"Because he is poor?"
"There is that, of course: but listen, I will tell you all."
She looked nervously towards the door, and dropped her voice to a melodramatic whisper. "Listen, Mademoiselle: he is an enemy. There are other bad points, of course: for instance, he is vicious; you are an English girl and understand what I mean. That is not important; all men are more or less like that. Then he is a thief and a cheat. Since my dear husband died, he has managed all my business affairs; all about the estates, you know. He has what we call a power-of-attorney, signs all documents to do with the property, collects all rents and dues, sees to the leases and the farms and all investments and improvements. Well, he is a robber. He takes commissions and bribes from the tenants and dealers; when he invests in the funds he makes a profit for himself; he falsifies all the documents he puts before me. Do you want evidence, proof? The tenants all come to me on the sly and tell me of his tricks. It was long before I discovered, and still longer before I took my courage in both hands and braved him with his treachery. Oh, I was prostrate with fear, but I worked myself into a temper and that helped me, and I told him in one word—Go!"
"And then?"
"Then the worst thing happened, the thing that had always held me back. He said that if I forced him to leave the château, he would publish abroad things he knew about my husband, would hold up the family name to ignominy and scorn, would prove to all the world that my husband possessed neither honesty nor honour. It was all false, or nearly all; but I was frightened lest he did know something really dishonourable. Anyway, I knew he would pretend he did, and so carry out his threat. Finally I gave in, though he saw the hate in my eyes, he saw that! So he stayed on. He goes more carefully, that is, he contents himself with stealing less. It is only because of this hold over me, through my affection for my dear husband's memory, that he stays. I hate him, and he hates me."
"Will he always stay?"
"Ah," she replied vaguely, "that's just it. I hope he will die. It is wicked of me, and I trust that the good God will pardon me. However, now you understand."
"I am beginning to understand. One thing, though. Surely, Madame, if he were to marry in the family, then he could have no reason to injure the family name—"
"Mademoiselle, for a man who has so spoken to enter our family would be the foulest dishonour." She drew herself up proudly; there was a touch of real majesty in her poor heroics. Then, subsiding into the customary worried-dormouse manner, puckering her brows, and poking forward her anxious nose: "If there is any danger, it must be stopped now—Oh, what a nightmare! We could easily manage Suzanne, but Elise would be terrible. We must find out for certain. Neither of them would tell me anything: I am only their mother! But you, that is different. They will talk freely to you about today, I feel sure they will, Suzanne for certain. You will tell me what they say?"
"Oh Madame, it would be unkind to make me promise that. I could not break their confidences any more than I could yours, could I?" (Much less so, I realized, as I liked the girls better; knowing that in the last resort I should be guided by preference rather than reason or even interest.)