The Count of Monte Cristo
began thoughtfully to caress the little spaniel. Lucien looked at her
for a moment in silence.
“Come, Hermine,” he said, after a short time, “answer
candidly,—something vexes you—is it not so?”
30239m
“Nothing,” answered the baroness.
And yet, as she could scarcely breathe, she rose and went towards a
looking-glass. “I am frightful tonight,” she said. Debray rose,
smiling, and was about to contradict the baroness upon this latter
point, when the door opened suddenly. M. Danglars appeared; Debray
reseated himself. At the noise of the door Madame Danglars turned
round, and looked upon her husband with an astonishment she took no
trouble to conceal.
“Good-evening, madame,” said the banker; “good-evening, M. Debray.”
Probably the baroness thought this unexpected visit signified a desire
to make up for the sharp words he had uttered during the day. Assuming
a dignified air, she turned round to Debray, without answering her
husband.
“Read me something, M. Debray,” she said. Debray, who was slightly
disturbed at this visit, recovered himself when he saw the calmness of
the baroness, and took up a book marked by a mother-of-pearl knife
inlaid with gold.
“Excuse me,” said the banker, “but you will tire yourself, baroness, by
such late hours, and M. Debray lives some distance from here.”
Debray was petrified, not only to hear Danglars speak so calmly and
politely, but because it was apparent that beneath outward politeness
there really lurked a determined spirit of opposition to anything his
wife might wish to do. The baroness was also surprised, and showed her
astonishment by a look which would doubtless have had some effect upon
her husband if he had not been intently occupied with the paper, where
he was looking to see the closing stock quotations. The result was,
that the proud look entirely failed of its purpose.
“M. Lucien,” said the baroness, “I assure you I have no desire to
sleep, and that I have a thousand things to tell you this evening,
which you must listen to, even though you slept while hearing me.”
“I am at your service, madame,” replied Lucien coldly.
“My dear M. Debray,” said the banker, “do not kill yourself tonight
listening to the follies of Madame Danglars, for you can hear them as
well tomorrow; but I claim tonight and will devote it, if you will
allow me, to talk over some serious matters with my wife.”
This time the blow was so well aimed, and hit so directly, that Lucien
and the baroness were staggered, and they interrogated each other with
their eyes, as if to seek help against this aggression, but the
irresistible will of the master of the house prevailed, and the husband
was victorious.
“Do not think I wish to turn you out, my dear Debray,” continued
Danglars; “oh, no, not at all. An unexpected occurrence forces me to
ask my wife to have a little conversation with me; it is so rarely I
make such a request, I am sure you cannot grudge it to me.”
Debray muttered something, bowed and went out, knocking himself against
the edge of the door, like Nathan in _Athalie_.
“It is extraordinary,” he said, when the door was closed behind him,
“how easily these husbands, whom we ridicule, gain an advantage over
us.”
30241m
Lucien having left, Danglars took his place on the sofa, closed the
open book, and placing himself in a dreadfully dictatorial attitude, he
began playing with the dog; but the animal, not liking him as well as
Debray, and attempting to bite him, Danglars seized him by the skin of
his neck and threw him upon a couch on the other side of the room. The
animal uttered a cry during the transit, but, arrived at its
destination, it crouched behind the cushions, and stupefied at such
unusual treatment remained silent and motionless.
“Do you know, sir,” asked the baroness, “that you are improving?
Generally you are only rude, but tonight you are brutal.”
“It is because I am in a worse humor than usual,” replied Danglars.
Hermine looked at the banker with supreme disdain. These glances
frequently exasperated the pride of Danglars, but this evening he took
no notice of them.
“And what have I to do with your ill-humor?” said the baroness,
irritated at the impassibility of her husband; “do these things concern
me? Keep your ill-humor at home in your money boxes, or, since you have
clerks whom you pay, vent it upon them.”
“Not so,” replied Danglars; “your advice is wrong, so I shall not
follow it. My money boxes are my Pactolus, as, I think, M. Demoustier
says, and I will not retard its course, or disturb its calm. My clerks
are honest men, who earn my fortune, whom I pay much below their
deserts, if I may value them according to what they bring in; therefore
I shall not get into a passion with them; those with whom I will be in
a passion are those who eat my dinners, mount my horses, and exhaust my
fortune.”
“And pray who are the persons who exhaust your fortune? Explain
yourself more clearly, I beg, sir.”
“Oh, make yourself easy!—I am not speaking riddles, and you will soon
know what I mean. The people who exhaust my fortune are those who draw
out 700,000 francs in the course of an hour.”
“I do not understand you, sir,” said the baroness, trying to disguise
the agitation of her voice and the flush of her face.
“You understand me perfectly, on the contrary,” said Danglars: “but, if
you will persist, I will tell you that I have just lost 700,000 francs
upon the Spanish loan.”
“And pray,” asked the baroness, “am I responsible for this loss?”
“Why not?”
“Is it my fault you have lost 700,000 francs?”
“Certainly it is not mine.”
“Once for all, sir,” replied the baroness sharply, “I tell you I will
not hear cash named; it is a style of language I never heard in the
house of my parents or in that of my first husband.”
“Oh, I can well believe that, for neither of them was worth a penny.”
“The better reason for my not being conversant with the slang of the
bank, which is here dinning in my ears from morning to night; that
noise of jingling crowns, which are constantly being counted and
re-counted, is odious to me. I only know one thing I dislike more,
which is the sound of your voice.”
“Really?” said Danglars. “Well, this surprises me, for I thought you
took the liveliest interest in all my affairs!”
30243m
“I? What could put such an idea into your head?”
“Yourself.”
“Ah?—what next?”
“Most assuredly.”
“I should like to know upon what occasion?”
“Oh, _mon Dieu!_ that is very easily done. Last February you were the
first who told me of the Haitian funds. You had dreamed that a ship had
entered the harbor at Le Havre, that this ship brought news that a
payment we had looked upon as lost was going to be made. I know how
clear-sighted your dreams are; I therefore purchased immediately as
many shares as I could of the Haitian debt, and I gained 400,000 francs
by it, of which 100,000 have been honestly paid to you. You spent it as
you pleased; that was your business. In March there was a question
about a grant to a railway. Three companies presented themselves, each
offering equal securities. You told me that your instinct,—and although
you pretend to know nothing about speculations, I think on the
contrary, that your comprehension is very clear upon certain
affairs,—well, you told me that your instinct led you to believe the
grant would be given to the company called the Southern. I bought two
thirds of the shares of that company; as you had foreseen, the shares
trebled in value, and I picked up a million, from which 250,000 francs
were paid to you for pin-money. How have you spent this 250,000
francs?—it is no business of mine.”
“When are you coming to the point?” cried the baroness, shivering with
anger and impatience.
“Patience, madame, I am coming to it.”
“That’s fortunate.”
“In April you went to dine at the minister’s. You heard a private
conversation respecting Spanish affairs—on the expulsion of Don Carlos.
I bought some Spanish shares. The expulsion took place and I pocketed
600,000 francs the day Charles V. repassed the Bidassoa. Of these
600,000 francs you took 50,000 crowns. They were yours, you disposed of
them according to your fancy, and I asked no questions; but it is not
the less true that you have this year received 500,000 livres.”
“Well, sir, and what then?”
“Ah, yes, it was just after this that you spoiled everything.”
“Really, your manner of speaking——”
“It expresses my meaning, and that is all I want. Well, three days
after that you talked politics with M. Debray, and you fancied from his
words that Don Carlos had returned to Spain. Well, I sold my shares,
the news got out, and I no longer sold—I gave them away, next day I
find the news was false, and by this false report I have lost 700,000
francs.”
“Well?”
“Well, since I gave you a fourth of my gains, I think you owe me a
fourth of my losses; the fourth of 700,000 francs is 175,000 francs.”
“What you say is absurd, and I cannot see why M. Debray’s name is mixed
up in this affair.”
“Because if you do not possess the 175,000 francs I reclaim, you must
have lent them to your friends, and M. Debray is one of your friends.”
30245m
“For shame!” exclaimed the baroness.
“Oh, let us have no gestures, no screams, no modern drama, or you will
oblige me to tell you that I see Debray leave here, pocketing the whole
of the 500,000 livres you have handed over to him this year, while he
smiles to himself, saying that he has found what the most skilful
players have never discovered—that is, a roulette where he wins without
playing, and is no loser when he loses.”
The baroness became enraged.
“Wretch!” she cried, “will you dare to tell me you did not know what
you now reproach me with?”
“I do not say that I did know it, and I do not say that I did not know
it. I merely tell you to look into my conduct during the last four
years that we have ceased to be husband and wife, and see whether it
has not always been consistent. Some time after our rupture, you wished
to study music, under the celebrated baritone who made such a
successful appearance at the Théâtre Italien; at the same time I felt
inclined to learn dancing of the _danseuse_ who acquired such a
reputation in London. This cost me, on your account and mine, 100,000
francs. I said nothing, for we must have peace in the house; and
100,000 francs for a lady and gentleman to be properly instructed in
music and dancing are not too much. Well, you soon become tired of
singing, and you take a fancy to study diplomacy with the minister’s
secretary. You understand, it signifies nothing to me so long as you
pay for your lessons out of your own cash box. But today I find you are
drawing on mine, and that your apprenticeship may cost me 700,000
francs per month. Stop there, madame, for this cannot last. Either the
diplomatist must give his lessons gratis, and I will tolerate him, or
he must never set his foot again in my house;—do you understand,
madame?”
“Oh, this is too much,” cried Hermine, choking, “you are worse than
despicable.”
“But,” continued Danglars, “I find you did not even pause there——”
“Insults!”
“You are right; let us leave these facts alone, and reason coolly. I
have never interfered in your affairs excepting for your good; treat me
in the same way. You say you have nothing to do with my cash box. Be it
so. Do as you like with your own, but do not fill or empty mine.
Besides, how do I know that this was not a political trick, that the
minister enraged at seeing me in the opposition, and jealous of the
popular sympathy I excite, has not concerted with M. Debray to ruin
me?”
“A probable thing!”
“Why not? Who ever heard of such an occurrence as this?—a false