Volume II Part 64 (1/2)
”Yes, that's all! Bras-Rouge is in the game. Yesterday he decoyed the broker by a letter which Barbillon and I took to her on the Boulevard Saint Denis. Bra.s.s-Rouge is a famous fellow! No one suspects him. To make her bite, he has already sold her a diamond for four hundred francs. She will not fail to come, at dusk, to his tavern in the Champs Elysees. We will be there concealed. Calabash may come also, to take care of my boat. If it is necessary to pack up the broker, dead or alive, this will be a nice carriage, and leave no traces behind.
There's a plan for you! Rouge of a Bras-Rouge, what a college-bred scamp!”
”I am always suspicious of Bras-Rouge,” said the widow. ”After the affair of the Rue Montmartre, your brother Ambrose was sent to Toulon, and Bras-Rouge was released.”
”Because there was no proof against him, he is so cunning! But betray others--never!”
The widow shook her head, as if she had been only half convinced of the probity of Bras-Rouge. ”I prefer,” said she, ”the affair of the Quai de Billy--the women-drowning. But Martial will be in the way, as he always is.”
”The devil's thunder will not rid us of him then?” cried Nicholas, half drunk, sticking his long knife with fury in the table.
”I told mother that we had had enough of him; that it could not last,”
said Calabash; ”as long as he is here, we can make nothing out of the children.”
”I tell you he is capable of denouncing us any day, the sneak,” said Nicholas. ”Do you see, mother; if you'd have agreed,” added he, in a ferocious manner, looking at the widow, ”all would have been settled.”
”There are other means.”
”This is the best.”
”At present, no,” answered the widow, with a tone so absolute that Nicholas was quiet, ruled by her influence. She added, ”To-morrow morning he leaves the island forever.”
”How?” said Calabash and Nicholas in a breath.
”He will soon come in; seek a quarrel--boldly--as you have never dared to do. Come to blows, if needs be. He is strong, but you will be two, and I will help you. Above all, no knives--no blood; let him be beaten, not wounded.”
”And what then?” asked Nicholas.
”We'll have an explanation; we will tell him to leave the island to-morrow, otherwise we'll repeat this again to-morrow night; such continual quarrels will disgust him, I know; we have let him be too quiet.”
”But he is stubborn as a mule; he'll remain on account of the children,” said Calabash.
”He is dead beat, but an attack will not scare him,” added Nicholas.
”Oh, yes,” said the widow; ”but every day, every day is too much; he will give up.”
”And if he will not?”
”Then I have another plan to force him to leave tonight, or to-morrow morning at latest,” answered the widow, with a strange smile.
”Truly, mother?”
”Yes; but I would rather frighten him by quarreling and fighting; if I do not then succeed, I'll try the other way.”
”And if the other way don't answer, mother?” said Nicholas.
”There is still another, which always does,” replied the widow.