"Perhaps," said Paul, smiling.
"You know not, then----?"
"Proceed."
"That Monsieur de Lectoure is to arrive to-morrow morning."
"I have been informed of that."
"And that to-morrow night the marriage contract is to be signed."
"I know that, too."
"Well! then! what can I hope for in such extremity as this? To whom can I apply to prevent this hated union? Who can I interest to aid me?
My brother? G.o.d knows that I forgive him, but he cannot comprehend my feelings. My mother? Oh! sir, you do not know my mother. She is a woman whose reputation is unsullied, of the most austere virtue, and her will inflexible, for never having failed in her duty, she does not believe that others can forget it, and when she has once said, "It is my will,"
all that remains to do is to bow down one"s head, to weep, and to obey.
My father? Yes, I well know that my father must leave the room from which he has never stirred for twenty years, to sign this contract. My father! for any one less unhappy and less culpable than I might prove a resource: but you know not that he is insane--that he has lost his reason, and with it every feeling of paternal affection. And besides, it is ten years since I last saw him. For the last ten years I have not pressed his trembling hands, nor kissed his snow white hairs. He knows not that he has still a daughter! he knows not even whether he has a heart, and will not be able even to recognize me. And were he but to know me, and took compa.s.sion on me, my mother would place a pen in his hand and would say, "Sign that, it is my will!" and he would sign it--the poor feeble old man! and his daughter would be condemned."
"Yes, yes. I know all this as well as you do, my poor child; but be pacified, that contract never will be signed."
"And who can prevent it?"
"I will!"
"You?"
"Do not despair. To-morrow I shall be present at the family council."
"Who will present you there?"
"I have the means."
"My brother is violent; and pa.s.sionate. Oh! good heaven, beware, while striving to save me that you do not sink me still deeper in misery?"
"Your brother"s person is in my eyes as sacred as your own, Marguerite.
Fear nothing, and rely confidently upon me."
"Oh! I believe you, sir, and I implicitly confide in you," said Marguerite, as if overwhelmed by the contending feelings of confidence and mistrust which she had till then labored under. "For what advantage could you derive from endeavoring to deceive me? What interest could you have to betray me?"
"None, undoubtedly; but let us talk of other matters. What line of conduct do you intend to pursue with regard to the Baron de Lectoure?"
"I will tell him all!"
"Oh!" cried Paul, bowing profoundly, "allow me to adore you."
"Sir!" murmured Marguerite, "sir!"
"As a sister! as a sister!"
"Yes, you are indeed kind and good," cried Marguerite, "and I believe it is G.o.d who sent you to my aid."
"Believe it," replied Paul. "Then--to-morrow evening."
"Do not be astonished, nor alarmed at anything that may occur, only contrive to let me know by letter, by a word, a sign, the result of your interview with Lectoure!"
"I will endeavor to do so."
"It is now late, and your servant may be surprised at the length of this interview. Return to the castle, and say not a word of me to any one.
Farewell!"
"Farewell," reiterated Marguerite; "you to whom I know not what name to give."
"Call me your brother."
"Farewell, then, brother."
"Oh, my sister! my sister!" cried Paul, clasping her convulsively in his arms, "your lips are the first from which I have heard so sweet a word.
G.o.d will reward you for it."
The young girl drew back amazed; and then returning to Paul, she held out her hand to him. Paul again pressed it, and Marguerite left the cottage.
The young man then went to the door of the inner room, and opened it.
"And now, good old man," said he, "conduct me to my father"s grave."
CHAPTER XI.--THE COURTIER.
Hamlet.--Dost thou know this water-fly?
Horatio.--No, my good lord.
Hamlet.--Thy state is the more gracious; for "tis a vice to know him.
SHAKESPEARE.
Here on my knees by heaven"s blest nower I swear, If you persist, I ne"er henceforth will see you; But rather wander through the world a beggar, And live on sordid sc.r.a.ps at poor men"s doors.
For, though to fortune lost, I"ll still inherit My mother"s virtues and my father"s honor.--Otway.
The day following that on which Paul had been made acquainted with the secret of his birth, the inhabitants of the castle of Auray awoke more than ever absorbed in the fears and hopes which their several interests had created, for that day must necessarily prove a decisive one to the whole of them. The marchioness, whom our readers have ere this discovered, was neither perverse or wicked, but a haughty and inflexible woman, saw in it the termination of those heart-rending apprehensions, which for so many years, had been her daily companions; for it was above all, in the eyes of her children, that she wished to preserve that unsullied reputation, the usurpation of which had been purchased at such cost. To her, Lectoure was not only a fitting son-in-law, being the bearer of a name as n.o.ble as her own, but more than this, a man, or rather a good genius, who at the same moment would bear away not only her daughter, whom he would take with him as his wife, but her son also, to whom the minister, thanks to this alliance, had promised to give a regiment. Both her children gone, her first-born might come, and the secret revealed to him, would find no echo. Moreover, there were a thousand methods by which to close his lips. The fortune of the marchioness was immense, and gold was one of those resources, which, in such a case, she deemed infallible. The more terrible her fears, the more ardently did she desire this union; so that she not only encouraged the anxiety of Lectoure, but she also excited that of Emanuel. As to the latter, tired of living unknown at Paris, or immured in Brittany, lost in the crowd of brilliant young men who formed the household of the King, or shut up in the antique castle of his ancestors, having their portraits as his sole companions, he knocked with impatient eagerness at the golden door which his intended brother-in-law was to open for him, at Versailles. The grief and tears of his sister had, certainly, for a time afflicted him; for he was ambitious, more from a dread of the _ennui_, which would consume him if compelled to live on his estate, and from the desire of parading at the head of his regiment, captivating the hearts of all the ladies by the richness and good taste of his uniform, than from either pride or hardness of heart. Being himself incapable of forming any serious attachment, and despite the fatal consequences of his sister"s love, he considered that love, merely as a childish fancy, which the tumult and pleasure of the world would soon efface from her memory, and he really believed that before a year had elapsed, she would be the first to thank him for having thus done violence to her feelings.
As to Marguerite, poor victim, so irrevocably condemned to be immolated to the fear of the one, and to the ambition of the other, the scene of the preceding day had made a profound impression on her mind. She could not at all account to herself for the extraordinary feelings which the young man who had transmitted to her the words of Lusignan, had awakened in her heart; who had tranquillized her as to the fate of the unhappy exile, and had concluded by pressing her to his heart, and calling her his sister. A vague and instinctive hope whispered to her heart, that this man, as he had told her, had received from heaven the mission to protect her. But as she was ignorant of the tie which bound him to her, of the secret which made him master of his mother"s will, of the influence he might exercise over her future life, she did not dare allow herself to dream of happiness, habituated as she had been for six months, to consider death as the only term to her misfortunes.
The marquis, alone, amid the various emotions which agitated all around him, had remained coldly and impa.s.sibly indifferent; for to him the world had ceased to move since the dreadful day on which reason had abandoned him; continually absorbed by one fixed idea, that of his mortal combat, without seconds. The only words he ever uttered, were those p.r.o.nounced by the Count de Morlaix, when he forgave him his death.
He was an old man, weak as an infant, and whom his wife could overawe by a gesture, and who received from her cold and continuous will, every impulsion, which, for twenty years, the vegetating instinct had received, and which, on him, had usurped the place of reason and free will. On this day, however, a great change had taken place in his monotonous mode of life. A valet de chambre had entered his apartment, and had succeeded to the marchioness in the cares of his toilette; he had dressed him in his uniform of steward of the household, had decorated his breast with the several orders that had been conferred upon him; and then the marchioness, placing a pen in his hand, had ordered him to try to sign his name, and he had obeyed, pa.s.sively and negligently, without imagining that he was studying the part of an executioner.
About three in the afternoon, a postchaise, the sound of whose wheels had very differently impressed the hearts of the three persons who were expecting it, entered the court-yard of the castle. Emanuel had eagerly run down to the vestibule to receive his future brother-in-law, for it was he who had arrived. Lectoure sprang lightly from his carriage. He had halted for some time at the last post-house, to attire himself in a presentable costume, so that he arrived in an elegant court dress of the latest fashion. Emanuel smiled at this evidence of his anxiety, for it was clearly to be perceived, that Lectoure was determined not to lose the advantage of a first favorable impression, by presenting himself in a dusty travelling dress. His intercourse with the fair s.e.x had taught him, that they almost invariably judge from the first glance, and the effect which it produces upon their minds or hearts, let it be favorable or unfavorable, is with difficulty removed. Moreover, it is but rendering justice to the baron to acknowledge that his person was graceful and elegant, and might have been dangerous to any woman whose heart was not already occupied by another.
"Permit me, my dear baron," said Emanuel, advancing toward him, "in the momentary absence of the ladies, to do the honors of the mansion of my ancestors. See," continued he, when they had reached the top of the stone steps leading into the hall, and pointing to the turrets and the bastions, "these date from the time of Philip Augustus, as to architecture, and from Henry IV., in point of ornament."