CHAPTER XXXIV
A SORDID MATTER
"_Bon Dieu!_ my old friend, what do you expect?" replied Madame deChantonnay to a rather incoherent statement made to her one May afternoonby the Marquis de Gemosac. "It is the month of May," she furtherexplained, indicating with a gesture of her dimpled hand the roses abloomall around them. For the Marquis had found her in a chair beneath themulberry-tree in the old garden of that house near Gemosac which looksacross the river toward the sea. "It is the month of May. One is young.Such things have happened since the world began. They will happen untilit ends, Marquis. It happened in our own time, if I remember correctly."
And Madame de Chantonnay heaved a prodigious sigh, in memory of the daysthat were no more.
"Given a young man of enterprise and not bad looking, I allow. He has thegrand air and his face is not without distinction. Given a young girl,fresh as a flower, young, innocent, not without feeling. Ah! I know, forI was like that myself. Place them in a garden, in the springtime. Whatwill they talk of--politics? Ah--bah! Let them have long eveningstogether while their elders play chess or a hand at bezique. What gamewill they play? A much older game than chess or bezique, I fancy."
"But the circumstances were so exceptional," protested the Marquis, whohad a pleased air, as if his anger were not without an antidote.
"Circumstances may be exceptional, my friend, but Love is a Rule. Youallow him to stay six weeks in the chateau, seeing Juliette daily, andthen you are surprised that one fine morning Monsieur de Bourbon comes toyou and tells you brusquely, as you report it, that he wants to marryyour daughter."
"Yes," admitted the Marquis. "He was what you may describe as brusque. Itis the English way, perhaps, of treating such matters. Now, for myself Ishould have been warmer, I think. I should have allowed myself a littleplay, as it were. One says a few pretty things--is it not so? Onesuggests that the lady is an angel and oneself entirely unworthy of ahappiness which is only to be compared with the happiness that ispromised to us in the hereafter. It is an occasion upon which to beeloquent."
"Not for the English," corrected Madame de Chantonnay, holding up a handto emphasise her opinion. "And you must remember, that although ourfriend is French, he has been brought up in that cold country--by aminister of their frozen religion, I understand. I, who speak to you,know what they are, for once I had an Englishman in love with me. It wasin Paris, when Louis XVIII was King. And did this Englishman tell me thathe was heart-broken, I ask you? Never! On the contrary, he appeared to beof an indifference only to be compared with the indifference of a tree.He seemed to avoid me rather than seek my society. Once, he made believeto forget that he had been presented to me. A ruse--a mere ruse toconceal his passion. But I knew, I knew always."
"And what was the poor man's fate? What was his name, Comtesse?"
"I forget, my friend. For the moment I have forgotten it. But tell memore about Monsieur de Bourbon and Juliette. He is passionately in lovewith her, of course; he is so miserable."
The Marquis reflected for a few moments.
"Well," he said, at last, "he may be so; he may be so, Comtesse."
"And you--what did you say?"
The Marquis looked carefully round before replying. Then he leant forwardwith his forefinger raised delicately to the tip of his nose.
"I temporised, Comtesse," he said, in a low voice. "I explained asgracefully as one could that it was too early to think of such adevelopment--that I was taken by surprise."
"Which could hardly have been true," put in Madame de Chantonnay in anaudible aside to the mulberry-tree, "for neither Guienne nor la Vendeewill be taken by surprise."
"I said, in other words--a good many words, the more the better, for onemust be polite--'Secure your throne, Monsieur, and you shall marryJuliette.' But it is not a position into which one hurries the last ofthe house of Gemosac--to be the wife of an unsuccessful claimant, eh?"
Madame de Chantonnay approved in one gesture of her stout hand of theseprinciples and of the Marquis de Gemosac's masterly demonstration ofthem.
"And Monsieur de Bourbon--did he accept these conditions?"
"He seemed to, Madame. He seemed content to do so," replied the Marquis,tapping his snuff-box and avoiding the lady's eye.
"And Juliette?" inquired Madame, with a sidelong glance.
"Oh, Juliette is sensible," replied the fond father. "My daughter is, Ihope, sensible, Comtesse."
"Give yourself no uneasiness, my old friend," said Madame de Chantonnay,heartily. "She is charming."
Madame sat back in her chair and fanned herself thoughtfully. It was thefashion of that day to carry a fan and wield it with grace and effect. Tofan oneself did not mean that the heat was oppressive, any more than theuse of incorrect English signifies to-day ill-breeding or a lack ofeducation. Both are an indication of a laudable desire to be unmistakablyin the movement of one's day.
Over her fan Madame cast a sidelong glance at the Marquis, whom she, likemany of his friends, suspected of being much less simple and spontaneousthan he appeared.
"Then they are not formally affianced?" she suggested.
"_Mon Dieu!_ no. I clearly indicated that there were other things to bethought of at the present time. A very arduous task lies before him, buthe is equal to it, I am certain. My conviction as to that grows as oneknows him better."
"But you are not prepared to allow the young people to force you to takea leap in the dark," suggested Madame de Chantonnay. "And that poorJuliette must consume her soul in patience; but she is sensible, as youjustly say. Yes, my dear Marquis, she is charming."
They were thus engaged in facile talk when Albert de Chantonnay emergedfrom the long window of his study, a room opening on to a moss-grownterrace, where this plotter walked to and fro like another Richelieu andbrooded over nation-shaking schemes.
He carried a letter in his hand and wore an air of genuine perturbment.But even in his agitation he looked carefully round before he spoke.
"Here," he said to the Marquis and his fond mother, who watched him withcomplacency--"here I have a letter from Dormer Colville. It isnecessarily couched in very cautious language. He probably knows, as Iknow, that any letter addressed to me is liable to be opened. I havereason to believe that some of my letters have not only been opened, butthat copies of them are actually in the possession of that man--the headof that which is called the Government."
He turned and looked darkly into a neighbouring clump of rhododendrons,as if Louis Napoleon were perhaps lurking there. But he was neverthelessquite right in his suspicions, which were verified twenty years later,along with much duplicity which none had suspected.
"Nevertheless," he went on, "I know what Colville seeks to convey to us,and is now hurrying away from Paris to confirm to us by word of mouth.The bank of John Turner in the Rue Lafayette has failed, and with it goesall the fortune of Madame St. Pierre Lawrence."
Both his hearers exclaimed aloud, and Madame de Chantonnay showed signsof a desire to swoon; but as no one took any notice, she changed hermind.
"It is a ruse to gain time," explained Albert, brushing the thin end ofhis moustache upward with a gesture of resolution. "Just as the other wasa ruse to gain time. It is at present a race between two resoluteparties. The party which is ready first and declares itself will be thevictor. For to-day our poor France is in the gutter: she is in the handsof the canaille, and the canaille will accept the first who placeshimself upon an elevation and scatters gold. What care they--King orEmperor, Emperor or King! It is the same to them so long as they have achange of some sort and see, or think they see, gain to themselves to besnatched from it."
From which it will be seen that Albert de Chantonnay knew his countrymen.
"But," protested Madame de Chantonnay, who had a Frenchwoman's inimitablequickness to grasp a situation--"the Government could scarcely cause abank to fail--such an old-established bank as Turner's, which has existedsince the day of Louis XIV--in order to gain time."
"An unscrupul
ous Government can do anything in France," replied thelady's son. "Their existence depends upon delay, and they are aware ofit. They would ruin France rather than forego their own aggrandisement.And this is part of their scheme. They seek to delay us at all costs. Tokidnap de Bourbon was the first move. It failed. This is their secondmove. What must be our counter-move?"
He clasped his hands behind his willowy back and paced slowly backwardand forward. By a gesture, Madame de Chantonnay bade the Marquis keepsilence while she drew his attention to the attitude of her son. When hepaused and fingered his whisker she gasped excitedly.
"I have it," said Albert, with an upward glance of inspiration.
"Yes, my son?"
"The Beauvoir estate," replied Albert, "left to me by my uncle. It isworth three hundred thousand francs. That is enough for the moment. Thatmust be our counter-move."
Madame de Chantonnay protested volubly. For if Frenchmen are ready tosacrifice, or, at all events, to risk all for a sentiment--and historysays nothing to the contrary--Frenchwomen are eminently practical andfar-sighted.
Madame had a hundred reasons why the Beauvoir estate should not be sold.Many of them contradicted each other. She was not what may be called aclose reasoner, but she was roughly effective. Many a general has won avictory not by the accuracy, but by the volume of his fire.
"What will become of France," she cried to Albert's retreating back as hewalked to and fro, "if none of the old families has a son to bless itselfwith? And Heaven knows that there are few enough remaining now. Besides,you will want to marry some day, and what will your bride say when youhave no money? There are no _dots_ growing in the hedgerows now. Not thatI am a stickler for a _dot_. Give me heart, I always say, and keep themoney yourself. And some day you will find a loving heart, but no _dot_.And there is a tragedy at once--ready made. Is it not so, my old friend?"
She turned to the Marquis de Gemosac for confirmation of this forecast.
"It is a danger, Madame," was the reply. "It is a danger which it wouldbe well to foresee."
They had discussed a hundred times the possibility of a romantic marriagebetween their two houses. Juliette and Albert--the two lastrepresentatives of an old nobility long-famed in the annals of thewest--might well fall in love with each other. It would be charming,Madame thought; but, alas! Albert would be wise to look for a _dot_.
The Marquis paused. Again he temporised. For he could not all in aninstant decide which side of this question to take. He looked at Albert,frail, romantic; an ideal representative of that old nobility of Francewhich was never practical, and elected to go to the guillotine ratherthan seek to cultivate that modern virtue.
"At the same time, Madame, it is well to remember that a loan offered nowmay reasonably be expected to bring such a return in the future as willprovide _dots_ for the de Chantonnays to the end of time."
Madame was about to make a spirited reply; she might even have suggestedthat the Beauvoir estate would be better apportioned to Albert's wifethan to Juliette as the wife of another, but Albert himself stopped infront of them and swept away all argument by a passionate gesture of hissmall, white hand.
"It is concluded," he said. "I sell the Beauvoir estate! Have not theChantonnays proved a hundred times that they are equal to any sacrificefor the sake of France?"
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