The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [120]
"We are true knights of the olden time, worthy of our fathers," cried the elder. "Speak, Laurence; decide between us."
"We cannot continue as we are," said the younger.
"Do not think, Laurence, that self-denial is without its joys," said the elder.
"My dear loved ones," said the girl, "I am unable to decide. I love you both as though you were one being--as your mother loved you. God will help us. I cannot choose. Let us put it to chance--but I make one condition."
"What is it?"
"Whichever one of you becomes my brother must stay with me until I suffer him to leave me. I wish to be sole judge of when to part."
"Yes, yes," said the brothers, without explaining to themselves her meaning.
"The first of you to whom Madame d'Hauteserre speaks to-night at table after the Benedicite, shall be my husband. But neither of you must practise fraud or induce her to answer a question."
"We will play fair," said the younger, smiling.
Each kissed her hand. The certainty of some decision which both could fancy favorable made them gay.
"Either way, dear Laurence, you create a Comte de Cinq-Cygne--"
"I believe," thought Michu, riding behind them, "that mademoiselle will not long be unmarried. How gay my masters are! If my mistress makes her choice I shall not leave; I must stay and see that wedding."
Just then a magpie flew suddenly before his face. Michu, superstitious like all primitive beings, fancied he heard the muffled tones of a death-knell. The day, however, began brightly enough for lovers, who rarely see magpies when together in the woods. Michu, armed with his plan, verified the spots; each gentleman had brought a pickaxe, and the money was soon found. The part of the forest where it was buried was quite wild, far from all paths or habitations, so that the cavalcade bearing the gold returned unseen. This proved to be a great misfortune. On their way from Cinq-Cygne to fetch the last two hundred thousand francs, the party, emboldened by success, took a more direct way than on their other trips. The path passed an opening from which the park of Gondreville could be seen.
"What is that?" cried Laurence, pointing to a column of blue flame.
"A bonfire, I think," replied Michu.
Laurence, who knew all the by-ways of the forest, left the rest of the party and galloped towards the pavilion, Michu's old home. Though the building was closed and deserted, the iron gates were open, and traces of the recent passage of several horses struck Laurence instantly. The column of blue smoke was rising from a field in what was called the English park, where, as she supposed, they were burning brush.
"Ah! so you are concerned in it, too, are you, mademoiselle?" cried Violette, who came out of the park at top speed on his pony, and pulled up to meet Laurence. "But, of course, it is only a carnival joke? They surely won't kill him?"
"Who?"
"Your cousins wouldn't put him to death?"
"Death! whose death?"
"The senator's."
"You are crazy, Violette!"
"Well, what are you doing here, then?" he demanded.
At the idea of a danger which was threatening her cousins, Laurence turned her horse and galloped back to them, reaching the ground as the last sacks were filled.
"Quick, quick!" she cried. "I don't know what is going on, but let us get back to Cinq-Cygne."
While the happy party were employed in recovering the fortune saved by the old marquis, and guarded for so many years by Michu, an extraordinary scene was taking place in the chateau of Gondreville.
About two o'clock in the afternoon Malin and his friend Grevin were playing chess before the fire in the great salon on the ground-floor. Madame Grevin and Madame Marion were sitting on a sofa and talking together at a corner of the fireplace. All the servants had gone to see the masquerade, which had long been announced in the arrondissement. The family of the bailiff who had replaced Michu had gone too. The senator's valet and Violette were the only persons beside