Chapter Thirteen.
“Here must be some mistake.”
The two stood staring at the paper, which told so little and so much.
When M. Bourget glanced at last at Mme. de Beaudrillart, he pushed a chair towards her.
“Sit down, for Heaven’s sake, madame,” he said in a hoarse voice. “Here must be some mistake. Who gave you this?”
Insensibly and unintentionally his voice had become that of the accuser. She answered, mechanically:
“My son.”
“Do you think—” he glanced at her again and was silent. Both were silent. They could hear the cooing of the pigeons in the yard; presently a child’s shout of laughter rang out, and their eyes met. M. Bourget said, quickly: “There must be some explanation. Could it have been an accident? Monsieur Léon perhaps carelessly handed you the wrong paper!”
She shook her head; he pushed his question.
“Consider, madame. Such a mistake is not impossible. It was at a time when his thoughts were, perhaps, elsewhere. A young man just married hasn’t got his head so clear for business as on ordinary occasions. Or are you certain this is the envelope he gave you? If you were to search a little further?”
“That is the envelope,” said Mme. de Beaudrillart, firmly. “At the same time—”
“Yes, yes!” cried M. Bourget, leaning forward, impatiently.—“I think it not impossible that it was a—a little farce on his part, because I pressed him so much for the receipt. I believe,” she went on, her voice and figure regaining strength, “that Monsieur de Cadanet sent him no receipt, and that he gave this to quiet me.”
“Oh!” groaned M. Bourget. He stood gloomily regarding the safe. “How would it be possible that such a sum could be received without so much as an acknowledgment?”
She was silent. He put another question.
“Other letters must have passed; have you seen any of them?”
“No.”
“Nothing, madame, from Monsieur de Cadanet?”
“Since my husband’s death, nothing.”
“Was anything paid before Monsieur Léon’s marriage?”
“Five hundred francs.”
M. Bourget had a perfect recollection of this sum having been mentioned by Léon; he only put the question to see how the accounts agreed.
“Is there, perhaps, a receipt for this?”
“No,” returned Mme. de Beaudrillart. “I was vexed that Léon did not demand it, but he assured me it was impossible.”
“Impossible or not, it is a great misfortune,” murmured the ex-builder, in a gloomy tone.
She looked up with sudden fire in her eyes.
“You say so, monsieur, but you have no reason to link the two points together. This disgraceful attempt by Monsieur Lemaire may have nothing whatever to do with the repayment of Monsieur de Cadanet’s loan.”
M. Bourget rubbed his face with his hand, and glanced at her doubtfully.
“No, madame,” he said, at last; “but with its non-payment.”
Mme. de Beaudrillart rose with all the pride she could summon to the support of a trembling heart.
“No one, monsieur, shall insult Monsieur de Beaudrillart in his own house.”
“Do you think I would?” he returned, hurriedly. “You forget, madame, that we are all in one boat. But something there is which has to be unravelled before things can be set right, and if I work I must have materials to go upon. If this money was the repayment of a loan from Monsieur de Cadanet, some sort of acknowledgment must exist. That,”—he pointed to the envelope—“you see what that is.”
“It was my fault,” she said, firmly.
“Perhaps. That is neither here nor there. It is not what you thought it. That makes it the more likely that Monsieur Lemaire’s action has to do with it. But how? I’ve half a mind to go after them to Paris.”
“No,” said Mme. de Beaudrillart, shivering. “Do not. You mean well, I know, but you might make matters worse by interfering. The fewer who are mixed up in it the better.”
“Maybe, madame; though that would not hinder me if only I had a lawyer’s brains to ferret out things. But that’s not my way. Give me a straight bit of work that requires no talking, and I’m your man; but as for hunting up and down in by-ways and back-stairs—well, if I attempted it, there would be blunders. There must be lots of the sort in Paris, though.”
“If it comes to that!”
M. Bourget stood regarding her.
“What does Monsieur Léon say?” he demanded, abruptly.
“He has tried to see this Lemaire, but he refuses to communicate except through a lawyer. It looks as if he could not face him.”
“Impossible to trust to that, madame,” said M. Bourget, with gloom. “The worst liars I ever met looked me straight in the face when they lied. Is Baron Léon going to take action himself!”
“He speaks of having a case for libel. Apparently, Monsieur Lemaire merely reiterates his demand without offering proof.”
“He is keeping his proof,” interjected the ex-builder.
“And Léon thinks that when he finds the money is not forthcoming, he will revenge himself by talking, unless he is threatened with an action.”
“Perhaps it is not a bad plan to see whether it is possible to shut his mouth. Monsieur Léon is the best judge.”
M. Bourget said this reflectively. Mme. de Beaudrillart, looking here and there with the instinct of an animal whose young are attacked, quivered.
“Are you supposing, monsieur, that my son would stoop to bribe?”
“It would not answer. It never does,” he answered, disregarding her indignation; “otherwise, get the fellow to accept a sum, and you have him. He could not move afterwards, because he would have put himself within reach of the law. He could not even blab, because he calls himself a gentleman.” He glanced at Mme. de Beaudrillart, and stopped suddenly. She had drawn a step nearer to him; all her features were sharpened, her voice harsh.
“Do you know what you are saying?” she cried. “To do this would be to acknowledge himself guilty! And you suggest it to me—his mother!”
“Come come, madame,” said M. Bourget, reasonably, “you forget that I also am his father-in-law, and anything which would put an extinguisher on the business without setting the world’s tongues wagging is worth discussion. However, Monsieur Léon, who knows the ins and outs of it all, as you and I don’t, may have some better plan in his head, and I suppose there are honest lawyers to be met with, even in Paris. As I said, too, he has Nathalie at his elbow. Who is his lawyer? Monsieur Rodoin?”
“Yes. Oh, if only I were there!” exclaimed Mme. de Beaudrillart, beginning to walk up and down the room.
M. Bourget conceived it prudent to take no notice of this desire; for privately he thought it as well that her rigid notions of honour, which he admired immensely but considered unpractical, should be replaced by Nathalie’s excellent sense. The discovery of the blank envelope had affected him very disagreeably. If there had been nothing in the shape of a receipt he would have put down the want to carelessness, or some overstrained idea which was pardonable in a Beaudrillart. But the empty enclosure pointed to deceit. For some reason or other Léon had hoodwinked his mother, and M. Bourget was convinced not only that the money had never been repaid, but that this movement on the part of Lemaire was but the sequel to a dark story. Rumours of the Baron Léon’s proceedings in Paris, which he had chosen to ignore when he gave him his daughter, came back to him now with terrible insistence. If the present overhanging disgrace reached the ears of those intimates at Tours whom he had pelted with boasts, could he ever hold up his head again? He shuddered. Wrong or right, honour or dishonour, if a bribe could have stopped the accuser’s mouth, M. Bourget would have urged its payment.
As for Mme. de Beaudrillart, she, too, was shaken. Passionately to proclaim her belief in her son was only the weapon caught up by a wounded heart with which to defend itself. She had covered them with tenderest excuses, but she knew, in that deeper consciousness where she dared not penetrate, that Léon had committed a thousand follies in those old days which she had hoped were buried. Alas, sin is an unquiet ghost. It walks.
In her heart she cried out against God’s justice. What! Could not those changed years atone? Could not her prayers, Félicie’s devotions, gain grace! Were the faults of his youth to meet him now—now when he was living a blameless life; now when he was the father of an innocent boy? Nathalie she passed over. To her it might be a grief, but she would not feel the pang of a dishonoured name, that, worse than death itself, would hang round Raoul’s neck all his life long. She hated M. Bourget, blaming her own triumphant assurance which allowed him to assist in her search for the papers. If she had gone alone, if that incident of the empty envelope had not come to his knowledge, she could have braved it out by taking the blame on herself. She even distrusted him, not understanding that though differing in form, in degree her pride in Poissy was equalled by his. And yet, she was so terribly alone, and this man knew! Before she realised what she was about, she had faltered an entreaty to him for silence, and was met by an uncomprehending stare. She bowed her head.
“What I mean, monsieur, is that it may do mischief to speak of this affair before my son has stopped it.”
“I speak of it!” cried M. Bourget, irritably. “You don’t seem to understand that I would give ten years of my life to be certain that it would never set tongues wagging! I, madame! What do you take me for? I! Shall you gossip yourself?”
Fear had shaken her. She murmured that he was not one of the family. His wave of the hand had a dignity she had never seen in him before.
“Do I claim to be? But my daughter, madame, is as much a Beaudrillart as yourself, and my grandson more than either. Our interests are identical.”
Under the shock of these words Mme. de Beaudrillart revived.
“Be it so, monsieur,” she said. “It appears to me that for the present we must wait until we know more. If we move, we may only cause mischief, and I would beg of you to give up any idea of going to Paris. I believe that matters will arrange themselves. You have of course breakfasted?”
He had left his house at a moment’s notice, and began to feel the need of food. Mme. de Beaudrillart rang, and gave orders for it to be spread in the dining-room at once, requesting further that Mlle. Claire might be sent for. She felt the need of support, and yet dreaded lest Claire’s sharp tongue might exasperate this man, who already began to represent h power. She need not have feared. M. Bourget felt little of, and cared for less, the prickly darts which Mlle. Claire let fly. He enraged her by his indifference, but in the middle of his hearty meal on red-legged partridges, he demanded Raoul, and though she would have made some excuse, her mother gave a peremptory order that he should be found. When he arrived, Mme. de Beaudrillart wondered that she had not thought before of taking refuge in his chatter.
Still, it had its awkwardnesses. He was bent upon showing his grandfather everything. Had he seen this, had he seen that! Why was it that he did not come oftener to Poissy? Would he come to the river directly? Mamma had made him promise not to go there by himself; but she would not mind if bon père took him.
“Do not be tiresome, Raoul!” said his aunt, sharply. M. Bourget opened his eyes at the idea.
“Pardon, mademoiselle; you do not know, then, that we are very good friends, my grandson and I. With your permission, since he wishes it, I will go with him to the river—”
“And catch fish. Can you catch fish, bon père?” interrupted Raoul.
“Here and there, my prince. But as I was saying, madame, if you will allow Jean to go to bring this young gentleman home, I will return to Tours by the river.”
“You will not walk, monsieur?” said Mme. de Beaudrillart. “There is Nathalie’s carriage doing nothing; pray allow me to order it.”
“No, no, madame. I thank Heaven I am yet strong on my legs, and can walk as well as any of them. The mayor himself would be sorry to engage me in a match, although he prides himself on his powers. Raoul takes after me, as I have told his mother more than once.”
Claire, who had expected her mother to make objections, especially after this insolent assumption that in any point Raoul could resemble the ex-builder, was amazed to find that his wishes were to be carried out. She said so when he had gone.
“Really, mamma, considering how much Raoul is allowed to be with him when Nathalie is at home, we might have kept the child out of his influence in the few days he is left to us!”
“Hush, Claire, you do not know!” exclaimed her mother, feverishly. “The man is terrible, but so far he means well, and it would never do to affront him at this moment.”
Claire shrugged her thin shoulders.
“Léon has had difficulties before now, and has got through them,” she remarked. “The whole affair seems to me so inconceivable that I am inclined to believe Nathalie is persuading Léon to exaggerate it, in order that she may gain a longer time in Paris. I should be capable of doing the same myself, I own.”
She laughed, and an hour or two ago Mme. de Beaudrillart might have admitted the likelihood of such a motive. But M. Bourget’s visit, and the dreadful possibilities suggested by the blank envelope, had left her ten times as uneasy as before. She shook her head and sighed.
“It is serious. More serious than I thought.”
“You have been listening to that man. I shall never forgive Nathalie for inflicting him upon us. And to hear him talking to Raoul as if the child was his! Of course he has made the most of this affair, if only because it would be such delight to him to humble us.”
“No,” said her mother, firmly, “there you are wrong. He identifies himself with us.”
Claire laughed again, this time contemptuously.
“How could you endure it? It seems to me that no misfortune could be so terrible. Really, Félicie’s idea of the cotton-wool was brilliant, only I imagine it will not do for us all to be seized with deafness. Do you suppose that he employs his time with Raoul in teaching the boy how to economise with his pence? Rose-Marie says his driver was forced to come here like a whirlwind, and got six sous for his pains.” But Mme. de Beaudrillart, to whom, great lady as she was, such details were intensely interesting, scarcely heard the words. Fear of something unknown, something overwhelming, because it had to do with Léon, and Léon’s honour, was shaking her. Personal danger would have found her calm, and the crash of misfortune; this was different. Little fears, little uneasinesses, forgotten as soon as their light touch was removed, trooped forth again, and dared her to ignore them now. Haunting dread lay in the thought that truth might, after all, lie in this accusation, at first scouted with scorn. Léon had never confided in her as to the process by which he was disentangled from his difficulties six years ago, had never said much about M. de Cadanet; had suddenly buried himself at Poissy; had shunned Paris, had evaded her desire to assist in the repayment of the debt; had finally, when pressed, deceived her by passing off an empty envelope as the receipt which he wished her to believe he held in his possession. Each fact might be trifling in itself, but heralding, as they had done, the storm which had burst, they became terribly significant. It was the collapse of faith in her son, the sudden admittance of a frightful doubt, before which her proud spirit quailed. If Léon had done this thing! If the net closing round him were, after all, the strong net of justice, implacable and unpitying—before such a dread she became helpless. Then she recalled his evident uneasiness at the charge—nay, further behind, the fits of depression—so opposed to his light spirit, which had now and then seized him without apparent cause during past years. As she looked back, accusing fingers seemed to start and point, phantom voices cried, “He did it! he did it!” She even believed she heard his father’s voice demanding an account from her of the honour of his son, more—the honour of Poissy, bound up as it was in this De Beaudrillart. It was only by a supreme effort that she forced herself into quietude. The horrible intuition in her heart might, after all, be false. Léon might be able to clear himself, the next letter might bring news to shame her for her want of confidence.
Rigid and white, Mme. de Beaudrillart went about the house through the day, and with steady fingers fashioned some of Félicie’s staring pink roses. But any one who had looked into her room that night would have seen a heaped-up figure lying, still dressed, outside the bed, and heard the stifled cry of a sorely smitten woman, “Léon, Léon!”