The fact is, the two lads were beginning rebel against Latin and learning, under pretence that their father cared not a straw whether they were scholars or no.

  The Marquise began by taking Père Delar’s, arm.

  “Father,” she said, “I am going to begin with you. My confession will not take long, thank God; yesterday I let my thoughts wander during mass.”

  “What made them wander, my daughter?”

  “I am expecting a letter from Monsieur de Chauvelin, and it has not come.”

  “I absolve you, daughter, if that is all your fault.”

  “Yes, that is all,” declared the Marquise with the smile of a seraph, — and the Monk withdrew.

  “Your turn, Monsieur l’Abbé. The examination would be long and tiresome. If the children are discontented, ’tis because they do not know their lessons. If this is so, and you show me it is so, I shall be forced to scold and punish them. Spare them and spare me; let us put off the trial till a time when it may prove satisfactory for all of us.”

  The Abbé agreed that the Marquise was right, and disappeared as the Monk had done, whose form could already be seen vanishing beneath the shadows of the long-drawn avenues.

  “Your turn now, Bonbonne,” said the Marquise; “there is only you left. Shall I find your ruffled brow as easy to smooth and your sad sighs to stifle?”

  “I fear not.”

  “Well, let us see.”

  “‘Tis easy said, but my figures are really terrifying.”

  “Well, terrify me; you have never yet succeeded in frightening my privy purse.”

  “This month your purse will be frightened, Madame; it will be worse than frightened, it will die of the blow.”

  “Come, come; have you reckoned up my private savings too?” expostulated the Marquise in a tone that was meant to be bantering.

  “Have I reckoned up your savings, Madame? Of course I have; where was the difficulty?”

  “But I never told a soul, Bonbonne.”

  “‘Twere better if you had. But I need not to be told to know.”

  “To know what?”

  “The grand total of your economies.”

  “I defy you to tell me!” cried the Marquise, turning red.

  “If you say so, I need not hesitate; you have twenty-five thousand five hundred crowns as near as may be.”

  “Oh! Bonbonne,” ejaculated the Marquise, as much chagrined as if the Intendant had indiscreetly discovered some painful secret.

  “Madame la Marquise does not suspect me, I trust, of having searched her strong-box.”

  “But then... how...?”

  “How much have you a year for household expenses? Ten thousand crowns, is not that the sum?”

  “Yes.”

  “And how much do you spend? Eight thousand crowns, I think.”

  “Yes.”

  “And is it not ten years that you have been hoarding, seeing it is ten years ago since Monsieur de Chauvelin took up his abode at Court?”

  “Yes, again.”

  “Very well, madame, when the interest is added to the principal you have twenty- five thousand crowns; you must have them.”

  “Bonbonne!”

  “So much for my guessing! — now, having this money, you will give it to Monsieur de Chauvelin; he has only to ask for it. Then, if you give it him, there will be nothing left for your children, supposing the Marquis should die suddenly.

  “Bonbonne!”

  “Let us look the thing in the face! Your property is pledged to other uses; Monsieur de Chauvelin’s estate owes seven hundred thousand livres.”

  “He has a fortune of sixteen hundred thousand.”

  “Granted, but the overplus of the seven hundred thousand will not suffice merely to satisfy the creditors.”

  “You alarm me!”

  “I want to.”

  “What is to be done?”

  “Urge Monsieur de Chauvelin, who spends too much, to make over at once for the benefit of his children, the nine hundred thousand livres remaining; get him to assign them to you as jointure, or arrange for their return to you by making a will...”

  “Making a will? how dreadful!”

  “There you are with your silly scruples! does a man die because he writes a will?”

  “But to speak of making a will to Monsieur de Chauvelin!”

  “That’s it; you are afraid to interrupt Monsieur le Marquis in his pleasures, to trouble his digestion, to vex his serenity, with that horrid word ‘the future,’ which always sounds like a death-knell in happy ears. Well, if you are deterred by this fear, you will ruin your children, — all to spare the Marquis’s susceptibilities.”

  “Bonbonne!”

  “My figures speak for me; read them.”

  “‘Tis too dreadful.”

  “It would be more dreadful to wait for the disaster I prophesy. Play the judicious counsellor; get into your travelling coach and away to see the Marquis.”

  “To Paris?”

  “No, to Versailles.”

  “And meet the society my husband frequents? Never, never!...

  “Write to him then.”

  “Will he so much as read my letter? Alas! when I write to congratulate him or wish him luck, he never reads what I say; is he likely to when I write about tiresome business matters?”

  “Then a friend must undertake the task, — myself for instance.”

  “You?”

  “You think he will not listen to me? but I can assure you, Madame, he will.”

  “You will make him ill, Bonbonne.”

  “His doctor will cure the illness.”

  “You will put him in a passion, and then agitation will kill him.”

  “Not so; I am far too anxious for him to live. If I did kill him, it would be after getting him to sign a will,” and the worthy man broke into a loud laugh that was very painful to the Marquise.

  “Bonbonne,” she moaned, “when you speak so, it is I you are like to kill.”

  The Intendant took her hand respectfully. “Forgive me,” he said, “I forget myself, Madame la Marquise; tell them to put the horses in the coach, I am going to Versailles.”

  “Thank God for it! You will take my account books with you, and... look, look!”

  “What is it?”

  “Can my orders have been attended to already?”

  “In what way?”

  “You spoke of my coach, and lo! there it is, in the Grand Avenue.”

  “Can it be?”

  “Sir, the Chauvelin liveries!”

  “It is the Marquis’s dark greys.”

  “Madame, Madame!” the Abbé V... was heard calling, echoed by another “Madame, Madame!” from Père Delar.

  “Madame, Madame!” shouted a score of voices, in the gardens, pleasances and park.

  “Mother, mother!” shrilled the children.

  “The Marquis, here, at Grosbois, today? It cannot be true,” faltered the Marquise.

  “Good day to you, Madame,” called the Marquis from the carriage window. It had just come to a halt and he was getting out with looks and gestures of alacrity.

  “Himself! it is himself, sound in body and cheerful in mind; God be thanked for this!”

  “God be thanked! God be thanked!” repeated the same twenty voices, all eager to welcome the master, husband and father.

  CHAPTER VIII.

  ‘LIKE DICERS’ OATHS’.

  IT was indeed the Marquis in person.

  Tenderly he embraced the two boys, who had given a shout of joy on seeing him, and kissed with heartfelt affection the hand of the astonished Marquise.

  “You here, sir! you!” she cried, taking possession of his arm.

  ‘‘Yes, it is I... But these lads were at play or at work; I am loth to interrupt their studies, and still more their games.”

  ‘‘Ah! sir, for the brief time they have to see you, let them have full enjoyment of your dear presence.”

  “God be thanked! they will have plenty of time to enjoy the sight of me.”

  “Plenty of time, — what, till to-morrow night? You will not be leaving us till to-morrow night?”

  “Better still, Madame.”

  “You will be sleeping two nights at Grosbois?”

  “Two nights, four nights, always.”

  “Ah! sir, what has happened then?” cried the Marquise eagerly, without a thought that the expression of so much surprise might well imply some reproach to Monsieur de Chauvelin as to his behaviour in the past.

  The Marquis frowned in momentary annoyance; then suddenly:

  “Have you not sometimes asked God to restore me to my family?” he asked with a smile.

  “Oh! yes, sir, constantly.”

  “Very well, Madame, your prayers have been answered. I seemed to hear a voice calling me; and I have obeyed the voice.”

  “And you are leaving Court?”

  “I am going to settle down at Gros- bois,” struck in the Marquis, stifling a sigh.

  “What bliss for us all, — for me, for the children, for the vassals. Is it true, sir, is it true? Can we credit such happiness?”

  “Your satisfaction, Madame, is a balm that heals all my wounds. But now, tell me, are you willing to talk over household matters a little?”

  “By all means, by all means,” assented the Marquise, pressing her husband’s hands.

  “I caught a glimpse, I think, of some very sorry nags at the cross roads at the park gates; are they yours?”

  “Yes, they are, sir.”

  “Beasts too old for a lady’s use, ugh!”

  “Sir, they are the horses you gave me when our boy was born.”

  “They were rising four and a half then; it is nine years ago, so they are fourteen now!.. Fie, Marquise, is such a team what you ought to have?”

  “Ah! sir, when I go to mass, they can still continue to jog along so far.”

  “I saw three, I think.”

  “I gave the fourth, being the least broken-down, to my son for his riding lessons.”

  “Riding lessons on a coach-horse! Oh! Marquise, Marquise, what sort of a horseman do you expect to make of him?”

  The Marquise dropped her eyes in some confusion.

  “So, you never drive four in hand now? You have eight in all, have you not, and two saddle horses?”

  I had, sir; but as hunting parties and state rides have become things of the past since you went away, I thought if I put down four carriage horses, a couple of grooms and the saddle-horses, it would save at least six thousand livres a year.”

  “What is six thousand livres after all, Marquise?” growled Monsieur de Chauvelin.

  “It is food and keep for a dozen families,” she retorted.

  He took her hand in his. “Always good and kind! Surely God instructs you from on high what to do on earth. Only the Marquise de Chauvelin has no cause to save.”

  She raised her head and looked her husband in the eyes.

  “You mean to say I spend extravagantly,” he cried; “yes, I do spend a great deal of money, and you, you feel the want of it?”

  “I never said that, sir.”

  “Marquise, it must needs be so. Noble and generous as you are, you would never have dismissed men in my service except under dire necessity. A groom out of place is a pauper the more. You have lacked money; I will speak to Bonbonne about it. But henceforth you shall have plenty. What I used to spend at Court I will spend at Grosbois; instead of feeding a dozen families, you shall feed two hundred.”

  “Sir...”

  “And, thank God! I hope there will be coin enough left for a dozen good horses of my own, which from to-morrow shall be lodged in your stables. Have you not been speaking of repairing the château?”

  “The reception rooms would want refurnishing.”

  “All my furniture from Paris will arrive this week. I shall invite guests to dinner twice a week... there will be hunting...”

  “You know, sir, I am rather shy of society,” said the Marquise, terrified at the idea of meeting all her husband’s Versailles friends, whom she looked upon much as if they were the deadly sins incarnate.

  “You shall write the invitations yourself, Marquise. Now Bonbonne will give you the books; you will have the kindness to amalgamate in one the Paris expenses and the Grosbois ones.”

  The Marquise, frantic with delight, tried to answer and could not. She seized Monsieur de Chauvelin’s hands and kissed them, gazing tenderly in his eyes as if she would fathom the depths of his soul, feeling herself softly enfolded in that warm atmosphere of pure love which vivifies all it touches and carries life and happiness to the chilliest extremities.

  “To come to the children,” he resumed; “what is your system with them?”

  “One that answers excellently; the Abbé is a man of wit, intelligence and profound learning. Shall I present him to you?”

  “Yes, I should like to know all members of the household.”

  The Marquise waived her hand, and there entered from the dark pathway to which he had withdrawn with his charges, the young tutor, a hand on either lad’s shoulder. In walk and look, a young oak between two reeds, there was something tender and fatherly in the man and his attitude that quite took the Marquis’s fancy.

  “Monsieur l’Abbé,” began the Marquise, “I have good news to tell you. Our lord the Marquis is for taking up his residence among us.”

  “God be praised!” returned the Abbé. “But alas! sir, this does not mean that the King is dead?”

  “No, thank Heaven! But I have said farewell to the Court and the great world. I shall stay here with my children. I am weary of living for amusement and self- advancement only, and would fain make some sacrifice for affection’s sake. So I am come to dwell at home. Now to begin with, are you satisfied, Monsieur l’Abbé, with your pupils?”

  “As well content, Monsieur le Marquis, as a man can be.”

  “So much the better. Make them good Christians, like their mother; honest and true, like their grandfather, and...”

  “Clever, able and talented, like their father,” put in the Abbé; “I hope to succeed in all this.”

  “You are one of a thousand, Abbé. And you, old friend,” he went on, turning to Bonbonne, “are you the same grumbler you always were? When I was their age, you wanted even then to initiate me into business ways. If I had followed your advice, I should not want your help so badly as I do to-day.”

  The children had joined hands and were dancing on the grass with the light- hearted gaiety of their age. Their father’s eyes filled with tears, and after a moment’s silence, he murmured softly:

  “Dear lads, I will never leave you any more.”

  “I pray you may be saying true, Monsieur le Marquis!” broke in a deep, grave voice behind him.

  Monsieur de Chauvelin turned and found himself face to face with a stern- faced, white-robed monk, who saluted him with the calm reserve of a man of religion.

  “This holy father, who and what is he?” the Marquis asked his wife.

  “This is Father Delar, my confessor.”

  “Ah! your confessor,” he repeated the word turning a trifle pale. Then in a lower tone, “I have need of a confessor, that is very true; you are welcome, sir.”

  The Monk, a man of tact and well accustomed to associate with great people, took no immediate notice of the offer; but he registered the words in his memory. He had been taken into his confidence by the Intendant a day or two before, and was prepared to undertake the necessary negotiations with the newly-arrived Marquis. He was resolved not to neglect so favourable an opportunity as the present for acting in God’s interest, in that of the Marquise, and perhaps, of his own too.

  “Might I venture to ask you news of the King, Monsieur le Marquis?” inquired the Monk.

  “Why so, my father?”

  “A rumour has gone abroad that Louis XV. was soon about to render to God an account of his reign. Such reports are generally but the precursors of Providence. His Majesty has not long to live, believe me!”

  “You think so, my father?” asked Monsieur de Chauvelin, feeling more and more discouraged.

  “It were therefore much to be desired that he should repent his scandalous life and do penance and...”

  “Sir,” broke in Monsieur de Chauvelin with some heat, “‘tis a confessor’s duty to wait in silence till he is called in by his penitent.”

  “Death will not wait, sir; I have been long wearying for a word from you, but it fails to come.’’

  “From me! Oh! my confession will be a long one, but the time is not yet ripe.”

  “The virtue of confession lies all in repentance, in sorrow for having sinned; and the greatest of all sins, I have just told you is scandalous living.”

  “Oh! but all the world lives so. There is not one of us but affords matter for evil tongues. Surely heaven does not think right to punish us for the maliciousness of others.”

  “Heaven punishes disobedience to its laws, it punishes indifference. It sends us warnings; if we neglect them, nothing can save us any more.”

  Monsieur de Chauvelin made no answer, but began to reflect deeply. Meantime the Marquise, seeing the conversation well begun, discreetly withdrew, praying God from the bottom of her heart that it might bear good fruit. After a long silent pause, during which the Monk watched his face, Monsieur de Chauvelin turned suddenly to him:

  “Look you, my father, you are right; I repent of having been over long young, and I would fain confess to you, for I feel, I do feel, that death is near.”

  “You think so; and yet you take no measures either for your soul’s salvation or the preservation of your fortune. You fear you are going to die; yet you never give a thought to the will you are bound to make, considering the position you will leave your heirs in. Forgive me, Monsieur le Marquis, if perhaps my zeal and my devotion to your house carry me too far.”

  “No, you are right in this too, my father; however, rest assured the will you speak of is drawn up, and only lacks my signature.”

  “You fear you are going to die, and you are in no state to appear before God.”

  “May He have mercy upon me; I was born in the Christian faith, and I would fain die a Christian. Come to-morrow, I beg you; we will resume this discourse of ours, which will give me back my peace of mind.”