File No. 113, Emile Gaboriau [digital e reader txt] 📗

and wait for an opportunity; sensible men make one. What did we agree upon in London? We were to implore my good mother to assist us a little, and, if she complied with our wishes, we were to be flattering and affectionate in our devotion to her. And what was the result? At the risk of killing the golden goose, you have made me torment the poor woman until she is almost crazy.”

“It was prudent to hasten matters.”

“You think so, do you? Was it also to hasten matters that you took it into your head to marry Madeleine? That made it necessary to let her into the secret; and, ever since, she has advised and set her aunt against us. I would not be surprised if she makes her confess everything to M. Fauvel, or even inform against us at the police-office.”

“I love Madeleine!”

“You told me that before. And suppose you do love her. You led me into this piece of business without having studied its various bearings, without knowing what you were about. No one but an idiot, my beloved uncle, would go and put his foot into a trap, and then say, ‘If I had only known about it!’ You should have made it your business to know everything. You came to me, and said, ‘Your father is dead,’ which was a lie to start with; perhaps you call it a mistake. He is living; and, after what we have done, I dare not appear before him. He would have left me a million, and now I shall not get a sou. He will find his Valentine, and then good-by.”

“Enough!” angrily interrupted Louis. “If I have made a mistake, I know how to redeem it. I can save everything yet.”

“You can? How so?”

“That is my secret,” said Louis gloomily.

Louis and Raoul were silent for a minute. And this silence between them, in this lonely spot, at dead of night, was so horribly significant that both of them shuddered.

An abominable thought had flashed across their evil minds, and without a word or look they understood each other.

Louis broke the ominous silence, by abruptly saying:

“Then you refuse to disappear if I pay you a hundred and fifty thousand francs? Think it over before deciding: it is not too late yet.”

“I have fully thought it over. I know you will not attempt to deceive me any more. Between certain ease, and the probability of an immense fortune, I choose the latter at all risks. I will share your success or your failure. We will swim or sink together.”

“And you will follow my instructions?”

“Blindly.”

Raoul must have been very certain of Louis’s intentions of resorting to the most dangerous extremities, must have known exactly what he intended to do; for he did not ask him a single question. Perhaps he dared not. Perhaps he preferred doubt to shocking certainty, as if he could thus escape the remorse attendant upon criminal complicity.

“In the first place,” said Louis, “you must at once return to Paris.”

“I will be there in forty-eight hours.”

“You must be very intimate at Mme. Fauvel’s, and keep me informed of everything that takes place in the family.”

“I understand.”

Louis laid his hand upon Raoul’s shoulder, as if to impress upon his mind what he was about to say.

“You have a sure means of being restored to your mother’s confidence and affection, by blaming me for everything that has happened to distress her. Abuse me constantly. The more odious you render me in her eyes and those of Madeleine, the better you will serve me. Nothing would please me more than to be denied admittance to the house when I return to Paris. You must say that you have quarrelled with me, and that, if I still come to see you, it is because you cannot prevent it, and you will never voluntarily have any intercourse with me. That is the scheme; you can develop it.”

Raoul listened to these strange instructions with astonishment.

“What!” he cried: “you adore Madeleine, and take this means of showing it? An odd way of carrying on a courtship, I must confess. I will be shot if I can comprehend.”

“There is no necessity for your comprehending.”

“All right,” said Raoul submissively; “if you say so.”

Then Louis reflected that no one could properly execute a commission without having at least an idea of its nature.

“Did you ever hear,” he asked Raoul, “of the man who burnt down his lady-love’s house so as to have the bliss of carrying her out in his arms?”

“Yes: what of it?”

“At the proper time, I will charge you to set fire, morally, to Mme. Fauvel’s house; and I will rush in, and save her and her niece. Now, in the eyes of those women my conduct will appear more magnanimous and noble in proportion to the contempt and abuse they have heaped upon me. I gain nothing by patient devotion: I have everything to hope from a sudden change of tactics. A well-managed stroke will transform a demon into an angel.”

“Very well, a good idea!” said Raoul approvingly, when his uncle had finished.

“Then you understand what is to be done?”

“Yes, but will you write to me?”

“Of course; and if anything should happen at Paris–-”

“I will telegraph to you.”

“And never lose sight of my rival, the cashier.”

“Prosper? not much danger of our being troubled by him, poor boy! He is just now my most devoted friend. Trouble has driven him into a path of life which will soon prove his destruction. Every now and then I pity him from the bottom of my soul.”

“Pity him as much as you like; but don’t interfere with his dissipation.”

The two men shook hands, and separated apparently the best friends in the world; in reality the bitterest enemies.

Raoul would not forgive Louis for having attempted to appropriate all the booty, and leave him in the lurch, when it was he who had risked the greatest dangers.

Louis, on his part, was alarmed at the attitude taken by Raoul. Thus far he had found his nephew tractable, and even blindly obedient; and now he had suddenly become rebellious and threatening. Instead of ordering Raoul, he was forced to consult and bargain with him.

What could be more wounding to his vanity and self-conceit than the reproaches, well founded though they were, to which he had been obliged to listen, from a mere youth?

As he walked back to his brother’s house, thinking over what had just occurred, Louis swore that sooner or later he would be revenged, and that, as soon as he could get rid of Raoul he would do so, and would do him some great injury.

But, for the present, he was so afraid lest the young villain should betray him, or thwart his plans in some way, that he wrote to him the next day, and every succeeding day, full particulars of everything that happened. Seeing how important it was to restore his shaken confidence, Louis entered into the most minute details of his plans, and asked Raoul’s advice about every step he took.

The situation remained the same. The dark cloud remained threateningly near, but grew no larger.

Gaston seemed to have forgotten that he had written to Beaucaire, and never mentioned Valentine’s name once.

Like all men accustomed to a busy life, Gaston was miserable except when occupied, and spent his whole time in the foundery, which seemed to absorb him entirely.

When he began the experiment of felling the woods, his losses had been heavy; but he determined to continue the work until it should be equally beneficial to himself and the neighboring land-owners.

He engaged the services of an intelligent engineer, and thanks to untiring energy, and the new improvements in machinery, his profits soon more than equalled his expenses.

“Now that we are doing so well,” said Gaston joyously, “we shall certainly make twenty-five thousand francs next year.”

Next year! Alas, poor Gaston!

Five days after Raoul’s departure, one Saturday afternoon, Gaston was suddenly taken ill.

He had a sort of vertigo, and was so dizzy that he was forced to lie down.

“I know what is the matter,” he said. “I have often been ill in this way at Rio. A couple of hours’ sleep will cure me. I will go to bed, and you can send someone to awaken me when dinner is ready, Louis; I shall be all right by that time.”

But, when the servant came to announce dinner, he found Gaston much worse. He had a violent headache, a choking sensation in his throat, and dimness of vision. But his worst symptom was dysphonia; he would try to articulate one word, and find himself using another. His jaw-bones became so stiff that it was with the greatest difficulty that he opened his mouth.

Louis came up to his brother’s room, and urged him to send for the physician.

“No,” said Gaston, “I won’t have any doctor to make me ill with all sorts of medicines; I know what is the matter with me, and my indisposition will be cured by a simple remedy which I have always used.”

At the same time he ordered Manuel, his old Spanish servant, who had lived with him for ten years, to prepare him some lemonade.

The next day Gaston appeared to be much better. He ate his breakfast, and was about to take a walk, when the pains of the previous day suddenly returned, in a more violent form.

Without consulting his brother, Louis sent to Oloron for Dr. C–-, whose wonderful cures at Eaux Bonnes had won him a wide reputation.

The doctor declared that there was no danger, and merely prescribed a dose of valerian, and a blister with some grains of morphine sprinkled on it.

But in the middle of the night, all the symptoms suddenly changed for the worse. The pain in the head was succeeded by a fearful oppression, and the sick man suffered torture in trying to get his breath; daybreak found him still tossing restlessly from pillow to pillow.

When Dr. C–- came early in the morning, he appeared very much surprised at this change for the worse. He inquired if they had not administered an overdose of morphine. Manuel said that he had put the blister on his master, and the doctor’s directions had been accurately followed.

The doctor, after having examined Gaston, and found his breathing heavy and irregular, prescribed a heavy dose of sulphate of quinine; he then retired, saying he would return the next day.

As soon as the doctor had gone, Gaston sent for a friend of his, a lawyer, to come to him as soon as possible.

“For Heaven’s sake, what do you want with a lawyer?” inquired Louis.

“I want his advice, brother. It is useless to try and deceive ourselves; I know I am extremely ill. Only timid fools are superstitious about making their wills; if I defer it any longer, I may be suddenly taken without having arranged my affairs. I would rather have the lawyer at once, and then my mind will be at rest.”

Gaston did not think he was about to die, but, knowing the uncertainty of life, determined to be prepared for the worst; he had too often imperilled his life, and been face to face with death, to feel any fear now.

He had made his will while ill at Bordeaux; but, now that he had found Louis, he wished to leave him all his property, and sent for his business man to advise as to the best means of disposing of his wealth for his benefit.

The lawyer was a shrewd, wiry little man, very popular because he had a faculty for always gaining suits which other attorneys had