The Deputy of Arcis

XI

IN WHICH THE CANDIDATE BEGINS TO LOSE VOTES

At this moment Simon Giguet, who had got through his bowing and scraping to all the influential men of Arcis, and who regarded himself as sure of his election, joined the circle around Cecile and Mademoiselle Mollot.  The evening was far advanced.  Ten o’clock had struck.  After an enormous consumption of cakes, orgeat, punch, lemonade, and various syrups, those who had come that evening solely for political reasons and who were not accustomed to Madame Marion’s floors, to them aristocratic, departed,—­all the more willingly, because they were unaccustomed to sitting up so late.  The evening then began to take on its usual air of intimacy.  Simon Giguet hoped that he could now exchange a few words with Cecile, and he looked at her like a conqueror.  The look displeased her.

“My dear fellow,” said Antonin to Simon, observing on his friend’s face the glory of success, “you come at a moment when the noses of all the young men in Arcis are put out of joint.”

“Very much so,” said Ernestine, whom Cecile had nudged with her elbow.  “We are distracted, Cecile and I, about the great Unknown, and we are quarrelling for him.”

“But,” said Cecile, “he is no longer unknown; he is a count.”

“Some adventurer!” replied Simon Giguet, with an air of contempt.

“Will you say that, Monsieur Simon,” answered Cecile, feeling piqued, “of a man to whom the Princesse de Cadignan has just sent her servants, who dined at Gondreville to-day, and is to spend this evening with the Marquise de Cinq-Cygne?”

This was said sharply, and in so hard a tone that Simon was disconcerted.

“Ah, mademoiselle,” said Olivier Vinet, “if we said to each other’s faces what we all say behind our backs, social life wouldn’t be possible.  The pleasures of society, especially in the provinces, are to slander and backbite our neighbors.”

“Monsieur Simon is jealous of your enthusiasm for the mysterious count,” said Ernestine.

“It seems to me,” said Cecile, “that Monsieur Simon has no right to be jealous of my affections.”

After which remark, uttered in a way to dumfound Simon, Cecile rose; the others made way for her and she went to her mother, who was just finishing her rubber of whist.

“My dearest!” cried Madame Marion, hurrying after the heiress, “I think you are rather hard on my poor Simon.”

“What has she done, my dear little kitten?” asked Madame Beauvisage.

“Mamma, Monsieur Simon called my great Unknown an adventurer!”

Simon had followed his aunt and was now beside the card-table.  The four persons whose interests were concerned were thus in the middle of the salon,—­Cecile and her mother on one side of the table, Madame Marion and her nephew on the other.

“Really, madame,” said Simon Giguet, “there must be a strong desire to find fault and to quarrel with me simply because I happened to say that a gentleman whom all Arcis is talking about and who stops at the Mulet—­”

“Do you think he has come here to put himself in competition with you?” said Madame Beauvisage jestingly.

“I should be very indignant with him certainly if he were to cause the slightest misunderstanding between Mademoiselle Cecile and myself,” said the candidate, with a supplicating look at the young girl.

“You gave your opinion, monsieur, in a decisive manner which proves that you are very despotic,” she replied; “but you are right; if you wish to be minister you ought to be decisive.”

Here Madame Marion took Madame Beauvisage by the arm and led her to a sofa.  Cecile, finding herself alone, returned to her former seat to avoid hearing Simon’s answer to her speech, and the candidate was left standing rather foolishly before the table, where he mechanically played with the counters.

“My dear friend,” said Madame Marion in a low voice to Madame Beauvisage, “you see that nothing can now hinder my nephew’s election.”

“I am delighted both for your sake and for the Chamber of Deputies,” said Severine.

“My nephew is certain to go far, my dear; and I’ll tell you why:  his own fortune, that which his father will leave him and mine, will amount altogether to some thirty thousand francs a year.  When a man is a deputy and has a fortune like that, he can aspire to anything.”

“Madame, he has our utmost admiration and our most earnest wishes for the success of his political career; but—­”

“I am not asking for an answer,” said Madame Marion, hastily interrupting her friend.  “I only beg you to reflect on the following suggestions:  Do our children suit each other?  Can we marry them?  We should then live in Paris during the sessions; and who knows if the deputy of Arcis may not be settled there permanently in some fine place in the magistracy?  Look at Monsieur Vinet of Provins, how he has made his way.  People blamed Mademoiselle de Chargeboeuf for marrying him; yet she will soon be wife of the Keeper of the Seals; Monsieur Vinet can be peer of France whenever he pleases.”

“Madame, I have not the power to marry my daughter according to my own tastes.  In the first place, her father and I leave her absolutely free to choose for herself.  If she wanted to marry the ‘great Unknown’ and we found that the match was suitable, we should give our consent.  Besides this, Cecile is wholly dependent on her grandfather, who intends to give her on her marriage the Hotel de Beauseant in Paris, which he purchased for us six years ago; the value of which is now rated at eight hundred thousand francs.  It is one of the finest houses in the faubourg Saint-Germain.  Moreover, he intends to add two hundred thousand francs for the cost of fitting it up.  A grandfather who behaves in this way, and who can influence my mother-in-law to make a few sacrifices for her granddaughter in expectation of a suitable marriage, has a right to advise—­”

“Certainly,” said Madame Marion, stupefied by this confidence, which made the marriage of her nephew and Cecile extremely difficult.

“Even if Cecile had nothing to expect from her grandfather Grevin,” continued Madame Beauvisage, “she would not marry without first consulting him.  If you have any proposals to make, go and see my father.”

“Very good; I will go,” said Madame Marion.

Madame Beauvisage made a sign to Cecile, and together they left the salon.

The next day Antonin and Frederic Marest found themselves, according to their usual custom, with Monsieur Martener and Olivier, beneath the lindens of the Avenue of Sighs, smoking their cigars and walking up and down.  This daily promenade is one of the petty pleasures of government officials in the provinces when they happen to be on good terms with one another.

After they had made a few turns, Simon Giguet came up and joined them saying to the sub-prefect with a mysterious air:—­

“You ought to be faithful to an old comrade who wishes to get you the rosette of an officer and a prefecture.”

“You are beginning your political career betimes,” said Antonin, laughing.  “You are trying to corrupt me, rapid puritan!”

“Will you support me?”

“My dear fellow, you know very well that Bar-sur-Aube votes here.  Who can guarantee a majority under such circumstances?  My colleague of Bar-sur-Aube would complain of me if I did not unite my efforts with his in support of the government.  Your promise is conditional; whereas my dismissal would be certain.”

“But I have no competitors.”

“You think so,” said Antonin, “but some one is sure to turn up; you may rely on that.”

“Why doesn’t my aunt come, when she knows I am on a gridiron!” exclaimed Giguet, suddenly.  “These three hours are like three years!”

His secret had escaped him and he now admitted to his friend that Madame Marion had gone on his behalf to old Grevin with a formal proposal for Cecile’s hand.

The pair had now reached the Brienne road opposite to the Mulet hostelry.  While the lawyer looked down the street towards the bridge his aunt would have to cross, the sub-prefect examined the gullies made by the rain in the open square.  Arcis is not paved.  The plains of Champagne furnish no material fit for building, nor even pebbles large enough for cobble-stone pavements.  One or two streets and a few detached places are imperfectly macadamized and that is saying enough to describe their condition after a rain.  The sub-prefect gave himself an appearance of occupation by apparently exercising his thoughts on this important object; but he lost not a single expression of suffering on the anxious face of his companion.

At this moment, the stranger was returning from the Chateau de Cinq-Cygne, where he had apparently passed the night.  Goulard resolved to clear up, himself, the mystery wrapped about the Unknown, who was physically enveloped in an overcoat of thick cloth called a paletot, then the fashion.  A mantle, thrown across his knees for a covering, hid the lower half of his body, while an enormous muffler of red cashmere covered his neck and head to the eyes.  His hat, jauntily tipped to one side, was, nevertheless, not ridiculous.  Never was a mystery more mysteriously bundled up and swathed.

“Look out!” cried the tiger, who preceded the tilbury on horseback.  “Open, papa Poupart, open!” he screamed in his shrill little voice.

The three servants of the inn ran out, and the tilbury drove in without any one being able to see a single feature of the stranger’s face.  The sub-prefect followed the tilbury into the courtyard, and went to the door of the inn.

“Madame Poupart,” said Antonin, “will you ask Monsieur—­Monsieur—­”

“I don’t know his name,” said Gothard’s sister.

“You do wrong!  The rules of the police are strict, and Monsieur Groslier doesn’t trifle, like some commissaries of police.”

“Innkeepers are never to blame about election-time,” remarked the little tiger, getting off his horse.

“I’ll repeat that to Vinet,” thought the sub-prefect.  “Go and ask your master if he can receive the sub-prefect of Arcis.”

Presently Paradise returned.

“Monsieur begs Monsieur the sub-prefect to come up; he will be delighted to see him.”

“My lad,” said Olivier Vinet, who with the two other functionaries had joined the sub-prefect before the inn, “how much does your master give a year for a boy of your cut and wits?”

“Give, monsieur!  What do you take me for?  Monsieur le comte lets himself be milked, and I’m content.”

“That boy was raised in a good school!” said Frederic Marest.

“The highest school, monsieur,” said the urchin, amazing the four friends with his perfect self-possession.

“What a Figaro!” cried Vinet.

“Mustn’t lower one’s price,” said the infant.  “My master calls me a little Robert-Macaire, and since we have learned how to invest our money we are Figaro, plus a savings bank.”

“How much do you earn?”

“Oh! some races I make two or three thousand francs—­and without selling my master, monsieur.”

“Sublime infant!” said Vinet; “he knows the turf.”

“Yes, and all gentlemen riders,” said the child, sticking out his tongue at Vinet.

Antonin Goulard, ushered by the landlord into a room which had been turned into a salon, felt himself instantly under the focus of an eyeglass held in the most impertinent manner by the stranger.

“Monsieur,” said the sub-prefect with a certain official hauteur, “I have just learned from the wife of the innkeeper that you refuse to conform to the ordinances of the police, and as I do not doubt that you are a person of distinction, I have come myself—­”

“Is your name Goulard?” demanded the stranger in a high voice.

“I am the sub-prefect, monsieur,” replied Antonin Goulard.

“Your father belonged to the Simeuse family?”

“And I, monsieur, belong to the government; that is how times differ.”

“You have a servant named Julien, who has tried to entice the Princesse de Cadignan’s maid away from her?”

“Monsieur, I do not allow any one to speak to me in this manner,” said Goulard; “you misunderstand my character.”

“And you want to know about mine!” returned the Unknown.  “Well, I will now make myself known.  You can write in the landlord’s book:  ’Impertinent fellow.  Direct from Paris.  Age doubtful.  Travelling for pleasure.’  It would be rather a novelty in France to imitate England and let people come and go as they please, without tormenting them at every turn for ‘papers.’  I have no passport; now, what will you do to me?”

“The procureur-du-roi is walking up and down there under the lindens,” said the sub-prefect.

“Monsieur Marest!  Wish him good-morning from me.”

“But who are you?”

“Whatever you wish me to be, my dear Monsieur Goulard,” said the stranger.  “You alone shall decide what I am to be in this department.  Give me some advice on that head.  Here, read that.”

And the stranger handed the sub-prefect the following letter:—­

  (Confidential.) Prefecture of the Aube.

Monsieur the Sub-prefect,—­You will consult with the bearer of this letter as to the election at Arcis, and you will conform to all the suggestions and requests he may make to you.  I request you to conduct this matter with the utmost discretion, and to treat the bearer with all the respect that is due to his station.

The letter was written and signed by the prefect of the Aube.

“You have been talking prose without knowing it,” said the Unknown, taking back the letter.

Antonin Goulard, already struck with the aristocratic tone and manners of this personage, became respectful.

“How was that, monsieur?” he asked.

“By endeavoring to entice Anicette.  She told us of the attempts of your man Julien to corrupt her.  But my little tiger, Paradise, got the better of him, and he ended by admitting that you wanted to put Anicette into the service of one of the richest families in Arcis.  Now, as the richest family in Arcis is the Beauvisage family I make no doubt it is Mademoiselle Cecile who covets this treasure.”

“Yes, monsieur.”

“Very good; then Anicette shall enter the Beauvisage household at once.”

He whistled.  Paradise presented himself so rapidly that his master said:  “You were listening!”

“In spite of myself, Monsieur le comte; these partitions are nothing but paper.  But if Monsieur le comte prefers, I will move upstairs.”

“No, you can listen; it is your perquisite.  It is for me to speak low when I don’t want you to know my affairs.  Go back to Cinq-Cygne, and give this gold piece to that little Anicette from me.  Julien shall have the credit of enticing her away,” he continued, addressing Goulard.  “That bit of gold will inform her that she is to follow him.  Anicette may be useful to the success of our candidate.”

“Anicette?”

“Monsieur, it is now thirty-two years since lady’s-maids have served my purposes.  I had my first adventure at the age of thirteen, like the regent, the great-great-grandfather of our present King.  Do you know the fortune of this Mademoiselle Beauvisage?”

“I can’t help knowing it, monsieur, for yesterday at Madame Marion’s, Madame Beauvisage said openly that Monsieur Grevin, Cecile’s grandfather, would give his granddaughter the hotel de Beauseant in Paris and two hundred thousand francs for a wedding present.”

The stranger’s eyes expressed no surprise.  He seemed to consider the fortune rather paltry.

“Do you know Arcis well?” he asked of Goulard.

“I am the sub-prefect and I was born here.”

“What is the best way to balk curiosity?”

“By satisfying it.  For instance, Monsieur le Comte has a baptismal name; let him register that with the title of count.”

“Very good; Comte Maxime.”

“And if monsieur will assume the position of a railway official, Arcis will be content; it will amuse itself by floating that stick at least for a fortnight.”

“No, I prefer to be concerned in irrigation; it is less common.  I have come down to survey the wastelands of Champagne in order to reclaim them.  That will be, my good Monsieur Goulard, a reason for inviting me to dine with you to-morrow to meet the mayor and his family; I wish to see them, and study them.”

“I shall be only to happy to receive you,” said the sub-prefect; “but I must ask your indulgence for the deficiencies of my little household.”

“If I succeed in managing the election of Arcis according to the wishes of those who have sent me here, you, my dear friend, will be made a prefect.  Here, read these”; and he held out two letters to his visitor.

“Very good, Monsieur le comte,” said Antonin, returning them.

“Make a list of all the votes on which the ministry may count.  Above all, let no one suspect that you and I understand each other.  I am a speculator in land, and I don’t care a fig for elections.”

“I will send the commissary of police to force you to inscribe your name on Poupart’s register.”

“So do.  Adieu, monsieur.  Heavens! what a region this is,” said the count, in a loud voice; “one can’t take a step without having the community, sub-prefect and all, on one’s back.”

“You will have to answer to the commissary of police, monsieur,” said Antonin, in an equally loud tone.

And for the next twenty minutes Madame Mollot talked of the altercation that took place between the sub-prefect and the stranger.

“Well, what wood is the beam that has plumped into our bog made of?” said Olivier Vinet when Antonin Goulard rejoined them on leaving the Mulet.

“He is a Comte Maxime who is here to study the geological system of Champagne, with a view to finding mineral waters,” replied the sub-prefect, with an easy manner.

“Say a speculator,” said Oliver.

“Does he expect to get the natives to lay out capital?” asked Monsieur Martener.

“I doubt if our royalists will go into that kind of mining,” remarked Vinet, laughing.

“What should you think from the air and gestures of Madame Marion?” said the sub-prefect turning off the subject by pointing to Madame Marion and Simon, who were deep in conversation.

Simon had gone toward the bridge to meet his aunt, and was now walking with her up the square.

“If he was accepted one word would suffice,” said the shrewd Olivier.

“Well?” said all the officials when Simon came to them under the lindens.

“My aunt thinks the matter very hopeful,” replied Simon.  “Madame Beauvisage and old Grevin, who has just gone to Gondreville, were not at all surprised at my proposals; they talked of our respective fortunes, and said they wished to leave Cecile perfectly free to make her choice.  Besides which, Madame Beauvisage said that, as for herself, she saw no objection to an alliance by which she should feel herself honored; although she postponed all answer until after my election, and possibly my first appearance in the Chamber.  Old Grevin said he should consult the Comte de Gondreville, without whose advice he never took any important step.”

“All of which means,” said Goulard, point-blank, “that you will never marry Cecile, my old fellow.”

“Why not?” said Giguet, ironically.

“My dear friend, Madame Beauvisage and her daughter spend four evenings every week in the salon of your aunt; your aunt is the most distinguished woman in Arcis; and she is, though twenty years the elder, an object of envy to Madame Beauvisage; don’t you see, therefore, that they wished to wrap up their refusal in certain civilities?”

“Not to say entire yes or no in such cases,” said Vinet, “is to say no, with due regard to the intimacy of the two families.  Though Madame Beauvisage has the largest fortune in Arcis, Madame Marion is the most esteemed woman in the place; for, with the exception of our chief-justice’s wife, who sees no one now, she is the only woman who knows how to hold a salon; she is the queen of Arcis.  Madame Beauvisage has tried to make her refusal polite, that’s all.”

“I think that old Grevin was fooling your mother,” said Frederic Marest.

“Yesterday you attacked the Comte de Gondreville, you insulted and grievously affronted him, and he is to be consulted about your marriage to Cecile!”

“Pere Grevin is a sly old dog,” said Vinet.

“Madame Beauvisage is very ambitious,” pursued Antonin Goulard.  “She knows very well her daughter is to have two millions; she means to be mother-in-law of a minister, or an ambassador, in order to play the great lady in Paris.”

“Well, why not?” said Simon Giguet.

“I wish you may get it!” replied the sub-prefect looking at Vinet, with whom he went off into a hearty laugh as soon as they were out of hearing.  “He won’t even be deputy,” added Antonin, addressing Vinet; “the ministry have other views.  You will find a letter from your father when you get home, enjoining you to make sure of the votes of all the persons in your department, and see that they go for the ministerial candidate.  Your own promotion depends on this; and he requests you to be very discreet.”

“But who is the candidate for whom our ushers and sheriffs and clerks, and solicitors and notaries are to vote?” asked Vinet.

“The one I shall name to you.”

“How do you know my father has written to me, and what he wrote?”

“The stranger told me—­”

“The man after water?”

“My dear Vinet, you and I are not to know; we must treat him as a stranger.  He saw your father at Provins as he came through.  Just now this same man gave me a note from the prefect instructing me to follow in every particular the instructions of Comte Maxime about this election.  I knew very well I should have a battle to fight!  Come and dine somewhere and we will get out our batteries.  You are to be procureur-du-roi at Mantes, and I am to be prefect; but we must seem to have nothing to do with the election, for don’t you see, we are between the hammer and the anvil.  Simon is the candidate of a party which wants to overturn the present ministry and may succeed; but for men as intelligent as you and I there is but one course to take.”

“What is that?”

“To serve those who make and unmake ministers.  A letter was shown to me from one of those personages who represent the stable and immovable thought of the State.”

Before going farther, it is necessary to explain who this Unknown person was, and what his purpose was in coming to Champagne.