“Besides, what interest could she have in ruining my father? Evidently
none. To ruin him was to ruin herself, since she was absolute mistress
of her fortune, and free to dispose of it as she chose.”
Proud of the accuracy of her decision, she was looking triumphantly at
the old dealer. The latter saw now that he must strike a decisive blow;
and his sister encouraged him by a gesture. He said,--
“Pray, listen to me, madam. So far I have only repeated to you the
report on ‘Change. I told you: They say the capital of the Pennsylvania
Petroleum _Company_ has been swallowed up by unlucky speculations on
‘Change. But I do not believe these reports. I am, on the contrary,
convinced, I am quite sure even, that these millions were not lost on
‘Change, because they never were used for the purpose of speculating.”
“Still”--
“Still they have disappeared, none the less; and your father is
probably the last man in the world to tell us how and where they have
disappeared. But I know it; and, when the question is raised how to
recover these enormous sums, I shall cry out, ‘Search Sarah Brandon,
Countess Ville-Handry; search M. Thomas Elgin and Mrs. Brian; search
Maxime de Brevan,’ the wretched tool of these wicked women!”
Now at last a terrible light broke upon Henrietta’s mind.
“Then,” she stammered, “these infamous slanders are only put out to
conceal an impudent robbery?”
“Yes.”
The young girl’s face showed that she was making a great effort to
comprehend; and then she said again,--
“And in that case, the articles in the papers”--
“Were written by the wretches who have robbed your father, yes, madam!”
And, shaking his fist with a threatening air, he added,--
“Oh! there is no mistaking it. Since when does this journal exist? Since
about six months ago. From the day on which it was established, it was
the aim and purpose of the founders to publish in it the articles which
you haven’t read.”
Even if she could not well understand by what ingenious combinations
such enormous sums could be abstracted, Henrietta was conquered by Papa
Ravinet’s sincere and earnest conviction.
“Then,” she went on, “these wretches who have robbed my father now mean
to ruin him!”
“They must do it for their own safety. The money has been stolen, you
see; therefore there must be a thief. For the world, for the courts, the
guilty one will be Count Ville-Handry.”
“For the courts?”
“Alas, yes!”
The poor girl’s eyes went from the brother to the sister with a terrible
expression of bewilderment. At last she asked,--
“And do you believe Sarah will allow my father’s name to be thus
dishonored,--the name which she bears, and of which she was so proud?”
“She will, perhaps, even insist upon it.”
“Great God! What do you mean? Why should she?”
Seeing her brother’s hesitation, the old lady took it upon herself to
answer. She touched the poor girl’s arm, and said in a subdued voice,--
“Because, you see, my poor child, now that Sarah has gotten possession
of the fortune she wanted, your father is in her way; because, you see,
she wants to be free--do you understand?--free!”
Henrietta uttered a cry of such horror that both the brother and the
sister saw at once that she had not misunderstood the horrible meaning
of that word “free.”
But, since the blow had fallen, the old dealer did not think the rest
need be concealed from Henrietta. He got up, therefore, and, leaning
against the mantlepiece, he addressed the poor girl, trembling in all
her limbs with terror, and looking at him with a fixed and painful gaze,
in these words,--
“You must at last learn to know, madam, the execrable woman who has
sworn to ruin you. You see, I know, because I have experienced it
myself, of what crimes she is capable; and I see clear in the dark night
of her infernal intrigues. I know that this woman with the chaste brow,
the open smile, and the soft eyes, has the genius and the instinct of a
murderess, and has never counted upon any thing else, but murder for the
gratification of her lusts.”
The attitude of the old man, who raised his head on high while his
breast swelled, breathed in every one of his sharp and threatening
gestures an intense thirst of vengeance. He no longer measured his words
carefully; and they overflowed from his lips as they came boiling up
under the pressure of his rage.
“Anthony!” said the old lady more than once,--“Anthony, brother! I
beseech you!”
But this friendly voice, ordinarily all-powerful, was not even heard by
him now. He went on,--
“And now, madam, must I still explain to you the simple and yet
formidable plan by which Sarah Brandon has succeeded in obtaining by one
effort the immense fortune of the Ville-Handry family? From the first
day, she has seen that you were standing between her and those millions;
therefore she attacked you first of all. A brave and honest man, M.
Daniel Champcey, loved you; he would have protected you; therefore she
got him out of the way. The world might have become interested in you,
might have taken your side; she beguiled your father, in his blind
passion, to calumniate you, to ruin your reputation, and to expose you
to the contempt of the world. Still you might have wished to secure
a protector, you might have found one. She placed by your side her
wretched tool, her spy, a forger, a criminal whom she knew to be able
of doing things from which even an accomplished galley-slave would have
shrunk with disgust and horror: I mean Maxime de Brevan.”
The very excess, of eruption had restored a part of her energy to
Henrietta. She said, therefore,--
“Alas, _sir_! have I not told you, on, the contrary, that Daniel himself
had confided me to the care of M. de Brevan? Have I not told you”--