“Oh! oh! oh!” ejaculated Wilkie, in three different tones. He knew what he had to expect from such a father as that. Anger now followed stupor—one of those terrible, white rages which stir the bile and not the blood. He saw his hopes and his cherished visions fade. Luxury and notoriety, high-stepping horses, yellow-haired mistresses, all vanished. He pictured himself reduced to a mere pittance, and held in check and domineered over by a brutal father. “Ah! I understand your game,” he hissed through his set teeth. “If you would only quietly assert your rights, everything could be arranged privately, and I should have time to put the property out of my father’s reach before he could claim it. Instead of doing that—as you hate me—you compel me to make the affair public, so that my father will hear of it and defraud me of everything. But you won’t play this trick on me. You are going to write at once, and make known your claim to your brother’s estate.”
“No.”
“Ah! you won’t? You refuse——” He approached threateningly, and caught hold of her arm. “Take care!” he vociferated; “take care! Do not infuriate me beyond endurance——”
As cold and rigid as marble, Madame d’Argeles faced him with the undaunted glance of a martyr whose spirit no violence can subdue. “You will obtain nothing from me,” she said, firmly; “nothing, nothing, nothing!”
Maddened with rage and disappointment, M. Wilkie dared to lift his hand as if about to strike her. But at this moment the door was flung open, and a man sprang upon him. It was Baron Trigault.
Like the other guests, the baron had seen the terrible effect produced upon Madame d’Argeles by a simple visiting card. But he had this advantage over the others: he thought he could divine and explain the reason of this sudden, seemingly incomprehensible terror. “The poor woman has been betrayed,” he thought; “her son is here!” Still, while the other players crowded around their hostess, he did not leave the card-table. He was sitting opposite M. de Coralth, and he had seen the dashing viscount start and change color. His suspicions were instantly aroused, and he wished to verify them. He therefore pretended to be more than ever absorbed in the cards, and swore lustily at the deserters who had broken up the game. “Come back, gentleman, come back,” he cried, angrily. “We are wasting precious time. While you have been trifling there, I might have gained—or lost—a hundred louis.”
He was nevertheless greatly alarmed, and the prolonged absence of Madame d’Argeles increased his fears each moment. At the end of an hour he could restrain himself no longer. So taking advantage of a heavy loss, he rose from the table, swearing that the beastly turmoil of a few moments before had changed the luck. Then passing into the adjoining drawing-room, he managed to make his escape unobserved. “Where is madame?” he inquired of the first servant he met.
“In the little sitting-room.”
“Alone?”
“No; a young gentleman is with her.”