The Honor of the Name, Emile Gaboriau [books to read now .txt] 📗

To discover the name and rank of his new clients was but child’s play to Fouche’s former pupil.

His task was all the easier since they had no suspicion whatever of his designs. Mme. Blanche, who had heard his powers of discernment so highly praised, was confident of success.

All the way back to the hotel she was congratulating herself upon the step she had taken.

“In less than a month,” she said to Aunt Medea, “we shall have the child; and it will be a protection to us.”

But the following week she realized the extent of her imprudence. On visiting Chelteux again, she was received with such marks of respect that she saw at once she was known.

She made an attempt to deceive him, but the detective checked her.

“First of all,” he said, with a good-humored smile, “I ascertain the identity of the persons who honor me with their confidence. It is a proof of my ability, which I give, gratis. But Madame need have no fears. I am discreet by nature and by profession. Many ladies of the highest ranks are in the position of Madame la Duchesse!”

So Chelteux still believed that the Duchesse de Sairmeuse was searching for her own child.

She did not try to convince him to the contrary. It was better that he should believe this than suspect the truth.

The condition of Mme. Blanche was now truly pitiable. She found herself entangled in a net, and each movement far from freeing her, tightened the meshes around her.

Three persons knew the secret that threatened her life and honor. Under these circumstances, how could she hope to keep that secret inviolate? She was, moreover, at the mercy of three unscrupulous masters; and before a word, or a gesture, or a look from them, her haughty spirit was compelled to bow in meek subservience.

And her time was no longer at her own disposal. Martial had returned; and they had taken up their abode at the Hotel de Sairmeuse.

The young duchess was now compelled to live under the scrutiny of fifty servants—of fifty enemies, more or less, interested in watching her, in criticising her every act, and in discovering her inmost thoughts.

Aunt Medea, it is true, was of great assistance to her. Blanche purchased a dress for her, whenever she purchased one for herself, took her about with her on all occasions, and the humble relative expressed her satisfaction in the most enthusiastic terms, and declared her willingness to do anything for her benefactress.

Nor did Chelteux give Mme. Blanche much more annoyance. Every three months he presented a memorandum of the expenses of investigations, which usually amounted to about ten thousand francs; and so long as she paid him it was plain that he would be silent.

He had given her to understand, however, that he should expect an annuity of twenty-four thousand francs; and once, when Mme. Blanche remarked that he must abandon the search, if nothing had been discovered at the end of two years:

“Never,” he replied: “I shall continue the search as long as I live.” But Chupin, unfortunately, remained; and he was a constant terror.

She had been compelled to give him twenty thousand francs, to begin with.

He declared that his younger brother had come to Paris in pursuit of him, accusing him of having stolen their father’s hoard, and demanding his share with his dagger in his hand.

There had been a battle, and it was with a head bound up in a blood-stained linen, that Chupin made his appearance before Mme. Blanche.

“Give me the sum that the old man buried, and I will allow my brother to think that I had stolen it. It is not very pleasant to be regarded as a thief, when one is an honest man, but I will bear it for your sake. If you refuse, I shall be compelled to tell him where I have obtained my money and how.”

If he possessed all the vices, depravity, and coldblooded perversity of his father, this wretch had inherited neither his intelligence nor his finesse.

Instead of taking the precautions which his interest required, he seemed to find a brutal pleasure in compromising the duchess.

He was a constant visitor at the Hotel de Sairmeuse. He came and went at all hours, morning, noon, and night, without troubling himself in the least about Martial.

And the servants were amazed to see their haughty mistress unhesitatingly leave everything at the call of this suspicious-looking character, who smelled so strongly of tobacco and vile brandy.

One evening, while a grand entertainment was in progress at the Hotel de Sairmeuse, he made his appearance, half drunk, and imperiously ordered the servants to go and tell Mme. Blanche that he was there, and that he was waiting for her.

She hastened to him in her magnificent evening-dress, her face white with rage and shame beneath her tiara of diamonds. And when, in her exasperation, she refused to give the wretch what he demanded:

“That is to say, I am to starve while you are revelling here!” he exclaimed. “I am not such a fool. Give me money, and instantly, or I will tell all I know here and now!”

What could she do? She was obliged to yield, as she had always done before.

And yet he grew more and more insatiable every day. Money remained in his pockets no longer than water remains in a sieve. But he did not think of elevating his vices to the proportions of the fortune which he squandered. He did not even provide himself with decent clothing; from his appearance one would have supposed him a beggar, and his companions were the vilest and most degraded of beings.

One night he was arrested in a low den, and the police, surprised at seeing so much gold in the possession of such a beggarly looking wretch, accused him of being a thief. He mentioned the name of the Duchesse de Sairmeuse.

An inspector of the police presented himself at the Hotel de Sairmeuse the following morning. Martial, fortunately, was in Vienna at the time.

And Mme. Blanche was forced to undergo the terrible humiliation of confessing that she had given a large sum of money to this man, whose family she had known, and who, she added, had once rendered her an important service.

Sometimes her tormentor changed his tactics.

For example, he declared that he disliked to come to the Hotel de Sairmeuse, that the servants treated him as if he were a mendicant, that after this he would write.

And in a day or two there would come a letter bidding her bring such a sum, to such a place, at such an hour.

And the proud duchess was always punctual at the rendezvous.

There was constantly some new invention, as if he found an intense delight in