"And yet it was you yourself who declared that this publication would help my election; besides, I repeat, I have read pa.s.sages to all our friends, I have announced the matter in the munic.i.p.al council, and if the work were not to appear I should be dishonored; people would be sure to say the government had bought me up."

"You have only to say that you are the friend of Ph.e.l.lion, the incorruptible; that will clear you. You might even give Celeste to his b.o.o.by of a son; that alliance would certainly protect you from all suspicion."

"Theodose," said Thuillier, "there is something in your mind that you don't tell me. It is not natural that for a simple quarrel about a word you should wish to lose a friend like me."

"Well, yes, there is," replied la Peyrade, with the air of a man who makes up his mind to speak out. "I don't like ingrat.i.tude."

"Nor I either; I don't like it," said Thuillier, hotly; "and if you accuse me of so base an action, I summon you to explain yourself. We must get out of these hints and innuendoes. What do you complain of?

What have you against a man whom only a few days ago you called your friend?"

"Nothing and everything," replied la Peyrade. "You and your sister are much too clever to break openly with a man who, at the risk of his reputation, has put a million in your hands. But I am not so simple that I don't know how to detect changes. There are people about you who have set themselves, in an underhand way, to destroy me; and Brigitte has only one thought, and that is, how to find a decent way of not keeping her promises. Men like me don't wait till their claims are openly protested, and I certainly do not intend to impose myself on any family; still, I was far, I acknowledge, from expecting such treatment."

"Come, come," said Thuillier, kindly, seeing in the barrister's eye the glint of a tear of which he was completely the dupe, "I don't know what Brigitte may have been doing to you, but one thing is very certain: I have never ceased to be your most devoted friend."

"No," said la Peyrade, "since that mishap about the cross I am only good, as the saying is, to throw to the dogs. How could I have struggled against secret influences? Possibly it is that pamphlet, about which you have talked a great deal too much, that has hindered your appointment.

The ministers are so stupid! They would rather wait and have their hand forced by the fame of the publication than do the thing with a good grace as the reward of your services. But these are political mysteries which would never enter your sister's mind."

"The devil!" cried Thuillier. "I think I've got a pretty observing eye, and yet I can't see the slightest change in Brigitte toward you."

"Oh, yes!" said la Peyrade, "your eyesight is so good that you have never seen perpetually beside her that Madame de G.o.dollo, whom she now thinks she can't live without."

"Ha, ha!" said Thuillier, slyly, "so it is a little jealousy, is it, in our mind?"

"Jealousy!" retorted la Peyrade. "I don't know if that's the right word, but certainly your sister--whose mind is nothing above the ordinary, and to whom I am surprised that a man of your intellectual superiority allows a supremacy in your household which she uses and abuses--"

"How can I help it, my dear fellow," interrupted Thuillier, sucking in the compliment; "she is so absolutely devoted to me."

"I admit the weakness, but, I repeat, your sister doesn't fit into your groove. Well, I say that when a man of the value which you are good enough to recognize in me, does her the honor to consult her and devote himself to her as I have done, it can hardly be agreeable to him to find himself supplanted by a woman who comes from n.o.body knows where--and all because of a few trumpery chairs and tables she has helped her to buy!"

"With women, as you know very well," replied Thuillier, "household affairs have the first place."

"And Brigitte, who wants a finger in everything, also a.s.sumes to carry matters with a high hand in affairs of the heart. As you are so extraordinarily clear-sighted you ought to have seen that in Brigitte's mind nothing is less certain than my marriage with Mademoiselle Colleville; and yet my love has been solemnly authorized by you."

"Good gracious!" cried Thuillier, "I'd like to see any one attempt to meddle with my arrangements!"

"Well, without speaking of Brigitte, I can tell you of another person,"

said Theodose, "who is doing that very thing; and that person is Mademoiselle Celeste herself. In spite of their quarrels about religion, her mind is none the less full of that little Ph.e.l.lion."

"But why don't you tell Flavie to put a stop to it?"

"No one knows Flavie, my dear Thuillier, better than you. She is a woman rather than a mother. I have found it necessary to do a little bit of courting to her myself, and, you understand, while she is willing for this marriage she doesn't desire it very much."

"Well," said Thuillier, "I'll undertake to speak to Celeste myself. It shall never be said that a slip of a girl lays down the law to me."

"That's exactly what I don't want you to do," cried la Peyrade. "Don't meddle in all this. Outside of your relations to your sister you have an iron will, and I will never have it said that you exerted your authority to put Celeste in my arms; on the contrary, I desire that the child may have complete control over her own heart. The only thing I request is that she shall decide positively between Felix Ph.e.l.lion and myself; because I do not choose to remain any longer in this doubtful position.

It is true we agreed that the marriage should only take place after you became a deputy; but I feel now that it is impossible to allow the greatest event of my life to remain at the mercy of doubtful circ.u.mstances. And, besides, such an arrangement, though at first agreed upon, seems to me now to have a flavor of a bargain which is unbecoming to both of us. I think I had better make you a confidence, to which I am led by the unpleasant state of things now between us. Dutocq may have told you, before you left the apartment in the rue Saint-Dominique, that an heiress had been offered to me whose immediate fortune is larger than that which Mademoiselle Colleville will eventually inherit. I refused, because I have had the folly to let my heart be won, and because an alliance with a family as honorable as yours seemed to me more desirable; but, after all, it is as well to let Brigitte know that if Celeste refuses me, I am not absolutely turned out into the cold."

"I can easily believe that," said Thuillier; "but as for putting the whole decision into the hands of that little girl, especially if she has, as you tell me, a fancy for Felix--"

"I can't help it," said the barrister. "I must, at any price, get out of this position; it is no longer tenable. You talk about your pamphlet; I am not in a fit condition to finish it. You, who have been a man of gallantry, you must know the dominion that women, fatal creatures!

exercise over our whole being."

"Bah!" said Thuillier, conceitedly, "they cared for me, but I did not often care for them; I took them, and left them, you know."

"Yes, but I, with my Southern nature, love pa.s.sionately; and Celeste has other attractions besides fortune. Brought up in your household, under your own eye, you have made her adorable. Only, I must say, you have shown great weakness in letting that young fellow, who does not suit her in any respect, get such hold upon her fancy."

"You are quite right; but the thing began in a childish friendship; she and Felix played together. You came much later; and it is a proof of the great esteem in which we hold you, that when you made your offer we renounced our earlier projects."

"_You_ did, yes," said la Peyrade, "and with some literary manias--which, after all, are frequently full of sense and wit--you have a heart of gold; with you friendship is a sure thing, and you know what you mean. But Brigitte is another matter; you'll see, when you propose to her to hasten the marriage, what a resistance she will make."

"I don't agree with you. I think that Brigitte has always wanted you and still wants you for son-in-law--if I may so express myself. But whether she does or not, I beg you to believe that in all important matters I know how to have my will obeyed. Only, let us come now to a distinct understanding of what you wish; then we can start with the right foot foremost, and you'll see that all will go well."

"I wish," replied la Peyrade, "to put the last touches to your pamphlet; for, above all things, I think of you."

"Certainly," said Thuillier, "we ought not to sink in port."

"Well, in consequence of the feeling that I am oppressed, stultified by the prospect of a marriage still so doubtful, I am certain that not a page of ma.n.u.script could be got out of me in any form, until the question is settled."

"Very good," said Thuillier; "then how do you present that question?"

"Naturally, if Celeste's decision be against me, I should wish an immediate solution. If I am condemned to make a marriage of convenience I ought to lose no time in taking the opportunity I mentioned to you."

"So be it; but what time do you intend to allow us?"

"I should think that in fifteen days a girl might be able to make up her mind."

"Undoubtedly," replied Thuillier; "but it is very repugnant to me to let Celeste decide without appeal."

"For my part, I will take that risk; in any case, I shall be rid of uncertainty; and that is really my first object. Between ourselves, I am not risking as much as you think. It will take more than fifteen days for a son of Ph.e.l.lion, in other words, obstinacy incarnate in silliness, to have done with philosophical hesitations; and it is very certain that Celeste will not accept him for a husband unless he gives her some proofs of conversion."

"That's probable. But suppose Celeste tries to dawdle; suppose she refuses to accept the alternative?"

"That's your affair," said the Provencal. "I don't know how you regard the family in Paris; I only know that in my part of the country it is an unheard-of thing that a girl should have such liberty. If you, your sister (supposing she plays fair in the matter), and the father and mother can't succeed in making a girl whom you dower agree to so simple a thing as to make a perfectly free choice between two suitors, then good-bye to you! You'll have to write upon your gate-post that Celeste is queen and sovereign of the house."

"Well, we haven't got to that point yet," said Thuillier, with a capable air.

"As for you, my old fellow," resumed la Peyrade, "I must postpone our business until after Celeste's decision. Be that in my favor or not, I will then go to work, and in three days the pamphlet can be finished."

"Now," said Thuillier, "I know what you have had on your mind. I'll talk about it with Brigitte."

"That's a sad conclusion," said la Peyrade; "but, unhappily, so it is."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I would rather, as you can easily imagine, hear you say of yourself that the thing shall be done; but old habits can't be broken up."

"Ah ca! do you think I'm a man without any will, any initiative of my own?"