第68章

"Yes.I know that your relations to Mademoiselle de Lanty have always been perfectly proper and becoming.But since their return to Paris another individual has occupied her mind,--a bold and enterprising man, capable of risking everything to compromise and thus win an heiress.Being taxed with having encouraged this man and allowed these nocturnal interviews, Mademoiselle de Lanty at first denied everything.Then, evidently fearing that her father, a violent man, would take some steps against her lover, she threw herself at his feet and admitted the visits, but denied that the visitor was the man her father named to her.At first she refused obstinately to substitute another name for the one she disavowed.After some days passed in this struggle, she finally confessed to her mother, under a pledge of secrecy, that her father was right in his suspicions, but she dreaded the results to the family if she acknowledged the truth to him.The man in question was a noted duellist, and her father and brother would surely bring him to account for his conduct.It was then, monsieur, that the idea occurred to this imprudent girl to substitute another name for that of her real lover.""Ah! I understand," I said; "the name of a nobody, an artist, a sculptor, or some insignificant individual of that kind.""You do Mademoiselle de Lanty injustice by that remark," replied the abbe."What decided her to make your name a refuge against the dangers she foresaw was the fact that Monsieur de Lanty had formerly had suspicions about you, and she thought that circumstance gave color to her statement.""But, Monsieur l'abbe," I said, "how do you explain those letters, that portfolio, which her father produced yesterday?""That again was an invention of Marianina; and I may add that this duplicity assures me that had she remained in the world her future might have been terrible.""Am I to suppose that this tale has been told you by Madame de Lanty?""Confided to me, monsieur, yes.You yourself saw Madame de Lanty's desire to stop your explanations yesterday, lest the truth might appear to her husband.I am requested by her to thank you for your connivance--passive, of course--in this pious falsehood.She felt that she could only show her profound gratitude by telling you the whole truth and relying upon your discretion.""Where is Mademoiselle Marianina?"

"As Monsieur de Lanty told you, in a convent in Italy.To avoid scandal, it was thought best to send her to some safe retreat.Her own conduct will decide her future."Now what do you think of that history? Does it not seem to you very improbable? Here are two explanations which have each come into my mind with the force of a conviction.First, Marianina's brother has just married into a grand-ducal family of Germany.Immense sacrifices must have been required of the de Lanty family to make such an alliance.Was Marianina's dot, and the fortune she inherited from that old grand-uncle, required to pay the costs of that princely union? Secondly, did Marianina really feel an attachment for me? And did she, in a girlish way, express it on those letters which she never sent? To punish her, had her parents sent her to a convent? And to disgust me, and throw me off the track, had the mother invented this history of another love in which she seemed to make me play so mortifying a part?

I may add that the intervention of the Abbe Fontanon authorizes such an interpretation.I have made inquiries about him, and I find he is one of those mischievous priests who worm themselves into the confidence of families for their own ends; he has already destroyed the harmony of one home,--that of Monsieur de Granville, attorney-general of the royal court of Paris under the Restoration.

As to the truth or falsehood of these suppositions I know nothing, and, in all probability, shall continue to know nothing.But, as you can easily understand, the thought of Marianina is a luminous point to which my eye is forever attached.Shall I love her? Shall I hate her and despise her? That is the question perpetually in my mind.

Uncertainty of that kind is far more certain to fix a woman in a man's soul than to dislodge her.

Well, to sum up in two brief sentences my reply to your warnings: As for the opinion of Monsieur Bixiou, I care as little for it as for last year's roses; and as for that other danger which you fear, Icannot tell you whether I love Marianina or not, but this I know, I do not love Madame de l'Estorade.That, I think, is giving you a plain and honest answer.And now, let us leave our master the Future to do what he likes.