Works of Honore De Balzac, page 633
“The devil!” said Corentin, while Derville entered their names and his profession as attorney to the lower Court in the department of the Seine, “I fancied the Sechards were very rich.”
“Some people say they are millionaires,” replied the innkeeper. “But as to hindering tongues from wagging, you might as well try to stop the river from flowing. Old Sechard left two hundred thousand francs’ worth of landed property, it is said; and that is not amiss for a man who began as a workman. Well, and he may have had as much again in savings, for he made ten or twelve thousand francs out of his land at last. So, supposing he were fool enough not to invest his money for ten years, that would be all told. But even if he lent it at high interest, as he is suspected of doing there would be three hundred thousand francs perhaps, and that is all. Five hundred thousand francs is a long way short of a million. I should be quite content with the difference, and no more of the Belle Etoile for me!”
“Really!” said Corentin. “Then Monsieur David Sechard and his wife have not a fortune of two or three millions?”
“Why,” exclaimed the innkeeper’s wife, “that is what the Cointets are supposed to have, who robbed him of his invention, and he does not get more than twenty thousand francs out of them. Where do you suppose such honest folks would find millions? They were very much pinched while the father was alive. But for Kolb, their manager, and Madame Kolb, who is as much attached to them as her husband, they could scarcely have lived. Why, how much had they with La Verberie! — A thousand francs a year perhaps.”
Corentin drew Derville aside and said:
“In vino veritas! Truth lives under a cork. For my part, I regard an inn as the real registry office of the countryside; the notary is not better informed than the innkeeper as to all that goes on in a small neighborhood. — You see! we are supposed to know all about the Cointets and Kolb and the rest.
“Your innkeeper is the living record of every incident; he does the work of the police without suspecting it. A government should maintain two hundred spies at most, for in a country like France there are ten millions of simple-minded informers. — However, we need not trust to this report; though even in this little town something would be known about the twelve hundred thousand francs sunk in paying for the Rubempre estate. We will not stop here long — — ”
“I hope not!” Derville put in.
“And this is why,” added Corentin; “I have hit on the most natural way of extracting the truth from the mouth of the Sechard couple. I rely upon you to support, by your authority as a lawyer, the little trick I shall employ to enable you to hear a clear and complete account of their affairs. — After dinner we shall set out to call on Monsieur Sechard,” said Corentin to the innkeeper’s wife. “Have beds ready for us, we want separate rooms. There can be no difficulty ‘under the stars.’”
“Oh, monsieur,” said the woman, “we invented the sign.”
“The pun is to be found in every department,” said Corentin; “it is no monopoly of yours.”
“Dinner is served, gentlemen,” said the innkeeper.
“But where the devil can that young fellow have found the money? Is the anonymous writer accurate? Can it be the earnings of some handsome baggage?” said Derville, as they sat down to dinner.
“Ah, that will be the subject of another inquiry,” said Corentin. “Lucien de Rubempre, as the Duc de Chaulieu tells me, lives with a converted Jewess, who passes for a Dutch woman, and is called Esther van Bogseck.”
“What a strange coincidence!” said the lawyer. “I am hunting for the heiress of a Dutchman named Gobseck — it is the same name with a transposition of consonants.”
“Well,” said Corentin, “you shall have information as to her parentage on my return to Paris.”
An hour later, the two agents for the Grandlieu family set out for La Verberie, where Monsieur and Madame Sechard were living.
Never had Lucien felt any emotion so deep as that which overcame him at La Verberie when comparing his own fate with that of his brother-in-law. The two Parisians were about to witness the same scene that had so much struck Lucien a few days since. Everything spoke of peace and abundance.
At the hour when the two strangers were arriving, a party of four persons were being entertained in the drawing-room of La Verberie: the cure of Marsac, a young priest of five-and-twenty, who, at Madame Sechard’s request, had become tutor to her little boy Lucien; the country doctor, Monsieur Marron; the Maire of the commune; and an old colonel, who grew roses on a plot of land opposite to La Verberie on the other side of the road. Every evening during the winter these persons came to play an artless game of boston for centime points, to borrow the papers, or return those they had finished.
When Monsieur and Madame Sechard had bought La Verberie, a fine house built of stone, and roofed with slate, the pleasure-grounds consisted of a garden of two acres. In the course of time, by devoting her savings to the purpose, handsome Madame Sechard had extended her garden as far as a brook, by cutting down the vines on some ground she purchased, and replacing them with grass plots and clumps of shrubbery. At the present time the house, surrounded by a park of about twenty acres, and enclosed by walls, was considered the most imposing place in the neighborhood.
Old Sechard’s former residence, with the outhouses attached, was now used as the dwelling-house for the manager of about twenty acres of vineyard left by him, of five farmsteads, bringing in about six thousand francs a year, and ten acres of meadow land lying on the further side of the stream, exactly opposite the little park; indeed, Madame Sechard hoped to include them in it the next year. La Verberie was already spoken of in the neighborhood as a chateau, and Eve Sechard was known as the Lady of Marsac. Lucien, while flattering her vanity, had only followed the example of the peasants and vine-dressers. Courtois, the owner of the mill, very picturesquely situated a few hundred yards from the meadows of La Verberie, was in treaty, it was said, with Madame Sechard for the sale of his property; and this acquisition would give the finishing touch to the estate and the rank of a “place” in the department.
Madame Sechard, who did a great deal of good, with as much judgment as generosity, was equally esteemed and loved. Her beauty, now really splendid, was at the height of its bloom. She was about six-and-twenty, but had preserved all the freshness of youth from living in the tranquillity and abundance of a country life. Still much in love with her husband, she respected him as a clever man, who was modest enough to renounce the display of fame; in short, to complete her portrait, it is enough to say that in her whole existence she had never felt a throb of her heart that was not inspired by her husband or her children.
The tax paid to grief by this happy household was, as may be supposed, the deep anxiety caused by Lucien’s career, in which Eve Sechard suspected mysteries, which she dreaded all the more because, during his last visit, Lucien roughly cut short all his sister’s questions by saying that an ambitious man owed no account of his proceedings to any one but himself.
In six years Lucien had seen his sister but three times, and had not written her more than six letters. His first visit to La Verberie had been on the occasion of his mother’s death; and his last had been paid with a view to asking the favor of the lie which was so necessary to his advancement. This gave rise to a very serious scene between Monsieur and Madame Sechard and their brother, and left their happy and respected life troubled by the most terrible suspicions.
The interior of the house, as much altered as the surroundings, was comfortable without luxury, as will be understood by a glance round the room where the little party were now assembled. A pretty Aubusson carpet, hangings of gray cotton twill bound with green silk brocade, the woodwork painted to imitate Spa wood, carved mahogany furniture covered with gray woolen stuff and green gimp, with flower-stands, gay with flowers in spite of the time of year, presented a very pleasing and homelike aspect. The window curtains, of green brocade, the chimney ornaments, and the mirror frames were untainted by the bad taste that spoils everything in the provinces; and the smallest details, all elegant and appropriate, gave the mind and eye a sense of repose and of poetry which a clever and loving woman can and ought to infuse into her home.
Madame Sechard, still in mourning for her father, sat by the fire working at some large piece of tapestry with the help of Madame Kolb, the housekeeper, to whom she intrusted all the minor cares of the household.
“A chaise has stopped at the door!” said Courtois, hearing the sound of wheels outside; “and to judge by the clatter of metal, it belongs to these parts — — ”
“Postel and his wife have come to see us, no doubt,” said the doctor.
“No,” said Courtois, “the chaise has come from Mansle.”
“Montame,” said Kolb, the burly Alsatian we have made acquaintance with in a former volume (Illusions perdues), “here is a lawyer from Paris who wants to speak with monsieur.”
“A lawyer!” cried Sechard; “the very word gives me the colic!”
“Thank you!” said the Maire of Marsac, named Cachan, who for twenty years had been an attorney at Angouleme, and who had once been required to prosecute Sechard.
“My poor David will never improve; he will always be absent-minded!” said Eve, smiling.
“A lawyer from Paris,” said Courtois. “Have you any business in Paris?”
“No,” said Eve.
“But you have a brother there,” observed Courtois.
“Take care lest he should have anything to say about old Sechard’s estate,” said Cachan. “He had his finger in some very queer concerns, worthy man!”
Corentin and Derville, on entering the room, after bowing to the company, and giving their names, begged to have a private interview with Monsieur and Madame Sechard.
“By all means,” said Sechard. “But is it a matter of business?”
“Solely a matter regarding your father’s property,” said Corentin.
“Then I beg you will allow monsieur — the Maire, a lawyer formerly at Angouleme — to be present also.”
“Are you Monsieur Derville?” said Cachan, addressing Corentin.
“No, monsieur, this is Monsieur Derville,” replied Corentin, introducing the lawyer, who bowed.
“But,” said Sechard, “we are, so to speak, a family party; we have no secrets from our neighbors; there is no need to retire to my study, where there is no fire — our life is in the sight of all men — — ”
“But your father’s,” said Corentin, “was involved in certain mysteries which perhaps you would rather not make public.”
“Is it anything we need blush for?” said Eve, in alarm.
“Oh, no! a sin of his youth,” said Corentin, coldly setting one of his mouse-traps. “Monsieur, your father left an elder son — — ”
“Oh, the old rascal!” cried Courtois. “He was never very fond of you, Monsieur Sechard, and he kept that secret from you, the deep old dog! — Now I understand what he meant when he used to say to me, ‘You shall see what you shall see when I am under the turf.’”
“Do not be dismayed, monsieur,” said Corentin to Sechard, while he watched Eve out of the corner of his eye.
“A brother!” exclaimed the doctor. “Then your inheritance is divided into two!”
Derville was affecting to examine the fine engravings, proofs before letters, which hung on the drawing-room walls.
“Do not be dismayed, madame,” Corentin went on, seeing amazement written on Madame Sechard’s handsome features, “it is only a natural son. The rights of a natural son are not the same as those of a legitimate child. This man is in the depths of poverty, and he has a right to a certain sum calculated on the amount of the estate. The millions left by your father — — ”
At the word millions there was a perfectly unanimous cry from all the persons present. And now Derville ceased to study the prints.
“Old Sechard? — Millions?” said Courtois. “Who on earth told you that? Some peasant — — ”
“Monsieur,” said Cachan, “you are not attached to the Treasury? You may be told all the facts — — ”
“Be quite easy,” said Corentin, “I give you my word of honor I am not employed by the Treasury.”
Cachan, who had just signed to everybody to say nothing, gave expression to his satisfaction.
“Monsieur,” Corentin went on, “if the whole estate were but a million, a natural child’s share would still be something considerable. But we have not come to threaten a lawsuit; on the contrary, our purpose is to propose that you should hand over one hundred thousand francs, and we will depart — — ”
“One hundred thousand francs!” cried Cachan, interrupting him. “But, monsieur, old Sechard left twenty acres of vineyard, five small farms, ten acres of meadowland here, and not a sou besides — — ”
“Nothing on earth,” cried David Sechard, “would induce me to tell a lie, and less to a question of money than on any other. — Monsieur,” he said, turning to Corentin and Derville, “my father left us, besides the land — — ”
Courtois and Cachan signaled in vain to Sechard; he went on:
“Three hundred thousand francs, which raises the whole estate to about five hundred thousand francs.”
“Monsieur Cachan,” asked Eve Sechard, “what proportion does the law allot to a natural child?”
“Madame,” said Corentin, “we are not Turks; we only require you to swear before these gentlemen that you did not inherit more than five hundred thousand francs from your father-in-law, and we can come to an understanding.”
“First give me your word of honor that you really are a lawyer,” said Cachan to Derville.
“Here is my passport,” replied Derville, handing him a paper folded in four; “and monsieur is not, as you might suppose, an inspector from the Treasury, so be easy,” he added. “We had an important reason for wanting to know the truth as to the Sechard estate, and we now know it.”
Derville took Madame Sechard’s hand and led her very courteously to the further end of the room.
“Madame,” said he, in a low voice, “if it were not that the honor and future prospects of the house of Grandlieu are implicated in this affair, I would never have lent myself to the stratagem devised by this gentleman of the red ribbon. But you must forgive him; it was necessary to detect the falsehood by means of which your brother has stolen a march on the beliefs of that ancient family. Beware now of allowing it to be supposed that you have given your brother twelve hundred thousand francs to repurchase the Rubempre estates — — ”
“Twelve hundred thousand francs!” cried Madame Sechard, turning pale. “Where did he get them, wretched boy?”
“Ah! that is the question,” replied Derville. “I fear that the source of his wealth is far from pure.”
The tears rose to Eve’s eyes, as her neighbors could see.
“We have, perhaps, done you a great service by saving you from abetting a falsehood of which the results may be positively dangerous,” the lawyer went on.
Derville left Madame Sechard sitting pale and dejected with tears on her cheeks, and bowed to the company.
“To Mansle!” said Corentin to the little boy who drove the chaise.
There was but one vacant place in the diligence from Bordeaux to Paris; Derville begged Corentin to allow him to take it, urging a press of business; but in his soul he was distrustful of his traveling companion, whose diplomatic dexterity and coolness struck him as being the result of practice. Corentin remained three days longer at Mansle, unable to get away; he was obliged to secure a place in the Paris coach by writing to Bordeaux, and did not get back till nine days after leaving home.
Peyrade, meanwhile, had called every morning, either at Passy or in Paris, to inquire whether Corentin had returned. On the eighth day he left at each house a note, written in their peculiar cipher, to explain to his friend what death hung over him, and to tell him of Lydie’s abduction and the horrible end to which his enemies had devoted them. Peyrade, bereft of Corentin, but seconded by Contenson, still kept up his disguise as a nabob. Even though his invisible foes had discovered him, he very wisely reflected that he might glean some light on the matter by remaining on the field of the contest.
Contenson had brought all his experience into play in his search for Lydie, and hoped to discover in what house she was hidden; but as the days went by, the impossibility, absolutely demonstrated, of tracing the slightest clue, added, hour by hour, to Peyrade’s despair. The old spy had a sort of guard about him of twelve or fifteen of the most experienced detectives. They watched the neighborhood of the Rue des Moineaux and the Rue Taitbout — where he lived, as a nabob, with Madame du Val-Noble. During the last three days of the term granted by Asie to reinstate Lucien on his old footing in the Hotel de Grandlieu, Contenson never left the veteran of the old general police office. And the poetic terror shed throughout the forests of America by the arts of inimical and warring tribes, of which Cooper made such good use in his novels, was here associated with the petty details of Paris life. The foot-passengers, the shops, the hackney cabs, a figure standing at a window, — everything had to the human ciphers to whom old Peyrade had intrusted his safety the thrilling interest which attaches in Cooper’s romances to a beaver-village, a rock, a bison-robe, a floating canoe, a weed straggling over the water.
“If the Spaniard has gone away, you have nothing to fear,” said Contenson to Peyrade, remarking on the perfect peace they lived in.
“But if he is not gone?” observed Peyrade.
“He took one of my men at the back of the chaise; but at Blois, my man having to get down, could not catch the chaise up again.”
Five days after Derville’s return, Lucien one morning had a call from Rastignac.
