Luc took advantage of his silence to speak again.
“Since you have come, Joseph,” he said, “let us part in friendship. We are the two last of our family, and—after all—that is something.”
“Will you leave this?” demanded the younger man, not kindly, but with a suppressed violence. “Will you come with me?”
“No,” replied Luc. “This is my place now. And it is easier for me to refuse you, Joseph, because I know that pride, not love, asks this.”
“Pride!” echoed Joseph. “You have the damnable pride of the Devil. You prefer your garret—your accursed book”—he snatched the thin volume from under Luc’s frail fingers, and cast it on the ground—“your outcast friends—to your family, your honour, your home.”
The Marquis made a faint gesture of sorrow and protest. “This is not needful,” he murmured. But Joseph’s vigorous voice overbore his feeble tones.
“Very well, then,” he continued; “die in the miserable loft your dishonourable conduct has brought you to, and leave us to endure your disgrace—as we have endured it since you left Aix!”
Luc got to his feet again, and stood holding on to the edge of the table.
“You will be able to blot me from your annals very completely soon,” he said. “When I am dead, no one will speak of me, and you can forget.”
He lifted his hand and let it fall. The little pile of silver pieces was knocked over by the gesture, and the money rolled across the floor to the feet of the younger brother.