"Do you mean it? Is it true? You will let me stay with them? I shall be Aline to you and still be Grandmamma to all our children? Oh! then," said the dear creature, beaming with joy and radiance, "then here is my picture, I give it to you. And, with it, all my heart, and forever."
XVIII.
THE JENKINS PEARLS.
About a week after his adventure with Moëssard,—a new complication in his sadly muddled affairs,—Jansoulet, on leaving the Chamber one Thursday, ordered his coachman to drive him to the hôtel de Mora. He had not been there since the fracas on Rue Royale, and the idea of appearing before the duke caused something of the same panicky sensation beneath his tough epidermis that a schoolboy feels on being summoned before the master after a scuffle in the class-room. However, it was necessary to submit to the embarrassment of that first interview. It was currently reported in the committee rooms that Le Merquier had completed his report, a masterpiece of logic and ferocity, recommending that Jansoulet be unseated, and that he was certain to carry his point off-hand unless Mora, whose power in the Assembly was so great, should himself issue contrary orders. A serious crisis, as will be seen, and one that caused his cheeks to burn with fever as he studied the expression of his features and his courtier-like smiles in the bevelled mirrors of his coupé, striving to prepare an adroit entry into the presence,—one of his masterstrokes of amiable impudence which had served him so well with Ahmed and thus far with the French statesman,—the whole accompanied by a rapid beating of the heart and the shivering sensation between the shoulders which precedes decisive steps, even when taken in a carriage with gilded panels.
When he reached the mansion on the river bank, he was greatly surprised to see that the footman on the quay, as on the days of great receptions, ordered the carriages to turn into Rue de Lille in order to leave one gateway free for exit. He said to himself, a little disturbed in mind: "What is going on?" Perhaps a concert given by the duchess, a charity bazaar, or some festivity from which Mora had left him out because of the scandal caused by his last adventure. And his anxiety augmented when, after crossing the court of honor amid the tumult of slamming carriage-doors and a constant, dull rumbling on the gravel, he had ascended the steps and found himself in the vast reception-room filled to overflowing with a great throng who were allowed to pass none of the inner doors, but whose anxious steps centred about the table of the servant in attendance, where all the famous names of aristocratic Paris were being inscribed. It seemed as if a sudden blast of disaster had passed through the house, swept away something of its superb tranquillity and allowed unrest and danger to creep into its well-being.
"What a misfortune!"
"Ah! yes, it is terrible."
"And so sudden!"