Marius de Tregars stood within the frame of the open door.
“Marius!” murmured Mlle. Gilberte, rooted to the spot by a surprise
hardly less immense than her joy.
To behold him thus suddenly, when she was wondering whether she
would ever see him again; to see him appear at the very moment
when she found herself alone, and exposed to the basest outrages,
--it was one of those fortunate occurrences which one can scarcely
realize; and from the depth of her soul rose something like a hymn
of thanks.
Nevertheless, she was confounded at M. Costeclar’s attitude.
According to her, and from what she thought she knew, he should have
been petrified at the sight of M. de Tregars.
And he did not even seem to know him. He seemed shocked, annoyed
at being interrupted, slightly surprised, but in no wise moved or
frightened. Knitting his brows,
“What do you wish?” he inquired in his most impertinent tone.
M. de Tregars stepped forward. He was somewhat pale, but unnaturally
calm, cool, and collected. Bowing to Mlle. Gilberte,
“If I have thus ventured to enter your apartment, mademoiselle,” he
uttered gently, “it is because, as I was going by the door, I
thought I recognized this gentleman’s carriage.”
And, with his finger over his shoulder, he was pointing to M.
Costeclar.
“Now,” he went on, “I had reason to be somewhat astonished at this,
after the positive orders I had given him never to set his feet, not
only in this house, but in this part of the city. I wished to find
out exactly. I came up: I heard--”
All this was said in a tone of such crushing contempt, that a slap
on the face would have been less cruel. All the blood in M.
Costeclar’s veins rushed to his face.
“You!” he interrupted insolently: “I do not know you.”
Imperturbable, M. de Tregars was drawing off his gloves.
“Are you quite certain of that?” he replied. “Come, you certainly
know my old friend, M. de Villegre?”
An evident feeling of anxiety appeared on M. Costeclar’s countenance.
“I do,” he stammered.
“Did not M. Villegre call upon you before the war?”
“He did.”
“Well, ‘twas I who sent him to you; and the commands which he
delivered to you were mine.”
“Yours?”
“Mine. I am Marius de Tregars.”
A nervous shudder shook M. Costeclar’s lean frame. Instinctively
his eye turned towards the door.
“You see,” Marius went on with the same gentleness, “we are, you
and I, old acquaintances. For you quite remember me now, don’t
you? I am the son of that poor Marquis de Tregars who came to
Paris, all the way from his old Brittany with his whole fortune,
--two millions.”
“I remember,” said the stock-broker: “I remember perfectly well.”
“On the advice of certain clever people, the Marquis de Tregars
ventured into business. Poor old man! He was not very sharp. He
was firmly persuaded that he had already more than doubled his
capital, when his honorable partners demonstrated to him that he was
ruined, and, besides, compromised by certain signatures imprudently
given.”
Mlle. Gilberte was listening, her mouth open, and wondering what
Marius was aiming at, and how he could remain so calm.
“That disaster,” he went on, “was at the time the subject of an
enormous number of very witty jokes. The people of the bourse
could hardly admire enough these bold financiers who had so deftly
relieved that candid marquis of his money. That was well done for
him; what was he meddling with? As to myself, to stop the
prosecutions with which my father was threatened, I gave up all I
had. I was quite young, and, as you see, quite what you call, I
believe, ‘green.’ I am no longer so now. Were such a thing to
happen to me to-day, I should want to know at once what had become
of the millions: I would feel all the pockets around me. I would
say, ‘Stop thief!’”
At every word, as it were, M. Costeclar’s uneasiness became more
manifest.
“It was not I,” he said, “who received the benefit of M. de Tregars’
fortune.”
Marius nodded approvingly.
“I know now,” he replied, “among whom the spoils were divided. You,
M. Costeclar, you took what you could get, timidly, and according to
your means. Sharks are always accompanied by small fishes, to which
they abandon the crumbs they disdain. You were but a small fish
then: you accommodated yourself with what your patrons, the sharks,
did not care about. But, when you tried to operate alone, you were
not shrewd enough: you left proofs of your excessive appetite for
other people’s money. Those proofs I have in my possession.”