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Louise d'Armilly and her brother Léon; as has already been stated, the celebrated cantatrice had retired from the boards in consequence of having inherited a fortune of several millions of francs from the estate of her deceased father, who, rumor asserted, had been a very wealthy Parisian banker; Léon had abandoned the stage simultaneously with his sister, who had invited him to share her suddenly acquired riches, for, strange to say, the banker had not bequeathed to him a single sou.
Then, having blown out the lights, the two fugitives, looking and listening eagerly, with outstretched necks, opened the door of a dressing-room which led by a side staircase down to the yard, Eugenie going first, and holding with one arm the portmanteau, which by the opposite handle Mademoiselle d'Armilly scarcely raised with both hands. The yard was empty; the clock was striking twelve.
Now, Madame Danglars feared Eugenie's sagacity and the influence of Mademoiselle d'Armilly; she had frequently observed the contemptuous expression with which her daughter looked upon Debray, an expression which seemed to imply that she understood all her mother's amorous and pecuniary relationships with the intimate secretary; moreover, she saw that Eugenie detested Debray, not only because he was a source of dissension and scandal under the paternal roof, but because she had at once classed him in that catalogue of bipeds whom Plato endeavors to withdraw from the appellation of men, and whom Diogenes designated as animals upon two legs without feathers.
"And yet you do not mourn for her! How strange!" "I never loved her as I love you, Louise. Eugénie Danglars was a capricious and eccentric girl, and had she lived would have been a capricious and eccentric woman. It was well for me she vanished when she did! But, by the way, another singular and inexplicable coincidence is that Louise d'Armilly, the name you bear, was also the name of Mlle.
"What is my daughter doing?" asked Madame Danglars. "She practiced all the evening, and then went to bed," replied Mademoiselle Cornelie. "Yet I think I hear her piano." "It is Mademoiselle Louise d'Armilly, who is playing while Mademoiselle Danglars is in bed." "Well," said Madame Danglars, "come and undress me." They entered the bedroom.
"Mademoiselle Eugenie," said the maid, "retired to her apartment with Mademoiselle d'Armilly; they then took tea together, after which they desired me to leave, saying that they needed me no longer."
But, then, the affairs of Gisquet, Cubières, Teste, and, last and worst, Petit, whose case was before the Chamber, do they not betray deplorable lack of firmness or morality? But no more of this. Who is that dark, splendid woman to whom young Joliette seems so devoted? I have seen them together before!" "Why, you surely have not forgotten Louise d'Armilly, the charming cantatrice!
It was soon known throughout Paris that Captain Joliette and Albert de Morcerf were identical, and that Mlle. d'Armilly was in reality no other than Mlle. Eugénie Danglars, daughter of Baron Danglars, the once famous and opulent Parisian banker; the report also was current that Albert and Eugénie were engaged and would shortly be united in the bonds of matrimony.
"Yesterday morning, it appears, Franz declined the honor." "Indeed? And is the reason known?" "No." "How extraordinary! And how does M. de Villefort bear it?" "As usual. Like a philosopher." Danglars returned at this moment alone. "Well," said the baroness, "do you leave M. Cavalcanti with your daughter?" "And Mademoiselle d'Armilly," said the banker; "do you consider her no one?"
Another bit of gossip was to the effect that the former cantatrice's brother Léon was not a man but a woman; in short, the real Louise d'Armilly, who had loaned her name to Eugénie Danglars and assumed male attire solely for professional purposes.
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