"Well, I know he has," answered the Marchioness. "But, however, his fault will all be done away with by the marriage, and so there is no use of saying too much about it."
"Ay, but I must say something," answered Monsieur de Liancourt. "However, go and make your preparations, for it is now past ten; and, immediately after the marriage, I will see Helen de la Tremblade myself, and inquire into the whole case, that I may break the tidings to poor father Walter.--'Tis very odd that she should become such as you represent, for she was as sweet and gentle a girl as ever I saw."
Madame de Chazeul left him without reply and entered her bed-room, while the Count retired by the other door. But, ere she reached the dressing-table, she paused twice; and at length, after a few moments' meditation, murmured to herself, "No, that must be prevented."
CHAPTER XXXIX.
When Madame de Chazeul entered the bed-room, she found the two maids busily engaged in ornamenting a dress, which she had ordered them to prepare against the marriage. It mingled, in a somewhat strange manner, the colours of mourning and rejoicing; and the two girls were tittering at some observations made by the page, who stood looking over their work, and who had just said, "Why, if Madam put on that, she will look like an old magpie." The boy's face was perfectly grave, but the maids could not recover a demure look quite so easily; and Madame de Chazeul, who was herself in deep and stern thoughts, gave them a fierce glance, saying, "What are the fools laughing at? Go both of you into the ante-room and let one tell the girl Blanchette to come to me; and you, Philip, run down to the kitchen, and fetch me two basins of soup. I am hungry," she added in a tone that she intended him to remark; "and that poor girl must have some food too."
The boy hastened to obey, and the maid went to call Blanchette: but the Countess remaining in her own chamber, opened a little bonbonnière which she carried, and shook out a small quantity of a white powder into a piece of paper, which she folded up carefully, but not indeed completely, for one end was left open. This packet she concealed between her first and second finger; and then, leaning her head upon her hand, she meditated for a moment or two, turning her own dark schemes in her mind, with some doubts and misgivings as to how she should carry the next step she purposed to take, into execution.
"If I carry it to her myself," she thought, "she will doubt something, and will not drink it. I'll send it by the maid Blanchette.--Yet, perhaps, if she knows that it comes from me, the same suspicions may arise: and I doubt that girl too. She has given me black looks and saucy answers. No--I had better take it myself: or, stay--I will send it by the page. He was always fond of her; and a light, thoughtless boy like that, one can make say what one will. He will suspect nothing, and the girl will not doubt him. Martin I dare not trust, for the fool thinks his conscience sufficiently burdened already with the imprisonment of the priest. He would not be so easily taken in either, to believe that I had any very tender consideration for the hunger of Helen de la Tremblade, any more than those two wenches in the ante-room. All my people know too much--I must get some new ones; and, if I can breed up this boy in perfect obedience, he may prove useful hereafter."
As she was going on with these pleasant meditations, the girl Blanchette presented herself and Madame de Chazeul, turning towards her, asked in a calm and complaisant tone, "How long has Mademoiselle de la Tremblade been here, Blanchette?"
"Really, Madam, I do not know," answered the maid; "I was not aware that she was here at all, till I found her with you and Mademoiselle d'Albret."
"Indeed!" exclaimed Madame de Chazeul with an air of surprise; "I thought you had known all about it."