Chapter Eighteen.
A Different Standpoint.
In his present mood Léon would have avoided any visitor, and M. Georges perhaps most of all; for to go over the estates, point out improvements and changes, and listen to the cautious encouraging admiration of his guest was almost unendurable. He had fallen upon him by chance, running down the stairs from his mother’s room just as a parley with M. Georges was being held at the door, and the kindliness of his nature prevented him from shaking him off, as he longed to do. But he hailed his sister as a means of escape, and though it was contrary to all etiquette to leave her to entertain him unassisted, this was an hour of anguish, in which everything not immediately connected with the matter in hand sank to insignificance. To Claire, too, under the exhaustion of her passion and her fears, the sight of M. Georges’s quiet, every-day respectful face gave an immediate and pleasurable sense of repose; and she was not sorry to second her brother when he explained that Mme. de Beaudrillart was ailing, that he himself had a pressing engagement, and that therefore he would ask his sister to go over the place, and show M. Georges anything that he would like to see.
“Mademoiselle will indeed do me too much honour,” murmured M. Georges, blushing, and clasping his straw hat and bowing to the ground. “If it is an inconvenience, permit me to choose some other time.”
“No, no!” cried Léon, hastily but kindly, for his heart had always reproached him with his treatment of his intendant, “you have had a long walk, and must certainly see what you came to see. Claire, be sure to show Monsieur Georges the new presses and the rick-yard.”
He waved his hand and went away. M. Georges, who was gazing after him, ventured to remark that monsieur le baron did not look so well as he had hoped to find him.
“No,” said Claire, abruptly; “he has his troubles. Who has not?”
“Ah, mademoiselle,” said M. Georges, simply, “I hoped that the troubles of Poissy were over.”
Mlle. de Beaudrillart, too, was altered. To him, she had been less dignified than to others, finding some sort of expansion in speaking to a man who, with all his indecision, was intelligent and had ideas. To-day she struck him as sharper and more angular; but he had always nursed a respectful admiration for Mlle. de Beaudrillart, who had often protected him from her mother’s criticisms. In the course of their walk round the estate he more than once suggested that he feared he was taking her from other occupations, to which she merely shook her head. Once he made an unfortunate allusion.
“Ah, here is the wall which has been strengthened, of which Monsieur Bourget was telling me the other day. He is a marvellous man, Monsieur Bourget!”
“Oh, do not talk of him!” said Claire, impatiently.
“No?” Little M. Georges glanced at her with nervousness. “Possibly one may admit that occasionally he expresses himself with too much force; but he is solid, and knows what he is speaking about.” He added, conscience demanding the tribute: “And he is devoted to his family.” They were advancing towards the château when he stopped, and said, supplicatingly, “Would mademoiselle permit me to beg for one favour? I have never had the honour of seeing Monsieur Raoul.”
The homage in his tone soothed poor Claire’s wounded spirit. She exclaimed, impulsively:
“Ah, Monsieur Georges, you served my brother very faithfully! I wish he still had such a good friend by his side!”
“You do me too much honour, mademoiselle,” he said, much touched; “the more so, because I have always been painfully aware of my own deficiencies at a critical time, and I have seen for myself to-day that Monsieur de Beaudrillart has done better without me. And I do not doubt that he has an excellent adviser in his wife.”
“In his wife? Oh no; she does not understand the exigencies of the family, and how should she? She looks at everything from a totally different standpoint to ours. But there she is, and Raoul with her.”
They were standing on the small stone balcony which clung to the wall outside Nathalie’s room, feeding the pigeons in the court, and, at Claire’s call, came down the steps and across the sun-smitten court. M. Georges, who had never seen her since her marriage, stared amazedly at this pale, noble-looking woman, with dark circles round her eyes, and the shadow of a great trouble resting upon her. He swept the ground with his hat, as Raoul marched up, put his hand into that of the visitor, and said, with sturdy precision: “How do you do, Monsieur Georges?” Mme. Léon also put out her hand.
“Léon desired me to tell you,” she said, turning to her sister-in-law, “that Félicie has coffee ready, and he hopes that Monsieur Georges will have that or anything else he may prefer.”
“Of course,” said Claire, shortly. “Are you coming?”
“No, Léon wants me. Good-bye, Monsieur Georges. If you see my father, will you beg him to come and see us?” She moved away, and he stared, open-mouthed, after her. There was a tender dignity in her face, a composure in her manner, which, after all he had heard, left him amazed. And, though his perceptions were slow, he read in her eyes that she was a very sorrowful woman. What could threaten Poissy? What had humbled Mlle. Claire? Even Félicie, whom they found with the coffee, had red and swollen eyes, although she brightened and became enthusiastic in her descriptions of the preparations for monseigneur, and of all that she and the Abbé Nisard had to organise. She even ran to fetch some of her cherished decorations, and when it appeared that a yard or two of coloured calico was wanting, and M. Georges offered to procure it in Tours, her little inexpressive face became radiant.
“Would you really be so kind? We should be most grateful, for I did not know where to turn, and to have failed in the effect just on account of two or three yards of stuff would have been too dreadful! Is it possible that you have never heard monseigneur preach! How much you would be edified! Instead of going to those terrible clubs where the Church is shut out, and the most dreadful doctrines are taught, you must come here and listen to him. You must indeed!”
M. Georges, whose talk at clubs had been always most innocent, was highly gratified.
“Mademoiselle is only too good,” he reiterated. “If I might be permitted—”
“But certainly,” cried Félicie, enchanted at a possible convert. “Monseigneur arrives on Monday—the day after to-morrow—and the function will be on Tuesday.”
“Félicie,” said her sister, warningly, “it is possible that we may not be able to receive monseigneur.”
Félicie nodded her head in full confidence.
“Ah, but I have spoken to Léon, and he wishes no change to be made; but everything to go on as was settled.”
“Perhaps—” hesitated M. Georges, “if Madame Léon wishes to see her father, Monsieur Bourget and I might come out together?”
“Monsieur Bourget!” Félicie was aghast. “Oh, for pity’s sake, do not bring him here! I am convinced that he is both a republican and a freethinker. He is really too dreadful! I believe he would be capable of shocking the bishop, and saying something insulting to the Church. Pray, pray, Monsieur Georges!”
“For all our sakes, I think you may forget that message,” said Claire, significantly.
But M. Georges could not so soon put aside his recollection of Mme. Léon’s earnest face and the sad sorrow in her eyes. After he got back to Tours, he was going in pursuit of M. Bourget, when he met him in the street, and uttered some little jest about the reversal of their positions.
“It is I who have now returned from Poissy,” he said, smiling.
“Well?”
The word shot out so sharply that it startled the hearer.
“The visit was exceedingly gratifying to me,” he returned, “although Monsieur de Beaudrillart was unfortunately a good deal occupied. But his sister kindly showed me the improvements, and it afforded me immense pleasure to see your grandson—and Madame Léon,” he added.
M. Bourget’s face softened.
“Did—did she say anything?” he demanded.
“She desired me to beg you to come out.”
“She wants me—eh?” Her father’s chin drooped on his chest, but he straightened himself by an effort, and inquired if she were well. M. Georges hesitated.
“To tell you the truth, I am afraid some bad news had reached the family. Nothing was said, but you know how an impression fixes itself upon the mind. Still, I may be mistaken. Mademoiselle Félicie, who is very amiable, appeared much interested in a visit which the bishop is to pay them on Monday. It is astonishing how much she contrives to do for the Church!”
M. Bourget paid no attention to his words, and when they had parted, M. Georges reflected that there had been a good deal of exaggeration in what Leroux and others had told him about the ex-builder’s mania on the subject of Poissy. Instead of descanting on the theme by the hour, as his victims represented, he had been as curt and silent as if the very name of the place were repugnant, and M. Georges, whose honest fealty had all come back that afternoon, made up his mind that jealousy probably lay at the bottom of the reports which had come to his ears. He walked away extremely well satisfied with himself, recalling Mlle. de Beaudrillart’s unusual condescension, and giving himself immense pains to match the coloured calico and despatch it.
On Sunday afternoon M. Bourget, in his Sunday clothes, with a stick. And very conspicuous watch-chain festooned with seals in front, presented himself at the château and demanded his daughter. He was shown to her room, and there had to wait for some time, as Mme. Léon was in the grounds with her husband. When she came at last, she advanced quickly to meet him, but stopped, checked by the gloom in his face.
“You see,” he said, briefly.
She moved forward then; her eyes softened with a divine pity.
“Yes,” she said, quietly.
“And what is he going to do, this rascal of a husband of yours?”
Her face flushed swiftly. “You must not speak of him like that.”
“Why, what else is he? Didn’t he take the money?”
“Yes, he took it. There he sinned. But he wrote to Monsieur de Cadanet by that day’s post, and told him what he had done, and promised to repay it—as he did.”
M. Bourget groaned. “And you believe this story! I’ve been thinking, Nathalie, as I came along, and there’s nothing for it but money, money. The amount must be raised, the saints know how! but somehow, and the black business hushed up. It’s the only thing to be done for the boy—for all of us; and the quicker the better. Look here, I must see your husband. I’ll keep my hands off him, if I can, but that letter will have to be written to-day.” He groaned again. “It will leave me a beggar. Oh, the villain, to have brought his good name to this!”
Nathalie’s face was white; but her eyes shone, and she confronted her father bravely.
“And you would drag it in the dust! You would make him own to what he never did! Raoul’s father! Oh, shame, father, shame! I sent for you because I knew you were an honest man, and I believed you would counsel my poor Léon honestly. This is not honesty, and you shall not see him—you shall not disgrace yourself and me.”
He flung angry glances at her.
“Mighty fine!” he said, ironically. “Pray, what better plan have you for keeping him out of prison?”
The light faded from her eyes, she locked her hands tightly one in the other, and was silent. He repeated, tauntingly,—
“Come, now, what?”
Thus cruelly pressed, her lips parted, she gasped rather than spoke the one word: “None.”
M. Bourget was too angry for pity. “Perhaps you would like to put him there?”
Silence.
“Don’t deceive yourself, my girl. If you don’t pay, that is where he goes.”
Her voice had come back to her.
“I cannot help it. He must tell the truth.”
He started to his feet with a violent exclamation of rage.
“So you have no consideration for me? How can I ever show my face again in Tours? And Raoul! You mean him to grow up to be pointed at as the son of a man who has been in prison, all for the sake of a story which is only another lie! Yes, a lie! Do you tell me you believe it?”
“I know it.”
“Then you are a fool!” he cried, fiercely. “You will be telling me next that you still care for him.”
“Ah, do I not!” she cried, her steadfast eyes shining.
“Will you let me see him?” he exclaimed, imperiously.
“No; I will not. He wants help, and you will not help him.”
He marched to the door in a rage, but came back again, and stood with his great hands resting on the table, palms downward.
“You are a woman, a foolish woman, and talk of things you don’t understand. You suppose that no one will have the heart to hurt your dear Léon; and that when they hear that fine story of his, judge and jury will be so much impressed that it will require no more to make them acquit him. A baron, the Baron de Beaudrillart, the master of Poissy, one of the oldest names in the country—you flatter yourself, no doubt, that all this will prepossess them in his favour, to say nothing of a weeping wife, clasping her hands and crying, ‘Gentlemen, gentlemen, for the love of Heaven!’ You know nothing at all, my girl. Baron, and Beaudrillart, and Poissy, and descent—all this grandeur—is exactly what will tell against him. In these days it is a fine thing for a miserable little tallow-chandler, or a creature like Leroux, to sit in the jury-box, and feel, ‘Now it is my turn. Down with these seigneurs and their accursed pride!’ If he were an upstart of a washer-woman’s son, picked out of the gutter, he would have a chance, but as it is,”—he stopped and blew out a whiff of air—“there! That is what his is worth! And as for the love of Heaven—peste! few of them will think twice of that.”
Till these last words, Nathalie had bent her head before the pitiless storm. Now she raised it confidently.
“Yet it will not fail us,” she said. “If Léon does what is right, I do not fear.”
His anger was on the point of overpowering him, but he mastered it by a great effort so far as to mutter:
“Perhaps it is as well I should not see your husband, lest I should lose patience. But you had better let him hear my opinion. He can send in and let me know, if it isn’t too late.”
“Will you not have the carriage?”
He refused curtly, and, without listening to the words with which she tried to thank him, took himself out of the room, down the stairs, and out into the broad sweep. Poissy had never looked more beautiful. It was one of those grey, languorous days in which thunder threatens, and the dark, rich tones of a cloudy sky threw the mellow stone-work and its delicate ornamentation into high relief. The court side was the more picturesque and broken, but the noble simplicity of the lines of the front had always powerfully affected M. Bourget, and he was ready to vow that nothing could exceed the grace of the chimneys or the fine proportion of the windows. And now, as he looked, the pride with which he had dwelt upon it broke forth in an angry snort, which was really a groan. Unfortunately for himself, Jean Charpentier was on his way round the house. It was very well known in the household how the father of Mme. Léon was regarded by Mme. de Beaudrillart and her daughters, and Jean held, if possible, yet stouter aristocratic opinions. The sight, therefore, of M. Bourget’s square and sturdy figure, planted on the drive, and tragically gesticulating, stretched his face into a broad grin, which he took no pains to hide. In a moment he found himself in the clutch of the avenger. M. Bourget, gripping his collar, rained down blows upon him with his cane until he roared for mercy, and the ex-builder, wrathfully sending him staggering, expressed a hope that the castigation would have a good and much-needed effect upon his manners.
At any rate, this little incident had a soothing influence upon M. Bourget. It made him hot, but it restored his sense of power, and he went on his way home with a feeling that his visit had not been all in vain. Jean ran into the house, smarting for revenge, but it was an unlucky day for him, as the first person he fell upon was his father. Jacques listened to the tale, spluttered out between threats of vengeance, and when it was ended took his son by the ear.
“I’ll wager you’ve had no more than you earned; and see here, if you talk about it, you’ll come in for another dose. Ay, you’d best look out. Let me catch you venturing to be insolent to Madame Léon or her father!” And as Jean went off in wholesome dread of threats which he knew his father too well to doubt would be carried out, Jacques remained looking doubtfully at the ground and scratching his head. “There’s trouble in the air, and I’m fearful it has to do with Monsieur Léon,” he reflected. “Madame has eaten next to nothing these two days, and as for Madame Léon, she is a ghost. It must be serious, for I’ve seen nothing like it since Monsieur Léon married; and if it’s an old story wakening up, why, all the worse! Monsieur Bourget, too; he will have been put out about something to give Jean a thrashing, and to go without so much as seeing Monsieur Raoul. A bad sign—a very bad sign.”
And Jacques went off mournfully to the gardens.