Orleans railway station, he went into a cafe near by, and called for a glass of ale.
As he sat sipping his glass, he picked up a daily paper, The Sun, and under the head of “Fashionable Gossip,” signed Jacques Durand, read the following:
“We understand that the niece of one of our most prominent bankers, M. Andre Fauvel, will shortly be married to M. le Marquis Louis de Clameran. The engagement has been announced.”
This news, coming upon him so unexpectedly, proved to Prosper the justness of M. Verduret’s calculations.
Alas! why did not this certainty inspire him with absolute faith? why did it not give him courage to wait, the strength of mind to refrain from acting on his own responsibility?
Frenzied by distress of mind, he already saw Madeleine indissolubly united to this villain, and, thinking that M. Verduret would perhaps arrive too late to be of use, determined at all risks to throw an obstacle in the way of the marriage.
He called for pen and paper, and forgetting that no situation can excuse the mean cowardice of an anonymous letter, wrote in a disguised hand the following lines to M. Fauvel:
“DEAR SIR—You consigned your cashier to prison; you acted prudently, since you were convinced of his dishonesty and faithlessness.
“But, even if he stole three hundred and fifty thousand francs from your safe, does it follow that he also stole Mme. Fauvel’s diamonds, and pawned them at the Mont-de-Piete, where they now are?
“Warned as you are, if I were you, I would not be the subject of public scandal. I would watch my wife, and would be distrustful of handsome cousins.
“Moreover, I would, before signing the marriage contract of Mlle. Madeleine, inquire at the Prefecture of Police, and obtain some information concerning the noble Marquis de Clameran.
“A FRIEND.”
Prosper hastened off to post his letter. Fearing that it would not reach M. Fauvel in time, he walked up to the Rue Cardinal Lemoine, and put it in the main letter-box, so as to be certain of its speedy delivery.
Until now he had not doubted the propriety of his action.
But now when too late, when he heard the sound of his letter falling into the box, a thousand scruples filled his mind. Was it not wrong to act thus hurriedly? Would not this letter interfere with M. Verduret’s plans? Upon reaching the hotel, his doubts were changed into bitter regrets.
Joseph Dubois was waiting for him; he had received a despatch from his patron, saying that his business was finished, and that he would return the next evening at nine o’clock.
Prosper was wretched. He would have given all he had to recover the anonymous letter.
And he had cause for regret.
At that very hour M. Verduret was taking his seat in the cars at Tarascon, meditating upon the most advantageous plan to be adopted in pursuance of his discoveries.
For he had discovered everything, and now must bring matters to a crisis.
Adding to what he already knew, the story of an old nurse of Mlle. de la Verberie, the affidavit of an old servant who had always lived in the Clameran family, and the depositions of the Vesinet husband and wife who attended M. Lagors at his country house, the latter having been sent to him by Dubois (Fanferlot), with a good deal of information obtained from the prefecture of police, he had worked up a complete case, and could now act upon a chain of evidence without a missing link.
As he had predicted, he had been compelled to search into the distant past for the first causes of the crime of which Prosper had been the victim.
The following is the drama, as he wrote it out for the benefit of the judge of instruction, knowing that it would contain grounds for an indictment against the malefactors.
XII
The Drama
About two leagues from Tarascon, on the left bank of the Rhone, not far from the wonderful gardens of M. Audibert, stood the chateau of Clameran, a weather-stained, neglected, but massive structure.
Here lived, in 1841, the old Marquis de Clameran and his two sons, Gaston and Louis.
The marquis was an eccentric old man. He belonged to the race of nobles, now almost extinct, whose watches stopped in 1789, and who kept time with the past century.
More attached to his illusions than to his life, the old marquis insisted upon considering all the stirring events which had happened since the first revolution as a series of deplorable practical jokes.
Emigrating with the Count d’Artois, he did not return to France until 1815, with the allies.
He should have been thankful to Heaven for the recovery of a portion of his immense family estates; a comparatively small portion, to be sure, but full enough to support him comfortably: he said, however, that he did not think the few paltry acres were worth thanking God for.
At first, he tried every means to obtain an appointment at court; but seeing all his efforts fail, he resolved to retire to his chateau, which he did, after cursing and pitying his king, whom he had worshipped.
He soon became accustomed to the free and indolent life of a country gentleman.
Possessing fifteen thousand francs a year, he spent twenty-five or thirty thousand, borrowing from every source, saying that a genuine restoration would soon take place, and that then he would regain possession of all his properties.
Following his example, his younger son lived extravagantly. Louis was always in pursuit of adventure, and idled away his time in drinking and gambling. The elder son, Gaston, anxious to participate in the stirring events of the time, prepared himself for action by quietly working, studying, and reading certain papers and pamphlets surreptitiously received, the very mention of which was considered a hanging matter by his father.
Altogether the old marquis was the happiest of mortals, living well, drinking high, hunting much, tolerated by the peasants, and execrated by the gentlemen of the neighborhood, who regarded him with contempt and raillery.
Time never hung heavy on his hands, except in mid-summer, when the valley of the Rhone was intensely hot; and even then he had infallible means of amusement, always new, though ever the same.
He detested, above all, his neighbor the Countess de la Verberie.
The Countess de la Verberie, the “bete noire” of the marquis, as he ungallantly termed her, was a tall, dry woman, angular in appearance and character, cold and arrogant toward her equals, and domineering over her inferiors.
Like her noble neighbor, she too had emigrated; and her husband was afterward killed at Lutzen, but unfortunately not in the French ranks.
In 1815, the countess came back to France. But while the Marquis de Clameran returned to comparative ease, she could obtain nothing from royal munificence, but
