Part 44

Petit-Claud had sold his professional connection, and was only waiting for M. Milaud’s promotion to take the public prosecutor’s place, which had been promised to him by the Comtesse du Châtelet. The public prosecutor’s second deputy was appointed first deputy to the Court of Limoges, the Keeper of the Seals sent a man of his own to Angoulême, and the post of first deputy was kept vacant for a couple of months. The interval was Petit-Claud’s honeymoon.

While Boniface Cointet was in Paris, David made a first experimental batch of unsized paper far superior to that in common use for newspapers. He followed it up with a second batch of magnificent vellum paper for fine printing, and this the Cointets used for a new edition of their diocesan prayer-book. The material had been privately prepared by David himself; he would have no helpers but Kolb and Marion.

When Boniface came back the whole affair wore a different aspect; he looked at the samples, and was fairly satisfied.

“My good friend,” he said, “the whole trade of Angoulême is in crown paper. We must make the best possible crown paper at half the present price; that is the first and foremost question for us.”

Then David tried to size the pulp for the desired paper, and the result was a harsh surface with grains of size distributed all over it. On the day when the experiment was concluded and David held the sheets in his hand, he went away to find a spot where he could be alone and swallow his bitter disappointment. But Boniface Cointet went in search of him and comforted him. Boniface was delightfully amiable.

“Do not lose heart,” he said; “go on! I am a good fellow, I understand you; I will stand by you to the end.”

“Really,” David said to his wife at dinner, “we are with good people; I should not have expected that the tall Cointet would be so generous.” And he repeated his conversation with his wily partner.

Three months were spent in experiments. David slept at the mill; he noted the effects of various preparations upon the pulp. At one time he attributed his non-success to an admixture of rag-pulp with his own ingredients, and made a batch entirely composed of the new material; at another, he endeavored to size pulp made exclusively from rags; persevering in his experiments under the eyes of the tall Cointet, whom he had ceased to mistrust, until he had tried every possible combination of pulp and size. David lived in the paper-mill for the first six months of 1823--if it can be called living, to leave food untasted, and go in neglect of person and dress. He wrestled so desperately with the difficulties, that anybody but the Cointets would have seen the sublimity of the struggle, for the brave fellow was not thinking of his own interests. The moment had come when he cared for nothing but the victory. With marvelous sagacity he watched the unaccountable freaks of the semi-artificial substances called into existence by man for ends of his own; substances in which nature had been tamed, as it were, and her tacit resistance overcome; and from these observations drew great conclusions; finding, as he did, that such creations can only be obtained by following the laws of the more remote affinities of things, of “a second nature,” as he called it, in substances.

Towards the end of August he succeeded to some extent in sizing the paper pulp in the vat; the result being a kind of paper identical with a make in use for printers’ proofs at the present day--a kind of paper that cannot be depended upon, for the sizing itself is not always certain. This was a great result, considering the condition of the paper trade in 1823, and David hoped to solve the final difficulties of the problem, but--it had cost ten thousand francs.

Singular rumors were current at this time in Angoulême and L’Houmeau. It was said that David Séchard was ruining the firm of Cointet Brothers. Experiments had eaten up twenty thousand francs; and the result, said gossip, was wretchedly bad paper. Other manufacturers took fright at this, hugged themselves on their old-fashioned methods, and, being jealous of the Cointets, spread rumors of the approaching fall of that ambitious house. As for the tall Cointet, he set up the new machinery for making lengths of paper in a ribbon, and allowed people to believe that he was buying plant for David’s experiments. Then the cunning Cointet used David’s formula for pulp, while urging his partner to give his whole attention to the sizing process; and thousands of reams of the new paper were despatched to Métivier in Paris.

When September arrived, the tall Cointet took David aside, and, learning that the latter meditated a crowning experiment, dissuaded him from further attempts.

“Go to Marsac, my dear David, see your wife, and take a rest after your labors; we don’t want to ruin ourselves,” said Cointet in the friendliest way. “This great triumph of yours, after all, is only a starting-point. We shall wait now for awhile before trying any new experiments. To be fair! see what has come of them. We are not merely paper-makers, we are printers besides and bankers, and people say that you are ruining us.”

David Séchard’s gesture of protest on behalf of his good faith was sublime in its simplicity.

“Not that fifty thousand francs thrown into the Charente would ruin us,” said Cointet, in reply to mute protest, “but we do not wish to be obliged to pay cash for everything in consequence of slanders that shake our credit; that would bring us to a standstill. We have reached the term fixed by our agreement, and we are bound on either side to think over our position.”

“He is right,” thought David. He had forgotten the routine work of the business, thoroughly absorbed as he had been in experiments on a large scale.

David went to Marsac. For the past six months he had gone over on Saturday evening, returning again to L’Houmeau on Tuesday morning. Eve, after much counsel from her father-in-law, had bought a house called the Verberie, with three acres of land and a croft planted with vines, which lay like a wedge in the old man’s vineyard. Here, with her mother and Marion, she lived a very frugal life, for five thousand francs of the purchase money still remained unpaid. It was a charming little domain, the prettiest bit of property in Marsac. The house, with a garden before it and a yard at the back, was built of white tufa ornamented with carvings, cut without great expense in that easily wrought stone, and roofed with slate. The pretty furniture from the house in Angoulême looked prettier still at Marsac, for there was not the slightest attempt at comfort or luxury in the country in those days. A row of orange-trees, pomegranates, and rare plants stood before the house on the side of the garden, set there by the last owner, an old general who died under M. Marron’s hands.

David was enjoying his holiday sitting under an orange-tree with his wife, and father, and little Lucien, when the bailiff from Mansle appeared. Cointet Brothers gave their partner formal notice to appoint an arbitrator to settle disputes, in accordance with a clause in the agreement. The Cointets demanded that the six thousand francs should be refunded, and the patent surrendered in consideration of the enormous outlay made to no purpose.

“People say that you are ruining them,” said old Séchard. “Well, well, of all that you have done, that is the one thing that I am glad to know.”

At nine o’clock the next morning Eve and David stood in Petit-Claud’s waiting-room. The little lawyer was the guardian of the widow and orphan by virtue of his office, and it seemed to them that they could take no other advice. Petit-Claud was delighted to see his clients, and insisted that M. and Mme. Séchard should do him the pleasure of breakfasting with him.

“Do the Cointets want six thousand francs of you?” he asked, smiling. “How much is still owing of the purchase-money of the Verberie?”

“Five thousand francs, monsieur,” said Eve, “but I have two thousand----”

“Keep your money,” Petit-Claud broke in. “Let us see: five thousand--why, you want quite another ten thousand francs to settle yourselves comfortably down yonder. Very good, in two hours’ time the Cointets shall bring you fifteen thousand francs----”

Eve started with surprise.

“If you will renounce all claims to the profits under the deed of partnership, and come to an amicable settlement,” said Petit-Claud. “Does that suit you?”

“Will it really be lawfully ours?” asked Eve.

“Very much so,” said the lawyer, smiling. “The Cointets have worked you trouble enough; I should like to make an end of their pretensions. Listen to me; I am a magistrate now, and it is my duty to tell you the truth. Very good. The Cointets are playing you false at this moment, but you are in their hands. If you accept battle, you might possibly gain the lawsuit which they will bring. Do you wish to be where you are now after ten years of litigation? Experts’ fees and expenses of arbitration will be multiplied, the most contradictory opinions will be given, and you must take your chance. And,” he added, smiling again, “there is no attorney here that can defend you, so far as I see. My successor has not much ability. There, a bad compromise is better than a successful lawsuit.”

“Any arrangement that will give us a quiet life will do for me,” said David.

Petit-Claud called to his servant.