His Excellency the Minister Part 33

"Nothing," she replied. "What you have promised me is enough. Now I feel that I am saved. Our house, you said so, we are in our own house here.

If the creditors will not believe me when I tell them to have patience--"

"They will believe you," said Vaudrey. "Come, we will find the means--On my signature, any one will lend me money."

It seemed that Marianne was expecting this word _money_, coa.r.s.e but eloquent, in order to tell Vaudrey that an old friend, Claire Dujarrier, was on intimate terms with a certain Adolphe Gochard, who upon the endors.e.m.e.nt of a responsible person, would certainly advance a hundred thousand francs that he had at this moment lying idle. Gochard only needed a bill of exchange in his favor for one hundred thousand francs at three months' date, plus interest at five per cent. This Gochard was a very straightforward capitalist, who did not make it a business to lend money, but merely to oblige. It was Madame Dujarrier who had introduced him and Marianne would have already availed herself of his courtesy, if she had believed herself able to repay it at the appointed date.

"And where does this Monsieur Gochard live?" Vaudrey promptly asked.

"Oh! it would not be necessary for you to go to see him," replied Marianne. "On receipt of a bill of exchange from me, Madame Dujarrier would undertake to let me have a hundred thousand francs from hand to hand."

"A hundred thousand francs!--In three months," said Vaudrey to himself, "in a vast placer like Paris, one can find many veins of gold."

He had, besides, his personal property and land in Dauphiny. If need be, without Adrienne's even knowing it, he could mortgage his farms at Saint-Laurent-du-Pont!

"Monsieur de Rosas would not have hesitated. But in his case there would have been no merit," said Mademoiselle Kayser.

At the name of that man, coupled with the recollection of him, Sulpice felt himself spurred to a decision. Clearly the great millionaire n.o.ble would not have delayed before s.n.a.t.c.hing this woman from the claws of her creditors. A hundred thousand francs, a mere trifle for the count! Well, Vaudrey would give it as the Spaniard would have done. He would find it.

Within three months, he would have put everything right; he did not know how, but that mattered little.

"Have you a pen, Marianne?"

The minister had not noticed the sheet of white paper that was lying on the blotting pad of Russia leather, among the satin finished envelopes and the ivory paper-cutters.

"What are you going to do, my friend?"

She pretended to put away the green, sharkskin penholder lying near the inkstand, but drew it imperceptibly nearer to Sulpice, who with a quick movement had already seated himself in front of the secretaire.

"A minister's signature is sufficient, I suppose?" he said with a smile.

He commenced to write.

"What did you say?--Gochard?--"

She was quite pale as she looked over Sulpice's shoulder and saw him rapidly write several lines on the paper, then she spelled:

"Adolphe Gochard--Go-go-c-h-ar-d."

"There it is!" he said, as he handed her the sheet of paper.

"I wish to know what is thereon, or I would never consent."

She took the paper between her fingers as if to tear it to pieces.

Sulpice prevented her.

"No," he said, "I request you to keep it; it is the best reply you can give to those people.--Rely on me!"

"Do you wish it?" asked Marianne, with a toss of her head, speaking in a very sweet voice.

"Decidedly. It is selfish, but I wish to feel myself not a little at home here," Sulpice replied.

He seized her hands, her plump, soft, coaxing hands, and as he clasped them within his own, he carried them to his lips and kissed them, as well as her face, neck, ear and mouth, which he covered with kisses; and Marianne, still holding the satin paper that the minister had just signed, said with a laugh as she feebly defended herself:

"Come--come--have done with it! Oh! the big boy!--You will leave nothing for another time!"

He left the house, his head was swimming, and he was permeated with strong odors. He flung to the coachman an address half-way to the ministry.

"Place de la Madeleine."

He shut his eyes to picture Marianne.

As soon as she was alone, her lips curled as a smile of satisfied vanity played over them. She began by reading the lines that he had so hastily written: _I guarantee to Monsieur Adolphe Gochard a bill of exchange at three months, if he agrees to advance that amount to Mademoiselle Dujarrier who will hand it to Mademoiselle Marianne Kayser_.

"Well! the Dujarrier was right," she said; "a woman's scheming works easier than a sinapism."

Then, after a slight toss of the head and still smiling, she opened one of the drawers of the small Inaltia cabinet and slipped into it the satin paper to which the minister had affixed his signature and which she had carefully folded four times. She considered that autograph worth a thousand times more gold than the few pieces that remained scattered about the drawer, like so many waifs of luxury. Then, slowly returning to her armchair, she sank into it, clasping her two hands behind her head and gazing at the ceiling, her thoughts wandered in dreams--a crowd of little ambitious thoughts pa.s.sed through her brain like drifting clouds across the sky--and while with the top of her foot she again beat her nervous march on the hem of her petticoat, her lips, the lips whose fever had been taken away by Vaudrey, still preserved the strange turn of the corners that indicated the unsatiated person who sees, however, his opportunity arrive.

She was as fully mistress of herself as Vaudrey was embarra.s.sed and unbalanced. He seemed to hear voices laughing and singing within him and his brain was inflamed with joy. Before him opened the immense prospects of his dreams. Glorious as it was to be all-powerful, it was better to be loved. Everything whirled about within his brain, he thought he still heard Denis Ramel talking to him, and in a twinkling, Marianne's smiling face appeared, and with a kiss she interrupted the old journalist's sallies, and Sulpice saw her, too, as it were half-fainting, through the window of her fiacre, like a pastel half-hidden beneath the gla.s.s.

He was delighted to walk about for a moment when the carriage had set him down on the asphalted s.p.a.ce that surrounds the Madeleine. The walk was beneficial. He raised his head instinctively, expanded his lungs with the air, and threw out his chest. He thought that people looked at him attentively. Some pa.s.sers-by turned round to see him. He would have felt prouder to have heard them say: "That is Mademoiselle Kayser's lover!" than: "That is Monsieur Vaudrey, the minister!"

He felt a kind of annoyance on returning to Place Beauvau. He was still with Marianne. He recalled her att.i.tudes, her smile, the tone of her voice. Public matters now fastened their collar on him, there were signatures to be subscribed, reports to be read, telegrams, routine work; in a word, vulgar professional duties were to be resumed. He did not at once go to his cabinet. Warcolier, the Under Secretary of State, received and despatched ordinary matters.

Through some strange caprice, he felt a desire to see Adrienne very soon after leaving Marianne, perhaps to know how he would feel and if "_cela se voyait_" as they say. There was also a feeling of remorse involved in this eagerness. He wished to satisfy himself that Adrienne was not suffering, and as formerly, to smile on her as if redoubled affection would, in his own eyes, obliterate his fault.

Adrienne was in her salon. Sulpice heard the sound of voices beyond the door. Some one was talking.

"Madame has a visitor?" he inquired of the domestic.

"Yes, Monsieur le Ministre--Monsieur de Lissac."

"What! Guy! what chance brings him here!" Sulpice thought.

He opened the door and entered, extending his hand to his friend.

"How lucky! it is very kind of you to come."

Guy stood, hat in hand, while Vaudrey stooped toward Adrienne to kiss her brow unceremoniously in the presence of his friend.

"Oh!" said Lissac, "I have not come to greet Your Excellency. It is your charming wife that I have called on."

"I thank you for it," said Sulpice, "my poor Adrienne does not receive many visits outside the circle of official relations."

"And she does not get very much entertainment! So I promise myself to come and pay court to her--or such court as you would wish--from time to time. Madame," said Lissac jocosely, "it is a fact that this devilish minister deserves that you should receive declarations from morning to night while he is over yonder ogling his portfolio. Such a husband as he is, is not to be found again--"

Adrienne, blushing a little, looked at Vaudrey with her usual expression of tender devotion as profound as her soul. Sulpice made an effort to smile at Lissac's pleasantries.

"No, take care, you know!" added Guy. "As Madame Vaudrey is so often alone, I shall allow myself to come here sometimes to keep her company, and I won't guarantee to you that I won't fall in love with her."