The cashier of the Mutual Credit shook his head. "Do you suppose, then, that I have not questioned him? I found his letter this morning at the office. At once I ran to his apartments, Rue Vivienne. He had just gone out; and it is in vain that I called for him at Jottras", and at the office of "The Financial Pilot." I found him at last at the bourse, after running three hours. But I could only get from him evasive answers and vague explanations. Of course he did not fail to say, that, if he does withdraw, it is because he despairs of ever succeeding in pleasing Gilberte. But it isn"t so: I know it; I am sure of it; I read it in his eyes. Twice his lips moved as if he were about to confess all; and then he said nothing. And the more I insisted, the more he seemed ill at ease, embarra.s.sed, uneasy, troubled, the more he appeared to me like a man who has been threatened, and dares not brave the threat."
He directed upon his children one of those obstinate looks which search the inmost depths of the conscience.
"If you have done any thing to drive him off," he resumed, "confess it frankly, and I swear I will not reproach you."
"We did not."
"You did not threaten him?"
"No!"
M. Favoral seemed appalled.
"Doubtless you deceive me," he said, "and I hope you do. Unhappy children! you do not know what this rupture may cost you."
And, instead of returning to his office, he shut himself up in that little room which he called his study, and only came out of it at about five o"clock, holding under his arm an enormous bundle of papers, and saying that it was useless to wait for him for dinner, as he would not come home until late in the night, if he came home at all, being compelled to make up for his lost day.
"What is the matter with your father, my poor children?" exclaimed Mme. Favoral. "I have never seen him in such a state."
"Doubtless," replied Maxence, "the rupture with Costeclar is going to break up some combination."
But that explanation did not satisfy him any more than it did his mother. He, too, felt a vague apprehension of some impending misfortune. But what? He had nothing upon which to base his conjectures. He knew nothing, any more than his mother, of his father"s affairs, of his relations, of his interests, or even of his life, outside the house.
And mother and son lost themselves in suppositions as vain as if they had tried to find the solution of a problem, without possessing its terms.
With a single word Mlle. Gilberte thought she might have enlightened them.
In the unerring certainty of the blow, in the crushing promptness of the result, she thought she could recognize the hand of Marius de Tregars.
She recognized the hand of the man who acts, and does not talk. And the girl"s pride felt flattered by this victory, by this proof of the powerful energy of the man whom, unknown to all, she had selected. She liked to imagine Marius de Tregars and M. Costeclar in presence of each other,-the one as imperious and haughty as she had seen him meek and trembling; the other more humble still than he was arrogant with her.
"One thing is certain," she repeated to herself; "and that is, I am saved."
And she wished the morrow to come, that she might announce her happiness to the very involuntary and very unconscious accomplice of Marius, the worthy Maestro Gismondo Pulei.
The next day M. Favoral seemed to have resigned himself to the failure of his projects; and, the following Sat.u.r.day, he told as a pleasant joke, how Mlle. Gilberte had carried the day, and had managed to dismiss her lover.
But a close observer could discover in him symptoms of devouring cares. Deep wrinkles showed along his temples; his eyes were sunken; a continued tension of mind contracted his features. Often during the dinner he would remain motionless for several minutes, his fork aloft; and then he would murmur, "How is it all going to end?"
Sometimes in the morning, before his departure for his office, M. Jottras, of the house of Jottras and Brother, and M. Saint Pavin, the manager of "The Financial Pilot," came to see him. They closeted themselves together, and remained for hours in conference, speaking so low, that not even a vague murmur could be heard outside the door.
"Your father has grave subjects of anxiety, my children," said Mme. Favoral: "you may believe me,-me, who for twenty years have been trying to guess our fate upon his countenance."
But the political events were sufficient to explain any amount of anxiety. It was the second week of July, 1870; and the destinies of France trembled, as upon a cast of the dice, in the hands of a few presumptuous incapables. Was it war with Prussia, or was it peace, that was to issue from the complications of a childishly astute policy?
The most contradictory rumors caused daily at the bourse the most violent oscillations, which endangered the safest fortunes. A few words uttered in a corridor by Emile Ollivier had made a dozen heavy operators rich, but had ruined five hundred small ones. On all hands, credit was trembling.
Until one evening when he came home, "War is declared," said M. Favoral.
It was but too true; and no one then had any fears of the result for France. They had so much exalted the French army, they had so often said that it was invincible, that every one among the public expected a series of crushing victories.
Alas! the first telegram announced a defeat. People refused to believe it at first. But there was the evidence. The soldiers had died bravely; but the chiefs had been incapable of leading them.
From that time, and with a vertiginous rapidity, from day to day, from hour to hour, the fatal news came crowding on. Like a river that overflows its banks, Prussia was overrunning France. Bazaine was surrounded at Metz; and the capitulation of Sedan capped the climax of so many disasters.
At last, on the 4th of September, the republic was proclaimed.
On the 5th, when the Signor Gismondo Pulei presented himself at Rue St. Gilles, his face bore such an expression of anguish, that Mlle. Gilberte could not help asking what was the matter.
He rose on that question, and, threatening heaven with his clinched fist, "Implacable fate does not tire to persecute me," he replied. "I had overcome all obstacles: I was happy: I was looking forward to a future of fortune and glory. No, the dreadful war must break out."
For the worthy maestro, this terrible catastrophe was but a new caprice of his own destiny.
"What has happened to you?" inquired the young girl, repressing a smile.
"It happens to me, signora, that I am about to lose my beloved pupil. He leaves me; he forsakes me. In vain have I thrown myself at his feet. My tears have not been able to detain him. He is going to fight; he leaves; he is a soldier!"
Then it was given to Mlle. Gilberte to see clearly within her soul. Then she understood how absolutely she had given herself up, and to what extent she had ceased to belong to herself.
Her sensation was terrible, such as if her whole blood had suddenly escaped through her open arteries. She turned pale, her teeth chattered; and she seemed so near fainting, that the Signor Gismondo sprang to the door, crying, "Help, help! she is dying."
Mme. Favoral, frightened, came running in. But already, thanks to an all-powerful projection of will, Mlle. Gilberte had recovered, and, smiling a pale smile, "It"s nothing, mamma," she said. "A sudden pain in the head; but it"s gone already."
The worthy maestro was in perfect agony. Taking Mme. Favoral aside, "It is my fault," he said. "It is the story of my unheard-of misfortunes that has upset her thus. Monstrous egotist that I am! I should have been careful of her exquisite sensibility."
She insisted, nevertheless, upon taking her lesson as usual, and recovered enough presence of mind to extract from the Signor Gismondo everything that his much-regretted pupil had confided to him.
That was not much. He knew that his pupil had gone, like anyone else, to Rue de Cherche Midi; that he had signed an engagement; and had been ordered to join a regiment in process of formation near Tours. And, as he went out, "That is nothing," said the kind maestro to Mme. Favoral. "The signora has quite recovered, and is as gay as a lark."
The signora, shut up in her room, was shedding bitter tears. She tried to reason with herself, and could not succeed. Never had the strangeness of her situation so clearly appeared to her. She repeated to herself that she must be mad to have thus become attached to a stranger. She wondered how she could have allowed that love, which was now her very life, to take possession of her soul. But to what end? It no longer rested with her to undo what had been done.
When she thought that Marius de Tregars was about to leave Paris to become a soldier, to fight, to die perhaps, she felt her head whirl; she saw nothing around her but despair and chaos.
And, the more she thought, the more certain she felt that Marius could not have trusted solely to the chance gossip of the Signor Pulei to communicate to her his determination.
"It is perfectly inadmissible," she thought. "It is impossible that he will not make an effort to see me before going."
Thoroughly imbued with the idea, she wiped her eyes, took a seat by an open window; and, whilst apparently busy with her work, she concentrated her whole attention upon the street.
There were more people out than usual. The recent events had stirred Paris to its lowest depths, and, as from the crater of a volcano in labor, all the social scoriae rose to the surface. Men of sinister appearance left their haunts, and wandered through the city. The workshops were all deserted; and people strolled at random, stupor or terror painted on their countenance. But in vain did Mlle. Gilberte seek in all this crowd the one she hoped to see. The hours went by, and she was getting discouraged, when suddenly, towards dusk, at the corner of the Rue Turenne, ""Tis he," cried a voice within her.
It was, in fact, M. de Tregars. He was walking towards the Boulevard, slowly, and his eyes raised.
Palpitating, the girl rose to her feet. She was in one of those moments of crisis when the blood, rushing to the brain, smothers all judgment. Unconscious, as it were, of her acts, she leaned over the window, and made a sign to Marius, which he understood very well, and which meant, "Wait, I am coming down."
"Where are you going, dear?" asked Mme. Favoral, seeing Gilberte putting on her bonnet.
"To the shop, mamma, to get a shade of worsted I need."
Mlle. Gilberte was not in the habit of going out alone; but it happened quite often that she would go down in the neighborhood on some little errand.
"Do you wish the girl to go out with you?" asked Mme. Favoral.
"Oh, it isn"t worth while!"
She ran down the stairs; and once out, regardless of the looks that might be watching her, she walked straight to M. de Tregars, who was waiting on the corner of the Rue des Minimes.
"You are going away?" she said, too much agitated to notice his own emotion, which was, however, quite evident.
"I must," he answered.
"Oh!"
"When France is invaded, the place for a man who bears my name is where the fighting is."
"But there will be fighting in Paris too."
"Paris has four times as many defenders as it needs. It is outside that soldiers will be wanted."
They walked slowly, as they spoke thus, along the Rue des Minimes, one of the least frequented in Paris; and there were only to be seen at this hour five or six soldiers talking in front of the barracks gate.
"Suppose I were to beg you not to go," resumed Mlle. Gilberte. "Suppose I beseeched you, Marius!"
"I should remain then," he answered in a troubled voice; "but I would be betraying my duty, and failing to my honor; and remorse would weigh upon our whole life. Command now, and I will obey."
They had stopped; and no one seeing them standing there side by side affectionate and familiar could have believed that they were speaking to each other for the first time. They themselves did not notice it, so much had they come, with the help of all-powerful imagination, and in spite of separation, to the understanding of intimacy. After a moment of painful reflection, "I do not ask you any longer to stay," uttered the young girl. He took her hand, and raised it to his lips.
"I expected no less of your courage," he said, his voice vibrating with love. But he controlled himself, and, in a more quiet tone, "Thanks to the indiscretion of Pulei," he added, "I was in hopes of seeing you, but not to have the happiness of speaking to you. I had written-"
He drew from his pocket a large envelope, and, handing it to Mlle. Gilberte, "Here is the letter," he continued, "which I intended for you. It contains another, which I beg you to preserve carefully, and not to open unless I do not return. I leave you in Paris a devoted friend, the Count de Villegre. Whatever may happen to you, apply to him with all confidence, as you would to myself."
Mlle. Gilberte, staggering, leaned against the wall.
"When do you expect to leave?" she inquired.
"This very night. Communications may be cut off at any moment."
Admirable in her sorrow, but also full of energy, the poor girl looked up, and held out her hand to him.
"Go then," she said, "O my only friend! go, since honor commands. But do not forget that it is not your life alone that you are going to risk."
And, fearing to burst into sobs, she fled, and reached the Rue St. Gilles a few moments before her father, who had gone out in quest of news.
Those he brought home were of the most sinister kind.
Like the rising tide, the Prussians spread and advanced, slowly, but steadily. Their marches were numbered; and the day and hour could be named when their flood would come and strike the walls of Paris.
And so, at all the railroad stations, there was a prodigious rush of people who wished to leave at any cost, in any way, in the baggage-car if needs be, and who certainly were not, like Marius, rushing to meet the enemy.
One after another, M. Favoral had seen nearly every one he knew take flight.
The Baron and Baroness de Thaller and their daughter had gone to Switzerland; M. Costeclar was traveling in Belgium; the elder Jottras was in England, buying guns and cartridge; and if the younger Jottras, with M. Saint Pavin of "The Financial Pilot," remained in Paris, it was because, through the gallant influence of a lady whose name was not mentioned, they had obtained some valuable contracts from the government.
The perplexities of the cashier of the Mutual Credit were great. The day that the Baron and the Baroness de Thaller had left, "Pack up our trunks," he ordered his wife. "The bourse is going to close; and the Mutual Credit can very well get along without me."
But the next day he became undecided again. What Mlle. Gilberte thought she could guess, was, that he was dying to start alone, and leave his family, but dared not do it. He hesitated so long, that at last, one evening, "You may unpack the trunks," he said to his wife. "Paris is invested; and no one can now leave."
XVIII
In fact, the news had just come, that the Western Railroad, the last one that had remained open, was now cut off.
Paris was invested; and so rapid had been the investment, that it could hardly be believed.
People went in crowds on all the culminating points, the hills of Montmartre, and the heights of the Trocadero. Telescopes had been erected there; and every one was anxious to scan the horizon, and look for the Prussians.
But nothing could be discovered. The distant fields retained their quiet and smiling aspect under the mild rays of the autumn sun.
So that it really required quite an effort of imagination to realize the sinister fact, to understand that Paris, with its two millions of inhabitants, was indeed cut off from the world and separated from the rest of France, by an insurmountable circle of steel.
Doubt, and something like a vague hope, could be traced in the tone of the people who met on the streets, saying, "Well, it"s all over: we can"t leave any more. Letters, even, cannot pa.s.s. No more news, eh?"
But the next day, which was the 19th of September, the most incredulous were convinced.
For the first time Paris shuddered at the hoa.r.s.e voice of the cannon, thundering on the heights of Chatillon. The siege of Paris, that siege without example in history, had commenced.
The life of the Favorals during these interminable days of anguish and suffering, was that of a hundred thousand other families.
Incorporated in the battalion of his ward, the cashier of the Mutual Credit went off two or three times a week, as well as all his neighbors, to mount guard on the ramparts,-a useless service perhaps, but which those that performed it did not look upon as such, -a very arduous service, at any rate, for poor merchants, accustomed to the comforts of their shops, or the quiet of their offices.
To be sure, there was nothing heroic in tramping through the mud, in receiving the rain or the snow upon the back, in sleeping on the ground or on dirty straw, in remaining on guard with the thermometer twenty degrees below the freezing-point. But people die of pleurisy quite as certainly as of a Prussian bullet; and many died of it.
Maxence showed himself but rarely at Rue St. Gilles: enlisted in a battalion of sharpshooters, he did duty at the advanced posts. And, as to Mme. Favoral and Mlle. Gilberte, they spent the day trying to get something to live on. Rising before daylight, through rain or snow, they took their stand before the butcher"s stall, and, after waiting for hours, received a small slice of horse-meat.
Alone in the evening, by the side of the hearth where a few pieces of green wood smoked without burning, they started at each of the distant reports of the cannon. At each detonation that shook the window-panes, Mme. Favoral thought that it was, perhaps, the one that had killed her son.
And Mlle. Gilberte was thinking of Marius de Tregars. The accursed days of November and December had come. There were constant rumors of b.l.o.o.d.y battles around Orleans. She imagined Marius, mortally wounded, expiring on the snow, alone, without help, and without a friend to receive his supreme will and his last breath.
One evening the vision was so clear, and the impression so strong, that she started up with a loud cry.
"What is it?" asked Mme. Favoral, alarmed. "What is the matter?"
With a little perspicacity, the worthy woman could easily have obtained her daughter"s secret; for Mlle. Gilberte was not in condition to deny anything. But she contented herself with an explanation which meant nothing, and had not a suspicion, when the girl answered with a forced smile, "It"s nothing, dear mother, nothing but an absurd idea that crossed my mind."
Strange to say, never had the cashier of the Mutual Credit been for his family what he was during these months of trials.
During the first weeks of the siege he had been anxious, agitated, nervous; he wandered through the house like a soul in trouble; he had moments of inconceivable prostration, during which tears could be seen rolling down upon his cheeks, and then fits of anger without motive.