On this, Maître Solonet came out of the inner room and interrupted his senior with a speech that restored Paul to life. Overwhelmed by the recollection of his own devoted speeches and lover-like attitude, Paul knew not how to withdraw or to modify them; he only longed to fling himself into some yawning gulf.
“There is a way of releasing Madame Evangelista from her debt to her daughter,” said the young lawyer with airy ease. “Madame Evangelista holds securities for forty thousand francs yearly in five percents; the capital will soon be at par, if not higher; we may call it eight hundred thousand francs. This house and garden are worth certainly two hundred thousand. Granting this, madame may, under the marriage contract, transfer the securities and title-deeds to her daughter, reserving only the life-interest, for I cannot suppose that the Count wishes to leave his mother-in-law penniless. Though madame has spent her own fortune, she will thus restore her daughter’s, all but a trifling sum.”
“Women are most unfortunate when they do not understand business,” said Madame Evangelista. “I have securities and title-deeds? What in the world are they?”
Paul was enraptured as he heard this proposal. The old lawyer, seeing the snare spread and his client with one foot already caught in it, stood petrified, saying to himself:
“I believe we are being tricked!”
“If madame takes my advice, she will at least secure peace,” the younger man went on. “If she sacrifices herself, at least she will not be worried by the young people. Who can foresee who will live or die?—Monsieur le Comte will then sign a release for the whole sum due to Mademoiselle Evangelista out of her father’s fortune.”
Mathias could not conceal the wrath that sparkled in his eyes and crimsoned his face. “A sum of?” he asked, trembling with indignation.
“Of one million one hundred and fifty-six thousand francs, according to the deed—”
“Why do you not ask Monsieur le Comte hic et nunc to renounce all claims on his wife’s fortune?” said Mathias. “It would be more straightforward.—Well, Monsieur le Comte de Manerville’s ruin shall not be accomplished under my eyes. I beg to withdraw.”
He went a step towards the door, to show his client that the matter was really serious. But he turned back, and addressing Madame Evangelista, he said:
“Do not suppose, madame, that I imagine you to be in collusion with my colleague in his ideas. I believe you to be an honest woman—a fine lady, who knows nothing of business.”
“Thank you, my dear sir!” retorted Solonet.
“You know that there is no question of offence among lawyers,” said Mathias.—“But at least, madame, let me explain to you the upshot of this bargain. You are still young enough and handsome enough to marry again. Oh, dear me!” he went on, in reply to a gesture of the lady’s, “who can answer for the future?”
“I never thought, monsieur,” said she, “that after seven years of widowhood in the prime of life, and after refusing some splendid offers for my daughter’s sake, I should, at nine-and-thirty, be thought capable of such madness.—If we were not discussing business, I should regard such a speech as an impertinence.”
“Would it not be a greater impertinence to assume that you could not remarry?”
“Can and will are very different words,” said Solonet, with a gallant flourish.
“Well,” said Mathias, “we need not talk about your marrying. You may—and we all hope you will—live for five-and-forty years yet. Now, since you are to retain your life-interest in the income left by Monsieur Evangelista as long as you live, must your children dine with Duke Humphrey?”
“What is the meaning of it all?” said the widow. “Who is Duke Humphrey, and what is life-interest?”
Solonet, a speaker of elegance and taste, began to laugh.
“I will translate,” said the old man: “If your children wish to be prudent, they will think of the future. To think of the future means to save half one’s income, supposing there are no more than two children, who must first have a good education, and then a handsome marriage portion. Thus, your daughter and her husband will be reduced to living on twenty thousand francs a year when they have each been accustomed to spend fifty thousand while unmarried. And even that is nothing. My client will be expected to hand over to his children in due course eleven hundred thousand francs as their share of their mother’s fortune, and he will never have received any of it if his wife should die and madame survive her—which is quite possible. In all conscience, is not this to throw himself into the Gironde, tied hand and foot? You wish to see Mademoiselle Natalie made happy? If she loves her husband—which no lawyer allows himself to doubt—she will share his troubles. Madame, I foresee enough to make her die of grief, for she will be miserably poor. Yes, madame, miserably poor; for it is poverty to those who require a hundred thousand francs a year to be reduced to twenty thousand. If love should lead Monsieur le Comte into extravagance, his wife would reduce him to beggary by claiming her share in the event of any disaster.
“I am arguing for your sake, for theirs, for that of their children—for all parties.”
“The good man has certainly delivered a broadside,” thought Solonet, with a glance at his client, as much as to say, “Come on!”
“There is a way of reconciling all these interests,” replied Madame Evangelista. “I may reserve only such a small allowance as may enable me to go into a convent, and you will become at once possessed of all my property. I will renounce the world if my death to it will secure my daughter’s happiness.”
“Madame,” said the old man, “let us take time for mature consideration of the steps that may smooth away all difficulties.”
“Bless me, my dear sir,” cried Madame Evangelista, who foresaw that by delay she would be lost, “all has been considered. I did not know what marriage meant
