The Deputy of Arcis [92]
and I coldly fell into them, vexed with myself for not being deeply moved and for not hearing in my heart the voice of kindred. Was this barrenness of emotion the result of my sudden accession to wealth? A moment later a second deed made me possessor, on payment of one hundred and eighty thousand francs in ready money, of the Chateau d'Arcis,--a grand edifice which had caught my eye, on my first arrival in the town, by its lordly and feudal air.
"You may congratulate yourselves," said Achille Pigoult, "that you have got that estate for a song."
"Come, come!" said Jacques Bricheteau, "how long have you had it on your hands to sell? Your client would have let it go for one hundred and fifty thousand to others, but, as family property, you thought you could get more from us. We shall have to spend twenty thousand to make the house habitable; the land doesn't return a rental of more than four thousand; so that our money, all expenses deducted, won't return us more than two and a half per cent."
"What are you complaining about?" returned Achille Pigoult. "You have employment to give and money to pay in the neighborhood, and what can be better for a candidate?"
"Ah! that electoral business," said Jacques Bricheteau; "we will talk about that to-morrow when we bring you the purchase-money and your fees."
Thereupon we took leave, and returned to the Hotel de la Poste, where I bade good-night to my father and came to my room to write to you.
Now I must tell you the terrible idea that drove sleep from my brain and put the pen once more in my hand,--although I am somewhat distracted from it by writing the foregoing two pages, and I do not see quite as much evidence for my notion as I did before I renewed this letter.
One thing is certain: during the last year many romantic incidents have happened to me. You may say that adventure seems to be the logical way of life for one in my position; that my birth, the chances that brought you (whose fate is so like mine) and me together, my relations with Marianina and my handsome housekeeper, and perhaps I might say with Madame de l'Estorade, all point to the possession of a fickle star, and that my present affair is only one of its caprices.
True; but what if, at the present moment under the influence of that star, I were implicated without my knowledge in some infernal plot of which I was made the passive instrument?
To put some order into my ideas, I begin by this half-million spent for an interest which you must agree is very nebulous,--that of fitting me to succeed my father in the ministry of some imaginary country, the name of which is carefully concealed from me.
Next: who is spending these fabulous sums on me? Is it a father tenderly attached to a child of love? No, it is a father who shows me the utmost coldness, who goes to sleep when deeds which concern our mutual existence are being drawn, and for whom I, on my side, am conscious of no feeling; in fact, not to mince my words, I should think him a great booby of an /emigre/ if it were not for the filial respect and duty I force myself to feel for him.
/But/--suppose this man were not my father, not even the Marquis de Sallenauve, as he asserts himself to be; suppose, like that unfortunate Lucien de Rubempre, whose history has made so much noise, I were caught in the toils of a serpent like that false abbe Don Carlos Herrera, and had made myself liable to the same awful awakening. You may say to me that you see no such likelihood; that Carlos Herrera had an object in fascinating Lucien and making him his double; but that I, an older man with solid principles and no love of luxury, who have lived a life of thought and toil, should fear such influence, is nonsense.
So be it. But why should the man who recognizes me as his son conceal the very country in which he lives, and the name by which he is known in that equally nameless Northern land which it is intimated that he governs? Why make such sacrifices for my benefit and show so little confidence? And see the mystery with which Jacques Bricheteau
"You may congratulate yourselves," said Achille Pigoult, "that you have got that estate for a song."
"Come, come!" said Jacques Bricheteau, "how long have you had it on your hands to sell? Your client would have let it go for one hundred and fifty thousand to others, but, as family property, you thought you could get more from us. We shall have to spend twenty thousand to make the house habitable; the land doesn't return a rental of more than four thousand; so that our money, all expenses deducted, won't return us more than two and a half per cent."
"What are you complaining about?" returned Achille Pigoult. "You have employment to give and money to pay in the neighborhood, and what can be better for a candidate?"
"Ah! that electoral business," said Jacques Bricheteau; "we will talk about that to-morrow when we bring you the purchase-money and your fees."
Thereupon we took leave, and returned to the Hotel de la Poste, where I bade good-night to my father and came to my room to write to you.
Now I must tell you the terrible idea that drove sleep from my brain and put the pen once more in my hand,--although I am somewhat distracted from it by writing the foregoing two pages, and I do not see quite as much evidence for my notion as I did before I renewed this letter.
One thing is certain: during the last year many romantic incidents have happened to me. You may say that adventure seems to be the logical way of life for one in my position; that my birth, the chances that brought you (whose fate is so like mine) and me together, my relations with Marianina and my handsome housekeeper, and perhaps I might say with Madame de l'Estorade, all point to the possession of a fickle star, and that my present affair is only one of its caprices.
True; but what if, at the present moment under the influence of that star, I were implicated without my knowledge in some infernal plot of which I was made the passive instrument?
To put some order into my ideas, I begin by this half-million spent for an interest which you must agree is very nebulous,--that of fitting me to succeed my father in the ministry of some imaginary country, the name of which is carefully concealed from me.
Next: who is spending these fabulous sums on me? Is it a father tenderly attached to a child of love? No, it is a father who shows me the utmost coldness, who goes to sleep when deeds which concern our mutual existence are being drawn, and for whom I, on my side, am conscious of no feeling; in fact, not to mince my words, I should think him a great booby of an /emigre/ if it were not for the filial respect and duty I force myself to feel for him.
/But/--suppose this man were not my father, not even the Marquis de Sallenauve, as he asserts himself to be; suppose, like that unfortunate Lucien de Rubempre, whose history has made so much noise, I were caught in the toils of a serpent like that false abbe Don Carlos Herrera, and had made myself liable to the same awful awakening. You may say to me that you see no such likelihood; that Carlos Herrera had an object in fascinating Lucien and making him his double; but that I, an older man with solid principles and no love of luxury, who have lived a life of thought and toil, should fear such influence, is nonsense.
So be it. But why should the man who recognizes me as his son conceal the very country in which he lives, and the name by which he is known in that equally nameless Northern land which it is intimated that he governs? Why make such sacrifices for my benefit and show so little confidence? And see the mystery with which Jacques Bricheteau