“Bought by the state!” he cried. “To be hung in the Luxembourg!” He pointed menacingly with his cane at De Vilmarte’s neat little signature. “Why, I ask, should I go to my grave unknown, poor, a pensioner of your bounty? Why should you be happy—fêted?”
The irony of being accused of happiness was too much for De Vilmarte. He laughed aloud.
“Wouldn’t it be better for you to be an honest man?” croaked Hazelton.
“Only death can make an honest man of me,” answered De Vilmarte.
“My death could make an honest man of you,” Hazelton said slowly. It was as if he had read the dark and nameless secret that was lurking in the bottom of De Vilmarte’s heart.
For a moment they two seemed alone in all the earth, the only living beings. They stood alone, their secret in their hands.
Then Hazelton’s lips began to move. “My God!” he said. “Bought by the state and hung in the Luxembourg! Bought by the state and hung in the Luxembourg!” He repeated it as if trying to familiarize himself with some inexplicable fact. “I will not have it!” he went on. “I will not have it! If I’m not bought by the state I shall not go on!”
Raoul looked at him with entreaty. Hazelton came up to the surface of consciousness and his eyes followed Raoul’s. A very frail little old lady was being pushed in a wheel-chair near them.
“My mother,” Raoul whispered.
“I wish to meet her,” said Hazelton.