Part 51 (1/2)
Know that I loved you from the first moment I saw you in the house of the Princess de Poix. I loved you, I adored you secretly, I sought for a favourable time to declare my pa.s.sion.”
Her eyes opened wide as she listened, and she would have given worlds to escape, yet her feeling was mainly of pity.
”This is very unfortunate. Calm yourself, Abbe. I will ever have a lively feeling of gratefulness for your devotion. Think of me on those terms.”
”Ah, Madame, those were the only terms which might have been possible in former days; but they do not belong to the new _regime_. We are all equal now. Nothing will satisfy me short of possessing you entirely.”
”Abbe, you are excited.”
”No, citizeness, I have long been determined you shall be my mate.” She shrank from the word and the uncanny pa.s.sion of his gaze.
”When you will have reflected a few hours you will see that this is impossible.”
”What! impossible? And why impossible? Ah, yes, I know, it is because of your pretty-faced lover Repentigny. I know all about that. I could have crushed him between my fingers; and I will crush him yet. What!--that man between myself and you! Why, then, did I bring you here? Was it to allow his interference with my object? After all I have done for you, am I to be met with answers of this sort?”
”I appreciate entirely your services, Abbe; they are too great to be underrated.”
”They shall be more, citizeness. In these days it is _my_ turn to dictate.”
”Am I to understand that this has been your aim all along?”
He hesitated, but replied boldly, ”It has, and were it not for that, I might long ago have pointed out both you and your doll-head lover to the Committee of Public Safety.”
”Then your whole service has been abstention from positive treachery for your own ends?”
”You dare me? Caution, citizeness! You are in my power.”
”In your power? You are a coward as well as a knave, then?”
”Remember still more,” he hissed, losing all control of himself, ”that your lover also is in my power; he is captured.”
”My G.o.d! you have brought us to this!” she cried.
The door creaked and the Admiral entered.
”Be off, you cur!” said he, standing sternly over the Abbe, who shrank as if struck. ”Go to your work, you----”
A look of terror upon his countenance, Jude precipitated himself through the doorway.
The Admiral closed it, and returning, sat down by the candle and began to talk to Cyrene. Seeing his features so close and large and accentuated by the candle-light, their coa.r.s.eness and horror filled her with wonder.
”So that fellow boasts of his fidelity!” he exclaimed, in a repulsively modulated and familiar tone. ”What a wealth of tenderness such a kidnapping shows! Possibly you knew his profession, citizeness?--that of salaried spy. Your protector he claims to be? Excellent--when he could not turn a straw in your favour. He has deprived you of your freedom; that was easier in these times. I, on the other hand,” he added, smiling yet more hideously, ”am here to return it to you.”
”I thank you,” she replied wearily, without hope.
”I shall reveal to you the true reason of your immunity for so long from the wrath of the people. It was because of Repentigny, not of yourself.
I arranged it, and you were then unknown to me. Through him Bec and Caron, two friends of the people, had died six years ago, in the days of the tyrant. It was I, as avenger, not the worm Jude as lover, who watched over your household in the Rue Honore, reserving Repentigny for prolonged punishment. It was I whose power surrounded you as it has surrounded all Paris.” He paused proudly.