"You could not have a better counsellor. I retire at once," said the Prefect.
Then an idea crossed his mind, for just as he was met, with a friendly greeting--"A word with you, Monsieur le Prefet"--from Joseph de la Mariniere, his eyes fell on Helene de Sainfoy as she turned away from Angelot at the door. He had already admired her at a distance, so far the most beautiful thing at Lancilly, in spite of the oppressed and weary air that suited so ill with her fresh girlhood.
"Mon Dieu, what a sacrilege! But no, impossible!" said the Prefect to himself.
Several young people were carrying the coffee-cups about the room, Sophie and Lucie in white frocks among them. It was generally the part of the young girls; the men did not often help them, so that Madame de Sainfoy looked at Angelot with surprise, and a shade of displeasure, when he approached her with Helene.
Angelot was perfectly grave and self-possessed. On his side, no one would have known that he had ever met General Ratoneau before, certainly not that he regarded him as an enemy. He hardly changed colour, even when Ratoneau waved him aside with a scowl, and stretched across him, without rising, to take his cup from Helene.
"Come," he said, "I"ll have my coffee from those pretty hands, or not at all."
Helene looked up startled, and met the man"s bold eyes. Angelot turned away instantly, and in a few seconds more she had joined him, and they were attending to other guests. Angelot commanded himself n.o.bly; his time for punishing the General would come some day, but was not yet. As he and his cousin walked together along the room, the Vicomte des Barres, Monsieur Joseph"s friend, pointed them out to Madame de la Mariniere.
"A pretty pair of cousins, madame!"
"Ah, yes," she said a little sadly. "I cannot always realise that Ange is grown up. To see him, a man, in the salon at Lancilly, makes me feel very old."
The Vicomte murmured smiling compliments, but they soon turned to talk which was more serious, if not a little treasonable.
And in the meanwhile other eyes followed the two young people: Madame de Sainfoy"s, while she doubted whether it might be necessary to snub Monsieur Ange de la Mariniere; General Ratoneau"s, with a long, steady, considering gaze, at the end of which he turned to his hostess and said, "You advise me to marry, madame! Give me your daughter."
For the moment, even the practical Madame de Sainfoy was both startled and shocked; so much so that she lifted her fan to hide the change in her face. But she collected herself instantly, and lowered it with a smile.
"Indeed, Monsieur le General, you do us great honour"--she began. "But you were good enough to ask my advice, and I should not, I think--in fact, my daughter is still rather young, rather unformed, for such a position--and then--"
"She is nineteen, I know," said General Ratoneau. "Too young for me, you think? Well, I am forty-two, the same age as the Emperor, and he married a young wife last year."
"You wish to resemble His Majesty in every way," said Madame de Sainfoy, smiling graciously; it was necessary to say something.
"I am like him, I know--sapristi, it is an advantage. But I am a better match in one way, madame. I have never been married. I have no wife to get rid of, before offering myself to Mademoiselle de Sainfoy. She looks like a good girl, and she is devilish pretty. I dare say she will do what she likes with me. Anyhow, it is a good marriage for her, and for me. I am well off, I shall not expect much money."
In Adelade de Sainfoy"s heart there was amazement at herself for having listened even so long and so patiently. This was indeed a trial of her theories. But after all, common sense was stronger than sentiment.
"We must live in our own times," she reminded herself. "These are the people of the future; the past is dead."
Her eyes wandered round the room. Every man she saw there was a gentleman, with ancestors, with manners, with traditions. Whether they were returned emigrants or people who had by _force majeure_ accepted the Revolution and the Empire, all bore the stamp of that old world which they alone kept in memory. Differences of dress, a new simplicity, ease and freedom, a revolt against formalities, these things made a certain separation between the new country society and the old. But gentlemen and ladies all her guests were, except the man who sat beside her and asked for Helene as coolly as if he were asking for one of her dog"s puppies.
Yet Madame de Sainfoy repeated to herself, "The past is dead!"
"You do us great honour," she repeated; for so strong-minded a person, the tone and words were vague.
"That is precisely what you do not think, madame," said Ratoneau, looking her straight in the face with a not unpleasant smile.
She was very conscious of the resolute will, the power to command, which the man possessed in common with his master. Who could refuse Napoleon anything? except a man or woman here and there with whom the repulsion was stronger than the attraction. Adelade de Sainfoy was not one of these.
"You are mistaken; I do," she said, and smiled back with all her brilliancy.
"It is true," he said, "I am not yet a Duke, or a Marshal of France, like the others. I have had enemies--envious people: my very wounds, marks of honour, have come between me and glory. But next year, madame, when I have swept the Chouans out of the West, you will see. I have a friend at Court, now, besides. One of the Empress"s equerries, Monsieur Monge, is an old brother-in-arms of mine. The Emperor has enn.o.bled him; he is the Baron de Beauclair--a prettier name than Monge, n"est-ce pas?"
"But that is charming! Tell me more about this friend of yours," said Madame de Sainfoy, rather eagerly.
This was a new view, a new possibility. Ratoneau knew what he was doing; he had not forgotten the Prefect"s remark at Les Chouettes, some days before, as to Madame de Sainfoy"s ambition of a place at Court for herself, as lady-in-waiting to the Empress. For a minute or two he swaggered on about his friend Monge; then suddenly turned again upon the Comtesse.
"But my answer, madame! There, you must excuse me; I am a rough soldier; I am not accustomed to wait for anything. When I want a thing, I ask for it. When it is not given at once--"
"You take it, I suppose? Yes: the wonder is that you should ask at all!"
said Madame de Sainfoy.
Her look and smile seemed to turn the words, which might have been very scornful, into an easy little jest; but none the less they were a slight check on the airs of this conquering hero. He laughed.
"Well, madame, you are right, I withdraw the words. If you refuse my request, I shall have to make my bow, I suppose. But you will not."
She leaned back with lowered eyelids, playing with her fan.
"At this moment," she said, "I can only give you a word of advice--Patience, Monsieur le General. For myself I will speak frankly.
I am entirely loyal to the Empire and the Army; they are the glory of France. I think a brave soldier is worthy of any woman. Personally, this sudden idea of yours does not at all displease me. But I am not the only or the chief person concerned. Monsieur de Sainfoy, too, has his own ideas, and among them is an extreme indulgence of his daughter"s fancies. You observe, I am speaking to you in the frankest confidence. I treat you as you treat me--" she glanced up and smiled. "Only this year, in Paris, plans of mine have been spoilt in this way."
"But fortunately for me, madame!" exclaimed Ratoneau. "We will not regret those plans, if you please. Shall I speak to Monsieur de Sainfoy this evening?"
"No, I beg! Say nothing at all. Leave the affair in my hands. I promise, I will do my best for you."
She spoke low and hurriedly, for her husband was walking up to the retired corner where she and the General were sitting, and she, knowing his humours so well, could see that he was surprised and a little angry at the confidences which had been going on.
It was one of Herve"s tiresome points, unworthy of a man of the world, that he did not always let her go her own way without question, though he ought to have learnt by this time to trust her in everything.
He now came up and asked General Ratoneau if he would play a game of billiards. Most of the men had already left the salon. The General grunted an a.s.sent, and rose stiffly to follow his host, with a grave bow to Madame de Sainfoy. The Comte walked with him half across the room, then suddenly turned back to meet his wife, whose preoccupation he had noticed rather curiously.
"You have other guests, Adelade!" he said, so that she alone could hear.
"I have," she answered. "And I must talk to you presently. I have something to say."
He gazed an instant into her eyes, which were very blue and shining, but he found no answer to the question in his own, and hurried at once away.
Without the Prefect"s sc.r.a.p of information or his wider knowledge of men, he did not even guess what those two could have been talking about.
Something political, he supposed; Adelade loved politics, and could throw herself into them with anybody, even such a lump of arrogant vulgarity as this fellow Ratoneau. She thought it wise, no doubt, to cultivate imperial officials. But in that case why did she not bestow the lion"s share of her smiles on the Prefect, a greater man and a gentleman into the bargain? Why did she let him waste his pleasant talk on the dowagers of Anjou, while she sat absorbed with that animal?
The guests, thirty or more, were scattered between the billiard-room, the smaller drawing-room, where card-tables were set out, and the large drawing-room, given up to conversation and presently to the acting of a proverb by several of the younger people and Mademoiselle Moineau, who played the part of a great-grandmother to perfection.
Angelot so distinguished himself as a jealous lover that Helene could hardly sit calmly to look on, and several people told him and his mother that his right place was at the _Francais_.
"It is part of our life at La Mariniere," Anne said with a shade of impatience to the Prefect, who was talking to her. "When we are not singing or playing or dancing or shooting, we are acting. It does not sound like a very responsible kind of life."
"Ah, madame," Monsieur de Mauves said softly, in his kind way, "we French people know how to play and to work at the same time. All these little amus.e.m.e.nts do not hinder people from conspiring against the State."
A flush rose in her thin face; she threw herself eagerly forward.
"Are you speaking of my son, Monsieur le Prefet? Do not blame him for loyalty to his uncle. He is not a conspirator. Sometimes--" she laughed--"I think Ange has not character enough."
"Yes, he has character," the Prefect answered. "But you are right in one way, madame; he does not yet care enough for one cause or the other.
Something will draw him--some stronger love than this for his uncle."