“Well, for one thing,” returned Artamène pensively, “M. le Marquis had definitely forbidden either of us to go to Mirabel, whereas I . . . and my family . . . had certainly encouraged Roland’s expedition. Then the Marquis seemed to consider also that I had deceived him about Roland by merely telling him of his visit to those confounded cousins (which of course I did solely to shield Roland). In fact he characterised my conduct by a very unpleasant term which I am not going to repeat. (However, we have since made it up, Charlemagne and I.) And thirdly, to such of us as have seen them together, it is undeniable that between M. le Marquis and the Vicomte de Céligny there subsists——”
“Chut!” said the prudent Lucien, holding up a finger.
“Mais, au nom de Dieu, pourquoi chut?” demanded Artamène in a voice of injured innocence. “I was merely going to say that there subsisted between them a special affection, of which I, for one, am not in the least jealous. What is the harm in that remark?”
Nobody present either condemned or absolved him, but one or two who in the spring had seen the couple together turned away to hide a smile.
“I still cannot quite understand,” remarked Lucien judicially, “how this good fairy of a concierge came to be inhabiting Mirabel. I thought that the place was in the hands of the Directory, and surely their nominee——”
“We shall have to wait until the Abbé or M. de Brencourt returns to discover that,” said Artamène. “I gathered that M. le Marquis expects the latter any day now; it seems, from what the Abbé wrote, a foregone conclusion that he would succeed in escaping from the Temple.”
“How?” asked Lucien, his head almost in the procrastinating pot.
“Mainly by the use of the root of all evil, mon cher—in plainer language, by bribery. I thought you knew that.”
“And M. le Comte did not get the treasure from Mirabel?” asked a newcomer.
“No, the booty is left to the Church to secure. And, do you know, I shall stake my money on the Church’s success.”