The Widow Lerouge Part 4

"You unfortunate?" cried old Tabaret, singularly affected by his dear Noel's sadness. "In heaven's name, what has happened to you?"

"I suffer," murmured the advocate, "and very cruelly. Not only do I fear that the injustice is irreparable; but here am I totally without defence delivered over to the shafts of calumny. I may be accused of inventing falsehood, of being an ambitious intriguer, having no regard for truth, no scruples of conscience."

Old Tabaret was puzzled. What connection could possibly exist between Noel's honour and the a.s.sa.s.sination at La Jonchere? His brain was in a whirl. A thousand troubled and confused ideas jostled one another in inextricable confusion.

"Come, come, Noel," said he, "compose yourself. Who would believe any calumny uttered about you? Take courage, have you not friends? am I not here? Have confidence, tell me what troubles you, and it will be strange, indeed if between us two-"

The advocate started to his feet, impressed by a sudden resolution.

"Well! yes," interrupted he, "yes, you shall know all. In fact, I am tired of carrying all alone a secret that is stifling me. The part I have been playing irritates and wearies me. I have need of a friend to console me. I require a counsellor whose voice will encourage me, for one is a bad judge of his own cause, and this crime has plunged me into an abyss of hesitations."

"You know," replied M. Tabaret kindly, "that I regard you as my own son. Do not scruple to let me serve you."

"Know then," commenced the advocate,-"but no, not here: what I have to say must not be overheard. Let us go into my study."

CHAPTER IV.

When Noel and old Tabaret were seated face to face in Noel's study, and the door had been carefully shut, the old fellow felt uneasy, and said: "What if your mother should require anything."

"If Madame Gerdy rings," replied the young man drily, "the servant will attend to her."

This indifference, this cold disdain, amazed old Tabaret, accustomed as he was to the affectionate relations always existing between mother and son.

"For heaven's sake, Noel," said he, "calm yourself. Do not allow yourself to be overcome by a feeling of irritation. You have, I see, some little pique against your mother, which you will have forgotten to-morrow. Don't speak of her in this icy tone; but tell me what you mean by calling her Madame Gerdy?"

"What I mean?" rejoined the advocate in a hollow tone,-"what I mean?"

Then rising from his arm-chair, he took several strides about the room, and, returning to his place near the old fellow, said,- "Because, M. Tabaret, Madame Gerdy is not my mother!"

This sentence fell like a heavy blow on the head of the amateur detective.

"Oh!" he said, in the tone one a.s.sumes when rejecting an absurd proposition, "do you really know what you are saying, Noel? Is it credible? Is it probable?"

"It is improbable," replied Noel with a peculiar emphasis which was habitual to him: "it is incredible, if you will; but yet it is true. That is to say, for thirty-three years, ever since my birth, this woman has played a most marvellous and unworthy comedy, to enn.o.ble and enrich her son,-for she has a son,-at my expense!"

"My friend," commenced old Tabaret, who in the background of the picture presented by this singular revelation saw again the phantom of the murdered Widow Lerouge.

But Noel heard not, and seemed hardly in a state to hear. The young man, usually so cold, so self-contained, could no longer control his anger. At the sound of his own voice, he became more and more animated, as a good horse might at the jingling of his harness.

"Was ever man," continued he, "more cruelly deceived, more miserably duped, than I have been! I, who loved this woman, who knew not how to show my affection for her, who, for her sake, sacrificed my youth! How she must have laughed at me! Her infamy dates from the moment when for the first time she took me on her knees; and, until these few days past, she has sustained without faltering her execrable role. Her love for me was nothing but hypocrisy! her devotion, falsehood! her caresses, lies! And I adored her! Ah! why can I not take back all the embraces I bestowed on her in exchange for her Judas kisses? And for what was all this heroism of deception, this caution, this duplicity? To betray me more securely, to despoil me, to rob me, to give to her b.a.s.t.a.r.d all that lawfully appertained to me; my name, a n.o.ble name, my fortune, a princely inheritance!"

"We are getting near it!" thought old Tabaret, who was fast relapsing into the colleague of M. Gevrol; then aloud he said, "This is very serious, all that you have been saying, my dear Noel, terribly serious. We must believe Madame Gerdy possessed of an amount of audacity and ability rarely to be met with in a woman. She must have been a.s.sisted, advised, compelled perhaps. Who have been her accomplices? She could never have managed this unaided; perhaps her husband himself."

"Her husband!" interrupted the advocate, with a laugh. "Ah! you too have believed her a widow. Pshaw! She never had a husband, the defunct Gerdy never existed. I was a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, dear M. Tabaret, very much a b.a.s.t.a.r.d; Noel, son of the girl Gerdy and an unknown father!"

"Ah!" cried the old fellow; "that then was the reason why your marriage with Mademoiselle Levernois was broken off four years ago?"

"Yes, my friend, that was the reason. And what misfortunes might have been averted by this marriage with a young girl whom I loved! However I did not complain to her whom I then called my mother. She wept, she accused herself, she seemed ready to die of grief: and I, poor fool! I consoled her as best I could, I dried her tears, and excused her in her own eyes. No, there was no husband. Do such women as she have husbands? She was my father's mistress; and, on the day when he had had enough of her, he took up his hat and threw her three hundred thousand francs, the price of the pleasures she had given him."

Noel would probably have continued much longer to pour forth his furious denunciations; but M. Tabaret stopped him. The old fellow felt he was on the point of learning a history in every way similar to that which he had imagined; and his impatience to know whether he had guessed aright, almost caused him to forget to express any sympathy for his friend's misfortunes.

"My dear boy," said he, "do not let us digress. You ask me for advice; and I am perhaps the best adviser you could have chosen. Come, then, to the point. How have you learned this? Have you any proofs? where are they?"

The decided tone in which the old fellow spoke, should no doubt, have awakened Noel's attention; but he did not notice it. He had not leisure to reflect. He therefore answered,- "I have known the truth for three weeks past. I made the discovery by chance. I have important moral proofs; but they are mere presumptive evidence. A word from Widow Lerouge, one single word, would have rendered them decisive. This word she cannot now p.r.o.nounce, since they have killed her; but she had said it to me. Now, Madame Gerdy will deny all. I know her; with her head on the block, she will deny it. My father doubtless will turn against me. I am certain, and I possess proofs; now this crime makes my cert.i.tude but a vain boast, and renders my proofs null and void!"

"Explain it all to me," said old Tabaret after a pause-"all, you understand. We old ones are sometimes able to give good advice. We will decide what's to be done afterwards."

"Three weeks ago," commenced Noel, "searching for some old doc.u.ments, I opened Madame Gerdy's secretary. Accidentally I displaced one of the small shelves: some papers tumbled out, and a packet of letters fell in front of my eyes. A mechanical impulse, which I cannot explain, prompted me to untie the string, and, impelled by an invincible curiosity, I read the first letter which came to my hand."

"You did wrong," remarked M. Tabaret.

"Be it so; anyhow I read. At the end of ten lines, I was convinced that these letters were from my father, whose name, Madame Gerdy, in spite of my prayers, had always hidden from me. You can understand my emotion. I carried off the packet, shut myself up in this room, and devoured the correspondence from beginning to end."

"And you have been cruelly punished my poor boy!"

"It is true; but who in my position could have resisted? These letters have given me great pain; but they afford the proof of what I just now told you."

"You have at least preserved these letters?"

"I have them here, M. Tabaret," replied Noel, "and, that you may understand the case in which I have requested your advice, I am going to read them to you."

The advocate opened one of the drawers of his bureau, pressed an invisible spring, and from a hidden receptacle constructed in the thick upper shelf, he drew out a bundle of letters. "You understand, my friend," he resumed, "that I will spare you all insignificant details, which, however, add their own weight to the rest. I am only going to deal with the more important facts, treating directly of the affair."

Old Tabaret nestled in his arm-chair, burning with curiosity; his face and his eyes expressing the most anxious attention. After a selection, which he was some time in making, the advocate opened a letter, and commenced reading in a voice which trembled at times, in spite of his efforts to render it calm.

"'My dearly loved Valerie,'- "Valerie," said he, "is Madame Gerdy."

"I know, I know. Do not interrupt yourself."

Noel then resumed.

"'My dearly loved Valerie, "'This is a happy day. This morning I received your darling letter, I have covered it with kisses, I have re-read it a hundred times; and now it has gone to join the others here upon my heart. This letter, oh, my love! has nearly killed me with joy. You were not deceived, then; it was true! Heaven has blessed our love. We shall have a son.

"'I shall have a son, the living image of my adored Valerie! Oh! why are we separated by such an immense distance? Why have I not wings that I might fly to your feet and fall into your arms, full of the sweetest voluptuousness! No! never as at this moment have I cursed the fatal union imposed upon me by an inexorable family, whom my tears could not move. I cannot help hating this woman, who, in spite of me bears my name, innocent victim though she is of the barbarity of our parents. And, to complete my misery, she too will soon render me a father. Who can describe my sorrow when I compare the fortunes of these two children?

"'The one, the son of the object of my tenderest love, will have neither father nor family, nor even a name, since a law framed to make lovers unhappy prevents my acknowledging him. While the other, the son of my detested wife, by the sole fact of his birth, will be rich, n.o.ble, surrounded by devotion and homage, with a great position in the world. I cannot bear the thought of this terrible injustice! How it is to be prevented, I do not know: but rest a.s.sured I shall find a way. It is to him who is the most desired, the most cherished, the most beloved, that the greater fortune should come; and come to him it shall, for I so will it.'"

"From where is that letter dated?" asked old Tabaret. The style in which it was written had already settled one point in his mind.

"See," replied Noel. He handed the letter to the old fellow, who read,- "Venice, December, 1828."

"You perceive," resumed the advocate, "all the importance of this first letter. It is like a brief statement of the facts. My father, married in spite of himself, adores his mistress, and detests his wife. Both find themselves enceinte at the same time, and his feelings towards the two infants about to be born, are not at all concealed. Towards the end one almost sees peeping forth the germ of the idea which later on he will not be afraid to put into execution, in defiance of all law human or divine!"

He was speaking as though pleading the cause, when old Tabaret interrupted him.

"It is not necessary to explain it," said he. "Thank goodness, what you have just read is explicit enough. I am not an adept in such matters, I am as simple as a juryman; however I understand it admirably so far."

"I pa.s.s over several letters," continued Noel, "and I come to this one dated Jan. 23, 1829. It is very long, and filled with matters altogether foreign to the subject which now occupies us. However, it contains two pa.s.sages, which attest the slow but steady growth of my father's project. 'A destiny, more powerful than my will, chains me to this country; but my soul is with you, my Valerie! Without ceasing, my thoughts rest upon the adored pledge of our love which moves within you. Take care, my darling, take care of yourself, now doubly precious. It is the lover, the father, who implores you. The last part of your letter wounds my heart. Is it not an insult to me, for you to express anxiety as to the future of our child! Oh heaven! she loves me, she knows me, and yet she doubts!'

"I skip," said Noel, "two pages of pa.s.sionate rhapsody, and stop at these few lines at the end. 'The countess's condition causes her to suffer very much! Unfortunate wife! I hate and at the same time pity her. She seems to divine the reason of my sadness and my coldness. By her timid submission and unalterable sweetness, one would think she sought pardon for our unhappy union. Poor sacrificed creature! She also may have given her heart to another, before being dragged to the altar. Our fates would then be the same. Your good heart will pardon my pitying her.'

"That one was my mother," cried the advocate in a trembling voice. "A saint! And he asks pardon for the pity she inspires! Poor woman."

He pa.s.sed his hands over his eyes, as if to force back his tears, and added,- "She is dead!"

In spite of his impatience, old Tabaret dared not utter a word. Besides he felt keenly the profound sorrow of his young friend, and respected it. After a rather long silence, Noel raised his head, and returned to the correspondence.

"All the letters which follow," said he, "carry traces of the preoccupation of my father's mind on the subject of his b.a.s.t.a.r.d son. I lay them, however, aside. But this is what strikes me in the one written from Rome, on March 5, 1829. 'My son, our son, that is my great, my only anxiety. How to secure for him the future position of which I dream? The n.o.bles of former times were not worried in this way. In those days I would have gone to the king, who, with a word, would have a.s.sured the child's position in the world. To-day, the king who governs with difficulty his disaffected subjects can do nothing. The n.o.bility has lost its rights, and the highest in the land are treated the same as the meanest peasants!' Lower down I find,-'My heart loves to picture to itself the likeness of our son. He will have the spirit, the mind, the beauty, the grace, all the fascinations of his mother. He will inherit from his father, pride, valour, and the sentiments of a n.o.ble race. And the other, what will he be like? I tremble to think of it. Hatred can only engender a monster. Heaven reserves strength and beauty for the children of love!' The monster, that is I!" said the advocate, with intense rage. "Whilst the other-But let us ignore these preliminaries to an outrageous action. I only desired up to the present to show you the aberration of my father's reason under the influence of his pa.s.sion. We shall soon come to the point."

M. Tabaret was astonished at the strength of this pa.s.sion, of which Noel was disturbing the ashes. Perhaps, he felt it all the more keenly on account of those expressions which recalled his own youth. He understood how irresistible must have been the strength of such a love and he trembled to speculate as to the result.

"Here is," resumed Noel, holding up a sheet of paper, "not one of those interminable epistles from which I have read you short extracts, but a simple billet. It is dated from Venice at the beginning of May; it is short but nevertheless decisive; 'Dear Valerie,-Tell me, as near as possible, the probable date of your confinement. I await your reply with an anxiety you would imagine, could you but guess my projects with regard to our child.'

"I do not know," said Noel, "whether Madame Gerdy understood; anyhow she must have answered at once, for this is what my father wrote on the 14th: 'Your reply, my darling, is what I did not dare expect it to be. The project I had conceived is now practicable. I begin to feel more calm and secure. Our son shall bear my name; I shall not be obliged to separate myself from him. He shall be reared by my side, in my mansion, under my eyes, on my knees, in my arms. Shall I have strength enough to bear this excess of happiness? I have a soul for grief, shall I have one for joy? Oh! my adored one, oh! my precious child, fear nothing, my heart is vast, enough to love you both! I set out to-morrow for Naples, from whence I shall write to you at length. Happen what may, however, though I should have to sacrifice the important interests confided to me, I shall be in Paris for the critical hour. My presence will double your courage; the strength of my love will diminish your sufferings.'"

"I beg your pardon for interrupting you, Noel," said old Tabaret, "do you know what important affairs detained your father abroad?"

"My father, my old friend," replied the advocate, "was, in spite of his youth, one of the friends, one of the confidants, of Charles X.; and he had been entrusted by him with a secret mission to Italy. My father is Count Rheteau de Commarin."

"Whew!" exclaimed the old fellow; and the better to engrave the name upon his memory, he repeated several times, between his teeth, "Rheteau de Commarin."

For a few minutes Noel remained silent. After having appeared to do everything to control his resentment, he seemed utterly dejected, as though he had formed the determination to attempt nothing to repair the injury he had sustained.

"In the middle of the month of May, then," he continued, "my father is at Naples. It is whilst there, that he, a man of prudence and sense, a dignified diplomatist, a n.o.bleman, prompted by an insensate pa.s.sion, dares to confide to paper this most monstrous of projects. Listen!

"'My adored one,- "'It is Germain, my old valet, who will hand you this letter. I am sending him to Normandy, charged with a commission of the most delicate nature. He is one of those servitors who may be trusted implicitly.

"'The time has come for me to explain to you my projects respecting my son. In three weeks, at the latest, I shall be in Paris.

"'If my previsions are not deceited, the countess and you will be confined at the same time. An interval of three or four days will not alter my plan. This is what I have resolved.

"'My two children will be entrusted to two nurses of Normandy, where my estates are nearly all situated. One of these women, known to Germain, and to whom I am sending him, will be in our interests. It is to this person, Valerie, that our son will be confided. These two women will leave Paris the same day, Germain accompanying her who will have charge of the son of the countess.

"'An accident, devised beforehand, will compel these two women to pa.s.s one night on the road. Germain will arrange so they will have to sleep in the same inn, and in the same chamber! During the night, our nurse will change the infants in their cradles.

"'I have foreseen everything, as I will explain to you, and every precaution has been taken to prevent our secret from escaping. Germain has instructions to procure, while in Paris, two sets of baby linen exactly similar. a.s.sist him with your advice.

"'Your maternal heart, my sweet Valerie, may perhaps bleed at the thought of being deprived of the innocent caresses of your child. You will console yourself by thinking of the position secured to him by your sacrifice. What excess of tenderness can serve him as powerfully as this separation? As to the other, I know your fond heart, you will cherish him. Will it not be another proof of your love for me? Besides, he will have nothing to complain of. Knowing nothing he will have nothing to regret; and all that money can secure in this world he shall have.

"'Do not tell me that this attempt is criminal. No, my well beloved, no. The success of our plan depends upon so many unlikely circ.u.mstances, so many coincidences, independent of our will, that, without the evident protection of Providence, we cannot succeed. If, then, success crowns our efforts, it will be because heaven decreed it.

"'Meanwhile I hope.'"

"Just what I expected," murmured old Tabaret.

"And the wretched man," cried Noel, "dares to invoke the aid of Providence! He would make heaven his accomplice!"

"But," asked the old fellow, "how did your mother,-pardon me, I would say, how did Madame Gerdy receive this proposition?"

"She would appear to have rejected it, at first, for here are twenty pages of eloquent persuasion from the count, urging her to agree to it, trying to convince her. Oh, that woman!"

"Come my child," said M. Tabaret, softly, "try not to be too unjust. You seem to direct all your resentment against Madame Gerdy? Really, in my opinion, the count is far more deserving of your anger than she is."

"True," interrupted Noel, with a certain degree of violence,-"true, the count is guilty, very guilty. He is the author of the infamous conspiracy, and yet I feel no hatred against him. He has committed a crime, but he has an excuse, his pa.s.sion. Moreover, my father has not deceived me, like this miserable woman, every hour of my life, during thirty years. Besides, M. de Commarin has been so cruelly punished, that, at this present moment, I can only pardon and pity him."

"Ah! so he has been punished?" interrogated the old fellow.

"Yes, fearfully, as you will admit. But allow me to continue. Towards the end of May, or, rather, during the first days of June, the count must have arrived in Paris, for the correspondence ceases. He saw Madame Gerdy, and the final arrangements of the conspiracy were decided on. Here is a note which removes all uncertainty on that point. On the day it was written, the count was on service at the Tuileries, and unable to leave his post. He has written it even in the king's study, on the king's paper; see the royal arms! The bargain has been concluded, and the woman who has consented to become the instrument of my father's projects is in Paris. He informs his mistress of the fact."

"'Dear Valerie,-Germain informs me of the arrival of your son's, our son's nurse. She will call at your house during the day. She is to be depended upon; a magnificent recompense ensures her discretion. Do not, however, mention our plans to her; for she has been given to understand that you know nothing. I wish to charge myself with the sole responsibility of the deed; it is more prudent. This woman is a native of Normandy. She was born on our estate, almost in our house. Her husband is a brave and honest sailor. Her name is Claudine Lerouge.

"'Be of good courage, my dear love I am exacting from you the greatest sacrifice that a lover can hope for from a mother. Heaven, you can no longer doubt it, protects us. Everything depends now upon our skill and our prudence, so that we are sure to succeed!'"

On one point, at least, M. Tabaret was sufficiently enlightened. The researches into the past life of widow Lerouge were no longer difficult. He could not restrain an exclamation of satisfaction, which pa.s.sed unnoticed by Noel.

"This note," resumed the advocate, "closes the count's correspondence with Madame Gerdy."

"What!" exclaimed the old fellow, "you are in possession of nothing more?"

"I have also ten lines, written many years later, which certainly have some weight, but after all are only a moral proof."

"What a misfortune!" murmured M. Tabaret. Noel laid on the bureau the letters he had held in his hand, and, turning towards his old friend, he looked at him steadily.

"Suppose," said he slowly and emphasising every syllable,-"suppose that all my information ends here. We will admit, for a moment, that I know nothing more than you do now. What is your opinion?"

Old Tabaret remained some minutes without answering; he was estimating the probabilities resulting from M. de Commarin's letters.

"For my own part," said he at length, "I believe on my conscience that you are not Madame Gerdy's son."

"And you are right!" answered the advocate forcibly. "You will easily believe, will you not, that I went and saw Claudine. She loved me, this poor woman who had given me her milk, she suffered from the knowledge of the injustice that had been done me. Must I say it, her complicity in the matter weighed upon her conscience; it was a remorse too great for her old age. I saw her, I interrogated her, and she told me all. The count's scheme, simply and yet ingeniously conceived, succeeded without any effort. Three days after my birth, the crime was committed, and I, poor, helpless infant, was betrayed, despoiled and disinherited by my natural protector, by my own father! Poor Claudine! She promised me her testimony for the day on which I should reclaim my rights!"

"And she is gone, carrying her secret with her!" murmured the old fellow in a tone of regret.

"Perhaps!" replied Noel, "for I have yet one hope. Claudine had in her possession several letters which had been written to her a long time ago, some by the count, some by Madame Gerdy, letters both imprudent and explicit. They will be found, no doubt, and their evidence will be decisive. I have held these letters in my hands, I have read them; Claudine particularly wished me to keep them, why did I not do so?"

No! there was no hope on that side, and old Tabaret knew so better than any one. It was these very letters, no doubt, that the a.s.sa.s.sin of La Jonchere wanted. He had found them and had burnt them with the other papers, in the little stove. The old amateur detective was beginning to understand.

"All the same," said he, "from what I know of your affairs, which I think I know as well as my own, it appears to me that the count has not overwell kept the dazzling promises of fortune he made Madame Gerdy on your behalf."