“When my husband married me I had nothing but my name and myself. My name alone was to him a treasure by which his wealth paled. What fortune can compare with a great name? My fortune was my beauty, virtue, happy temper, birth, and breeding. Can money buy these gifts? If Natalie’s father could hear this discussion, his magnanimous spirit would be grieved forever, and his happiness would be marred in Paradise. I spent millions of francs, foolishly I daresay, without his ever frowning even. Since his death I have been economical and thrifty by comparison with the life he liked me to lead. Let this end it! Monsieur de Manerville is so dejected that I—”
No words can represent the confusion and excitement produced by this exclamation “end it!” It is enough to say that these four well-bred persons all talked at once.
“In Spain you marry Spanish fashion, as you will; but in France, you marry French fashion—rationally, and as you can,” said Mathias.
“Ah, madame,” Paul began, rousing himself from his stupor, “you are mistaken in my feelings—”
“This is not a question of feelings,” said the old man, anxious to stop his client; “this is business affecting three generations. Was it we who made away with the missing millions—we, who merely ask to clear up the difficulties of which we are innocent?”
“Let us marry without further haggling,” said Solonet.
“Haggling! Haggling! Do you call it haggling to defend the interests of the children and of their father and mother?” cried Mathias.
“Yes,” Paul went on, addressing his mother-in-law, “I deplore the recklessness of my youth, which now hinders my closing this discussion with a word, as much as you deplore your ignorance of business-matters and involuntary extravagance. God be my witness that at this moment I am not thinking of myself; a quiet life at Lanstrac has no terrors for me; but Mademoiselle Natalie would have to give up her tastes and habits. That would alter our whole existence.”
“But where did Evangelista find his millions?” said the widow.
“Monsieur Evangelista was a man of business, he played the great game of commerce, he loaded ships and made considerable sums; we are a landed proprietor, our capital is sunk, and our income more or less fixed,” the old lawyer replied.
“Still, there is a way out of the difficulty,” said Solonet, speaking in a high-pitched key, and silencing the other three by attracting their attention and their eyes.
The young man was like a dexterous coachman who, holding the reins of a four-in-hand, amuses himself by lashing and, at the same time, holding in the team. He spurred their passions and soothed them by turns, making Paul foam in his harness, for to him life and happiness were in the balance; and his client as well, for she did not see her way through the intricacies of the dispute.
“Madame Evangelista may, this very day, hand over the securities in the five percents, and sell this house. Sold in lots, it will fetch three hundred thousand francs. Madame will pay you one hundred and fifty thousand francs. Thus, madame will pay down nine hundred and fifty thousand francs at once. Though this is not all she owes her daughter, can you find many fortunes to match it in France?”
“Well and good,” said Mathias; “but what is madame to live on?” At this question, which implied assent, Solonet said within himself:
“Oh, ho! old fox, so you are caught.”
“Madame?” he said aloud. “Madame will keep the fifty thousand crowns left of the price of the house. That sum, added to the sale of her furniture, can be invested in an annuity, and will give her twenty thousand francs a year. Monsieur le Comte will arrange for her to live with him. Lanstrac is a large place. You have a good house in Paris,” he went on, addressing Paul, “so madame your mother-in-law can live with you wherever you are. A widow who, having no house to keep up, has twenty thousand francs a year, is better off than madame was when she was mistress of all her fortune. Madame Evangelista has no one to care for but her daughter; Monsieur le Comte also stands alone; your heirs are in the distant future, there is no fear of conflicting interests.
“A son-in-law and a mother-in-law under such circumstances always join to form one household. Madame Evangelista will make up for the deficit of capital by paying a quota out of her annuity which will help towards the housekeeping. We know her to be too generous, too large-minded, to live as a charge on her children.
“Thus, you may live happy and united with a hundred thousand francs a year to spend—a sufficient income, surely, Monsieur le Comte, to afford you, in any country, all the comforts of life and the indulgence of your fancies?—And, believe me, young married people often feel the need of a third in the household. Now, I ask you, what third can be more suitable than an affectionate, good mother?”
Paul, as he listened to Solonet, thought he heard the voice of an angel. He looked at Mathias to see if he did not share his admiration for Solonet’s fervid eloquence; for he did not know that, under the assumed enthusiasm of impassioned words, notaries, like attorneys, hide the cold and unremitting alertness of the diplomatist.
“A petty Paradise!” said the old man.
Bewildered by his client’s delight, Mathias sat down on an ottoman, resting his head on one hand, lost in evidently grieved meditations. He knew too well the ponderous phrases in which men of business purposely shroud their tricks, and he was not the man to be duped by them. He stole a glance at
