gentleman's handwriting had always resembled himself. It was bold, free
and distinct, with an air of the great century. But a slight
tremulousness in some letters testified how painful a task it had been
to him to write the lines of that page. A box stood open on his desk,
containing documents relating to the treasures. The "Genealogy of the
House of Claviers-Grandchamp" was also there with a mark at the famous
Appendix number 44, upon which Altona had formerly based his offer. The
last, in blood, of the magnificent Claviers was drawing up the
death-certificate of his family, in a form determined upon by himself.
He had, that very morning, been assailed by distressing emotions, the
reflection of which made his noble countenance more imposing than ever.
His old-fashioned courtesy brought him to his feet to receive the son of
the corrupt steward. He waved him to a chair--without offering him his
hand; a slight circumstance which Pierre interpreted as confirming his
suspicions: the marquis was punishing his father's sins in him.
Pierre's visit was, in fact, a surprise to M. de Claviers, and a most
painful surprise, but for a reason very different from that which the
young man imagined. He had been Jaubourg's physician. He had been
present during his last moments, when the patient had undoubtedly
spoken. Although M. de Claviers knew nothing of the learned theories of
modern specialists concerning "ecmnesia" and "onirism," he had seen
people die. He knew what confessions the excitation of fever sometimes
extorts from lips previously dumb. He explained in that way the
declaration of paternity made by Jaubourg. Perhaps Pierre Chaffin had
been present at that horrible scene of which the young man had told him.
That was the reason that the heroic marquis had consented to receive
him. He had not chosen to seem to fear the meeting.
Another detail impressed the doctor--the truly extraordinary change in
that imposing countenance. M. de Claviers had aged, within the last few
weeks, as much as his ex-secretary. But it was the aging of a man
consumed by grief without remorse,--the despair, with undimmed eyes, of
him who has naught to blame himself for in the suffering that is killing
him; whereas Chaffin had exhibited to his son the mask of the unhappy
wretch with sombre, veiled glance, the conscious architect of his own
misery. This comparison shaped itself involuntarily in the physician's
mind, as he was saying:--
"You will excuse me for disturbing you. Monsieur le Marquis, and at such
an early hour. It will not be for very long."
"It is your time that is valuable, doctor, not mine," replied M. de
Claviers, now wholly master of himself. He was trying to divine the
motive of this unexpected visit. "Probably he isn't satisfied with his
fees, as Métivier fixed them," he thought, and the other continued:--
"I shall not try to play at diplomacy with you, Monsieur le Marquis.
That is not my style, and I know that it isn't yours, either. I will go
straight to the goal. This then, in few words, and very simply, is the
object of my visit. You parted with my father after you had had him in
your service more than fifteen years. The separation was very sudden. It
has caused talk. I myself have had the impression that I do not know the
whole truth. My father has refused to explain himself clearly to me
thereon. Or, rather, he has explained himself, but in terms which do not
satisfy me, and I have come to say to you, knowing your ideas and how
high you rank the family spirit, I cannot endure the idea that my father
is suspected, still less to suspect him myself. If you parted for
reasons which do not involve his honor, as I believe, as I wish to
believe, I ask you to say so publicly two or three times, under
circumstances which will cut short all rumors, especially before
Monsieur le Professeur Louvet, my chief. I ask you to say so to me, too.
If, on the other hand--" And in a heart-rending tone: "I must know it."
M. de Claviers had listened to the young man with a more and more
distressed expression in his clouded eyes. The resemblance was too
striking between the grief of this son who suspected his father and the
anguish with which he had seen Landri overwhelmed, in that same place,
because of his mother's sin,--the same Landri whom he continued to love
so dearly even while hardening his heart against him! He was too
entirely, too genuinely religious not to recognize the justice of a
higher power in this punishment visited, as the Book promises, on the
second generation. This view of the moral side of life harmonized
perfectly with his view of its social side. He was too humane not to
pity the young man whose toilsome and honorable career he had followed
from childhood. On the other hand, his indignation against Chaffin was
too fresh, too well-deserved.--And he was still ignorant of the wretched
creature's crowning infamy!--He could not give him the certificate of
honorable conduct which the son demanded. Moreover, he abhorred
falsehood. These diverse feelings were reflected in his reply, which he
did not make until he had taken what seemed to his visitor a very long
time for reflection.
"Pierre," he said at last, addressing him in the familiar tone that he
had formerly used with him, "give me your hand." And he suited the
action to the word. "You are a very noble fellow. I have always known
it. I felt it more profoundly than ever while you were speaking to me.
But for the very reason that you are a very noble fellow, how could you
fail to realize the enormity of this appeal you are making to me? And
you say that you know my ideas! Remember, my boy, a son doesn't judge
his father. He does not institute an investigation concerning his
father. I shall not, by answering you, associate myself with what I
consider a deplorable mistake on your part, an aberration of the mind.
If I had spoken to any person whomsoever of my reasons for depriving
myself of your father's services, I might, by straining a point, permit
you to come and ask me to explain my words. But I have said nothing.
Your father left me because he mismanaged my affairs. That is all. It is
all that I have said or shall ever say about him, to you or to any one
else."
"Mismanage has two meanings, Monsieur le Marquis," rejoined the
physician nervously; and, anticipating M. de Claviers' protest, "if I
insist it is because you have acknowledged my right to do so. Yes. You
say that you would permit my question if you had spoken to any one. You
meant by that, any stranger. You forgot your son. Monsieur le Comte de
Claviers came to my house yesterday afternoon to question me, in his own
name and yours, concerning certain papers which have been stolen, it
seems, from Monsieur Charles Jaubourg's apartment. He accused my father
of the theft, with my assistance. He probably knows now that he was
mistaken. But it is none the less true that such a suspicion justified
me in finding out upon what ground he could have conceived it. It must
have been upon what you had told him. He was under arrest when the thing
happened. He confronted me with that alibi when I questioned him. There
was nothing left for me to do but to apply to you. Tell me what you have
told him about my father. Is it unfair to ask you?"
"My son is another myself," M. de Claviers replied. To learn, even in
this vague way, of the scene of the day before between the two young men
wounded him where his susceptibility was tenderest. What indications had
led Landri to invite an explanation which might well have been so
dangerous? It might arouse suspicions concerning the nature and
importance of the papers stolen at Jaubourg's. To maintain to the end
the rôle of a father on perfectly cordial terms with his child, the
marquis must neither ask a question upon that subject, nor seem to
disavow the young man's act. But the news affected him profoundly, and
his voice trembled as he continued: "You surely do not claim that I must
detail to you my interviews with Landri alone? Nor that I should take
you to my new man of affairs and inform you as to the details of my
receipts and expenditure? And observe that that is exactly what you
presume to demand of me! I excuse you because of the motive that impels
you. But let us stop here."
He had risen, with contracted eyebrows and haughty bearing, thus
constraining his interlocutor to do likewise, and he pressed the
electric button on his desk.
"I have told you that Monsieur Chaffin had mismanaged my affairs.
Wherein? How? That concerns him and myself, and us alone. I shall not
add a word. So that it is useless for us to prolong a discussion which
henceforth would have no meaning. You have your patients, and I"--he
pointed to the table--"have to finish this urgent task.--Garnier," he
added, as the maître d'hôtel for whom he had rung entered the room,
"show Monsieur le Docteur Chaffin to the door.--Monsieur, I have the
honor to salute you."
"No, we will not stop here," said Pierre to himself, while yielding, in
spite of himself, to the extraordinary authority that emanated from the
old noble when he was in a certain state of concentrated irritation.--"I
am to go to Monsieur le Comte's apartments and get my father," he said
to the servant; "will you take me there?"
As he followed the maître d'hôtel through the glass gallery which his
father had passed through a quarter of an hour before, another person
was on his way, by an interior passage, to that same room in which
Landri was talking with Chaffin. It was the Marquis de Claviers. He
wished to learn, and without loss of time, Landri's reasons for going to
Quai de Béthune, and whether he had at last discovered a way to solve
the mystery of the anonymous denunciation which had been a constant
source of anxiety to him for so many days. Thus it was that he knocked
at one door of the young man's smoking-room, at almost the same instant
that Pierre entered at the other door.
This simultaneous double appearance, which had the air of being
concerted, almost extorted a shriek from the two occupants of the room,
between whom a scene had just taken place almost more distressing than
that between the marquis and Pierre. Their arrival brought about a
terrible dénouement.
At the moment that they entered, Chaffin was seated at a table. He had
just laid aside a pen with which he had written upon an envelope before
him the following address: "Monsieur le Marquis de Claviers-Grandchamp."
He was about to rise. The sight of his son caused him to fall back upon
his chair, and that of the marquis, the next instant, to spring up
again. He retreated backward, so demoralized by terror that his legs
gave way and he had to lean against the wall.
M. de Claviers, thunderstruck himself by the presence of his former
secretary, and of his son, whom he had just left, gazed at them both and
at Landri. Then, addressing the latter,--
"I have to talk with you," he said, "when you have finished with these
gentlemen."
At that moment his eye fell on the envelope lying on the desk. He
recognized his own name. He took it up and opened it. Chaffin had not
had time to seal it, a circumstance which made more striking the exact
parallel between that moment and another, when the betrayed husband had
compelled the adulterine son to read the proof of their common shame.
The envelope contained the three letters from Jaubourg to Madame de
Claviers stolen by the tutor, and, on a separate sheet, these lines in
his hand, written at Landri's dictation:--
"The wretch who, in a moment of insanity, sent an anonymous letter to M.
le Marquis de Claviers-Grandchamp, restores to him the other papers
mentioned in that letter, and, while asking his forgiveness, appeals to
his generosity not to dishonor him in the eyes of his son."
The marquis read the note. He recognized on the other sheets the
detested handwriting of his wife's lover, his villainous friend. He
looked at Chaffin and said: "So it was you!"--Then he took two steps
towards him with an expression so threatening that the unhappy
wretch--ah! he well deserved that title at that cruel moment!--fell on
his knees, crying, "Pardon!"
The doctor rushed between his father and M. de Claviers. The marquis
stopped, plainly struggling against himself, to refrain from revenging
himself with his own hands. At last, pointing to the door, he commanded:
"Go! go, I say!" in so imperative a tone that his former secretary,
still on his knees, crawled towards the door. His nerveless fingers had
difficulty in opening it. He escaped at last, while Landri said to the
horrified Pierre, who no longer needed to have any one tell him the
truth about his father:--
"Follow him. Do not leave him alone."
"You're afraid that he'll kill himself," said M. de Claviers, when the
door had closed on the two men. "I suppose that he played that comedy
for you," he continued with a bitter smile. "It is not he, but his son,
who should not be left alone. Cowards live. It's the men of courage who
think of suicide in the presence of disgrace. And when one does not
believe in God! On that boy's account, I tried to control myself. I
could not do it.--But no," he continued, with a fierce energy wherein
the stern inheritance of a warlike race reappeared. "We are too much
afraid of suffering and of causing others to suffer. The grief of the
sons is the redemption of the fathers in this world and the next. We
must learn to atone for the sins that we did not commit, as we profit by
virtues that we never had."
He had spoken as if to himself, and he seemed to have forgotten the
existence of Landri, who watched him pace the floor, silent now.
Chaffin's note and Jaubourg's three letters still lay on the table,
where he had left them when he rushed upon the traitor. The young man
trembled lest, when he emerged from that fit of excited meditation, the
sight of those sheets should increase the smart of the wound from which
his noble heart was bleeding. So that he was amazed by the calm tone in
which M. de Claviers, upon returning to himself and spying the papers,
said to him, pointing to them as he spoke: "Do as you did before!" He
resumed his walk while the proofs of the terrible secret were being
consumed. At last, halting in front of Landri, he said to him:--
"You have done what you promised. It is well. It is very well. I am
relieved of a horrible weight. We are entitled to think that all the
letters are destroyed. The Chaffins will not talk. They cannot talk. Our
honor is safe, thanks to you. Once more, it is well, and I thank you."
"You thank me? O monsieur!" exclaimed Landri; and he continued, choking
with emotion: "If you really think that I have at least tried to satisfy
you, allow me to implore one favor--that you will hasten the time when
this pretence of intimacy that you have imposed upon me, that you have
rightly imposed upon me, shall come to an end. This life in society,
among all those indifferent people, is too hard. I haven't the strength
for it any longer. You must have seen that I have not shirked it. I
venture to say that no one can have guessed what I have suffered these
last weeks. But I am at the end. I can do no more."
"And I?" said the marquis; "do you think that I am not weary of it,
too?--But it is true: the test has been a severe one. The world will
never dream now of supposing that we parted on a pretence. Your marriage
will suffice to explain everything. The author of that infamous
anonymous letter is unmasked and disarmed. We have nothing more to fear
now. We can put an end to it.--These are my wishes," he continued after
another pause: "You will write me a letter that I can show. You will
inform me of your purpose to marry Madame Olier, despite my prohibition,
and to employ such legal measures as the Code places at your disposal. I
don't know what they are, so you will specify them. You will leave the
house this very day, and let me know your address, so that I can
communicate with you at once in case of urgent need. I do not anticipate
such a contingency. Métivier, in conformity with my orders, should have
turned into cash by this time the property that you inherit from your
mother. It is fully understood that the share that she left me by her
will is to be added to it. I ask you to deposit the money at the Bank of
France, until further orders. In that way it will be easier for me to
turn over to your account, without intermediary, another fortune, which
you know about and which you accept. You have pledged yourself to do it.
Last of all, I ask you not to settle in Paris, so long as I last. It
won't be very long."
"I will repeat what I said the first day," Landri replied: "I have no
wish but to obey you. As to the last point, I propose, not only not to
live in Paris, but to leave France, to undertake the farming business in
Canada. On my return from Saint-Mihiel, you said to me--I remember your
exact words: 'It is a horrible thing to me that the family you will
found will bear the name of mine.' It would be no less horrible to me,
knowing that that name is not my own. I cannot change it in France,
without causing people to seek the cause of such a resolution. By
expatriating myself, to engage in a new business in an absolutely new
country, I shall escape all comments. I intend to adopt one of the names
which belonged to my mother's family, and which no one has borne for
more than a hundred years. You spoke of legal measures. If there is any
possible means by which the title of Marquis de Claviers-Grandchamp can
pass, after you, to some one of your young kinsmen, I will assent to it,
in whatever form you prefer."
"You would do that?" cried M. de Claviers. The trembling born of an
emotion stronger than all his resolutions strangled his voice in his
throat. "You would change your name? But she--that woman--"
"Madame Olier?" Landri interrupted. "I have told her of my plan. She
assented to it in advance, without asking for any explanation."
"Yes," continued the marquis. "It is the truth. That is the true
remedy." He was no longer able to control himself, and his words echoed
his thoughts. "I saw it, from the first moment. But the suggestion could
not come from me.--Adopt another son,--who is not you? Never!--Ah!" he
continued, with increasing excitement, "I can truly say, like that widow
of the Middle Ages: 'You were stolen from me.'--No, I will have no other
son. The Claviers-Grandchamps will die with me. I shall be the last of
the name, as I am the last of the race. It is what they would have
wished, if they could have looked ahead. Our house will end, as it has
lived, nobly. By assisting therein, you have wiped out the insult. For
your sake, I can forgive.--We must do our duty to the end," he added, at
the conclusion of another pause, during which Landri waited, hoping for
a different word, a gesture, an embrace, a kiss. But the old nobleman
considered, doubtless, that he had said too much already, and, too, he
was doubtless afraid of himself, of that wave of affection which was
rushing from his heart, drowning every other sentiment; for he concluded
abruptly: "Go you to your goal. I go to mine. Adieu!"
"Adieu," Landri replied.
The marquis hesitated another second. He had his hand on the door-knob.
He opened the door and disappeared, without even turning his head. He
walked with the inert step that had characterized him since the ghastly
discovery had stricken him in his magnificent vitality--his head bent
forward, his back slightly bowed. When he was in his library once more,
and alone, his prostration was so complete that he let himself drop into
the first arm-chair within his reach and sat there an indefinite time,
gazing at--what? a portrait of Landri as a child that he had had in that
room for years. All that past of paternal love throbbed in his heart,
and he reflected that at that very moment the young man, who was the
object of his passionate affection, was preparing to go away, and
forever.
But when he roused himself from that savage immobility, it was not to
return to the apartment where Landri undoubtedly still was. No. He took
from the table once more the bulky volume in which he had written the
history of his family, and opened it at the genealogical tree. He had to
unfold the enormous sheet on which were inscribed more than four hundred
names. The first two, Geoffroy and Aude, had above them the date 1060.
The blue eyes of Geoffroy IX, of 1906, embraced with a burning glance
that table which was, as it were, the imaginary cemetery of all his
dead. When he closed the book, he was calm. His hand traced, this time
without a tremor, the lines of a note which evidently represented a
decisive episode in a fully matured resolution. For he read it twice
before sealing it and writing the address on the envelope.
"Is the automobile in the courtyard?" he asked Garnier, who appeared in
answer to another ring. "Let Auguste take this line to Monsieur le Comte
de Bressieux at once. If Monsieur de Bressieux is at home, let him bring
him back. If not, let him leave the note."--And, alone once more, "If
any one can resume the negotiations for the sale of the furniture of
Grandchamp with that Altona, he is the man," he said to himself. "Altona
will give four millions merely for the articles enumerated in Appendix
number 44. If I add all the rest, he will give five."--And he put in
order the papers on his desk, which were nothing less than a schedule
prepared by him of "the rest": plate, Dresden ware, weapons, books,
linen--in a word, all the furniture of the château.--"That wretched
money is to be returned. Suppose that, while I am waiting for Bressieux,
I write to Charlus to announce the marriage? Poor Marie! She loved
Landri. It's fortunate, however, that he did not love her as well. I
should have had to prevent their union. Should I have had the strength?
One has strength for anything when the honor of the name is at stake.
And all the great names stand together. The Claviers would not have
inflicted upon the Charluses, by my hand, the outrage of vitiating their
blood."
As the suddenly evoked vision of the treachery restored his energy, he
began the letter to Marie's father which should justify his quarrel with
his supposititious son, in the eyes of the world; and this new upheaval
of resentment neutralized for a moment his misery at that parting.
X
EPILOGUE
In the early days of March of this year, 1907, several of the guests who
had taken part, some months' before, in the last hunting dinner that the
châtelain of Grandchamp was destined ever to give, were assembled after
luncheon in one of the small salons of the hôtel Charlus. There were
Florimond de Charlus himself, and his daughter Marie, who had done the
honors of the repast, in the absence of her mother, who was perennially
ill, to the Sicards and Louis de Bressieux. With the coffee had appeared
little de Travers, the too intimate friend of little Madame de Sicard,
and the _alter ego_ of her diminutive husband. You will remember the
wretched pun on the size and names of the members of this family of
three: "The Three Halves."
Elzéar de Travers, with his pink pug-nose, his pointed mustache, and
his great blue eyes on a level with his face, was a finished exemplar of
the peddler of scandal, who runs from club to club, from salon to salon,
with a "Have you heard the news?" ordinarily followed by the most
insignificant of tales. On the afternoon in question, he did not abandon
that habit.
"Guess whom I met last night, on his way to England, at the Gare du
Nord, where I went to escort Lady Semley, who told me to give you her
compliments?"--He turned to Simone de Sicard, who smiled at
him.--"Geoffroy de Claviers, who is going there to buy horses!"
"Doesn't he think himself sufficiently ruined, for Heaven's sake?" said
Sicard. "It seems that with the Jaubourg inheritance and the sale of the
pictures and furniture at Grandchamp, he still owes ten millions."