"How could she have come here in your absence?" said Edouard, looking at the baron with an expression of curiosity.
"She had a key to the garden of this house," replied Monsieur de Marcey; "but let us go to her cottage and see if we cannot find some proof which may help us to discover the authors of this crime!"
They returned to the cottage, they visited and examined every corner; but except in Isaure"s bedroom, they found nothing disturbed in the house.
"She has carried away a part of her clothes!" said the baron, who seemed overwhelmed by Isaure"s disappearance.
"Can she have gone voluntarily?" cried Edouard.
"Voluntarily!" said Alfred; "does not this wounded dog prove, on the contrary, that someone forced his way into the house to carry Isaure away? The entrance was effected through the garden. Had Isaure any money with her?"
"She may have had some fifty louis," said the baron.
"That money is no longer here," cried Edouard; "so it must have been a robber who came here. But would a robber have taken Isaure away with him?"
They left the house, and were crossing the yard when Alfred spied something that glistened against the wall; he held his light to it and saw at his feet a sword still dripping with blood; it seemed evident that that was the weapon with which Vaillant had been wounded. They at once examined the sword with care. It was a weapon which seemed to be very old, the hilt was broken in several places, and it was impossible to distinguish the characters which had once been carved on the blade, which seemed to be of finely tempered steel.
"Such a weapon cannot have belonged to a thief," said the baron.
The young men agreed with him, and they lost themselves in innumerable conjectures. Suddenly, Alfred exclaimed:
"Stay! something, I don"t know what, tells me that that wretch, that vagabond, who is always prowling about these mountains, is not unconnected with this event!"
"What man are you talking about?" asked the baron.
"A villain, whose conduct and speech seem to indicate that he formerly lived in good society. We have not been able to take a step without meeting him; he knew you, father--at least he said he did; and when your name was mentioned before him, it seemed to produce a strange effect on him. However, I offered him money, and he refused it; but some unknown motive led him to think ill of Isaure. The villain! if I had followed his advice, I should have abducted this girl long ago; he considers such an exploit as a trivial escapade, and constantly told me that a girl that lived alone did not deserve to be treated differently."
"The scoundrel!" said the baron. "Ah! he did not know my Isaure! Dear Alfred, how bitterly you would have regretted it, if you had yielded to a pa.s.sing pa.s.sion! You do not know yet who this sweet, interesting girl is; you have no idea what bond there is between her and myself. I did not intend to reveal this mystery to you, I wished that it might be kept concealed forever; but since circ.u.mstances have led to your meeting your father in this place, you shall know everything, you shall learn the secret which is the cross of my life. You will pity your father, but I think that you cannot blame him. And you, Edouard, who think perhaps that you see in me a rival, you shall know how pure and unselfish is my attachment for Isaure; you shall learn that in seeking to keep her apart from the world, I had no such purpose as you may have supposed me to have."
"What! Can it be, monsieur?" cried Edouard, whose jealousy was instantly banished by these words. "You do not love Isaure? Then she did not deceive me when she told me that she still loved me, that she constantly thought of me? Her tears were not feigned! Oh! Mon Dieu! and to think that I added to her grief by my suspicions, by my jealousy!"
"This is no time to give way to fruitless regret," said Alfred; "we must find her, first of all. If the man I suspect is the author of this abduction, he may still be in this neighborhood. Why, I believe that that fellow, whose audacity is unmeasured, is capable of having taken Isaure to the chateau, to the tower, into the cellars, perhaps. We must neglect nothing. I"ll ride back to the chateau and search every nook and corner of the deserted portion."
"Go, dear Alfred; meanwhile, monsieur le baron and I will continue our search in the mountains. I shall not take an instant"s rest until I have found Isaure."
"To-morrow, at daybreak," said the baron, "we will meet at the White House; and there, my son, I propose to tell you the cause of my mysterious conduct. Edouard, too, shall know my misfortunes. He loves Isaure and she loves him; he must know the whole story of her birth, and then he can consider whether he still wishes her to be his wife."
"Ah! always, always, monsieur!"
Alfred did not allow Edouard to discourse any farther upon his love; he urged him to remember that at that moment it was more important to act, and to try to overtake the girl"s abductors. Edouard mounted his horse; Alfred did the same. The baron had his at the White House, and each of them took a different road, agreeing to meet on the morrow at daybreak.
Alfred dug his spurs into his horse, at the risk of breaking his neck on the mountain paths; he reached the chateau at three o"clock in the morning. As the concierge had informed him, the gate was not closed, and the Chateau of La Roche-Noire was open to all comers. But Alfred needed a light, and he desired the concierge to open the underground vaults and the deserted apartments, to which he had the keys. So he knocked loudly at the door of Monsieur Cunette, who was sleeping like a deaf man and did not reply. Caring little whether he disturbed the rest of the occupants of the chateau, Alfred continued to hammer and call, and soon nearly every window opened except the concierge"s.
Robineau appeared at the window of his apartment in his silk nightcap, the marquis in one of cotton, Eudoxie half-wrapped in a pelisse, Cornelie in a lace-trimmed dressing jacket, Mademoiselle Cheval in deshabille, Jeannette in a mob cap; the scullions also showed themselves in the windows in the roof.
"What"s the matter? what"s up now?" asked Robineau.
"Why this uproar?" said Cornelie.
"Is this chateau bewitched?" said Eudoxie.
"A body can"t dream comfortably here," said the cook.
"Son-in-law," said Monsieur de la Pincerie, "I order you to go down and thrash the miscreants who are disturbing my sleep."
"Monsieur le marquis, I am distressed to have awakened you," said Alfred, "but I do not believe that anyone will thrash me for that."
"What! is it Alfred who is making this disturbance?"
"My dear fellow, go back to bed with your wife; there are no thieves or ghosts in the chateau. It is possible, however, that there may be someone hidden in the old tower; and it is that someone that I propose to arrest."
"Someone hidden in my house!"
"It wouldn"t be the first time that that person had pa.s.sed the night in this house."
"Great heavens! People hide themselves in my chateau, without my knowledge?"
"You see, monsieur, that we are well guarded," said Cornelie; "to-morrow I shall throw the whole household out of doors!"
However, upon the a.s.surance that there was nothing new in the chateau, the windows closed one by one. The cook provided Alfred with a light, and he decided to examine the tower and the vaults, without the a.s.sistance of the concierge. Mademoiselle Cheval boldly offered to accompany the young man; but he thanked her and bent his steps alone toward the part of the chateau which was not occupied.
Alfred found the door of the tower still open; he went up to every floor, examined all the chambers, and carefully secured the doors; then he went down into the cellars, to which the more dignified name of subterranean vaults had been given; but he saw no one there and nothing to indicate that the vagabond had visited the place very recently.
Alfred spent nearly two hours in his investigation. The dawn was beginning to appear when he went to his apartment, to prepare his things for his departure. He ordered Francois to send his luggage and Edouard"s to the White House, and was on the point of leaving the chateau, when he saw Robineau, who had risen very early in order to see his friends before their departure.
"So you are going away?" said Robineau to Alfred.
"Yes, my friend; nothing can stop me now."
"And Monsieur Edouard?"
"He is waiting for me at the White House."
"At the White House?"
"Yes, we know the owner now."
"The deuce you do? and the girl?"
"She has been kidnapped and we are looking for her."
"Kidnapped! the little witch!"
"Adieu; when I see you again, I will tell you more."
"But--who is this person who dares to come to my chateau at night?"
"The man of Clermont-Ferrand."
"Mon Dieu! and you never told me! I am going to have the North Tower torn down."