It was a dark, freezing night; the sky was laden with clouds which hung so low, that they nearly touched the roofs of the houses; and a furious wind was shaking the black branches of the trees in the Champs Elysees, passing through the air like a fine dust of snow.
Daniel rushed in feverish haste, like an escaped convict, headlong on, without aim or purpose, solely bent upon escaping. But, when he had gone some distance, the motion, the cold night-air, and the keen wind playing in his hair, restored him to consciousness. Then he became aware that he was still in evening costume, bareheaded, and that he had left his hat and his overcoat in Miss Brandon’s house. Then he remembered that Count Ville-Handry was waiting for him in the great reception-room, together with M. Elgin and Mrs. Brian. What would they say and think? Unhappy man, in what a sad predicament he found himself!
There might have been a way to escape from that hell; and he himself, in his madness, had closed it forever.
Like one of those dissipated men who awake from the heavy sleep after a debauch, with dry mouth and weary head, he felt as if he had just been aroused from a singular and terrible dream. Like the drunkard, who, when he is sobered, tries to recall the foolish things he may have done under the guidance of King Alcohol, Daniel conjured up one by one all his emotions during the hour which he had just spent by Miss Brandon’s side,--an hour of madness which would weigh heavily upon his future fate, and which alone contained in its sixty minutes more experiences than his whole life so far.
At no time had he been so near despair.
What! He had been warned, put on his guard, made fully aware of all of Miss Brandon’s tricks; they had told him of the weird charm of her eyes; he himself had caught her that very evening in the open act of deceiving others.
And in spite of all this, feeble and helpless as he was, he had let himself be caught by the fascinations of this strange girl. Her voice had made him forget every thing, every thing--even his dear and beloved Henrietta, his sole thought for so many years.
“Fool!” he said to himself, “what have I done?”
Unmindful of the blast of the tempest, and of the snow which had begun to fall, he had sat down on the steps of one of the grandest houses in Circus Street, and, with his elbows on his knees, he pressed his brow with his hands, as if hoping that he might thus cause it to suggest to him some plan of salvation. Conjuring up the whole energy of his will, he tried to retrace his interview with Miss Brandon in order to find out by what marvellous transformation it had begun as a terrible combat, and ended as a love-scene. And recalling thus to his memory all she had told him in her soft, sweet voice, he asked himself if she had not really been slandered; and, if there was actually something amiss in her past life, why should it not rather be laid at the door of those two equivocal personages who watched over her, M. Elgin and Mrs. Brian.
What boldness this strange girl had displayed in her defence! but also what lofty nobility! How well she had said that she did not love Count Ville-Handry with real love, and that, until now, no man had even succeeded in quickening her pulse! Was she of marble, and susceptible only of delight in foolish vanity?
Oh, no! a thousand times no! The most refined coquetry never achieved that passionate violence; the most accomplished artist never possessed that marvellous contagion which is the sublime gift of truth alone. And, whatever he could do, his head and heart remained still filled with Miss Brandon; and Daniel trembled as he remembered certain words in which, under almost transparent illusions, the secret of her heart had betrayed itself. Could she have told Daniel more pointedly than she had actually done, “He whom I could love is none other but you”? Certainly not! And as he thought of it his heart was filled with a sense of eager and unwholesome desires; for he was a man, no better, no worse, than other men; and there are but too many men nowadays, who would value a few hours of happiness with a woman like Miss Brandon more highly than a whole life of chaste love by the side of a pure and noble woman.
“But what is that to me?” he repeated. “Can I love her, I?”
Then he began again to revolve in his mind what might have happened after his flight from the house.
How had Miss Brandon explained his escape? How had she accounted for her own excitement?
And, drawn by an invincible power, Daniel had risen to return to the house; and there, half-hid under the shadow of the opposite side, in a deep doorway, he watched anxiously the windows, as if they could have told him any thing of what was going on inside. The reception-room was still brilliantly lighted, and people came and went, casting their shadows upon the white curtains. A man came and leaned his face against the window, then suddenly he drew back; and Daniel distinctly recognized Count Ville-Handry.
What did that mean? Did it not imply that Miss Brandon had been taken suddenly ill, and that people were anxious about her? These were Daniel’s thoughts when he heard the noise of bolts withdrawn, and doors opened. It was the great entrance-gate of Miss Brandon’s house, which was thrown open by some of the servants. A low coupe with a single horse left the house, and drove rapidly towards the Champs Elysees.
But, at the moment when the coupe turned, the light of the lamp fell full upon the inside, and Daniel thought he recognized, nay, he did recognize, Miss Brandon. He felt as if he had received a stunning blow on the head.
“She has deceived me!” he exclaimed, grinding his teeth in his rage; “she has treated me like an imbecile, like an idiot!”
Then, suddenly conceiving a strange plan, he added,--
“I must know where she is going at four o’clock in the morning. I will follow her.”
Unfortunately, Miss Brandon’s coachman had, no doubt, received special orders; for he drove down the avenue as fast as the horse could go, and the animal was a famous trotter, carefully chosen by Sir Thorn, who understood horse-flesh better than any one else in Paris. But Daniel was agile; and the hope of being able to avenge himself at once gave him unheard-of strength.
“If I could only catch a cab!” he thought.
But no carriage was to be seen. His elbows close to the body, managing his breath, and steadily measuring his steps, he succeeded in not only following the coupe, but in actually gaining ground. When Miss Brandon reached Concord Square, he was only a few yards behind the carriage. But there the coachman touched the horse, which suddenly increased its pace, crossed the square, and trotted down Royal Street.
Daniel felt his breath giving out, and a shooting pain, first trifling, but gradually increasing, in his side. He was on the point of giving up the pursuit, when he saw a cab coming down towards him from the Madeleine, the driver fast asleep on the box. He threw himself before the horses, and cried out as well as he could,--
“Driver, a hundred francs for you, if you follow that coupe down there!”
But the driver, suddenly aroused by a man who stood in the middle of the street, bareheaded, and in evening costume, and who offered him such an enormous sum, thought it was a practical joke attempted by a drunken man, and replied furiously,--
“Look out, rascal! Get out of the way, or I drive over you!”
And therewith he whipped his horses; and Daniel would have been driven over, if he had not promptly jumped aside. But all this had taken time; and, when he looked up, the coupe was far off, nearly at the boulevard. To attempt overtaking it now would have been folly indeed; and Daniel remained there, overwhelmed and defeated.
What could he do? It occurred to him that he might hasten to Maxime, and ask him for advice. But fate was against him; he gave up that idea. He went slowly back to his lodgings, and threw himself into an arm-chair, determined not to go to bed till he had found a way to extricate himself from the effects of his egregious folly.
But he had now been for two days agitated by the extremest alternatives, like a man out at sea, whom the waves buffet, and throw--now up to the shore, and now back again into open water. He had not closed an eye for forty-eight hours; and, if the heart seems to be able to suffer almost indefinitely, our physical strength is strictly limited. Thus he fell asleep, dreaming even in his sleep that he was hard at work, and just about to discover the means by which he could penetrate the mystery of Miss Brandon.
It was bright day when Daniel awoke, chilled and stiffened; for he had not changed his clothes when he came home, and his fire had gone out. His first impulse was one of wrath against himself. What! he succumbed so easily?--he, the sailor, who remembered very well having remained more than once for forty, and even once for sixty hours on deck, when his vessel was threatened by a hurricane? Had his peaceful and monotonous life in his office during the last two years weakened him to such a point, that all the springs of his system had lost their power?
Poor fellow! he knew not that the direst fatigue is trifling in comparison with that deep moral excitement which shakes the human system to its most mysterious depths. Nevertheless, while he hastened to kindle a large fire, in order to warm himself, he felt that the rest had done him good. The last evil effects of his excitement last night had passed away; the charm by which he had been fascinated was broken; and he felt once more master of all his faculties.
Now his folly appeared to him so utterly inexplicable, that, if he had but tasted a glass of lemonade at Miss Brandon’s house, he should have been inclined to believe that they had given him one of those drugs which set the brains on fire, and produce a kind of delirium. But he had taken nothing, and, even if he had, was the foolish act less real for that? The consequences would be fatal, he had no doubt.
He was thus busy trying to analyze the future, when his servant entered, as he did every morning, bringing his hat and overcoat on his arm.
“Sir,” he said, with a smile which he tried to render malicious, “you have forgotten these things at the house where you spent the evening yesterday. A servant--on horseback too--brought them. He handed me at the same time this letter, and is waiting for an answer.”
Daniel took the letter, and for a minute or more examined the direction. The handwriting was a woman’s, small and delicate, but in no ways like the long, angular hand of an American lady. At last he tore the envelope; and at once a penetrating but delicate perfume arose, which he had inhaled, he knew but too well, in Miss Brandon’s rooms.
The letter was indeed from her, and on the top of the page bore her name, Sarah, in small blue Gothic letters. She wrote,--
“Is it really so, O Daniel! that you are entirely mine, and that I can count upon you? You told me so tonight. Do you still remember your promises?”
Daniel was petrified. Miss Brandon had told him that she was imprudence personified; and here she gave him a positive proof of it.
Could not these few lines become a terrible weapon against her? Did they not admit the most extraordinary interpretation? Still, as the bearer might be impatient, the servant asked,--
“What must I tell the man?”
“Ah, wait!” answered Daniel angrily.
And, sitting down at his bureau, he wrote to Miss Brandon,--
“Certainly, Miss Brandon, I remember the promises you extorted from me when I was not master of myself; I remember them but too well.”
Suddenly an idea struck him; and he paused. What! Having been caught already in the very first trap she had prepared for his inexperience, was he to risk falling into a second? He tore the letter he had commenced into small pieces, and, turning to his servant, said,--
“Tell the man that I am out; and make haste and get me a carriage!”
Then, when he was once more alone, he murmured,--
“Yes, it is better so. It is much better to leave Miss Brandon in uncertainty. She cannot even suspect that her driving out this morning has enlightened me. She thinks I am still in the dark; let her believe it.”
Still this letter of hers seemed to prepare some new intrigue, which troubled Daniel excessively. Miss Brandon was certain of achieving her end; what more did she want? What other mysterious aim could she have in view?
“Ah! I cannot make it out,” sighed Daniel. “I must consult Brevan.”
On his writing-table he found that important and urgent work which the minister had intrusted to his hands still unfinished. But the minister, the department, his position, his preferment,--all these considerations weighed as nothing in comparison with his passion.
He went down, therefore; and, while his carriage drove to his friend’s house, he thought of the surprise he would cause Maxime.
When he arrived there, he found M. de Brevan standing in his shirt- sleeves before an immense marble table, covered all over with pots and bottles, with brushes, combs, and sponges, with pincers, polishers, and files, making his toilet.
If he expected Daniel, he had not expected him so soon; for his features assumed an expression which seemed to prohibit all confidential talk. But Daniel saw nothing. He shook hands with his friend, and, sinking heavily into a chair, he said,--
“I went to Miss Brandon. She has made me promise all she wanted. I cannot imagine how it came about!”
“Let us hear,” said M. de Brevan.
Then, without hesitation, and with all the minutest details, Daniel told him how Miss Brandon had taken him into her little boudoir, and how she had exculpated herself from all complicity with Malgat by showing him the letters written by that wretched man.
“Strange letters!” he said, “which, if they are authentic”--
M. de Brevan shrugged his shoulders.
“You were forewarned,” he said, “and you have promised all she wanted! Do you not think she might have made you sign your own death-sentence?”
“But Kergrist?” said Daniel. “Kergrist’s brother is her friend.”
“I dare say. But do you imagine that brother is any cleverer than you are?”
Although he was by no means fully satisfied, Daniel went on, describing his amazement when Miss Brandon told him that she did not love Count Ville-Handry.
But Maxime burst out laughing, and interrupted him, saying with bitter irony,--
“Of course! And then she went on, telling you that she had never yet loved anybody, having vainly looked in the world for the man of whom she dreamed. She painted to you the phoenix in such colors, that you had to say to yourself, ‘What does she mean? That phoenix! Why, she means me!’ That has tickled you prodigiously. She has thrown herself at your feet; you have raised her up; she has fainted; she has sobbed like a distressed dove in your arms; you have lost your head.”
Daniel was overcome. He stammered,--
“How did you know?”
Maxime could not look him in the face; but his voice was as steady as ever when he replied, in a tone of bitterest sarcasm,--
“I guess it. Did I not tell you I knew Miss Brandon? She has only one card in her hand; but that is enough; it always makes a trick.”
To have been deceived, and even to have been rendered ridiculous, is one of those misfortunes which we confess to ourselves, however painful the process may be; but to hear another person laugh at us after such a thing has happened is more than we can readily bear. Daniel, therefore, did not conceal his impatience, and said rather dryly,--
“If I have been the dupe of Miss Brandon, my dear Maxime, you see, at last, that I am so no longer.”
“Ah, ah!”
“No, not in the least. And that, thanks to her; for she herself has destroyed my illusions.”
“Pshaw!”
“Unconsciously, of course, having ran away from her like a fool, I was wandering about in the streets near her house, when I saw her come out in her coupe.”
“Oh, come!”
“I saw her as distinctly as I see you. It was four o’clock in the morning, mind!”
“Is it possible? And what did you do?”
“I followed her.”
M. de Brevan nearly let the brush fall, with which he was polishing his finger-nails; but he mastered his confusion so promptly, that Daniel did not perceive it.
“Ah! you followed her,” he said in a voice which all his efforts could not steady entirely. “Then, of course, you know where she went.”
“Alas, no! She drove so fast, that, quick as I am, I could not follow her, and lost sight of her.”
Certainly M. de Brevan was breathing more freely, and said in an easy tone,--
“That is provoking, and you have lost a fine opportunity. I am, however, by no means astonished that you are at last enlightened.”
“Oh! I am so; you may believe me. And yet”--
“Well, yet?”
Daniel hesitated, for fear of seeing another sardonic smile appear on Maxime’s lips. Still making an effort, he replied,--
“Well, I am asking myself whether all that Miss Brandon states about her childhood, her family, and her fortune, might not, after all, be true.”
Maxime looked like a sensible man who is forced to listen to the absurd nonsense of an insane person.
“You think I am absurd,” said Daniel. “Perhaps I am; but, then, do me the favor to explain to me how Miss Brandon, anxious as she must be to conceal her past, could herself point out to me the means to ascertain every thing about her, and even to learn the precise amount of her income? America is not so far off!”
M. de Brevan’s face no longer expressed astonishment; he looked absolutely bewildered.
“What!” he cried out, “could you seriously think of undertaking a trip to America?”
“Why not?”
“To be sure, my dear friend, you are, in all sincerity, too naive for our age. What! have you not yet been able to divine Miss Brandon’s plan? And yet it is patent enough. When she saw you, and had taken your measure, she said to herself, ‘Here is an excellent young man who is in my way, excessively in my way; he must go and breathe a better air a few thousand miles off.’ And thereupon she suggested to you that pleasant trip to America.”
After what Daniel had learned about Miss Brandon’s character, this explanation sounded by no means improbable. Nevertheless, he was not quite satisfied. He objected to it thus:--
“Whether I go or stay, the wedding will still take place. Consequently, she has no interest in my being abroad. Believe me, Maxime, there is something else underneath. Outside of this marriage, Miss Brandon must be pursuing some other plan.”
“What plan?”
“Ah! That is what I cannot find out, to save my life. But you may be sure that I am not mistaken. I want no better evidence of it than the fact that she wrote to me this morning.”
M. de Brevan jumped up, and said,--
“What! She has written to you?”
“Yes; it is that accursed letter, more than any thing else, that brings me here. Here it is, just read it; and, if you can understand it, you are more fortunate than I am.”
At one glance M. de Brevan had read the five lines which Miss Brandon had written; and, turning deadly pale, he said,--
“This is incomprehensible. A note, and such an indiscreet note, from her who never writes!”
He looked upon Daniel as if he wished to penetrate his innermost thoughts, and then asked him, weighing his words with the utmost care,--
“If she should really love you, what would you say?”
Daniel looked disgusted. He replied,--“It is hardly generous in you to make sport of me, Maxime. I may be a fool; but I am not an idiot, to be conceited to that degree.”
“That is no answer to my question,” said Brevan; “and I repeat my question. What would you say?”
“I would say that I execrate her!”
“Oh! if you hate her so bitterly, you are very near loving her.”
“I despise her; and without esteem”--
“That is an old story. That is no impediment.”
“Finally, you know how dearly, how ardently, I love Miss Ville-Handry.”
“Of course; but that is not the same thing.”
M. de Brevan had at last finished his careful toilet. He put on a dressing-gown; and, carrying Daniel with him into the small room which he used as a dressing-room, he asked,--
“And what have you said in reply to that note?”
“Nothing.”
M. de Brevan had thrown himself into a comfortable chair, and assumed the careful air of a physician who has been consulted. He nodded, and said,--
“You have done well, and for the future I advise you to pursue the same plan. Don’t say a word. Can you do any thing to prevent Miss Brandon from carrying out her purposes? No! Let her go on, then.”
“But”--
“Let me finish. It is not only your own interest to act thus, but also Miss Henrietta’s interest. The day on which they part you, you will be inconsolable; but you will also be free to act. She, on the other hand, will be forced to live under the same roof with Miss Brandon; and you do not know what a stepmother can do to torture the child of her husband!”
Daniel trembled. He had already thought of that; and the idea had made him shudder. Brevan continued,--
“For the present, the most important thing is to find out how your flight has been explained. We may be able to draw our conclusions from what has been said on the subject.”
“I’ll go at once and try to find out,” said Daniel.
And, after having affectionately shaken hands with Maxime, he hurried down to his carriage and drove as fast as he could to Count Ville- Handry’s palace. The count was at home and alone, walking up and down in the most excited manner. And certainly he had enough to excite and preoccupy him just now. It was nearly noon; and he had not yet been in the hands of his valet. When he saw Daniel, he paused for a moment, and, crossing his arms on his breast, he said, in a terrible tone,--
“Ah! here you are, M. Champcey. Well, you are doing nice things!”
“I, count? How so?”
“How so? Who else has overwhelmed poor Miss Sarah with insults at the very time when she was trying to explain every thing to you? Who else, ashamed of his scandalous conduct, has run away, never daring to reappear at her house?”
What had the count been told? Certainly not the truth. He went on,--
“And do you know, M. Champcey, what has been the effect of your brutality? Miss Brandon has been seized with such a terrible nervous attack, that they had to send the carriage for a doctor. You unlucky man, you might have killed her! They would, of course, never have allowed me to enter her own room; but from the reception-room I could at times hear her painful cries and sobs. It was only after eight o’clock this morning that she could get any rest; and then Mrs. Brian, taking pity on my great grief, granted me the favor to see her, sleeping like an infant.”
Daniel listened, stupefied by amazement, utterly confounded by the impudence of Sir Thorn and Mrs. Brian, and hardly able to understand the count’s astonishing credulity. He thought to himself,--
“This is abominable! Here I am an accomplice of this Miss Brandon. Must I actually aid her in obtaining possession of this unlucky man?”
But what could he do? Should he speak? Should he tell Count Ville- Handry, that if he really heard cries of pain, and sobs, they were certainly not uttered by Miss Brandon? Should he tell him, that, while he was dying with anxiety, his beloved was driving about Paris, Heaven knows where and with whom.
The thought of doing so occurred to Daniel. But what would have been the good of it? Would the count believe him? Most probably not. And thus he would only add new difficulties to his position, which was already complicated enough. Finally, he saw very, clearly that he would never dare tell the whole truth, or show that letter which he had in his pocket. Still he tried to excuse himself, and began,--
“I am too much of a gentleman to insult a woman.”
The count interrupted him rudely, saying,--
“Spare me, I pray, a rigmarole which cannot affect me. Besides, I do not blame you particularly. I know the heart of man too well not to be sure, that, in acting thus, you have followed much less the inspirations of your own heart than the suggestions made by my daughter.”
It might have been very dangerous for Henrietta to allow the count to cherish such thoughts. Daniel, therefore, tried once more to explain.
“I assure you, count”--
But the count interrupted him fiercely, stamping with his foot.
“No more! I mean to make an end to this absurd opposition, and to break it forever. Do they not know that I am master in my own house? and do they propose to treat me like a servant, and to laugh at me, into the bargain? I shall make you aware who is master.”
He checked himself for an instant, and then continued,--
“Ah, M. Champcey! I did not expect that from you. Poor Sarah! To think that I could not spare her such a humiliation! But it is the last; and this very morning, as soon as she wakes, she shall know that all is ended. I have just sent for my daughter to tell her that the day for the wedding is fixed. All the formalities are fulfilled. We have the necessary papers”--
He paused, for Henrietta came in.
“You wish to speak to me, papa?” she said as she entered the room.
“Yes.”
Greeting Daniel with a sweet glance of her eyes, Henrietta walked up to the count, and offered him her forehead to kiss; but he pushed her back rudely, and said, assuming an air of supreme solemnity,--
“I have sent for you, my daughter, to inform you that to-morrow fortnight I shall marry Miss Brandon.”
Henrietta must have been prepared for something of the kind, for she did not move. She turned slightly pale; and a ray of wrath shot from her eyes. The count went on,--
“Under these circumstances, it is not proper, it is hardly decent, that you should not know her who is to be your mother hereafter. I shall therefore present you to her this very day, in the afternoon.”
The young girl shook her head gently, and then she said,--
“No!”
Count Ville-Handry had become very red. He exclaimed,--
“What! You dare! What would you say if I threatened to carry you forcibly to Miss Brandon’s house?”
“I, should say, father, that that is the only way to make me go there.”
Her attitude was firm, though not defiant. She spoke in a calm, gentle voice, but betrayed in every thing a resolution firmly formed, and not to be shaken by any thing. The count seemed to be perfectly amazed at this audacity shown by a girl who was usually so timid. He said,--
“Then you detest, you envy, this Miss Brandon?”
“I, father? Why should I? Great God! I only know that she cannot become the Countess Ville-Handry,--she who has filled all Paris with evil reports.”
“Who has told you so? No doubt, M. Champcey.”
“Everybody has told me, father.”
“So, because she has been slandered, the poor girl”--
“I am willing to think she is innocent; but the Countess Ville-Handry must not be a slandered woman.”
She raised herself to her full height, and added in a higher voice,--
“You are master here, father; you can do as you choose. But I--I owe it to myself and to the sacred memory of my mother, to protest by all the means in my power; and I shall protest.”
The count stammered and stared. The blood rose to his head. He cried out,--
“At last I know you, Henrietta, and I understand you. I was not mistaken. It was you who sent M. Daniel Champcey to Miss Brandon, to insult her at her own house.”
“Sir!” interrupted M. Daniel in a threatening tone.
But the count could not be restrained; and, with his eyes almost starting from their sockets, he continued,--
“Yes, I read your innermost heart, Henrietta. You are afraid of losing a part of your inheritance.”
Stung by this insult, Henrietta had stepped up close to her father,--
“But don’t you see, father, that it is this woman who wants your fortune, and that she does not like us, and cannot like us?”
“Why, if you please?”
Once before, Count Ville-Handry had asked this question of his daughter in almost the same words. Then she had not dared answer him; but now, carried away by her bitterness at being insulted by a woman whom she despised, she forgot every thing. She seized her father’s hand, and, carrying him to a mirror, she said in a hoarse voice,--
“‘Why?’--you ask. Well, look there! look at yourself!”
If Count Ville-Handry had trusted nature, he would have looked like a man of barely sixty, still quite robust and active. But he had allowed art to spoil every thing. And this morning, with his few hairs, half white, half dyed, with the rouge and the white paint of yesterday cracked, and fallen away in places, he looked as if he had lived a few thousand years.
Did he see himself as he really was,--hideous?
He certainly became livid; and coldly, for his excessive rage gave him the appearance of composure, he said,--
“You are a wretch, Henrietta!”
And as she broke out in sobs, terrified by his words, he said,--
“Oh, don’t play comedy! Presently, at four o’clock precisely, I shall call for you. If I find you dressed, and ready to accompany me to Miss Brandon’s house, all right. If not M. Champcey has been here for the last time in his life; and you will never--do you hear?--never be his wife. Now I leave you alone; you can reflect!”
And he went out, closing the door so violently, that the whole house seemed to shake.
“All is over!”
Both Henrietta and Daniel were crushed by this certain conviction.
The crisis could no longer be postponed. A few hours more, and the mischief would be done. Daniel was the first to shake off the stupor of despair; and, taking Henrietta’s hand, he asked her,--
“You have heard what your father said. What will you do?”
“What I said I would do, whatever it may cost me.”
“But could you yield?”
“Yield?” exclaimed the young girl.
And, looking at Daniel with grieved surprise, she added,--
“Would you really dare give me that advice,--you who had only to look at Miss Brandon to lose your self-control so far as to overwhelm her with insults?”
“Henrietta, I swear”--
“And this to such an extent, that father accused you of having done so at my bidding. Ah, you have been very imprudent, Daniel!”
The unhappy man wrung his hands with despair. What punishment he had to endure for a moment’s forgetfulness! He felt as if he had rendered himself guilty already by not revealing the mean conduct of M. Elgin and Mrs. Brian while Miss Brandon was driving about Paris. And now, at this very hour, he was put into a still more difficult position, because he could not even give a glimpse of the true state of things.
He said nothing; and Henrietta gloried in his silence.
“You see,” she said, “that if your heart condemns me, your reason and your conscience approve of my decision.”
He made no reply, but, rising suddenly, he began to walk up and down in the room like a wild beast searching for some outlet from the cage in which it has been imprisoned. He felt he was caught, hemmed in on all sides, and he could do nothing, nothing at all.
“Ah, we must surrender!” he exclaimed at last, overcome with grief; “we must do it; we are almost helpless. Let us give up the struggle; reason demands it. We have done enough; we have done our duty.”
All trembling with passion, he spoke on for some time, bringing up the most conclusive arguments, one by one; while his love lent him all its persuasive power. And at last it looked as if Henrietta’s determination were giving way, and she began to hesitate. It was so; but she was still struggling against her own emotion, and said in a half-suppressed tone,--
“No doubt, Daniel, you think I am not yet wretched enough.”
And then, fixing upon him a long, anxious glance, she added,--
“Say no more, or I shall begin to fear that you are dreading the time which has still to elapse till we can be united, and that you doubt me--or yourself.”
He blushed, finding himself thus half detected; but, given up entirely to sinister presentiments, he insisted,--
“No, I do not doubt; but I cannot reconcile myself to the idea that you are going to live under the same roof with Miss Brandon, M. Elgin, and Mrs. Brian. Since this abominable adventuress must triumph, let us flee. I have in Anjou an old respectable kinswoman, who will be very proud to offer you her hospitality.”
Henrietta stopped him by a gesture. Then she said,--
“In other words, I who risk my happiness in order to avoid a blot upon the name of Ville-Handry, I should tarnish it in an almost ineffaceable manner. That cannot be.”
“Henrietta!”
“No more. I stand upon a post of honor which I shall not abandon. The more formidable Miss Brandon is, the more it becomes my duty to remain here in order to watch over my father.”
Daniel trembled.
He remembered suddenly what M. de Brevan had told him of the means employed by Miss Brandon for the purpose of getting rid of troublesome people. Did Henrietta’s instincts make her anticipate a crime? No, not such a crime, at least.
“You will understand my decision all the better,” she continued, “if I tell you what a strange discovery I have made. This morning a gentleman called here, who said he was a business-man, and had an appointment with Count Ville-Handry which was of the utmost importance.
“The servants had told him that their master was out. He became angry, and began to talk so loud, that I came to see what was the matter. When he saw me, and found out who I was, he at once became very quiet, and begged me to take charge of a rough copy of a legal paper, which he had been directed to prepare secretly, and which he desired me to hand to my father.
“I promised to do so; but, as I was carrying the paper up stairs to put it upon my father’s bureau, I happened to look at it. Do you know what it was? The statutes of a new society, of which father was to be president.”
“Great God! Is it possible?”
“Most assuredly, unfortunately. I saw on the top of the paper, ‘Count Ville-Handry, director in chief’ and after the name followed all his titles, the high offices he has filled, and the French and foreign decorations which he has received.”
Daniel could no longer doubt. He said,--
“We knew that they would try to obtain possession of your father’s fortune, and now we have the proof of it. But what can we ever do, Henrietta, against the cunning manoeuvres of people like these?”
She bowed her head, and answered in a tone of resignation,--
“I have heard it said that often the mere presence of an inoffensive child is sufficient to intimidate and frighten away the boldest criminals. If God wills it so, I will be that child.”
Daniel tried once more to insist; but she cut him short, saying,--
“You forget, my dear friend, that this is, perhaps for many years, the last time we shall ever be alone together. Let us think of the future. I have secured the confidence of one of my waiting-women, and to her you must direct your letters. Her name is Clarissa Pontois. If any grave and unforeseen necessity should arise, and it becomes absolutely necessary for me to see you, Clarissa will bring you the key of the little garden-gate, and you will come.”
Both of them had their eyes filled with tears; and their hearts felt increasing anguish as the hand on the dial advanced. They knew they would have to part. Could they hope ever to meet again?
It struck four o’clock. Count Ville-Handry reappeared. Stung to the quick by what he called the insulting remarks of his daughter, he had stimulated the zeal of his valet; and that artist had evidently surpassed himself in the arrangement of the hair, and especially in the complexion.
“Well, Henrietta?” he asked.
“My decision remains unchanged, father.”
The count was probably prepared for this answer; for he succeeded in controlling his fury.
“Once more, Henrietta,” he said, “consider! Do not decide rashly, relying simply upon odious slanders.”
He drew from his pocket a photograph, looked at it lovingly, and, handing it to his daughter, he added,--
“Here is Miss Brandon’s portrait. Look at it, and see if she to whom God has given such a charming face, such sublime eyes, can have a bad heart.”
For more than a minute Henrietta examined the likeness; and then, returning it to her father, she said coldly,--
“This woman is beautiful beyond all conception. Now I can explain to myself that new society of which you are going to be director-general.”
Count Ville-Handry turned pale under this “juncture,” and cried in a terrible voice,--
“Unhappy child! Unhappy child! You dare insult an angel?”
Maddened with rage, he had lifted up his hand, and was about to strike his daughter, when Daniel seized his wrist in his iron grasp, and threateningly, as if he himself was about to strike, he said,--
“Ah, sir, have a care! have a care!”
The count cast upon him a look of concentrated hatred; but, regaining his self-control, he freed himself, and, pointing at the door, he said slowly,--
“M. Champcey, I order you to leave this house instantly; and I forbid your ever coming back to it again. My servants will be informed, that, if any one of them ever allows you to cross the threshold of this house, he will be instantly dismissed. Go, sir!”
