Part 77 (1/2)
The stove-fitter, who had run after the girl, came to the carriage door.
”Take her away!” said Adeline. The man put his arms round Atala and fairly carried her off.
”Thanks for such a sacrifice, my dearest,” said Adeline, taking the Baron's hand and clutching it with delirious joy. ”How much you are altered! you must have suffered so much! What a surprise for Hortense and for your son!”
Adeline talked as lovers talk who meet after a long absence, of a hundred things at once.
In ten minutes the Baron and his wife reached the Rue Louis-le-Grand, and there Adeline found this note awaiting her:--
”MADAME LA BARONNE,--
”Monsieur le Baron Hulot d'Ervy lived for one month in the Rue de Charonne under the name of Th.o.r.ec, an anagram of Hector. He is now in the Pa.s.sage du Soleil by the name of Vyder. He says he is an Alsatian, and does writing, and he lives with a girl named Atala Judici. Be very cautious, madame, for search is on foot; the Baron is wanted, on what score I know not.
”The actress has kept her word, and remains, as ever,
”Madame la Baronne, your humble servant,
”J. M.”
The Baron's return was hailed with such joy as reconciled him to domestic life. He forgot little Atala Judici, for excesses of profligacy had reduced him to the volatility of feeling that is characteristic of childhood. But the happiness of the family was dashed by the change that had come over him. He had been still hale when he had gone away from his home; he had come back almost a hundred, broken, bent, and his expression even debased.
A splendid dinner, improvised by Celestine, reminded the old man of the singer's banquets; he was dazzled by the splendor of his home.
”A feast in honor of the return of the prodigal father?” said he in a murmur to Adeline.
”Hus.h.!.+” said she, ”all is forgotten.”
”And Lisbeth?” he asked, not seeing the old maid.
”I am sorry to say that she is in bed,” replied Hortense. ”She can never get up, and we shall have the grief of losing her ere long. She hopes to see you after dinner.”
At daybreak next morning Victorin Hulot was informed by the porter's wife that soldiers of the munic.i.p.al guard were posted all round the premises; the police demanded Baron Hulot. The bailiff, who had followed the woman, laid a summons in due form before the lawyer, and asked him whether he meant to pay his father's debts. The claim was for ten thousand francs at the suit of an usurer named Samanon, who had probably lent the Baron two or three thousand at most. Victorin desired the bailiff to dismiss his men, and paid.
”But is it the last?” he anxiously wondered.
Lisbeth, miserable already at seeing the family so prosperous, could not survive this happy event. She grew so rapidly worse that Bianchon gave her but a week to live, conquered at last in the long struggle in which she had scored so many victories.
She kept the secret of her hatred even through a painful death from pulmonary consumption. And, indeed, she had the supreme satisfaction of seeing Adeline, Hortense, Hulot, Victorin, Steinbock, Celestine, and their children standing in tears round her bed and mourning for her as the angel of the family.
Baron Hulot, enjoying a course of solid food such as he had not known for nearly three years, recovered flesh and strength, and was almost himself again. This improvement was such a joy to Adeline that her nervous trembling perceptibly diminished.
”She will be happy after all,” said Lisbeth to herself on the day before she died, as she saw the veneration with which the Baron regarded his wife, of whose sufferings he had heard from Hortense and Victorin.
And vindictiveness hastened Cousin Betty's end. The family followed her, weeping, to the grave.
The Baron and Baroness, having reached the age which looks for perfect rest, gave up the handsome rooms on the first floor to the Count and Countess Steinbock, and took those above. The Baron by his son's exertions found an official position in the management of a railroad, in 1845, with a salary of six thousand francs, which, added to the six thousand of his pension and the money left to him by Madame Crevel, secured him an income of twenty-four thousand francs. Hortense having enjoyed her independent income during the three years of separation from Wenceslas, Victorin now invested the two hundred thousand francs he had in trust, in his sister's name and he allowed her twelve thousand francs.