VA FAMILY IN DANGER
BEFORE the court sits, the barristers and attorneys customarily meet and chat a few moments amongst themselves in the lobby. It is the place where all the town news is subjected to the test. To-day Mr. Roquevillard, famous for his good humour and redoubtable sallies, took his robe from its hook in the cloak-room and went directly to his place at the bar. His colleagues eyed him from a distance, with ill-natured curiosity, while they made merry over the escapade of young Maurice, which for the matter of that they treated lightly, and as a revenge upon the constraints of country manners. As Mr. Roquevillard was apparently absorbed in the preparation of his plea, a court attendant came to his bench and touched him on the shoulder.
“Sir, you are wanted in the prosecutor’s office.”
He rose at once, respectfully.
“I’ll come,” he said. It happened every day that the prosecutor took advantage of the presence of some lawyer at the sessions to consult with him on some point of penal business. Mr. Roquevillard, nevertheless, was not without some anxiety. His encounter with Mr. Frasne at the entrance to the court-house made him speculate:
“Will he be so foolish as to enter a complaint of adultery?”
Legally adultery remains a misdemeanour in France. A husband, but not a wife, has the right to enter a complaint, but it is a privilege seldom exercised. But the notary’s face was so difficult to make out——
The prosecutor, Mr. Vallerois, had held the office in Chambéry for several years, and had had time to appreciate Mr. Roquevillard’s professional probity, character and talent. People talked, it is true, of his possible candidacy at the next election, and the opposition would find in him, should he accept, its most energetic and acknowledged chief. Mr. Frasne’s accusation fatally destroyed this political danger. Ambitious office-holder that he was, Mr. Vallerois was considering this aspect of things without displeasure when Mr. Roquevillard entered the room.
But he thought less of this when he began his obligatory talk with him, and it was to his credit that in the lawyer facing him he saw only an honest man in trouble. He held out his hand to him and began:
“I have a disagreeable duty to take up with you.”
He stopped and hesitated. Mr. Roquevillard’s moral force showed to best advantage in difficult circumstances. He appreciated the delicacy of the prosecutor, but he went straight to the point himself.
“It concerns my son?”
“Yes.”
“In the matter of a divorce in which his name is involved? A complaint of adultery?”
“No, unfortunately.”
“Unfortunately?”
The word could scarcely have any significance. In a firm but muffled voice, Mr. Roquevillard demanded: “Does it concern an accident? A suicide?”
“No, no. Reassure yourself,” cried Mr. Vallerois, realising the error that he had provoked. “He eloped last night with Mrs. Frasne: the whole town knows it. But what is more serious is that Mr. Frasne, who has just been here, has placed in my hands a complaint of abuse of confidence against him.”
In spite of his self-possession, the old lawyer, red to his forehead, grew indignant.
“Abuse of confidence? I know my son. It’s impossible.”
The prosecutor let him read the accusation which the notary had signed, together with the examinations made by the commissioner of police. Mr. Roquevillard read them through attentively and without interruption. It might be, it was, the foundering of his family, the disgrace of his name. Master of him self, but stricken to his heart, he said at last:
“Mr. Frasne is taking a base revenge.”
“I believe as you do,” replied Mr. Vallerois, letting his sympathy appear without circumlocution. “But the money has disappeared. How can a public trial be prevented?”
“My son is not the only one in this case. When a boy of twenty elopes with a woman of thirty, which of the two prepares and directs the expedition?”
“I made him listen to all that just now, in this very place, with some insistence. I recommended prudence, and insisted upon twenty-four hours of reflection. I am forced back on taking some formal action. Justice must take its course. I am obliged to lay the matter before the examining magistrate.”
Mr. Roquevillard, summoning his courage to meet this blow of fate, said nothing, while the prosecutor turned the insoluble problem over and over again.
“There are presumptions against him, serious, precise and corroborating. In the first place the facilities of his position in the office, then his presence there last night with the keys, after the other clerks had gone, his lack of resources with which to carry through this bold elopement, and even his pains to limit the sum he took, as if he were fixing the rating of a loan he expected to repay.”
“There are other presumptions in his favour,” replied the father proudly. “In the first place, his family. The last of a long line of honest people does not lie. And who told you that he left without any money? When his own money is used up, he’ll come back. I’ll answer for it.”
Their interview was interrupted by an attendant coming to summon the lawyer, for whose argument the court was waiting.
“I’ll follow,” said Mr. Roquevillard, motioning him away.
“But he has been accused. How will he defend himself?” asked Mr. Vallerois. “You must realise that he has a bad case. Evidence accumulates against him. And even on the most favourable hypothesis he must accuse some one else to clear himself. Do you wish that? And he will pass always as having been an accomplice. At all events, if you know where he is, advise him to wait there before he re-enters France. I will deal lightly in the matter of the extradition.”
Mr. Roquevillard shook his head energetically.
“No, no. To run away is to confess. He must come back. I shall find proof of his innocence.”
And after a moment of reflection, during which he weighed the pros and cons, he added:
“Since our misfortune touches you, Mr. Prosecutor, give me leave to ask a service of you, a great service which may yet save us.”
“Which is?”
“Propose to Frasne that he withdraw his complaint in consideration of the full payment to him of one hundred thousand francs.”
“You would make restitution?”
“I will pay him the money.”
“And if your son is not guilty?”
“He’s in a situation from which there’s no way out, as you have said. Our honour is worth more than that. Even pursuit must splash mud on it.”
“Mr. Frasne is supposed to be close. His complaint perhaps is only a way of putting himself in funds again. Try him with half of it.”
“No; no bargaining. Full payment in consideration of withdrawal.”
The attorney was much distressed; naturally desirous of quiet and propriety, he fell back now on his professional scruples.
“You are right, and I want to oblige you, especially in view of the sacrifice you propose. But does it become my character to risk such an abnormal step?”
Mr. Roquevillard put a little emotion in his reply.
“It’s abnormal, yes. But time presses. I am pleading in court. In a little while the complaint will be noised about. You alone know of it and can still suspend it. Quash it. I beg of you.”
“It’s impossible. I can’t deliberately seek out a complainant.”
“You can have him come here.”
“So be it,” said Mr. Vallerois. “The means are dear, but effective surely. I will present the proposal in my own name, so that if by any chance I fail, you will not be embarrassed. The offer on your part might seem to be an admission of the crime.”
“Thank you.”
They separated. The lawyer returned to the court-room, where the councillors were growing impatient, and began his argument with his customary lucidity. Listening to the ordered closeness of his reasoning, no one would have suspected that anguish tortured him. But when he sat down, this old fighter who was never tired, he was conscious at last of an extreme fatigue, heavy as the mysterious blows of age.
After the argument in rebuttal and his brief reply, he regained his liberty at last. He looked at his watch: it was half-past three. In this interval of three hours the fate of his son had been decided. He went up again to the prosecutor’s office, where Mr. Vallerois was waiting for him. At a glance he could see that that officer’s mission had failed.
“Mr. Frasne came here,” explained the latter. “You were right. He wants revenge.”
“He refused?”
“Absolutely. He prefers his revenge to his money. In vain I pressed him in every way in my power. I spoke of the scandal, which would react against his wife; spoke even of his lack of evidence. He replied that if I did not begin a public action, he would bring a civil suit before the examining magistrate. He has the right, and his resolution is unbreakable.”
“And if I should try myself to move him? Our relations were pleasant.”
“Your visit would be useless, painful; perhaps even compromising. I don’t advise you that way at all. I spoke to him of your family, of yourself: He replied: ‘His son has broken my heart. So much the worse if the innocent pay for the guilty.’”
Mr. Roquevillard reflected a moment, and yielded to this advice, of which he could not but approve. He took leave of the prosecutor, stretching out his hand to him.
“There’s nothing left for me but to thank you. You have treated me as a friend, and I shall not forget it.”
“I’m sorry for you,” replied Mr. Vallerois, who was really touched.
The lawyer, his portfolio under his arm, went on his way home. He walked briskly, with his always youthful tread, holding his head high, according to his habit, but his face was very pale. Under the Porticoes, that resort for loungers, he came across friends, who turned aside, while passersby stared at him insistently and mockingly. He perceived that Frasne’s clerks were already hawking the shame of the Roquevillards about the town. The Roquevillards: it was the first failing, for centuries, of any of the race. It must have been watched for, that it should be spread with so much spite. What base envy the pride in their name stirred up! The weakness of one member undid a whole past of energy and honour, a past that had furnished such manly examples for so many years. Did not those who exulted in it understand that this ruin reached them, too?
He straightened himself up and walked more slowly. No one now could look him in the eye. Stiffening with contempt, setting his face to the storm, he reflected: “Dogs, bark and keep away from me. Don’t come nearer. As long as I’m alive I shall protect my own. I’ll shield them with all my power. And you shall not see me suffer.”
Outside his door he was accosted by the Viscount de la Mortellerie, his country neighbour. Must he submit already to condolences and sympathy? Yet this eccentric, in hunting him out, showed himself the most human of all. The old nobleman pointed out the castle, bathed in the evening light.
“At the reception of the Emperor Sigismund in 1416,” he confided mysteriously, “the Duke Amedeus VIII gave a banquet in the grand hall there. It was prepared by Jean de Belleville, the inventor of Savoy cakes. The meats were gilded and covered with ornaments and streamers bearing the arms of the guests, and each one received the dishes that were meant for him in single, double or triple portions, according to his rank. I love the distinction, don’t you? That we should eat, not according to our appetite, but our importance.”
“One portion would do for me,” replied Mr. Roquevillard, shaking off his anger.
He could not, himself, beguile the present with these memories of the past. He disappeared beneath the archway, mounted the stairs, and reached his study, avoiding the room where his wife, as always, kept her bed. But she heard him pass and sent for him, hoping that he might give her some news of her son. He found her alone, sitting up in bed, in the falling shadows.
“Margaret has gone out,” she murmured; and scarcely daring to frame her question, she added: “You know nothing of Maurice?”
“No, nothing. For a long time doubtless we shall know nothing.”
“How hard your voice is, Francis,” replied the invalid. “This woman has bewitched him, you see, the poor boy.”
“Feebleness is one kind of guiltiness.”
She was struck by this rigid tone, and pressing the button of the electric light, beheld her husband looking as if stricken with a sudden old age, so pale and hollow-eyed that she felt at once a presentiment of danger.
“Francis,” she begged of him, “there is something else that you’re hiding from me. Am I not your comrade as I used to be, from whom you have no secrets?”
He moved nearer toward the bed. “Why no, dear wife, there’s nothing else. Isn’t our son’s desertion of us enough?”
Sitting up again, her arms stretched out, she only entreated him the more.
“I can read in your look some terrible menace that hangs over us. Don’t spare me as you did last night. Speak. I shall be brave.”
“You are exciting yourself needlessly. There’s nothing.”
“I swear to you that I shall have the courage to bear it. Don’t you believe me?”
“Valentine, calm yourself.”
“Wait, you shall believe me.”
And joining her hands, the aged woman on her bed of pain called aloud to her God for help. In her pale and emaciated face, through which the pulse of life moved so feebly, her eyes flashed with an ardent flame.
“Valentine,” he said softly.
She turned toward him as if transfigured.
“Now,” she said, “now speak. I can bear all. Is he dead?”
“Oh, no!”
Her heart had given the same cry as his. Conquered by this faith that animated her, he confided to her the terrible accusation that had attainted their flesh and blood. She thrust it from her indignantly.
“It’s not true. Our son is not a thief.”
“No, but for every one else he is.”
“What of that, if it is not true? And that I know, I’m sure of it.”
He cut her short with a quick gesture, dwelling upon the disaster:
“He has brought disgrace on us.”
It was the crime against his race, head of the family as he was, that he condemned, while the Christian woman thought only of her boy’s heart.
“God will not abandon us,” she declared solemnly.
As she uttered these single words of hope Margaret entered, much upset and evidently battling with her dismay. She looked at her father and mother, saw them both suffering there with the same sorrow, and like a stream that breaks its barriers her self-restraint gave way in a burst of tears.
Mrs. Roquevillard drew her to her heart.
“Come to me,” she said.
“Who has been hurting you?” her father demanded.
She was feverish with excitement, but controlled her distress to make some explanation.
“People are insulting us,” she began.
“Who?”
“I’ve just come from Mrs. Bercy’s. Raymond was there. ‘A pretty brother you have,’ said Mrs. Bercy to me. It was horrid of her. As for me, I only kept my head down. Then she began again: ‘You know the story the clerks in the Frasne office are telling about him?’ Still I held my tongue. ‘They say your brother wasn’t content with the wife.’ ‘Mamma,’ cried Raymond feebly. But I was already on my feet. ‘Go on, madame, you must,’ I said. And she dared to finish: ‘He took away the cash-box, too.’ Then I said, ‘I forbid you to insult my brother.’ And to Raymond I added: ‘You, sir, who can’t protect me in your own house, may consider yourself free.’ He wanted to keep me back, but I would not listen to anything more, and here I am.”
“Dear little girl,” murmured her mother, putting her arms around her.
“Oh,” cried Mr. Roquevillard, standing over the two heads, his wife’s and his daughter’s, “people always condemn you thus, without hearing you.”
But already Margaret had forgotten her personal troubles in the common sorrow. She rose and went up to her father, gazing earnestly into his eyes.
“You, father, in whom I have such confidence, tell me, it isn’t true, is it?”
“It’s false,” the invalid assured her.
“I hope so,” said the head of the family. “But all the appearances are against him, and he runs the risk of being sentenced.”
“Sentenced?”
“Yes, sentenced,” replied the lawyer, “and with him all of us that bear his name, all of us who come from the same past with him and are making toward the same future.”
He made a movement as if at once to protect the two weeping women and threaten the deserter:
“One feeble moment has been enough to wreck the efforts of so many close and solid generations. Oh, let him down there in his shameful flight measure the damage of his treachery! His sister’s betrothal is broken, his brother’s future is spoiled, his mother’s health is shattered, his family’s fortune is compromised, our name spotted and our honour stained! That’s his work! And that is called love! What does it matter whether he has stolen a sum of money! From us he has stolen everything. What is there left to us to-day?”
“You,” cried Margaret. “And you will save him.”
“God,” said Mrs. Roquevillard, finding a strange serenity in her sorrow. “Have confidence. The worth of a race can never be undone. It will redeem the culprit’s faults.”