"Because the time has come sooner than I expected for me to prove the truth of that offer to you. There is something which I must say to you which no one but a friend ought to do. May I?"

But before she could frame the little "Yes!" which already trembled on her lips, her father's voice and de Marmont's rang out from the further end of the room itself.

The folding doors had been thrown open: M. le Comte and his son-in-law elect were on the point of entering and had paused for a moment just under the lintel. De Marmont was talking in a loud voice and apparently in response to something which M. le Comte had just told him.

"Ah!" he said, "Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse will be leaving Brestalou? I am sorry to hear that. Why should she go so soon?"

"An affair of business, my dear de Marmont," replied the Comte. "I will tell you about it at an early opportunity."

After which there was a hubbub of talk in the corridors outside, the sound of greetings, the pleasing confusion of questions and answers which marks the simultaneous arrival of several guests.

Crystal rose and turned to Bobby with a smile.

"You will have to tell me some other time," she said lightly. "Don't forget!"

The psychological moment had gone by and Clyffurde cursed himself for having fought too long against the promptings of his heart and lost the precious moments which might have changed the whole of Crystal's future. He cursed himself for not having spoken sooner, now that he saw de Marmont with glowing eyes and ill-concealed triumph approach his beautiful fiancee and with the air of a conqueror raise her hand to his lips.

She looked very pale, and to the man who loved her so ardently and so hopelessly it seemed as if she gave a curious little shiver and that for one brief second her blue eyes flashed a pathetic look of appeal up to his.

VI

M. le Comte's guests followed closely on the triumphant bridegroom's heels: M. le prefet, fussy and nervous, secretly delighted at the idea of affixing his official signature to such an aristocratic _contrat de mariage_ as was this between Mlle. de Cambray de Brestalou and M. Victor de Marmont, own nephew to Marshal the duc de Raguse; Madame la prefete, resplendent in the latest fashion from Paris, the Duc and d.u.c.h.esse d'Embrun, cousins of the bride, the Vicomte de Genevois and his mother, who was Abbess of Pont Haut and G.o.dmother by proxy to Crystal de Cambray; whilst General Marchand, in command of the troops of the district, fresh from the Council of War which he had hastily convened, was trying to hide behind a _debonnaire_ manner all the anxiety which "the brigand's" march on Gren.o.ble was causing him.

The chief notabilities of the province had a.s.sembled to do honour to the occasion, later on others would come, lesser lights by birth and position than this select crowd who would partake of the _souper des fiancailles_ before the _contrat_ was signed in their presence as witnesses to the transaction.

Everyone was talking volubly: the ogre's progress through France--no longer to be denied--was the chief subject of conversation. Some spoke of it with contempt, others with terror. The ex-Bonapartists Fourier and Marchand were loudest in their curses against "the usurper."

Clyffurde, silent and keeping somewhat aloof from the brilliant throng, saw that de Marmont did not enter into any of these conversations. He kept resolutely close to Crystal, and spoke to her from time to time in a whisper, and always with that a.s.sured air of the conqueror, which grated so unpleasantly on Clyffurde's irritable nerves.

The Comte, affable and gracious, spoke a few words to each of his guests in turn, whilst Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse douairiere d'Agen was talking openly of her forthcoming return journey to the North.

"I came in great haste," she said loudly to the circle of ladies gathered around her, "for my little Crystal's wedding. But I was in the middle of a Lenten retreat at the Sacred Heart, and I only received permission from my confessor to spend three days in all this gaiety."

"When do you leave us again, Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse?" queried Mlle. Marchand, the General's daughter, in a honeyed voice.

"On Tuesday, directly after the religious ceremony, Mademoiselle,"

replied Madame, whilst M. le prefet tried to look unconcerned. He had brought the money over as Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse had directed. Twenty-five millions of francs in notes and drafts had been transferred from the cellar of the Hotel de Ville to his own pockets first and then into the keeping of Madame. He had driven over from the Hotel de Ville in his private coach, he himself in an agony of fear every time the road looked lonely, or he heard the sound of horse's hoofs upon the road behind him--for there might be mounted highwaymen about. Now he felt infinitely relieved; he had shifted all responsibility of that vast sum of money on to more exalted shoulders than his own, and inwardly he was marvelling how coolly Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse seemed to be taking such an awful responsibility.

Now Hector threw open the great doors and announced that M. le Comte was served. Through the vast corridor beyond appeared a vista of liveried servants in purple and canary, wearing powdered perruque, silk stockings and buckled shoes.

There was a general hubbub in the room, the men moved towards the ladies who had been a.s.signed to them for partners. M. le Comte in his grandest manner approached Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse d'Embrun in order to conduct her down to supper. An air of majestic grandeur, of solemnity and splendid decorum pervaded the fine apartment; it sought out every corner of the vast reception room, flickered round every wax candle; it spread itself over the monumental hearth, the stiff brocade-covered chairs, the gilt consoles and tall mirrors. It emanated alike from the graciousness of M.

le Comte de Cambray and the pompousness of his majordomo. Hector in fact appeared at this moment as the high priest in a temple of good manners and bon ton: the muscles of his face were rigid, his mouth was set as if ready to p.r.o.nounce sacrificial words; in his right hand he carried a gold-headed wand, emblem of his high office.

But suddenly there was a disturbance--an unseemly noise came from the further end of the corridor, where rose the magnificent staircase.

Hector's face became a study in rapidly changing expressions: from pompousness, to astonishment, then horror, and finally wrath when he realised that an intruder in stained cloth clothes and booted and spurred was actually making his way through the ranks of liveried and gaping servants and loudly demanding to speak with M. le Comte.

Such an unseemly disturbance had not occurred at the Chateau de Brestalou since Hector had been installed there as majordomo nearly twelve months ago, and he was on the point of literally throwing himself upon the impious malapert who thus dared to thrust his ill-clad person upon the brilliant company, when he paused--more aghast than before. In this same impious malapert he had recognised M. le Marquis de St. Genis!

The young man looked to be labouring under terrible excitement: his face was flushed and he was panting as if he had been running hard:

"M. le Comte!" he cried breathlessly as soon as he caught sight of Hector, "tell M. le Comte that I must speak with him at once."

"But M. le Marquis . . . M. le Marquis . . ."

This was all that poor, bewildered Hector could stammer: his slowly-moving brain was torn between the duties of his position and his respect for M. le Marquis, and in the struggle the worthy man was enduring throes of anxiety.

Fortunately M. le Comte himself put an end to Hector's dilemma. He had recognised St. Genis' voice. Unlike his majordomo, he knew at once that something terribly grave must have happened, else the young man would never have committed such a serious breach of good manners. And M. le Comte himself was never at a loss how to turn any situation to a dignified and proper issue: he murmured a quick and courteous apology to Mme. la d.u.c.h.esse d'Embrun and a comprehensive one to all his guests, then he hastened to meet St. Genis at the door.

Already St. Genis had entered. His rough clothes and muddy boots looked strangely in contrast to the immaculate get-up of the Comte's guests, but of this he hardly seemed to be aware. His face was flushed; with his right hand he clutched a small riding cane, and his glowering dark eyes swept a rapid glance over every one in the room.

And to the Comte he said hoa.r.s.ely: "I must offer you my humblest apologies, my dear Comte, for obtruding my very untidy person upon you at this hour. I have walked all the way from Gren.o.ble, as I could not get a hackney-coach, else I had been here earlier and spared you this unpleasantness."

"You are always welcome in this house, my good Maurice," said the Comte in his loftiest manner, "and at any hour of the day."

And he added with a certain tone of dignified reproach: "I did ask you to be my guest to-night, if you remember."

"And I," said St. Genis, "was churlish enough to refuse. I would not have come now only that I felt I might be in time to avert the most awful catastrophe that has yet fallen upon your house."

Again his restless, dark eyes--sullen and wrathful and charged with a look of rage and of hate--wandered over the a.s.sembled company. The look frightened the ladies. They took to clinging to one another, standing in compact little groups together, like frightened birds, watchful and wide-eyed. They feared that the young man was mad. But the men exchanged significant glances and significant smiles. They merely thought that St.

Genis had been drinking, or that jealousy had half-turned his brain.

Only Clyffurde, who stood somewhat apart from the others, knew--by some unexplainable intuition--what it was that had brought Maurice de St.

Genis to this house in this excited state and at this hour. He felt excited too, and mightily thankful that the catastrophe would be brought about by others--not by himself.

But all his thoughts were for Crystal, and an instinctive desire to stand by her and to shield her if necessary from some unknown or unguessed evil, made him draw nearer to her. She stood on the fringe of the little crowd--as isolated as Bobby was himself.

De Marmont--whose face had become the colour of dead ashes--had left her side: one step at a time and very slowly he was getting nearer and nearer to St. Genis, as if the latter's wrath-filled eyes were drawing him against his will.

At the young man's ominous words, M. le Comte's sunken cheeks grew a shade more pale.

"What catastrophe, _mon Dieu!_" he exclaimed, "could fall on my house that would be worse than twenty years of exile?"

"An alliance with a traitor, M. le Comte," said St. Genis firmly.

A gasp went round the room, a sigh, a cry. The women looked in mute horror from one man to the other, the men already had their right hand on their swords. But Clyffurde's eyes were fixed upon Crystal, who pale, silent, rigid as a marble statue, with lips parted and nostrils quivering, stood not five paces away from him, her dilated eyes wandering ceaselessly from the face of St. Genis to that of de Marmont and thence to that of her father. But beyond that look of tense excitement she revealed nothing of what she thought and felt.

Already de Marmont--his hand upon his sword--had advanced menacingly towards St. Genis.

"M. le Marquis," he said between set teeth, "you will, by G.o.d! eat those words, or----"

"Eat my words, man?" retorted St. Genis with a harsh laugh. "By Heaven!

have I not come here on purpose to throw my words into your lying face?"

There was a brief but violent skirmish, for de Marmont had made a movement as if he meant to spring at his rival's throat, and General Marchand and the Vicomte de Genevois, who happened to be near, had much ado to seize and hold him: even so they could not stop the hoa.r.s.e cries which he uttered:

"Liar! Liar! Liar! Let me go! Let me get to him! I must kill him! I must kill him!"

The Comte interposed his dignified person between the two men.