this is carrying his contempt too far, and I am going to forbid----"

Thelenie had not had time to finish her sentence, when Paul Duronceray entered the salon, attended by Edmond and Freluchon.

No longer in the guise of the hunter who shuns the world, no longer with an untrimmed beard and with his head covered by an otter cap the vizor of which concealed his eyes, did the owner of the Tower present himself; he appeared before the notables of Ch.e.l.les in the costume of a man of the world, which he wore with as much ease as distinction of manner.

Paul walked straight to Thelenie; his glance was terrifying to behold, and despite her usual audacity, despite all her efforts to overcome her terror, Thelenie shuddered, trembled and lowered her eyes before him.

"You propose to forbid my entering this house, madame," exclaimed Paul in a powerful voice; "I can well believe it; you divine, doubtless, that I know your crimes, and you are afraid that I might reveal them to your numerous acquaintances."

"My crimes, monsieur! You dare----"

"To accuse you of an infamous plot! It was not enough to have tried by calumny to ruin two honorable women, one of whom, Madame Dalmont, does me the honor to accept my hand; while the other, Mademoiselle Agathe, daughter of Comte Adhemar de Hautmont--for I am very glad to inform you that that young lady is the daughter of a man for whose death you are responsible. Yes, Mademoiselle Agathe de Hautmont is to marry Monsieur Edmond Didier, who stands beside me;--it was not enough, I say, to have uttered calumny against those ladies, which always finds echoes among fools and evil-minded persons----"

At this point all of Madame Droguet's social circle made wry faces.

"No," continued Paul, "this woman, impelled by the most criminal pa.s.sions, determined to contrive the death by drowning in the Marne of those two persons, whom she detests because they possess virtues which she never understood."

A low murmur bore witness to the impression produced by these words.

Thelenie summoned all her energy and cried:

"You lie, monsieur; your accusations are false."

"Very well, madame; deny this letter, sent by you to those ladies. It is in your handwriting; there are several of us here who are perfectly familiar with it. In this letter you announce that Monsieur Edmond is to fight at eight o'clock--on an island above the mill; which was equivalent to telling them to go to that place. And in fact, immediately on receipt of your letter, they started and hurried to the bank of the Marne, where a miserable villain, in your pay, was waiting for them with a boat. They entered the boat unsuspectingly; and when they were near the obstructions in the river, the pretended boatman threw his oars overboard, jumped after them and swam ash.o.r.e, abandoning to almost certain death the two victims you had sent him!"

"Monsieur!"

"You did that--see, here is the gold found on your accomplice, your brother, who played the role here of a German baron, and who met death on the river bank, thanks to my good dog who was determined that the robber, the a.s.sa.s.sin, should not escape him again. He put us upon the track of the persons whom you meant to destroy, and whom we saved! Ah!

that is what must distress you above all else--that your scheme did not succeed, despite the gold lavished on your brother--See, here it is, madame--the gold of which you make such a diabolical use!"

And Paul threw at Thelenie's feet the roll of a thousand francs which he had found upon Croque.

The accusation he had made and the tone of conviction in which he spoke made a profound impression upon all the people a.s.sembled there. They looked at one another in terror, they turned their eyes away from that woman to whom they had burned incense two days before. Thelenie observed the effect produced by Duronceray's speech; she reflected that, her accomplice being dead, she could safely deny everything, and, collecting all her resources, she exclaimed:

"I have long known, monsieur, that I was the object of your hatred; to-day you prove that I was right. You turn against me a service that I tried to render, and you invent a series of crimes, of plots, which are utterly ridiculous.--Yes, I did write that letter--why should I deny it, when it proves simply that I wished to prevent a duel which might have deplorable results? I had been told, I had heard--some persons about me say on the night of the fete, after that quarrel--which I deeply regretted--those persons a.s.sured me that a meeting had been arranged to take place on the island I described. I believed it, and I conveyed that information to those ladies. As for your fable of the boatman who jumped into the water purposely, and who proves to be my brother--oh! that is too much! I never read anything more improbable in a novel! I never had a brother."

"But you had a son, madame!" said a voice at the door of the salon, where Beauregard suddenly appeared, leading little Emile by the hand and followed by Jacqueline, his nurse.

Thelenie was terror-stricken by that apparition; all her audacity deserted her. She fell back in her chair, while Beauregard, motioning to the peasant woman to go before him, pointed to the mistress of the house, saying:

"Look, my good woman; you will find the Baronne de Mortagne not at Dieppe, but here!"

"Eh! bless my soul, yes! that's her for sure; that's madame; I know her all right! she ain't changed; she's still got those big eyes of hers!"

At these words of Jacqueline directed at Thelenie, everybody looked at that mother who had abandoned her child, and whose story Chamoureau had told them two days before.

Overwhelmed, crushed by these successive revelations, which made her known at last for what she was, she could find no word to say; she hid her face in her hands.

"You see, my good woman," Beauregard continued, "that I was quite right to prevent your going to Dieppe; for she hoped to s.h.i.+p you off with the child to some distant country from which you would never have returned.

Oh! madame had laid her plan shrewdly; your presence here embarra.s.sed her! But unluckily for her, her brother--for it was her brother again whom she employed to get rid of you--her brother was very fond of drinking and he was rather loquacious in his cups; so that it was not hard for me to learn from him all that it was important for me to know."

"For all that," said the peasant, "madame is little Emile's mother; there's your mamma, my boy!"

"Her!" cried the child, gazing at Thelenie in dismay. "I don't want her for my mother; she'd beat me!"

"Still, I suppose madame will take back her son."

"No, she will not take him back," said Beauregard, "for, as you see, she never had the sentiments of a mother. But I will keep him, as I have the right to do, for I am his father!"

"His father!" was heard on all sides.

"What's that! his father?" cried Chamoureau. "I say! what does all this mean? my wife has children, monsieur is their father, and----"

"Shut up, Chamoureau!" said Freluchon. "Don't you see that all this doesn't concern you? I advise you to pretend to be dead!"

"Now," continued Beauregard, "I have nothing more to say to madame, whom I have been asking for a long time what she had done with this child.--Come, nurse, I will settle your account.--Monsieur Duronceray, chance brings me into your presence to-day. I no longer deserve to take your hand, I know, since I betrayed long ago the friends.h.i.+p that united us. But perhaps you will forgive me to-day, when you reflect that at all events I served to enlighten you concerning madame's sentiments."

As he concluded, Beauregard bowed low to Paul, who coldly returned his bow, but was obliged to hold Ami, who growled savagely and seemed determined to attack that gentleman.

Beauregard departed, with his son and Jacqueline. Paul then said to the people of Ch.e.l.les who were present:

"I think that no one now among you ladies and gentlemen retains any doubt concerning the honor of Madame Dalmont and Mademoiselle Agathe de Hautmont?"

"No one! no one!" they hastened to reply on all sides.

"As for myself," said Doctor Antoine, going up to Paul, "I may say that I never doubted it, and that I have always defended those ladies when anyone presumed to speak ill of them."

"Very good, doctor; give me your hand then, and come to see us at the Tower; I trust that your welcome will make you forget your first visit."

The doctor shook the hand that Paul offered him, and the three friends took their leave.

Ere long, the rest of the company followed their example, and Chamoureau was left alone with his wife, to whom he proposed to address a severe lecture. But before he had determined what to say, Thelenie abruptly left the room.

"Ah! she suspects that I have some unpleasant things to say to her,"

said Chamoureau to himself; "she fled from my wrath; I will say it all to her at dinner."

But Chamoureau dined alone; his wife did not come down; and in the evening, when he tried to find her, he learned that she had sent her trunks to the railway station, and had left the house long before.

Thereupon he wondered whether he should go after her; but upon mature reflection, he concluded that he would do better to wait until it should please her to return to him.

A month after these occurrences, a double marriage united Paul Duronceray to Honorine, and Edmond Didier to Agathe, to whom her aged uncle bequeathed his whole fortune.

Freluchon, witnessing the happiness of his friends, declares that he shall end by following their example, but he is in no hurry. Pere Ledrux is still employed as gardener by the two new households, although he still carries on a somewhat dangerous traffic, by slandering their hens; but they forgive him in consideration of his tutu--turlututu.

Chamoureau, having abandoned the name of Belleville, continued to expect his wife, who did not return to him.

After six months he learned that she had been killed at London, riding in a steeple chase. Thereupon he put on mourning and went to see Freluchon, to whom he imparted the news, with tears in his eyes.

"What! you idiot! you weep for that woman!" said Freluchon.