He seated himself and began to trace mechanically these words at the head of a sheet:
“Monsieur the President:”
The night fell while this unhappy man was still in the same place, his brow in his hand, and not having written the first line of this letter. He waited for the news of the second session, and it was with a shock that he heard his father recount the details of it.
“Ah! my dear André! You were right not to come! What infamy! Ah! what infamy! Greslon was questioned. He continues his system and refuses to say anything. That is nothing. The experts reported the results of their analyses. Our good doctor first. His voice trembled, the dear man, when he described his impression at seeing our poor Charlotte, you know, in her room. And then Professor Armand; you could not have endured this horrible thing, this autopsy of our angel in that room in which there were certainly five hundred persons. And then the Paris chemist. If there could be any doubt after that! The bottle which that monster used, was on the table. I saw it. And then—how did he dare? His lawyer, an official advocate, however, and who has not even the excuse of being the friend of his client. His advocate. But how shall I tell you? He asked if Charlotte had had a lover. There was a murmur of disgust in the hall, of indignation from everybody. She, my child, so pure, so noble, a saint! I could have choked the man. Even the assassin was moved, he whom nothing touches. I saw him. At that moment he put his head in his hands and wept. Answer, ought it not to be forbidden by law, to speak in that way of a victim in open court? What did this rogue believe then, that she had a lover? A lover! She a lover!”
The old man’s indignation was so strong that he suddenly burst into tears. The son, in presence of this touching grief felt his heart melt and the tears fill his eyes, and the two men embraced one another without a word.
“You see,” resumed the father when he was able to speak, “this is the dreadful side of these trials, the public discussion of the most private matters. I have told you before that I was sure she was unhappy all winter because Maxime was absent. She loved him, but was not willing that it should be seen. It was this that aroused Greslon’s jealousy when he came to the house and found her so gracious, so unpretentious, he believed that he could win her. How could she have suspected such a thing, when I who have had so much experience of men, never saw or guessed any thing?”
Once started on this subject the marquis talked all through the dinner, then during the whole evening. He enjoyed the consolation, the only one possible in certain crises, of recollecting aloud. And the religious worship which the unhappy father preserved for the dead was for the son, who listened without responding, something tragical at this moment when he was preparing to do what? Was he really about to bring this terrible blow on the old man? In his own room, with the great silence of a provincial city around him, he took up his sister’s letter and read it again, although he knew by heart every phrase in it. There arose from these pages traced by the hand forever still, a sigh so profound, a breath of agony so sad and so heartrending! The illusion of the girl had been so mad, her struggles so sincere, her awakening so bitter, that the count felt again the tears flow down his cheeks. This was the second time that he had wept that day, he who, since the death of Charlotte, had kept his eyes dry and burning with hate.
He said: “Greslon has deserved—” He remained motionless some minutes, and, walking toward the chimney in which the fire was just extinguished, he placed on the half-consumed log the leaves of the letter. He struck a match and slipped it under the paper. He saw the line of flame develop all around, then again the frail writing, then transform this only proof of the miserable amour and suicide into a blackish mass.
The brother finished by mixing this debris with the ashes. He lay down saying aloud: “It is done,” and he slept, as on the night after his first battle, the exhausted sleep which succeeds with men of action, great expenditure of will, and he did not open his eyes until nine o’clock the next day.
“Monsieur, the marquis forbade me to wake you,” said Pourat when, called by his master, he opened the shutters. The sunlight entered, the bright sunlight instead of the sad and lowering sky of the evening before. “He has been gone an hour. My captain knows that to-day they are going to take the accused by the subterranean passage, everybody is so excited against him.”