rudolph must
hear of the abduction. In this interval, Sarah hoped to force the
notary to favor the unworthy scheme of which we have spoken. This was
not all. Sarah wished also to get rid of Madame d'Harville, who
inspired her with serious fears, and who would have been lost but for
Rudolph's rescue.

On the day when the marquis had followed his wife to the house in the
Rue du Temple, where she was to meet Charles Robert, but where Rudolph
led her to the Morels, and thus changed the assignation into a call in
charity, Sarah's brother Tom went there, easily set Mrs. Pipelet
jabbering, and learned that a young lady, on the point of being
surprised by her husband, had been saved, thanks to a lodger in the
house named Rudolph. Informed of this circumstance, Sarah, possessing
no material proof of the rendezvous that Lady d'Harville had given to
Charles Robert, conceived another odious plan. It was concocted to
send an anonymous letter to the marquis, in order to effect a complete
rupture between him and Rudolph, or, at least, to make the marquis so
suspicious as to forbid any further intercourse between the prince and
his wife.

This letter was thus couched:

"You have been deceived most shamefully. The other day, your wife,
advised that you were following her, pretended an imaginary visit of
charity; she went to meet a very _august personage_, who has
hired in the Rue du Temple a room in the fourth story, under the name
of Rudolph. If you doubt these facts, strange as they may appear, go
to the Rue du Temple, No. 17, and inform yourself; paint to yourself
the features of the _august person_ spoken of, and you will easily
acknowledge that you are the most credulous, good-natured husband
who has ever been so _sovereignly_ deceived. Do not neglect
this advice; otherwise it will be supposed that you, also are too much.

"THE FRIEND OF PRINCES."

This note was put in the post at five o'clock by Sarah, on the day of
her interview with the notary. The same evening, Rudolph went to pay a
visit to a foreign embassy: after which it was his intention to go to
Madame d'Harville's to announce to her that he had found a charitable
intrigue worthy of her. We will conduct the reader to Madame
d'Harville's. It will be seen, from the following conversation, that
this young lady, in showing herself generous and compassionate towards
her husband, whom she had until then treated with extreme coldness,
followed already the noble counsels of Rudolph.

The marquis and his wife had just left the table; the scene passed in
the little saloon of which we have spoken; the expression of Clemence
d'Harville was affectionate and kind; D'Harville seemed less sad than
usual. He had not yet received the now infamous letter from Sarah.

"What are you going to do to-night?" said he, mechanically, to his
wife.

"I shall not go out; pray what are your plans?"

"I do not know," answered he, with a sigh. "Society is insupportable
to me. I will pass this evening, like so many other evenings, alone."

"Why alone, since I am not going out?"

M. d'Harville looked at his wife with surprise. "Doubtless, but--"

"Well?"

"I know that you often prefer solitude when you do not go out."

"Yes; but as I am very capricious," said Clemence, smiling, "at
present I prefer to partake my solitude with you, if it is agreeable
to you."

"Really," cried D'Harville, with emotion, "how kind you are to
anticipate what I dared not express."

"Do you know, dear, that your astonishment has almost an air of
reproach?"

"A reproach? Oh, no, no! not after my unjust and cruel suspicions the
other day. To find you so forgiving, it is, I confess, a surprise for
me; but a surprise the most delightful."

"Let us forget the past," said she to her husband, with an angelic
smile.

"Clemence, can you forget?" answered he, sadly. "Have I not dared to
suspect you? To tell you to what extremity a blind jealousy has
impelled me? But what is all this compared to other wrongs, still
greater, more irreparable?"

"Let us forget the past, I say," repeated Clemence, restraining her
emotion.

"What do I hear? The past also--can you forget it?"

"I hope to do so."

"Can it be true, Clemence, you can be so generous? But no, no, I
cannot believe in so much happiness; I had renounced it forever."

"You were wrong, you see."

"What a change! Is it a dream? Oh, tell me I am not mistaken."

"No, no, you are not mistaken."

"And, truly, your look is less cold; your voice almost falters. Oh,
say, is it true? Am I not under an illusion?"

"No; for I also have need of pardon."

"You!"

"Have I not been cruel towards you! Ought I not to have thought that
you must have needed a rare courage, a virtue more than human, to act
differently from what you did? Isolated, unhappy, how resist the
desire of seeking some consolation in a marriage which pleased you?
Alas! when one suffers, one is so disposed to believe in the
generosity of others! Your error has been, until now, to count on
mine. Well, henceforth I will try to give you reason."

"Oh, speak, speak once more!" said D'Harville, his hands clasped in a
kind of ecstasy.

"Our existence is forever united. I will do all in my power to render
your life less bitter."

"Is it you I hear?"

"I beg you do not be so much astonished; it gives me pain; it is a
bitter censure on my past conduct. Who else should pity you? Who
should lend you a friendly and helping hand, if not I? A happy
inspiration I have received. I have reflected, well reflected, on the
past, on the future. I have seen my errors, and I have found, I
believe, the means to repair them."

"Your errors, poor wife?"

"Yes; I should have, the next day after our marriage, appealed to your
honor, and frankly demanded a separation."

"Ah, Clemence, pity, pity!"

"Otherwise, since I accepted my position, I should have augmented it
by submission, instead of causing you constant self-reproach by my
haughty and taciturn coldness. I should have endeavored to console you
for a fearful malady, by only remembering your misfortune. By degrees
I should have become attached to my work of commiseration, by reason
even of the cares, perhaps the sacrifices, which it would have cost
me; your gratitude had rewarded me, and then--but what is the matter?
You weep!"

"Yes, I weep--weep with joy. You do not know how many new emotions
your words cause me. Oh, Clemence, let me weep!"

"Never more than at this moment have I comprehended how culpable I
have been in chaining you to my sad destiny!"

"And never have I felt more decided to forget. These gentle tears that
you shed make me acquainted with a happiness of which I was ignorant.
Courage, dear, courage; in default of a fortunate and smiling destiny,
let us seek our satisfaction in the accomplishment of the serious
duties that fate imposes. Let us be indulgent to one another; if we
falter, let us regard the cradle of our child, let us concentrate on
her all our affections, and we shall yet have some joys, melancholy
and holy."

"An angel, she is an angel!" cried D'Harville, joining his hands and
looking at his wife with affectionate admiration. "Oh! you do not know
the pain and pleasure you cause me, Clemence! you do not know that
your harshest words formerly, your most severe reproaches, alas! the
most merited, have never so much overwhelmed me as this adorable,
generous resignation, and yet, in spite of myself, you make hope
spring up again. You do not know the future that I dare imagine."

"And you can have blind and entire faith in what I tell you, Albert.
This resolution is taken firmly; it shall never fail, I swear it to
you. Before long I may give you new guarantees of my word."

"Guarantees?" cried D'Harville, more and more excited by happiness so
unlooked for, "guarantees! have I need of them? Your look, your voice,
this beaming expression of goodness which still graces you, the
throbbings of my heart, all, all prove to me that what you say is
true. But you know, Clemence, man is insatiable in his hopes," added
the marquis. "Your noble and touching words give me courage to hope,
yes, to hope what yesterday I regarded as an insensate dream."

"Albert, I swear to you I shall always be the most devoted of friends,
the most tender of sisters; but nothing more. Pardon, pardon, if
unknowingly my words have ever given you hopes which can never be
realized."

"Never?" cried D'Harville, fixing on her a desperate and supplicating
look.

"Never!" answered Clemence.

This single word, the tone of voice, revealed an irrevocable
resolution. Clemence, brought back to noble resolutions by the
influence of Rudolph, was firmly resolved to surround her husband with
the most touching attentions; but she felt that she was incapable of
ever loving him. An impression still stronger than fright, contempt,
hatred, separated Clemence from her husband forever. It was a
repugnance invincible. After a moment of mournful silence, D'Harville
passed his hand over his eyes, and said to his wife, bitterly:

"Pardon me for deceiving myself; pardon me for having abandoned myself
to a hope, mad as it was foolish. Oh! I am very unfortunate!"

"My friend," said Clemence to him gently, "I do not wish to reproach
you; yet do you reckon as nothing my promise to be for you the most
tender of sisters? You will owe to the most devoted friendship
attentions that love could not give you. Hope for better days. Until
now you have found me almost indifferent to your sorrows; you shall
see how I shall compassionate you, and what consolations you will find
in my affection."

A servant entered, and said to Clemence, "His Royal Highness the Grand
Duke of Gerolstein asks if your ladyship will receive him?"

Clemence looked at her husband, who, recovering his coolness, said to
her, "Of course." The servant retired.

"Pardon me, my friend," said Clemence; "I did not say that I would not
receive. Besides, it is a long time since you have seen the prince; he
will be happy to find you here. I shall, also, be much pleased to see
him; yet I avow, that just now I am so agitated that I should have
preferred to receive his visit some other day."

"I can comprehend it; but what could we do? Here he is." At the same
moment, Rudolph was announced.

"I am a thousand times happy, madame, to have the honor to meet you,"
said Rudolph; "and I doubly appreciate my good fortune, since it also
procures me the pleasure of seeing you, my dear Albert," added he,
turning toward the marquis, whom he cordially shook by the hand.

"It is a long time since I have had the honor to pay your highness my
respects."

"And whose fault is it, invisible lord? The last time I came to pay my
respects to Madame d'Harville, I asked for you; you were absent. It is
now three weeks that you have forgotten me; it is very wrong."

"Be merciless, your highness," said Clemence, smiling: "M. d'Harville
is the more guilty, since he has for your highness the most profound
respect, and he might make that doubted by his negligence."

"Well! see my vanity, madame; whatever D'Harville might do, it would
always be impossible for me to doubt his affection; but I ought not to
say this. I am encouraging him in such conduct."

"Believe me, your highness, that some unforeseen circumstances alone
have prevented me from profiting oftener by your kindness toward me."

"Between ourselves, my dear Albert, I believe you a little too
platonic in friendship; very sure that you are loved, you are not
pliant enough to give or receive proofs of attachment."

Through a breach of etiquette, which rather annoyed Madame d'Harville,
a servant entered, bringing a letter to the marquis. It was the
anonymous denunciation of Sarah, which accused the prince of being the
lover of Madame d'Harville.

The marquis, out of deference to the prince, pushed back with his hand
the silver salver which the servant handed him, and said, in an
undertone, "Not now, not now."

"My dear Albert," said the prince, in the most affectionate tone, "do
you stand on ceremony with me?"

"But, your highness--"

"With the permission of Madame d'Harville, I beg you to read this
letter!"

"I assure your highness that there is nothing pressing."

"Once more, Albert, read this letter!"

"But--"

"I entreat you--I wish it."

"Since your royal highness requires it," said the marquis, taking the
letter from the salver.

"Certainly. I require you to treat me as a friend."

Then turning toward the marchioness, while M. d'Harville broke the
seal of this fatal letter, the contents of which Rudolph could not
have imagined, he added, smiling, "What a triumph for you, madame, to
cause this will, so stern, always to yield!"

D'Harville drew near one of the candelabra on the chimney-piece, and
opened the letter. Rudolph and Clemence conversed together, while
D'Harville twice read the letter. His countenance remained composed; a
nervous trembling, almost imperceptible, agitated his hands alone;
after a moment's hesitation, he put the note into his waistcoat
pocket.

"At the risk of passing for a savage," said he to Rudolph, smiling, "I
shall ask permission to go and answer this letter--more important than
I thought at first."

"Shall I not see you again to-night?"

"I do not think that I can have that honor; I hope your royal highness
will excuse me."

"What a man!" said Rudolph gayly. "Will you not try to retain him,
madame!"

"I dare not attempt what your highness has attempted in vain."

"Seriously, my dear Albert, try to return to us as soon as your letter
is written; if not, promise to grant me an interview some morning. I
have a thousand things to say to you."

"Your royal highness overwhelms me," said the marquis, bowing
profoundly as he retired.

"Your husband is preoccupied," said Rudolph to the marchioness, "his
smile appeared constrained."

"When your royal highness arrived D'Harville was profoundly affected;
he had great trouble to conceal it."

"I have arrived, perhaps, at an inopportune moment."

"No, you have even spared me the conclusion of a painful
conversation."

"How is that?"

"I have told D'Harville the new line of conduct that I was resolved to
follow, promising him support and consolation."

"How happy he should be!"

"At first he was as much so as myself; for his tears and joy produced
an emotion to which I had, as yet, been a stranger. Formerly I thought
I revenged myself by addressing him a reproach, a sarcasm. Sad
revenge! My sorrow afterward has only been more bitter. While just
now--what a difference! I asked my husband if he were going out: he
answered me sadly, that he should pass the evening alone, as was
usually the case. When I offered to remain with him--Oh! if you could
have seen his astonishment! how his expression, always sad, became at
once radiant. Ah! you were right--nothing is more pleasing than to
contrive such surprises of happiness!"

"But how did these proofs of goodness on your part lead to this
painful conversation of which you have spoken?"

"Alas!" said Clemence, blushing, "to these hopes succeeded hopes more
tender, which I was very guarded not to excite, because it will always
be impossible for me to realize them."

"I comprehend; he loves you tenderly."

"As much as I was at first touched with his gratitude, so much was I
alarmed at his protestations of love. I could not conceal my alarm. I
caused him a sad blow in manifesting thus my invincible repugnance to
his love, I regret it. But, at least, D'Harville is now forever
convinced that he has only to expect from me the most devoted
friendship."

"I pity him, without being able to blame you; there are
susceptibilities, thus to speak, which are sacred. Poor Albert, so
good, so kind! If you knew how much I have been afflicted, for a long
time past, with his sadness and dejection, although ignorant of the
cause. Let us leave all to time, to reason. By degrees he will
recognize the value of the affection you offer him, and he will be
resigned to it, as he was resigned before having the touching
consolations which you offer him."

"And which shall never be wanting, I swear to your highness."

"Now let us think of the other unfortunates. I have promised you a
good work, having all the charm of a romance in action. I come to
fulfill my engagement."

"Already! what happiness!"

"Ah! it was a kind of happy inspiration that induced me to take that
poor room in the house of the Rue du Temple, of which I have spoken to
you. You cannot imagine all that I find curious and interesting! In
the first place, your _proteges_ of the garret enjoy the comforts
your presence had promised them; they have, however, yet to undergo
some sad trials; but I do not wish to make you sad. Some day you shall
know how many horrible calamities may overwhelm one single family."

"What must be their gratitude toward you!" "It is your name they
bless."

"Your highness has succored them in my name?"

"To render the charity sweeter to them. Besides, I have only realized
your promises."

"Oh! I will go and undeceive them: tell them it is to you they owe--"

"Do not do that! you know I have a room in that house: be guarded
against any new cowardly acts of your enemies, or of mine; and since
the Morels are now out of the reach of want, think of others. Let us
think of our intrigue. It concerns a poor mother and her daughter,
who, formerly in affluence, are at this time, in consequence of an
infamous spoliation, reduced to the most frightful misery."

"Unfortunate women! and where do they live, your highness?"

"I do not know."

"But how did you find out their situation?"

"Yesterday I went to the temple. Your ladyship does not know what the
Temple is?"

"No, my lord."

"It is a bazaar very amusing to see. I went there to make some
purchases with my neighbor of the fourth floor."

"Your neighbor?"

"Have I not my room in the Rue du Temple?"

"I forgot."

"This neighbor is a charming little grisette; she calls herself
Rigolette; this Miss Dimpleton is always laughing, and never had a
lover."

"What virtue for a grisette!"

"It is not exactly from virtue that she is virtuous, but because, she
says, she has no time to be in love; for she must work from twelve to
fifteen hours a-day to earn twenty-five sous, on which she lives."

"She can live on so small an amount?"

"Rather; and she has even articles of luxury; two birds who eat more
than she does; her little room is as neat as possible, and her dress
really quite coquettish."

"Live on twenty-five sous a-day! she is a prodigy."

"A real prodigy of order, labor, economy, and practical philosophy, I
assure you; hence, I recommend her to you. She is, she says, a very
skillful seamstress. At all events, you would not be ashamed to wear
the clothes she may make."

"To-morrow I will send her some work. Poor girl! to live on so small a
sum, and, so to speak, be unknown to us, who are rich, whose smallest
caprices cost a hundred times that amount."

"I am rejoiced that you have determined to interest yourself in my
little _protegee_. I will now explain our new adventure. I had
gone to the Temple with Rigolette, to purchase some furniture designed
for the poor people in the garret, when, upon accidentally examining
an old secretary which was for sale, I found the draft of a letter
written by a female to some individual, in which she complained that
herself and daughter were reduced to the greatest misery, on account
of the dishonesty of a lawyer. The secretary was part of a lot of
furniture, which a woman of middle age had been compelled by her
penury to sell; and I was told by the dealer that the woman and her
daughter seemed to belong to the upper classes of society, and to bear
their reverses with great fortitude and pride."

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