Scenes from a Courtesan's Life Part 96

"With impatience! Then she is saved," said the dreadful magician.

And, in fact, after an interview of half an hour, Jacques Collin opened the door and said:

"Come in, Monsieur le Comte; there is nothing further to fear."

The Countess had the letter clasped to her heart; she was calm, and seemed to have forgiven herself. The Count gave expression to his joy at the sight.

"And these are the men who settle our fate and the fate of nations,"

thought Jacques Collin, shrugging his shoulders behind the two men. "A female has but to sigh in the wrong way to turn their brain as if it were a glove! A wink, and they lose their head! A petticoat raised a little higher, dropped a little lower, and they rush round Paris in despair! The whims of a woman react on the whole country. Ah, how much stronger is a man when, like me, he keeps far away from this childish tyranny, from honor ruined by pa.s.sion, from this frank malignity, and wiles worthy of savages! Woman, with her genius for ruthlessness, her talent for torture, is, and always will be, the marring of man. The public prosecutor, the minister--here they are, all hoodwinked, all moving the spheres for some letters written by a d.u.c.h.ess and a chit, or to save the reason of a woman who is more crazy in her right mind than she was in her delirium."

And he smiled haughtily.

"Ay," said he to himself, "and they believe in me! They act on my information, and will leave me in power. I shall still rule the world which has obeyed me these five-and-twenty years."

Jacques Collin had brought into play the overpowering influence he had exerted of yore over poor Esther; for he had, as has often been shown, the mode of speech, the look, the action which quell madmen, and he had depicted Lucien as having died with the Countess' image in his heart.

No woman can resist the idea of having been the one beloved.

"You now have no rival," had been this bitter jester's last words.

He remained a whole hour alone and forgotten in that little room.

Monsieur de Granville arrived and found him gloomy, standing up, and lost in a brown study, as a man may well be who makes an 18th Brumaire in his life.

The public prosecutor went to the door of the Countess' room, and remained there a few minutes; then he turned to Jacques Collin and said:

"You have not changed your mind?"

"No, monsieur."

"Well, then, you will take Bibi-Lupin's place, and Calvi's sentence will be commuted."

"And he is not to be sent to Rochefort?"

"Not even to Toulon; you may employ him in your service. But these reprieves and your appointment depend on your conduct for the next six months as subordinate to Bibi-Lupin."

Within a week Bibi-Lupin's new deputy had helped the Crottat family to recover four hundred thousand francs, and had brought Ruffard and G.o.det to justice.

The price of the certificates sold by Esther Gobseck was found in the courtesan's mattress, and Monsieur de Serizy handed over to Jacques Collin the three hundred thousand francs left to him by Lucien de Rubempre.

The monument erected by Lucien's orders for Esther and himself is considered one of the finest in Pere-Lachaise, and the earth beneath it belongs to Jacques Collin.

After exercising his functions for about fifteen years Jacques Collin retired in 1845.

DECEMBER 1847.