The Lesser Bourgeoisie - Honoré de Balzac (top novels to read txt) 📗

mother-in-law, he would have rushed upon her with some frantic intention.

His anger, however, spent itself in words. Harshly abused, Madame Cardinal contented herself by remarking that all hope was not lost, and then, with a faith that ought to have moved mountains, she set to work to empty the straw from the mattress she had already vainly explored in all directions. But Cerizet would not allow that extreme measure; he remarked that after the autopsy of a straw mattress such detritus would remain upon the floor as must infallibly give rise to suspicion. But the Cardinal, who thought this caution ridiculous, was determined to, at least, take apart the flock bedstead. The passion of the search gave extraordinary vigilance to her senses, and as she raised the wooden side-frame she heard the fall of some tiny object on the floor. Seizing the light she began to search in the mound of filth of all kinds that was under the bed, and finally laid her hand on a bit of polished steel about half an inch long, the use of which was to her inexplicable.

"That's a key!" cried Cerizet, who was standing beside her with some indifference, but whose imagination now set off at a gallop.

"Ha! ha! you see I was right," cried the Cardinal. "But what can it open?" she added, on reflection; "nothing bigger than a doll's house."

"No," said Cerizet, "it is a modern invention, and very strong locks can be opened with that little instrument."

With a rapid glance he took in all the pieces of furniture in the room; went to the bureau and pulled out the drawers; looked in the stove, in the table; but nowhere did he find a lock to which the little key could be adapted.

Suddenly the Cardinal had a flash of illumination.

"See here!" she said. "I remarked that the old thief, as he lay on his bed, never took his eyes off the wall just opposite to him."

"A cupboard hidden in the wall!" cried Cerizet, seizing the light eagerly; "it is not impossible!"

Examining attentively the door of the alcove, which was opposite the bed's head, he could see nothing there but a vast accumulation of dust and spiders' webs. He next employed the sense of touch, and began to rap and sound the wall in all directions. At the spot to which Toupillier's constant gaze was directed he thought he perceived in a very narrow space a slight sonority, and he presently perceived that he was rapping on wood. He then rubbed the spot vigorously with his handkerchief, and beneath the thick layer of dust and dirt which he thus removed he found a piece of oak plank carefully inserted in the wall. On one side of this plank was a small round hole; it was that of the lock which the key fitted!

While Cerizet was turning the key, which worked with great difficulty, Madame Cardinal, holding the light, was pale and breathless; but, oh! cruel deception! the cupboard, at last unlocked and open, showed only an empty space, into which the light in her hand fell uselessly.

Allowing this bacchante to give vent to her despair by saluting her much-beloved uncle with the harshest epithets, Cerizet quietly inserted his arm into the cupboard, and after feeling it over at the back, he cried out, "An iron safe!" adding, impatiently, "Give me more light, Madame Cardinal."

Then, as the light did not penetrate to the depths of the cupboard, he snatched the candle from the bottle, where, in default of a candlestick, the Cardinal had stuck it, and, taking it in his hand, moved it carefully over all parts of the iron safe, the existence of which was now a certainty.

"There is no visible lock," he said. "There must be a secret opening."

"Isn't he sly, that old villain!" exclaimed Madame Cardinal, while Cerizet's bony fingers felt the side of the safe over minutely.

"Ha!" he exclaimed, after groping for ten minutes, "I have it!"

During this time Madame Cardinal's life seemed actually suspended.

Under the pressure which Cerizet now applied, the iron side rose quickly into the thickness of the wall above, and in the midst of a mass of gold thrown pell-mell into a large excavation that was now exposed to view, lay a case of red morocco, which, from its size and appearance, gave promise of magnificent booty.

"I take the diamonds for myself," said Cerizet, when he had opened the case and seen the splendid jewels it contained; "you won't know how to get rid of them. I'll leave you the gold for your share. As for the house and the money in the Funds, they are not worth the trouble it would be to get the old fellow to make a will."

"Not so fast, my little man!" replied the Cardinal, who thought this decision rather summary; "we will first count the money--"

"Hush!" exclaimed Cerizet, apparently listening to a sound.

"What is it?" asked the Cardinal.

"Don't you hear some one moving below?"

"No, I hear nothing."

Cerizet, making her a sign to be silent, listened attentively.

"I hear a step on the stairs," he said, a moment later.

Then he hastily replaced the morocco case, and made desperate but unavailing efforts to lower the panel.

"Yes!" cried Madame Cardinal, terrified; "some one is really coming." Then, fastening to a hope of safety, she added, "I dare say it is that insane girl; they say she walks at night."

At any rate, the insane girl (if it were she) had a key to the room, for a moment later, this key was inserted in the lock. With a rapid glance Madame Cardinal measured the distance to the door; should she have time to push the bolt? No; certain that it was then too late, so she blew out the candle to give herself at least some chances in the darkness.

Useless effort! the intruder who now appeared had brought a candle with him.

When Madame Cerizet saw that she had to do with a small, old man of puny appearance, she flung herself before him with flaming eyes, like a lioness from whom the hunter is seeking to take her cubs.

"Be calm, my good woman," said the little man, in a jeering tone; "the police are sent for; they will be here in a moment."

At the word "police" the Cardinal's legs gave way.

"But, monsieur," she said, "why the police? we are not robbers."

"No matter for that; if I were in your place I shouldn't wait for them," said the little old man; "they make unfortunate mistakes sometimes."

"Can I clear out?" asked the woman, incredulously.

"Yes, if you empty your pockets of anything which has, _by accident_, got into them."

"Oh! my good monsieur, I haven't a thing in my hands or my pockets; I wasn't here to harm any one,--only to nurse my poor dear uncle; you can search me."

"Come, be off with you! that will do," said the old man.

Madame Cardinal did not oblige him to repeat the order, and she rapidly disappeared down the staircase.

Cerizet made as though he would take the same road.

"You, monsieur, are quite another thing," said the little old man. "You and I must talk together; but if you are tractable, the affair between us can be settled amicably."

Whether it was that the narcotic had ceased to operate, or that the noise going on about Toupillier put an end to his sleep, he now opened his eyes and cast around him the glance of a man who endeavors to remember where he is; then, seeing his precious cupboard open, he found in the emotion that sight produced the strength to cry out two or three times, "Help! help! robbers!" in a voice that was loud enough to rouse the house.

"No, Toupillier," said the little old man; "you have not been robbed; I came here in time to prevent it; nothing has been taken."

"Why don't you arrest that villain?" shouted the old pauper, pointing to Cerizet.

"Monsieur is not a thief," replied the old man. "On the contrary, he came up with me to lend assistance." Then, turning to Cerizet, he added, in a low voice: "I think, my good friend, that we had better postpone the interview I desire to have with you until to-morrow. Come at ten o'clock to the adjoining house, and ask for Monsieur du Portail. After what has passed this evening, there will, I ought to warn you, be some danger to you in not accepting this conference. I shall find you elsewhere, infallibly; for I have the honor to know who you are; you are the man whom the Opposition journals were accustomed to call 'the courageous Cerizet.'"

In spite of the profound sarcasm of this remark, Cerizet, perceiving that he was not to be treated more rigorously than Madame Cardinal, felt so pleased with this conclusion that he promised, very readily, to keep the appointment, and then slipped away with all the haste he could.


CHAPTER XVI. DU PORTAIL

The next day Cerizet did not fail to appear at the rendezvous given to him. Examined, at first, through the wicket of the door, he was admitted, after giving his name, into the house, and was ushered immediately to the study of Monsieur du Portail, whom he found at his desk.

Without rising, and merely making a sign to his guest to take a chair, the little old man continued the letter he was then writing. After sealing it with wax, with a care and precision that denoted a nature extremely fastidious and particular, or else a man accustomed to discharge diplomatic functions, du Portail rang for Bruneau, his valet, and said, as he gave him the letter:--

"For the justice-of-peace of the arrondissement."

Then he carefully wiped the steel pen he had just used, restored to their places, symmetrically, all the displaced articles on his desk, and it was only when these little arrangements were completed that he turned to Cerizet, and said:--

"You know, of course, that we lost that poor Monsieur Toupillier last night?"

"No, really?" said Cerizet, putting on the most sympathetic air he could manage. "This is my first knowledge of it."

"But you probably expected it. When one gives a dying man an immense bowl of hot wine, which has also been narcotized,--for the Perrache woman slept all night in a sort of lethargy after drinking a small glass of it,--it is evident that the catastrophe has been hastened."

"I am ignorant, monsieur," said Cerizet, with dignity, "of what Madame Cardinal may have given to her uncle. I have no doubt committed a great piece of thoughtlessness in assisting this woman to obtain an inheritance to which she assured me she had legal rights; but as to attempting the life of that old pauper, I am quite incapable of such a thing; nothing of the kind ever entered my mind."

"You wrote me this letter, I think," said du Portail, abruptly, taking from beneath a bohemian glass bowl a paper which he offered to Cerizet.

"A letter?" replied Cerizet, with the hesitation of a man who doesn't know whether to lie or speak the truth.

"I am quite sure of what I say," continued du Portail. "I have a mania for autographs, and I possess one of yours, obtained at the period when the Opposition exalted you to the glorious rank of martyr. I have compared the two writings, and I find that you certainly wrote me, yesterday,