A Rich Man's Relatives Volume II Part 12

"Ze bench? I do not know him. He vill not know my poor Pierre. But M.

Gerald? Is he also arrest?"

"He gave his card, and he promised to appear."

"All! and my poor Pierre have not ze carte. But he give ze promesse, and he keep it."

"It could not be taken, unfortunately. You see the others had run away, and the law must be vindicated. What else are the police for?"

"Ah!--_La loi!_ She take ze poor vich have not ze carte, ze riches _echappent_. It is not but ze good G.o.d who have pity on ze poor," and she sat down rocking herself in hopeless woe.

"You must bear up, my good woman. There is really no ground for despondency. Miss Stanley has engaged the very best lawyers in Montreal to see that the young man is brought safely through his difficulty. She feels most grateful to him."

"Mees Stanley is ver good. I have say so always. But it was to M.

Gerald Pierre bring ze _secours_. Does he notting? Go all his money to buy _la carte?_"--with a shrug which rather outraged Mrs. Bunce, who claimed much deference from the lower orders.

"My nephew will see your son comes to no harm," she said. Just a little loftily. "Set your mind at rest as to that; but Miss Stanley insists on bearing all the expense. She looks on your son as having got into difficulty through defending her niece; and indeed the young man himself, as he was being led away, said he would have done far more than that for the sake of Miss Muriel. We talked about him all through supper, when they got home--I did not go to the tobogganing myself--and we all said it was so nice of him. Depend on it, he will be no loser in the end----"

"For Mees Muriel? Always Mees Muriel! My Pierre shut up for _her!_ Sainte Vierge! Have pity on a wife and mother _malheureuse!_--ah!--And was it me who brought her there! _Serpenteau! Que tu m'as broui les yeux par ta vue! Que tu as niaise le c[oe]ur de ton frere legitime!_"

"Speak English, my good woman. What is it you say? You seem to have some ground of complaint against Miss Stanley's niece."

"She is not niece of Mees Stanley. She is _enfante trouvee_."

"What sort of an infant? But why do you say she is not Miss Stanley's niece? She is the daughter of Miss Stanley's brother. Surely a lady like Miss Stanley must know who are members of her own family. Why!

Mr. Bunce is her first cousin."

"_Vous vous trompez, madame. Vous vous l'imaginez la niece_----"

"Speak English, please."

"You imagine yourself the niece----"

"I do nothing of the kind. Betsey! I think this poor soul is losing her wits with grief for her boy. What shall we do?--Call your uncle."

"Not a bit of it, auntie. She is as peart as you or I; but she knows something about Muriel, and we'd better hear it. Designing little monkey! It is just scandalous the way that girl goes on with Gerald and all the young fellows who will mind her. I have long suspected there was something, and Uncle Dionysius always said he never knew that the Stanleys had had a brother at all, till he was shown this daughter."

"Surely that was sufficient."

"I don't know. Let's hear her, any way," and she drew her chair forward, smirking and nodding her head by way of introduction to the French woman.

"_Vous avez raison, Mademoiselle_."

"I told you so, auntie. She says I have reason. That means sense, of course, and I believe her; though some people"--and she sighed--"don't seem to see it. She is evidently a person of penetration and sagacity, this--a superior person. We'd better hear what she has to say. Wee, wee, ma bong fam," turning to the stranger; "but speak English. Parley Onglay, you know, we haven't much French here."

Annette knitted her dark brows and coughed determinedly; and then she stopped, and as another thought seemed to strike her, the frown cleared itself away before the propitiatory smile which she turned on her interviewers, as the night police cast the gleam of their bull's-eye on those who accost them.

"Since madame and mademoiselle are of ze parents of Mees Stanley, it is of their right, it is able to be of their advantage to know."

"Parents? Betsey. Penelope must be every day as old as I am. I told you the poor creature's wits were unsettled."

"Tush! auntie. Be quiet. Wee, wee; but speak English, Mrs. Bruneau. To be sure we wish to hear something to our advantage. Go on."

"But madame and mademoiselle must promesse not never to say zat the _connaissance_ have come from me. My man vould lose his _emploi chez_ Mees Stanley for sure."

"We'll promise you," cried Betsey, in eager curiosity. "Go ahead."

"_Cela etant_----"

"No French now, please. Take your time, but put it all into English."

Annette settled herself in her chair, clasping her hands in her lap with a long breath; while her eyes rolled abstractedly in her head in search, no doubt, of the English words to convey her meaning. "Madame is _mariee_ as me. She will know _la jalousie_, which carries ze good vife for _son epoux_."

"Auntie!" cried Betsey in uncontrollable hilarity. "Were you ever so jealous of Uncle Dionysius that you had to carry him about with you?

It would be more likely to be the other way. It is you, I should say, would want watching. He! he!"

"Betsey," said Aunt Judy austerely, for in truth her sense of propriety was outraged, "you surprise me. No! Mrs. Bruneau, I am not jealous. I have no occasion."

"Madame ees _heureuse_; but me--_l'epouse_ who loves as me, vill have _des doutes_ from time in time. Zere arrive von night--it was a hot night of summer, ven ze vindow ver leff open, and I do not sleep well, and zen sound _au dessous de la fenetre_--"

"Say window, and go on."

"I hear ze cry of a _bebe_, I raise myself and go down, and behold! on ze stoop it were laid. And _la jalousie_ she demand of me '_pour-quoi_ at ze door of my Jean Bruneau?' And I _reponds qu'oui_, it is too evident. And I say in myself that no! It shall not be that the _enfante d'autrui_ shall eat the _crote_ of _mes enfants_; and for Jean Bruneau, he shall of it never know. And then I carry to the _porte_ of Mees Stanley, and I sound, and hide myself till I shall see it carried in ze house. And now, behold, the reward of my _bienfaisance!_ Pierre, _a la prison!_ And he has loffe her since long time. _Peut-etre sa s[oe]ur!_ Oh! My boy so innocent, in sin so mortal, and not to know! But how to hinder?"

"And the child is no relation to them at all? Well--I call it _ou_dacious. Auntie, did you ever hear anything like it? A brat like Muriel, not a drop's blood to them in the world, to be pampered up there in sealskin and velvet, while I, their own cousin, am glad to dress myself in a suit of homespun."

"Yes, my dear, it seems wrong. I wonder at a correct person like Penelope Stanley compromising herself in a thing so contrary to all rule. But then, Matilda is flighty; I always thought her flighty.

Beware of flightiness, Betsey, and yielding to the momentary impulses of an ill-regulated mind. It never answers. In the touching language of--of--the Psalmist, I suppose--and be sure your impulses will find you out! No, that isn't just it, but it might be; that is the intention of it. But, Mrs. Bruneau, I feel for you"--she rose as she said so, to intimate that the interview was ended--"I feel for you deeply. Be sure of my kindest consideration. When we hear further about your son, we will let you know, and all my influence I promise you to exert on his behalf. Good morning. You may rely on our not making an improper use of what you have told us."

"Madame have give her promesse to be silent. I confide;" and she curtsied herself out, with a confidence which was fast wearing into a misgiving that she would have done more wisely to hold her tongue. A secret shared with two others, who have no interest in maintaining it, has ceased almost to be a secret at all.

CHAPTER XI.

BLUFF.

The mines brought a rush of trade to St. Euphrase. The drowsy little place, of late years, under the patronage of the railway, had been growing into a sort of sequestered rustic suburb, or at least a rural outlet for dust-stifled townspeople during the dog days, where such as could buy a house might pick their own strawberries, or cut their melon with the dew still on it, for breakfast. It was now breaking into the "live-village" stage of growth, raising its own dust in most respectable clouds, exhaling its own smoke--the villagers had burnt only wood in their golden age, and their atmosphere had been pure--with brawling navvies at the lane corners to disturb the night, and the glare of illuminated saloons, now for the first time able to outface the disapproval of M. le Cure, who hitherto had been able to fend off such dangerous allurements from his simple flock.

As spring advanced things progressed with a rush, and everybody in the district expected to make his fortune forthwith. The cautious _habitants_, who would not risk their savings in a bank (remembering how once upon a time a bank had broke, and a grandfather had lost some dollars), but hid them away in crannies below the roof or underneath the oven, took courage now, and bought shares. Were not the mines there? visible to the naked eye. Did not Baptiste and Jean earn wages there? paid regularly every Sat.u.r.day night. The whistle of their steam engine could be heard for miles around, and clouds of smoke drifted across the country, dropping flakes of soot on the linen hung out to dry. It was very real, this--definite and tangible. Had it not raised even the price of hay, which now could be sold at home, for the mine teams, at more than could be got for it in Montreal?

The rustics crowded into town to buy shares, and the price rose higher and higher, till they became so valuable that no one would sell.

Still, however, shares were to be got, with exertion, and at a good price, at the offices of the company, which were also those of the Messrs. Herkimer, whose senior partner was president of the company.

The board of directors was so composed as to conciliate the local interests of St. Euphrase--M. Podevin the hotelkeeper, Joseph Webb, Esquire--Esquire meaning J.P.--Farmer Belmore, and Stinson, Ralph's favourite clerk. These met periodically to accept five dollars apiece for their attendance, sanction such proposals as their president might make, and sign the minutes. None of them had an opinion upon the matters to be considered, and even if they had had one, they would have felt it to be indelicate to question the decisions of the city magnate who was making their fortunes; but that mattered little; it was pleasant to sit upon a board, and be paid for sitting, especially when their decision upon the points on which they came to be consulted was already framed, to save them the trouble of consideration, and required only a mute a.s.sent. They found their consequence vastly augmented among their neighbours, who all prayed them for advice and private information; which, not having, they found it difficult to give, and had to fall back on their habit, learned at the "board," of looking as wise and saying as little as possible.

It was delightful, for the time being, thus to play at Lord Burleigh, and be thought only the wiser the more they held their tongues; but they little imagined the responsibility they were building up for themselves, when issues of stock unregistered in the company's books, funds not accounted for, and other irregularities had to be explained to infuriated shareholders. The storm was yet in the future, for the present the heavens were shining.