Chapter 18
At last, then, the truth had come out!
Overcome with horror, her hair standing at an end, and shaken by nervous spasms, poor Henrietta was trying to measure the depth of the abyss into which she had thrown herself.
Voluntarily, and with the simplicity of a child, she had walked into the pit which had been dug for her. But who, in her place, would not have trusted? Who could have conceived such an idea? Who could have suspected such monstrous rascality?
Ah! Now she understood but too well all the mysterious movements that had so puzzled her in M. de Brevan. She saw how profound had been his calculations when he recommended her so urgently not to take her jewels with her while escaping from her father's house, nor any object of value; for, if she had had her jewelry, she would have been in possession of a small fortune; she would have been independent, and above want, at least for a couple of years.
But M. de Brevan wanted her to have nothing. He knew, the coward! with what crushing contempt she would reject his first proposals; but he flattered himself with the hope that isolation, fear, destitution would at last reduce her to submission, and enable him--
"It is too horrible," repeated the poor girl,--"too horrible!"
And this man had been Daniel's friend! And it was he to whom Daniel, at the moment of sailing, had intrusted his betrothed! What atrocious deception! M. Thomas Elgin was no doubt a formidable bandit, faithless and unscrupulous; but he was known as such: he was known to be capable of any thing, and thus people were on their guard. But this man!--ah, a thousand times meaner and viler!--he had watched for a whole year, with smiling face, for the hour of treachery; he had prepared a hideous crime under the veil of the noblest friendship!
Henrietta thought she could divine what was the traitor's final aim. In obtaining possession of her, he no doubt thought he would secure to himself a large portion of Count Ville-Handry's immense fortune.
And hence, she continued in her meditations, hence the hatred between Sir Thorn and M. de Brevan. They both coveted the same thing; and each one trembled lest the other should first get hold of the treasure which he wanted to secure. The idea that the new countess was in complicity with M. de Brevan did not enter Henrietta's mind. On the contrary, she thought they were enemies, and divided from each other by separate and opposite interests.
"Ah!" she said to herself, "they have one feeling, at all events, in common; and that is hatred against me."
A few months ago, so fearful and so sudden a catastrophe would have crushed Henrietta, in all probability. But she had endured so many blows during the past year, that she bore this also; for it is a fact that the human heart learns to bear grief as the body learns to endure fatigue. Moreover, she called in to her assistance a light shining high above all this terrible darkness,--the remembrance of Daniel.
She had doubted him for an instant; but her faith had, after all, remained intact and perfect. Her reason told her, that, if he had really loved Sarah Brandon, her enemies, M. Elgin and M. de Brevan, would not have taken such pains to make her believe it. She thought, therefore, she was quite certain that he would return to her with his heart devoted to her as when he left her.
But, great God! to think of the grief and the rage of this man, when he should hear how wickedly and cowardly he had been betrayed by the man whom he called his friend! He would know how to restore the count's daughter to her proper position, and how to avenge her.
"And I shall wait for him," she said, her teeth firmly set,--"I shall wait for him!"
How? She did not ask herself that question; for she was yet in that first stage of enthusiasm, when we are full of heroic resolves which do not allow us to see the obstacles that are to be overcome. But she soon learned to know the first difficulties in her way, thanks to Dame Chevassat, who brought her her dinner as the clock struck six, according to the agreement they had made.
The estimable lady had assumed a deeply grieved expression; you might have sworn she had tears in her eyes. In her sweetest voice, she asked:--
"Well, well, my beautiful young lady; so you have quarrelled with our dear M. Maxime?" Henrietta was so sure of the uselessness of replying, and so fearful of new dangers, that she simply replied,-- "Yes, madam."
"I was afraid of it," replied the woman, "just from seeing him come down the stairs with a face as long as that. You see, he is in love with you, that kind young man; and you may believe me when I tell you so, for I know what men are."
She expected an answer; for generally her eloquence was very effective with her tenants. But, as no reply came, she went on,--
"We must hope that the trouble will blow over."
"No!"
Looking at Mrs. Chevassat, one would have thought she was stunned.
"How savage you are!" she exclaimed at last. "Well, it is your lookout. Only I should like to know what you mean to do?"
"About what?"
"Why, about your board."
"I shall find the means, madam, you may be sure."
The old woman, however, who knew from experience what that cruel word, "living," sometimes means with poor forsaken girls, shook her head seriously, and answered,--
"So much the better; so much the better! Only I know you owe a good deal of money."
"Owe?"
"Why, yes! The furniture here has never been paid for."
"What? The furniture"--
"Of course, M. Maxime was going to pay for it; he has told me so. But if you fall out in this way--you understand, don't you?"
She hardly did understand such fearful infamy. Still Henrietta did not show her indignation and surprise. She asked,--
"What did the furniture of this room cost? do you know?"
"I don't know. Something like five or six hundred francs, things are so dear now!" The whole was probably not worth a hundred and fifty or two hundred francs.
"Very well. I'll pay," said Henrietta. "The man will give me forty- eight hours' time, I presume?"
"Oh, certainly!"
As the poor girl was now quite sure that this honeyed Megsera was employed by M. de Brevan to watch her, she affected a perfectly calm air. When she had finished her dinner, she even insisted upon paying on the spot fifty francs, which she owed for the last few days, and for some small purchases. But, when the old woman was gone, she sank into a chair, and said,--
"I am lost!"
There was, in fact, no refuge for her, no help to be expected.
Should she return to her father, and implore the pity of his wife? Ah! death itself would be more tolerable than such a humiliation. And besides, in escaping from M. de Brevan, would she not fall into the hands of M. Elgin?
Should she seek assistance at the hands of some of the old family friends? But which?
In greater distress than the shipwrecked man who in vain examines the blank horizon, she looked around for some one to help her. She forced her mind to recall all the people she had ever known. Alas! she knew, so to say, nobody. Since her mother had died, and she had been living alone, no one seemed to have remembered her, unless for the purpose of calumniating her.
Her only friends, the only ones who had made her cause their own, the Duke and the Duchess of Champdoce, were in Italy, as she had been assured.
"I can count upon nobody but myself," she repeated,--"myself, myself!" Then rousing herself, she said, her heart swelling with emotion,--
"But never mind! I shall be saved!"
Her safety depended upon one single point: if she could manage to live till she came of age, or till Daniel returned, all was right.
"Is it really so hard to live?" she thought. "The daughters of poor people, who are as completely forsaken as I am, nevertheless live. Why should not I live also?"
Why?
Because the children of poor people have served, so to say, from the cradle, an apprenticeship of poverty,--because they are not afraid of a day without work, or a day without bread,--because cruel experience has armed them for the struggle,--because, in fine, they know life, and they know Paris,--because their industry is adapted to their wants, and they have an innate capacity to obtain some advantage from every thing, thanks to their smartness, their enterprise, and their energy.
But Count Ville-Handry's only daughter--the heiress of many millions, brought up, so to say, in a hothouse, according to the stupid custom of modern society--knew nothing at all of life, of its bitter realities, its struggles, and its sufferings. She had nothing but courage.
"That is enough," she said to herself. "What we will do, we can do."
Thus resolved to seek aid from no one, she set to