“No,” he uttered, “Costeclar is not the man to trouble himself about the ridiculous caprices of a little girl. There is something else. But what is it? Come, if you know it, any of you, if you suspect it even, speak, say it. You must see that I am in a state of fearful anxiety.”
It was the first time that he thus allowed something to appear of what was passing within him, the first time that he ever complained.
“M. Costeclar alone, father, can give you the explanation you ask of us,” said Mlle. Gilberte.
The cashier of the Mutual Credit shook his head. “Do you suppose, then, that I have not questioned him? I found his letter this morning at the office. At once I ran to his apartments, Rue Vivienne. He had just gone out; and it is in vain that I called for him at Jottras’, and at the office of ‘The Financial Pilot.’ I found him at last at the bourse, after running three hours. But I could only get from him evasive answers and vague explanations. Of course he did not fail to say, that, if he does withdraw, it is because he despairs of ever succeeding in pleasing Gilberte. But it isn’t so: I know it; I am sure of it; I read it in his eyes. Twice his lips moved as if he were about to confess all; and then he said nothing. And the more I insisted, the more he seemed ill at ease, embarrassed, uneasy, troubled, the more he appeared to me like a man who has been threatened, and dares not brave the threat.”
He directed upon his children one of those obstinate looks which search the inmost depths of the conscience.
“If you have done any thing to drive him off,” he resumed, “confess it frankly, and I swear I will not reproach you.”
“We did not.”
“You did not threaten him?”
“No!”
M. Favoral seemed appalled.