Collected Works of Eugène Sue

by Eugène Sue

  “I believe you, monsieur, as I said before. I only wish to say that it is impossible for me to even consider the proposition you have been so kind as to make to me.”

  The baron was astounded now in his turn.

  “What, monsieur, you refuse?” he exclaimed. “But no, I cannot have heard you aright. It is impossible that you should be so blind as not to see the immense advantages of such a marriage.”

  “Then I must endeavour to be more explicit, monsieur. I positively decline your offer, while acknowledging that Mlle. de Beaumesnil’s kind intentions are entirely too flattering to me.”

  “You decline — the richest heiress in France. You treat Mlle. de Beaumesnil’s unheard-of concessions with disdain.”

  “Pardon me,” exclaimed Olivier, hastily interrupting him. “I told you just now how deeply honoured I felt by your proposition, so I should be truly inconsolable if you interpreted my refusal as in any respect uncomplimentary to Mlle. de Beaumesnil, whom I have not the honour of knowing.”

  “But I have offered you an opportunity to make her acquaintance.”

  “That would be useless, monsieur. I do not doubt Mlle. de Beaumesnil’s merits in the least, but as I should tell you all under the circumstances, I am not free. My heart and my honour are alike pledged.”

  “You are betrothed already?”

  “In short, monsieur, I am about to marry a young lady whom I both love and esteem.”

  “Great God! What are you telling me, monsieur?” exclaimed the unfortunate baron, fairly gasping for breath, so great was his consternation.

  “The truth, monsieur, and such an announcement will suffice, I am sure, to convince you that — without the slightest intended disparagement of Mlle. de Beaumesnil — I cannot even consider the proposition you have made to me.”

  “But if this marriage doesn’t come off, I shall lose my deputyship,” thought the baron, despairingly. “Why the devil did the marquis insist upon my giving my consent if this young idiot was going to be fool enough to refuse such a colossal fortune? And there is my ward who declared to me this very morning that she would never marry anybody but Olivier Raymond. The marquis told me that I would find this an enigma, but all enigmas have their answers, and this can be no exception to the rule!”

  So the baron, unwilling to renounce his hope of political preferment, added aloud:

  “My dear sir, I implore you to reflect. Do not decide hastily. You have plighted your troth, — well and good! You love a young girl, you say, — so be it, but thank Heaven, you are still free, and there are sacrifices which one should have the courage to make for the sake of his future. Think, monsieur, an income of more than three million francs a year from landed property! Why, nobody on earth could be expected to refuse such a fortune as that! And the young girl who loves you — if she really loves you for yourself alone — will be the first, if she is not frightfully selfish, to advise you to accept this unexpected good fortune with resignation. An income of over three million francs, my dear sir, and from real estate, remember.”

  “I have told you that my heart and honour are alike pledged, monsieur, so it pains me to see that, in spite of the favourable reports you have heard concerning me, you still believe me capable of a base and cowardly act,” added Olivier, severely.

  “Heaven forbid, my dear sir! I believe you to be the most honourable man in the world, but—”

  “Will you do me the favour, monsieur,” said Olivier, rising, “to inform Mlle. de Beaumesnil of the reasons that prompted my decision. I feel sure that when she hears them she will consider me worthy of her esteem, though—”

  “But you are worthy of something more than esteem, my dear sir. Such disinterestedness is marvellous, admirable, sublime.”

  “Such disinterestedness on my part is a very simple thing, monsieur. I love and I am loved in return. The happiness of my life depends upon my approaching marriage.”

  And Olivier started towards the door.

  “But take a few days for reflection, I beseech you, monsieur. Do not be guided by this first rash impulse. Again let me venture to remind you that it means an income of over three million francs from—”

  “There is nothing more that you wish to say to me, I suppose, monsieur,” said Olivier, interrupting the baron, and bowing, as if to take leave of him.

  “Monsieur,” exclaimed the baron, desperately, “consider, I beg of you, that this refusal on your part is sure to make Mlle. de Beaumesnil very unhappy; for you must realise that a guardian, a grave, conscientious man like myself, would not have taken the step I have, if he had not been absolutely compelled to do so. In other words, my ward will be made miserable by your refusal, — she will die, perhaps—”

  “Monsieur, I beseech you, in my turn, to remember the exceedingly painful position in which you are placing me, a position, in fact, that it is impossible for me to endure longer after the announcement of my approaching marriage, which I have felt it my duty to make.”

  Again Olivier bowed respectfully to the baron, and again he started towards the door, adding, as he opened it:

  “I should have been glad to end this interview less abruptly, monsieur. Will you, therefore, be kind enough to excuse me, and to attribute my hasty retreat to an insistence on your part which places me in the most disagreeable, I was about to say the most ridiculous, position imaginable.”

  And having uttered these words, Olivier walked out of the room, in spite of the baron’s despairing protests.

  That gentleman, half frantic with disappointment and anger, rushed towards the door leading into the room where the hunchback and the two young girls were standing, and pulling aside the portière, exclaimed:

  “And now will you be good enough to explain the meaning of all this? Why have you made such a fool of me? And why does this M. Olivier refuse Mlle. de Beaumesnil’s hand, and declare he has never seen her in his life when you assure me that he and my ward are desperately in love with each other?”

  CHAPTER XXVII.

  THE MYSTERY DEEPENS.

  BUT M. DE la Rochaiguë’s bewilderment was by no means at an end.

  The baron had fully expected to find the unseen auditors of the foregoing conversation in a state of intense consternation over M. Olivier’s refusal.

  Far from it.

  Mlle. de Beaumesnil and Herminie, clasped in each other’s arms, were laughing and crying and kissing each other in a transport of half delirious joy.

  “He refused me! He refused me!” exclaimed Ernestine, in accents of ineffable delight.

  “Ah, I told you that M. Olivier would not disappoint our expectations, my dear Ernestine,” added Herminie.

  “Wasn’t I right? Didn’t I tell you that he would refuse?” cried the marquis, no less delighted.

  “Then why the devil did you make such a fuss about gaining my consent?” demanded the baron, forgetting his dignity in his thorough exasperation. “Why did both of you insist upon my making that young idiot such an unheard-of proposal, if you wanted him to refuse it?”

  These words seemed to recall Ernestine to the fact of the baron’s existence, for, releasing herself from her friend’s arms, she turned a radiant face towards her guardian, and exclaimed, in tones of the most profound gratitude:

  “Oh, thank you, monsieur, thank you! I shall owe the happiness of my whole life to you, and I assure you, I shall never prove ungrateful.”

  “But you must have misunderstood him,” cried the baron, “he refuses, he refuses, he refuses, I tell you.”

  “Yes, he refuses,” exclaimed Ernestine, ecstatically. “Ah, has he not the noblest of hearts!”

  “They have certainly gone mad, every one of them,” murmured the poor baron, in despair.

  “But this young man is as good as married, — he won’t have you! He says nothing would induce him to have you!” he fairly shouted in Ernestine’s ear. “His marriage is to take place very shortly.”

  “Yes, thank God, there is no further obstacle to that marriage now,�
�� cried Ernestine, “so I thank you once again, M. de la Rochaiguë. I thank you with all my heart, and I shall never, never forget what you have done for me.”

  Fortunately the hunchback now came to the rescue of the unfortunate baron, who really felt as if his poor brain was about to burst.

  “I promised you the answer to the enigma, you remember, my dear baron,” said M. de Maillefort.

  “I think it is time, quite time for you to give it, then, marquis. If you do not, I believe I shall go mad. There is a strange buzzing in my ears, my head feels as if it would split, there are specks floating before my eyes — and—”

  “Well, then, listen to me. This morning your ward declared that she would not marry anybody but M. Olivier Raymond, and that the happiness of her life depended upon it, did she not?”

  “You certainly are not going to begin that all over again?” exclaimed M. de la Rochaiguë, stamping his foot angrily.

  “Have a little patience, baron. I told you afterwards that all the good you had heard in relation to M. Olivier Raymond was nothing in comparison with what you would soon discover for yourself.”

  “Well, what have I discovered?”

  “Is the disinterestedness which you yourself were obliged to admire nothing? To refuse the richest heiress in France to fulfil a promise of marriage previously made to a penniless young girl — is not such conduct as that — ?”

  “Admirable, commendable, worthy of all praise,” exclaimed the baron. “I know all that! But I repeat that I shall go stark staring mad if you don’t explain why this refusal, which should fill you and my ward with dismay and consternation, seems to delight you beyond measure, — that is, if you are still anxious for Ernestine to marry Olivier.”

  “I certainly am.”

  “Well, I’d like to know how you are going to bring it about, for his heart seems to be set upon marrying the other girl.”

  “And that is precisely what pleases us so much,” said the hunchback.

  “Delights us, you mean,” corrected Ernestine.

  “It delights you because he is determined to marry another girl?” exclaimed the baron, positively furious now.

  “Yes, but you see this other girl is she!” explained the marquis.

  “She — and who is she?” shouted the baron.

  “Your ward.”

  “But the other girl is my ward.”

  “Certainly,” replied Ernestine, triumphantly, “I am the other girl.”

  “Yes, baron, the other girl, I tell you, is she, your ward.”

  “Yes, she is Ernestine,” added Herminie.

  “It is all perfectly clear now, you see,” remarked the marquis.

  On hearing this explanation, which was even more incomprehensible to him than what had gone before, the unfortunate baron cast a half frantic glance around him, then, closing his eyes, said to the hunchback, in despairing tones:

  “M. de Maillefort, you seem to be absolutely pitiless. I have as strong a mind as anybody else, I think, but it is incapable of unravelling such a mystery as this. You promised to give me the answer to this beastly enigma, but the answer is even more incomprehensible than the enigma itself.”

  “Come, come, my dear baron, calm yourself, and listen to me.”

  “I have been listening to you for a quarter of an hour or more,” groaned the baron, “and yet I am very much worse off than I was in the beginning.”

  “Well, well, everything shall be made plain now,” said the marquis, soothingly.

  “Proceed, then, I beg of you.”

  “Very well, then, these are the facts of the case: Through a combination of circumstances which will be explained later on, and which have no special bearing on the subject now under consideration, your ward met M. Olivier and passed herself off to him as a poor orphan girl, who was supporting herself by her needle. Do you understand thus far, baron?”

  “Yes, I understand thus far. What next?”

  “Well, by reason of other circumstances with which you will soon be made conversant, your ward and M. Olivier fell in love with each other, he still supposing Mlle. de Beaumesnil to be a friendless and penniless orphan, and so unhappy in her home relations that he felt that he was, and in fact was, exceedingly generous in offering to marry her when he was made an officer.”

  “In short,” exclaimed the baron, straightening himself up to his full height, and speaking in triumphant tones,— “in short, Ernestine and the other young girl are simply one and the same person.”

  “Precisely,” responded the hunchback.

  “And so,” continued the baron, wiping the perspiration which his Herculean mental efforts had produced from his brow,— “and so you wished to find out if Olivier loved the other, the poor girl, enough to resist, for her sake, the temptation to marry the richest heiress in France?”

  “Exactly, baron.”

  “Hence your romantic story that Mlle. de Beaumesnil had seen Olivier during his stay at the château and had fallen in love with him.”

  “It was necessary to find some plausible excuse for the proposal you were commissioned to make to him. This story furnished it, and I must say that you played your part admirably. And M. Olivier, — well, was I wrong in assuring you that M. Olivier Raymond was the soul of honour?”

  “He is, indeed!” exclaimed the baron. “Listen, marquis. I am not inclined to revert to the past, but I admit that I considered this a very unsuitable marriage for my ward. Ah, well, now I distinctly assert, affirm, and declare that, after what I have just seen and heard, if my ward were my own daughter, I should say to her: ‘Marry M. Raymond, by all means. You could not make a better choice.’”

  “Ah, monsieur, I shall never forget those words!” cried Ernestine.

  “But this is not all, my dear baron.”

  “What else can there be, pray?” demanded M. de la Rochaiguë, uneasily, evidently fearing a fresh imbroglio.

  “This test had a twofold object. M. Olivier’s extreme sensitiveness in pecuniary matters is so well known to his friends that we feared when he discovered that the young girl whom he thought so poor was really Mlle. de Beaumesnil, he, being only a young lieutenant without either rank or fortune, would absolutely refuse to marry the richest heiress in France, though he had loved her and asked her to be his wife, when he believed her absolutely penniless.”

  “Such scruples on his part would not surprise me in the least,” said the baron. “The fellow is so proud, the slightest hint that he might be considered a fortune-hunter would infuriate him. And now I think of it, the obstacle you fear still exists.”

  “No, my dear baron.”

  “But why not?”

  “Why, can’t you see?” exclaimed Ernestine, joyously. “M. Olivier has positively refused to marry Mlle. de Beaumesnil, the rich heiress, has he not?”

  “Unquestionably,” said the baron; “still, I don’t understand—”

  “But when M. Olivier discovers who I really am, how can he feel any fear of being accused of mercenary motives in marrying me, when he had positively refused to accept the proffered hand of the richest heiress in France?”

  “Or, in other words, an income of over three million francs,” exclaimed the baron, interrupting his ward. “That is true. The idea is an excellent one. I congratulate you upon it, M. le marquis, and I say, with you, that even if M. Olivier were a thousand times more proud and sensitive, he could not hold out against this argument, viz.: ‘You positively refused to accept the three million francs when they were offered you, so your motives are necessarily above suspicion.’”

  “And it is impossible for M. Olivier to feel any scruples under these circumstances, do you not think so, monsieur?”

  “Most assuredly I do, my dear ward. But this revelation will have to be made to M. Olivier sooner or later, I suppose.”

  “Of course, and I will attend to it,” replied the marquis. “I have a plan. We will talk that over together, by and by, baron, that and certain business matters which young girls understand
very little about. Am I not right, my child?” added the marquis, with a smile, turning to Ernestine.

  “Perfectly right,” answered Mlle. de Beanmesnil, “and whatever you and my guardian may decide, I agree to in advance.”

  “I need not say, my dear baron, that we must maintain the utmost secrecy in relation to all this until the signing of the marriage contract, which I have my reasons for desiring should precede the publishing of the banns. Day after to-morrow will not be too soon, I suppose. What do you think about it, Ernestine?”

  “You can guess my reply, monsieur,” answered the young girl, blushing and smiling.

  Then she added, hastily:

  “But mine will not be the only contract to sign. There is another, isn’t there, Herminie?”

  “That is for M. de Maillefort to decide,” replied Herminie, blushingly.

  “I approve most decidedly; but who is to attend to all this rather troublesome business?”

  “You, of course, M. de Maillefort. You are so good and kind!” cried Ernestine.

  “Besides, have you not proved that nothing is impossible to you?” added Herminie.

  “Oh, as for the impossibilities achieved, when I think of the scene at your home this morning, you, my dear child, are the one who deserves praise, not I.”

  On hearing these words, M. de la Rochaiguë, who had seemed to be hardly aware of Herminie’s presence before, turned to her, and said:

  “Pardon me, my dear young lady; my attention has been so engrossed by what has just occurred that—”

  “M. de la Rochaiguë,” said Ernestine, taking Herminie by the hand, “I wish to present to you my dearest friend, or, rather, my sister, for no two sisters could love each other more devotedly than we do.”

  “But,” said the baron, greatly surprised, “if I am not very much mistaken, mademoiselle — mademoiselle is the music teacher we selected for you on account of the extreme delicacy of her conduct in relation to a perfectly just claim upon the Beaumesnil estate.”