Like all residences where the owners receive much company, the Hotel de Montgeron had a double porte-cochere. Just as the Swiss opened the outer gate to allow the departure of Mademoiselle de Vermont, the two carriages crossed each other on the threshold. In fact, Henri had had hardly time to cross the courtyard to mount to his own apartments before his brother-in-law and his sister stopped him at the foot of the steps. He rejoined them to say good-night.
“Won’t you come and take a cup of tea with us in the little salon?” they asked.
“Willingly,” was his response. He followed them, and all three seated themselves beside a table which was already laid, and upon which the boiling water sang in the kettle.
“Leave us,” said the Duchess to the butler. “I will serve tea myself. Did Mademoiselle de Vermont bring you home?” she asked, when the servant had retired.
“Well,” said Henri, “in proposing to do so she mentioned my discreet age, which appeared to her to make the thing all right! If I had declined her invitation, I should have seemed to pose as a compromising person! That is the reason why I accepted.”
“You did quite right. What do you really think of her?”
“She is very different from what I had fancied her: I find her frank, intellectual, full of originality. I have only one fault to mention: she is too rich.”
“Well, surely, you do not expect her to ruin herself to please you.”
“I should think not! Besides, what would be the object?”
“To permit you to fall in love with her.”
“Oh, that is what you are thinking of, is it?”
“Certainly, for, if need be, perhaps you would make a sacrifice to your feelings.”
“In what way?”
“In the toleration of a few remaining millions which she might retain, so that when you marry her neither of you will be reduced to absolute beggary!”
“Marry her!—I?” cried the General, astonished.
“What is there to prevent your doing so?”
“The past, my dear sister. To speculate upon my title and my rank in order to make a wealthy marriage? To quit my nomad’s tent for a fixed residence other than that where the Prerolles have succeeded one another from generation to generation? Never! Of all our ancient prejudices, that is the only one I cherish. Besides, I am free at present to serve my country under any form of government which it may please her to adopt. But, with his hereditary estates lost, through his own fault, shall he who has nothing left to him but his name form a mere branch of another family? He has no right to do so.”
This declaration was categorical. Madame de Montgeron bent her head; her jesting vein was quenched in a moment.
After a moment of silence the Duke spoke.
“There are scruples that one does not discuss,” he said. “But, on the other hand, if I do not deceive myself, there are others which can be adjusted to suit circumstances.”
“What circumstances?” said the General.
“The subject is rather delicate—especially to mention before you, my dear Jeanne.”
“I was just about to propose that I should retire,” said the Duchess. “Good-night, Henri!” And she bent to kiss him.
“You are not vexed?” said her brother, embracing her tenderly.
“What an idea! Good-night!”
“Am I always to be considered as occupying the stool of repentance?” Henri inquired, as soon as his sister had left the room.
“Yes, but you will not be offended if I interrogate you a little, after the manner of a judge?” said the Duke.
“Quite the contrary. Go on; I will listen.”
“Had you not just now expressed yourself very distinctly in disfavor of any project of marriage because of perfectly unimpeachable principles, I should not permit myself to make any allusion to your private life. Every man is his own master in his choice of liaisons, and on that head is answerable only to his own conscience. In these days, moreover, art is on a level with birth, and talent with military glory. You see that I am quite modern in my ideas! However—”
“Ah, there is a reserve?”
“Without liability. Mademoiselle Gontier is surrounded by great luxury. She maintains an expensive house and keeps an open table. Her annual salary and her income can not possibly cover these expenses. Whence does she obtain further resources?”
“From the investments made for her by the Baron de Samoreau.”
“Without her having to pay a commission of any kind? A most remarkable case of disinterestedness!”
“I never have sought to examine the matter particularly,” said Henri.
“And is that the way you keep yourself informed? A future general-in-chief!”
“I was not aware that I am in an enemy’s country.”
“No, but you are in a conquered country, which is still more dangerous. Oh, no one will attack you face to face at the point of the sword. But behind your back, in the shadow, you have already massed against you various rejected swains, the Desvanneaux of the coulisses, jealous of a preference which wounds their own vanity, and the more ready to throw discredit—were they able—upon a man of your valor, because they are better armed against him with the logic of facts.”
“What logic, in heaven’s name?”
“That which emanates from the following dilemma: Either Danae is obliged to hide from Jupiter—or, rather, from Maecenas—her intimacy with you—and you are only a lover who simply loves her—or else Maecenas is an epicurean who has no objection to share his fortune philosophically; so that ostensibly you sit at the feast without paying the cost—which is worse yet.”
“Does any one dare to say that of me?” cried the General, springing from his chair.
“They are beginning to say it,” the Duke replied, his eyes fixed on his brother-in-law, who paced to and fro, gnawing his moustache. “I ask your pardon for throwing such a bucket of ice-water on you, but with men of your constitution—”
“Pleurisy is not mortal,” Henri interrupted briefly. “I know. Don’t worry about me.”
“I knew you would understand,” said the Duke, going toward the door of his own apartments. “That is the reason why I have not spared you a thorough ducking!”
“I thank you,” said the General, as he was about to leave the room. “I will talk to you about this tomorrow. The night brings counsel.”
Wrapped in thought, he made his way to the little suite of apartments between the ground floor and the first story which he occupied, and which had a separate door opening on the Rue de Bellechase.
At the foot of the stairs, in a coach-house which had been transformed into a chamber, slept the orderlies beneath the apartment of their chief. This apartment, composed of four rooms, was of the utmost simplicity, harmonizing with the poverty of its occupant, who made it a point of honor not to attempt to disguise his situation.
The ante-chamber formed a military bureau for the General and his chief orderly.
The salon, hung with draperies to simulate a tent, had no other decoration than some trophies of Arabian arms, souvenirs of raids upon rebellious tribes.
More primitive still was the bedroom, furnished with a simple canteen bed, as if it were put up in a temporary camp, soon to be abandoned.
The only room which suggested nothing of the anchorite was the dressing-room, furnished with all the comforts and conveniences necessary to an elegant and fastidious man of the world.
But his real luxury, which, by habit and by reason of his rank, the General had always maintained, was found among his horses, as he devoted to them all the available funds that could be spared from his salary. Hence the four box-stalls placed at his disposal in the stables of his brother-in-law were occupied by four animals of remarkably pure blood, whose pedigrees were inscribed in the French stud-book. Neither years, nor the hard service which their master had seen, had deteriorated any of his ability as a dashing horseman. His sober and active life having even enabled him to preserve a comparatively slender figure, he would have joined victoriously in the races, except that his height made his weight too heavy for that amusement.
Entering his own domain, still overwhelmed, with the shock of the revelations and the gossip of which he never had dreamed, he felt himself wounded to the quick in all those sentiments upon which his ‘amour propre’ had been most sensitive.
The more he pondered proudly over his pecuniary misfortunes, the more grave the situation appeared to him, and the more imperious the necessity of a rupture.
When it had been a question of dismissing Fanny Dorville, an actress of humble standing, his parting gift, a diamond worth twenty-five thousand francs, had seemed to him a sufficient indemnity to cancel all accounts.
But now, in the presence of an artiste of merit, who had given herself without calculation and who loved him for himself alone, how, without wounding her heart and her dignity, could he break violently a chain so light yesterday, so heavy to-day?
To indulge in tergiversation, to invent some subterfuge to cover his retreat—he did not feel himself capable of such a course; moreover, his manoeuvre would be quickly suspected by a clever woman whom nothing escaped.
To ask to be sent back to Africa, just at the time when his intelligent and practical instruction in the latest grand manoeuvres had drawn all eyes upon him, would compromise, by an untimely retirement, the advantages of this new office, the object of his ambition.
For the first time this nobleman, always prompt and radical in his decisions, found himself hesitating; and, such is the power of human egotism even in generous natures, he felt almost incensed against Eugenie, the involuntary cause of his hesitation.
After weighing everything carefully in his mind, he finally said to himself that an open confession, sincere and unrestricted, would be the best solution of the difficulty; and just as the first light of day came to dissipate the shadow that overcast his mind, when his orderly entered to open the blinds in his chamber, he formed a fixed resolution as to his course.
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