The Launching of Roger Brook (30 page)

At this announcement the governess and the Abbé exchanged a somewhat disturbed glance and the little Count, eyeing Roger’s clothes disdainfully, said in a haughty voice: ‘Was it necessary to invite Monsieur to eat with us, sister? Surely Aldegonde could have attended to his wants, and he could have told us his story afterwards.’

‘Hold thy tongue, little fool,’ replied the girl, tartly. ‘Thou would’st do better to spend more time studying thy books and less in thinking as thy sixty-four quarterings.’

But evidently Madame Marie-Angé Velot was of the boy’s opinion for she said: ‘I hardly think, Mademoiselle, that Monseigneur your father would approve.’

‘My father, Madame, is in Paris,’ snapped Athénaïs. ‘And in his absence I am the best judge of what takes place here.’

‘Even so, Mademoiselle,’ hazarded the Abbé, ‘I feel sure Monsieur Breuc would find himself more at home below stairs, and I support the suggestion that he should be conducted there.’

Athénaïs stamped her small foot. ‘I’ll not have it! I found him; and he is mine, to do what I will with!’

Roger, now flushed with mortification at this unseemly wrangle as to if or no he was fitted to eat at their table, was
about to declare hotly that he was an English Gentleman and as good as any of them, when he was saved from this imprudence by the door opening to disclose Monsieur Aldegonde, who cried in a loud voice:

‘
Monsieur le Comte et Mademoiselle sont servis
!’

Athénaïs looked at Roger and said with extraordinary dignity in one so young: ‘Monsieur Breuc, your arm, if you please.’

With his most courtly bow he proffered it to her; then, following the pompous Aldegonde, who held aloft a six-branched silver candelabra to light them, they traversed the big rooms again and crossed the landing to enter a lofty dining-room. At the table in it five places were laid and behind the chair set for each stood one of the tall footmen. Athénaïs took one end of the table, motioning Roger to a seat on her right, while her brother took the other. The Abbé said a short grace and the meal began.

The dishes were lighter and more varied and sumptuous than anything that Roger had encountered in England, but his good table manners soon showed the Abbé and Madame Marie-Angé that they had been wrong to judge him by his worn cloth suit as fitted only to eat downstairs in the kitchen, and both of them began to regard him with more friendly attention.

At their request he retold his story, giving additional details. His eleven weeks in France had improved his French out of all recognition, so that although he still had a noticeable accent he could talk with unhesitating fluency; and since he was by nature a born raconteur, he kept the small company enthralled through several courses.

Athénaïs both fascinated and intrigued him. He thought her quite the most beautiful thing he had ever seen, and could only compare her in his mind to a fairy, from the top of a Christmas tree. It may be that she put the idea into his head herself as she seemed fond of fairy stories and made frequent references to them, chaffingly remarking that she felt sure he must be a Prince in disguise, or at least, a miller’s youngest son, since they always leave home in search of dragons to kill and end up with a Princess for their bride.

Yet he found it extraordinarily difficult to place her satisfactorily. She was so small and slight of build that she could well have been taken at first sight for no more than thirteen; moreover, she frequently showed the most abysmal
ignorance on many matters of common interest, and spoke with the petulant, dictatorial manner of a spoilt child. But, against this, the air of dignity and authority that she equally frequently assumed, and her rather surprising fund of knowledge upon certain subjects, suggested that she might easily be a physically undeveloped seventeen.

Roger had yet to learn the reason for these strange anomalies, which were by no means uncommon among young people of her class in France at that time. Among the French nobility family life had degenerated to such an extent that it was the common practice for parents to leave their offspring during the whole period of childhood in the care of servants on their country estates, or often, even put them out to board with some almost illiterate family. There they were left, rarely seeing their parents and frequently entirely forgotten by them, until they reached their teens. They were only then belatedly given tutors and governesses, to fit them for the high stations in life they were to occupy; but, once they emerged from the sad neglect to which they had been subject, they were given rich clothes, money, fine apartments and a horde of servants to wait on them, and were, in fact, expected to behave like grown-ups with the full exercise of the authority over all inferiors which was assumed to be theirs by right of birth.

Athénaïs de Rochambeau was at this time actually fourteen and a quarter, while her brother Lucien was just one year younger, and it was a bare two years since they had been removed from their foster-parents to begin their education; yet in those two years they had both learned to regard themselves as people of great importance in the small world they occupied, and born to be obeyed. Normally, despite the fact that he was the younger of the two, the boy would have been the dominant partner of the pair but, as Roger had rightly assessed, he was a dullard, so she, conscious that she was one of the greatest heiresses in Brittany, had made herself the pivot round which the life of the great mansion revolved during her father’s absence.

They had reached a marvellous confection of violet ice-cream topped by a mass of spun sugar when the Abbé said to Roger:

‘And what is it your intention to do now, Monsieur Breuc?’

‘I hardly know, Monsieur l’Abbé,’ replied Roger, but
having by now had a chance to sort out his ideas to some extent he went on: ‘After some little thought, this man Fouché may realise that, as I could have no possible motive for murdering my poor old friend, his case is a weak one and decide not to pursue it. If that occurs, as I pray it may, I feel under a natural obligation to arrange for Doctor Fénelon’s burial. Then, too, I am most anxious to return to the
Du Guesclin
for the purpose of recovering the purse I dropped. It may still be lying in a dark corner of the passage or, if someone has picked it up, unless they are downright dishonest, they will have given it for safe keeping to the landlord. Yet I greatly hesitate to go there until I feel a little more confident that I’ll not be putting my head in a noose. Would you, Monsieur l’Abbé, do me the favour of giving me your advice?’

‘I am no man of the robe,’ the old priest replied, ‘so ’tis outside my office to offer an opinion on legal matters. Yet it does seem to me that this purse containing fifty-four
louis
would have been motive enough to incite a young man in your situation to the crime, had he the nature of a murderer. According to your own account you fled with it, and I should not have thought it usual for one so many years junior to his partner to be entrusted with the whole resources of a partnership.’

‘There was an especial reason for that,’ Roger broke in quickly. ‘As I have told you…’

The Abbé Duchesnie raised his hand. ‘I know, I know, my young friend. I do not seek to question your own explanation but, as I understand it you have no one whom you can bring forward to give evidence of the Doctor’s habits, and I am simply putting to you the view that the police may take of this matter.’

From having regained some degree of optimism Roger was suddenly cast back into the depths of gloom. He realised now that the good food and wine and rich surroundings had given him a false sense of security and that in the cold light of impartial examination his case must look very black indeed. The Doctor had died by violence and he, Roger, had made off with what would undoubtedly be assumed to be his partner’s money.

Madame Marie-Angé saw his look of misery and, being a good-natured, motherly woman, strove to comfort him, by saying:

‘I do not see what this Monsieur Fouché has to gain by fixing the assassination on Monsieur Breuc.’

‘Why, to prevent it being fixed upon himself, Madame,’ promptly replied the Abbé.

‘But he could equally well say that the Doctor took his own life to save himself from being arrested,’ urged the governess. ‘’Twould be beyond reason vindictive in any man, however ill-natured, to send another who had done him no harm to the rope.’

‘A thousand thanks, Madame!’ Roger exclaimed eagerly. There is much in what you say. And in my own mind, I feel confident now, that Fouché called “Murder” after me not so much with a view to getting me hanged, but to have me stopped so that he might secure the purse.’

‘Is he likely, though, once having made the charge, to withdraw it?’ pessimistically remarked the Abbé.

‘’Twould be easy for him to say that people had misunderstood his cries,’ Madame Marie-Angé retorted. ‘He could claim that by his cry of “Murder” he had meant no more than that a violent death had just occurred, and that those who heard him had confused it with his shouts of “Stop, thief”!’

‘By so doing he could save himself from the sin of perjury and avoid the burden of attending at a lengthy trial,’ the Abbé agreed. ‘And as you, Madame, have very rightly pointed out, there seems no particular cause for him to carry vindictiveness to the point of endeavouring to bring about our young friend’s death.’

Athénaïs shrugged her slim shoulders. ‘You have admitted, Monsieur l’Abbé, that you know little of such matters, and I know nothing. Why should we not send for the notary—what is his name—Maître—Maître___?’

‘Léger,’ supplied the Abbé.

‘Yes, Maître Léger. Let us summon him and find out.’

She had no sooner had the idea than she turned to Aidegonde and ordered him to send a messenger with instructions that she required Maître Léger to wait on her at once. Then, having toyed a little with the desserts, they all retired to the yellow salon to await the lawyer’s arrival.

Within a quarter of an hour Maître Léger was announced. He proved to be a man of about sixty and something of a dandy. His green suit was of cloth but very well cut, with padded shoulders and silver buttons. His cravat
and wristbands were of fine lawn and his hair, which had been black, now being flecked with grey had the smart appearance of having been lightly dusted with powder. Beneath a broad forehead he had a pair of lively brown eyes, a very sharply pointed nose and a firm, thin mouth.

Having bowed to Athénaïs he thanked her deferentially as she waved him to a chair.

‘In my father’s absence, Monsieur, I require your services,’ she began at once, and with a slight turn of her head towards Roger, went on: ‘This is Monsieur Breuc of Strasbourg. He is accused of killing some old man. Please see to it that the charge is withdrawn.’

The lawyer coughed. ‘I am entirely at your disposal, Mademoiselle; but I am sure you will permit me to remark that the law is made by the King, and is therefore above and beyond us all. Once set in motion its processes cannot be stopped by a mere request, even should the request be made by such a distinguished personage as Monseigneur, your father. However, I will assuredly do all I can if I may be permitted to know the full circumstances of the case.’

Without replying Athénaïs waved her fan in Roger’s direction and he once more related the nerve-racking sequence of events that had befallen him earlier that evening.

When he had done, Maître Léger slightly inclined his handsome head. ‘If all that you have told me is correct, I think there is a fair hope that you are mistaken in your belief that Monsieur Fouché intended to charge you with the Doctor’s murder. It seems to me more likely that his attempts to have you stopped were actuated by his desire to get possession of the money-belt, and that in your own excitement you confused his cries announcing that a killing had taken place with those calling upon the other occupants of the inn to stay your flight.’

‘There,’ exclaimed Madame Marie-Angé in triumph, ‘’tis the very thing I said myself towards the end of dinner.’

‘I only pray you may be right,’ Roger murmured, as the lawyer continued:

‘Moreover, if a trial results, Monsieur Fouché will be forced to resort to statements containing much perjury in order to make a case against you. If one of them is proved false not only might the whole case break down but he would find himself in serious trouble. I can see no reason
why he should elect to run such a risk when he can terminate the issue by frankly admitting that he killed the doctor himself in self-defence. That was in fact what happened, was it not?’

‘Yes, it would be difficult to contend otherwise,’ Roger agreed, after a moment. ‘’Twas all so sudden and so horrible that the thought had not occurred to me; yet I must admit that the Doctor had struck him down with the hilt of my sword, and was about to strike at him again just as he fired his pistol.’

‘Are you prepared to swear to that before a magistrate?’

‘Yes; if I must.’

That is well. You must remember that in the moments succeeding your friend’s death Monsieur Fouché had no reason at all to suppose that you would be willing to give evidence which would clear him of a charge of murder. It may be that he believed that you would attempt to get him hanged, if you could, and instantly made up his mind that his best prospect of escape lay in accusing you of the killing. It would then have been your word against his, and as you had taken the money the odds would have been in his favour. But there will be no official inquiry into the Doctor’s death until tomorrow morning, and I will see Monsieur Fouché before the inquiry opens. If I inform him that you will come forward to give evidence that he killed the Doctor in self-defence, I feel there is every reason to hope that he will see the wisdom of admitting to it.’

‘I am indeed grateful, Monsieur,’ smiled Roger, now much comforted. ‘What you have said takes a great load from my mind.’

‘You are not out of the wood yet,’ Maître Léger warned him. ‘And if complications arise it may be that you will be detained while further inquiries are made; but at least it does not appear that you have any grave reason to fear that you will be hung.’