There was a minute of dumb horror; then Felicie would have broken into
lamentation before the messenger if Claire had not hastily signed to him
to go round to the offices. Leon stood, ghastly white; his wife clasped
his arm with both hands, and Felicie's sobs, the only sound, came to her
ears as distant as the rush of the river. Leon did not hear them at
all. For the moment he was turned into stone, and his heart stood
still. He had talked of it, dreaded it, but until this instant the
horror of the thing had never really touched him. Arrested! He, Leon
de Beaudrillart!
He looked round at his wife, and her eyes met his with brave tenderness.
But he wanted words, and he held the letter to her with piteously
trembling hands. Every word had already burned itself into her brain.
His lips faltered the words: "What does it mean?"
If she could only have told him that it was a dreadful nightmare from
which they would presently wake! The clasp on his arm tightened. She
whispered:
"Dear, we will meet it together."
Claire, who in spite of her anger against him, was listening
breathlessly for some suggestion, turned away with a groan and rushed
up-stairs to her mother's room. She panted out:
"We must think of a way of saving Leon. Nathalie is helpless, and if
something is not done he will be arrested." In the immediate face of
danger Mme. de Beaudrillart's iron will exerted itself. She was deadly
pale, and she clutched the back of a chair; but her voice was unshaken
as she put the quick question: "When? To-day?"
"To-morrow."
"Then we must act. Bring them here."
They were already on the stairs. Leon came in first, his round face
absolutely colourless, his limbs dragging. He tried to smile, but the
effort only seemed to contort his features, and, stumbling forward, he
sank into a chair, and stretched out the hand which held the letter to
his mother. She read it with staring eyes, and when she spoke her voice
sounded as if one metal struck another.
"This is no time for crying out, or for tears," she said. "Monsieur
Rodoin has done very well in giving us warning, and he no doubt
understands that you must not be arrested. What remains is to decide
how to act, and then to act quickly. There has been too much delay
already. I suppose the time for money is past--"
"Owing to Nathalie," murmured Claire.
"--And only flight remains."
Leon lifted his head and looked at her with feverish eyes.
"You must fly, my son. Apparently there are countries where you will be
safe; I do not know which they are, but that can be ascertained. You
must start at once, telling no one and going alone, until your wife can
safely join you. This is the only way of escaping the worst
degradation. Claire, you have a good head; do you not think with me?"
"It is the one thing he can do for us," said Claire, rigidly.
"Felicie?"
Felicie nodded, but was weeping too much to speak. Leon had buried his
head in his hands, and his wife knelt by him, her eyes fixed on Mme. de
Beaudrillart's face.
"You see we are all agreed, Leon," his mother went on, vanquishing a
catch in her voice. "My son, remember what you owe to your name, and
act. Where will you go? to Bordeaux or Marseilles? If you could reach
America--" Her voice failed, she stood trembling, while her lips formed
the words she had not strength to utter. As for Leon, with a mute
gesture of despair he turned and hid his face against his wife's arm.
The little dependent action gave her words. She started to her feet,
her tall figure swaying, her whole frame one passionate protest.
"You forget me, madame! I am not agreed. I say that he did not do this
shameful thing, and that he shall not fly from it as if he were a
coward. A De Beaudrillart a coward! Because there is one act of which
he is ashamed, you want him to own to what is a hundred times worse!
Leon, do not listen to them! For Raoul's sake, do not listen to them!
Dear love, be brave, live it down!" She dropped again by his side,
gathering him to her heart, and with quivering lips kissing his hair,
his hands. Claire would have answered angrily, but her mother stopped
her.
"You have a right to be heard," she said to the young wife, "and we
have, perhaps, all too much forgotten that you suffer too. But let us
clearly understand each other. What is it that you suggest? That--that
he submits to arrest?" Her voice dropped miserably.
Nathalie made a mute sign of assent.
"Then you think," Mme. de Beaudrillart went on, in the same dry and
mechanical tones, "that it will be found they have not sufficient
evidence to prove what they--have to prove!"
"I do not know," said the wife, breathing hard. "I do not know. I only
know that he must tell the truth."
His mother's hands gripped her chair.
"Acknowledge that--that he took the money?"
"Yes. Because it is true."
A groan burst from Claire's lips.
"Impossible!" cried Mme. de Beaudrillart, with an agitation she had not
yet shown. "Plead guilty!"
Nathalie drove back anguish, recognising that all her strength was
needed.
"What would flight plead, madame? That would mean that he was guilty of
everything."
"Yes," the mother moaned. "His honour is lost. But he would escape the
dreadful disgrace of punishment."
"All his life would be one miserable punishment--too heavy, because
unjust. If he comes forward now, and tells the troth when it goes
against him, has he not a much better chance of being believed when it
is in his favour? There is the letter he wrote to Monsieur de Cadanet.
May that not still be found among his papers?"
Her heart was throbbing, and, holding him in her clasp, it was almost
beyond her powers to speak calmly. Mme. de Beaudrillart's self-control
began to forsake her, and all unconsciously the sight of her son
clinging to his wife impelled her into opposition. She cried out:
"But suppose they will not believe! Suppose he is--" She choked at the
word "convicted."
Nathalie felt her husband shiver, and pressed her lips on his hair.
"He will bear it," she breathed.
"No, no," cried his mother, starting up, "this is asking too much! You
are no judge. You cannot tell what he, what we all, would suffer.
Leon, speak! Flight is your only hope. Do not listen to your wife."
At this appeal he raised himself, and stared vacantly round the room.
His eyes lit on Felicie, and a haggard smile crossed his face.
"You had better not weep so much, Felicie; you will have no eyes left
for your embroideries."
She broke into more poignant sobs, and cried out:
"Mamma, must he go? Could we not hide him here somewhere?"
"In perpetuity," he muttered. "Nathalie is right, mother, in one thing,
for flight would only condemn me, and I could not bear it. I should not
be spared a single humiliation. Besides, in these days one must be
unknown to hide successfully, and all that I should gain would be the
being dragged back in ignominy."
Nathalie's eyes were fixed anxiously upon him, her lips trembled, her
shoulders contracted; it was as if she were trying to send strength from
her soul to his, in his weak striving against fate.
"I believe I know what I shall do," he went on, in a mechanically dull
voice; then suddenly starting up, clasped his hands across his burning
eyes, his face ghastly pale. His words came out slowly, shortly. "Yes,
do not fear, mother. I know what to do. Have a little patience. I
shall think of our honour, believe me." Then he reeled, and his wife
caught his arm. She was as white as he, but all her trembling had gone.
"Hush, Leon," she said, firmly; "the shock has unnerved you so much that
you do not know what you think or say. Whatever is done, even if you do
go away as your mother wishes you, it could not be yet, for you could
not reach the railway until dark; and you must have food. And if you
stay, there is no use acting as though all were lost. Let him go to our
room, madame, and come again to you later on. Come, dear love."
Mme. de Beaudrillart made no opposition, for her strength had failed
her. With a face of anguish she watched them out of the door, and fell
back in her chair, scarcely conscious. Felicie, still sobbing, busied
herself about her mother, and ran to fetch a handful of leaves from her
stores, with which to make a tisane. Claire, dry-eyed and tense, stood
with her eyes fixed on the photograph of her father, which always rested
on a small easel near her mother's chair.
"How unhappy we were when he died!" she said in a low voice, "and how
much better it would have been if we had all died with him! I can never
forgive Leon!"
Mme. de Beaudrillart did not speak--she could not. With her not only
pride but love was smitten low--so low that her usual emotions had lost
their leaders, and wandered objectless. Despair seized her whichever
way she looked, and, like Claire, she, too, wished for death.
Leon submitted without resistance to his wife's leading, clinging to
her, indeed, as they passed along the passages to her room. The window
leading into the stone balcony was open, and the whole air seemed to
vibrate with the hoarse croaking of frogs from the pond beyond the
kitchen-garden. Nathalie quietly closed it, and rang the bell. She
stood at the door, and gave the astonished Rose-Marie directions to
bring coffee at once, and, when it came, took it from her without
allowing the girl to enter. Then she knelt by her husband, and coaxed
him as if he were a child. He shuddered: "I cannot!"
"Dear, only to please me. It will do your head so much good."
"There is a millwheel in my head. You see they are all falling away
from me, so that even my mother will never be able to forgive."
"Do you know," she said, trying to speak cheerfully, "I believe we are
all making too much of it. What will you say if it comes to nothing,
and the jury are clever enough to take the sensible view of the case?
Why should this man make the charge when Monsieur de Cadanet is dead?
You will see that will tell against him."
He groaned.
"And if worst comes to the worst, your friends will know that you have
told the truth, dear; they will not think evil of you. And you will
have us--your mother and sisters, and Raoul, and me. Do not we count
for anything? Do not--"
He lifted his face and looked at her, and all her loving words stopped
midway in her throat, and made a lump there. If she could have thought
of herself she would have cried out to him to take away his eyes and
their anguish, for if Leon's soul had been wanting before, it had come
to him now, and gazed at her; and it needs an angel or a devil to bear
the sight of a human soul wrung with misery. Curiously enough, she felt
all the time that if she had known about the world and its ways, her
husband would have listened to her more readily. What she said to
comfort him he set down to ignorance. One of his old companions with a
jest and a laugh might have had a stronger influence than she with a
bleeding heart. But this only made her try the more. She knew enough
of Leon to be assured that silence would not soothe; she must talk,
argue, entreat, go over the same ground again and again, appeal to his
sentiment for them all, and this with a horrid fear deep within her to
which she dared not allude, and scarcely dared to think of. He was not
going to attempt to fly; so much she gathered. But that there was some
rising purpose in his mind which was colouring his broken words and
looks at her she was certain, and the certainty drove her almost mad
with hidden fear. She made him drink a little coffee, which was
something, and she wanted to bring Raoul to the rescue. But Raoul had
gone off with the pony and Jacques Charpentier to see the last of the
vintage at a distant farm, and would not be home until late--perhaps not
till after dark.
By this time all the household was aware that there was something wrong,
though they had different opinions as to the what, but, with a feeble
sort of pretence, dinner was gone through as usual. Mme. de
Beaudrillart, however, went away before it was ended, and Nathalie
detained Claire, to ask her if she would come to her room as soon as
Raoul returned. She grew more and more uneasy.
The lamp had been brought in before Claire appeared with the news that
she had heard the pony pass the window a few minutes before. His wife
glanced at Leon, but he sat, as he had sat for the last hour, his head
buried on his arm, and she hoped that, worn out, he might be sleeping.
She signed to Claire to speak to her outside the door.
"Please don't leave him, even for a minute," she whispered, and flew
down the stairs.
Rain was falling at last, and though Jacques had sheltered Raoul with
his own coat, the boy was wet. His mother hurried him up the stairs,
his laugh ringing out so strangely in the sorrow-stilled house that she
almost hushed it. But she did not, because she thought within herself
that a child's laugh is a healthy thing, and that the sound might drive
away other things not so healthy. She left the door of his room open,
however, and kept her ears on the alert, while she hustled him into dry
clothes, and then, holding his hand, ran along the passages to the room
where she had left her husband and Claire. Claire met her at the door.
"He is gone," she said, in a frightened whisper.
"You left him?"
"Only for a minute. He asked me to get him a newspaper from
down-stairs, and when I came back the window was open--"
Nathalie rocked as she stood, caught at the wall, and said, with a gasp:
"Take the boy to your mother, and don't frighten her." Then she ran--
how she ran!--though to this hour she thinks her feet were tied
together.
In three minutes she had found Jacques in the stable. He thought a
ghost was upon him till she spoke.
"Your master is out somewhere, and I think he is going to kill himself.
You and I must find him."
Jacques understood at once. He had known that some calamity was at
hand. He snatched up the stable-lantern, went outside, locked the door,
and put his question:
"Had he his pistols, madame?"
"No."
"Then I believe he will have gone to the river."
"I know it, I know it!" she cried, wildly. "But where!" Jacques
muttered to himself, "He would go to the bridge, because it is at its
deepest, but there is no use in following him there; one must strike it
lower down." He caught up a long rake which stood against the wall.
"Come, madame." The rain had been swept off by a strong breeze, and the
moon made the leaves glisten like diamonds, and flung deep shadows under
the trees. The two hurried round in front of the chateau, and plunged
into the heavy wet gloom which brooded round the garden. Nathalie's
cry, "Leon, Leon!" at first timid, rose sharper as they left the house
behind them; then she remembered the whistle which she used as a call
for her husband, and blew shrilly.
"That is better," said the gardener, encouragingly. He had kicked off
his shoes and stockings before Mme. Leon came out, and ran all the
easier, his steps falling with a soft thud. That, the croaking of
frogs, the soft hoot of owls, and the rush of the river were the only
sounds, and to the wife's strained ears the silence seemed full of
strange significance.
Suddenly Jacques stopped.
"Go round by the bridge, madame. I shall take the bank."
"I am coming with you," she said, determinedly.
He raised no further objection, and they went where she and Jean had
followed Raoul not so long ago, down a dark abyss of underwood which
snatched at them as they pushed through it, slipping and sliding on the
wet ground, her dress torn by briars and sharp twigs. Here and there,
as they parted the branches, they caught a gleam of the river running,
fiercely swollen, below, the moon striking the swift current, and
leaving the darkness on either side more impenetrable. Several times
Nathalie fell, but she repelled her companion's help almost angrily,
catching at the branches, and trying to add her feeble voice to the
gardener's shouts. When they reached the river it was like coming out
into the day, the freakish moonlight falling in a flood of light on the
grass, and bringing into clear distinctness the broad burdocks and
mulleins which spread themselves near the water, while it left a fringe
of poplars lower down on the other side in misty shadow. Jacques knew
the river well, and had hastily made up his mind. Close to the spot
where they were was a shallow into which he could wade, a spot where,
when the river was in flood, things brought down by the current were
often recoverable, caught as they were by a few stakes driven in at that
point. It might be--But how the river ran, how it ran! What a slender
hope was here! Their thoughts, though they had sprung together to this
point, might be all unfounded; they might already be too late, or Leon
might be lying, stiff and ghastly, in some gloomy shadow close to which
they had passed unknowing. Jacques stood for a moment considering, and
with the foolish inconsequence of misery Nathalie found herself noticing
how white his bare feet looked in the moonlight, sunk as they were in
the wet grass.
"I will stay here with the pole, madame," he said. "Will you go up
towards the bridge, and whistle for me if there is need?"
She was gone before he had finished, stumbling along, her staring eyes
devouring the waters as they rushed by her; and she had not gone twenty
yards before Jacques heard a scream, a splash, and, running to the spot,
found her up to her knees in the water among the flags, clutching
something which rose and fell, and, when it rose, turned a white face to
the moonlight.