CHAPTER II.
The Marquis de Rochebriant was seated in his pleasant apartment, glancing
carelessly at the envelopes of many notes and letters lying yet unopened
on his breakfast-table. He had risen late at noon, for he had not gone
to bed till dawn. The night had been spent at his club--over the card-
table--by no means to the pecuniary advantage of the Marquis. The reader
will have learned, through the conversation recorded in a former chapter
between De Mauleon and Enguerrand de Vandemar, that the austere Seigneur
Breton had become a fast _viveur_ of Paris. He had long since spent the
remnant of Louvier's premium of L10,000., and he owed a year's interest.
For this last there was an excuse. M. Collot, the contractor to whom he
had been advised to sell the yearly fall of his forest-trees, had removed
the trees, but had never paid a sou beyond the preliminary deposit; so
that the revenue, out of which the mortgagee should be paid his interest,
was not forthcoming. Alain had instructed M. Hebert to press the
contractor; the contractor had replied, that if not pressed he could soon
settle all claims--if pressed, he must declare himself bankrupt. The
Chevalier de Finisterre had laughed at the alarm which Alain conceived
when he first found himself in the condition of debtor for a sum he could
not pay--creditor for a sum he could not recover.
"Bagatelle!" said the Chevalier. "Tschu! Collot, if you give him time,
is as safe as the Bank of France, and Louvier knows it. Louvier will not
trouble you--Louvier, the best fellow in the world! I'll call on him and
explain matters."
It is to be presumed that the Chevalier did so explain; for though both
at the first, and quite recently at the second default of payment, Alain
received letters from M. Louvier's professional agent, as reminders of
interest due, and as requests for its payment, the Chevalier assured him
that these applications were formalities of convention--that Louvier, in
fact, knew nothing about them; and when dining with the great financier
himself, and cordially welcomed and called "Mon cher," Alain had taken
him aside and commenced explanation and excuse, Louvier had cut him
short. "Peste! don't mention such trifles. There is such a thing as
business--that concerns my agent; such a thing as friendship--that
concerns me. Allez!"
Thus M. de Rochebriant, confiding in debtor and in creditor, had suffered
twelve months to glide by without much heed of either, and more than live
up to an income amply sufficient indeed for the wants of an ordinary
bachelor, but needing more careful thrift than could well be expected
from the head of one of the most illustrious houses in France, cast so
young into the vortex of the most expensive capital in the world.
The poor Marquis glided into the grooves that slant downward, much as the
French Marquis of tradition was wont to glide; not that he appeared to
live extravagantly, but he needed all he had for his pocket-money, and
had lost that dread of being in debt which he had brought up from the
purer atmosphere of Bretagne.
But there were some debts which; of course, a Rochebriant must pay--debts
of honour--and Alain had, on the previous night, incurred such a debt and
must pay it that day. He had been strongly tempted, when the debt rose
to the figure it had attained, to risk a change of luck; but whatever his
imprudence, he was incapable of dishonesty. If the luck did not change,
and he lost more, he would be without means to meet his obligations. As
the debt now stood, he calculated that he could just discharge it by the
sale of his coupe and horses. It is no wonder he left his letters
unopened, however charming they might be; he was quite sure they would
contain no cheque which would enable him to pay his debt and retain his
equipage.
The door opened, and the valet announced M. le Chevalier de Finisterre--
a man with smooth countenance and air _distinque_, a pleasant voice and
perpetual smile.
"Well, mon cher," cried the Chevalier, "I hope that you recovered the
favour of Fortune before you quitted her green table last night. When I
left she seemed very cross with you."
"And so continued to the end," answered Alain, with well-simulated
gaiety--much too _bon gentilhomme_ to betray rage or anguish for
pecuniary loss.
"After all," said de Finisterre, lighting his cigarette, "the uncertain
goddess could not do you much harm; the stakes were small, and your
adversary, the Prince, never goes double or quits."
"Nor I either. 'Small,' however, is a word of relative import; the
stakes might be small to you, to me large. _Entre nous, cher ami_, I am
at the end of my purse, and I have only this consolation_-I am cured of
play: not that I leave the complaint, the complaint leaves me; it can no
more feed on me than a fever can feed on a skeleton."
"Are you serious?"
"As serious as a mourner who has just buried his all."
"His all? Tut, with such an estate as Rochebriant!"
For the first time in that talk Alain's countenance became overcast.
"And how long will Rochebriant be mine? You know that I hold it at the
mercy of the mortgagee, whose interest has not been paid, and who could
if, he so pleased, issue notice, take proceedings--that--"
"Peste!" interrupted de Finisterre; "Louvier take proceedings! Louvier,
the best fellow in the world! But don't I see his handwriting on that
envelope? No doubt an invitation to dinner."
Alain took up the letter thus singled forth from a miscellany of
epistles, some in female handwritings, unsealed but ingeniously twisted
into Gordian knots--some also in female handwritings, carefully sealed--
others in ill-looking envelopes, addressed in bold, legible, clerk-like
caligraphy. Taken altogether, these epistles had a character in common;
they betokened the correspondence of a _viveur_, regarded from the female
side as young, handsome, well-born--on the male side, as a _viveur_ who
had forgotten to pay his hosier and tailor.
Louvier wrote a small, not very intelligible, but very masculine hand, as
most men who think cautiously and act promptly do write. The letter ran
thus:
"_Cher petit Marquis_" (at that commencement Alain haughtily raised his
head and bit his lips).
"_CHER PETIT MARQUIS_,--It is an age since I have seen you. No
doubt my humble soirees are too dull for a _beau seigueur_ so
courted. I forgive you. Would I were a beau seigneur at your age!
Alas! I am only a commonplace man of business, growing old, too.
Aloft from the world in which I dwell, you can scarcely be aware
that I have embarked a great part of my capital in building
speculations. There is a Rue de Louvier that runs its drains right
through my purse. I am obliged to call in the moneys due to me. My
agent informs me that I am just 7000 louis short of the total I
need--all other debts being paid in--and that there is a trifle more
than 7000 louis owned to me as interest on my hypotheque on
Rochebriant: kindly pay into his hands before the end of this week
that sum. You have been too lenient to Collot, who must owe you
more than that. Send agent to him. _Desole_ to trouble you, and am
au _desespoir_ to think that my own pressing necessities compel me
to urge you to take so much trouble. _Mais que faire_? The Rue de
Louvier stops the way, and I must leave it to my agent to clear it.
"Accept all my excuses, with the assurance of my sentiments the most
cordial. PAUL LOUVIER."
Alain tossed the letter to De Finisterre. "Read that from the best
fellow in the world."
The Chevalier laid down his cigarette and read. "_Diable_!" he said,
when he returned the letter and resumed the cigarette--"_Diable_!
Louvier must be much pressed for money, or he would not have written in
this strain. What does it matter? Collot owes you more than 7000 louis.
Let your lawyer get them, and go to sleep with both ears on your pillow."
"Ah! you think Collot can pay if he will?"
"_Ah! foi_! did not M. Gandrin tell you that M. Collot was safe to buy
your wood at more money than any one else would give?"
"Certainly," said Alain, comforted. "Gandrin left that impression on my
mind. I will set him on the man. All will come right, I dare say; but
if it does not come right, what would Louvier do?"
"Louvier do!" answered Finisterre, reflectively. "Well do you ask my
opinion and advice?"
"Earnestly, I ask."
"Honestly, then, I answer. I am a little on the Bourse myself--most
Parisians are. Louvier has made a gigantic speculation in this new
street, and with so many other irons in the fire he must want all the
money he can get at. I dare say that if you do not pay him what you owe,
he must leave it to his agent to take steps for announcing the sale of
Rochebriant. But he detests scandal; he hates the notion of being
severe; rather than that, in spite of his difficulties, he will buy
Rochebriant of you at a better price than it can command at public sale.
Sell it to him. Appeal to him to act generously, and you will flatter
him. You will get more than the old place is worth. Invest the surplus
--live as you have done, or better--and marry an heiress. Morbleu! a
Marquis de Rochebriant, if he were sixty years old, would rank high in
the matrimonial market. The more the democrats have sought to impoverish
titles and laugh down historical names, the more do rich democrat
fathers-in-law seek to decorate their daughters with titles and give
their grandchildren the heritage of historical names. You look shocked,
_pauvre anti_. Let us hope, then, that Collot will pay. Set your dog--
I mean your lawyer--at him; seize him by the throat!"
Before Alain had recovered from the stately silence with which he had
heard this very practical counsel, the valet again appeared, and ushered
in M. Frederic Lemercier.
There was no cordial acquaintance between the visitors. Lemercier was
chafed at finding himself supplanted in Alain's intimate companionship by
so new a friend, and De Finisterre affected to regard Lemercier as a
would-be exquisite of low birth and bad taste.
Alain, too, was a little discomposed at the sight of Lemercier,
remembering the wise cautious which that old college friend had wasted on
him at the commencement of his Parisian career, and smitten with vain
remorse that the cautions had been so arrogantly slighted.
It was with some timidity that he extended his hand to Frederic, and he
was surprised as well as moved by the more than usual warmth with which
it was grasped by the friend he had long neglected. Such affectionate
greeting was scarcely in keeping with the pride which characterised
Frederic Lemercier.
"Ma foi!" said the Chevalier, glancing towards the clock, "how time
flies! I had no idea it was so late. I must leave you now, my dear
Rochebriant. Perhaps we shall meet at the club later--I dine there
to-day. Au plaisir, M. Lemercier."
