"You?" exclaimed Madame de Senneterre.
And strange to say the lady's acerbity of manner gave place to a sort of envious deference for the new representative of this powerful family.
"But I thought that the Prince Duc de Haut-Martel, who has resided on his estates in Germany since that idiotic revolution of 1830--"
"That Prince Duc de Haut-Martel is dead, madame, and as he had neither brothers nor children, and as I am his cousin-germain, I inherit his estates and title."
"Then this event must have occurred very recently."
"I received the first intimation of it through the Austrian ambassador, and last night I had an official confirmation of the fact."
"So you are now the Marquis de Maillefort, Prince Duc de Haut-Martel?"
said Madame de Senneterre, with mingled admiration and envy.
"Precisely, and without troubling myself very much about it, as you see."
"But your position is magnificent," exclaimed this monomaniac, quite forgetting the son whose despair might end in suicide. "Why, you are now one of the greatest noblemen in France."
"Good Heavens! yes. My newly acquired dignities enable me to aspire to anything, do they not? And to think that only yesterday I was but a simple marquis! What a change to-day, is there not? Don't you find my hump a little smaller since you have heard that I am so great a nobleman?"
"One should no more sneer at rank than at religion, monsieur."
"Certainly not. There are plenty of other subjects for ridicule. But I forgot to tell you that the Prince Duc de Haut-Martel left me estates in Hungary which yield a yearly income of about fifty thousand crowns, free of all incumbrances."
"One hundred and fifty thousand francs! Why, though no one knows the exact amount of your fortune, you are supposed to be very rich already, monsieur," replied Madame de Senneterre, with a sort of jealous envy.
"I scarcely know the exact amount of my income, myself," said the hunchback, "for my tenants, poor souls! pay me only when they can do so without too great an effort; but even in the worst of times I can generally count upon at least sixty thousand francs a year, to say nothing of the fact--of course, this is little more than an empty honour--that the electors of the arrondissement in which my estates are located propose to do me the honour of making me their deputy, their former representative having recently died; so you see that wealth and honours are falling upon me thick as hail."
"Then you have an income of more than two hundred thousand francs, and are Prince Duc de Haut-Martel and--"
"Prospective deputy, besides. Don't forget that."
"Your position is certainly a very enviable one."
"Yes, and with my figure and appearance I can aspire to the most beautiful woman in the land, can I not? Say, what a pity it is that Mlle. de Beaumesnil is in love with a handsome young man! But for that, I might have married her myself."
A new thought suddenly occurred to Madame de Senneterre, and after a moment's reflection the avaricious creature, casting a keen glance at M.
de Maillefort, said:
"I think I understand you, M. le marquis."
"Let me see if you do."
"The question you asked me just now as to what I thought of the house of Haut-Martel was intended to suggest a sort of compensation for the terrible disappointment my unworthy son has caused me."
"You are right, madame."
"And as you have unexpectedly become the head of an illustrious house, you do not want it to become extinct."
"There is some truth in that, also," replied the hunchback, not a little surprised at Madame de Senneterre's penetration, though he was far from suspecting the lady's real thought.
"Yes, I admit that I would not like the name to die out, madame," he added, after a slight pause.
"And as you know that only a carefully reared girl of noble birth would be capable of bearing this noble name as it should be borne, and of understanding the sacred obligations she would have to fulfil towards the man to whom she owed such a magnificent position, you are thinking of my eldest daughter,--and believe you can thus offer me an adequate compensation for the misery my son's insubordination has caused me."
"I! marry?" exclaimed the hunchback, even more revolted than surprised by Madame de Senneterre's heartless proposal.
But anxious to see how far the blindness, hardness of heart, and love of greed would carry this cruel parent, he responded with one of those half way refusals that seem to be made only in the hope of seeing them overcome.
"I think of such a marriage! Besides, even if I did, would there be any possibility of compassing it? Think of it, madame, at my age and deformed as I am, while your daughter Bertha is a charming girl of barely twenty. She would laugh in my face and she would do perfectly right."
"You are mistaken, monsieur," replied this incomparable parent, gravely.
"In the first place, Mlle. de Senneterre has been reared in habits of respect and submission from which I feel sure she will never depart.
Besides, she knows that she is poor, and that she would never be likely to attain another position to be compared with that you offer her."
"But again let me remind you that I am old and ugly and a hunchback besides."
"M. le marquis, my daughters have been brought up in such a way that they would not dare to so much as look at the husband I select for them until the marriage ceremony is over."
"A pleasant surprise you would give the poor child that married me!"
"I repeat, M. le marquis, that my daughters have not those lewd imaginations that are capable only of a carnal appreciation of a husband. If I tell my daughter my wishes, that will suffice."
"I am strongly inclined to tell this heartless, unscrupulous woman what I think of her," the hunchback said to himself; "but what should I gain by it? She is an egregious fool, and there is nothing for me to do but answer the fool according to her folly."
So seeing that Madame de Senneterre was awaiting his reply with keen anxiety, the marquis said:
"You said a few minutes ago, and very sensibly, I think, that one should no more speak lightly of rank than of religion, did you not?"
"Yes, M. le marquis."
"You will admit, too, probably, that it is equally wrong to treat marriage lightly."
"Certainly, M. le marquis."
"Then allow me to say that your desire to see your daughter Bertha Princesse de Haut-Martel would result in nothing more or less than a cruel mockery of religion, nobility of rank, and marriage,--three sacred things, as you call them."
"How is that, monsieur?"
"Mlle. de Senneterre would outrage all the laws of marriage and religion, or rather of nature and the Creator, which is even worse, by pledging love and fidelity to an old hunchback like me; and I, in turn, would bring disgrace and ridicule upon the nobility in general, and upon the houses of Senneterre and Haut-Martel in particular, by running any risk of perpetuating their illustrious line with a set of hideous little hunchbacks made in my image. They might serve as convincing proof of my wife's resignation and faithfulness, but they would certainly give the world a droll opinion of our great historic races."
"Really, M. le marquis--I--"
"You are going to cite Prince Eugene, possibly, as an example for me, and I ought, perhaps, to feel greatly flattered by the comparison, but it would not be well to impair the lustre of such rarities by multiplying them. I am extremely grateful to you for your kind offer, and Mlle. Bertha, believe me, will be equally grateful to me for having declined it. It depends entirely upon you, however, whether a union of our two powerful houses is realised or not, and also whether this income of two hundred thousand francs is allowed to go out of your family. I make haste to assure you that I am too thoroughly convinced of my own unworthiness to venture to lift my eyes to you, madame la duchesse,"
added the hunchback, with a low, though decidedly ironical bow. "In the first place I should make you the most detestable husband in the world, and then I have no inclination for marriage."
"It is hardly necessary to decline with such alacrity a proposition that has never been made to you," replied the Duchesse de Senneterre, rather spitefully. "You would oblige me by explaining yourself more clearly, however, for I never was good at solving enigmas. You are kind enough to speak of a union of our two houses, and of preventing your fortune from going out of my family, but I haven't the slightest idea how you propose to bring these things about."
"First permit me to say--not at all by way of reproach, understand--that you were not so very difficult to please in regard to lineage when Gerald's marriage with Mlle. de Beaumesnil was under consideration.