Colonel Chabert Part 7

"He would defend me, monsieur."

"No, madame."

"What reason could he have for deserting me, monsieur?"

"That he would be free to marry the only daughter of a peer of France, whose t.i.tle would be conferred on him by patent from the King."

The Countess turned pale.

"A hit!" said Derville to himself. "I have you on the hip; the poor Colonel's case is won."--"Besides, madame," he went on aloud, "he would feel all the less remorse because a man covered with glory--a General, Count, Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor--is not such a bad alternative; and if that man insisted on his wife's returning to him--"

"Enough, enough, monsieur!" she exclaimed. "I will never have any lawyer but you. What is to be done?"

"Compromise!" said Derville.

"Does he still love me?" she said.

"Well, I do not think he can do otherwise."

The Countess raised her head at these words. A flash of hope shone in her eyes; she thought perhaps that she could speculate on her first husband's affection to gain her cause by some feminine cunning.

"I shall await your orders, madame, to know whether I am to report our proceedings to you, or if you will come to my office to agree to the terms of a compromise," said Derville, taking leave.

A week after Derville had paid these two visits, on a fine morning in June, the husband and wife, who had been separated by an almost supernatural chance, started from the opposite ends of Paris to meet in the office of the lawyer who was engaged by both. The supplies liberally advanced by Derville to Colonel Chabert had enabled him to dress as suited his position in life, and the dead man arrived in a very decent cab. He wore a wig suited to his face, was dressed in blue cloth with white linen, and wore under his waistcoat the broad red ribbon of the higher grade of the Legion of Honor. In resuming the habits of wealth he had recovered his soldierly style. He held himself up; his face, grave and mysterious-looking, reflected his happiness and all his hopes, and seemed to have acquired youth and _impasto_, to borrow a picturesque word from the painter's art. He was no more like the Chabert of the old box-coat than a cartwheel double sou is like a newly coined forty-franc piece. The pa.s.ser-by, only to see him, would have recognized at once one of the n.o.ble wrecks of our old army, one of the heroic men on whom our national glory is reflected, as a splinter of ice on which the sun shines seems to reflect every beam. These veterans are at once a picture and a book.

When the Count jumped out of his carriage to go into Derville's office, he did it as lightly as a young man. Hardly had his cab moved off, when a smart brougham drove up, splendid with coats-of-arms. Madame la Comtesse Ferraud stepped out in a dress which, though simple, was cleverly designed to show how youthful her figure was. She wore a pretty drawn bonnet lined with pink, which framed her face to perfection, softening its outlines and making it look younger.

If the clients were rejuvenescent, the office was unaltered, and presented the same picture as that described at the beginning of this story. Simonnin was eating his breakfast, his shoulder leaning against the window, which was then open, and he was staring up at the blue sky in the opening of the courtyard enclosed by four gloomy houses.

"Ah, ha!" cried the little clerk, "who will bet an evening at the play that Colonel Chabert is a General, and wears a red ribbon?"

"The chief is a great magician," said G.o.deschal.

"Then there is no trick to play on him this time?" asked Desroches.

"His wife has taken that in hand, the Comtesse Ferraud," said Boucard.

"What next?" said G.o.deschal. "Is Comtesse Ferraud required to belong to two men?"

"Here she is," answered Simonnin.

"So you are not deaf, you young rogue!" said Chabert, taking the gutter-jumper by the ear and twisting it, to the delight of the other clerks, who began to laugh, looking at the Colonel with the curious attention due to so singular a personage.

Comte Chabert was in Derville's private room at the moment when his wife came in by the door of the office.

"I say, Boucard, there is going to be a queer scene in the chief's room!

There is a woman who can spend her days alternately, the odd with Comte Ferraud, and the even with Comte Chabert."

"And in leap year," said G.o.deschal, "they must settle the _count_ between them."

"Silence, gentlemen, you can be heard!" said Boucard severely. "I never was in an office where there was so much jesting as there is here over the clients."

Derville had made the Colonel retire to the bedroom when the Countess was admitted.

"Madame," he said, "not knowing whether it would be agreeable to you to meet M. le Comte Chabert, I have placed you apart. If, however, you should wish it--"

"It is an attention for which I am obliged to you."

"I have drawn up the memorandum of an agreement of which you and M.

Chabert can discuss the conditions, here, and now. I will go alternately to him and to you, and explain your views respectively."

"Let me see, monsieur," said the Countess impatiently.

Derville read aloud:

"'Between the undersigned:

"'M. Hyacinthe Chabert, Count, Marechal de Camp, and Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor, living in Paris, Rue du Pet.i.t-Banquier, on the one part;

"'And Madame Rose Chapotel, wife of the aforesaid M. le Comte Chabert, _nee_--'"

"Pa.s.s over the preliminaries," said she. "Come to the conditions."

"Madame," said the lawyer, "the preamble briefly sets forth the position in which you stand to each other. Then, by the first clause, you acknowledge, in the presence of three witnesses, of whom two shall be notaries, and one the dairyman with whom your husband has been lodging, to all of whom your secret is known, and who will be absolutely silent--you acknowledge, I say, that the individual designated in the doc.u.ments subjoined to the deed, and whose ident.i.ty is to be further proved by an act of recognition prepared by your notary, Alexandre Crottat, is your first husband, Comte Chabert. By the second clause Comte Chabert, to secure your happiness, will undertake to a.s.sert his rights only under certain circ.u.mstances set forth in the deed.--And these," said Derville, in a parenthesis, "are none other than a failure to carry out the conditions of this secret agreement.--M. Chabert, on his part, agrees to accept judgment on a friendly suit, by which his certificate of death shall be annulled, and his marriage dissolved."

"That will not suit me in the least," said the Countess with surprise.

"I will be a party to no suit; you know why."

"By the third clause," Derville went on, with imperturbable coolness, "you pledge yourself to secure to Hyacinthe Comte Chabert an income of twenty-four thousand francs on government stock held in his name, to revert to you at his death--"

"But it is much too dear!" exclaimed the Countess.

"Can you compromise the matter cheaper?"

"Possibly."

"But what do you want, madame?"

"I want--I will not have a lawsuit. I want--"

"You want him to remain dead?" said Derville, interrupting her hastily.

"Monsieur," said the Countess, "if twenty-four thousand francs a year are necessary, we will go to law--"

"Yes, we will go to law," said the Colonel in a deep voice, as he opened the door and stood before his wife, with one hand in his waistcoat and the other hanging by his side--an att.i.tude to which the recollection of his adventure gave horrible significance.

"It is he," said the Countess to herself.