The shock had been violent enough to deprive Buvat of all wish for sleep, and even to convince him that he should sleep badly that night; but he reflected that in sitting up he should force Bathilde to sit up, and should see her in the morning with red eyes and pale cheeks, and, with his usual sacrifice of self, he told Bathilde that she was right—that he felt that sleep would do him good—lit his candle—kissed her forehead—and went up to his own room; not without stopping two or three times on the staircase to hear if there was any noise.
Left alone, Bathilde listened to the steps of Buvat, who went up into his own room; then she heard the creaking of his door, which he double locked; then, almost as trembling as Buvat himself, she ran to the window, forgetting even to pray.
She remained thus for nearly an hour, but without having kept any measure of time. Then she gave a cry of joy, for through the window, which no curtain now obscured, she saw her neighbor's door open, and D'Harmental enter with a candle in his hand.
By a miracle of foresight Bathilde had been right—the man in the felt hat and the cloak, who had protected Buvat, was really the young stranger, for the stranger had on a felt hat and a cloak; and moreover, hardly had he returned and shut the door, with almost as much care as Buvat had his, and thrown his cloak on a chair, than she saw that he had a tight coat of a dark color, and in his belt a sword and pistols. There was no longer any doubt: it was from head to foot the description given by Buvat. Bathilde was the more able to assure herself of this, that D'Harmental, without taking off any of his attire, took two or three turns in his room, his arms crossed, and thinking deeply; then he took his pistols from his belt, assured himself that they were primed, and placed them on the table near his bed, unclasped his sword, took it half out of the scabbard, replaced it, and put it under his pillow; then, shaking his head, as if to shake out the somber ideas that annoyed him, he approached the window, opened it, and gazed earnestly at that of the young girl, who, forgetting that she could not be seen, stepped back, and let the curtain fall before her, as if the darkness which surrounded her were not a sufficient screen.
She remained thus motionless and silent, her hand on her heart, as if to still its beatings; then she quietly raised the curtain, but that of her neighbor was down, and she saw nothing but his shadow passing and repassing before it.
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE CONSUL DUILIUS.
The morning following the day, or rather the night, on which the events we have just related had occurred, the Duc d'Orleans, who had returned to the Palais Royal without accident, after having slept all night as usual, passed into his study at his accustomed hour—that is to say, about eleven o'clock. Thanks to the sang-froid with which nature had blessed him, and which he owed chiefly to his great courage, to his disdain for danger, and his carelessness of death, not only was it impossible to observe in him any change from his ordinary calm, which ennui only turned to gloom, but he had most probably already forgotten the strange event of which he had so nearly been the victim.
The study into which he had just entered was remarkable as belonging to a man at once a savant, a politician, and an artist. Thus a large table covered with a green cloth, and loaded with papers, inkstand, and pens, occupied the middle of the room; but all round, on desks, on easels, on stands, were an opera commenced, a half-finished drawing, a chemical retort, etc. The regent, with a strange versatility of mind, passed in an instant from the deepest problems of politics to the most capricious fancies of painting, and from the most delicate calculations of chemistry to the somber or joyous inspirations of music. The regent feared nothing but ennui, that enemy against whom he struggled unceasingly, without ever quite succeeding in conquering it, and which, repulsed by work, study, or pleasure, yet remained in sight—if one may say so—like one of those clouds on the horizon, toward which, even in the finest days, the pilot involuntarily turns his eyes. The regent was never unoccupied, and had the most opposite amusements always at hand.
On entering his study, where the council were to meet in two hours, he went toward an unfinished drawing, representing a scene from "Daphnis and Chloe," and returned to the work, interrupted two days before by that famous game of tennis, which had commenced by a racket blow, and finished by the supper at Madame de Sabran's.