Baron Trigault's Vengeance [150]
but is ever tormented by a terrible thirst for bustle and excitement; whose head is empty, and whose heart is dry--the woman who only exists for the world; and who is devoured by unappeasable covetousness, and who, at times, envies an actress's liberty, and the notoriety of the leaders of the demi- monde; the woman who is always in quest of fresh excitement, and fails to find it; the woman who is blase, and prematurely old in mind and body, and who yet still clings despairingly to her fleeting youth.
Inaccessible to any emotion but vanity, the baroness had never shed a tear over her husband's sufferings. She was sure of her absolute power over him. What did the rest matter? She even gloried in her knowledge that she could make this man--who loved her in spite of everything--at one moment furious with rage or wild with grief, and then an instant afterward plunge him into the rapture of a senseless ecstasy by a word, a smile, or a caress. For such was her power, and she often exercised it mercilessly. Even after the frightful scene that Pascal had witnessed, she had made another appeal to the baron, and he had been weak enough to give her the thirty thousand francs which M. de Coralth needed to purchase his wife's silence.
However, this time the baroness trembled. Her usual shrewdness had not deserted her, and she perfectly understood all that Marguerite's presence in that house portended. Since her husband brought this young girl--her daughter--to her he must know everything, and have taken some fatal resolution. Had she, indeed, exhausted the patience which she had fancied inexhaustible? She was not ignorant of the fact that her husband had disposed of his immense fortune in a way that would enable him to say and prove that he was insolvent whenever occasion required; and if he found courage to apply for a legal separation, what could she hope to obtain from the courts? A bare living, almost nothing. In such a case, how could she exist? She would be compelled to spend her last years in the same poverty that had made her youth so wretched. She saw herself--ah! what a frightful misfortune--turfed out of her princely home, and reduced to furnished apartments rented for five hundred francs a year!
Mademoiselle Marguerite was no less startled and horror-stricken than Madame Trigault, and she stood rooted to the spot, exactly where the baron had left her. Silent and motionless, they confronted each other for a moment which seemed a century to both of them. The resemblance--which had astonished Pascal could not fail to strike them, for it was still more noticeable now that they stood face to face. But anything was preferable to this torturing suspense, and so, summoning all her courage, the baroness broke the silence by saying: "You are the daughter of the Count de Chalusse?"
"I think so, but I have no proofs of it."
"And--your mother?"
"I don't know her; madame, and I have no desire to know her."
Disconcerted by this brief but implacable reply, Madame Trigault hung her head.
"What could I have to say to my mother?" continued Marguerite. "That I hate her? My courage would fail me to do so. And yet, how can I think without bitterness of the woman who, after abandoning me herself, endeavored to deprive me of my father's love and protection? I could have forgiven anything but that. Ah! I have not always been so patient and resigned! The laws of our country do not forbid illigitimate children to search for their parents, and more than once I have said to myself that I would discover my mother, and have my revenge."
"But you have no means of discovering her?"
"In this you are greatly mistaken, madame. After the Count de Chalusse's death, a package of letters, a glove and some withered flowers were found in one of the drawers of his escritoire."
The baroness started back as if a yawning chasm had suddenly opened at her feet. "My letters!" she exclaimed. "Ah! wretched woman that I am, he kept them. It is all over! I am lost, for of course, they have been read?"
"The ribbon
Inaccessible to any emotion but vanity, the baroness had never shed a tear over her husband's sufferings. She was sure of her absolute power over him. What did the rest matter? She even gloried in her knowledge that she could make this man--who loved her in spite of everything--at one moment furious with rage or wild with grief, and then an instant afterward plunge him into the rapture of a senseless ecstasy by a word, a smile, or a caress. For such was her power, and she often exercised it mercilessly. Even after the frightful scene that Pascal had witnessed, she had made another appeal to the baron, and he had been weak enough to give her the thirty thousand francs which M. de Coralth needed to purchase his wife's silence.
However, this time the baroness trembled. Her usual shrewdness had not deserted her, and she perfectly understood all that Marguerite's presence in that house portended. Since her husband brought this young girl--her daughter--to her he must know everything, and have taken some fatal resolution. Had she, indeed, exhausted the patience which she had fancied inexhaustible? She was not ignorant of the fact that her husband had disposed of his immense fortune in a way that would enable him to say and prove that he was insolvent whenever occasion required; and if he found courage to apply for a legal separation, what could she hope to obtain from the courts? A bare living, almost nothing. In such a case, how could she exist? She would be compelled to spend her last years in the same poverty that had made her youth so wretched. She saw herself--ah! what a frightful misfortune--turfed out of her princely home, and reduced to furnished apartments rented for five hundred francs a year!
Mademoiselle Marguerite was no less startled and horror-stricken than Madame Trigault, and she stood rooted to the spot, exactly where the baron had left her. Silent and motionless, they confronted each other for a moment which seemed a century to both of them. The resemblance--which had astonished Pascal could not fail to strike them, for it was still more noticeable now that they stood face to face. But anything was preferable to this torturing suspense, and so, summoning all her courage, the baroness broke the silence by saying: "You are the daughter of the Count de Chalusse?"
"I think so, but I have no proofs of it."
"And--your mother?"
"I don't know her; madame, and I have no desire to know her."
Disconcerted by this brief but implacable reply, Madame Trigault hung her head.
"What could I have to say to my mother?" continued Marguerite. "That I hate her? My courage would fail me to do so. And yet, how can I think without bitterness of the woman who, after abandoning me herself, endeavored to deprive me of my father's love and protection? I could have forgiven anything but that. Ah! I have not always been so patient and resigned! The laws of our country do not forbid illigitimate children to search for their parents, and more than once I have said to myself that I would discover my mother, and have my revenge."
"But you have no means of discovering her?"
"In this you are greatly mistaken, madame. After the Count de Chalusse's death, a package of letters, a glove and some withered flowers were found in one of the drawers of his escritoire."
The baroness started back as if a yawning chasm had suddenly opened at her feet. "My letters!" she exclaimed. "Ah! wretched woman that I am, he kept them. It is all over! I am lost, for of course, they have been read?"
"The ribbon