THE JUSTIFICATION.
Bonnier paused for a moment on the threshold, fixing his eyes on
Victoria, who greeted him with a sweet, fascinating smile. But the smile
disappeared from her lips when she beheld the threatening angry glance
with which he was staring at her, and the air of gloomy indignation
depicted on his countenance. She might be mistaken, however, and perhaps
it was merely the anguish of her conscience which made her tremble.
“And you bring me the papers, my beloved friend?” asked Victoria, with
an air of fascinating kindness.
“Yes,” said Bonnier, still remaining on the threshold, “I bring you the
papers. But just look what a fool love has made of me! For your sake,
I forgot the portfolio with those other papers, and dropped it on the
floor there. Do you now perceive your power over me? For I believe I
told you that the loss of those papers would ruin me irretrievably.”
“Yes, you told me so,” said Victoria, smiling.
“And yet I forgot them here!” exclaimed Bonnier, stooping to pick them
up. But Victoria immediately rose and hastened to him.
“To punish you for your carelessness, you shall now leave the portfolio
on the floor,” she said, smiling; “nor shall you think of it again as
long as I am with you. Tell me, will that be too hard for you?”
She bent her beautiful face over him, and with flaming glances looked
deeply into his eyes.
Bonnier dropped the portfolio again and smiled.
“It may lie there,” he said; “it has performed its part anyhow. And now,
I suppose, we will talk again about our business?”
“Yes, we will,” replied Victoria. “Give me the papers.”
“No, madame; no one gives up such important papers without witnesses,”
said Bonnier. “Permit me therefore to call my witnesses.”
He hastily turned to the door and pushed it open.
“Come in, gentlemen!” he shouted, and his two colleagues, Roberjot and
Debry, immediately appeared on the threshold. Without greeting Victoria,
merely eyeing her with cold, contemptuous glances, the two gentlemen
entered and walked directly to the desk. Bonnier locked the door and put
the key into his pocket.
Victoria saw it, and a slight pallor overspread her rosy face for a
moment.
“Will you tell me, sir, what all this means?” she asked, in a
threatening voice.
“You will learn it directly,” said Bonnier. “Please sit down again in
your arm-chair, for we are going to resume our diplomatic negotiations.
You, gentlemen, take seats on both sides of the lady; I shall sit down
opposite her, and at the slightest motion she makes, either to jump out
of the window there, or to interrupt us by an exclamation, I shall shoot
her as sure as my name is Bonnier!”
He drew a pistol from his bosom and cocked it. “I command you to be
silent and not to interrupt us,” he said, turning to Victoria. “The
pistol is loaded, and, unless you respect my orders, I will most
certainly inflict upon you the punishment you have deserved; I shall
take your life like that of any other spy who has been caught in a
hostile camp.”
He dropped his right hand with the pistol on the table, and then turned
to the two gentlemen, who had listened to him in gloomy silence.
“Yes, my friends,” he said, throwing back his head in order to shake
away his long black hair, surrounding his face like a mane--“now, my
friends, I beg you to listen to my justification. You have latterly
believed me to be a fool, a prodigal son of the republic, who, for the
sake of a miserable love-affair with a flirt, neglected the most sacred
interests of his country. You shall see and acknowledge now that, while
I seemed to be lost, I was only working for the welfare and glory of our
great republic, and that this woman with her beautiful mask did not
make me forget for a single moment my duties to my country. These papers
contain my justification--these papers, madame, with which you hoped
to revenge yourself. Pardon me, my fairy queen, I have made another
mistake, and again brought a wrong portfolio; these are not the
documents either which you would like to obtain. Perhaps they are after
all in the portfolio lying on the floor there!”
He looked at Victoria with a scornful smile; she fixed her large eyes
steadfastly upon him; not a muscle of her face was twitching--not the
slightest anxiety or fear was depicted on her features.
Bonnier opened the portfolio and drew the papers from it.
“I shall only briefly state to you the contents of those papers,” he
said, “you may afterward peruse them at leisure. This first paper is a
letter I received by a courier from Vienna, without knowing who sent it
to me. The letter only contains the following words:”
“‘Be on your guard. A very dangerous spy will be sent to you--a lady who
is the most intimate friend of a distinguished statesman. Receive her
well, and let no one see these lines. It will promote the welfare of
France.’”
“As a matter of course, I said nothing about it, not even to you, my
friends; I was silent, and waited for further developments. Two days
later I received this second paper. It was a note from a lady, who wrote
to me that she had just arrived at Rastadt, and was very anxious to
see me, but under the seal of the most profound secrecy. I followed the
invitation, and repaired to the designated house. I found there this
lady, who introduced herself to me as Madame Victoria de Poutet; and
if you now look at her you will comprehend why that refined half-Turk
Thugut, as well as the mad rake Count Lehrbach, are both in love with
her, for she is more beautiful than the loveliest odalisque and the most
fascinating Phryne!”
The three men fixed their eyes upon Victoria, and ogled her with an
impudent leer. Victoria sat erect and immovable, and even her eye-lashes
did not move; she apparently did not see the glances fixed upon her; nor
even heard what Bonnier had said about her, for her countenance remained
calm and almost smiling.
Bonnier continued: “The lady told me a very pretty little story, the
particulars of which I shall not relate to you. In short, Thugut had
attacked her innocence and her honor--her innocence and her honor, do
not forget that!--and she wanted to revenge herself upon him. She asked
me to lend her my assistance for this purpose. I feigned to believe
every thing she told me, and promised to protect her.”
“This third paper here I found on my desk on returning home from my
visit to the lady. A stranger had delivered it. It was written by the
same man who had addressed the first letter to me. It read as
follows: ‘A romance is to be played with you; let them proceed without
interfering with their doings. The fascination of beauty is very
powerful, and the lady is going to fascinate you, for the purpose of
obtaining important papers from you. Pretend to be fascinated, and you
will penetrate the intrigue.’”
“The advice was good, and I followed it. I feigned to be fascinated;
I played the enthusiastic lover of this lady; and although I doubtless
acted my part in a very clumsy manner, she was kind enough to believe
me; for she is well aware that no one is able to withstand the power of
her beauty. But in order to perform my ROLE in a really truthful manner,
not only Madame de Poutet, but also all Rastadt, had to be convinced of
my ardent love for her, for Victoria is very shrewd; Thugut has
educated a worthy pupil in her. Hence I had to wear the mask of my love
everywhere, even before you, my friends. I had to make up my mind to
pass for a fool until I was able to prove to you that I was a man of
sense; I had to wear MY mask until I was able to tear this woman’s
mask from her face. Oh, I assure you, it is not an easy task to be this
lady’s lover! She demands a great deal of courting, a great deal of
ardor, a great deal of passion; she has got very warm blood herself,
and, if I am not mistaken, she is a great-granddaughter of that
beautiful Roman lady, Messalina.”
Now, for the first time, a slight tremor pervaded Victoria’s frame, and
a deep blush suffused her cheeks. But this lasted only a moment, and
then she sat again quite erect and immovable.
“In spite of the difficulty of your task, you have played your part in a
masterly manner,” said Jean Debry, in a rude and stern voice. “All of us
believed you were in love, and this modern Messalina certainly did not
doubt it, either.”
“No, she did not doubt it,” said Bonnier, with a disdainful smile. “She
surrounded herself with spies, who had to watch me, but fortunately I
knew them, and did not betray myself.”
“How did you know them?” asked Roberjot.
“My unknown correspondent pointed them out to me. He had given up his
incognito, and came to me, satisfying me of his identity by writing
a few lines, which proved him to be the author of the two previous
letters. He offered for a brilliant compensation to assist me in
unravelling the intrigue, and I promised him five thousand francs. He
was one of our most astute and skilful spies, and he wanted this affair
to be his masterpiece, in order to obtain from me a recommendation to
General Bonaparte, who has just returned from Egypt. I shall give him
to-day the promised sum and the recommendation, for he has honestly
earned both, and faithfully assisted me in unmasking this woman.
[Footnote: This spy was the famous Schulmeister, afterward Bonaparte’s
most adroit and intrepid spy. He boasted of the role he had played
at Kastadt, and which had brought him double pay; first from Count
Lehrbach, whom he had informed that there were important papers in the
hands of the French, and then from the French ambassadors, whom he had
cautioned against Count Lehrbach, and given the advice to burn their
papers and to be on their guard.] I received every morning a written
report from him about every thing Madame Poutet had done during the
previous day. All these reports are in this portfolio, and you will
examine them, my friends. You will see from them that Madame Victoria,
who had come to me in order to revenge herself upon Thugut, nevertheless
kept up a good understanding with his most intimate friend, Count
Lehrbach, for every night, as soon as I had left Victoria, the noble
count repaired to her house and spent several hours with her, although
Victoria had assured me Count Lehrbach did not even suspect her presence
at Rastadt. However, there was a possibility that my spy was deceiving
me just as well as he had deceived Madame de Poutet. In order to
ascertain that, I informed Victoria one evening that a courier would set
out for Paris in the morning, and forward to the Directory papers of
the highest importance, concerning an alliance with Russia. We sent
a courier to Paris in the morning, but not far from Rastadt he was
arrested by Austrian hussars, robbed of his papers, and taken to the
headquarters of the Austrian Colonel Barbaczy, at Gernsbach, although
our courier was provided with a French passport and an official badge,
enabling him fully to prove that he was in our service.” [Footnote:
Historical.]
“This was an unheard-of violation of international law, for which we
have vainly sought redress,” said Jean Debry, gloomily.
“These German cowards are not even courageous enough to acknowledge
their own acts. They deny having robbed our courier, but they cannot
deny having imprisoned him, contrary to international law.”
“Just as little as Victoria can deny that she was the person who
had informed Lehrbach and Barbaczy of the courier’s departure,” said
Bonnier; “for, fifteen minutes before setting out, the courier himself
did not know any thing about his mission; and the dispatches, of course,
were of the most harmless description. But my pretty lady-bird there had
gone into the trap I had set for her, and I kept her in it without her
knowing any thing about it. She was quite unsuspecting, and, thanks to
my talents as a comedian, and to my love, I finally found out the real
purpose of her visit to Rastadt. Yesterday I promised her to deliver to
her to-day the papers that endanger Thugut’s position at the head of the
Austrian government, and prove him to be a hireling of England. In the
evening Count Lehrbach sent a courier to Vienna; then we retaliated,
caused the courier to be arrested and took his papers from him. He had,
however, only a small note, addressed to Minister Thugut. Here it is. It
contains only the following words:”
‘I shall get the papers to-morrow.’
‘VICTORIA.’
“But these words were written by the beautiful hand of the same lady
who latterly had penned so many tender love-letters to myself. I had
promised her those papers if she would call for them to-day, and you
see, my friends, that she has come. But I desired to know if this really
was the only object for which Baron Thugut had sent his most beautiful
and sagacious agent to Rastadt, or if there were not some secondary
objects at the bottom of this mission. I therefore resolved to ascertain
this to-day. My astute spy had told me that Madame de Poutet was also
anxious to get hold of some other important papers. I therefore feigned
to-day to have abstracted the wrong papers and to have brought here a
portfolio containing our correspondence with the Prussian minister and
documents in relation to an alliance between France and Prussia. I
told my fair friend that the loss of these papers would ruin me
irretrievably, and yet I was such a love-sick fool as to drop the
portfolio with the papers while engaged in tenderly kissing my hand to
my dulcinea. Look, gentlemen, the portfolio is yet lying on the floor,
but the papers are no longer in it. They are carefully concealed in
Madame Victoria’s pocket. Oh, it was a very pretty scene, when she stole
them. I watched her through a small hole which I had bored through the
door this morning, and through which I could plainly see every motion
of my beautiful Victoria. Yes, my beautiful Victoria stole the papers,
although she knew that this loss would seriously embarrass me. However,
my friends, it will be unnecessary for the republic to punish me for
this theft Madame de Poutet has committed, for the papers she has got
in her pocket are nothing but the faithful diary of my daily intercourse
with Victoria de Poutet. I have carefully noted in it every conversation
I had with her, and every favor she granted to me, and I have no
objection whatever to this diary being transmitted to Minister Thugut.
If he is not jealous, he will not complain of it. And now I am through
with my justification, and I ask you, did I not act as a good and
faithful son of the republic should? Have I done my duty? Will the
country be content with me?”
“Yes,” said Roberjot, solemnly, “you have acted as a good and faithful
son of the republic. You have intrepidly followed the enemy who had
approached you on secret paths, into his hiding-places, and you have
skilfully exposed the perfidious intrigues he had carried on against
France. You have done your duty.”
“Yes, the republic will thank you for your zeal,” exclaimed Jean Debry;
“you have run great risks for her sake. For a beautiful, voluptuous, and
intriguing woman is even more dangerous than a venomous serpent. Like
St. Anthony, you have withstood the temptress by praying to our holy
mother, the great French Republic! Yes, the country will be content with
you.”
“I thank you, my friends,” said Bonnier, with a happy smile; “I now
stand again before you with a clear conscience, and without a blush of
shame on my cheeks. You have accepted my atonement. As for this woman,
we will inflict no further punishment on her. She was only a tool in
Thugut’s hands; that was all. This hour has punished her sufficiently,
and our profound contempt shall be the only penalty she will take away
with her.”
“Yes, our profound contempt shall be the penalty she will take with
her,” exclaimed Roberjot and Jean Debry at the same time.
“There is nothing more disgraceful under the sun than a woman who sells
her charms,” said Roberjot.
“There is nothing more dreadful and dishonorable than an ambitious and
heartless wanton!” added Jean Debry, in a voice of profound disdain.
“Victoria de Poutet,” said Bonnier, throwing the pistol aside, “every
thing between us was a comedy, even this pistol, the pretended bullet of
which frightened and silenced you. It was not loaded. The comedy is
now at an end, and there remains nothing for you but to go to your
stage-manager and to tell him that you utterly failed in performing your
part. You may go now; nothing further detains you here.”
“I beg your pardon,” said Victoria, in a perfectly calm and sonorous
voice; “you forget that you put the key of the door into your pocket;
go, therefore, and unlock it.”
She pointed at the door with an imperious gesture, and Bonnier went to
unlock it. Victoria, remaining still erect and calm in her arm-chair,
looked at him while he was doing so, and only when Bonnier had opened
the door and returned to the table, she rose slowly from her seat.
Now she stood there, drawing herself up to her full height, her face
glowing with indignation, a deep blush mantling her cheeks, a disdainful
smile playing on the slightly parted lips, the expansive white forehead
deeply wrinkled, as cold as marble, and yet concealing under this marble
surface a torrent of molten lava, which, as soon as it should burst
forth, could not but produce death and destruction. Hers was now
a diabolic beauty, and when she turned her eyes toward the three
republicans, they glistened like dagger-points.
“I have to make but a brief reply to M. Bonnier’s long speech,” she
said, proudly and calmly. “This is my answer: I shall obtain those
papers in spite of you, and I shall revenge myself for this hour! To
your last high-sounding sentences, I answer by another sentence: there
is nothing more dangerous than an irritated and insulted woman, for she
will revenge herself and imbrue her hands in the blood of those who have
insulted her. Roberjot, Bonnier, and Debry, you have insulted me, and
I tell you I shall revenge myself. Before three times three days have
passed, you will have atoned with your blood for this hour, and may God
have mercy on your poor souls!”
She greeted all of them with a haughty nod, and slowly turning around,
she proudly crossed the room. The three men looked at her with pale and
gloomy faces, and a slight shudder pervaded for a moment the hearts of
the republicans, usually so bold and undaunted.
“She looked like an evil demon predicting our future!” murmured
Roberjot.
“She will fulfil her word; she will try to assassinate us,” said
Bonnier. “Did you not see it? Her eyes were moist; no tears were
glistening in them, however, only the venom she will discharge at us.
Let us be on our guard!”
“Yes, let us beware of the serpent’s venom!” exclaimed Jean Debry, with
gloomy energy--“let us beware, and most of all, let us be men who cannot
be intimidated by the furious threats of a woman.”
But Jean Debry knew neither the energy nor the power of this woman whose
threats he despised. He did not know that, her anger once aroused, she
would not rest until she had taken her revenge. Late in the evening of
that day, when all Rastadt was sleeping, Victoria received in her house
her two powerful assistants, Count Lehrbach and Colonel Barbaczy, the
latter having been invited by a mounted messenger to come to her from
Gernsbach.
A long and portentous conference these three persons held in the course
of that night, during which they consulted about the best way to punish
the French ambassadors, and to take from them the papers which Thugut
wished to obtain. “We must have those papers at any price,” exclaimed
Victoria, with flashing eyes.
“Oh, it will only cost a little blood!” shouted Count Lehrbach, in a
hollow voice, and laughing hoarsely. “These overbearing French have
trampled us under foot for two long years, and tormented us by pricking
us with pins. Now we will also trample them under foot and prick them,
and if our pins are longer than theirs, who will complain?”
“Thugut wants those papers, and he has forgiven us in advance if they
should be a little blood-stained,” said Victoria, looking up smilingly
to old Colonel Barbaczy, who, with his hands folded on his back, his
large shaggy eyebrows gloomily contracted, was slowly pacing the room.
“Barbaczy! Barbaczy!” he muttered, in a low voice, “what will the
world say of your old head?” [Footnote: Barbaczy’s own words.--Vide
“Uteransoher Lodiacus.” Edited by Theod. Mundt, 1835. Third number, p.
208]
“The world will not grudge these hot-blooded French a little
blood-letting, and it will praise your surgical skill, my dear
Barbaczy,” exclaimed Lehrbach, laughing. “The responsibility, besides,
does not fall on your shoulders. Who will blame you if your hot-blooded
hussars commit some excesses-some highway robberies? You do not order
them to assassinate anybody; you only order them to take the papers from
the ambassadors, and only to use force if it cannot be helped.”
“I shall send fifty hussars to the city to-morrow,” said Barbaczy,
thoughtfully. “They shall encamp in front of the Ettlinger Gate, so
that no one, whosoever it may be, will be able to cross the bridges
connecting the city with the suburbs without passing through their
ranks.”
Victoria approached him, and laying her hands on his shoulders, she
looked up to him with a fascinating smile.
“And you will send some of your most intrepid hussars to Lehrbach and to
me, that we may tell the brave men what rewards are in store for them if
they perform their duly in a satisfactory manner? No, my beautiful god
of war, do not shake your silvery locks BO wildly--do not threaten me
with your frowning brow! Think of Gurgewo, my friend! Do you remember
what you swore to me at that time in the trenches when I dressed with my
own hands the wound for which you were indebted to a Turkish sabre? Do
you remember that you swore to me at that time you would reciprocate my
service as soon as it was in your power?”
“I know it, and I am ready to fulfil my oath,” said Barbaczy, heaving a
sigh.
“Well, my friend, all I ask is this: send to-morrow six of your bravest
and wildest hussars to my house, and order them faithfully to carry out
what Count Lehrbach and I shall tell them.”
“The hussars shall halt at your door to-morrow morning at nine o’clock,”
said Barbaczy, resolutely.
“And I will admit them!” exclaimed Victoria, smiling. “You will be here,
Count Lehrbach, I suppose?”
“I shall be here in order to listen to the wise lessons which the
goddess Victoria will teach the sons of Mars,” replied Lehrbach, fixing
his small, squinting eyes with an admiring air on Victoria’s beautiful
face. “You will need no other means but your smiles and your beauty in
order to inspire those brave soldiers with the most dauntless heroism.
Who would not be willing to shed a little French blood, if your lips
should promise him a reward?”
“And what reward are you going to promise to the soldier?” asked
Barbaczy, turning to Madame de Poutet. “What are you going to ask them
to do?”
“Only to seize all the papers of the ambassadors,” said Victoria.
“And to examine their bodies if any papers should be concealed there,”
added Count Lehrbach, laughing.
“And their reward shall be that the hussars will be allowed to look for
some other spoils,” said Victoria.
“Highway robbery and murder, then,” sighed Barbaczy, “and perpetrated by
soldiers of my regiment! Highway robbery and murder!”
“Fie, what ugly words those are! and who thinks of murder?” exclaimed
Victoria. “Did we Germans die, then, of the numerous kicks and blows
which the French have given us for the last few years? We will only
return those kicks and blows, and the French will assuredly not be so
thin-skinned as to die of them on the spot.”
“Do as you please,” sighed Barbaczy. “Count Lehrbach has the right to
issue orders to myself and to my troops, and I owe you the fulfilment
of my oath. My hussars will occupy the city to-morrow, and I shall order
the French ambassadors to depart forthwith. What is to be done after
their departure you may settle with the hussars I shall send to you. I
shall take no notice of it.”
“And that is a very wise resolution of yours, colonel,” said Lehrbach.
“‘To know too much gives us the headache,’ says our gracious emperor,
whenever he returns the dispatches to Baron Thugut without having read
them. Send us, then, your hussars to-morrow, and whatever may happen,
colonel, we shall not betray each other.”
“No, we shall not betray each other!” repeated Victoria and Barbaczy,
with uplifted hands.
“To-morrow, then!” said Victoria. “Now, good-night, gentlemen!”