Madame Vernet had not the slightest objection to be left in charge of this good-looking young officer
Monsieur Bouchard would much rather have gone off with a gendarmeat that very moment, but Léontine had him by the arm, and was determinedly dragging him away. An anxious grin appeared on his countenance as he turned to Madame Vernet and said:
“One moment, Madame, and I will return.”
“Only a moment, remember,” answered this bashful creature.
Madame Vernet had not the slightest objection to being left in charge of this good-looking young officer. She cast down her eyes and began to murmur something about her timidity, when she was brought up all standing by de Meneval saying:
“Madame, a few moments ago I overheard you thanking Monsieur Bouchard for that superb necklace you wear.”
Madame Vernet smiled. Superb necklace, indeed! It must be a fine imitation.
“But,” continued de Meneval,“that necklace belongs to my wife, Madame de Meneval. I myself selected it, and paid forty thousand francs for it. Last night I left it in Monsieur Bouchard’s care in the Rue Bassano. To-night I find you, a woman with whom, I am sure, Monsieur Bouchard has a very casual acquaintance, wearing my wife’s forty thousand franc necklace. You will admit that the circumstances justify me in demanding the necklace.”
“Monsieur,” replied Madame Vernet, “this necklace is paste. It cost only seventy-five francs. I have Monsieur Bouchard’s word for it.”
“The old sinner! Well, Monsieur Bouchard wasn’t saying his prayers when he told you that. I tell you the stones are real, and unless you hand the necklace over to me this instant I shall telephone for a couple of policemen—there is a police station not two minutes away—and to-morrow morning you and Monsieur Bouchardcan explain the matter in the police court.”
Now, Madame Vernet was really as brave as a lion. She suspected at once that she had got hold of something of actual value, and she determined to hold on to it and get away with it; hence nothing could have been more pleasing to her at that moment than to have de Meneval out of the way for a few moments—even to fetch a policeman—so she merely replied, with calm assurance:
“Do as you like, Monsieur. I never saw you before—I hope I shall never see you again. My protector is at hand, and when you arrive with your police officers it is Monsieur Bouchard with whom you will have to settle.”
De Meneval turned and ran out of the garden toward the police station. He thought that exposure was coming anyhow, and he had better secure the stakes in the game. As he rushed out he caromed against a very well-dressed,portly, clean-shaven elderly gentleman, who was parading into the garden with a great air of pomposity. In his hand he held conspicuously a newspaper, on the first page of which was a large photogravure easily recognizable as himself, and under it, in letters an inch long, were the words,
Dr. DelcasseThe Most Celebrated Alienistin Paris.
Below this was the cut of a handsome building, and under this was inscribed, “The Private Sanatorium at Melun of Dr. Delcasse.”
Dr. Delcasse seemed to feel the injury to his dignity very much when de Meneval jostled by him so unceremoniously, nearly knocking him down. He stopped, scowled, growled, and then, with a portentous air of being much displeased, stalked forward, took a seat close to where Madame Vernet was standing, and began pompously to unfoldhis newspaper, always keeping the picture to his audience, so to speak—which audience consisted solely of Madame Vernet.
He took a seat close to where Madame Vernet was standing
Now, for quickness and boldness of resource Madame Vernet was fully the equal of de Meneval or any man alive,and the moment she became convinced of the identity of Dr. Delcasse a plan was formed in her mind. Everybody knew Dr. Delcasse, and also of the war waged between him and Dr. Vignaud, another celebrated alienist, which, if carried to extremes, would have resulted in locking up half the population of Paris as lunatics either in Dr. Delcasse’s sanatorium at Melun or Dr. Vignaud’s private hospital in Paris.
Madame Vernet realized, in her brilliant scheme, the value of time. There was a train leaving for Paris in ten minutes. If she could but make the first train, getting away before Monsieur Bouchard returned! She determined to at least try for it. She came near to Dr. Delcasse, and said, in a silvery voice:
“May I ask if this is not the renowned Dr. Delcasse—the man who has restored the largest number of persons, cured and sane, to their families,of any doctor for the insane in the whole world?”
To this insinuating address from a remarkably pretty and attractive woman Dr. Delcasse, as would any other man, felt a warming of the heart, and he replied, rising politely:
“You flatter me. IamDr. Delcasse.”
“Then,” cried Madame Vernet, taking out her handkerchief and preparing to weep, “you are the man I most desire to meet. Oh, how fortunate it is for me that you are here! I have a brother with me—a dear, good young man, but whose mind has been affected ever since a fall he had from an apricot tree some years ago. For a year I had him at Dr. Vignaud’s hospital for the insane—rightly named, for I think anyone who went there would shortly be insane. Dr. Vignaud is a charlatan of the worst description.” Dr. Delcasse smiled in a superior manner to hear himselfpraised and Dr. Vignaud reviled—how delicious! “I am my poor brother’s guardian,” continued Madame Vernet, producing her card, inscribed “Madame Vernet,néeBrion.” “My brother’s name is Louis Brion. Ever since he was released from Dr. Vignaud’s asylum he has been much crazier than when he went in, although Dr. Vignaud declared him thoroughly cured.”
“Just like Vignaud!” remarked Dr. Delcasse, with that spirit of fraternity which sometimes distinguishes the medical profession.
“This evening,” continued Madame Vernet, throwing her most pleading and fascinating look into her eyes, “I brought my poor, dear brother out to this place to supper, thinking it would divert him. But he has been quite insane in all his actions, and just now he became violent. He took it into his head that this necklace I wear—which I may say to you confidentiallyis paste—is real, and is worth forty thousand francs, and that I have stolen it from his wife. The poor boy has no wife. And while I was trying to soothe him just now he suddenly broke away, nearly knocking you down as you came in, and declared he was going after the police to arrest me—me, his devoted sister!” Madame Vernet’s voice became lost in her lace handkerchief.
“I saw an unmistakable gleam of insanity in his eye as he rushed by me,” said Dr. Delcasse, promptly. “My experience, Madame, has been vast. I can tell an insane patient at a glance, and I have no hesitation in saying that the young man gave every indication to a practiced eye of being, as you say, very much unbalanced. And Vignaud said he was cured! Ha, ha!”
“But the great thing,” said Madame Vernet, with real and not pretended anxiety, “is to get him away fromhere without scandal, and into your sanatorium, where I wish to place him under your care. How can that be managed?”
“Nothing easier, Madame,” replied Dr. Delcasse, eager to get hold of one of Dr. Vignaud’s patients. “I am well known here—indeed, I am personally acquainted with many of our police officers. When the young man returns with the officers I shall simply, with your permission, direct them to convey him to my sanatorium—it is less than half a mile from here—and I will telephone to my assistant to have a strait-jacket, a padded cell and a cold douche ready for the unfortunate young man, and we will take care of him, never fear. When I release him, depend upon it, he will be actually cured. I am not Dr. Vignaud, I beg you to believe.”
At this moment de Meneval, with a couple of officers, was entering the garden. The police station, as hehad said, was but two minutes away. Dr. Delcasse, accompanied by Madame Vernet, coolly advanced, and recognizing the officers, spoke to them civilly, saying:
“Good-evening, Lestocq; good-evening, Caron.” And then to de Meneval he said, soothingly: “Good-evening, Monsieur Brion. I am pleased to see you and your charming sister at Melun, and think you will enjoy your stay with me.”
De Meneval looked from one to the other in amazement, and opened his mouth to speak; but before he could get out a word Madame Vernet laid her hand on his arm and said, in the tone of soothing a raving lunatic:
“Yes, dear Louis, Dr. Delcasse will take the best possible care of you, and I will come out to see you every week.”
De Meneval found his tongue then.
“To the devil with Dr. Delcasse! I never heard of him before. Police,arrest this woman. I can prove by my wife and by a gentleman now in this garden that the diamond necklace this person wears is the property of my wife.”
“Do nothing of the kind,” interrupted Dr. Delcasse, with quiet authority. “This young man, Louis Brion, is the brother of this lady, Madame Vernet. He is demented, and his latest hallucination is that Madame Vernet has stolen the necklace she wears; that it is worth forty thousand francs, that she stole it from his wife—and he has no wife.”
“But I tell you,” shouted de Meneval, quite beside himself, “that I never saw this woman before. She has my wife’s diamond necklace, and I can prove it. Call Monsieur Bouchard!”
“You see how it is,” coolly remarked Dr. Delcasse to the two police officers, “the only thing is to get him out of the way as quietly as possible. I shall take him at once out to my sanatorium, where I will have a strait-jacket, a padded cell and a cold douche waiting for him.”
The police officers seized him, and dragged him out, under Dr. Delcasse’s directionThe police officers seized him, and dragged him out, under Dr. Delcasse’s direction.
The police officers seized him, and dragged him out, under Dr. Delcasse’s direction.
The police officers seized him, and dragged him out, under Dr. Delcasse’s direction.
With this the Doctor suddenly whipped out his silk handkerchief, and with the greatest ingenuity bound it fast round de Meneval’s mouth, so that he was completely gagged and silenced. The police officers seized him, and dragged him out, under Dr. Delcasse’s direction. De Meneval fought like a tiger, but it was one to three. The struggle, though violent, was noiseless, and before the two or three waiters in the vicinity realized what was going on everything was over, and Madame Vernet, picking up her gloves, fan and other belongings, scurried off another way to make the ten o’clock train.
Meanwhile, the interview between Papa Bouchard and Léontine had been stormy. Léontine had demanded an explanation, but Papa Bouchard had no satisfactory one to give. At first he mounted his high horse, declared Léontine’s suspicions intolerable, and refusedto discuss the subject of the necklace at all. But she was not so easily put off.
“If you refuse me an explanation,” she said at last, “I shall simply confess all to Victor, and you will have to treat with a man instead of a woman.”
“Do; confess all to Victor,” replied Papa Bouchard, tartly. “Tell him that sociological yarn you told me.”
“I’m afraid to,” replied Léontine, so dolefully, that it partially softened Monsieur Bouchard, who really had a good heart.
“Come, come, now,” he said. “You had better take my word for it when I tell you that, in spite of appearances, your necklace is safe. I can’t and won’t tell you the circumstances—you and de Meneval would both blazon it over Paris, and it would be devilish uncomfortable—” Papa Bouchard was becoming expert in the use of bad language—“it would be devilish uncomfortable for me. I can straighten thewhole thing out in a few days, if you will only keep quiet.Can’tyou keep quiet?”
By this time they were re-entering the garden.
“I will agree to keep quiet for a week,” said Léontine, firmly. “At the end of that time, if this unpleasant complication about my necklace is not cleared up, I have a presentiment that the whole thing will get into the newspapers. Just fancy the headlines, ‘Mystery of Madame de Meneval’s Diamond Necklace. Monsieur Paul Bouchard Proved to have Given it to an Adventuress, With Whom he was Caught at the Pigeon House.’”
Papa Bouchard felt his knees grow a little weak under him, and went and sat down in the chair he had lately vacated. Léontine followed him and said dramatically, as if reading the scare head in a great metropolitan daily.
“‘Suicideof Monsieur Paul Bouchard! The late Advocate Discoveredin his Apartment With a Pistol Wound Through his Temple! The Apartment presents the Appearance of a Shambles! Blood Over Everything!! Walls and Ceilings Much Bespattered!!!’”
Papa Bouchard, very white around the lips, poured out with an unsteady hand a glass of champagne, and drank it, the glass clinking against his teeth.
“Léontine,” he said, after having drained the glass. “You are trying to frighten me. But you can’t do it. You sha’n’t do it. And I insist that you shall not be carrying any of your sensational tales to the Rue Clarisse, alarming my poor sister, and making her life a torment. Do you hear me?”
“Yes, indeed, I do,” replied Léontine. “And, by the way, where is your lady friend?”
Monsieur Bouchard looked around for Madame Vernet, and was much disturbed at not seeing her. In the perplexities and annoyances of the last half-hour he had made up his mind thatit was absolutely necessary to get that diabolical necklace back, and to work himself out of the scrape in which he unexpectedly found himself.
He called up François, who reported that Madame Vernet had gone out in a great hurry. There was a train for Paris just leaving. It struck him Madame was trying to make that train. Such was precisely Monsieur Bouchard’s idea. Her departure in this way seriously annoyed and alarmed him. One thing, however, was clear in his mind—he must get back to Paris as soon as possible. There was another train in twenty minutes, and then there would be no more till eleven.
De Meneval’s disappearance was also strange, but just as Léontine was beginning to feel uncomfortable she saw de Meneval approaching. Something unusual had evidently happened. He looked angry and excited, and his usually immaculate dress showed that he had been in a scrimmage. By his sidewalked the portly, the imposing Dr. Delcasse. The Doctor was apologizing to de Meneval with the utmost earnestness.
“My dear sir, I beg you will believe it was a most extraordinary mistake——”
“Veryextraordinary!” replied de Meneval, grinding his teeth with rage.
“If I had succeeded in getting you into my sanatorium you would have found every comfort awaiting you.”
“Yes, a strait-jacket, a cold douche, and a padded cell, as you kindly promised me.”
“May I ask, Monsieur, that you will not spread this unfortunate story abroad in Paris?”
“I shall have it printed in every newspaper in Paris to-morrow morning, and I shall myself write to Dr. Vignaud, giving him a detailed account of the affair.”
“Good heavens!”
“And if insanity ever develops in my family, it is Dr. Vignaud who shalltreat every case—every case, do you hear?”
Go to the devil!
“Then, sir,” said Dr. Delcasse, angrily, “all I have to say is that I am not at all sure my first diagnosis was not correct, and you are indeed, already crazy—and I have the honor to bid you good-evening.”
“Go to the devil!”
Dr. Delcasse, slapping his hat down angrily on his head, marched indignantlyout, and de Meneval, still furious at the treatment to which he had been subjected, poured out his injuries:
“And but for having been recognized by some of the waiters as I was being dragged away I should at this moment be an inmate of a lunatic asylum, sent there by the wiles of a shameless adventuress, brought to the Pigeon House by Monsieur Bouchard.” This was de Meneval’s exact language.
“Take care, sir; take care!” cried Papa Bouchard, in a voice trembling with wrath. He was not accustomed to being talked to in that manner. “You may repent of this language. Madame Vernet is a lady of means and respectability. I did not bring her out here. She came expecting to find here her uncle and aunt, who live in Melun. I invited her to sup in a public place, as any gentleman is authorized to do in the case of a widow old enough to take care of herself—and because your suspicions were excited by her having ona necklace like that you bought for your wife, you proceeded to make trouble. Well, it seems she turned the tables on you very cleverly, and no doubt, being a bashful little thing, she dreaded the sensation it would make and the notoriety which might follow, and—and so, naturally, has gone.” Then, turning to Léontine, Papa Bouchard played his trump card. “Haven’t you your diamond necklace safe at home, Léontine?”
To which Léontine faltered: “Y—y—yes, Papa Bouchard.”
“Well, then,” cried Papa Bouchard, assuming an air of triumphant virtue to poor de Meneval, “I hope you see the enormity of your conduct.”
“I can’t say I do,” sullenly replied de Meneval.
“Very well, very well,” continued Papa Bouchard, realizing that he held all the trumps in the game. “Do you want to go into the whole business of this necklace? If you do there is notime like the present. Do you, Léontine, want the matter sifted to the bottom?”
De Meneval remained gloomily silent, while Léontine murmured, “N—no, Papa Bouchard.”
Papa Bouchard, having thus effectually silenced both of them, felt master of the situation, but all the same, he was desperately anxious to reach Paris in advance of the de Menevals, so that he could get on Madame Vernet’s track before they should. He was pretty sure that she could not slip away from her apartment without leaving some trace. There was another train going almost immediately, and there would be no more till eleven o’clock. It would be exceedingly convenient for him to get an hour’s start of the de Menevals. So it occurred to him that if he were to propose a little more champagne Léontine and de Meneval would never run away and leave it, buthecould and would.
“Now,” said he, with an air of benevolence, “everything having been straightened out about the necklace, suppose we have a bottle of champagne before returning to Paris. Here, waiter!”
François immediately responded with a bottle of champagne.
De Meneval had never supposed that anything would be too pressing to drag him away from good champagne, but he inwardly swore, as Léontine silently fretted, at the delay that might prevent him from making the next train to Paris. Both of them gulped down the champagne rather than drank it, while Papa Bouchard, alleging that he had already taken several glasses, declined any more. Every moment or two he looked at his watch, and he said to Léontine:
“Will you be going back to Paris to-night, Léontine?”
“Indeed I shall,” eagerly replied Léontine. “I shall go back with you.”
“But I sha’n’t be going back till the midnight train. You see I am beginning to keep late hours, to make up for lost time, and that will be too late for you. Why can’t you remain at de Meneval’s quarters?”
“I have an engagement early to-morrow morning,” replied Léontine, who was determined to get to Paris as quickly as she could and make some private inquiries on her own account concerning Madame Vernet. The same intention was fixed in de Meneval’s mind. Therefore he said:
“Never mind, Léontine; I am off duty till twelve o’clock to-morrow, and I will take you to Paris to-night, if you wish.”
At which Léontine, looking very blank, replied:
“Oh, very well. That will be nice.”
“Now, why are you in such a hurry to get to Paris?” asked Papa Bouchard. “The next train is always crowded—nota seat to be had in a first-class compartment for love or money, and it makes a stop of only two minutes and a half; unless one is already at the station it is almost impossible to make it, and you see it is now within a few minutes of the train.”
All three of them bolted for the exit to the garden
While Monsieur Bouchard was speaking he was putting on his gloves and making for the garden door, and the de Menevals, each carefully avoidingan appearance of haste, were following him. Everybody had forgotten that the champagne was not paid for, except François.
“So,” kept on Papa Bouchard, still edging away, “you will go by the late train; perhaps I’ll wait for it myself.”
At that moment the shriek of the locomotive resounded. Immediately every pretense of waiting for the other train vanished. All three of them bolted for the exit to the garden. François rushed after them, bawling, “Your bill, Monsieur—the champagne—and the tip—” while the parrot, suddenly wakened from a nap, uttered a screech of demoniac laughter and began to yell after Papa Bouchard’s rapidly retreating figure:
“Bad boy Bouchard! bad boy Bouchard!”