it was lucien who rode to lanvennec next morning for the surgeon. m. de brencourt considered him discreet, and chose him rather than artamène (who had besides been up all night) or any other of the younger men. but had he known that lucien, though outwardly respectful and certainly of a fundamental prudence, was finishing in his head as he rode a short but very venomous epistle in verse, beginning, “artus, le judas de nos jours!” in which, somewhere near the end, “ma?tre” rhymed with “tra?tre,” he might have selected another messenger.
however, the surgeon came, concerned but unsuspicious, and, assisted by m. chassin, did his unpleasant work with reasonable speed and deftness, producing at the end of it what he vaguely termed a “projectile” from a region of m. de kersaint’s forearm which, on the contrary, he described with much exactitude. and while he was binding up the arm in question the abbé quietly annexed the bullet—“as a souvenir,” he said.
but someone else seemed to be souvenir-hunting that morning. not long after the abbé had left his patient to repose and had established himself again in the outer room with his reflections and his breviary, the comte de brencourt appeared there.
“is it out satisfactorily?” he enquired.
“quite,” replied the priest. “a painful business; but nothing, mercifully, appears to be permanently injured. yet the surgeon tells me that our leader”—he stressed the words a little—“came very near never having the use of his sword-arm again.”
the comte looked grave. to do him justice, he had desired last night to kill, not to maim.
“the curious thing,” went on the priest, “is that the bullet is a pistol bullet, though last night m. de kersaint distinctly said that his assailant shot him with a musket.”
“no, no! the man had a pistol,” said m. de brencourt. “the marquis was mistaken.”
“obviously the man had a pistol,” agreed m. chassin with serenity. “and not an army pistol either.”
the comte met his look. “i should rather like to see that bullet,” he observed.
“no doubt,” thought the abbé, twiddling it in his pocket. “but you are not going to.” and as he made no audible reply to this suggestion the enquirer had to let the subject drop.
“to turn to another question, abbé,” he said, sitting down, “one has not yet had opportunity to congratulate you on your wonderful success. allow me to do so now—most heartily.”
“you are generous, monsieur le comte,” said the priest, reaching round to place his breviary on the table, and not seeming to notice the proffered hand. “i thank you all the more. another person ought by rights, however, to be included in your congratulations.”
“who—not roland de céligny, surely?”
“no. his friend the concierge—your friend the concierge.”
“why do you call her my friend?” asked the comte with a frown. “she was certainly de céligny’s, but in no sense mine.”
“no? well, my friend the concierge, then,” said the priest with a little smile.
de brencourt’s heart was beating to suffocation as he looked at him. now, surely, he should learn whether to m. chassin she were more than a concierge—the main purpose with which he had sought this interview.
“yes, she was of the greatest service to me,” resumed the priest, “although, indeed, she gave me no active assistance. poor woman, she had had a sad history.”
“did she tell it to you?” demanded the comte quickly.
“oh, one did not need to be told it,” replied the abbé.
but the look of relief which at that most palpably appeared on the comte’s features had the briefest stay there conceivable, for the aum?nier went on to say meditatively, “i am glad to think that i was able to make her some recompense. you remember the ruby necklace mentioned in the plan, monsieur le comte?”
“you are not going to say that you gave her that!” exclaimed his companion, starting up in his chair.
“ah, i see you think it an excessive reward?” commented the abbé, looking at him enquiringly. “so did m. le marquis, i fancy, when i told him. but come now, monsieur le comte, do you not think that it really was no more than her due, that if ever woman had a right to it, she had . . . and that if m. de kersaint knew all he would say the same?”
but the comte was quite speechless. the piercing little eyes held his, and he could feel them boring into his very soul. “if ever woman had a right to it” . . . “if m. de kersaint knew all.” the abbé knew—he knew! he would never have given her the necklace else. had he told the duc yet?
“of course,” went on the priest in a lowered tone, lowering that uncomfortable gaze also till it rested on his blunt fingers outspread on his knees, “had there been a duchess of the house living i should not have felt justified in giving so valuable an heirloom to a concierge. but, under the sad circumstances, i hold that i was absolved, do not you, monsieur le comte?”
oh, curse his maddening and mysterious persistence! was he playing with him, or was he ignorant after all?
“that is not for me to say,” muttered the comte thickly. “the matter concerns m. de kersaint.”
“very true. everything about mme vidal more nearly concerns m. de kersaint than anybody else.” he seemed to wait for the comte to agree or else to ask why, but the comte could bring out neither assent nor query.
“since he is most interested in the treasure,” finished the abbé with an amicable air of explaining his statement. “and, speaking of that treasure, monsieur le comte, i feel sure that by now you have penetrated the disguise. the cloak was bound to sit rather awkwardly after—you know what i mean.” he looked at him again.
m. de brencourt changed colour. “disguise? whose disguise? no, i do not know what you mean!” there was sharp alarm in his tone; whither was this tending?
“whose disguise?” repeated the priest. “why, surely, there is only one disguise in question?” he waited a second and then went on, “the marquis has perhaps told you himself who he is?”
“no, he has not!” returned m. de brencourt angrily. “and i do not wish to learn any secrets, if you please, abbé!” for if he could carry it off with the abbé and the outside world in general that he had never known who de kersaint really was, how could he be blamed for not having told him that his wife was alive?
“very well said, monsieur le comte,” remarked m. chassin in a tone of commendation. “and if i were not sure that, like myself, you know already, i would not speak to you of the identity of m. de kersaint and the duc de trélan.”
“but for heaven’s sake do not speak to me of their identity!” cried the comte, his head reeling as he saw this knowledge being openly thrust upon him. “how do i know—or care—who he is!”
“i am afraid i have done it now,” said the priest placidly “but only because i was sure you had guessed it.”
“how could you be sure?” growled the other. “did—surely he did not tell you? only last night he asked me to respect his confidence!”
“ah!” said the priest. “after you . . . saved his life, no doubt! well, monsieur de brencourt, you can still respect it. and since you do know it—i thought you did—i am sure that as a gentleman you must regret the expressions you used, in ignorance, of m. de trélan, that night at hennebont. but you have no doubt made that all right with him.”
“that,” said m. de brencourt, with hostility, “is a matter which concerns m. de trélan and myself, not you, monsieur chassin.—and as regards confidences, it seems to me that you were going very near betraying one yourself just now. if i had not known . . . are you usually in the habit of doing that?” for now there was a fresh track of alarm; had the priest betrayed this particular confidence to one at mirabel—told the concierge, even without knowing who she was, that he really came from mirabel’s master? it was not impossible. he waited in acute tension.
“no,” said the abbé composedly, “without wishing to belaud myself, it is a point i am rather particular upon. but i assured the marquis—the duc—some time ago that he would have to tell you sooner or later. i wonder he did not do so before you went to mirabel. did you not guess it then, from the knowledge he displayed of the place?”
“monsieur l’abbé,” replied the comte, with more than irritation, “it does not seem to me to matter much what i guessed or what i did not guess. enough that i did not impart my speculations to any living soul.”
“no, i am sure you were very careful not to do that!” said the abbé warmly, and he looked at him harder than ever.
m. de brencourt got up and went to the window. he must know, this man. and yet . . . did he? he would have told de trélan at once, if he did; a bullet in the arm would not have prevented the reception of that news. the comte would almost have given his soul to make sure, but it was so difficult to plumb the extent of the priest’s knowledge without exposing his own. a sort of fascination caused him to recur to the subject of mirabel, but he approached it this time from a safer side.
“when am i to have an account of your securing of the treasure, abbé?” he asked, throwing himself down on the window-seat. “it was under the hearth in the sallette, i suppose?”
and presumably his fellow-adventurer felt he owed him this, for he gave him, on this invitation, a fairly circumstantial account of his success at mirabel and his peregrinations afterwards. the comte listened from the window with the closest attention. after all, she did not seem to have played so much part in the business as he had feared. perhaps——
“but i was glad to leave mirabel in any case,” finished the narrator with a sigh. “it has a tragic atmosphere—a haunted feeling. were you not conscious of that, monsieur le comte?” and as the comte, for fear of giving an opening, did not reply, the priest went on, “if it were m. de trélan’s once more and he were free to go there, i am sure he never would.”
m. de brencourt could not resist the bait. “no, i should think not!” he broke out in spite of himself. “he would think always of that night—of his wife, alone——”
the priest looked up. “ah yes, i have heard you in that vein before, monsieur le comte,” he interrupted coolly. “now tell me candidly, for i want to know, since i am not gently born, and can’t understand the refinements of you nobles—is it not a fact that all the aristocrats who emigrated early, as m. de trélan did, emigrated on a point of honour . . . mistaken, it may be, but still a principle? why, if it comes to that, monsieur de brencourt, you are, i think, an émigré yourself, and i don’t suppose you considered that you were running away?”
“no, that is true,” conceded the comte somewhat reluctantly. “it was—before it became a matter of safety—a matter of principle.”
“when the duc emigrated in 1790 it would have taken a very far-sighted person to prophesy the extremities to which the revolution would go later on. i happen to know, too, that he made a great effort to induce the duchesse to accompany him. she refused, as it were on a point of honour also. she disapproved of the emigration.”
“and dearly enough she paid for that disapproval,” muttered the comte.
“quite true. and don’t you think that m. de trélan has paid dearly for it too?”
a pause. “he deserved to,” said his companion.
the abbé made a gesture. “one must make allowances for you, monsieur. i know that you had the honour of the acquaintance of that noble and unfortunate lady—you told us so—and it has biased you against a man who has been equally unfortunate, and who, for seven years, in the midst of hardships and dangers of his own seeking, has never ceased to suffer the pangs of a remorse which, as i hope for salvation, i consider excessive.”
“you are an eloquent defender, abbé,” said the comte de brencourt, shrugging his shoulders. “you should be at the bar . . . i happen to differ from you. i consider, to put it bluntly, that m. le duc de trélan deserves every sting of remorse he has suffered and may still suffer henceforward. i am not for letting a man off so cheaply.”
m. chassin leant forward. “that was a figure of speech, i presume?” he put in like lightning.
“what do you mean?” asked the comte, startled.
“you spoke of letting him off—as if you had the power to do it.”
the comte recovered himself. “do not be absurd, abbé!” he said scornfully. “am i the judge of all the earth? of course it was a figure of speech! how could i absolve him for what is done and can never be undone? put his behaviour down, at the best, to mistaken judgment, we have to suffer for our mistakes just as much as for our crimes.”
the abbé sat back in his chair again. “since you know that so well, monsieur de brencourt,” he said gravely, “it might occur to you that it is a mistake—a dangerous mistake—to play with other people’s remorse. you might conceivably know that torment yourself one day!”
“i’ll take the risk of that,” said the comte drily, and got up. “especially as i have no idea what you mean about ‘playing’ with other people’s,” he added, not at all certain what that phrase did mean in the mouth that had uttered it. it was time, at any rate, to end this dangerous interview, which had not told him what he wanted to know. one thing was clear, that if the priest knew mme vidal’s secret he would eventually tell the “marquis de kersaint,” and after that, no doubt, would come the deluge, and either he, artus de brencourt, or his late adversary would really be swept away in it, this time. but if there came no deluge, then m. chassin did not know.
“if you will excuse me, mon père,” he said, looking down at him, “i must quit this interesting conversation for my duties. ask m. de . . . kersaint when you go in to him again, to send for me if he wants me.” and he left the room.
so the abbé chassin knew that he did not mean ever to tell gaston de trélan that his wife was alive, that he meant to go on withholding the knowledge for his own purpose. and his heart was hardened against m. de brencourt.
