At the age of twenty-five Henry de Croisenois affected the airs and manners of a lad of twenty, and so found many who looked upon his escapades with lenient eyes, ascribing them to the follies of youth.
Under this youthful mask, however he concealed a most astute and cunning intellect, and had more than once got the better of the women with whom he had had dealings. His fortune was terribly involved, because he had insisted on living at the same rate as men who had ten times his income.
Forming one of the recklessly extravagant band of which the Duke de Saumeine was the head, Croisenois, too, kept his racehorses, which was certainly the quickest way to wreck the most princely fortune. The Marquis had found out this, and was utterly involved, when Mascarin extended a helping hand to him, to which he clung with all the energy of a drowning man.
Whatever Henry de Croisenois" anxieties may have been on the day in question, he did not allow a symptom of them to appear, and on his entrance negligently drawled, "I have kept you waiting, I fear; but really my time is not my own. I am quite at your service now, and will wait until these gentlemen have finished their business with you." And as he concluded, he again placed the cigar which he had removed while saying these words, to his lips.
His manner was very insolent, and yet the amiable Mascarin did not seem offended, although he loathed the scent of tobacco.
"We had begun to despair of seeing you, Marquis," answered he politely.
"I say so, because these gentlemen are here to meet you. Permit me to introduce to you, Dr. Hortebise, M. Catenac of the Parisian bar, and our secretary," pointing as he spoke, to Paul.
As soon as Croisenois had taken his seat, Mascarin went straight to the point, as a bullet to the target. "I do not intend," began he, "to leave you in doubt for a moment. Beatings about the bush would be absurd among persons like ourselves."
At finding himself thus cla.s.sed with the other persons present, the Marquis gave a little start, and then drawled out, "You flatter me, really."
"I may tell you, Marquis," resumed Mascarin, "that your marriage has been definitely arranged by myself and my a.s.sociates. All you have to do is to get the young lady"s consent; for that of the Count and Countess has already been secured."
"There will be no difficulty in that," lisped the Marquis. "I will promise her the best horsed carriage in the Bois, a box at the opera, unlimited credit at Van Klopen"s, and perfect freedom. There will be no difficulty, I a.s.sure you. Of course, however, I must be presented by some one who holds a good position in society."
"Would the Viscountess de Bois Arden suit you?"
"No one better; she is a relation of the Count de Mussidan."
"Good; then when you wish, Madame de Bois Arden will introduce you as a suitor for the young lady"s hand, and praise you up to the skies."
The Marquis looked very jubilant at hearing this. "All right," cried he; "then that decides the matter."
Paul wondered whether he was awake or dreaming. He too had been promised a rich wife, and here was another man who was being provided for in the same manner. "These people," muttered he, "seem to keep a matrimonial agency as well as a servants" registry office!"
"All that is left, then," said the Marquis, "is to arrange the--shall I call it the commission?"
"I was about to come to that," returned Mascarin.
"Well, I will give you a fourth of the dowry, and on the day of my marriage will hand you a cheque for that amount."
Paul now imagined that he saw how matters worked. "If I marry Flavia,"
thought he, "I shall have to share her dowry with these highly respectable gentlemen."
The offer made by the Marquis did not, however, seem to please Mascarin.
"That is not what we want," said he.
"No,--well, must I give you more? Say how much."
Mascarin shook his head.
"Well then, I will give you a third; it is not worth while to give you more."
"No, no; I would not take half, nor even the whole of the dowry. You may keep that as well as what you owe us."
"Well, but tell me what you _do_ want."
"I will do so," answered Mascarin, adjusting his spectacles carefully; "but before doing so, I feel that I must give you a short account of the rise and progress of this a.s.sociation."
At this statement Hortebise and Catenac sprang to their feet in surprise and terror. "Are you mad?" said they at length, with one voice.
Mascarin shrugged his shoulders.
"Not yet," answered he gently, "and I beg that you will permit me to go on."
"But surely we have some voice in the matter," faltered Catenac.
"That is enough," exclaimed Mascarin angrily, "Am not I the head of this a.s.sociation? Do you think," he continued in tones of deep sarcasm, "that we cannot speak openly before the Marquis?"
Hortebise and the lawyer resignedly resumed their seats. Croisenois thought that a word from him might rea.s.sure them.
"Among honest men--" began he.
"We are not honest men," interrupted Mascarin. "Sir," added he in a severe tone, "nor are you either."
This plain speaking brought a bright flush to the face of the Marquis, who had half a mind to be angry, but policy restrained him, and he affected to look on the matter as a joke. "Your joke is a little personal," said he.
But Mascarin took no heed of his remark. "Listen to me," said he, "for we have no time to waste, and do you," he added, turning to Paul, "pay the greatest attention."
A moment of perfect silence ensued, broken only by the hum of voices in the outer office.
"Marquis," said Mascarin, whose whole face blazed with a gleam of conscious power, "twenty-five years ago I and my a.s.sociates were young and in a very different position. We were honest then, and all the illusions of youth were in full force; we had faith and hope. We all then tenanted a wretched garret in the Rue de la Harpe, and loved each other like brothers."
"That was long, long ago," murmured Hortebise.
"Yes," rejoined Mascarin; "and yet the effluxion of times does not hinder me from seeing things as they then were, and my heart aches as I compare the hopes of those days with the realities of the present. Then, Marquis, we were poor, miserably poor, and yet we all had vague hopes of future greatness."
Croisenois endeavored to conceal a sneer; the story was not a very interesting one.
"As I said before, each one of us antic.i.p.ated a brilliant career.
Catenac had gained a prize by his "Treatise on the Transfer of Real Estate," and Hortebise had written a pamphlet regarding which the great Orfila had testified approval. Nor was I without my successes. Hortebise had unluckily quarrelled with his family. Catenac"s relatives were poor, and I, well, I had no family. I stood alone. We were literally starving, and I was the only one earning money. I prepared pupils for the military colleges, but as I only earned twenty-five sous a day by cramming a dull boy"s brain with algebra and geometry, that was not enough to feed us all. Well, to cut a long story short, the day came when we had not a coin among us. I forgot to tell you that I was devotedly attached to a young girl who was dying of consumption, and who had neither food nor fuel. What could I do? I knew not. Half mad, I rushed from the house, asking myself if I had better plead for charity or take the money I required by force from the first pa.s.ser-by. I wandered along the quays, half inclined to confide my sorrow to the Seine, when suddenly I remembered it was a holiday at the Polytechnic School, and that if I went to the _Cafe Semblon_ or the Palais Royal, I should most likely meet with some of my old pupils, who could perhaps lend me a few sous.
Five francs perhaps, Marquis,--that is a very small sum, but in that day it meant the life of my dear Marie and of my two friends. Have you ever been hungry, M. de Croisenois?"
De Croisenois started; he had never suffered from hunger, but how could he tell what the future might bring? for his resources were so nearly exhausted, that even to-morrow he might be compelled to discard his fict.i.tious splendor and sink into the abyss of poverty.
"When I reached the _Cafe Semblon_," continued Mascarin, "I could not see a single pupil, and the waiter to whom I addressed my inquiries looked at me with the utmost contempt, for my clothes were in tatters; but at length he condescended to inform me that the young gentlemen had been and gone, but that they would return. I said that I would wait for them. The man asked me if I would take anything, and when I replied in the negative, contemptuously pointed to a chair in a distant corner, where I patiently took my seat. I had sat for some time, when suddenly a young man entered the _cafe_, whose face, were I to live for a century, I shall never forget. He was perfectly livid, his features rigid, and his eyes wild and full of anguish. He was evidently in intense agony of mind or body. Evidently, however, it was not poverty that was oppressing him, for as he cast himself upon a sofa, all the waiters rushed forward to receive his orders. In a voice that was almost unintelligible, he asked for a bottle of brandy, and pen, ink, and paper. In some mysterious manner, the sight of this suffering brought balm to my aching heart. The order of the young man was soon executed, and pouring out a tumbler of brandy, he took a deep draught. The effect was instantaneous, he turned crimson, and for a moment almost fell back insensible. I kept my eyes on him, for a voice within me kept crying out that there was some mysterious link connecting this man and myself, and that his life was in some manner interwoven with mine, and that the influence he would exercise over me would be for evil. So strongly did this idea become rooted, that I should have left the _cafe_, had not my curiosity been so great. In the meantime the stranger had recovered himself, and seizing a pen, scrawled a few lines on a sheet of paper. Evidently he was not satisfied with his composition, for after reading it over, he lit a match and burnt the paper. He drank more brandy, and wrote a second letter, which, too, proved a failure, for he tore it to fragments, which he thrust into his waistcoat pocket. Again he commenced, using greater care. It was plain that he had forgotten where he was, for he gesticulated, uttered a broken sentence or two and evidently believed that he was in his own house. His last letter seemed to satisfy him, and he recopied it with care. He closed and directed it; then, tearing the original into pieces, he flung it under the table; then calling the waiter, he said, "Here are twenty francs; take this letter to the address on the envelope. Bring the answer to my house; here is my card."
The man ran out of the room, and the n.o.bleman, only waiting to pay his bill, followed almost immediately. The morsels of white paper beneath the table had a strange fascination for me; I longed to gather them up, to put them together, and to learn the secret of the strange drama that had been acted before me. But, as I have told you, then I was honest and virtuous, and the meanness of such an act revolted all my instincts; and I should have overcome this temptation, had it not been for one of those trifling incidents which too often form the turning-point of a life.
A draught from a suddenly opened door caught one of these morsels of paper, and wafted it to my feet. I stooped and picked it up, and read on it the ominous words, "blow out my brains!" I had not been mistaken, then, and was face to face with some coming tragedy. Having once yielded, I made no further efforts at self-control. The waiters were running about; no one paid any attention to me; and creeping to the place that the unknown had occupied, I obtained possession of two more sc.r.a.ps of paper. Upon one I read, "shame and horror!" upon the other, "one hundred thousand francs by to-night." The meaning of these few words were as clear as daylight to me; but for all that, I managed to collect every atom of the torn paper, and piecing them together, read this:--
""CHARLES,--"I must have one hundred thousand francs to-night, and you are the only one to whom I can apply. The shame and horror of my position are too much for me. Can you send it me in two hours? As you act, so I regulate my conduct. I am either saved, or I blow out my brains."
"You are probably surprised, Marquis, at the accuracy of my memory, and even now I can see this scrawl as distinctly as if it were before me. At the end of this scrawl was a signature, one of the best known commercial names, which, in common with other financial houses, was struggling against a panic on the Bourse. My discovery disturbed me very much. I forgot all my miseries, and thought only of his. Were not our positions entirely similar? But by degrees a hideous temptation began to creep into my heart, and, as the minutes pa.s.sed by, a.s.sume more vivid color and more tangible reality. Why should I not profit by this stolen secret? I went to the desk and asked for some wafers and a Directory.
Then, returning, I fastened the torn fragments upon a clean sheet of paper, discovered the address of the writer, and then left the _cafe_.
The house was situated in the Rue Chaussee d"Autin. For fully half an hour I paced up and down before his magnificent dwelling-place. Was he alive? Had the reply of Charles been in the affirmative? I decided at last to venture, and rang the bell. A liveried domestic appeared at my summons, and said that his master did not receive visitors at that hour; besides, he was at dinner. I was exasperated at the man"s insolence, and replied hotly, "If you want to save your master from a terrible misfortune, go and tell him that a man has brought him the rough draft of the letter he wrote a little time back at the _Cafe Semblon_." The man obeyed me without a word, no doubt impressed by the earnestness of my manner. My message must have caused intense consternation, for in a moment the footman reappeared, and, in an obsequious manner, said, "Follow at once, sir; my master is waiting for you." He led me into a large room, magnificently furnished as a library, and in the centre of this room stood the man of the _Cafe Semblon_. His face was deadly pale, and his eyes blazed with fury. I was so agitated that I could hardly speak.
""You have picked up the sc.r.a.ps of paper I threw away?" exclaimed he.