United States or Hong Kong ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
But, with his hereditary estates lost, through his own fault, shall he who has nothing left to him but his name form a mere branch of another family? He has no right to do so." This declaration was categorical. Madame de Montgeron bent her head; her jesting vein was quenched in a moment. After a moment of silence the Duke spoke. "There are scruples that one does not discuss," he said.
The young mistress of the house was seated on one side, between the Duc de Montgeron and the Marquis de Prerolles. Facing her sat the Duchesse de Montgeron, between General Lenaieff and the Chevalier de Sainte-Foy.
"I shall take good care not to fail to call," earnestly replied the fair Lady Bountiful. She telephoned immediately to her head-groom, ordering ham to bring around her brougham at three o'clock. At the same hour that the elegant carriage of Zibeline was conducting her to the Hotel de Montgeron, M. Desvanneaux descended from a modest fiacre at the gate of the hotel occupied by Eugenie Gontier.
He owed eight hundred thousand francs to the Credit Foncier; four hundred thousand to Paul Landry; more than one hundred thousand to various jewellers and shopkeepers; twenty-five thousand to the Duc de Montgeron. It was necessary to sell the chateau and the property at one million four hundred thousand francs, and the posters advertising the sale must be displayed without delay.
An event so unexpected as the enthronement of Zibeline in one of the two large boxes between the columns, in company with the Duchesse de Montgeron, Madame de Lisieux, and Madame de Nointel, did not escape their observation and comment. "The Duchess is never thoughtless in her choice of associates," said one of the ten.
Zibeline's horse, which was a rapid trotter, now stopped before the Hotel de Montgeron, arriving just in advance of the Duchess's carriage, for which the Swiss was watching at the threshold of the open Porte cochere. He drew himself up; the brougham entered the gate at a swift pace, described a circle, and halted under the marquee at the main entrance. The General sprang lightly to the ground.
L'Ile-d'Adam was at that time the nearest station; to day it is Presles, on the intermediate line, which they now took. "This is our station," said Madame de Montgeron, when the train stopped at Montsoult.
"Is the Duke at home?" he inquired of the Swiss. Receiving an affirmative reply, he crossed the courtyard, and was soon announced to his brother-in-law, the noble proprietor of La Sarthe, deputy of the Legitimist opposition to the Corps Legislatif of the Empire. The Duc de Montgeron listened in silence to his relative's explanation of his situation.
In the midst of this sacrilegious upheaval, the Hotel de Montgeron, one of the largest in the Rue St. Dominique, had the good fortune to be hardly touched by the surveyor's line; in exchange for a few yards sliced obliquely from the garden, it received a generous addition of air and light on that side of the mansion which formerly had been shut in. The Duke lived there in considerable state.
"That is because I have been trained to them since childhood," she replied. "My plan is to place this document myself in the hands of Madame la Duchesse de Montgeron." "You can do so this very afternoon, if you wish. Thursday is her reception day," said the notary, rising with a bow, preparatory to taking his leave.
Word Of The Day