III
Madame had not moved since the moment when de Maurel's announcement that he intended to sleep at the Lodge that night had so completely staggered her that she felt momentarily dazed and quite unable to think. For a second or two it seemed to her as if her heart had completely ceased to beat, as if her body alone had remained sitting in the room there, while her spirit had fled on the wings of a nameless terror.
Ronnay de Maurel at the Lodge that night! What did that mean? How much did he know? What did he suspect? These were questions which went hammering through her brain while Leroux was finally cowed and dismissed. Now that she was once more alone with her son, it was obviously of the most vital importance that nothing in her attitude should betray the agitation which she felt. She had to make an almost superhuman effort to recover herself, to rise from her chair, and to steady her knees which were shaking under her. But all this she did, and even succeeded in saying, with every appearance of unconcern:
"I do think, my dear Ronnay, that you were unnecessarily harsh with the man. He is not a sympathetic personality I own, and, of course, he did very wrong in disobeying you; but now that we are alone, let me assure you that it is indeed my maid Marie whom he has been visiting of late. He knew that he had done wrong; your allusion to his own wife roused his surly temper, and undoubtedly he forgot himself. And now," she added glibly, "shall we forget this unpleasant incident? Fernande is in the garden. Shall we join her?"
"I thank you, Madame," he replied coldly, "but I must return home as soon as possible. My uncle cannot bear me out of his sight for very long, and there are many matters I must attend to before nightfall. An you will allow me to pay you my respects another time...."
"'Tis not much respect you have paid me to-day, my good Ronnay," rejoined Madame, who, indeed, by now was once again completely mistress of herself. "Why you should have dragged me into your quarrel with that creature I cannot imagine, and I ought to deal very severely with you for this want of consideration for me."
"I am sorry to have offended you, Madame, and fear me that I must do so again ere I go."
"'Twere not wise to do that, Ronnay," she retorted haughtily; "even a mother's indulgence hath its limits."
"I trust that I shall not be overstepping them, Madame, when I request you in all earnestness to refrain in future from any intercourse with my workpeople."
"Are you afraid that I might succeed in imbuing them with a spirit of loyalty to their King?"
"Whatever my motive, Madame, I earnestly pray you to follow my behests."
"You mean, your commands?"
"We'll call them that an you wish," he replied slowly.
"You forbid me to speak to your workpeople?"
"Absolutely."
"You are not over confident of their loyalty," she said, with a sardonic little laugh.
He made no reply. Madame's searching gaze was fixed upon him; she would have given worlds to divine his thoughts. On the whole, she felt reassured that he knew nothing of the vital issues which centred round the powder factory to-night. She was pretty certain that Leroux would try to see her again to-day—he had probably not left the château, and was waiting his opportunity to have speech with her as soon as de Maurel had gone. Something would have to be devised, something thought of, to meet the unlooked-for eventuality of de Maurel's presence at the factory to-night. But for this Madame required solitude and a calm view of the new situation. For the moment she was supremely conscious of the desire to be alone. Ronnay's presence now jarred well nigh unbearably on her nerves; the calm way in which he regarded her and dictated his will to her, with a certainty that she would obey, irritated her past endurance.
She turned away from him, for she did not choose to let him see how maddened she was, how thoroughly shaken was her usual haughty placidity. She walked deliberately to the window and turned her back on him, her aristocratic fingers beating a devil's tattoo against the panes.
"I'd best go now," suggested de Maurel, after a while, in that same awkward manner of his which seemed only to have dropped from him when he was dealing with Leroux.
"You are in your own house, my good Ronnay," rejoined Madame coldly, and without turning to look at him; "you have a perfect right to come and go as you please."
"Then am I your obedient servant," he said placidly.
Madame, from where she stood, could feel that his whole attitude was one of complete detachment. Her wrath and her scorn had no more effect on him than Leroux' threats of a while ago. She knew instinctively that he bowed and took his leave in that clumsy manner which she abhorred. Then she heard him moving across the room, opening the door, and finally shutting it behind him.
Even then she did not turn round. She remained standing beside the window, gazing out into the distance—seeing nothing and yet still gazing—her mind fixed upon the one great, all-absorbing puzzle. What was to happen to-night? She never moved, while her ears caught the sound of that firm, dragging step as it slowly died away in the distance. Then, when even its echo had ceased to reverberate through the silent house, she caught at the heavy curtain beside her, for suddenly in her whole body there was a relaxing of the tension on her nerves, and for the first time in her life Madame de Mortain felt ready to swoon. But even when she was all alone she would have scorned an unnecessary exhibition of weakness. A few seconds sufficed her to regain her self-control. She turned away from the window at last and sat down beside the heavy desk whereat she had so often penned enthusiastic reports to the Royalist agents. She drew pen and ink closer to her and sat thinking for a while. She had a mind to send a letter to de Puisaye—a runner might be found quick and clever enough to deliver it into the hands of the Chouan leader in the Cerf-Volant woods and to bring back his answer before nightfall.
In any case, before she wrote Madame was bent on seeing Leroux again. Leroux alone, she thought, would be able to cope with the situation as it now presented itself. Leroux was a man of resource, as his correspondence with Madame over the wall of the exercising ground had proved. He was not greatly troubled with scruples, and though he was by nature a coward, his temper, when roused, was apt to be both defiant and ugly.
Moreover, he was wilful, and would know how to act without any very explicit instructions, which Madame, in the absence of the chiefs, was not prepared to give him.
She put down her pen again, and pushing her chair away from the table, she rose with an impatient, nervy little sigh. Despite the warmth of this June afternoon she shivered, almost as if she felt cold.
Somewhere in the château a distant clock struck six.