"Oh, my mother, my mother! what a terrible misfortune!"

In the pa.s.sage M. de Chandore was coming forward. He had not been able to follow his granddaughter's rapid steps.

"Let us go in," he said to the two ladies: "don't stand there!"

For at all the windows curious eyes were peeping through the blinds.

He drew them into the sitting-room. Poor M. Folgat was sorely embarra.s.sed what to do with himself. No one seemed to be aware of his existence. He followed them, however. He entered the room, and standing by the door, sharing the general excitement, he was watching by turns, Dionysia, M. de Chandore, and the two spinsters.

Dionysia was then twenty years old. It could not be said that she was uncommonly beautiful; but no one could ever forget her again who had once seen her. Small in form, she was grace personified; and all her movements betrayed a rare and exquisite perfection. Her black hair fell in marvellous ma.s.ses over her head, and contrasted strangely with her blue eyes and her fair complexion. Her skin was of dazzling whiteness.

Every thing in her features spoke of excessive timidity. And yet, from certain movements of her lips and her eyebrows, one might have suspected no lack of energy.

Grandpapa Chandore looked unusually tall by her side. His ma.s.sive frame was imposing. He did not show his seventy-two years, but was as straight as ever, and seemed to be able to defy all the storms of life. What struck strangers most, perhaps, was his dark-red complexion, which gave him the appearance of an Indian chieftain, while his white beard and hair brought the crimson color still more prominently out. In spite of his herculean frame and his strange complexion, his face bore the expression of almost child-like goodness. But the first glance at his eyes proved that the gentle smile on his lips was not to be taken alone.

There were flashes in his gray eyes which made people aware that a man who should dare, for instance, to offend Dionysia, would have to pay for it pretty dearly.

As to the two aunts, they were as tall and thin as a couple of willow-rods, pale, discreet, ultra-aristocratic in their reserve and their coldness; but they bore in their faces an expression of happy peace and sentimental tenderness, such as is often seen in old maids whose temper has not been soured by celibacy. They dressed absolutely alike, as they had done now for forty years, preferring neutral colors and modest fashions, such as suited their simple taste.

They were crying bitterly at that moment; and M. Folgat felt instinctively that there was no sacrifice of which they were not capable for their beloved niece's sake.

"Poor Dionysia!" they whispered.

The girl heard them, however; and, drawing herself up, she said,--

"But we are behaving shamefully. What would Jacques say, if he could see us from his prison! Why should we be so sad? Is he not innocent?"

Her eyes shone with unusual brilliancy: her voice had a ring which moved Manuel Folgat deeply.

"I can at least, in justice to myself," she went on saying, "a.s.sure you that I have never doubted him for a moment. And how should I ever have dared to doubt? The very night on which the fire broke out, Jacques wrote me a letter of four pages, which he sent me by one of his tenants, and which reached me at nine o'clock. I showed it to grandpapa. He read it, and then he said I was a thousand times right, because a man who had been meditating such a crime could never have written that letter."

"I said so, and I still think so," added M. de Chandore; "and every sensible man will think so too; but"--

His granddaughter did not let him finish.

"It is evident therefore, that Jacques is the victim of an abominable intrigue; and we must unravel it. We have cried enough: now let us act!"

Then, turning to the marchioness, she said,--

"And my dear mother, I sent for you, because we want you to help us in this great work."

"And here I am," replied the old lady, "not less certain of my son's innocence than you are."

Evidently M. de Chandore had been hoping for something more; for he interrupted her, asking,--

"And the marquis?"

"My husband remained in Paris."

The old gentleman's face a.s.sumed a curious expression.

"Ah, that is just like him," he said. "Nothing can move him. His only son is wickedly accused of a crime, arrested, thrown into prison. They write to him; they hope he will come at once. By no means. Let his son get out of trouble as he can. He has his _faiences_ to attend to. Oh, if I had a son!"

"My husband," pleaded the marchioness, "thinks he can be more useful to Jacques in Paris than here. There will be much to be done there."

"Have we not the railway?"

"Moreover," she went on, "he intrusted me to this gentleman." She pointed out M. Folgat.

"M. Manuel Folgat, who has promised us the a.s.sistance of his experience, his talents, and his devotion."

When thus formally introduced, M. Folgat bowed, and said,--

"I am all hope. But I think with Miss Chandore, that we must go to work without losing a second. Before I can decide, however, upon what is to be done, I must know all the facts."

"Unfortunately we know nothing," replied M. de Chandore,--"nothing, except that Jacques is kept in close confinement."

"Well, then, we must try to find out. You know, no doubt, all the law officers of Sauveterre?"

"Very few. I know the commonwealth attorney."

"And the magistrate before whom the matter has been brought."

The older of the two Misses Lavarande rose, and exclaimed,--

"That man, M. Galpin, is a monster of hypocrisy and ingrat.i.tude. He called himself Jacques's friend; and Jacques liked him well enough to induce us, my sister and myself, to give our consent to a marriage between him and one of our cousins, a Lavarande. Poor child. When she learned the sad truth, she cried, 'Great G.o.d! G.o.d be blessed that I escaped the disgrace of becoming the wife of such a man!'"

"Yes," added the other old lady, "if all Sauveterre thinks Jacques guilty, let them also say, 'His own friend has become his judge.'"

M. Folgat shook his head, and said,--

"I must have more minute information. The marquis mentioned to me a M.

Seneschal, mayor of Sauveterre."

M. de Chandore looked at once for his hat, and said,--

"To be sure! He is a friend of ours; and, if any one is well informed, he is. Let us go to him. Come."

M. Seneschal was indeed a friend of the Chandores, the Lavarandes, and also of the Boiscorans. Although he was a lawyer he had become attached to the people whose confidential adviser he had been for more than twenty years. Even after having retired from business, M. Seneschal had still retained the full confidence of his former clients. They never decided on any grave question, without consulting him first. His successor did the business for them; but M. Seneschal directed what was to be done.

Nor was the a.s.sistance all on one side. The example of great people like M. de Chandore and Jacques's uncle had brought many a peasant on business into M. Seneschal's office; and when he was, at a later period of his life, attacked by the fever of political ambition, and offered to "sacrifice himself for his country" by becoming mayor of Sauveterre, and a member of the general council, their support had been of great service to him.

Hence he was well-nigh overcome when he returned, on that fatal morning, to Sauveterre. He looked so pale and undone, that his wife was seriously troubled.

"Great G.o.d, Augustus! What has happened?" she asked.

"Something terrible has happened," he replied in so tragic a manner, that his wife began to tremble.

To be sure, Mrs. Seneschal trembled very easily. She was a woman of forty-five or fifty years, very dark, short, and fat, trying hard to breathe in the corsets which were specially made for her by the Misses Mechinet, the clerk's sisters. When she was young, she had been rather pretty: now she still kept the red cheeks of her younger days, a forest of jet black hair, and excellent teeth. But she was not happy. Her life had been spent in wishing for children, and she had none.

She consoled herself, it is true, by constantly referring to all the most delicate details on the subject, mentioning not to her intimate friends only, but to any one who would listen, her constant disappointments, the physicians she had consulted, the pilgrimages she had undertaken, and the quant.i.ties of fish she had eaten, although she abominated fish. All had been in vain, and as her hopes fled with her years, she had become resigned, and indulged now in a kind of romantic sentimentality, which she carefully kept alive by reading novels and poems without end. She had a tear ready for every unfortunate being, and some words of comfort for every grief. Her charity was well known. Never had a poor woman with children appealed to her in vain. In spite of all that, she was not easily taken in. She managed her household with her hand as well as with her eye; and no one surpa.s.sed her in the extent of her washings, or the excellence of her dinners.