Part 17

“Do not call my sincerity in question, sir,” Brunner interrupted quickly. “If you know of a penniless girl, one of a large family, well brought up but without fortune, as happens very often in France; and if her character offers me security, I will marry her.”

A pause followed; Frederic Brunner left Cecile’s grandfather and politely took leave of his host and hostess. When he was gone, Cecile appeared, a living commentary upon her Werther’s leave-taking; she was ghastly pale. She had hidden in her mother’s wardrobe and overheard the whole conversation.

“Refused!...” she said in a low voice for her mother’s ear.

“And why?” asked the Presidente, fixing her eyes upon her embarrassed father-in-law.

“Upon the fine pretext that an only daughter is a spoilt child,” replied that gentleman. “And he is not altogether wrong there,” he added, seizing an opportunity of putting the blame on the daughter-in-law, who had worried him not a little for twenty years.

“It will kill my child!” cried the Presidente, “and it is your doing!” she exclaimed, addressing Pons, as she supported her fainting daughter, for Cecile thought well to make good her mother’s words by sinking into her arms. The President and his wife carried Cecile to an easy-chair, where she swooned outright. The grandfather rang for the servants.

“It is a plot of his weaving; I see it all now,” said the infuriated mother.

Pons sprang up as if the trump of doom were sounding in his ears.

“Yes!” said the lady, her eyes like two springs of green bile, “this gentleman wished to repay a harmless joke by an insult. Who will believe that that German was right in his mind? He is either an accomplice in a wicked scheme of revenge, or he is crazy. I hope, M. Pons, that in future you will spare us the annoyance of seeing you in the house where you have tried to bring shame and dishonor.”

Pons stood like a statue, with his eyes fixed on the pattern of the carpet.

“Well! Are you still here, monster of ingratitude?” cried she, turning round on Pons, who was twirling his thumbs.--“Your master and I are never at home, remember, if this gentleman calls,” she continued, turning to the servants.--“Jean, go for the doctor; and bring hartshorn, Madeleine.”

In the Presidente’s eyes, the reason given by Brunner was simply an excuse, there was something else behind; but, at the same time, the fact that the marriage was broken off was only the more certain. A woman’s mind works swiftly in great crises, and Mme. de Marville had hit at once upon the one method of repairing the check. She chose to look upon it as a scheme of revenge. This notion of ascribing a fiendish scheme to Pons satisfied family honor. Faithful to her dislike of the cousin, she treated a feminine suspicion as a fact. Women, generally speaking, hold a creed peculiar to themselves, a code of their own; to them anything which serves their interests or their passions is true. The Presidente went a good deal further. In the course of the evening she talked the President into her belief, and next morning found the magistrate convinced of his cousin’s culpability.

Every one, no doubt, will condemn the lady’s horrible conduct; but what mother in Mme. Camusot’s position will not do the same? Put the choice between her own daughter and an alien, she will prefer to sacrifice the honor of the latter. There are many ways of doing this, but the end in view is the same.

The old musician fled down the staircase in haste; but he went slowly along the boulevards to his theatre, he turned in mechanically at the door, and mechanically he took his place and conducted the orchestra. In the interval he gave such random answers to Schmucke’s questions, that his old friend dissembled his fear that Pons’ mind had given way. To so childlike a nature, the recent scene took the proportions of a catastrophe. He had meant to make every one happy, and he had aroused a terrible slumbering feeling of hate; everything had been turned topsy-turvy. He had at last seen mortal hate in the Presidente’s eyes, tones, and gesture.

On the morrow, Mme. Camusot de Marville made a great resolution; the President likewise sanctioned the step now forced upon them by circumstances. It was determined that the estate of Marville should be settled upon Cecile at the time of her marriage, as well as the house in the Rue de Hanovre and a hundred thousand francs. In the course of the morning, the Presidente went to call upon the Comtesse Popinot; for she saw plainly that nothing but a settled marriage could enable them to recover after such a check. To the Comtesse Popinot she told the shocking story of Pons’ revenge, Pons’ hideous hoax. It all seemed probable enough when it came out that the marriage had been broken off simply on the pretext that Cecile was an only daughter. The Presidente next dwelt artfully upon the advantage of adding “de Marville” to the name of Popinot; and the immense dowry. At the present price fetched by land in Normandy, at two per cent, the property represented nine hundred thousand francs, and the house in the Rue de Hanovre about two hundred and fifty thousand. No reasonable family could refuse such an alliance. The Comte and Comtesse Popinot accepted; and as they were now touched by the honor of the family which they were about to enter, they promised to help explain away yesterday evening’s mishap.

And now in the house of the elder Camusot, before the very persons who had heard Mme. de Marville singing Frederic Brunner’s praises but a few days ago, that lady, to whom nobody ventured to speak on the topic, plunged courageously into explanations.

“Really, nowadays” (she said), “one could not be too careful if a marriage was in question, especially if one had to do with foreigners.”

“And why, madame?”

“What has happened to you?” asked Mme. Chiffreville.

“Do you not know about our adventure with that Brunner, who had the audacity to aspire to marry Cecile? His father was a German that kept a wine-shop, and his uncle is a dealer in rabbit-skins!”

“Is it possible? So clear-sighted as you are!...” murmured a lady.

“These adventurers are so cunning. But we found out everything through Berthier. His friend is a beggar that plays the flute. He is friendly with a person who lets furnished lodgings in the Rue du Mail and some tailor or other.... We found out that he had led a most disreputable life, and no amount of fortune would be enough for a scamp that has run through his mother’s property.”

“Why, Mlle. de Marville would have been wretched!” said Mme. Berthier.

“How did he come to your house?” asked old Mme. Lebas.

“It was M. Pons. Out of revenge, he introduced this fine gentleman to us, to make us ridiculous.... This Brunner (it is the same name as Fontaine in French)--this Brunner, that was made out to be such a grandee, has poor enough health, he is bald, and his teeth are bad. The first sight of him was enough for me; I distrusted him from the first.”

“But how about the great fortune that you spoke of?” a young married woman asked shyly.

“The fortune was not nearly so large as they said. These tailors and the landlord and he all scraped the money together among them, and put all their savings into this bank that they are starting. What is a bank for those that begin in these days? Simply a license to ruin themselves. A banker’s wife may lie down at night a millionaire and wake up in the morning with nothing but her settlement. At first word, at the very first sight of him, we made up our minds about this gentleman--he is not one of us. You can tell by his gloves, by his waistcoat, that he is a working man, the son of a man that kept a pot-house somewhere in Germany; he has not the instincts of a gentleman; he drinks beer, and he smokes--smokes? ah! madame, twenty-five pipes a day!... What would have become of poor Lili? ... It makes me shudder even now to think of it. God has indeed preserved us! And besides, Cecile never liked him.... Who would have expected such a trick from a relative, an old friend of the house that had dined with us twice a week for twenty years? We have loaded him with benefits, and he played his game so well, that he said Cecile was his heir before the Keeper of the Seals and the Attorney General and the Home Secretary!... That Brunner and M. Pons had their story ready, and each of them said that the other was worth millions!... No, I do assure you, all of you would have been taken in by an artist’s hoax like that.”

In a few weeks’ time, the united forces of the Camusot and Popinot families gained an easy victory in the world, for nobody undertook to defend the unfortunate Pons, that parasite, that curmudgeon, that skinflint, that smooth-faced humbug, on whom everybody heaped scorn; he was a viper cherished in the bosom of the family, he had not his match for spite, he was a dangerous mountebank whom nobody ought to mention.