The Eight Strokes of the Clock, Maurice Leblanc [summer books TXT] 📗

“Have you never questioned him on this point?”

“Yes, I have, twice. The first time, he said that his aunt’s name was Vaurois and his mother’s d’Imbleval.”

“And the second time?”

“He told me the contrary: he spoke of his mother as Vaurois and of his aunt as d’Imbleval. I pointed this out. He coloured up and I thought it better not to question him any further.”

“Does he live far from Paris?”

“Right down in Brittany: at the Manoir d’Elseven, five miles from Carhaix.”

Rénine rose and asked the girl, seriously:

“Are you quite certain that he loves you, mademoiselle?”

“I am certain of it and I know too that he represents all my life and all my happiness. He alone can save me. If he can’t, then I shall be married in a week’s time to a man whom I hate. I have promised my father; and the banns have been published.”

“We shall leave for Carhaix, Madame Daniel and I, this evening,” said Rénine.

That evening he and Hortense took the train for Brittany. They reached Carhaix at ten o’clock in the morning; and, after lunch, at half past twelve o’clock they stepped into a car borrowed from a leading resident of the district.

“You’re looking a little pale, my dear,” said Rénine, with a laugh, as they alighted by the gate of the garden at Elseven.

“I’m very fond of Geneviève,” she said. “She’s the only friend I have. And I’m feeling frightened.”

He called her attention to the fact that the central gate was flanked by two wickets bearing the names of Madame d’Imbleval and Madame Vaurois respectively. Each of these wickets opened on a narrow path which ran among the shrubberies of box and aucuba to the left and right of the main avenue. The avenue itself led to an old manor-house, long, low and picturesque, but provided with two clumsily-built, ugly wings, each in a different style of architecture and each forming the destination of one of the side-paths. Madame d’Imbleval evidently lived on the left and Madame Vaurois on the right.

Hortense and Rénine listened. Shrill, hasty voices were disputing inside the house. The sound came through one of the windows of the ground-floor, which was level with the garden and covered throughout its length with red creepers and white roses.

“We can’t go any farther,” said Hortense. “It would be indiscreet.”

“All the more reason,” whispered Rénine. “Look here: if we walk straight ahead, we shan’t be seen by the people who are quarrelling.”

The sounds of conflict were by no means abating; and, when they reached the window next to the front-door, through the roses and creepers they could both see and hear two old ladies shrieking at the tops of their voices and shaking their fists at each other.

The women were standing in the foreground, in a large dining-room where the table was not yet cleared; and at the farther side of the table sat a young man, doubtless Jean Louis himself, smoking his pipe and reading a newspaper, without appearing to trouble about the two old harridans.

One of these, a thin, tall woman, was wearing a purple silk dress; and her hair was dressed in a mass of curls much too yellow for the ravaged face around which they tumbled. The other, who was still thinner, but quite short, was bustling round the room in a cotton dressing-gown and displayed a red, painted face blazing with anger:

“A baggage, that’s what you are!” she yelped. “The wickedest woman in the world and a thief into the bargain!”

“I, a thief!” screamed the other.

“What about that business with the ducks at ten francs apiece: don’t you call that thieving?”

“Hold your tongue, you low creature! Who stole the fifty-franc note from my dressing-table? Lord, that I should have to live with such a wretch!”

The other started with fury at the outrage and, addressing the young man, cried:

“Jean, are you going to sit there and let me be insulted by your hussy of a d’Imbleval?”

And the tall one retorted, furiously:

“Hussy! Do you hear that, Louis? Look at her, your Vaurois! She’s got the airs of a superannuated barmaid! Make her stop, can’t you?”

Suddenly Jean Louis banged his fist upon the table, making the plates and dishes jump, and shouted:

“Be quiet, both of you, you old lunatics!”

They turned upon him at once and loaded him with abuse:

“Coward!⁠ ⁠… Hypocrite!⁠ ⁠… Liar!⁠ ⁠… A pretty sort of son you are!⁠ ⁠… The son of a slut and not much better yourself!⁠ ⁠…”

The insults rained down upon him. He stopped his ears with his fingers and writhed as he sat at table like a man who has lost all patience and has need to restrain himself lest he should fall upon his enemy.

Rénine whispered:

“Now’s the time to go in.”

“In among all those infuriated people?” protested Hortense.

“Exactly. We shall see them better with their masks off.”

And, with a determined step, he walked to the door, opened it and entered the room, followed by Hortense.

His advent gave rise to a feeling of stupefaction. The two women stopped yelling, but were still scarlet in the face and trembling with rage. Jean Louis, who was very pale, stood up.

Profiting by the general confusion, Rénine said briskly:

“Allow me to introduce myself. I am Prince Rénine. This is Madame Daniel. We are friends of Mlle. Geneviève Aymard and we have come in her name. I have a letter from her addressed to you, monsieur.”

Jean Louis, already disconcerted by the newcomers’ arrival, lost countenance entirely on hearing the name of Geneviève. Without quite knowing what he was saying and with the intention of responding to Rénine’s courteous behaviour, he tried in his turn to introduce the two ladies and let fall the astounding words:

“My mother, Madame d’Imbleval; my mother, Madame Vaurois.”

For some time no one spoke. Rénine bowed. Hortense did not know with whom she should shake hands, with Madame d’Imbleval, the mother, or with Madame Vaurois, the mother. But what happened was that Madame d’Imbleval and Madame Vaurois both at the same time attempted to snatch the letter which Rénine was holding