Lucienne's life from the time that she had left her with the poor gardeners at Louveciennes, without giving either her name or her address, - the injury she had received by being run over by Mme. de Thaller's carriage; the long letter she had written from the hospital, begging for assistance; her visit to the house, and her meeting with the Baron de Thaller; the effort to induce her to emigrate to America; her arrest by means of false information, and her escape, thanks to the kind peace-officer; the attempt upon her as she was going home late one night; and, finally, her imprisonment after the Commune, among the petroleuses, and her release through the interference of the same honest friend."
And, charging her with the responsibility of all these infamous acts, he paused for an answer or a protest.
And, as Mme. de Thaller said nothing, "You are looking at me, madame, and wondering how I have discovered all that. A single word will explain it all. The peace-officer who saved your daughter is precisely the same to whom it was once my good fortune to render a service. By comparing notes, we have gradually reached the truth, - reached you, madame. Will you acknowledge now that I have more proofs than are necessary to apply to the courts?"
Whether she acknowledged it or not, she did not condescend to discuss.
"What then?" she said coldly.
But M. de Traggers was too much on his guard to expose himself, by continuing to speak thus, to reveal the secret of his designs.
Besides, whilst he was thoroughly satisfied as to the manoeuvres used to defraud his father he had, as yet, but presumptions on what concerned Vincent Favoral.
"Permit me not to say another word, madame," he replied. "I have told you enough to enable you to judge of the value of my weapons."
She must have felt that she could not make him change his mind, for she rose to go.
"That is sufficient," she uttered. "I shall reflect; and to-morrow I shall give you an answer."
She started to go; but M. de Traggers threw himself quickly between her and the door.
"Excuse me," he said; "but it is not to-morrow that I want an answer: it is to-night, this instant!"
Ah, if she could have annihilated him with a look.
"Why, this is violence," she said in a voice which betrayed the incredible effort she was making to control herself.
"It is imposed upon me by circumstances, madame."
"You would be less exacting, if my husband were here."
He must have been within hearing; for suddenly the door opened, and he appeared upon the threshold. There are people for whom the unforeseen does not exist, and whom no event can disconcert. Having ventured every thing, they expect every thing. Such was the Baron de Thaller. With a sagacious glance he examined his wife and M. de Traggers; and in a cordial tone, "We are quarreling here?" he said.
"I am glad you have come!" exclaimed the baroness.
"What is the matter?"
"The matter is, that M. de Traggers is endeavoring to take an odious advantage of some incidents of our past life."
"There's woman's exaggeration for you!" he said laughing.
And, holding out his hand to Marius, "Let me make your peace - for you, my dear marquis," he said: "that's within the province of the husband." But, instead of taking his extended hand, M. de Tregars stepped back.
"There is no more peace possible, sir, I am an enemy.
"An enemy!" he repeated in a tone of surprise which was wonderfully well assumed, if it was not real.
"Yes," interrupted the baroness; "and I must speak to you at once, Frederic. Come: M. de Traggers will wait for you."
And she led her husband into the adjoining room, not without first casting upon Marius a look of burning and triumphant hatred.
Left alone, M. de Traggers sat down. Far from annoying him, this sudden intervention of the manager of the Mutual Credit seemed to him a stroke of fortune. It spared him an explanation more painful still than the first, and the unpleasant necessity of having to confound a villain by proving his infamy to him.
"And besides," he thought, "when the husband and the wife have consulted with each other, they will ac-knowledge that they cannot resist, and that it is best to surrender." The deliberation was brief. In less than ten minutes, M. de Thaller returned alone. He was pale; and his face expressed well the grief of an honest man who discovers too late that he has misplaced his confidence.
"My wife has told me all, sir," he began.
M. de Tregars had risen. "Well?" he asked.
"You see me distressed. Ah, M. le Marquis! how could I ever expect such a thing from you? - you, whom I thought I had the right to look upon as a friend. And it is you, who, when a great misfortune befalls me, attempts to give me the finishing stroke. It is you who would crush me under the weight of slanders gathered in the gutter."
M. de Tregars stopped him with a gesture.
"Mme. de Thaller cannot have correctly repeated my words to you, else you would not utter that word 'slander.'"
"She has repeated them to me without the least change."
"Then she cannot have told you the importance of the proofs I have in my hands."
But the Baron persisted, as Mlle. Cesarine would have said, to "do it up in the tender style."
"There is scarcely a family," he resumed, " in which there is not some one of those painful secrets which they try to withhold from the wickedness of the world. There is one in mine. Yes, it is true, that before our marriage, my wife had had a child, whom poverty had compelled her to abandon. We have since done everything that it was humanly possible to find that child, but without success.