year past the moral and intellectual powers of her husband, M. d’Espard,
have undergone so serious a change, that at the present day they have
reached the state of dementia and idiocy provided for by Article 448 of
the Civil Code, and require the application of the remedies set forth
by that article, for the security of his fortune and his person, and to
guard the interest of his children whom he keeps to live with him.
“‘That, in point of fact, the mental condition of M. d’Espard, which
for some years has given grounds for alarm based on the system he has
pursued in the management of his affairs, has reached, during the last
twelvemonth, a deplorable depth of depression; that his infirm will was
the first thing to show the results of the malady; and that its effete
state leaves M. the Marquis d’Espard exposed to all the perils of his
incompetency, as is proved by the following facts:
“‘For a long time all the income accruing from M. d’Espard’s estates are
paid, without any reasonable cause, or even temporary advantage,
into the hands of an old woman, whose repulsive ugliness is generally
remarked on, named Madame Jeanrenaud, living sometimes in Paris, Rue
de la Vrilliere, No. 8, sometimes at Villeparisis, near Claye, in the
Department of Seine et Marne, and for the benefit of her son, aged
thirty-six, an officer in the ex-Imperial Guards, whom the Marquis
d’Espard has placed by his influence in the King’s Guards, as Major in
the First Regiment of Cuirassiers. These two persons, who in 1814
were in extreme poverty, have since then purchased house-property of
considerable value; among other items, quite recently, a large house
in the Grand Rue Verte, where the said Jeanrenaud is laying out
considerable sums in order to settle there with the woman Jeanrenaud,
intending to marry: these sums amount already to more than a hundred
thousand francs. The marriage has been arranged by the intervention of
M. d’Espard with his banker, one Mongenod, whose niece he has asked
in marriage for the said Jeanrenaud, promising to use his influence
to procure him the title and dignity of baron. This has in fact been
secured by His Majesty’s letters patent, dated December 29th of last
year, at the request of the Marquis d’Espard, as can be proved by His
Excellency the Keeper of the Seals, if the Court should think proper to
require his testimony.
“‘That no reason, not even such as morality and the law would concur in
disapproving, can justify the influence which the said Mme. Jeanrenaud
exerts over M. d’Espard, who, indeed, sees her very seldom; nor account
for his strange affection for the said Baron Jeanrenaud, Major with whom
he has but little intercourse. And yet their power is so considerable,
that whenever they need money, if only to gratify a mere whim, this
lady, or her son----’ Heh, heh! _No reason even such as morality and the
law concur in disapproving!_ What does the clerk or the attorney mean to
insinuate?” said Popinot.
Bianchon laughed.
“‘This lady, or her son, obtain whatever they ask of the Marquis
d’Espard without demur; and if he has not ready money, M. d’Espard draws
bills to be paid by the said Mongenod, who has offered to give evidence
to that effect for the petitioner.
“‘That, moreover, in further proof of these facts, lately, on the
occasion of the renewal of the leases on the Espard estate, the farmers
having paid a considerable premium for the renewal of their leases on
the old terms, M. Jeanrenaud at once secured the payment of it into his
own hands.
“‘That the Marquis d’Espard parts with these sums of money so little of
his own free-will, that when he was spoken to on the subject he seemed
to remember nothing of the matter; that whenever anybody of any weight
has questioned him as to his devotion to these two persons, his replies
have shown so complete an absence of ideas and of sense of his own
interests, that there obviously must be some occult cause at work to
which the petitioner begs to direct the eye of justice, inasmuch as it
is impossible but that this cause should be criminal, malignant, and
wrongful, or else of a nature to come under medical jurisdiction;
unless this influence is of the kind which constitutes an abuse of moral
power--such as can only be described by the word _possession_----‘The
devil!” exclaimed Popinot. “What do you say to that, doctor. These are
strange statements.”
“They might certainly,” said Bianchon, “be an effect of magnetic force.”
“Then do you believe in Mesmer’s nonsense, and his tub, and seeing
through walls?”
“Yes, uncle,” said the doctor gravely. “As I heard you read that
petition I thought of that. I assure you that I have verified, in
another sphere of action, several analogous facts proving the unlimited
influence one man may acquire over another. In contradiction to the
opinion of my brethren, I am perfectly convinced of the power of the
will regarded as a motor force. All collusion and charlatanism apart,
I have seen the results of such a possession. Actions promised during
sleep by a magnetized patient to the magnetizer have been scrupulously
performed on waking. The will of one had become the will of the other.”
“Every kind of action?”
“Yes.”
“Even a criminal act?”
“Even a crime.”
“If it were not from you, I would not listen to such a thing.”
“I will make you witness it,” said Bianchon.
“Hm, hm,” muttered the lawyer. “But supposing that this so-called
possession fell under this class of facts, it would be difficult to
prove it as legal evidence.”
“If this woman Jeanrenaud is so hideously old and ugly, I do not see
what other means of fascination she can have used,” observed Bianchon.
“But,” observed the lawyer, “in 1814, the time at which this fascination
is supposed to have taken place, this woman was fourteen years younger;
if she had been connected with M. d’Espard ten years before that, these
calculations take us back four-and-twenty years, to a time when the lady
may have been young and pretty, and have won for herself and her son a
power over M. d’Espard which some men do not know how to evade. Though
the source of this power is reprehensible in the sight of justice, it
is justifiable in the eye of nature. Madame Jeanrenaud may have been
aggrieved by the marriage, contracted probably at about that time,
between the Marquis d’Espard and Mademoiselle de Blamont-Chauvry, and at
the bottom of all this there may be nothing more than the rivalry of
two women, since the Marquis had for a long time lived apart from Mme.
d’Espard.”
“But her repulsive ugliness, uncle?”
“Power of fascination is in direct proportion to ugliness,” said the
lawyer; “that is the old story. And then think of the smallpox, doctor.
But to proceed.
“‘That so long ago as in 1815, in order to supply the sums of money
required by these two persons, the Marquis d’Espard went with his two
children to live in the Rue de la Montagne-Sainte-Genevieve, in
rooms quite unworthy of his name and rank’--well, we may live as
we please--‘that he keeps his two children there, the Comte Clement
d’Espard and Vicomte Camille d’Espard, in a style of living quite
unsuited to their future prospects, their name and fortune; that he
often wants money, to such a point, that not long since the landlord,
one Mariast, put in an execution on the furniture in the rooms; that
when this execution was carried out in his presence, the Marquis
d’Espard helped the bailiff, whom he treated like a man of rank, paying
him all the marks of attention and respect which he would have shown to
a person of superior birth and dignity to himself.’”
The uncle and nephew glanced at each other and laughed.
“‘That, moreover, every act of his life, besides the facts with
reference to the widow Jeanrenaud and the Baron Jeanrenaud, her son, are
those of a madman; that for nearly ten years he has given his thoughts
exclusively to China, its customs, manners, and history; that he refers
everything to a Chinese origin; that when he is questioned on the
subject, he confuses the events of the day and the business of
yesterday with facts relating to China; that he censures the acts of
the Government and the conduct of the King, though he is personally much
attached to him, by comparing them with the politics of China;
“‘That this monomania has driven the Marquis d’Espard to conduct devoid
of all sense: against the customs of men of rank, and, in opposition to
his own professed ideas as to the duties of the nobility, he has joined
a commercial undertaking, for which he constantly draws bills which, as
they fall due, threaten both his honor and his fortune, since they
stamp him as a trader, and in default of payment may lead to his being
declared insolvent; that these debts, which are owing to stationers,
printers, lithographers, and print-colorists, who have supplied the
materials for his publication, called A Picturesque History of China,
now coming out in parts, are so heavy that these tradesmen have
requested the petitioner to apply for a Commission in Lunacy with regard
to the Marquis d’Espard in order to save their own credit.’”
“The man is mad!” exclaimed Bianchon.
“You think so, do you?” said his uncle. “If you listen to only one bell,
you hear only one sound.”
“But it seems to me----” said Bianchon.
“But it seems to me,” said Popinot, “that if any relation of mine wanted
to get hold of the management of my affairs, and if, instead of being a
humble lawyer, whose colleagues can, any day, verify what his condition
is, I were a duke of the realm, an attorney with a little cunning, like
Desroches, might bring just such a petition against me.
“‘That his children’s education has been neglected for this monomania;
and that he has taught them, against all the rules of education, the
facts of Chinese history, which contradict the tenets of the Catholic
Church. He also has them taught the Chinese dialects.’”
“Here Desroches strikes me as funny,” said Bianchon.
“The petition is drawn up by his head-clerk Godeschal, who, as you know,
is not strong in Chinese,” said the lawyer.
“‘That he often leaves his children destitute of the most necessary
things; that the petitioner, notwithstanding her entreaties, can never
see them; that the said Marquis d’Espard brings them to her only once a
year; that, knowing the privations to which they are exposed, she makes
vain efforts to give them the things most necessary for their
existence, and which they require----’ Oh! Madame la Marquise, this is
preposterous. By proving too much you prove nothing.--My dear boy,” said
the old man, laying the document on his knee, “where is the mother who
ever lacked heart and wit and yearning to such a degree as to fall
below the inspirations suggested by her animal instinct? A mother is as
cunning to get at her children as a girl can be in the conduct of a love
intrigue. If your Marquise really wanted to give her children food and
clothes, the Devil himself would not have hindered her, heh? That is
rather too big a fable for an old lawyer to swallow!--To proceed.
“‘That at the age the said children have now attained it is necessary
that steps should be taken to preserve them from the evil effects of
such an education; that they should be provided for as beseems their
rank, and that they should cease to have before their eyes the sad
example of their father’s conduct;
“‘That there are proofs in support of these allegations which the Court
can easily order to be produced. Many times has M. d’Espard spoken
of the judge of the Twelfth Arrondissement as a mandarin of the third
class; he often speaks of the professors of the College Henri IV. as
“men of letters”’--and that offends them! ‘In speaking of the simplest
things, he says, “They were not done so in China;” in the course of
the most ordinary conversation he will sometimes allude to Madame
Jeanrenaud, or sometimes to events which happened in the time of Louis
XIV., and then sit plunged in the darkest melancholy; sometimes he
fancies he is in China. Several of his neighbors, among others one Edme
Becker, medical student, and Jean Baptiste Fremiot, a professor, living
under the same roof, are of opinion, after frequent intercourse with the
Marquis d’Espard, that his monomania with regard to everything Chinese
is the result of a scheme laid by the said Baron Jeanrenaud and the
widow his mother to bring about the deadening of all the Marquis
d’Espard’s mental faculties, since the only service which Mme.
Jeanrenaud appears to render M. d’Espard is to procure him everything
that relates to the Chinese Empire;
“‘Finally, that the petitioner is prepared to show to the Court that the
moneys absorbed by the said Baron and Mme. Jeanrenaud between 1814 and
1828 amount to not less than one million francs.
“‘In confirmation of the facts herein set forth, the petitioner can
bring the evidence of persons who are in the habit of seeing the Marquis
d’Espard, whose names and professions are subjoined, many of whom
have urged her to demand a commission in lunacy to declare M. d’Espard
incapable of managing his own affairs, as being the only way to preserve
his fortune from the effects of his maladministration and his children
from his fatal influence.
“‘Taking all this into consideration, M. le President, and the
affidavits subjoined, the petitioner desires that it may please you,
inasmuch as the foregoing facts sufficiently prove the insanity and
incompetency of the Marquis d’Espard herein described with his titles
and residence, to order that, to the end that he may be declared
incompetent by law, this petition and the documents in evidence may be
laid before the King’s public prosecutor; and that you will charge one
of the judges of this Court to make his report to you on any day you may
be pleased to name, and thereupon to pronounce judgment,’ etc.
“And here,” said Popinot, “is the President’s order instructing
me!--Well, what does the Marquise d’Espard want with me? I know
everything. But I shall go to-morrow with my registrar to see M. le
Marquis, for this does not seem at all clear to me.”
“Listen, my dear uncle, I have never asked the least little favor of you
that had to do with your legal functions; well, now I beg you to show
Madame d’Espard the kindness which her situation deserves. If she came
here, you would listen to her?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then, go and listen to her in her own house. Madame d’Espard is
a sickly, nervous, delicate woman, who would faint in your rat-hole of a
place. Go in the evening, instead of accepting her dinner, since the law
forbids your eating or drinking at your client’s expense.”
“And does not the law forbid you from taking any legacy from your dead?”
said Popinot, fancying that he saw a touch of irony on his nephew’s
lips.
“Come, uncle, if it were only to enable you to get at the truth of this
business, grant my request. You will come as the examining judge, since
matters do not seem to you very clear. Deuce take it! It is as necessary
to cross-question the Marquise as it is to examine the Marquis.”
“You are right,” said the lawyer. “It is quite possible that it is she
who is mad. I will go.”
“I will call for you. Write down in your engagement book: ‘To-morrow
evening at nine, Madame d’Espard.’--Good!” said Bianchon, seeing his
uncle make a note of the engagement.
Next evening at nine Bianchon mounted his uncle’s dusty staircase, and
found him at work on the statement of some complicated judgment. The
coat Lavienne had ordered of the tailor had not been sent, so Popinot
put on his old stained coat, and was the Popinot unadorned whose
appearance made those laugh who did not know the secrets of his
private life. Bianchon, however, obtained permission to pull his cravat
straight, and to button his coat, and he hid the stains by crossing the
breast of it with the right side over the left, and so displaying the
new front of the cloth. But in a minute the judge rucked the coat
up over his chest by the way in which he stuffed his hands into his
pockets, obeying an irresistible habit. Thus the coat, deeply wrinkled
both in front and behind, made a sort of hump in the middle of the back,
leaving a gap between the waistcoat and trousers through which his shirt
showed. Bianchon, to his sorrow, only discovered this crowning absurdity
at the moment when his uncle entered the Marquise’s room.
A brief sketch of the person and the career of the lady in whose
presence the doctor and the judge now found themselves is necessary for
an understanding of her interview with Popinot.
Madame d’Espard had, for the last seven years, been very much the
fashion in Paris, where Fashion can raise and drop by turns various
personages who, now great and now small, that is to say, in view or
forgotten, are at last quite intolerable--as discarded ministers are,
and every kind of decayed sovereignty. These flatterers of the past,
odious with their stale pretensions, know everything, speak ill of
everything, and, like ruined profligates, are friends with all the
world. Since her husband had separated from her in 1815, Madame d’Espard
must have married in the beginning of 1812. Her children, therefore,
were aged respectively fifteen and thirteen. By what luck was the mother
of a family, about three-and-thirty years of age, still the fashion?
Though Fashion is capricious, and no one can foresee who shall be her
favorites, though she often exalts a banker’s wife, or some woman of
very doubtful elegance and beauty, it certainly seems supernatural when
Fashion puts on constitutional airs and gives promotion for age. But
in this case Fashion had done as the world did, and accepted Madame
d’Espard as still young.
The Marquise, who was thirty-three by her register of birth, was
twenty-two in a drawing-room in the evening. But by what care, what
artifice! Elaborate curls shaded her temples. She condemned herself to
live in twilight, affecting illness so as to sit under the protecting
tones of light filtered through muslin. Like Diane de Poitiers, she used
cold water in her bath, and, like her again, the Marquise slept on a
horse-hair mattress, with morocco-covered pillows to preserve her hair;
she ate very little, only drank water, and observed monastic regularity
in the smallest actions of her life.
This severe system has, it is said, been carried so far as to the use of
ice instead of water, and nothing but cold food, by a famous Polish lady
of our day who spends a life, now verging on a century old, after the
fashion of a town belle. Fated to live as long as Marion Delorme, whom
history has credited with surviving to be a hundred and thirty, the old
vice-queen of Poland, at the age of nearly a hundred, has the heart
and brain of youth, a charming face, an elegant shape; and in her
conversation, sparkling with brilliancy like faggots in the fire, she
can compare the men and books of our literature with the men and books
of the eighteenth century. Living in Warsaw, she orders her caps of
Herbault in Paris. She is a great lady with the amiability of a mere
girl; she swims, she runs like a schoolboy, and can sink on to a sofa
with the grace of a young coquette; she mocks at death, and laughs at
life. After having astonished the Emperor Alexander, she can still amaze
the Emperor Nicholas by the splendor of her entertainments. She can
still bring tears to the eyes of a youthful lover, for her age is
whatever she pleases, and she has the exquisite self-devotion of a
grisette. In short, she is herself a fairy tale, unless, indeed, she is
a fairy.
Had Madame d’Espard known Madame Zayonseck? Did she mean to imitate
her career? Be that as it may, the Marquise proved the merits of the
treatment; her complexion was clear, her brow unwrinkled, her figure,
like that of Henri II.’s lady-love, preserved the litheness, the
freshness, the covered charms which bring a woman love and keep it
alive. The simple precautions of this course, suggested by art and
nature, and perhaps by experience, had met in her with a general system
which confirmed the results. The Marquise was absolutely indifferent
to everything that was not herself: men amused her, but no man had
ever caused her those deep agitations which stir both natures to their
depths, and wreck one on the other. She knew neither hatred nor love.
When she was offended, she avenged herself coldly, quietly, at her
leisure, waiting for the opportunity to gratify the ill-will she
cherished against anybody who dwelt in her unfavorable remembrance. She
made no fuss, she did not excite herself, she talked, because she knew
that by two words a woman may cause the death of three men.
She had parted from M. d’Espard with the greatest satisfaction. Had he
not taken with him two children who at present were troublesome, and in
the future would stand in the way of her pretensions? Her most intimate
friends, as much as her least persistent admirers, seeing about her none
of Cornelia’s jewels, who come and go, and unconsciously betray their
mother’s age, took her for quite a young woman. The two boys, about
whom she seemed so anxious in her petition, were, like their father, as
unknown in the world as the northwest passage is unknown to navigators.
M. d’Espard was supposed to be an eccentric personage who had deserted
his wife without having the smallest cause for complaint against her.
Mistress of herself at two-and-twenty, and mistress of her fortune of
twenty-six thousand francs a year, the Marquise hesitated long before
deciding on a course of action and ordering her life. Though she
benefited by the expenses her husband had incurred in his house, though
she had all the furniture, the carriages, the horses, in short, all the
details of a handsome establishment, she lived a retired life during the
years 1816, 17, and 18, a time when families were recovering from the
disasters resulting from political tempests. She belonged to one of the
most important and illustrious families of the Faubourg Saint-Germain,
and her parents advised her to live with them as much as possible after
the separation forced upon her by her husband’s inexplicable caprice.
In 1820 the Marquise roused herself from her lethargy; she went to
Court, appeared at parties, and entertained in her own house. From 1821
to 1827 she lived in great style, and made herself remarked for her
taste and her dress; she had a day, an hour, for receiving visits, and
ere long she had seated herself on the throne, occupied before her by
Madame la Vicomtesse de Beauseant, the Duchesse de Langeais, and Madame
Firmiani--who on her marriage with M. de Camps had resigned the sceptre
in favor of the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, from whom Madame d’Espard
snatched it. The world knew nothing beyond this of the private live
of the Marquise d’Espard. She seemed likely to shine for long on the
Parisian horizon, like the sun near its setting, but which will never
set.
The Marquise was on terms of great intimacy with a duchess as famous for
her beauty as for her attachment to a prince just now in banishment,
but accustomed to play a leading part in every prospective government.
Madame d’Espard was also a friend of a foreign lady, with whom a famous
and very wily Russian diplomate was in the habit of discussing public
affairs. And then an antiquated countess, who was accustomed to shuffle
the cards for the great game of politics, had adopted her in a maternal
fashion. Thus, to any man of high ambitions, Madame d’Espard was
preparing a covert but very real influence to follow the public and
frivolous ascendency she now owed to fashion. Her drawing-room
was acquiring political individuality: “What do they say at Madame
d’Espard’s?” “Are they against the measure in Madame d’Espard’s
drawing-room?” were questions repeated by a sufficient number of
simpletons to give the flock of the faithful who surrounded her the
importance of a coterie. A few damaged politicians whose wounds she had
bound up, and whom she flattered, pronounced her as capable in diplomacy
as the wife of the Russian ambassador to London. The Marquise had indeed
several times suggested to deputies or to peers words and ideas that had
rung through Europe. She had often judged correctly of certain events on
which her circle of friends dared not express an opinion. The principal
persons about the Court came in the evening to play whist in her rooms.