Part 3
Monsieur de Latour, in the August afternoon, walked along the grand promenade, gay with elegant-looking women and well-dressed men sitting at tables, chatting, drinking tea, and eating ices, the blue air vibrant with music from the band, and over all that atmosphere of pleasurable excitement which seems to belong to Dinard. It occurred to him that he might find Madame de Beauregard among the crowd of pleasure-seekers.
He did not, however, see her until a well-directed chocolate bonbon hit him in the back. He turned around, and there at a table sat Madame de Beauregard, Eugène de Contiac, and a small, sunburned military man, whom Monsieur de Latour recognised at once as General Granier, who had been a lady-killer fifty years before at the republican court of Louis Napoleon. He was beautifully dyed and made up, elaborately and very youthfully dressed, and wore an orchid in his buttonhole. It occurred to Monsieur de Latour that the old general and Madame de Beauregard matched each other as well as the Dresden figures of Daphnis, the shepherd, and Chloe, the shepherdess. But there was nothing rural about either of them, especially Madame de Beauregard. She was much nearer Chloe’s age than Monsieur de Latour; that is, if she could be said to be of any age, for the brightness of her eye, the quickness of her hand, the overflowing vitality which bubbled forth, were more like sixteen than sixty.
She was evidently in the midst of a roaring flirtation with the general, and their remarks were so free that poor Eugène de Contiac, by nature as pious and modest as a girl, sat and hung his head in embarrassment. Eugène was neat, precise, clean-shaven, and not ill-looking, but persons not so gay even as Madame de Beauregard might have seen in him a slight superfluity of goodness and correctness.
Monsieur de Latour, considering the chocolate bonbon thrown at him as an invitation, advanced, and Madame de Beauregard greeted him rapturously. Eugène de Contiac, thinking this a good moment to escape from bad company, promptly offered Monsieur de Latour his chair and was sneaking off, but was caught by Madame de Beauregard and dragged back by his coat-tails.
“Oh, you delicious old soap-boiler!” she cried to Monsieur de Latour, holding on meanwhile with one hand to Eugène de Contiac, “I am so glad to see you. Now, Eugène, sit down. Monsieur de Latour will fetch himself a chair”--which he promptly did--“and try to learn something from the conversation of two such men as General Granier and Monsieur de Latour, who, I dare say, only wants a chance to kick up his heels with the rest of us at Dinard. You see,” cried this terrible old lady, whisking herself into an attitude by which she thoroughly displayed her small and pretty feet in a pair of silk stockings more daring than those she had worn in the morning, and flouncing out her skirts so as to show a wonderful lace and chiffon petticoat, “you see, Eugène still has pious inclinations. I can’t get that out of him, but if he ever becomes permanently pious and correct he sha’n’t have a franc of my money, and he knows it. I like a man with life in him, like you, General Granier, and you, my rural friend.” And at this she actually pinched Monsieur de Latour on the arm in full sight of a thousand persons.
But to be pinched publicly by a comtesse of one of the greatest families in France was an honour that flooded Monsieur de Latour’s soul with joy. He wished to say something impudent in reply, but could think of nothing more original than to ask after Madame de Beauregard’s health.
“It is perfect, thank you,” replied the old lady. “My back is not a day over twenty-five, my head is about fifteen, and as for my le-- What are you winking and blinking at me for, Eugène?” she snapped, turning around on that unfortunate young man.
Monsieur de Latour, apprehending what Madame de Beauregard meant to say, hastened to interrupt.
“And Mademoiselle de Brésac, whom I reckon it a privilege to call my ward?”
“Oh, she’s in the country!” Madame de Beauregard answered, again falling foul of the luckless Eugène. “This fellow has been doing rather better in the last few months. He has been tipsy three or four times, has been going to some of the gayest theatres in Paris, and has given up reading Bossuet’s sermons. I thought I should never cure him of that abominable practice of sermon-reading, but the last time I caught him at it I cut down his allowance five hundred francs the month, and it acted like a charm. Money is a great persuader. I brought him down here for the benefit of General Granier’s society, who has promised to teach him a few things; and, as neither one of them returned to the hotel until two o’clock this morning, I am in hopes that Eugène is reforming.”
Eugène, with a hangdog countenance, listened to all of this, apprehending that every word would be repeated to Mélanie.
“But I had a very difficult time of it,” put in General Granier. “I took him to the theatre, and I almost had to drag him behind the scenes, and when one of the young ladies of the ballet made at him, out he ran for his life, and much too fast for a man with an artificial leg, like myself, to catch him.”
Madame de Beauregard whirled around on Eugène.
“And is that the way you see life?” she cried indignantly. “Well, I always said I was the only man in the family. All of my brothers and nephews are like boarding-school misses. My husband, poor man, was entirely too good for this world.”
“Not a gay dog in the lot except yourself,” impudently remarked General Granier, and was rewarded by a kiss airily blown at him from Madame de Beauregard’s little withered hand.
Monsieur de Latour, although somewhat frightened, enjoyed this extremely. It was a great deal more lively than drinking tea in the garden with Mademoiselle Cheri and Mélanie.
“I don’t see,” he said, “why our young friend objects to dancing the quadrille of life to a lively air. Perhaps I can assist you, madame, in educating him.”
Poor Eugène shuddered.
“I shall be a million times obliged to you, my dear man,” promptly replied Madame de Beauregard, pulling up her skirt higher and showing so much of her chiffon petticoat that Monsieur de Latour was seriously alarmed. “But I know what ails Eugène. He is in love with your niece--charming girl, and I should not have the least objection to her if she would only be as gay as I am. But she won’t, and won’t let Eugène be. So I have told him frankly--for I am a very frank person, as you know--that he may have Mélanie and be pious and not get a single sou from me, or he can be a man, as I reckon men to be, and I will leave him five hundred thousand francs. No proposition could be fairer.”
“I wish I could get five hundred thousand francs on the same terms,” remarked the old general, with a couple of winks.
“Oh, I should not have the slightest trouble with you!” replied Madame de Beauregard gaily.
“Really, it seems to me,” said Monsieur de Latour, jealous of the attentions which the general was receiving, “it would be easy enough for anybody. I always liked a gay life myself, and I could tell you some of my experiences, madame”--here old De Latour assumed a mysterious air--“which I am afraid would frighten you very much.”
“Then pray go on,” cried this terrible old lady, “and tell us the worst.”
But Monsieur de Latour, whose experiences were really exceedingly mild, felt ashamed to speak of them before two such accomplished sinners as Madame de Beauregard and General Granier. They were, however, a pair of merry old grigs, but Monsieur de Latour felt, as well as saw, that Madame de Beauregard, for all her kittenishness, was really a very great lady and not without kindness of heart.
Poor Eugène sat, the image of woe, his countenance lighted up by an occasional sickly grin at the daring sallies of Madame de Beauregard, to which General Granier promptly responded in kind, and which Monsieur de Latour vainly endeavoured to surpass. He hit upon a lucky subject, however. Madame de Beauregard speaking of her possible intention to buy a villa at Dinard, Monsieur de Latour, mentioned, with a magniloquent air, his recently acquired relationship to Louis Victor de Latour, of the Chateau of Montplaisir.
“I think I know that young man,” cried Madame de Beauregard. “A delightful young scamp, as impudent as they make them. He came near kissing me at Algiers, a couple of years ago. Now, Monsieur de Latour, I think it would be a good idea for you to repair and refurnish the Chateau of Montplaisir. Oh, what a name! What pleasure we could have there!”
This plan, recommended by a woman of Madame de Beauregard’s rank and consequence, immediately appeared highly desirable to Monsieur de Latour.
“It would be quite possible,” he said, meditating, “to patch up the roof of the best wing, put in windows, and get some furniture into the place in a week or two. Money can annihilate time and distance.”
“Then do it!” cried Madame de Beauregard, pinching his ear, to the delight of the passers-by, who reckoned Madame de Beauregard as among the peep-shows of Dinard.
“And if I can make the place habitable, you will probably do me and my kinsman the honour of becoming our guest?” Monsieur de Latour said grandly. “And may I also count upon the presence of Mademoiselle de Brésac? By the way, is she in the neighbourhood of Dinard?”
“Oh, yes!” answered Madame de Beauregard, suddenly becoming interested in poor Eugène de Contiac’s hair. “She is staying at a convent at Saint Malo. Eugène, why do you wear your hair plastered down in that sanctimonious manner?”
“But I thought you said Mademoiselle de Brésac was in the country?” inquired Monsieur de Latour, anxious to establish his association with such great people as the De Brésacs and De Beauregards.
“So she is! so she is! The next thing, Eugène, you will be taken for a clergyman, and I shall be forever disgraced. I have had a great many milksops in my family, but so far I have been spared a clergyman.”
The party remained together a half-hour longer, and consumed several ices and some very expensive wine before they rose from the table, and Madame de Beauregard made a triumphal circuit of the grand promenade, with Monsieur de Latour on one side of her and General Granier on the other, while the unfortunate Eugène, with a carriage-load of wraps, parasol, fan, books, and other impedimenta, brought up the rear. For a man with an artificial leg, General Granier walked remarkably well, and Monsieur de Latour was electrified by Madame de Beauregard making minute inquiries as to how the chassepot rifle in the general’s leg worked.
“Beautifully!” cried the old gentleman with enthusiasm. “I keep a record of my target practice and can hit the bull’s-eye five times out of seven at forty paces.”
Then, seeing Monsieur de Latour was completely mystified, General Granier continued, lifting up his right leg, which, apparently, was a perfectly normal right leg with correctly fitting trousers and a well-made shoe.
“Do you see that leg?” he asked critically. “The real one is buried on the field of Gravelotte, but this one is twice as good. I had it fitted with a rifle-barrel and trigger here in my pocket.”
The general slapped his pocket, and Monsieur de Latour then noticed, as General Granier lifted up the heel of the boot, a small round hole which was evidently the end of the rifle-barrel.
“Well, every man must have his hobby, and mine is to shoot as well with my right leg as most men can do with their right hands. Come to see me some morning, monsieur, and I will give an exhibition that will make your hair stand on end.”
Monsieur de Latour’s hair already stood on end at this.
“Now,” cried Madame de Beauregard triumphantly, “are you surprised that I adore General Granier? Think of a man having the pluck and ingenuity to make a gun out of his leg!”
General Granier showed his appreciation of this compliment by pirouetting on his left leg, without any regard to the crowd of laughing sightseers, for he, like Madame de Beauregard, had been one of the monuments at Dinard for years.
“You see how delightfully gay we are,” cried Madame de Beauregard to Monsieur de Latour, when they resumed their walk. “Now, do have that old rookery of Montplaisir done up, and then we will all come and pay you a visit.”
“I shall endeavour to do so,” replied Monsieur de Latour gallantly.
The party escorted Madame de Beauregard to her hotel. Once or twice more Monsieur de Latour tried to find out something about Julie de Brésac, but as every mention of her name brought down maledictions upon the unlucky Eugène, Monsieur de Latour abandoned the subject after Madame de Beauregard had informed him that Julie had all the life, spirit, and gaiety which her cousin, Eugène de Contiac, ought to have had but hadn’t.
Monsieur de Latour took his way home meditating deeply. These two persons, Madame de Beauregard and General Granier, were of his period, though actually older than he, and yet life was full of gaiety and sparkling pleasures for them. He began to think that in the higher classes youth lasted longer than in the middle classes. He had been reckoned an old fogy even at Brionville, and Mademoiselle Cheri had a way of assuming that he was an antiquated person who had no longer any right to the fantasies or the follies of youth, and this was extremely distasteful to Monsieur de Latour, who had a taste for both fantasies and follies. He almost decided to marry Madame de Beauregard, provided, of course, that she would take him; but what man lives who does not in his secret heart believe that he can get any woman he wants, for the asking?
IV
THE PLOT THICKENS
The next morning, bright and early, Monsieur de Latour presented himself at the Chateau of Montplaisir. He proposed to Louis that a large force of workmen should be put in immediately to make one wing of the old place habitable.
“For, to tell you the truth, my dear nephew,” he said confidentially, “it would add immensely to my consequence to be able to date my letters from the Chateau of Montplaisir, and I don’t mind spending twenty or thirty thousand francs for that purpose.”
“My precious uncle!” was Louis’s only reply, endeavouring to clasp in his arms Monsieur de Latour.
But his first embrace had been fraught with so much danger to Monsieur de Latour’s ribs that the old gentleman fought him off, and Louis was reduced, as usual, to embracing the hat and umbrella.
“I could very easily telegraph to Paris for workmen,” continued Monsieur de Latour. “I could have fifty in here within twenty-four hours, and the materials could be had at Dinard. Fifty workmen ought to be able to make one wing habitable certainly within a fortnight.”
“My beloved uncle,” answered Louis, “you may have the whole chateau repaired at your expense if you desire. No one shall call me mean in that particular.”
“And as for furniture and tapestries, if an order were placed in Paris to-day it could be filled within forty-eight hours.”
“You are at perfect liberty to order furniture amounting to a million francs, if you like, also at your own expense, and Gobelins tapestries in any quantities you may wish. You will find me the most accommodating person in the world in these matters as long as you foot the bill.”
“And pictures--we must have some pictures to hide those discoloured walls.”
“Pray decorate them with old masters at five hundred thousand francs each, or if you prefer the moderns, buy a few Munkácsys, Corots, Détailles, or anything you like, provided they are good and very expensive. I place no limit upon you in that respect.”
“Really,” sarcastically answered Monsieur de Latour, “you are too good. I don’t contemplate spending my whole fortune in fitting up one wing of this establishment.”
“I shall put no obstacles in your way, if you do,” said Louis with the utmost amiability.
“I am afraid, young man, you don’t know very much about business.”
“Of course not. I am a De Latour, and if you wish to be taken for a scion of this noble house you must forget all about business--that is, as soon as you have conveyed to me the three hundred thousand francs which you have promised.”
Monsieur de Latour looked solemnly at Louis and then winked his left eye.
“I am a De Latour,” he said, “but I sha’n’t forget all about business. Don’t think that I am dipping into my principal or even hampering myself seriously in spending thirty or forty thousand francs of my income on this chateau. It is difficult to spend much in a small provincial place like Brionville. My income has been steadily accumulating for the past twenty years, and this is my first fling.”
Monsieur de Latour, however, being practical even in his follies, then proceeded to unfold his projects to Louis as they sat together at the rickety table in what Louis with much solemnity called the grand saloon. Plans were discussed, estimates were made, which provided for the expenditure of a considerable sum of money, but by no means foolishly or recklessly. Monsieur de Latour accompanied Louis through each room of the wing to be repaired. He selected his own apartments, a bedroom and a study.
“Not that I am what is called a reading man,” he explained, “but it sounds well to have a study. I have had an office all my life until now at Brionville. I can bring my servants on from home and get others here.”
All the time Louis had been asking subtle questions meant to discover how much Monsieur de Latour knew or would tell about Julie de Brésac, but without success, until Monsieur de Latour, returning to the grand saloon, squared himself off and said in a grandiose manner:
“My object in hurrying things up is that I may entertain as my guests the Comtesse de Beauregard and her niece, Mademoiselle de Brésac, of whom I spoke yesterday, and General Granier. You see, my young friend, I am not without grand acquaintances.”
“Of course not,” replied Louis. “You have known me since yesterday.”
“I mean other than yourself.”
“And what did you say was the name of Madame de Beauregard’s niece--Mademoiselle de Marsac?” asked Louis artlessly, meaning to throw Monsieur de Latour off the scent.
“De Brésac. She is in the country, or in a convent, or at St. Malo, or in Paris, or in half a dozen other places. I don’t know which. I could not get any satisfactory information concerning her out of Madame de Beauregard, and it seemed to exasperate her every time I asked about Julie.”
Louis walked to the window.
“But she is coming to the chateau, is she not?” he asked, turning around.
“Oh, yes! She is young and pretty, I understand, and I like youth and beauty. The fact is, I have not yet made up my mind whether I shall marry youth and beauty, age and rank, or”--remembering Séline Cheri--“middle age and merit.”
“I know which I shall marry,” answered Louis stoutly. “Youth and beauty, love and rapture, smiles and kisses.”
Monsieur de Latour then rose to go.
“I hope, my dear nephew-to-be,” he said, smiling, “that you will call upon my niece, Mademoiselle Mélanie Dupont, who is shortly to become your cousin. But although she has youth and beauty already, and kisses and smiles in store, they are not for you, but for that very piously inclined nephew of Madame de Beauregard, of whom I spoke--Eugène de Contiac. I am afraid you would be too gay for my niece. She is, as I mentioned, staying under the charge of Mademoiselle Cheri, my old friend, at the Villa Rose. But don’t go to kissing and embracing them as you do me.”
“Neither of them contemplates giving me three hundred thousand francs,” interrupted Louis. “I insist that it shall be made a part of our agreement that I shall be permitted to embrace you at least three times a day. You can get your life insured, you know. I shall do myself the honour and pleasure of calling this very afternoon upon Mademoiselle Cheri and my cousin, Mademoiselle Mélanie, whom I shall be proud to acknowledge as a relative.”
The arrangements took up all of the forenoon and much of the afternoon, and instead of turning up at the Villa Rose punctually at five o’clock for tea, as was his habit, Monsieur de Latour was, at that time, in the telegraph office sending and receiving despatches concerning work on the Chateau of Montplaisir.
But meanwhile Louis de Latour appeared at the villa to pay his respects to the ladies, quite unconscious of a strange and fortuitous meeting which was ahead of him.
A little before five o’clock Louis rang the bell of the villa, and was ushered through a gateway into a beautiful garden at the back, where, at their tea-table in a little grassy place almost surrounded by ancient rose-trees in the last blooming of summer, Mademoiselle Cheri and Mélanie received their guests in the afternoons. The air was soft and fragrant with the late blown roses, and the sunlight in unclouded splendour lay over land and sea. As Louis walked along the shady garden path to where the tea-table stood, the graceful figure of a girl, dressed modestly in black, was preceding him through the mazes of the shrubbery. One look sufficed. It was Julie de Brésac. Louis felt a shock of delight, rushed after her, and they met, unseen by other eyes, in a sweet and odorous solitude formed by a circle of rose-trees. Louis seized Julie’s hand, and she turned on him two sweet, dark eyes and a charming face all dimpling with smiles. There was pure delight in her glance.
“I did not expect to meet you here,” she said with pretty gravity, seating herself on a garden-chair and arranging her black draperies gracefully around her.
“And I did not expect to meet you here, mademoiselle,” answered Louis in rapture. “I suppose you have come, as I have, to call upon Mademoiselle Cheri and Mademoiselle Dupont, the niece of my benefactor, Monsieur de Latour. O mademoiselle, what a budget I have to unpack for you!”
“That will keep,” replied Julie hurriedly, raising her hand in a warning gesture. “But you are not to know that I am here nor to recognise me in the least, until we are introduced.”
What madcap prank had Julie now in her pretty head? thought Louis; for Julie was a madcap and given to pranks, and those which did not come of themselves into her head Madame de Beauregard was tolerably certain to put there, and this Louis expressed in guarded language. Suddenly it flashed upon him, the escapade which Julie proposed entering upon with Monsieur de Latour, and Julie herself confirmed this by whispering to him, as she opened her dainty black parasol so as to conceal her laughing face:
“You know, I have never seen Monsieur de Latour, who is the trustee of my property, but I happen to know that he has arrived at Dinard with his niece, Mélanie, and my cousin Eugène adores that girl. I also found out that Monsieur de Latour was advertising for a companion for Mélanie; so it came into my head and that of my aunt that I would take a look at my trustee without telling him who I am. So I have replied to the advertisement, and I am here to-day to be inspected for the position of companion.”
Julie said this with a dangerous demureness. Louis had discovered, in those radiant days at Algiers, that Julie was never perfectly serious unless she was bent on mischief.
“But, mademoiselle,” he said, “although Monsieur de Latour may not have mentioned it in his advertisement, he wishes a serious and settled person as companion, or rather chaperon, for Mademoiselle Mélanie. That much I know, although I met Monsieur de Latour only yesterday morning.”
“Am I not a serious and settled person?” asked Julie, tapping her little shoe with the end of her parasol. “At least am I not as serious and settled as you are?”
“Perhaps so, mademoiselle,” answered Louis, smiling. “I am afraid that both of us are a little intoxicated with the new wine of life which we are drinking.”