"That would be better," returned the duke, "I dare say the d.u.c.h.esse de Maufrigneuse would help you to persuade her from Rosny. If she goes the king will not be displeased at the use of his hunting equipage. Don't go to Havre, my dear," added the duke, paternally, "that would be giving yourself away. Come, here's a better plan, I think. Gaspard's chateau of Rosembray is on the other side of the forest of Brotonne; why not give him a hint to invite the whole party?"

"He invite them?" said Eleonore.

"I mean, of course, the d.u.c.h.ess; she is always engaged in pious works with Mademoiselle d'Herouville; give that old maid a hint, and get her to speak to Gaspard."

"You are a love of a man," cried Eleonore; "I'll write to the old maid and to Diane at once, for we must get hunting things made,--a riding hat is so becoming. Did you win last night at the English emba.s.sy?"

"Yes," said the duke; "I cleared myself."

"Henri, above all things, stop proceedings about Melchior's two appointments."

After writing half a dozen lines to the beautiful Diane de Maufrigneuse, and a short hint to Mademoiselle d'Herouville, Eleonore sent the following answer like the lash of a whip through the poet's lies.

To Monsieur le Baron de Ca.n.a.lis:--

My dear poet,--Mademoiselle de La Bastie is very beautiful; Mongenod has proved to me that her father has millions. I did think of marrying you to her; I am therefore much displeased at your want of confidence. If you had any intention of marrying La Briere when you went to Havre it is surprising that you said nothing to me about it before you started. And why have you omitted writing to a friend who is so easily made anxious as I?

Your letter arrived a trifle late; I had already seen the banker.

You are a child, Melchior, and you are playing tricks with us. It is not right. The duke himself is quite indignant at your proceedings; he thinks you less than a gentleman, which casts some reflections on your mother's honor.

Now, I intend to see things for myself. I shall, I believe, have the honor of accompanying _Madame_ to the hunt which the Duc d'Herouville proposes to give for Mademoiselle de La Bastie. I will manage to have you invited to Rosembray, for the meet will probably take place in Duc de Verneuil's park.

Pray believe, my dear poet, that I am none the less, for life,

Your friend, Eleonore de M.

"There, Ernest, just look at that!" cried Ca.n.a.lis, tossing the letter at Ernest's nose across the breakfast-table; "that's the two thousandth love-letter I have had from that woman, and there isn't even a 'thou' in it. The ill.u.s.trious Eleonore has never compromised herself more than she does there. Marry, and try your luck! The worst marriage in the world is better than this sort of halter. Ah, I am the greatest Nicodemus that ever tumbled out of the moon! Modeste has millions, and I've lost her; for we can't get back from the poles, where we are to-day, to the tropics, where we were three days ago! Well, I am all the more anxious for your triumph over the grand equerry, because I told the d.u.c.h.ess I came here only for your sake; and so I shall do my best for you."

"Alas, Melchior, Modeste must needs have so n.o.ble, so grand, so well-balanced a nature to resist the glories of the Court, and all these splendors cleverly displayed for her honor and glory by the duke, that I cannot believe in the existence of such perfection,--and yet, if she is still the Modeste of her letters, there might be hope!"

"Well, well, you are a happy fellow, you young Boniface, to see the world and your mistress through green spectacles!" cried Ca.n.a.lis, marching off to pace up and down the garden.

Caught between two lies, the poet was at a loss what to do.

"Play by rule, and you lose!" he cried presently, sitting down in the kiosk. "Every man of sense would have acted as I did four days ago, and got himself out of the net in which I saw myself. At such times people don't disentangle nets, they break through them! Come, let us be calm, cold, dignified, affronted. Honor requires it; English stiffness is the only way to win her back. After all, if I have to retire finally, I can always fall back on my old happiness; a fidelity of ten years can't go unrewarded. Eleonore will arrange me some good marriage."

CHAPTER XXVI. TRUE LOVE

The hunt was destined to be not only a meet of the hounds, but a meeting of all the pa.s.sions excited by the colonel's millions and Modeste's beauty; and while it was in prospect there was truce between the adversaries. During the days required for the arrangement of this forestrial solemnity, the salon of the villa Mignon presented the tranquil picture of a united family. Ca.n.a.lis, cut short in his role of injured love by Modeste's quick perceptions, wished to appear courteous; he laid aside his pretensions, gave no further specimens of his oratory, and became, what all men of intellect can be when they renounce affectation, perfectly charming. He talked finances with Gobenheim, and war with the colonel, Germany with Madame Mignon, and housekeeping with Madame Latournelle,--endeavoring to bias them all in favor of La Briere.

The Duc d'Herouville left the field to his rivals, for he was obliged to go to Rosembray to consult with the Duc de Verneuil, and see that the orders of the Royal Huntsman, the Prince de Cadignan, were carried out.

And yet the comic element was not altogether wanting. Modeste found herself between the depreciatory hints of Ca.n.a.lis as to the gallantry of the grand equerry, and the exaggerations of the two Mesdemoiselles d'Herouville, who pa.s.sed every evening at the villa. Ca.n.a.lis made Modeste take notice that, instead of being the heroine of the hunt, she would be scarcely noticed. _Madame_ would be attended by the d.u.c.h.esse de Maufrigneuse, daughter-in-law of the Prince de Cadignan, by the d.u.c.h.esse de Chaulieu, and other great ladies of the Court, among whom she could produce no sensation; no doubt the officers in garrison at Rouen would be invited, etc. Helene, on the other hand, was incessantly telling her new friend, whom she already looked upon as a sister-in-law, that she was to be presented to _Madame_; undoubtedly the Duc de Verneuil would invite her father and herself to stay at Rosembray; if the colonel wished to obtain a favor of the king,--a peerage, for instance,--the opportunity was unique, for there was hope of the king himself being present on the third day; she would be delighted with the charming welcome with which the beauties of the Court, the d.u.c.h.esses de Chaulieu, de Maufrigneuse, de Lenoncourt-Chaulieu, and other ladies, were prepared to meet her. It was in fact an excessively amusing little warfare, with its marches and countermarches and stratagems,--all of which were keenly enjoyed by the Dumays, the Latournelles, Gobenheim, and Butscha, who, in conclave a.s.sembled, said horrible things of these n.o.ble personages, cruelly noting and intelligently studying all their little meannesses.

The promises on the d'Herouville side were, however, confirmed by the arrival of an invitation, couched in flattering terms, from the Duc de Verneuil and the Master of the Hunt to Monsieur le Comte de La Bastie and his daughter, to stay at Rosembray and be present at a grand hunt on the seventh, eighth, ninth, and tenth, of November following.

La Briere, full of dark presentiments, craved the presence of Modeste with an eagerness whose bitter joys are known only to lovers who feel that they are parted, and parted fatally from those they love. Flashes of joy came to him intermingled with melancholy meditations on the one theme, "I have lost her," and made him all the more interesting to those who watched him, because his face and his whole person were in keeping with his profound feeling. There is nothing more poetic than a living elegy, animated by a pair of eyes, walking about, and sighing without rhymes.

The Duc d'Herouville arrived at last to arrange for Modeste's departure; after crossing the Seine she was to be conveyed in the duke's caleche, accompanied by the Demoiselles d'Herouville. The duke was charmingly courteous, he begged Ca.n.a.lis and La Briere to be of the party, a.s.suring them, as he did the colonel, that he had taken particular care that hunters should be provided for them. The colonel invited the three lovers to breakfast on the morning of the start. Ca.n.a.lis then began to put into execution a plan that he had been maturing in his own mind for the last few days; namely, to quietly reconquer Modeste, and throw over the d.u.c.h.ess, La Briere, and the duke. A graduate of diplomacy could hardly remain stuck in the position in which he found himself. On the other hand La Briere had come to the resolution of bidding Modeste an eternal farewell. Each suitor was therefore on the watch to slip in a last word, like the defendant's counsel to the court before judgment is p.r.o.nounced; for all felt that the three weeks' struggle was approaching its conclusion. After dinner on the evening before the start was to be made, the colonel had taken his daughter by the arm and made her feel the necessity of deciding.

"Our position with the d'Herouville family will be quite intolerable at Rosembray," he said to her. "Do you mean to be a d.u.c.h.ess?"

"No, father," she answered.

"Then do you love Ca.n.a.lis?"

"No, papa, a thousand times no!" she exclaimed with the impatience of a child.

The colonel looked at her with a sort of joy.

"Ah, I have not influenced you," cried the true father, "and I will now confess that I chose my son-in-law in Paris when, having made him believe that I had but little fortune, he grasped my hand and told me I took a weight from his mind--"

"Who is it you mean?" asked Modeste, coloring.

"_The man of fixed principles and sound moralities_," said her father, slyly, repeating the words which had dissolved poor Modeste's dream on the day after his return.

"I was not even thinking of him, papa. Please leave me at liberty to refuse the duke myself; I understand him, and I know how to soothe him."

"Then your choice is not made?"

"Not yet; there is another syllable or two in the charade of my destiny still to be guessed; but after I have had a glimpse of court life at Rosembray I will tell you my secret."

"Ah! Monsieur de La Briere," cried the colonel, as the young man approached them along the garden path in which they were walking, "I hope you are going to this hunt?"

"No, colonel," answered Ernest. "I have come to take leave of you and of mademoiselle; I return to Paris--"

"You have no curiosity," said Modeste, interrupting, and looking at him.

"A wish--that I cannot expect--would suffice to keep me," he replied.

"If that is all, you must stay to please me; I wish it," said the colonel, going forward to meet Ca.n.a.lis, and leaving his daughter and La Briere together for a moment.

"Mademoiselle," said the young man, raising his eyes to hers with the boldness of a man without hope, "I have an entreaty to make to you."

"To me?"

"Let me carry away with me your forgiveness. My life can never be happy; it must be full of remorse for having lost my happiness--no doubt by my own fault; but, at least,--"

"Before we part forever," said Modeste, interrupting a la Ca.n.a.lis, and speaking in a voice of some emotion, "I wish to ask you one thing; and though you once disguised yourself, I think you cannot be so base as to deceive me now."

The taunt made him turn pale, and he cried out, "Oh, you are pitiless!"

"Will you be frank?"

"You have the right to ask me that degrading question," he said, in a voice weakened by the violent palpitation of his heart.

"Well, then, did you read my letters to Monsieur de Ca.n.a.lis?"