“As to that, console yourself. Sarah will never consent.”
“So far from that, she herself has made the suggestion.”
This time, Maxime raised his head suddenly, and looked stupefied.
“Then your friend must be very rich.”
“He is immensely rich.”
“He bears a great name, and holds a high position?”
“His name is one of the oldest and noblest in the province of Anjou.”
“And he is a very old man?”
“He is sixty-five.”
Brevan struck the marble slab of the mantlepiece with his fist so that
it shook, and exclaimed,--
“Ah, she told me she would succeed!”
And then he added in a very low tone of voice, as if speaking to himself
with an indescribable accent of mingled admiration and hatred,--
“What a woman! Oh, what a woman!”
Daniel, who was himself greatly excited, and far too busy with his own
thoughts to observe what was going on, did not notice the excitement of
his friend; he continued quietly,--
“Now you will understand my great curiosity. In order to prevent the
scandal of such a marriage, my friend’s family would do every thing in
the world. But how can you attack a woman of whose antecedents and mode
of life nothing is known?”
“Yes, I understand,” said Brevan,--“I understand.”
His features betrayed that he was making a great mental effort. He
remained for some time absorbed in his thoughts; and at last he said, as
if coming to a decision,--
“No, I do not see any way to prevent this marriage; none at all.”
“Still, from what you told me”--
“What!”
“About the cupidity of this woman.”
“Well?”
“If she were offered a large sum, some eighty or a hundred thousand
dollars?”
Maxime laughed out loud; but there was not the true ring in his
laughter.
“You might offer her two hundred thousand, and she would laugh at you.
Do you think she would be fool enough to content herself with a fraction
of a fortune, if she can have the whole, with a great name and a high
position into the bargain?”
Daniel opened his lips to present another suggestion; but Maxime, laying
aside his usual half-dreamy, mocking manner, said, as if roused by a
matter of great personal interest,--
“You do not understand me, my dear friend. Miss Brandon is not one of
those vulgar hawks, who, in broad daylight, seize upon a poor pigeon,
pluck it alive, and cast it aside, still living, and bleeding all over.”
“Then, Maxime, she must be”--
“Well, I tell you you misapprehend her. Miss Brandon”--
He stopped suddenly, and looking at Daniel with a glance with which
a judge examines the features of a criminal, he added in an almost
threatening voice,--
“By telling you what little I know about her, Daniel, I give you the
highest proof of confidence which one man can give to another. I love
you too dearly to exact your promise to be discreet. If you ever mention
my name in connection with this affair, if you ever let any one suspect
that you learned what I am going to tell you from me, you will dishonor
yourself.”
Daniel, deeply moved, seized his friend’s hand, and, pressing it most
affectionately, said,--
“Ah, you know Daniel Champcey is to be relied upon.”