“Do you know, madame,” Fraisier said, when at last the red sluices of La Cibot’s torrent tongue were closed, “do you know that your principal enemy will be a man who can send you to the scaffold?”
The portress started on her chair, making a sudden spring like a jack-in-the-box.
“Calm yourself, dear madame,” continued Fraisier. “You may not have known the name of the President of the Chamber of Indictments at the Court of Appeal in Paris; but you ought to have known that M. Pons must have an heir-at-law. M. le President de Marville is your invalid’s sole heir; but as he is a collateral in the third degree, M. Pons is entitled by law to leave his fortune as he pleases. You are not aware either that, six weeks ago at least, M. le President’s daughter married the eldest son of M. le Comte Popinot, peer of France, once Minister of Agriculture, and President of the Board of Trade, one of the most influential politicians of the day. President de Marville is even more formidable through this marriage than in his own quality of head of the Court of Assize.”
At that word La Cibot shuddered.
“Yes, and it is he who sends you there,” continued Fraisier. “Ah! my dear madame, you little know what a red robe means! It is bad enough to have a plain black gown against you! You see me here, ruined, bald, broken in health—all because, unwittingly, I crossed a mere attorney for the crown in the provinces. I was forced to sell my connection at a loss, and very lucky I was to come off with the loss of my money. If I had tried to stand out, my professional position would have gone as well.
“One thing more you do not know,” he continued, “and this it is. If you had only to do with President Camusot himself, it would be nothing; but he has a wife, mind you!—and if you ever find yourself face to face with that wife, you will shake in your shoes as if you were on the first step of the scaffold, your hair will stand on end. The Presidente is so vindictive that she would spend ten years over setting a trap to kill you. She sets that husband of hers spinning like a top. Through her a charming young fellow committed suicide at the Conciergerie. A count was accused of forgery—she made his character as white as snow. She all but drove a person of the highest quality from the Court of Charles X. Finally, she displaced the Attorney-General, M. de Granville—”
“That lived in the Rue Vieille-du-Temple, at the corner of the Rue Saint-Francois?”
“The very same. They say that she means to make her husband Home Secretary, and I do not know that she will not gain her end.—If she were to take it into her head to send us both to the Criminal Court first and the hulks afterwards—I should apply for a passport and set sail for America, though I am as innocent as a new-born babe. So well I know what justice means. Now, see here, my dear Mme. Cibot; to marry her only daughter to young Vicomte Popinot (heir to M. Pillerault, your landlord, it is said)—to make that match, she stripped herself of her whole fortune, so much so that the President and his wife have nothing at this moment except his official salary. Can you suppose, my dear madame, that under the circumstances Mme. la Presidente will let M. Pons’ property go out of the family without a word?—Why, I would sooner face guns loaded with grape-shot than have such a woman for my enemy—”
“But they have quarreled,” put in La Cibot.
“What has that got to do with it?” asked Fraisier. “It is one reason the more for fearing her. To kill a relative of whom you are tired, is something; but to inherit his property afterwards—that is a real pleasure!”