If M. Fortunat’s chair had been a gridiron, heated by an excellent fire, he could not have felt more uncomfortable. After pouring out bumper after bumper for his guest, he perceived that he had gone too far, and that it would not be easy to check him. “And this letter?” he interrupted, at last.
“Well?”
“You promised to let me read it.”
“That’s true—that’s quite true; but it would be as well to have some mocha first, would it not? What if we ordered some mocha, eh?”
Coffee was served, and when the waiter had closed the door, M. Casimir drew the letter, the scraps of which were fixed together, from his pocket, and unfolded it, saying: “Attention; I’m going to read.”
This did not suit M. Fortunat’s fancy. He would infinitely have preferred perusing it himself; but it is impossible to argue with an intoxicated man, and so M. Casimir with a more and more indistinct enunciation read as follows: “‘Paris, October 14, 186—.’ So the lady lives in Paris, as usual. After this she puts neither ‘monsieur,’ nor ‘my friend,’ nor ‘dear count,’ nothing at all. She begins abruptly: ‘Once before, many years ago, I came to you as a suppliant. You were pitiless, and did not even deign to answer me. And yet, as I told you, I was on the verge of a terrible precipice; my brain was reeling, vertigo had seized hold of me. Deserted, I was wandering about Paris, homeless and penniless, and my child was starving!’”
M. Casimir paused to laugh. “That’s like all the rest of them,” he exclaimed; “that is exactly like all the rest! I’ve ten such letters in my drawer, even more imperative in their demands. If you’ll come home with me after breakfast, I’ll show them to you. We’ll have a hearty laugh over them!”
“Let us finish this first.”
“Of course.” And he resumed: “‘If I had been alone. I should not have hesitated. I was so wretched that death seemed a refuge to me. But what was to become of my child? Should I kill him, and destroy myself afterward? I thought of doing so, but I lacked the courage. And what I implored you in pity to give me, was rightfully mine. I had only to present myself at your house and demand it. Alas! I did not know that then. I believed myself bound by a solemn oath, and you inspired me with inexpressible terror. And still I could not see my child die of starvation before my very eyes. So I abandoned myself to my fate, and I have sunk so low that I have been obliged to separate from my son. He must not know the shame to which he owes his livelihood. And he is ignorant even of my existence.’”
M. Fortunat was as motionless as if he had been turned to stone. After the information he had obtained respecting the count’s past, and after the story told him by Madame Vantrasson, he could scarcely doubt. “This letter,” he thought, “can only be from Mademoiselle Hermine de Chalusse.”