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He is pretty effectually used up, judging from appearances," one of them remarked. It was not until some moments later that they learned a portion of the truth through the servants who had been on duty upstairs, and who now ran down in great terror, crying that Madame d'Argeles was dying, and that a physician must be summoned at once.
She seemed to experience anew the same agony of terror she had felt twenty years before; and this lent such poignant intensity to the interest of her narrative that if M. Wilkie's heart was not exactly touched, he was, as he afterward confessed, at least rather interested. But Madame d'Argeles seemed to have forgotten his existence.
"Alas!" faltered Madame d'Argeles, "I am none the less ruined the name of Chalusse is none the less dishonored!" She wanted to return to the drawing-room; but she was compelled to relinquish this idea. The expression of her face betrayed too plainly the terrible ordeal she had passed through.
The wine-vendor, moreover, told his customers that Madame d'Argeles never went out before half-past two or three o'clock, and then always in a carriage a piece of information which must have troubled Chupin; for, as soon as the landlord had left them to serve some other customers, he leant forward and said to M. Fortunat: "Did you hear that?
This was done so quickly that Chupin barely had time to fling two francs to his driver and rush after her. She had already turned round the corner of the Rue du Helder, and was walking rapidly up the street. It was a little after five o'clock, and dusk was setting in. Madame d'Argeles had taken the side of the street allotted to the uneven numbers.
"The wretch knows through Coralth that Madame d'Argeles is a Chalusse," he said to himself; "and when Mademoiselle Marguerite has become his wife, he intends to oblige Madame d'Argeles to accept her brother's estate and share it with him." At that same moment Madame d'Argeles finished her narrative. "And now, what shall I do?" she added.
If a gentleman like myself was allowed to notice such blackguards, how I'd chastise them!" But the valet who had gone to warn Madame d'Argeles soon reappeared and put an end to his sufferings. "Madame will see you," said the man, impudently. "Ah! if I were in her place "
For five days she was the talk of Paris, and Alfred d'Aunay even published her portrait in the Illustrated Chronicle. Still, no one was able to say exactly who Madame Lia d'Argeles was. Who was she, and whence did she come? How had she lived until she sprang up, full grown, in the sunshine of the fashionable world? Did the splendid mansion in the Rue de Berry really belong to her?
He only understood one thing, that Marguerite was lost to him, and that she was on the point of becoming the wife of the vile scoundrel who had planned the snare which had ruined him at the Hotel d'Argeles. Breathless, despairing, and half crazed with rage, he sprang toward Madame Leon. "Marguerite, where is she?" he demanded, in a hoarse, unnatural voice; "I must see her!"
With a gesture of indifference, which was difficult to explain after the vehemence and the threatening tone of her letter, Madame d'Argeles murmured: "Ah, well! what does it matter?" "What does it matter?" repeated M. Fortunat. "I see, madame, that your grief prevents you from realizing the extent of the peril you have escaped.
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