“Take my arm and come defiantly with me; I can find your carriage,” said he.
“Will you finish the evening with me?” she replied, as she got into her carriage and made room for him by her side.
La Palférine said to his groom, “Follow Madame’s carriage,” and got in with Madame de Rochefide, to Calyste’s amazement. He was left standing, planted on his feet as though they were made of lead, for it was on seeing him looking pale and blank that Béatrix had invited the young Count to accompany her. Every dove is a Robespierre in white feathers.
Three carriages arrived together at the Rue de Courcelles with lightning swiftness—Calyste’s, la Palférine’s, and the Marquise’s.
“So you are here?” said Béatrix, on going into her drawing-room leaning on the young Count’s arm, and finding Calyste already there, his horse having outdistanced the other two carriages.
“So yon are acquainted with this gentleman?” said Calyste to Béatrix with suppressed fury.
“Monsieur le Comte de la Palférine was introduced to me by Nathan ten days ago,” said Béatrix; “and you, monsieur, have known me for four years—”
“And I am ready, madame,” said la Palférine, “to make Madame d’Espard repent of having been the first to turn her back on you—down to her grandchildren—”
“Oh, it was she?” cried Béatrix. “I will pay her out.”
“If you want to be revenged, you must win back your husband, but I am prepared to bring him back to you,” said la Palférine in her ear.
The conversation thus begun was carried on till two in the morning, without giving Calyste an opportunity of speaking two words apart to Béatrix, who constantly kept his rage in subjection by her glances. La Palférine, who was not in love with her, was as superior in good taste, wit, and charm as Calyste was beneath himself; writhing on his seat like a worm cut in two, and thrice starting to his feet with an impulse to stop la Palférine. The third time that Calyste flew at his rival, the Count said, “Are you in pain, monsieur?” in a tone that made Calyste sit down on the nearest chair, and remain as immovable as an image.
The Marquise chatted with the light ease of a Célimène, ignoring Calyste’s presence. La Palférine was so supremely clever as to depart on a last witty speech, leaving the two lovers at war.
Thus, by Maxime’s skill, the flames of discord were raging in the divided households of Monsieur and Madame de Rochefide.
On the morrow, having heard from la Palférine, at the Jockey Club, where the young Count was playing whist with great profit, of the success of the scene he had plotted, Maxime went to the Hôtel Schontz to ascertain how Aurélie was managing her affairs.
“My dear fellow,” cried Madame Schontz, laughing as she saw him, “I am at my wits’ end. I am closing my career with the discovery that it is a misfortune to be clever.”
“Explain your meaning.”
“In the first place, my dear friend, I kept my Arthur for a week on a regimen of kicking his shins, with the most patriotic old stories and the most unpleasant discipline known in our profession. ‘You are ill,’ said he with fatherly mildness, ‘for I have never been anything but kind to you, and I perfectly adore you.’—‘You have one fault, my dear,’ said I; ‘you bore me.’—‘Well, but have you not all the cleverest men and the handsomest young fellows in Paris to amuse you?’ said the poor man. I was shut up. Then I felt that I loved him.”
“Hah!” said Maxime.
“What is to be done? These ways are too much for us; it is impossible to resist them. Then I changed the stop; I made eyes at that wild boar of a lawyer, my future husband, as great a sheep now as Arthur; I made him sit there in Rochefide’s armchair, and I thought him a perfect fool. How bored I was!—But, of course, I had to keep Fabien there that we might be discovered together—”
“Well,” cried Maxime, “get on with your story! When Rochefide found you together, what next?”
“You would never guess, my good fellow. By your instructions the banns are published, the marriage contract is being drawn, Notre-Dame de Lorette is out of court. When it is a case of matrimony, something may be paid on account. —When he found us together, Fabien and me, poor Arthur stole off on tiptoe to the dining-room, and began growling and clearing his throat and knocking the chairs about. That great gaby Fabien, to whom I cannot tell everything, was frightened, and that, my dear Maxime, is the point we have reached.—Why, if Arthur should find the couple of us some morning on coming into my room, he is capable of saying, ‘Have you had a pleasant night, children?’ ”
Maxime nodded his head, and for some minutes sat twirling his cane.
“I know the sort of man,” said he. “This is what you must do; there is no help for it but to throw Arthur out the window and keep the door tightly shut. You must begin again the same scene with Fabien—”
“How intolerable! For, after all, you see, the sacrament has not yet blessed me with virtue. …”
“You must contrive to catch Arthur’s eye when he finds you together,” Maxime went on; “if he gets angry, there is an end of the matter. If he only growls
