IN WHICH MAÎTRE LORIOT'S CURIOSITY
IS NOT EXACTLY SATISFIED.
Maître Loriot profited, as we have said, by the example of the young
ladies, and left the marquis and his guests to evoke at ease their
memories of the "war of giants." He rose from table and followed the
Demoiselles de Souday into the salon. There he advanced toward them,
bending almost double, and rubbing his hands.
"Ah!" said Bertha; "you seem to be pleased about something, Monsieur
le notaire."
"Mesdemoiselles," replied Maître Loriot, in a low voice, "I have done
my best to second your father's trick. I hope that if need be you will
not refuse to certify to the coolness and self-possession I have shown
under the circumstances."
"What trick do you mean, dear Monsieur Loriot," said Mary, laughing.
"Neither Bertha nor I know what you mean."
"Good heavens!" said the notary; "I don't know any more than you know,
but it seems to me that Monsieur le marquis must have some serious and
powerful reasons to treat as old friends, and even better than some
old friends are treated, those hateful bullies whom he has admitted to
his table. The attentions he is paying to those hirelings of the
usurper strike me as very strange, and I fancy they have a purpose."
"What purpose?" asked Bertha.
"Well, that of filling those fellows' minds with such a sense of
security that they will neglect to look after their own safety, and
then--taking advantage of their carelessness, to make them share the
fate--"
"The fate?"
"The fate of--" repeated the notary.
"The fate of whom?"
The notary passed his hand across his throat.
"Holofernes, perhaps?" cried Bertha, laughing.
"Exactly," said Maître Loriot.
Mary joined her sister in the peals of laughter this assurance called
forth. The little notary's supposition delighted the sisters beyond
measure.
"So you assign us the part of Judith!" cried Bertha, endeavoring to
check her laughter.
"But, mesdemoiselles--"
"If my father were here, Monsieur Loriot, he might be angry that you
suppose him capable of such proceedings, which would be in my opinion,
a little too Biblical. But don't be uneasy; we will tell neither papa
nor the general, who certainly would not be flattered at the meaning
you put upon our attentions."
"Young ladies," entreated Loriot, "forgive me if my political fervor,
my horror for all the partisans of the present unfortunate doctrines,
carried me rather too far."
"I forgive you, Monsieur Loriot," replied Bertha, who, having been, in
consequence of her frank, decided nature, the most suspicious, felt
that she had the most to pardon,--"I forgive you; and in order that
you may not make such mistakes in future I shall give you the key-note
of the situation. You must know that General Dermoncourt, whom you
regard as Antichrist, has merely come to Souday to make exactly the
same search that is made in all the neighboring châteaus."
"If that's the case," said the little notary, who was getting himself
deeper and deeper into trouble, "why treat him with,--yes, I will say
the word,--with such luxury and splendor? The law is precise."
"The law! How so?"
"Yes; it forbids all magistrates and civil and military officers
charged with the execution of judicial authority to seize, carry away,
or appropriate any articles other than those named in the warrant.
What are these men now doing with the viands and wines of all
sorts which are on the table of the Marquis de Souday? They are
ap-pro-pri-ating them!"
"It seems to me, my dear Monsieur Loriot," said Mary, "that my father
has the right to invite whom he chooses to his table."
"Even those who come to execute--to bring into his home--an odious and
tyrannical power? Certainly he has the right, mademoiselle; but you
will allow me to regard it as a most unnatural thing, and to suppose
it has some secret cause or object."
"In other words, Monsieur Loriot, you see a secret which you want to
penetrate."
"Oh, mademoiselle--"
"Well, I'll confide it to you, as well as I can, my dear Monsieur
Loriot. I am willing to trust you, if you, on your side, will tell me
how it happened that having to look for Monsieur Michel de la Logerie,
you came straight to the château de Souday."
Bertha said the words in a firm, incisive way, and the notary, to whom
they were addressed, heard them with more embarrassment than was felt
by the lady who uttered them.
As for Mary, she came up to her sister, slipped her arm within
Bertha's, and resting her head upon the latter's shoulder, awaited,
with a curiosity she did not seek to disguise, the answer of Maître
Loriot.
"Well, if you really wish to know why, young ladies--"
The notary made a pause, as though expecting to be encouraged; and
Bertha did encourage him with a nod.
"I came," continued Maître Loriot, "because Madame la Baronne de la
Logerie informed me that the château de Souday was probably the place
to which her son went on taking flight from his home."
"And on what did Madame la Baronne de la Logerie base that
supposition?" asked Bertha, with the same questioning look and the
same firm, incisive voice.
"Mademoiselle," replied the notary, more and more embarrassed, "after
what I said to your father, really I do not know whether, in spite of
the reward you promise to my frankness, I have the courage to say
more."
"Why not?" said Bertha, with the same coolness. "Shall I help you? It
is because she thinks, I believe you said, that the object of Monsieur
Michel's love is at Souday."
"Yes, mademoiselle, that is just it."
"Very good; but what I desire to know, and what I shall insist on
knowing, is Madame de la Logerie's opinion of that love."
"Her opinion is not exactly favorable, mademoiselle," returned the
notary; "that I must admit."
"That's a point on which my father and the baroness will agree," said
Bertha, laughing.
"But," continued the notary, pointedly, "Monsieur Michel will be of
age in a few months,--consequently, free as to his actions, and the
master of an immense fortune."
"As to his actions," said Bertha, "so much the better for him."
"In what way, mademoiselle?" asked the notary, maliciously.
"Why to rehabilitate the name he bears and efface the evil memories
his father left behind him. As to the fortune, if I were the woman
Monsieur Michel honored with his affection, I should advise him to
make such use of it that there would soon be no name in the whole
province more honored than his."
"What use would you advise him to make of it?" exclaimed the notary,
much astonished.
"To return that money to those from whom they say his father got it,
and to make restitution to the former proprietors of the national
domain which M. Michel bought."
"But in that case, mademoiselle, you would ruin the man who had the
honor to be in love with you," said the little notary, quite
bewildered.
"What would that matter if he obtained the respect of all, and the
regard of her who advised the sacrifice?"
Just then Rosine appeared at the door of the salon.
"Mademoiselle," she said, not addressing herself particularly to
either Mary or Bertha, "will you please come here?"
Bertha wanted to continue her conversation with the notary. She was
eager for information as to the feelings Madame de la Logerie had
against her; and, moreover, she enjoyed talking, however vaguely, of
projects which for some time past had been the theme of her
meditations. So she told Mary to go and see what was wanted.
But Mary, on her side, was rather unwilling to leave the salon. She
was frightened to see to what lengths Bertha's love had developed
within the last few days; every word her sister said echoed painfully
in her soul. She felt sure that Michel's love was wholly her own, and
she thought with actual terror of Bertha's despair when she should
discover how strangely she had deceived herself. Besides, in spite of
Mary's immense affection for her sister, love had already poured into
her heart the little dose of selfishness which always accompanies that
emotion, and she was quite joyful, from another point of view, at what
she was now hearing. The part which Bertha was tracing out for the
wife of Michel she felt should be her own. So it happened that Bertha
was obliged to ask her for the second time to see what Rosine wanted.
"Go, dearest," she said, kissing Mary's forehead, "go; and while you
are there please give orders about preparing Monsieur Loriot's room;
for I fear, in all this turmoil, it has been forgotten."
Mary was accustomed to obey, and she obeyed. Of the two sisters, she
was by far the most docile and gentle. She found Rosine at the door.
"What do you want of us?" she asked.
Rosine did not reply. Then, as if she feared to be overheard from the
dining-room, where the marquis was narrating the last day of
Charette's life, she took Mary by the arm and drew her under the
staircase at the farther end of the vestibule.
"Mademoiselle," she said, "he is hungry."
"He is hungry?" repeated Mary.
"Yes; he has just told me so."
"Who is it you are talking of? Who is hungry?"
"He, the poor lad."
"Who is he?"
"Why, Monsieur Michel."
"Monsieur Michel here!"
"Didn't you know it?"
"No."
"Two hours ago--after Mademoiselle Bertha returned from the chapel,
just before the soldiers arrived--he came to the kitchen."
"Didn't he go away with Petit-Pierre?"
"No."
"And you say he went to the kitchen?"
"Yes; and he was so tired, it was quite pitiful. 'Monsieur Michel,' I
said like that, 'why don't you go into the salon?' 'My dear Rosine,'
said he, in his gentle way, 'they didn't ask me.' Then he wanted to go
and sleep at Machecoul, for he said he wouldn't go back to La Logerie
for all the world. It seems his mother meant to take him to Paris. So
I wouldn't let him leave the house."
"You did quite right, Rosine. Where is he now?"
"I put him in the tower chamber; but as the soldiers have taken the
ground-floor, we can't get in there now except through the passage at
the end of the hay-loft, and I came to ask you for the key."
Mary's first thought (it was her good thought) was to tell her sister;
but a second thought succeeded the first, and that, it must be owned,
was less generous. It was no other than to see Michel first and alone.
Rosine gave her the opportunity.
"I'll tell you where the key is," said Mary.
"Oh, mademoiselle," replied Rosine, "do come with me. There are so
many men about that I don't like to be alone, and I should die of
fright to go up there by myself; whereas if you, the marquis's
daughter, were with me they would all respect us."
"But the provisions?"
"Here they are."
"Where?"
"In this basket."
"Oh, very good; then come."
And Mary sprang up the stairs with the agility of the kids she
sometimes hunted among the rocks in the forest of Machecoul.