"I venture to hope, mademoiselle, that you won't take a mere joke quite
seriously."
"A joke!" exclaimed Mlle. de Porhoet. "A nice subject to joke upon!
And, sir, what do you people of to-day call the jokes that can be boldly
addressed to an old and defenceless woman, but which you would not dare
to utter in the presence of a man?"
"Mademoiselle, you leave me no choice; I must trust to your discretion.
I do not know whether the name of Champcey d'Hauterive is familiar to
you?"
"I know the Champcey d'Hauterives perfectly well, sir. They are a good,
an excellent Dauphin family. What inference am I to make from your
question?"
"I am the present representative of that family."
"You!" exclaimed Mlle. de Porhoet, coming to a sudden halt. "You are a
Champcey d'Hauterive?"
"Yes, the male representative, mademoiselle."
"That alters the question," she said. "Give me your arm, cousin, and
tell me your history."
I thought that in the circumstances it would be better not to conceal
anything from her. As I finished the painful story of my family
troubles, we found ourselves opposite a small house, remarkably low and
narrow. On one side stood a kind of low pigeon-house with a pointed
roof.
"Enter, marquis," said the daughter of the kings of Gael at the
threshold of her lowly palace. "I beg that you will enter."
The next moment I stepped into a little _salon_ meanly paved with brick;
on the faded tapestry of the walls hung portraits of ancestors gorgeous
in ducal ermine. Over the mantel-piece sparkled a magnificent clock in
tortoise-shell and brass, surmounted by a group representing the chariot
of the sun. Some oval-backed arm-chairs and an old spindle-legged couch
completed the furniture of the room. Everything shone with cleanliness,
and the air was filled with mingled odours of iris, Spanish snuff, and
aromatic essences.
"Pray be seated," said the old lady, taking her place on the couch;
"pray be seated, my cousin. I call you cousin, though we are not
related, and cannot be, as Jeanne de Porhoet and Hugues de Champcey were
so ill-advised as to leave no issue. But, with your permission, I should
like to treat you as a cousin when we are alone, if only to make me
forget for a moment that I am alone in the world.
"So, cousin, I see how you are situated; the case is a hard one, most
assuredly. But I will suggest one or two reflections which have solaced
me, and which I think are likely to bring consolation to you.
"In the first place, my dear marquis, I often tell myself that among all
the charlatans and ex-lackeys one now sees rolling in carriages, poverty
has a peculiar perfume of distinction and good taste. And also I am
inclined to believe that God has brought some of us down to a poor and
narrow life, that this coarse, materialistic, money-grubbing age may
have before it the type of a merit, dignity, and splendour which owes
nothing to money, that money cannot buy--that is not for sale. In all
probability, my cousin, such is the providential justification of your
situation and of mine."
I conveyed to Mlle. de Porhoet my satisfaction at having been chosen
with her to give the world the noble example it needs so much, and shows
itself so ready to profit by.
"For my own part," she went on, "I am inured to privation, and I do not
feel it much. When, in the course of a life that has been too long, one
has seen a father and four brothers, worthy of their father, perish
before their time, by sword or bullet; when one has lost, one by one,
all the objects of one's affection and worship, one must have a very
paltry soul to be much concerned about more or less ample meals and more
or less dainty clothing. Certainly, marquis, you may be sure that if my
personal comfort only were at stake, I should not trouble about my
Spanish millions; but to me it seems but right and proper and exemplary
that a house like mine should not disappear without leaving some
permanent sign, some striking monument of its grandeur and its faith.
And that is why, cousin, I have, in imitation of some of my ancestors,
thought of the pious foundation of which you must have heard, and which,
while I have life, I shall not relinquish."
Assured of my sympathy, the noble old lady seemed to lose herself in
meditation, and as she looked sadly at the fading portraits of her
ancestors, only the beat of the hereditary clock broke the silence of
midnight in the dim room.
"There will be," Mlle. de Porhoet suddenly resumed, in a solemn voice,
"there will be a chapter of regular canons attached to the church. Each
day at matins, a mass will be said in the private chapel of my family,
for the repose of my soul and the souls of my ancestors. The feet of
the celebrant priest will tread a slab of unlettered marble, which will
form the step of the altar and cover my ashes."
I bent towards her with evident emotion, with visible respect. Mlle. de
Porhoet took my hand and pressed it gently.
"Cousin," she said, "I am not mad, whatever they may say. My father,
who was truth itself, always declared that when the direct line of our
Spanish branch became exhausted we should be sole heirs to the estate.
Unfortunately, his sudden and violent death prevented him from giving us
more exact information; but, as I cannot doubt his word, I do not doubt
my rights. However," she added, after a little pause, and in accents of
touching sadness, "if I am not mad, I am old, and the people in Spain
know it. For fifteen years they have dragged me on from one delay to
another; they are waiting for my death to finish everything. And ...
they will not have to wait long. Some morning, very soon now, I must
make my last sacrifice. My dear cathedral--my only love, which has
taken the place of so many broken or suppressed attachments--will have
but one stone--that of my tomb."
She was silent; her thin hands wiped away two tears that flowed down her
worn face, as, striving to smile, she said:
"Forgive me, cousin, you have enough troubles of your own. Besides, it
is late--you must go. You will compromise me!"
Before leaving, I again recommended the greatest discretion in reference
to the secret I had intrusted to her. She replied, a little naively,
that I need not be anxious, and that my peace of mind and dignity were
safe in her hands. Nevertheless, during the next few days, I suspected,
from Mme. Laroque's increased attentions, that my excellent friend had
handed on my confidence. Indeed, Mlle. de Porhoet admitted the fact,
declaring that the honour of her family demanded this, and assured me
that Mme. Laroque was incapable of betraying a secret intrusted to her,
even to her own daughter.
Our interview had filled me with sympathetic respect for the old lady,
which I tried to express by my actions. The evening of the next day I
taxed all the resources of my pencil in the invention of decorations,
internal and external, for her beloved cathedral. The attention seemed
to please her very much, and I soon got into the habit of working on the
cathedral every evening after our whist, enriching the ideal edifice
with a statue, a pulpit, and a rood-loft. Mlle. Marguerite, who seems
to feel a kind of adoration for her old neighbour, associated herself
with my work of charity by devoting a special album to the Basilica
Porhoet, which it is my duty to fill with designs and drawings.
And in addition, I offered my old confidant to take my share in the
inquiries and other matters of business connected with her lawsuit. The
poor lady confessed that I should do her a service; that though she
could still keep up her ordinary correspondence, her sight was too weak
to decipher the manuscripts of her archives. Hitherto she had not
associated any one with her in this important work, for fear of giving
more occasion to the rustic humourists. In short, she accepted me as
counsellor and collaborator. Since this, I have conscientiously studied
the voluminous documents of her lawsuit, and I have been convinced that
the case, which must be sooner or later definitively settled, is
absolutely hopeless from the beginning. M. Laubepin agrees with me in
this opinion, which as far as possible I have concealed from the old
lady. Meanwhile I have pleased her by going through her family archives
piece by piece; she still hopes to find among them some incontestable
proof in favour of her claim. Unfortunately, the records are very
copious, and fill the pigeon-house from floor to roof. Yesterday I went
early to Mlle. de Porhoet's to finish before lunch the examination of
packet No. 115, which I had begun overnight. The lady of the house had
not risen yet, so, with the help of the little servant, I quietly
installed myself in the _salon_ and settled down to my dusty work.
About an hour later, as I was going joyfully through the last sheet of
packet No. 115, Mlle. de Porhoet came in, dragging a huge bundle neatly
wrapped up in a white linen cover.
"Good-morning, my dear cousin," she said. "I've heard how you have been
working for me this morning, so I determined to work for you. Here is
packet No. 116."
I must confess that at this moment Mlle. de Porhoet reminded me of the
cruel fairy of folklore, who shuts the princess up in a lonely tower and
imposes a succession of extraordinary and impossible tasks on her.
"Last night," she continued, "I dreamed that the key of my Spanish
treasure lay in this packet. So you will very much oblige me by
examining it at once. Afterward I hope you will do me the honour to
share a frugal repast in the shade of my arbour."
There was no help for it. I obeyed, and I need not say that the
wonderful packet No. 116 contained, like its predecessors, nothing more
valuable than the dust of centuries. Precisely at noon, the old lady
came to offer me her arm and conduct me formally to a little
box-bordered garden which, with a bit of adjoining meadow, now
constitutes the sole domain of the Porhoets. The table was set out under
an arched bower of foliage, and through the leaves the sunshine of a
fine summer's day dappled the spotless, sweet-smelling table-cloth. I
had done justice to the chicken, the fresh salad, and the bottle of old
Bordeaux, which made up the _menu_ of the banquet, when Mlle. de
Porhoet, who seemed charmed with my appetite, turned the conversation on
to the Laroque family.
"I will own," she said to me, "that I do not care for the old buccaneer.
When he first came here he had a large and favourite ape, which he
dressed up like a servant, and which he seemed to be able to communicate
with perfectly. The animal was a nuisance to the whole country, and
only a man without education or decency could have kept it. I agreed
when they told me that it was an ape, but, as a fact, I have always
believed that it was a negro, more especially as I had always suspected
its master of having trafficked in that commodity in Africa. But M.
Laroque, the son, was a good sort of man, and quite a gentleman. As to
the ladies--I refer, of course, to Mme. Laroque and her daughter, and in
no way to the widow Aubry, an extremely common person--as to the ladies,
I say, they deserve every good thing one can say of them."
Just then we heard the hoofs of a horse on the path that runs outside
the garden wall, and the next moment some one was knocking sharply at a
small door near the arbour.
"Yes," said Mlle. de Porhoet. "Who goes there?"