This story of M. Vincent, as told by these two honest companions, was something like the vulgar legend of other people's money, so eagerly craved, and so madly dissipated. Easily-gotten wealth is easily gotten rid of. Stolen money has fatal tendencies, and turns irresistibly to gambling, horse-jockeys, fast women, all the ruinous fancies, all the unwholesome gratifications.
They are rare indeed, among the daring cut-throats of speculation, those to whom their ill-gotten gain proves of real service, - so rare, that they are pointed out, and are as easily numbered as the girls who leap some night from the street to a ten-thousand-franc apartment, and manage to remain there.
Seized with the intoxication of sudden wealth, they lose all measure and all prudence. Whether they believe their luck inexhaustible, or fear a sudden turn of fortune, they make haste to enjoy themselves, and they fill the noted restaurants, the leading cafes, the theatres, the clubs, the race-courses, with their impudent personality, the clash of their voice, the extravagance of their mistresses, the noise of their expenses, and the absurdity of their vanity. And they go on and on, lavishing other people's money, until the fatal hour of one of those disastrous liquidations which terrify the courts and the exchange, and cause pallid faces and a gnashing of teeth in the "street," until the moment when they have the choice between a pistol-shot, which they never choose, the criminal court, which they do their best to avoid, and a trip abroad.
What becomes of them afterwards? To what gutters do they tumble from fall to fall? Does any one know what becomes of the women who disappear suddenly after two or three years of follies and of splendors?
But it happens sometimes, as you step out of a carriage in front of some theatre, that you wonder where you have already seen the face of the wretched beggar who opens the door for you, and in a husky voice claims his two sous. You saw him at the Caf Riche, during the six months that he was a big financier.
Some other time you may catch, in the crowd, snatches of a strange conversation between two crapulous rascals.
"It was at the time," says one, "when I drove that bright chestnut team that I had bought for twenty thousand francs of the eldest son of the Duke de Sermeuse."
"I remember," replies the other; "for at that moment I gave six thousand francs a month to little Cabriole of the Varieties."
And, improbable as this may seem, it is the exact truth; for one was manager of a manufacturing enterprise that sank ten millions; and the other was at the head of a financial operation that ruined five hundred families. They had house like the one in the Rue du Cirque, mistresses more expensive than Mme. Zelie Cadelle, and servants like those who were now talking within a step of Maxence and Marius de Tregars. The latter had resumed their conversation; and the oldest one, the coachman with the red nose, was saying to his younger comrade, "This Vincent affair must be a lesson to you. If ever you find yourself again in a house where so much money is spent, remember that it hasn't cost much trouble to make it, and manage somehow to get as big a share of it as you can."
"That's what I've always done wherever I have been."
"And, above all, make haste to fill your bag, because, you see, in houses like that, one is never sure, one day, whether, the next, the gentleman will not be at Mazas, and the lady at St.
Lazares."
They had done their second bowl of punch, and finished their conversation. They paid, and left.
And Maxence and M. de Traggers were able, at last, to throw down their cards.
Maxence was very pale; and big tears were rolling down his cheeks.
"What disgrace!" he murmured: "This, then, is the other side of my father's existence! This is the way in which he spent the millions which he stole; whilst, in the Rue St. Gilles, he deprived his family of the necessaries of life!
And, in a tone of utter discouragement, "Now it is indeed all over, and it is useless to continue our search. My father is certainly guilty.
But M. de Traggers was not the man thus to give up the game.
"Guilty? Yes," he said, "but dupe also."
"Whose dupe?"
"That's what we'll find out, you may depend upon it."
"What! after what we have just heard?"
"I have more hope than ever."
"Did you learn any thing from Mme. Zelie Cadelle, then?"
"Nothing more than you know by those two rascals' conversation."
A dozen questions were pressing upon Maxence's lips; but M. de Traggers interrupted him.
In this case, my friend, less than ever must we trust appearances.
Let me speak. Was your father a simpleton? No! His ability to dissimulate, for years, his double existence, proves, on the contrary, a wonderful amount of duplicity. How is it, then, that latterly his conduct has been so extraordinary and so absurd? But you will doubtless say it was always such. In that case, I answer you, No; for then his secret could not have been kept for a year.
We hear that other women lived in that house before Mme. Zelie Cadelle. But who were they? What has become of them? Is there any certainty that they have ever existed? Nothing proves it.
"The servants having been all changed, Amanda, the chambermaid, is the only one who knows the truth; and she will be very careful to say nothing about it. Therefore, all our positive information goes back no farther than five months. And what do we hear? That your father seemed to try and make his extravagant expenditures as conspicuous as possible. That he did not even take the trouble to conceal the source of the money he spent so profusely; for he told Mme. Zelie that he was at the end of his tether, and that, after having spent his own fortune, he was spending other people's money.
He had announced his intended departure; he had sold the house, and received its price. Finally, at the last moment, what does he do?