Cousin Bette (52 page)

In spite of the two hundred thousand francs that Crevel had given his daughter, at a time when his vanity had been flattered by the marriage and before the Baron had stolen Josépha from him, and although a further two hundred thousand francs had been paid off by Victorin over seven years, the debt on the property still stood at five hundred thousand francs, as a result of the money he had raised on it, as a dutiful son, to pay off his father's debts.

Fortunately, the steady rise in rents, and the beauty of the situation, began at this time to give the houses a greatly increased value. The speculation was paying off after eight years, during which the lawyer had toiled to pay interest and an insignificant amount of the capital. The shopkeepers of their own accord were offering satisfactory rents for the shops, on condition of having eighteen-year leases. The flats were rising in value because of the shift in the business centre of Paris, by then becoming settled between the Bourse and the Madeleine, a district which was in future to be the seat of political and financial power.

The trust money placed in Victorin's hands by the Minister, together with the salary paid in advance, and the additional sums agreed to by his tenants, would reduce his debt to two hundred thousand francs. The two houses, fully let, would bring in a hundred thousand francs a year. In another two years, during which he could live on his professional fees augmented by the salaries of the appointments that the Minister had given him, Hulot would be in a splendid position. It was manna fallen from heaven.

Victorin would now be able to give his mother the whole first floor of his
pavillon
, and the second floor, apart from two rooms for Lisbeth, to his sister. And this triple household, run by Lisbeth, could meet its expenses and honourably maintain the establishment expected of a rising lawyer. The luminaries of the Palais de Justice were rapidly disappearing; and Hulot, eloquent but judicious and discreet, and a man of strict probity, was listened to by Judges and Councillors. He worked hard at his cases, said nothing that he could not prove, and was selective in the causes he undertook to plead; he was, in sum, a credit to his profession.

Her home in the rue Plumet was so hateful to the Baroness that she did not hesitate to leave it for the rue Louis-le-Grand. Through her son's kindness, she now occupied a beautiful set of rooms. She was spared all domestic cares, for Lisbeth had agreed to work the same housekeeping miracles for the Hulots that she had achieved at Madame Marneffe's, foreseeing that she would thus be in a position to bring the heavy weight of her vengeance to bear upon the lives of these three upright persons, for whom her hatred had been inflamed by the overthrow of all her hopes. Once a month Lisbeth went to see Valérie, sent there both by Hortense, anxious for news of Wenceslas, and by Célestine, who was exceedingly uneasy about her father's open and acknowledged liaison with a woman who had ruined the lives of her husband's mother and sister, and wrecked their happiness. As may be imagined, Lisbeth took advantage of their desire for information to visit Valérie as often as she pleased.

About twenty months went by, in the course of which the Baroness's health improved, although her nervous trembling persisted. She acquainted herself with her duties, which offered her a means of distracting her mind from her grief, useful to others, as well as nourishment for the divine faculties of her soul. She saw in them, moreover, a way by which she might find her husband, because of the chances afforded by the calls for her services that led her into every part of Paris.

During this time, the notes of hand held by Vauvinet were redeemed, and the pension of six thousand francs due to Baron Hulot almost cleared of the charge upon it. Victorin
paid all his mother's expenses, and Hortense's, with the ten thousand francs interest on the capital left in trust for them by the Marshal. Adeline's salary was six thousand francs, so that when they had the Baron's pension mother and daughter would be assured of a clear income of twelve thousand francs. The poor woman would have been almost happy, if it had not been for her unremitting anxiety about the fate of her Baron, whom she would have liked to share in the brightening family fortunes, and the sight of her deserted daughter, and the terrible blows that Lisbeth struck her, in apparent innocence, giving free rein to the promptings of her diabolical spirit.

A scene which took place at the beginning of March 1843, will show Lisbeth's persistent smouldering hate at work, and the effects of the old maid's continuing partnership with Madame Marneffe. Two notable events had taken place in Madame Marneffe's life. First, she had given birth to a stillborn child, whose coffin was worth two thousand francs a year to her. Then, eleven months before, Lisbeth had brought back a sensational piece of news about Marneffe, from a reconnaissance expedition to the Marneffe household.

‘This morning,' she had reported, ‘that dreadful Valérie called in Doctor Bianchon to make quite sure that the doctors who said yesterday that there was no hope for her husband had made no mistake. Doctor Bianchon said that the unspeakable creature is going to be claimed this very night by the hell that's waiting for him. Old Crevel and Madame Marneffe escorted the Doctor to the door, and your father, my dear Célestine, gave him five gold pieces for the good news. When he got back to the drawing-room Crevel twirled on his toes like a ballet dancer, and he hugged that woman, crying “You'll be Madame Crevel at last!” And when she went back to her place at the bedside of her husband with the death-rattle in his throat, and left us together, your fine father said to me “With Valérie as my wife, I'll be a Peer of France! I'll buy an estate I have my eye on – Presles. I'll be a member of the Council of Seine-et-Oise, and a Deputy. I'll have a son! I'll be anything in the world I want to be.” “All very well,” I said to him; “and what about your daughter?”
“Bah, she's only a daughter!” was what he answered. “And she's become far too much of a Hulot, and Valérie can't bear that lot. My son-in-law has always refused to come here. Why should he play the mentor, the Spartan, the puritan, the slum visitor? Besides I've settled my reckoning with my daughter; she's had all her mother's fortune and two hundred thousands francs besides. So I'm free to do as I like. I'll consider how my son-in-law acts when my marriage comes off; I'll give them tit-for-tat. If they behave well to their stepmother, I'll see! I'm a man, you know!” And plenty more of the same stuff! And he struck a pose like Napoleon on his column!'

The ten months of formal widowhood ordained by the Code Napoléon had run out a few days since. The Presles estate had been bought. And that very morning Victorin and Célestine had sent Lisbeth to Madame Marneffe's to look for news about the charming widow's marriage to a Mayor of Paris, now a member of the Council of Seine-et-Oise.

Célestine and Hortense had been drawn closely together in affection since they had come to live under the same roof, and they formed virtually one household. The Baroness was so conscientious about fulfilling the duties attached to her post that she spent even more time than was necessary at her charities, and was out of the house every day between eleven o'clock and five. The two sisters-in-law stayed at home and looked after their children together, and this had created a bond between them. They had come to be so close to each other that they spoke their thoughts aloud. They presented a touching picture of two sisters in harmony, one happy, the other sad. The unhappy sister, beautiful, charged with overflowing vitality, lively, gay, and quick-witted, in appearance belied her actual situation; while the sober Célestine, so gentle and calm, as equable as reason itself, habitually reflective and thoughtful, would have made an observer believe that she had some secret sorrow. Perhaps the contrast between them contributed to their warm friendship: each found in the other what she herself lacked.

Sitting in a little summer-house in the middle of a garden that the trowel of speculative building had spared, by a whim
of the builder who had thought of keeping this patch a hundred feet square for himself, they were enjoying the first green shoots of the lilacs, an occasion in spring only properly and fully savoured in Paris, where for six months of the year the Parisians live oblivious of green leaves, among the stone cliffs round which their human ocean ebbs and flows.

‘Célestine,' Hortense was saying, in answer to an observation of her sister-in-law's, lamenting her fate in having a husband shut up in the Chamber on such a fine day, ‘I don't believe you know how well off you are. Victorin is an angel, and you often plague him.'

‘Men enjoy being plagued, my dear! Teasing is a mark of affection sometimes. If your poor mother had been – not exactly demanding, but nearer to it, harder to please, you would certainly have had fewer troubles to put up with.'

‘Lisbeth's not back yet! I may sing the song of Marl-borough going to the war and never returning, for her,' said Hortense. ‘I can't wait to have news of Wenceslas! What is he living on? He has done no work for two years.'

‘Victorin saw him the other day, so he told me, with that hateful woman, and he thinks she must keep him in idleness. Ah, if you wanted to, Hortense dear, you could still bring your husband back.'

Hortense shook her head.

‘Believe me, your situation will soon become intolerable,' Célestine went on. ‘Your anger and despair and indignation helped you to bear up at first. And then you had the frightful misfortunes that have overtaken our family since – two deaths, financial ruin, and Baron Hulot's catastrophe – to occupy your mind and heart. But now, when you are living in peace and quiet, you will not find the emptiness of your life easy to endure. And as you cannot, and would never want to, turn aside from the path of virtue, you will simply have to seek a reconciliation with Wenceslas. That's what Victorin thinks, and he's so fond of you. There is something stronger than our personal feelings, and that's nature.'

‘A man so spineless!' exclaimed the proud Hortense. ‘He's that woman's lover because she keeps him. Has she even paid his debts, I wonder? Heavens, I think night and day of
the position he's in! He's my child's father, and he lets himself fall so low.…'

‘Look at the example your mother gives you, dear child…' said Célestine. Célestine belonged to the type of woman who, given reasons of sufficient force to convince a Breton peasant, reiterates her original argument for the hundredth time. The rather insipid, cold and commonplace character of her face, the stiff braids of her light brown hair, her colouring, were indicative of the down-to-earth, sensible woman she was, with no charm, but with no weakness either.

‘The Baroness would like nothing better than to be with her disgraced husband, to console him, and wrap him in her love, and hide him from all eyes,' Célestine went on. ‘She has had Monsieur Hulot's room made ready for him upstairs, as if she might find him any day and bring him home to it.'

‘Oh, my mother is sublime!' answered Hortense. ‘She has been sublime every moment of every day for twenty-six years; but I'm not that kind, I haven't got her temperament… I get angry with myself sometimes, but what can I do? Oh, you don't know what it's like, Célestine, to have to come to terms with sordid degradation!'

‘You forget my father…' said Célestine, without emotion. ‘He is certainly travelling the road on which yours came to grief. My father is ten years younger than the Baron, and he's a businessman, it's true; but where will it end? That Madame Marneffe has turned my father into her lap-dog. Both his money and his ideas are hers to do what she likes with; and there's no way of opening his eyes. And now we may hear that the banns of marriage have been published, and, I can tell you, I tremble! My husband means to do everything possible; he looks upon it as a duty to strike back, on behalf of society as well as the family, and to call that woman to account for all her crimes. Ah! dear Hortense, minds like Victorin's are too noble, and you and I have hearts too idealistic, for the ways of the world. We come to realize what it is like too late! I am telling you a secret, dear sister, in confidence, because it concerns you; but don't give it away by a word or a sign to Lisbeth, or your mother, or anyone, for…'

‘Here is Lisbeth!' said Hortense. ‘Well, Cousin, how do things go in the little inferno in the rue Barbet?'

‘Not well for you, my dears. Your husband, my dear Hortense, is more infatuated than ever with that woman, and I must admit that she's madly in love with him. And your father, dear Célestine, is as blind drunk with love as a lord. There's nothing new in that sort of thing – I see it happening all the time. Thank heaven I have never had anything to do with men… they really are just animals! In five days from now, Victorin and you, my dear child, will have lost your father's fortune!'

‘The banns have been published?' asked Célestine.

‘Yes,' answered Lisbeth. ‘I have been pleading your cause. I said to that monster, who is following in the other one's footsteps, that if he cared to get you out of your difficulties and pay off the debt on your house, you would be grateful to him, and receive your stepmother…'

Hortense raised her hands in dismay.

‘Victorin will decide,' Célestine said coldly.

‘And do you know what Monsieur le Maire replied?' Lisbeth went on. ‘“I don't mind leaving them in a bit of trouble. The only way to break a horse is by hunger, lack of sleep, and sugar!” Monsieur Crevel is worse than Baron Hulot.… So you poor children may put on mourning for your chances of inheriting that fortune. And what a fortune too! Your father has paid three millions for Presles, and he still has an income of thirty thousand francs! Oh, he has no secrets from me! He is talking of buying the Navarreins town house, in the rue du Bac. Madame Marneffe has forty thousand a year of her own.… Ah, here comes our angel, here's your mother!' she exclaimed, as they heard the sound of wheels.