gendarme appeared. For an instant it remained motionless as one of
the stone decorations of the building, then after a long sigh of
disappointment the head disappeared. The brigadier, calm and dignified
as the law he represented, passed through the crowd, without answering
the thousand questions addressed to him, and re-entered the hotel.
"Well?" asked the two gendarmes.
"Well, my boys," said the brigadier, "the brigand must really have
escaped early this morning; but we will send to the Villers-Coterets and
Noyon roads, and search the forest, when we shall catch him, no doubt."
The honorable functionary had scarcely expressed himself thus, in that
intonation which is peculiar to brigadiers of the gendarmerie, when a
loud scream, accompanied by the violent ringing of a bell, resounded
through the court of the hotel. "Ah, what is that?" cried the brigadier.
"Some traveller seems impatient," said the host. "What number was it
that rang?"
"Number 3."
"Run, waiter!" At this moment the screams and ringing were redoubled.
"Ah," said the brigadier, stopping the servant, "the person who is
ringing appears to want something more than a waiter; we will attend
upon him with a gendarme. Who occupies Number 3?"
"The little fellow who arrived last night in a post-chaise with his
sister, and who asked for an apartment with two beds." The bell here
rang for the third time, with another shriek of anguish.
"Follow me, Mr. Commissary!" said the brigadier; "tread in my steps."
"Wait an instant," said the host; "Number 3 has two staircases,--inside
and outside."
"Good," said the brigadier. "I will take charge of the inside one. Are
the carbines loaded?"
"Yes, brigadier."
"Well, you guard the exterior, and if he attempts to fly, fire upon him;
he must be a great criminal, from what the telegraph says."
The brigadier, followed by the commissary, disappeared by the inside
staircase, accompanied by the noise which his assertions respecting
Andrea had excited in the crowd. This is what had happened. Andrea had
very cleverly managed to descend two-thirds of the chimney, but then his
foot slipped, and notwithstanding his endeavors, he came into the room
with more speed and noise than he intended. It would have signified
little had the room been empty, but unfortunately it was occupied. Two
ladies, sleeping in one bed, were awakened by the noise, and fixing
their eyes upon the spot whence the sound proceeded, they saw a man.
One of these ladies, the fair one, uttered those terrible shrieks which
resounded through the house, while the other, rushing to the bell-rope,
rang with all her strength. Andrea, as we can see, was surrounded by
misfortune.
"For pity's sake," he cried, pale and bewildered, without seeing whom
he was addressing,--"for pity's sake do not call assistance! Save me!--I
will not harm you."
"Andrea, the murderer!" cried one of the ladies.
"Eugenie! Mademoiselle Danglars!" exclaimed Andrea, stupefied.
"Help, help!" cried Mademoiselle d'Armilly, taking the bell from her
companion's hand, and ringing it yet more violently. "Save me, I am
pursued!" said Andrea, clasping his hands. "For pity, for mercy's sake
do not deliver me up!"
"It is too late, they are coming," said Eugenie.
"Well, conceal me somewhere; you can say you were needlessly alarmed;
you can turn their suspicions and save my life!"
The two ladies, pressing closely to one another, and drawing the
bedclothes tightly around them, remained silent to this supplicating
voice, repugnance and fear taking possession of their minds.
"Well, be it so," at length said Eugenie; "return by the same road you
came, and we will say nothing about you, unhappy wretch."
"Here he is, here he is!" cried a voice from the landing; "here he is!
I see him!" The brigadier had put his eye to the keyhole, and had
discovered Andrea in a posture of entreaty. A violent blow from the butt
end of the musket burst open the lock, two more forced out the bolts,
and the broken door fell in. Andrea ran to the other door, leading to
the gallery, ready to rush out; but he was stopped short, and he stood
with his body a little thrown back, pale, and with the useless knife in
his clinched hand.
"Fly, then!" cried Mademoiselle d'Armilly, whose pity returned as her
fears diminished; "fly!"
"Or kill yourself!" said Eugenie (in a tone which a Vestal in the
amphitheatre would have used, when urging the victorious gladiator to
finish his vanquished adversary). Andrea shuddered, and looked on the
young girl with an expression which proved how little he understood such
ferocious honor. "Kill myself?" he cried, throwing down his knife; "why
should I do so?"
"Why, you said," answered Mademoiselle Danglars, "that you would be
condemned to die like the worst criminals."
"Bah," said Cavalcanti, crossing his arms, "one has friends."
The brigadier advanced to him, sword in hand. "Come, come," said Andrea,
"sheathe your sword, my fine fellow; there is no occasion to make such a
fuss, since I give myself up;" and he held out his hands to be manacled.
The girls looked with horror upon this shameful metamorphosis, the man
of the world shaking off his covering and appearing as a galley-slave.
Andrea turned towards them, and with an impertinent smile asked,--"Have
you any message for your father, Mademoiselle Danglars, for in all
probability I shall return to Paris?"
Eugenie covered her face with her hands. "Oh, ho!" said Andrea, "you
need not be ashamed, even though you did post after me. Was I not nearly
your husband?"
And with this raillery Andrea went out, leaving the two girls a prey to
their own feelings of shame, and to the comments of the crowd. An hour
after they stepped into their calash, both dressed in feminine attire.
The gate of the hotel had been closed to screen them from sight, but
they were forced, when the door was open, to pass through a throng of
curious glances and whispering voices. Eugenie closed her eyes; but
though she could not see, she could hear, and the sneers of the crowd
reached her in the carriage. "Oh, why is not the world a wilderness?"
she exclaimed, throwing herself into the arms of Mademoiselle d'Armilly,
her eyes sparkling with the same kind of rage which made Nero wish that
the Roman world had but one neck, that he might sever it at a single
blow. The next day they stopped at the Hotel de Flandre, at Brussels.
The same evening Andrea was incarcerated in the Conciergerie.
Chapter 99. The Law.
We have seen how quietly Mademoiselle Danglars and Mademoiselle
d'Armilly accomplished their transformation and flight; the fact being
that every one was too much occupied in his or her own affairs to think
of theirs. We will leave the banker contemplating the enormous magnitude
of his debt before the phantom of bankruptcy, and follow the baroness,
who after being momentarily crushed under the weight of the blow which
had struck her, had gone to seek her usual adviser, Lucien Debray. The
baroness had looked forward to this marriage as a means of ridding her
of a guardianship which, over a girl of Eugenie's character, could not
fail to be rather a troublesome undertaking; for in the tacit relations
which maintain the bond of family union, the mother, to maintain her
ascendancy over her daughter, must never fail to be a model of wisdom
and a type of perfection.
Now, Madame Danglars feared Eugenie's sagacity and the influence of
Mademoiselle d'Armilly; she had frequently observed the contemptuous
expression with which her daughter looked upon Debray,--an expression
which seemed to imply that she understood all her mother's amorous and
pecuniary relationships with the intimate secretary; moreover, she
saw that Eugenie detested Debray,--not only because he was a source of
dissension and scandal under the paternal roof, but because she had at
once classed him in that catalogue of bipeds whom Plato endeavors to
withdraw from the appellation of men, and whom Diogenes designated as
animals upon two legs without feathers.
Unfortunately, in this world of ours, each person views things through
a certain medium, and so is prevented from seeing in the same light as
others, and Madame Danglars, therefore, very much regretted that the
marriage of Eugenie had not taken place, not only because the match was
good, and likely to insure the happiness of her child, but because it
would also set her at liberty. She ran therefore to Debray, who, after
having like the rest of Paris witnessed the contract scene and the
scandal attending it, had retired in haste to his club, where he was
chatting with some friends upon the events which served as a subject of
conversation for three-fourths of that city known as the capital of the
world.
At the precise time when Madame Danglars, dressed in black and
concealed in a long veil, was ascending the stairs leading to Debray's
apartments,--notwithstanding the assurances of the concierge that
the young man was not at home,--Debray was occupied in repelling the
insinuations of a friend, who tried to persuade him that after the
terrible scene which had just taken place he ought, as a friend of the
family, to marry Mademoiselle Danglars and her two millions. Debray did
not defend himself very warmly, for the idea had sometimes crossed
his mind; still, when he recollected the independent, proud spirit of
Eugenie, he positively rejected it as utterly impossible, though the
same thought again continually recurred and found a resting-place in
his heart. Tea, play, and the conversation, which had become interesting
during the discussion of such serious affairs, lasted till one o'clock
in the morning.
Meanwhile Madame Danglars, veiled and uneasy, awaited the return of
Debray in the little green room, seated between two baskets of flowers,
which she had that morning sent, and which, it must be confessed, Debray
had himself arranged and watered with so much care that his absence was
half excused in the eyes of the poor woman.
At twenty minutes of twelve, Madame Danglars, tired of waiting, returned
home. Women of a certain grade are like prosperous grisettes in one
respect, they seldom return home after twelve o'clock. The baroness
returned to the hotel with as much caution as Eugenie used in leaving
it; she ran lightly up-stairs, and with an aching heart entered her
apartment, contiguous, as we know, to that of Eugenie. She was fearful
of exciting any remark, and believed firmly in her daughter's innocence
and fidelity to the paternal roof. She listened at Eugenie's door, and
hearing no sound tried to enter, but the bolts were in place. Madame
Danglars then concluded that the young girl had been overcome with the
terrible excitement of the evening, and had gone to bed and to sleep.
She called the maid and questioned her.
"Mademoiselle Eugenie," said the maid, "retired to her apartment with
Mademoiselle d'Armilly; they then took tea together, after which they
desired me to leave, saying that they needed me no longer." Since then
the maid had been below, and like every one else she thought the young
ladies were in their own room; Madame Danglars, therefore, went to bed
without a shadow of suspicion, and began to muse over the recent events.
In proportion as her memory became clearer, the occurrences of the
evening were revealed in their true light; what she had taken for
confusion was a tumult; what she had regarded as something distressing,
was in reality a disgrace. And then the baroness remembered that she had
felt no pity for poor Mercedes, who had been afflicted with as severe a
blow through her husband and son.
"Eugenie," she said to herself, "is lost, and so are we. The affair, as
it will be reported, will cover us with shame; for in a society such as
ours satire inflicts a painful and incurable wound. How fortunate that
Eugenie is possessed of that strange character which has so often
made me tremble!" And her glance was turned towards heaven, where a
mysterious providence disposes all things, and out of a fault, nay, even
a vice, sometimes produces a blessing. And then her thoughts, cleaving
through space like a bird in the air, rested on Cavalcanti. This Andrea
was a wretch, a robber, an assassin, and yet his manners showed the
effects of a sort of education, if not a complete one; he had been
presented to the world with the appearance of an immense fortune,
supported by an honorable name. How could she extricate herself from
this labyrinth? To whom would she apply to help her out of this painful
situation? Debray, to whom she had run, with the first instinct of a
woman towards the man she loves, and who yet betrays her,--Debray could
but give her advice, she must apply to some one more powerful than he.
The baroness then thought of M. de Villefort. It was M. de Villefort who
had remorselessly brought misfortune into her family, as though they
had been strangers. But, no; on reflection, the procureur was not a
merciless man; and it was not the magistrate, slave to his duties, but
the friend, the loyal friend, who roughly but firmly cut into the very
core of the corruption; it was not the executioner, but the surgeon, who
wished to withdraw the honor of Danglars from ignominious association
with the disgraced young man they had presented to the world as their
son-in-law. And since Villefort, the friend of Danglars, had acted in
this way, no one could suppose that he had been previously acquainted
with, or had lent himself to, any of Andrea's intrigues. Villefort's
conduct, therefore, upon reflection, appeared to the baroness as
