Works of Honore De Balzac, page 391
“Read this,” said Baruch, taking the letter to old Hochon.
“Read it to me yourself; I haven’t my spectacles.”
My dear Friend, — I hope you will not hesitate, under the serious
circumstances in which I find myself, to do me the service of
receiving a power of attorney from Monsieur Rouget. Be at Vatan
to-morrow morning at nine o’clock. I shall probably send you to
Paris, but don’t be uneasy; I will furnish you with money for the
journey, and join you there immediately. I am almost sure I shall
be obliged to leave Issoudun, December third.
Adieu. I count on your friendship; rely on that of your friend,
Maxence
“God be praised!” exclaimed Monsieur Hochon; “the property of that old idiot is saved from the claws of the devil.”
“It will be if you say so,” said Madame Hochon; “and I thank God, — who has no doubt heard my prayers. The prosperity of the wicked is always fleeting.”
“You must go to Vatan, and accept the power of attorney from Monsieur Rouget,” said the old man to Baruch. “Their object is to get fifty thousand francs a year transferred to Mademoiselle Brazier. They will send you to Paris, and you must seem to go; but you are to stop at Orleans, and wait there till you hear from me. Let no one — not a soul — know where you lodge; go to the first inn you come to in the faubourg Bannier, no matter if it is only a post-house — ”
“Look here!” cried Francois, who had rushed to the window at the sudden noise of wheels in the Grande-Narette. “Here’s something new! — Pere Rouget and Colonel Bridau coming back together in the caleche, Benjamin and Captain Carpentier following on horseback!”
“I’ll go over,” cried Monsieur Hochon, whose curiosity carried the day over every other feeling.
Monsieur Hochon found old Rouget in his bedroom, writing the following letter at his nephew’s dictation:
Mademoiselle, — If you do not start to return here the moment you
receive this letter, your conduct will show such ingratitude for
all my goodness that I shall revoke the will I have made in your
favor, and give my property to my nephew Philippe. You will
understand that Monsieur Gilet can no longer be my guest after
staying with you at Vatan. I send this letter by Captain
Carpentier, who will put it into your own hands. I hope you will
listen to his advice; he will speak to you with authority from me.
Your affectionate
J.-J. Rouget.
“Captain Carpentier and I MET my uncle, who was so foolish as to follow Mademoiselle Brazier and Monsieur Gilet to Vatan,” said Philippe, with sarcastic emphasis, to Monsieur Hochon. “I have made my uncle see that he was running his head into a noose; for that girl will abandon him the moment she gets him to sign a power of attorney, by which they mean to obtain the income of his money in the Funds. That letter will bring her back under his roof, the handsome runaway! this very night, or I’m mistaken. I promise to make her as pliable as a bit of whalebone for the rest of her days, if my uncle allows me to take Maxence Gilet’s place; which, in my opinion, he ought never to have had in the first place. Am I not right? — and yet here’s my uncle bemoaning himself!”
“Neighbor,” said Monsieur Hochon, “you have taken the best means to get peace in your household. Destroy your will, and Flore will be once more what she used to be in the early days.”
“No, she will never forgive me for what I have made her suffer,” whimpered the old man; “she will no longer love me.”
“She shall love you, and closely too; I’ll take care of that,” said Philippe.
“Come, open your eyes!” exclaimed Monsieur Hochon. “They mean to rob you and abandon you.”
“Oh! I was sure of it!” cried the poor imbecile.
“See, here is a letter Maxence has written to my grandson Borniche,” said old Hochon. “Read it.”
“What infamy!” exclaimed Carpentier, as he listened to the letter, which Rouget read aloud, weeping.
“Is that plain enough, uncle?” demanded Philippe. “Hold that hussy by her interests and she’ll adore you as you deserve.”
“She loves Maxence too well; she will leave me,” cried the frightened old man.
“But, uncle, Maxence or I, — one or the other of us — won’t leave our footsteps in the dust of Issoudun three days hence.”
“Well then go, Monsieur Carpentier,” said Rouget; “if you promise me to bring her back, go! You are a good man; say to her in my name all you think you ought to say.”
“Captain Carpentier will whisper in her ear that I have sent to Paris for a woman whose youth and beauty are captivating; that will bring the jade back in a hurry!”
The captain departed, driving himself in the old caleche; Benjamin accompanied him on horseback, for Kouski was nowhere to be found. Though threatened by the officers with arrest and the loss of his situation, the Pole had gone to Vatan on a hired horse, to warn Max and Flore of the adversary’s move. After fulfilling his mission, Carpentier, who did not wish to drive back with Flore, was to change places with Benjamin, and take the latter’s horse.
When Philippe was told of Kouski’s flight he said to Benjamin, “You will take the Pole’s place, from this time on. It is all mapping out, papa Hochon!” cried the lieutenant-colonel. “That banquet will be jovial!”
“You will come and live here, of course,” said the old miser.
“I have told Fario to send me all my things,” answered Philippe. “I shall sleep in the room adjoining Gilet’s apartment, — if my uncle consents.”
“What will come of all this?” cried the terrified old man.
“Mademoiselle Flore Brazier is coming, gentle as a paschal lamb,” replied Monsieur Hochon.
“God grant it!” exclaimed Rouget, wiping his eyes.
“It is now seven o’clock,” said Philippe; “the sovereign of your heart will be here at half-past eleven: you’ll never see Gilet again, and you will be as happy ever after as a pope. — If you want me to succeed,” he whispered to Monsieur Hochon, “stay here till the hussy comes; you can help me in keeping the old man up to his resolution; and, together, we’ll make that crab-girl see on which side her bread is buttered.”
Monsieur Hochon felt the reasonableness of the request and stayed: but they had their hands full, for old Rouget gave way to childish lamentations, which were only quieted by Philippe’s repeating over and over a dozen times: —
“Uncle, you will see that I am right when Flore returns to you as tender as ever. You shall be petted; you will save your property: be guided by my advice, and you’ll live in paradise for the rest of your days.”
When, about half-past eleven, wheels were heard in the Grande-Narette, the question was, whether the carriage were returning full or empty. Rouget’s face wore an expression of agony, which changed to the prostration of excessive joy when he saw the two women, as the carriage turned to enter the courtyard.
“Kouski,” said Philippe, giving a hand to Flore to help her down. “You are no longer in Monsieur Rouget’s service. You will not sleep here to-night; get your things together, and go. Benjamin takes your place.”
“Are you the master here?” said Flore sarcastically.
“With your permission,” replied Philippe, squeezing her hand as if in a vice. “Come! we must have an understanding, you and I”; and he led the bewildered woman out into the place Saint-Jean.
“My fine lady,” began the old campaigner, stretching out his right hand, “three days hence, Maxence Gilet will be sent to the shades by that arm, or his will have taken me off guard. If I die, you will be the mistress of my poor imbecile uncle; ‘bene sit.’ If I remain on my pins, you’ll have to walk straight, and keep him supplied with first-class happiness. If you don’t, I know girls in Paris who are, with all due respect, much prettier than you; for they are only seventeen years old: they would make my uncle excessively happy, and they are in my interests. Begin your attentions this very evening; if the old man is not as gay as a lark to-morrow morning, I have only a word to say to you; it is this, pay attention to it, — there is but one way to kill a man without the interference of the law, and that is to fight a duel with him; but I know three ways to get rid of a woman: mind that, my beauty!”
During this address, Flore shook like a person with the ague.
“Kill Max — ?” she said, gazing at Philippe in the moonlight.
“Come, here’s my uncle.”
Old Rouget, turning a deaf ear to Monsieur Hochon’s remonstrances, now came out into the street, and took Flore by the hand, as a miser might have grasped his treasure; he drew her back to the house and into his own room and shut the door.
“This is Saint-Lambert’s day, and he who deserts his place, loses it,” remarked Benjamin to the Pole.
“My master will shut your mouth for you,” answered Kouski, departing to join Max who established himself at the hotel de la Poste.
On the morrow, between nine and eleven o’clock, all the women talked to each other from door to door throughout the town. The story of the wonderful change in the Rouget household spread everywhere. The upshot of the conversations was the same on all sides, —
“What will happen at the banquet between Max and Colonel Bridau?”
Philippe said but few words to the Vedie, — ”Six hundred francs’ annuity, or dismissal.” They were enough, however, to keep her neutral, for a time, between the two great powers, Philippe and Flore.
Knowing Max’s life to be in danger, Flore became more affectionate to Rouget than in the first days of their alliance. Alas! in love, a self-interested devotion is sometimes more agreeable than a truthful one; and that is why many men pay so much for clever deceivers. The Rabouilleuse did not appear till the next morning, when she came down to breakfast with Rouget on her arm. Tears filled her eyes as she beheld, sitting in Max’s place, the terrible adversary, with his sombre blue eyes, and the cold, sinister expression on his face.
“What is the matter, mademoiselle?” he said, after wishing his uncle good-morning.
“She can’t endure the idea of your fighting Maxence,” said old Rouget.
“I have not the slightest desire to kill Gilet,” answered Philippe. “He need only take himself off from Issoudun and go to America on a venture. I should be the first to advise you to give him an outfit, and to wish him a safe voyage. He would soon make a fortune there, and that is far more honorable than turning Issoudun topsy-turvy at night, and playing the devil in your household.”
“Well, that’s fair enough,” said Rouget, glancing at Flore.
“A-mer-i-ca!” she ejaculated, sobbing.
“It is better to kick his legs about in a free country than have them rot in a pine box in France. However, perhaps you think he is a good shot, and can kill me; it’s on the cards,” observed the colonel.
“Will you let me speak to him?” said Flore, imploring Philippe in a humble and submissive tone.
“Certainly; he can come here and pack up his things. I will stay with my uncle during that time; for I shall not leave the old man again,” replied Philippe.
“Vedie,” cried Flore, “run to the hotel, and tell Monsieur Gilet that I beg him — ”
“ — to come and get his belongings,” said Philippe, interrupting Flore’s message.
“Yes, yes, Vedie; that will be a good pretext to see me; I must speak to him.”
Terror controlled her hatred; and the shock which her whole being experienced when she first encountered this strong and pitiless nature was now so overwhelming that she bowed before Philippe just as Rouget had been in the habit of bending before her. She anxiously awaited Vedie’s return. The woman brought a formal refusal from Max, who requested Mademoiselle Brazier to send his things to the hotel de la Poste.
“Will you allow me to take them to him?” she said to Jean-Jacques Rouget.
“Yes, but will you come back?” said the old man.
“If Mademoiselle is not back by midday, you will give me a power of attorney to attend to your property,” said Philippe, looking at Flore. “Take Vedie with you, to save appearances, mademoiselle. In future you are to think of my uncle’s honor.”
Flore could get nothing out of Max. Desperate at having allowed himself, before the eyes of the whole town, to be routed out of his shameless position, Gilet was too proud to run away from Philippe. The Rabouilleuse combated this objection, and proposed that they should fly together to America; but Max, who did not want Flore without her money, and yet did not wish the girl to see the bottom of his heart, insisted on his intention of killing Philippe.
“We have committed a monstrous folly,” he said. “We ought all three to have gone to Paris and spent the winter there; but how could one guess, from the mere sight of that fellow’s big carcass, that things would turn out as they have? The turn of events is enough to make one giddy! I took the colonel for one of those fire-eaters who haven’t two ideas in their head; that was the blunder I made. As I didn’t have the sense to double like a hare in the beginning, I’ll not be such a coward as to back down before him. He has lowered me in the estimation of this town, and I cannot get back what I have lost unless I kill him.”
“Go to America with forty thousand francs. I’ll find a way to get rid of that scoundrel, and join you. It would be much wiser.”
“What would people say of me?” he exclaimed. “No; I have buried nine already. The fellow doesn’t seem as if he knew much; he went from school to the army, and there he was always fighting till 1815; then he went to America, and I doubt if the brute ever set foot in a fencing-alley; while I have no match with the sabre. The sabre is his arm; I shall seem very generous in offering it to him, — for I mean, if possible, to let him insult me, — and I can easily run him through. Unquestionably, it is my wisest course. Don’t be uneasy; we shall be masters of the field in a couple of days.”
That it was that a stupid point of honor had more influence over Max than sound policy. When Flore got home she shut herself up to cry at ease. During the whole of that day gossip ran wild in Issoudun, and the duel between Philippe and Maxence was considered inevitable.
“Ah! Monsieur Hochon,” said Mignonnet, who, accompanied by Carpentier, met the old man on the boulevard Baron, “we are very uneasy; for Gilet is clever with all weapons.”
“Never mind,” said the old provincial diplomatist; “Philippe has managed this thing well from the beginning. I should never have thought that big, easy-going fellow would have succeeded as he has. The two have rolled together like a couple of thunder-clouds.”
“Oh!” said Carpentier, “Philippe is a remarkable man. His conduct before the Court of Peers was a masterpiece of diplomacy.”
“Well, Captain Renard,” said one of the townsfolk to Max’s friend. “They say wolves don’t devour each other, but it seems that Max is going to set his teeth in Colonel Bridau. That’s pretty serious among you gentlemen of the Old Guard.”
“You make fun of it, do you? Because the poor fellow amused himself a little at night, you are all against him,” said Potel. “But Gilet is a man who couldn’t stay in a hole like Issoudun without finding something to do.”
“Well, gentlemen,” remarked another, “Max and the colonel must play out their game. Bridau had to avenge his brother. Don’t you remember Max’s treachery to the poor lad?”
“Bah! nothing but an artist,” said Renard.
“But the real question is about the old man’s property,” said a third. “They say Monsieur Gilet was laying hands on fifty thousand francs a year, when the colonel turned him out of his uncle’s house.”
“Gilet rob a man! Come, don’t say that to any one but me, Monsieur Canivet,” cried Potel. “If you do, I’ll make you swallow your tongue, — and without any sauce.”
Every household in town offered prayers for the honorable Colonel Bridau.
CHAPTER XVI
Towards four o’clock the following day, the officers of the old army who were at Issoudun or its environs, were sauntering about the place du Marche, in front of an eating-house kept by a man named Lacroix, and waiting the arrival of Colonel Philippe Bridau. The banquet in honor of the coronation was to take place with military punctuality at five o’clock. Various groups of persons were talking of Max’s discomfiture, and his dismissal from old Rouget’s house; for not only were the officers to dine at Lacroix’s, but the common soldiers had determined on a meeting at a neighboring wine-shop. Among the officers, Potel and Renard were the only ones who attempted to defend Max.
“Is it any of our business what takes place among the old man’s heirs?” said Renard.
“Max is weak with women,” remarked the cynical Potel.
“There’ll be sabres unsheathed before long,” said an old sub-lieutenant, who cultivated a kitchen-garden in the upper Baltan. “If Monsieur Maxence Gilet committed the folly of going to live under old Rouget’s roof, he would be a coward if he allowed himself to be turned off like a valet without asking why.”
“Of course,” said Mignonnet dryly. “A folly that doesn’t succeed becomes a crime.”
At this moment Max joined the old soldiers of Napoleon, and was received in significant silence. Potel and Renard each took an arm of their friend, and walked about with him, conversing. Presently Philippe was seen approaching in full dress; he trailed his cane after him with an imperturbable air which contrasted with the forced attention Max was paying to the remarks of his two supporters. Bridau’s hand was grasped by Mignonnet, Carpentier, and several others. This welcome, so different from that accorded to Max, dispelled the last feeling of cowardice, or, if you prefer it, wisdom, which Flore’s entreaties, and above all, her tendernesses, had awakened in the latter’s mind.
“We shall fight,” he said to Renard, “and to the death. Therefore don’t talk to me any more; let me play my part well.”
After these words, spoken in a feverish tone, the three Bonapartists returned to the group of officers and mixed among them. Max bowed first to Bridau, who returned his bow, and the two exchanged a frigid glance.
