"Be calm, and hope for the best; your daughter will be restored to you; her innocence must be proved; she cannot be guilty."
"Guilty of what? She is not guilty of anything. I will put my hand in the fire if--" Then, remembering the gold which Louise had brought to pay the bill with, Morel cried, "But the money--that money you had this morning, Louise!" And he gave his daughter a terrible look.
Louise understood it.
"I rob!" she exclaimed; and her cheeks suffused with generous indignation, her tone and gesture, rea.s.sured her father.
"I knew it well enough!" he exclaimed. "You see, M. le Commissaire, she denies it; and I swear to you, that she never told me a lie in her life; and everybody that knows her will say the same thing as I do. She lie!
Oh, no, she is too proud to do that! And, then, the bill has been paid by our benefactor. The gold she does not wish to keep, but will return it to the person who lent it to her, desiring him not to tell any one; won"t you, Louise?"
"Your daughter is not accused of theft," said the magistrate.
"Well, then, what is the charge against her? I, her father, swear to you that she is innocent of whatever crime they may accuse her of, and I never told a lie in my life either."
"Why should you know what she is charged with?" said Rodolph, moved by his distress. "Louise"s innocence will be proved; the person who takes so great an interest in you will protect your daughter. Come, come!
Courage, courage! This time Providence will not forsake you. Embrace your daughter, and you will soon see her again."
"M. le Commissaire," cried Morel, not attending to Rodolph, "you are going to deprive a father of his daughter without even naming the crime of which she is accused! Let me know all! Louise, why don"t you speak?"
"Your daughter is accused of child-murder," said the magistrate.
"I--I--I--child-mur--I don"t--you--"
And Morel, aghast, stammered incoherently.
"Your daughter is accused of having killed her child," said the commissary, deeply touched at this scene; "but it is not yet proved that she has committed this crime."
"Oh, no, I have not, sir! I have not!" exclaimed Louise, energetically, and rising; "I swear to you that it was dead. It never breathed,--it was cold. I lost my senses,--this is my crime. But kill my child! Oh, never, never!"
"Your child, abandoned girl!" cried Morel, raising his hands towards Louise, as if he would annihilate her by this gesture and imprecation.
"Pardon, father, pardon!" she exclaimed.
After a moment"s fearful silence, Morel resumed, with a calm that was even more frightful:
"M. le Commissaire, take away that creature; she is not my child!"
The lapidary turned to leave the room; but Louise threw herself at his knees, around which she clung with both arms; and, with her head thrown back, distracted and supplicating, she exclaimed:
"Father, hear me! Only hear me!"
"M. le Commissaire, away with her, I beseech you! I leave her to you,"
said the lapidary, struggling to free himself from Louise"s embrace.
"Listen to her," said Rodolph, holding him; "do not be so pitiless."
"To her! To her!" repeated Morel, lifting his two hands to his forehead, "to a dishonoured wretch! A wanton! Oh, a wanton!"
"But, if she were dishonoured through her efforts to save you?" said Rodolph to him in a low voice.
These words made a sudden and painful impression on Morel, and he cast his eyes on his weeping child still on her knees before him; then, with a searching look, impossible to describe, he cried in a hollow voice, clenching his teeth with rage:
"The notary?"
An answer came to Louise"s lips. She was about to speak, but paused,--no doubt a reflection,--and, bending down her head, remained silent.
"No, no; he sought to imprison me this morning!" continued Morel, with a violent burst. "Can it be he? Ah, so much the better, so much the better! She has not even an excuse for her crime; she never thought of me in her dishonour, and I may curse her without remorse."
"No, no; do not curse me, my father! I will tell you all,--to you alone, and you will see--you will see whether or not I deserve your forgiveness."
"For pity"s sake, hear her!" said Rodolph to him.
"What will she tell me,--her infamy? That will soon be public, and I can wait till then."
"Sir," said Louise, addressing the magistrate, "for pity"s sake, leave me alone with my father, that I may say a few words to him before I leave him, perhaps for ever; and before you, also, our benefactor, I will speak; but only before you and my father."
"Be it so," said the magistrate.
"Will you be pitiless, and refuse this last consolation to your child?"
asked Rodolph of Morel. "If you think you owe me any grat.i.tude for the kindness which I have been enabled to show you, consent to your daughter"s entreaties."
After a moment"s sad and angry silence, Morel replied:
"I will."
"But where shall we go!" inquired Rodolph; "your family are in the other room."
"Where shall we go," exclaimed the lapidary, with a bitter irony, "where shall we go? Up above,--up above, into the garret, by the side of the body of my dead daughter; that spot will well suit a confession, will it not? Come along, come, and we will see if Louise will dare to tell a lie in the presence of her sister"s corpse. Come! Come along!"
And Morel went out hastily with a wild air, and turning his face from Louise.
"Sir," said the commissary to Rodolph, in an undertone, "I beg you for this poor man"s sake not to protract this conversation. You were right when you said his reason was touched; just now his look was that of a madman."
"Alas, sir, I am equally fearful with yourself of some fresh and terrible disaster! I will abridge as much as I can this most painful farewell."
And Rodolph rejoined the lapidary and his daughter.
However strange and painful Morel"s determination might appear, it was really the only thing that, under the circ.u.mstances, could be done. The magistrate consented to await the issue of this conversation in Rigolette"s chamber; the Morel family were occupying Rodolph"s apartment, and there was only the garret at liberty; and it was into this horrid retreat that Louise, her father, and Rodolph betook themselves. Sad and affecting sight!
In the middle of the attic which we have already described, there lay, stretched on the idiot"s mattress, the body of the little girl who had died in the morning, now covered by a ragged cloth. The unusual and clear light, reflected through the narrow skylight, threw the figures of the three actors in this scene into bold relief. Rodolph, standing up, was leaning with his back against the wall, deeply moved. Morel, seated at the edge of his working-bench, with his head bent, his hands hanging listless by his sides, whilst his gaze, fixed and fierce, rested on, and did not quit, the mattress on which the remains of his poor little Adele were deposited. At this spectacle, the anger and indignation of the lapidary subsided, and were changed to inexpressible bitterness; his energy left him, and he was utterly prostrated beneath this fresh blow.
Louise, who was ghastly pale, felt her strength forsake her. The revelation she was about to make terrified her. Still she ventured, tremblingly, to take her father"s hand,--that miserable and shrivelled hand, withered and wasted by excess of toil. The lapidary did not withdraw it, and then his daughter, sobbing as if her heart would burst, covered it with kisses, and felt it slightly pressed against her lips.
Morel"s wrath had ended, and then his tears, long repressed, flowed freely and bitterly.
"Oh, father, if you only knew!" exclaimed Louise; "if you only knew how much I am to be pitied!"
"Oh, Louise, this, this will be the heaviest bitter in my cup for the rest of my life,--all my life long," replied the lapidary, weeping terribly. "You, you in prison,--in the same bench with criminals; you so proud when you had a right to be proud! No," he resumed in a fresh burst of grief and despair, "no; I would rather have seen you in your shroud beside your poor little sister!"
"And I, I would sooner be there!" replied Louise.