"Fairest without is often foulest within, Bigot," answered Cadet, doggedly. "Open speech in a woman is often an open trap to catch fools! Angelique des Meloises is free-spoken and open-handed enough to deceive a conclave of cardinals; but she has the lightest heels in the city. Would you not like to see her dance a ballet de triomphe on the broad flagstone I laid over the grave of that poor girl? If you would, you have only to marry her, and she will give a ball in the secret chamber!"
"Be still, Cadet! I could take you by the throat for suggesting it!
But I will make her prove herself innocent!" exclaimed Bigot, angry at the cool persistence of Cadet.
"I hope you will not try it to-day, Bigot." Cadet spoke gravely now. "Let the dead sleep, and let all sleeping dogs and bitches lie still. Zounds! we are in greater danger than she is! you cannot stir in this matter without putting yourself in her power. Angelique has got hold of the secret of Caroline and of the Baron de St.
Castin; what if she clear herself by accusing you? The King would put you in the Bastile for the magnificent lie you told the Governor, and La Pompadour would send you to the Place de Greve when the Baron de St. Castin returned with the bones of his daughter, dug up in your Chateau!"
"It is a cursed dilemma!" Bigot fairly writhed with perplexity.
"Dark as the bottomless pit, turn which way we will. Angelique knows too much, that is clear; it were a charity, if it were a safe thing, to kill her too, Cadet!"
"Not to be thought of, Bigot; she is too much in every man's eye, and cannot be stowed away in a secret corner like her poor victim.
A dead silence on every point of this cursed business is our only policy, our only safety." Cadet had plenty of common sense in the rough, and Bigot was able to appreciate it.
The Intendant strode up and down the room, clenching his hands in a fury. "If I were sure! sure! she did it, I would kill her, by God! such a damnable cruel deed as this would justify any measure of vengeance!" exclaimed he, savagely.
"Pshaw! not when it would all rebound upon yourself. Besides, if you want vengeance, take a man's revenge upon a woman; you can do that! It will be better than killing her, much more pleasant, and quite as effectual."
Bigot looked as Cadet said this and laughed: "You would send her to the Parc aux cerfs, eh, Cadet? Par Dieu! she would sit on the throne in six months!"
"No, I do not mean the Parc aux cerfs, but the Chateau of Beaumanoir. But you are in too ill humor to joke to-day, Bigot."
Cadet resumed his pipe with an air of nonchalance.
"I never was in a worse humor in my life, Cadet! I feel that I have a padlock upon every one of my five senses; and I cannot move hand or foot in this business."
"Right, Bigot, do not move hand or foot, eye or tongue, in it. I tell you the slightest whisper of Caroline's life or death in your house, reaching the ears of Philibert or La Corne St. Luc, will bring them to Beaumanoir with warrants to search for her. They will pick the Chateau to pieces stone by stone. They will drag Caroline out of her grave, and the whole country will swear you murdered her, and that I helped you, and with appearances so strong against us that the mothers who bore us would not believe in our innocence!
Damn the women! The burying of that girl was the best deed I did for one of the *** in my life, but it will be the worst if you breath one word of it to Angelique des Meloises, or to any other person living. I am not ready to lose my head yet, Bigot, for the sake of any woman, or even for you!"
The Intendant was staggered by the vehemence of Cadet, and impressed by the force of his remarks. It was hard to sit down quietly and condone such a crime, but he saw clearly the danger of pushing inquiry in any direction without turning suspicion upon himself. He boiled with indignation. He fumed and swore worse than his wont when angry, but Cadet looked on quietly, smoking his pipe, waiting for the storm to calm down.
"You were never in a woman's clutches so tight before, Bigot," continued Cadet. "If you let La Pompadour suspect one hair of your head in this matter, she will spin a cart-rope out of it that will drag you to the Place de Greve."
"Reason tells me that what you say is true, Cadet," replied Bigot, gloomily.
"To be sure; but is not Angelique a clever witch to bind Francois Bigot neck and heels in that way, after fairly outwitting and running him down?"
Cadet's cool comments drove Bigot beside himself. "I will not stand it; by St. Maur! she shall pay for all this! I, who have caught women all my life, to be caught by one thus! she shall pay for it!"
"Well, make her pay for it by marrying her!" replied Cadet. "Par Dieu! I am mistaken if you have not got to marry her in the end! I would marry her myself, if you do not, only I should be afraid to sleep nights! I might be put under the floor before morning if she liked another man better!"
Cadet gave way to a feeling of hilarity at this idea, shaking his sides so long and heartily that Bigot caught the infection, and joined in with a burst of sardonic laughter.
Bigot's laughter was soon over. He sat down at the table again, and, being now calm, considered the whole matter over, point by point, with Cadet, who, though coarse and unprincipled, was a shrewd counsellor in difficulties.
It was determined between the two men that nothing whatever should be said of the assassination. Bigot should continue his gallantries to Angelique, and avoid all show of suspicion in that quarter. He should tell her of the disappearance of Caroline, who had gone away mysteriously as she came, but profess absolute ignorance as to her fate.
Angelique would be equally cautious in alluding to the murder; she would pretend to accept all his statements as absolute fact. Her tongue, if not her thoughts, would be sealed up in perpetual silence on that bloody topic. Bigot must feed her with hopes of marriage, and if necessary set a day for it, far enough off to cover all the time to be taken up in the search after Caroline.